We’re getting close to the end. Chapter 9 of the visual novel once again maps to two anime episodes. This set is for the Moeka Kiryu fans. That is, if there are any, given how she’s been part of the SERN attack force.
Here’s your quick recap: Mayuri kept dying, no matter what Okabe tried. The only solution seemed to be for the “Future Gadget Laboratory” to delete their D-mails from SERN’s database, for which they need an IBN 5100. Meaning they need to undo their D-mails, including one from Moeka.
ENDLESS APOPTOSIS
Episode nineteen opens with the sound of wind and Moeka standing on a roof holding a phone. Jump to credits. It’s Sunday, August 15th, 8:03pm, and Comima – the comic convention discussed back in episode 11 – had its first day today. Mayuri’s pumped, while Okabe’s distant.
Makise takes Okabe aside over his attitude, and he reveals that Mayuri is going to die tomorrow… which he’s told Makise over and over. Meanwhile, to undo Moeka’s D-mail, he needs her old phone to do it. (Moeka’s D-mail from episode 8 said to not buy the new phone she ended up with.)
And Moeka’s not responding to Okabe in this world line. Recall she was never even a lab member. (She “rejoined” once Luka’s D-mail had been sent, which has now been undone.)
Makise tells Okabe he should spend his time tracking Moeka, she’ll go to Comima with Mayuri. They’re in this together.
Next morning, Makise texts Okabe from Ariake for Comima Day 2. Okabe texts back that he found out where Moeka works – the headquarters of “Arc Rewrite”. But apparently she only worked there a couple days before quitting. So Okabe heads to the home address (Heights White 202), where he finds a police investigation.
Moeka committed suicide last night.
Okabe wonders if it’s a cover-up for murder, and prepares to time leap… but realizes he needs extra information first. He gets it when Mayuri dies at 7:52pm, according to Makise.
It’s then August 11th, 5:36pm, after two time leaps back (the 48 hour barrier can be breached that way, but Okabe can’t go back to before the machine existed, lest it somehow not get finished). Makise is complaining to Okabe about him eating her pudding (from episode 11).
Okabe calls Makise by her name, saying she was right, he can’t do this alone. That gets her attention.
Next, Okabe is arriving at Moeka’s apartment. He finds it unlocked, with her inside, staring at her phone. She’s near catatonic, desperate for an answer, she did everything FB wanted, so what are her orders now?
Okabe tries to take the phone. Moeka resists. Okabe remembers how Moeka shot Mayuri, and punches her. He gets outside, blocks the door, and with help from Makise, sends the D-Mail “Get a new phone before they sell out”. (So much for “playing things straight” as he did with Luka, right?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvf0FGGGq0c?rel=0
Except Okabe’s Reading Steiner doesn’t activate. Nothing’s changed.
Only now does Okabe realize that he’s holding the same phone Moeka had all along. She never did buy a new phone. But then why did the world lines shift on her D-mail? Could it be the message she showed them wasn’t the actual message she sent?
Okabe’s right on the money – and incidentally, if you buy the manga novelization, you can see the true message Moeka sent back in episode 8. It’s a bad spoiler, in my opinion.
As Okabe realizes this, Moeka continues screaming for Okabe to give the phone back. Okabe goes back in and tackles her… which is when a neighbour finally comes to investigate. Okabe pretends they’re making out. The neighbour leaves, but Moeka bites Okabe.
This at least calms the Rounder down enough for Okabe to question her. Unfortunately, all he gets is that Moeka “can’t betray them”, even if she wants her phone back. FB is everything to her.
Okabe fires back that FB has abandoned her, she’s been betrayed, she’s not needed.
Moeka resists that fact, because FB rescued her, and we now get context for the opening image. We see she was about to commit suicide back in 2006, when she couldn’t find a job. But while standing on a roof with her phone, she got a message from FB saying “Rounders Wanted”.
She messaged back, worried she had no skills, and FB made her feel useful and needed. They’ve since been “like a mother to me”. But Okabe (who couldn’t see the flashback we got) continues to press, saying that he has a time machine, and he knows Moeka’s going to kill herself in four days. Why is that?
Because there won’t ever be another FB message. (And now we get a visual of the police finding her hung body in the apartment.)
