Nana (Elfen Lied)

Silpelit #7 or Nana (a common Japanese name, meaning 'Seven') was one of the Diclonius not euthanized at birth, but rather taken and experimented on at the Diclonius Research Institute. She has the physical appearance of being twelve to fifteen years old. Nana's actual age is actually about six to seven years old; the manga explains in greater detail that Silpelits age more rapidly than humans (or a "Queen Diclonius" like Kaede). Which is actually labeled one of the weirdest specualations in the series. She developed a father-daughter relationship with Director Kurama and in fact believed that Kurama was her true father. This connection enabled Nana to endure the hardships and depredations of life as a test subject.

Attempt to recapture Lucy
Lucy's attack on NanaAs part of his ongoing scheme to manipulate Kurama, Chief Kakuzawa ordered him to use Nana as part of the task force meant to recapture the recently escaped Lucy. Kurama gave her strict orders to do nothing but locate Lucy, and then call in the armed forces meant to subdue her. Nana, desperately wishing to make her supposed father proud, ignored these orders and engaged Lucy in direct combat. Hopelessly outmatched and distracted by the nearby presence of Mayu (whom she had yet to meet on a personal level), Nana was slowly and coldly dismembered by Lucy. Nana tried to pretend that losing her limbs didn't hurt, which only spurred Lucy further. (In the anime, Lucy is if anything even more sadistic, first slicing the fingers on Nana's hands to ribbons before taking her arms.) As Lucy went to cut off her head, Nana activated her own ability to disable the telekinetic vectors of another Diclonius. As Kurama came to get her back, he showed his regard for her by punching Lucy in the face, this despite not knowing that Lucy's vectors had been disabled, shocking his assistant Isobe. With Lucy escaping again, Kurama brought Nana back to the island institute.

Disposal order and leaving the Institute
Chief Kakuzawa ordered Nana, who he now saw as useless, killed. Kurama not only refused, but outfitted her with realistic prosthetic limbs responsive to her vectors. At first Nana believed that he was having her killed, but rather than anger, she felt sorrow that she had not been of more use to her "Papa". Kurama, already suspicious of the Kakuzawas' true agenda, also used this opportunity to leave the Institute entirely. Added by SlavEliseevTo her surprise, Nana ended up on the same beach in Kamakura that Lucy had washed up on after her escape, and there met Bando, another enemy of Lucy's. After a battle, Nana convinced Bando that they had a common enemy, and that her Diclonius ability to sense another of her kind could aid him in his quest for vengeance. Nana left the beach, and while Kurama had left her with plenty of money, she had no concept of what it was, due to the restricted life she had led. After a few comical attempts to use it failed, she met up again with Mayu, who, despite witnessing the battle between Nana and Lucy, assumed that her seeing Nana's arms and legs come off was a hallucination, since to her eyes, Nana seemed intact. Mayu quickly determined that Nana knew nothing of what money was, and after using it to buy them some food, Mayu guided her back to her new home at Maple House. Nana at this time also had no idea what to make of Mayu's pup Wanta, calling the small dog a creature.

As she met Kouta, Yuka and Nozomi, she also again encountered Lucy, this time having the personality of the amnesiac Nyu, who was childlike and remembered nothing of the fight. Reacting instinctively, the furious Nana began to attack Nyu, only to be warned off by an angry Kouta. Confused and upset, Nana fled, with a worried Mayu going after her. Once away, Mayu assured Nana that the girl they knew as Nyu was not the evil being she described. Nana realized that when she had attacked, Nyu exhibited none of Lucy's traits and also had no Diclonius presence for her to sense. Nana came to the conclusion that Nyu was a different person, while still occupying Lucy's body. When a fever brought about by her attack reawakened Lucy, Nana sensed this and headed back to Maple House, only to have it fade again. Deciding to keep watch against Lucy's return outside the Inn, Nana realized her poor position and apologized to Nyu for the attack, which was also heard by Kouta and Yuka. After a bit of applied reverse psychology on Yuka's part, Nana agreed to stay at Maple House, finding the early tension with Kouta evaporating as he made it clear that she could stay there, and enjoying simple things like food and baths that were nearly alien to her. She moved to renege on her agreement to find Lucy with Bando, not wishing her new life to be ruined.

