Layer 09 Script

Back to Layer 09

English

Voice: If you want to avoid pain, you should believe in God.

Voice: Whether you believe in him or not, God is always with you.

Title: PROTOCOL Layer 09

Narrator: In July 4th, 1947, a strange flying object dropped into a desert in New Mexico, USA.

Narrator: Even now, its identity has not been ascertained.

Narrator: Guesses became facts, and rumors became histories.

Lain: Who was it?

Lain: Who was it?

Narrator: In 1984, James Chandra, a TV producer, received an undeveloped roll of film in a brown envelope from an anonymous person.

Narrator: In the film was the MJ-12 document.

Narrator: It said that 12 people made a secret pact with an extraterrestrial under the President's direct orders.

Narrator: Roscoe Hillenketter, who was the director of the CIA when the Roswell incident happened, was the chief of the 12 people.

Narrator: It is well known now that President Truman's signature was copied from another document.

Narrator: Vannevar Bush, who was a Head of Department in MIT, was one of the 12 members of MJ-12.

Lain: Connect Wired.

Lain(wired): How can you make something that already happened not have happened?

Eye: Are you Lain? I see.

Lain(w): I don't know you, but you know me...

Eye: Information does not always flow both ways.

Eye: You have been here since the Wired was created.

Eye: You are free in here.

Lain(w): But that wasn't me!

Ear: I see, then, since when have we been here?

Ear: I know we didn't start existing at the beginning of this world.

Eye: That's nothing to be concerned about!

Eye: If something exists in memory, then it's part of a record.

Arm: What you said is groundless.

Arm: How old do you think Lain is? She's still a child.

Lain(w): Let's not talk about me right now-

Narrator: Vannevar Bush put forward a new plan to extend memories, MEMEX, in 1945.

Narrator: It was a system to view information in microfilm on a translucent screen.

Narrator: He planned to compress information to access it quickly.

Narrator: Bush led the Manhattan project that produced an atomic bomb.

Narrator: He also made the foundations of multimedia at the same time.

JJ: You forgot this.

Lain: What?

JJ: You left this here yesterday.

JJ: I'll dump it if you don't need it.

Lain: Did I leave this?

JJ: That's what I said.

Narrator: John C. Lilly explored the human unconscious in an experiment with sensory deprivation by using drugs and an isolation tank.

Narrator: He thought that he was connected to something like an existence in space.

Narrator: He called the existence that led him ECCO, Earth Coincidence Control Office.

Narrator: After that, Lilly began to research dolphins.

Narrator: Dolphins can communicate over long distances in water using ultrasonic waves.

Taro: What?

Lain: I promised you.

Taro: What?

Lain: I'll go on a date with you.

Myu-myu: Really? Did you say that?

Taro: Did I promise?

Myu-myu: No, no.

Taro: Even if I did, I don't want to date with the current you, Lain.

Myu-myu: Idiot! Taro!

Lain: She is the same as me. I'm myself. I'm the only one.

Taro: Great!

Taro: You made this very well.

Taro: I see. This synchronizes the parallel processors.

Taro: It's not very neat, but you can keep extending it this way.

Taro: How do you cool this?

Lain: Taro.

Taro: Is this liquid carbon?

Lain: Sit there.

Taro: What?

Lain: You know what this is, don't you?

Taro: !

Lain: It was you, Taro, right?

Lain(w): You're one of the Knights, aren't you?

Taro: You're...the real Lain...

Lain(w): I'm not sure if there is another me in the Wired or not.

Lain(w): But in the real world, there is no me other than myself.

Lain(w): The only other me with a body only appeared in the club.

Lain(w): It would have been enough just to modify the memories of people who were there.

Taro: I can't...

Lain(w): Play track 44.

Father: It is drawing to a close...

Father: Finally...

Mother: So, before it's too late...

Mika: a.. e..

Mika: Pii Pii Pii... Understood.

Mika: Pii Pii Pii... Now transmitting. Pii Pii Pii...

Lain(w): Stop.

Taro: It wasn't me...

Taro: But I know that the data that JJ receives can have such effects.

Lain(w): If I install this chip, what will happen to me?

Lain(w): Would I commit suicide? Or would I go insane?

Taro: I don't know. I'm too young to be a formal member of Knights. I'm only...

Lain(w): What will this do?

Taro: It is an involatile memory. It will rewrite the memories which already exist.

Lain(w): What kinds of memories?

Taro: I... I don't know...

Taro: Knights aren't just crackers, Lain.

Taro: ?

Taro: You're strange. That's why the Knights are interested in you.

Taro: Knights fight in order to make the only truth become real.

Lain: I don't understand. What's the only truth?

Taro: I've never been told, because I'm not a formal member of Knights.

Taro: But it's true. Truth is strong because it is true.

Taro: Truth is justice because it is true.

Taro: Don't you find it convincing?

Taro: Don't you also want such a truth?

Taro: I'm going back. Myu-myu will be jealous of you.

Lain: Taro, thank you.

Taro: You...

Taro: It's a date, after all. I'm a guy, so I had to do that.

Narrator: Ted Nelson, who learned from heretic pioneers Vannevar Bush and John C. Lilly,

Narrator: made a plan for a digital library in orbit that can be used anywhere on earth through electromagnetic waves and a telephone network.

Narrator: It would be a utopia where every text from every culture will exist forever.

Narrator: It is called "Xanadu". Hypertext can make it real in this world.

Narrator: Ted Nelson will go down in history as a proponent of it.

Lain: Hello Navi.

Lain: Kachi Kachi...

Sound of machine: Memory check...

Lain: Kachi Kachi...

Lain: Was it me?

Lain(past): Yes, it was me.

Lain: Who were those people?

Lain(past): I don't know because I'm you.

Lain: It can't be true...

Lain: Everything must be a lie... Why did you do that?

Narrator: The earth itself has peculiar electromagnetic waves.

Narrator: There are always resonances between the ground and the ionosphere at 8 Hz in the ELF band. It is called the "Schumann Effect".

Narrator: It is the brain wave of the earth. But we still don't know how it affects humans.

Narrator: The human population on Earth is aproaching the number of neurons in the brain.

Narrator: Douglas Rachcov claims that it will awaken the consciousness of Earth itself by connecting humans to each other in a network.

Narrator: The network has quickly grown into a form like the neurones in the brain, so the Earth itself will become a neural network.

Lain: The only truth... God.

Deus: Yes, me.

Narrator: Eiri Masami was a chief research worker in Tachibana Labs.

Narrator: He caused the theory about Earth's neural network to progress.

Narrator: He advocated that every human's unconscious should be connected to a wireless network without devices through the Schumann effect.

Narrator: He added a function to use the Schumann Resonances to the 7th protocol code on his own discretion.

Narrator: When Tachibana Labs found out, they fired him.

Narrator: One week later, Eiri's corpse was found run over and killed on the railway on Yamanote line.

Newspaper: Mr. Eiri Masami

(Adapted from [1] and from memory. Originally translated by Keisuke Shindo.)