Moeka sobs uncontrollably. Okabe finally just searches Moeka’s phone for her D-Mail, seeing all the FB messages in the process. He does apologize now, asking if FB is a woman; Moeka doesn’t know, they never even spoke on the phone. (It’s heavily implied that the reason Moeka mostly communicates by messaging is because she thinks others hate her in person.)
We get a juxtaposition of Moeka saying FB made her feel like “she belonged”, with images from her “belonging” with the Future Gadget Laboratory – images of a time that didn’t happen after her D-Mail.
Okabe finally finds the message, which says: The retro PC is at the Yanabayashi Shrine, “procure at once”. He and Makise send a new message back to 11am on July 31st, saying the Shrine is a trap, it’s not there.
But that also doesn’t work.
Moeka is so caught up with FB that she investigated anyway. It dawns on Okabe that he’ll have to send a D-mail message to Moeka from FB’s phone, the only person she takes her orders from.
As Okabe leaves to find FB, Moeka wonders about him saying she killed someone. Okabe responds that she’d kill if FB ordered it, right? Moeka agrees. To which Okabe warns her death on August 15th is destined to be reality (much like Mayuri’s death)… but he’s fought the world before. He’ll keep doing so now. For Mayuri.
At last, Moeka gives him a tip. The coin lockers at the Dai Building, that’s where she left the IBN 5100. That’s where the episode ends.
FINALIZE APOPTOSIS
We begin episode twenty with the end of the prior episode, taking us into the credits. Then, with a jump ahead to August 12th, a little after midnight, Makise is asking Okabe what he’s doing. He says he’s getting a crowbar, because the locker is still shut, with the IBN 5100 inside.
Makise stops him. That’s reckless, only the original world line guarantees they get the computer. (She has a point, what if breaking in gets Okabe arrested?) Okabe reluctantly agrees, and so stakes out the locker to track down FB.
While he watches, Moeka arrives with some provisions, and confesses she wants to know who FB really is too. Okabe’s reluctant, but lets her stay.
Cut to a Makise and Mayuri scene, where Okabe’s childhood friend laments that she hasn’t spoken with him in what feels like a long time. The two ladies return to the lab, where Nae and “Mr Braun” greet them, the latter talking about upping Okabe’s rent (after all the shaking last night from sending D-mails using Moeka’s phone).
Though we also see here that “Mr Braun” envies Okabe, for being a student with his own place, good friends, and a happy-go-lucky lifestyle. Nae pulls her dad away so they can get to a sale.
Night has fallen when Okabe asks Moeka if he could read one of FBs old messages. She shows him one from July 29th, where FB has praised M4 (Moeka) for her hard work.
The next day (August 13th) at 1:25pm is when someone finally carts off the contents of the locker. But it’s a guy, not a woman. So they tail him, Okabe recognizing a tattoo that marks him as one of the Rounders.
They get off the train – and realize tattoo guy left the IBN behind. Strobe effect back in time to 2:11pm, and Okabe knows to stay and follow the package. It gets passed off a few times, then delivered – to “Mr Braun”? In his truck. Strobe effect forward in time to 4:45pm, Moeka driving after him.
They end up staking out “Mr Braun”‘s house. Some time after midnight, the IBN 5100 is picked up, taken to the Marita Airport, and placed on a plane headed for France. Okabe never saw a “maternal woman”.
Makise turns up, wondering where Okabe’s been, Mayuri’s worried. Okabe repeats Mayuri’s earlier remark about it feeling like they haven’t spoken in a long time.
Okabe decides there’s nothing for it but to confront “Mr Braun”, real name Yugo Tennoji.
The morning of August 15th, they go to Mr. Tennoji’s house. He invites them in, and banters about rent. Okabe counters that they saw the IBN 5100 being taken away, so Mr. Tennoji must know FB, and can they meet her?
Mr. Tennoji fires back that apparently M4 couldn’t keep quiet. He knows Moeka’s code name. He is, in fact, FB.
Tennoji explains that FB comes from Ferdinand Braun, the Nobel Prize physicist who invented the CRT (Cathode Ray Tube). Of course, Okabe already knows that guy, given his nickname for his landlord. Which has been foreshadowing this whole time.
Tennoji takes them to a construction site nearby, so that they don’t disturb Nae, who is still sleeping.