Kurama's True Daughter
This all changed as another Silpelit, #35, was sent in pursuit of Lucy. Her name was Mariko and while the copter carrying her was passing over the beach, she and Nana sensed one another. Nana returned to Maple House, and feeling that facing this new threat was inevitable, left saying that she would come back, but thought this unlikely, and thought about how she would miss her wonderful new life.

Once again facing a vicious opponent with power greater than her own, Nana still managed to hold her own, but was for the most part a plaything in Mariko's cruel hands. Yet by the same luck, also once again, her ability to disable another Diclonius' vectors stopped Mariko cold. The two then argued about the worth of fathers, with Nana praising hers, and Mariko strongly denouncing hers, who she had been told abandoned her. In the midst of this fight, Kurama reappeared to embrace not Nana but Mariko--his true daughter, who he said he loved with all his heart. Nana saw a change in Mariko almost immediately, most especially when she defended Nana and Kurama from a missile strike, becoming a Nyu-like amnesiac in the process. In the meantime, Kouta, concerned for her, approached the battle zone in the company of Nyu, who vaulted the blockade, and once wounded, reverted to being Lucy. Nana prepared herself to again fight Lucy, only to have Mariko snap back to normal and offer to do it herself, in the name of the father they shared and who at last told her he loved her. Nana saw a horrific re-enactment of her own fight, despite Mariko's advantages, which ended with the exploding control bombs embedded in Mariko's body not only turning Lucy back into Nyu, but destroying her horns. Nana begged her father not to kill Nyu, and also told him, in light of the life and death of his true daughter, Nana would not serve as a substitute, but would instead aim to be his wife and have children with him. Kurama, falling apart from despair, made her vow to one day kill Lucy if she ever came back. With Nyu, she found Kouta and returned home, with Nana grateful for his lack of questions.

A Brief Time of Peace
Once home and again enjoying her new life, Nana wept for Mariko, who would never enjoy such things. Some months passed, and a new Nyu emerged, more mature and less grope-happy, but Nana kept watch for Lucy's re-emergence. A chain of events began when Nana and Mayu faced the psychotic Kakuzawa operative known as the Unknown Man, whose poisoned spiked iron balls were too heavy for Nana's vectors to deflect. Later on, Nana would bury his victim, Silpelit Number 28 on the beach. Driving Unknown Man away with the aid of Bando, Nana witnessed as Bando's attack on Nyu revealed that she had re-grown her horns, and drove her into becoming Lucy once more. Nana became part of an all-out battle between herself, Lucy, Unknown Man and Bando once more on that same pivotal beach, with the now-insane Kurama lurking in the background. The deadly cost of the battle, including seeing Lucy threaten the life of Mayu, now like her own sister, drove Nana to vow that next time, she would kill Lucy even if she were Nyu at the time.

At Mayu's urging, Nana told her life story, and reiterated her vow to kill the person known as both Lucy and Nyu. This was overheard by a tearful Nyu, who fled the small shelter Nana and Mayu were in. When she returned, Nana tried to strangle Nyu, but Mayu said even stopping Lucy wasn't worth Nana becoming a killer. Following Mayu's dog Wanta, Kouta found the trio just after Nana and Mayu told Nyu a comforting lie about her having killed people. Nana felt that she brought nothing but trouble, but Kouta fought to persuade her to come back to what had become their home.

Though the next day promised to be full of questions for both Nana and Nyu, the makeshift family ate a happy meal together, only to have it shattered by an invasion force sent by Kakuzawa to recover Lucy. Nana attempted to fight back, but among the attackers were three mind-controlled clones of the late Mariko Kurama, and they overwhelmed her. The cold scientist Nousou taunted that she would soon be harvested for her organs, and held up her limbless form like a trophy. When Kouta was shot, Nyu went wild and began to be able to control vectors without fully becoming Lucy, and urged Nana to help their family while she dealt with the attackers, who she killed almost to a man. Despite this, Nyu/Lucy was captured. One of the Mariko clones, Cynthia, split in half by Nyu's rage, was seized by the now-deranged Kurama, who held her in the memory of his dead daughter.

