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Serial Experiments: lain
(Alternate Ending)
(For the many of us who hated the unsatisfying ending…
And want an ending with an explanation)
This part starts near the beginning of Layer: 13, EGO, right after she stops Eiri from creating a fleshly body for himself, and after Alice (Arisu) slaps her in the face, Lain cries and hugs her. I’m warning you, though, there’s more talking than what would normally be placed in a Serial Experiments: lain layer.
Lain stared at the option laid out in front of her.
Reset… Return?
Should she really do it? Delete herself from everyone’s memory? She knew the warnings her heart gave her.
I know I want to reset everything and put it all back. None of this will ever happen. No one will remember me. If no one remembers me, I never existed… anything dealing with me never happened… right?
She squinted and stretched out her hand, ready to confirm her command.
“Perhaps, but you would have to forget all about yourself. You would have to force yourself out of my memory, too.”
“Huh? Who—who said that?”
“Come now, Lain. Here, take a seat.”
Lain looked up and realizes a glowing image of her father sitting at a table.
“Daddy?”
Lain took a seat opposite from him, dressed in her bear pajamas.
“You know, Lain, you don’t have to wear that anymore.”
Lain responded by removing the bear-faced cap from her head.
“You have a problem here, Lain. You have forgotten two people. Yourself and all-knowing God. You would have to erase Me from your memory and yourself from your own memory to never truly exist—if your statement is true.”
“But I—but I…” Tears rush out like a waterfall out of Lain’s eyes.
“Feel like you love them?”
Lain nods her head.
“Lain, do you know who you are?”
She shyly shakes her head.
“Well, I can tell you, I knew you before you ever existed.”
“But—I don’t exist.”
The being posed as her father chuckled. “Really? What makes you think that?”
“I just—who am I?”
“You are someone who holds a special purpose, Lain, just as everyone in my Creation.”
“No, not anymore.”
“Lain, listen. I’ve been watching you and all those around you. I see that you try to help them, but you seem to continue to further ruin their lives. You’ve been lied to all along.”
“Why are you telling me this? Why do you even care? I ruined everyone’s life!” Tears streamed down her face now as anger overtook her.
“Lain…” He put his hand under her chin and lifted it up. The wonderful look in his eyes calms her down) “I love you. Remember Alice? She loved you, despite being so scared. The love she had for you overcame her fear and discomfort. I have that same love. We all show love by action, by doing something, or nothing if it fits best. You showed your love for everyone, even Eiri by planning on erasing yourself from everyone’s memory.”
“Yes, but…”
“To you, that’s what seems best. To me, its not, not in your interest. I’m going to adopt you, Lain, if you let me.”
“… What?”
“You were born for evil and selfish purposes, but do not worry, I am in control. The evil can do nothing without my permission of allowing it.”
“What do you mean?”
“You have control over the Wired, and at one point, someone tried to protect their secrets by storing them in you. Who would’ve thought that the Seventh Protocol was a thirteen-year-old school girl? Apparently, their plan had a flaw in the Wired itself.”
“How do you explain me being all over the Wired, when I was in my body?”
“Simple. Everyone holds existence in both worlds. When your body was crammed with the information necessary for the Seventh Protocol, it leaked of other information, and continued to leak at various points in your life. You may recall a day in school when your fingertips erupted information spiraling into the air.”
“Huh?”
“However, that was you in the Real World. In the Wired, with your new power, your true self, your character that existed before the leaking had taken control of the Wired—the you that you encountered.”
“Before the Seventh Protocol?”
The Being nodded and continued, “When people abandon their flesh in the Real World, that body becomes non-existent, and whatever they had from their body is collected into the Wired and stored on their other self.”
“But, that other self in the Wired is me.”
“Correct. If you had died in the Real World, your power in the Wired would become beyond your imagination, then you really wouldn’t have existed. That evil you is your true self, but it cannot have all the power it wants without your death—the new, Real World you. That nice, quiet Lain would become but non-existent. I knew that wasn’t best for you. I protected you, giving you the wisdom to fight back.”
“But you still gave me power? Over the Wired, when I was really that dangerous?”
“Charge over all the Wired, to dress and keep it, your responsibility. I allowed this control to you.”
“That makes you God over everything!”
“And as goddess over the Wired, you can do anything with that power entitled to you.”
“But I’m a being with faults! What can I…”
A tiny smile flashed across her face. Lain lets out a few tears and removes herself from the table. She held out her hand to the image of her father. He smiled and took hold of it.
A flash of light emits around the universe. The Wired world breaks into billions of particles, the Real World crashes and the universe shakes in static. Lain’s face appears everywhere, and it slips away.
Mrs. Iwakura looked at her husband, “She says she’s on a diet.”
“Hmm,” Mr. Iwakura replied.
“Uh, Mika,” a voice squeaked.
Mika turned around.
“What?”
“You shouldn’t be on a diet. Start eating while you still look beautiful.”
“Huh?”
Lain smiled. Mika stared at her sister for a few moments. She sat back down at the table.
“Well, I guess I have time to finish off my plate.”
“So, Lain,” Mrs. Iwakura started, “are you ready for tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow? What’s tomorrow?”
“Oh please!” Mika gestured, “don’t tell me you don’t know your birthday is today! You planned…”
“MY BIRTHDAY?”
