A Chance to Say Goodbye

After a series of disturbing prophetic nightmares, 9 realizes that he needs to return to the First Room to find answers before 6's eerie warnings from beyond the grave become a reality.

—official summary

A Chance to Say Goodbye is one of the many 9 Fix Fics that resurrect the dolls that died during the movie. However, it differs from the normal genre of it by A; having a real reason, a need to bring them back, and B; after they are all brought back, it clearly isn't "the end" just yet.

The fic is an AU, and has even spawned an Extended-Universe RP, "The 9 Renaissance" (the wiki of which can be found here, several sequels and side-stories written by both the original author and various fans, and in the extended-universe/sequels, OCs abound. They also have their own tropes.

The fic was written by chibijaime and can be read in eight parts here.

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Tropes used in A Chance to Say Goodbye include:

• Alternate Universe Fic
• Anticlimax Boss: The Fish Beast. 1 warns 9 about it, saying 6 was worried about it, and it attack 9, 5, and 7, but...well, it's dispatched pretty easily, and fairly quickly too. And we don't even see it happening.
• Babies Ever After: The ending implies that 5 and 7 will have a baby. In the sequel, 7 has just given birth to a baby girl.
  • Also in the sequel, 1 and 8 have twin sons, and 9 ends up pregnant with 6's child as well.
• Character Development
• Crowning Moment of Heartwarming: 2's forgiveness of 1, 5 confessing his feelings for 7 and telling her he understands that she doesn't feel the same way, she loves 9...and then getting cut off by her kiss.
• Easily Forgiven: 2 says he forgives 1 for sending him out to die, and actually looks forward to seeing him again. When asked how, he simply says that 1 did what he thought he had to, and 2 understands. Though somewhat subverted in that while 2 is ready to forgive, 7 is most certainly not.
• Fan-Preferred Couple: Subverted, and how. Not one of the pairings that occurs in the fic are the ones mainly noted in 9 fandom, with 5 and 7 heavily implied to have had a thing going before the film, despite 9's interest in the latter in the fic. In the end, 5 and 7 do confirm their love for one another, and in the sequel, 1 and 8 along with 9 and 6, respectively, pair off as well.
• Fix Fic
• Ho Yay: Oh, it's there all right.
• Ill Twins: Arguably, 3 and 4. Near the beginning of the fic, they both became weak, and 4 actually has horrible spasms, so they can't go along on any of the adventures to retrieve the others' bodies. Turns out to be a side-effect of five of their number being dead, and they (along with 9 and 7) would die if their friends weren't brought back to life.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: 5 was/is in love with 7, but is willing to give her up to 9, if that's what she wants. But 7 wants him, not 9.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: 1 still has this, though he's definitely better at showing the "heart of gold" part now.
• May-December Romance: The sequel series/extended universe has some. Also, 1 and 8.
• No One Should Survive That: 7, by some miracle, manages to escape the clutches of the Fish Beast that drags her underwater while they are retrieving 2's body.
• Pair the Spares: In the sequel, 1 and 8 and 9 and 6.
• Settled for Gay: 9 pretty much does this when 7 chooses 5. In the sequel, he settles down quite happily with 6 instead.
• "Shut Up" Kiss
• Talking to the Dead: Literally, in 9's case. First he speaks to 5's ghost, once, and then 6's a few more times.
• The Un-Reveal: We never really find out how 7 slayed the Fish Beast.
• Title Drop
• We Can Rebuild Him: Since 8's body was completely destroyed in the explosion, the others have to completely rebuild him from scratch.