Another complication, never resolved within the series proper, came when Yuka's mother objected to Nana's presence in Maple House, fearing she could turn out to be just like Lucy. When Mayu, sensing the awkwardness of this discussion, asked Nana to take food to a homeless man living on the beach, Nana learned to her shock that this was Kurama. Nana did not wish to leave the Inn at that point, but felt strongly she had no choice but to pursue and try to recover her 'Papa', who in his lunacy, at one point even dismissed her as just an experiment. When another Mariko clone, Barbara, assaulted the pair (Nana for consorting with Humans, Kurama for being a connection to a Humanity she rejected), Nana nearly defeated her, but was again shown up by her more vicious opponent. The threat to Nana was enough to re-energize Kurama, who killed the clone of his true daughter to save the one he had chosen. The two began to prepare for a final showdown with Lucy.

The End
It all came to a head as Lucy returned from her final confrontation with Chief Kakuzawa, and was talking with Kouta, whose childhood memories of the wrongs Lucy had done to him came back. Sensing Lucy atop a tower, Nana and Kurama made for the spot amidst a building military strike against Lucy. Kurama had one arm ripped off by Lucy, and then shot Kouta by accident in trying to finish her. Taking comfort from Nana's behavior when she was attacked, Kurama told her to go and be with her friends, all of whom ascended the tower to be with Kouta and Nyu/Lucy, barely dodging a rage attack that threatened to destroy Japan, if not the world. They found Lucy dying from overuse of her powers, most especially to heal Kouta. At one point, Nana warned Kouta that Nyu and Lucy had left their dying body, leaving only the murderous inner voice in charge. Nana was among those present as Kouta killed the girl known as both Lucy and Nyu.

During the final manga chapter, Nana and Kurama were shown together visiting a grave marked Kurama with Kurama holding Mariko's ashes. Nana then reveals that they are now living together, though whether this is at a separate residence or if Kurama is staying at Maple House is not mentioned. Nana asks him to take her as his wife and began crying, questioning whether Kurama wanted to 'make babies with Nana', to which Kurama smiles and responds, "Why are you saying such silly things? Nana is my...", as the scene fades. Nana's fate in light of the purge of remaining Diclonius is unclear, but it seems likely that with her friends and Kurama protecting her, she has a good chance at a better life. It can be speculated that she and Mayu served as Onee-Chans to [http://elfen-lied.wikia.com/wiki/Nyuu_Jr. any children] Kouta and Yuka later had.

The anime does not show Nana's fate past a certain point, though she is in mourning for Kurama, who chose to embrace Mariko as her bombs exploded. She is nearly killed by Kurama's assistant Isobe but he is stopped and killed by Lucy, who urges her to return to their friends and live the life she could never have.

Unlike many other Diclonii, because Kurama treated her with kindness, Nana is not homicidal or sadistic. She has the ability to temporarily disable other Diclonius' vectors by having her vectors go through their pineal gland. Although her vector power was superior to Kaede's in terms of range (Five meters to Kaede's two, later Kaede's became much longer and even more powerful) and certain abilities, she lacks Kaede's sheer strength (Kaede can lift and throw many times heavier objects than Nana can), and violent nature; Nana's empathy for others does not allow her to fight as vigorously, let alone, kill. With her vector arms, she is later able to manipulate prosthetic appendages and even throw them like a rocket punch.

Nana can be seen as the exact opposite of Kaede. While Kaede's default personality is serious and cold, Nana's is friendly and kind; Kaede's split personality "Nyu" is similar to Nana's default while Nana sometimes goes into trances and acts cold like Kaede's default personality. One time in particular was remarkably similar to Kaede's fall into the path of a cold-blooded killer, and it literally took the force of a magnum bullet grazing her skull to knock her back to her senses. Nana is in the middle of the spectrum of Kaede's split personalities: she's not as mature as Kaede, but more mature than Nyu. She is in fact extremely childish due to her young age. The extent to which her romantic feelings for Kurama may be returned, if ever, are left unclear.

Personality
Nana had an unusual personality for a Diclonius, not having the desire to kill or even to hurt someone. Her personality seems to defy the standard belief that a Diclonius' killing instinct is inborn, and yet it does not disprove it, either.

The bond between herself and Kurama made it possible for Nana to endure the hardships and depredations of life as a test subject at the Diclonius Research Institute, turning Nana into a kind, sweet and compassionate person, understanding other people's pain, although it left her very naive.

Sometimes, Nana enters in a state of rage and fury, so great she might actually kill someone. When in this state, her personality is more like the other Diclonius, such as Kaede and Mariko. She only enters this state in extreme cases, like when someone threatens her Papa, or her friends, notably Mayu.