Her sudden jump and knocking the chair over caused the family to look at her in the strangest way.
“Well, don’t get too excited,” Mr. Iwakura replied, “Tomorrow I was going to pick up your friends, you know, Chisa, Alice, and those other three at Cyberia.”
“Today I turn…”
Lain looked up at a glowing face of her father in the air. He smiled warmly and winked.
Every memory caught up to her. Her first memory back when she was four and her sister knocked over her tower of blocks, her first day of school, her birthdays, good and bad memories. Her family took a trip to the beach. She watched her life flash before her eyes.
“I’m thirteen—I’m a teenager!” she stated in a more mild tone.
“Aren’t you more excited than usual?”
She walked outside and almost began to skip her way to school, holding a large grin on her face. She looked at the shadows.
Where are all the red dots that used to be there? Catching her attention, she looked at her own shadow. It was normal! She never felt so happy over a shadow! The grey clouds and rains could come and she could care less! Her sun-like power had left pools of blood in the shadows, but not anymore!
Looking out the window and seeing the sun shining brought her smile and say good morning to everyone. Everyone she met on the train, she could change their day with a “good morning”, and a smile.
“Oh, good morning Alice!”
Lain waved and walked up to her.
“Happy birthday, Lain! Here, I know your party isn’t till tomorrow, but I couldn’t wait!”
Alice pulled a hand-sized colorful box from her school bag wrapped in a red and green bow. Lain stared at it in shock and awe.
“Well—open it!”
Lain pulled out a silver necklace with a heart at the end of the sparkling chain. Finding that the heart had a latch, she unclipped it and discovered writing in red.
“You… are… loved. Oh, thank you, Alice!” Lain gave her a gentle squeezing hug.
“Um, uh—Lain?” Came a shy question from behind.
Lain turned around and noticed Chisa shyly looking at the ground.
“Your party—its still up for tomorrow, right?”
“You invited Chisa Yamoda?” Reika gestured. She and Juri came up from behind, “before inviting us? Your party is going to be a little boring, don’t you think?”
We all have information… what will you do with the information you have?
“Reika,” Alice scolded, “stop making fun of her!”
Lain hesitated. Should she say it?
“At least,” Lain later added turning her head and closing her eyes, “she doesn’t fail grades like some people! Chisa is an A+ student.”
“Huh!” Everyone cried.
“Uh, Reika,” Juri pondered aloud, “what classes are you failing?”
“Nothing! I’m not failing!” She rudely replied with confidence.
“Really,” Lain countered, “then why did you ask Chisa to tutor you in Algebra?”
“I—never—humph!” Reika turned, swiping her hand through her hair and walked away.
“Sorry about that Chisa,” Alice said after the short incident.
“No—that’s ok,”
“Yes, my party is still tomorrow, ok? I hope to see you!”
Chisa looked up and let out a faint smile.
“Hold on, I’m getting a message.”
He pulled out his hand-held NAVI and opened it up.
It read: Still up for the party tomorrow? You have access to the music, I need you.
“TARO!”
“Hey, Myu-Myu, you still coming to Lain’s party?”
“Of course I am! Chisa’s helping with setting up the connections for the games! Games? Of course! I need to go.”
“Yeah…” Taro sighed looking at his hand-held NAVI shaped like a gun’s trigger.
“Hey, nice machine. The one I’ve got is pretty tricked out too. I heard you mention ‘Lain’,” a young man said walking up from behind.
“Yeah, so what?”
“She’s the one who told this guy how to get a sweet NAVI, who’s post on the Wired got a hold of my friend who helped me get the NAVI. She’s a nice girl; how do you know her?”
“I guess you could say she’s my girlfriend.”
“Really? Your pretty lucky. I guess we’re all connected somehow,” he added with a chuckled.
“C’mon! C’mon! Mom’s waiting for us!” the young man’s sister urged.
“Ok, ok. Bye.”
The group of three looked at each other for a second.
“Hurry up! Let’s go!”
While looking at the e-mail he nearly bumped into another man.
“I’ll quit that dump,” he said under his breath, “I’ll quit that place! Oh, the crap they make me go through! I ought to take the advice from Lain, I…”
He looked up and noticed two familiar faces on two men working on a telephone pole, looking exactly like the two men who guarded and watched Lain at her house. He regained his thoughts.
“I’ll quit, I’ll quit today for sure! They underestimate me…”
“NAVI, check mail.”
“Lain has fifty-eight e-mails,” came back a feminine digital voice.
Lain scrolled through the numerous e-mails, finding out most of them were birthday wishes. One e-mail, however, caught her eye.
“Open this e-mail.”
“Lain:
You did the right thing, and the best thing—giving your power over the Wired to Me. So in return, I took what you gave me, repaired it, and in return of your sacrifice, I gave back your life. The things you remember did happen, because you and I remember them. You have extra information that no one else has, and I found that important for this world, today and tomorrow, for you to change. I decided to give these to you on a birthday you never really had. Now you can be happy knowing that you are someone—someone special— and that Someone Else Who can handle the power, has control over the Wired.”
Lain slumped back in her seat and sighed. She looked up at her ceiling and smiled once more.
She hesitated and whispered, “I love You.”
“Of course you do. You have showed your love, and now you know I love you for I showed you my love.”
“I wish more people would connect with You more often.”
“Through you, Lain, they can.”