Moeka has trouble getting over the fact that the motherly messages were written by him, but Tennoji explains it was deliberate deception. He tailors all his messages, pretending to be the sort of person each “Rounder” needs. Then he cuts people loose once they’re no longer useful, and no one asks about them.
Okabe brings up Suzuha, who had taken Tennoji in all those years ago. Surely it wasn’t so he could become a lapdog of SERN.
Tennoji (who is surprised Okabe knows about Suzu in this world line) says don’t drag her into this. He then tells his backstory, of sleeping in gutters when he was a kid, not eating for days at a time… and having a thread thrown down at him. He followed it, despite how it meant he’d have to do some terrible things.
Alas, the thread meant he became a puppet. Perhaps it’s time for the threads to be cut loose.
Mr Tennoji pulls a gun, and shoots Moeka.
An alarm clock rings as Moeka falls, and we see Nae waking up. Tennoji continues to narrate, about how he’d thought of escaping before, as we see Nae doing her morning routine. The thing is, Tennoji doesn’t want Nae mixed up in things, but now that he’s failed, he knows of only one way to protect his daughter.
Mr Tennoji shoots himself in the head.
We see Nae has prepared breakfast for both her and her father. She waits for him.
Okabe throws up, as Moeka calls out to him, asking for forgiveness as she dies too.
Makise snaps Okabe out of it. He needs to send M4 a message using “Mr Braun”‘s phone. Okabe scrambles to get it. The message is “IBN search off. Stand by, do nothing.” And I think we have to assume Makise is controlling the PhoneWave with her cell, as she has it out, and the effects are immediate…
Divergence 0.571046%.
Okabe finds himself at Moeka’s apartment, even as she greets him with a message about her not needing the IBN for a while yet. Okabe quickly returns to the lab, seeing Nae and “Mr Braun” having lunch downstairs. And their IBN 5100 is back.
Okabe calls for Daru, but Makise reminds him that both Daru and Mayuri are at Day 2 of Comima. Strobe effect back in time to August 13, after 3pm. Daru gets the IBN 5100 ready for hacking SERN as Okabe explains again about the situation.
They simply need to erase all their D-Mails from the database. Meaning time travel is never invented in 2010, sending them past the 1% barrier, so Mayuri can live. Amusingly, Daru suggests Okabe go into writing, based on his wild tale. (The dub suggests time travel writing, while the Japanese suggests light novels.)
By the way, Makise asks, what was that first D-mail again? The one that they’re going to undo?
OH RIGHT. The one about Makise getting stabbed, which somehow prevented that action from occurring. Meaning to keep Mayuri Shiina alive, Kurisu Makise must die. Credits.
Wondering now about a Moeka ending in the visual novel? Well, supposedly the creators had one in mind, but decided she was too much of an antagonist. That said, Moeka isn’t killed by “Mr Braun”, things do play out differently.
Instead, Moeka’s killed by Nae, who has mind leapt back into her young body from the future. (Apparently they fix the 48 hour limitation? Possibly at the cost of sanity.) Nae has held a grudge against the people who exposed her father, and also killed/will kill Okabe in 2025. Having an eleven year old murderer is what gets undone, via the FB D-Mail.
That said, shippers may be relieved to know that in a drama CD spinoff, a gamma world line (2.615074%) has Okabe as a Rounder, paired with Moeka, both of them fighting against the lab.
But of course, our goal in the anime isn’t a gamma world line, but the beta one. And we’re nearly there. In fact, beta is where the show started – everything since the opening credits has been alpha. Did you notice? The opening happened partway through episode one, not long after Okabe’s first D-Mail. Check my first column, where I cryptically said “Alpha Worldline”.
Honestly, in my first viewing, I was wondering when we’d get back to the problem of Makise’s death. I saw the writing on the wall for her as soon as they talked about undoing the D-mails. She’s also the one in the credits, in the shattered hourglass. (Another reason to watch the show is how the hourglass imagery is everywhere. In universe, the lab has it to cook their instant noodles, for instance to start episode 19.)
That said, did you forget about Makise’s fate? Will Okabe now pick a dystopian future with Makise, leaving Mayuri dead? Or an unknown future with Mayuri, leaving Makise dead? Is there even another option? You’re welcome to hypothesize in the comments. Thanks for reading, and as always, please do let me know your opinion, if you have the time.
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