This alternate ending is only "alternate" in the fact that the events happen just slightly different than in the final cut of the film. The same realization is made, there is just a different way of arriving at that realization. It picks up right after David talks to Elijah's mother in Limited Edition.
David watches as Elijah's mother walks across the store and waits for Elijah to finish talking.
David turns back to the frame sketch. He looks at it with his hands in his pockets. Beat
David's stare turns into a gaze. His gaze turns into stillness.
THE SKETCH is of a withered man with large tense eyes. He sits in the shadows. He's seated in some type of machine. There are lots of buttons and levers on the machine. The machine has wheels.
David turns from the sketch. He looks across the room to Elijah seated in his wheelchair. Elijah's eyes stay focused on the customers as he finishes negotiating.
David turns back to the sketch. He looks at it with growing confusion. The more you look at the drawing, the more the machine the man is seated in looks like a wheelchair.
David looks back across the store. Elijah and his mother are talking. Elijah has spotted David.
Beat. Elijah starts across the crowded store towards David. He wheels up to him.
ELIJAH
Did you see this?
Elijah has a newspaper on his lap. He holds it up.
There's a drawing on the front page. It's of a hooded figure shielding two huddled children behind him.
ELIJAH (soft)
It has begun.
David stares quietly at the sketch of himself.
ELIJAH
When I saw it this morning, I felt a part of the world again.
Elijah looks down at the newspaper.
David hesitates and then reaches forward.
He reaches past the paper... And TOUCHES ELIJAH'S ARM.
FLASHCUT: AN AIRPORT GATE. ELIJAH IS STANDING AT THE WINDOW LOOKING OUT ONTO THE AIRFIELD. HE'S CRYING.
SIRENS START SOUNDING THROUGHOUT THE AIRPORT.
WAITING PASSENGERS START GETTING UP AND MOVING TO THE WINDOWS.
MAN
What's going on?
Elijah speaks to no one in particular as he stares out the window with tortured eyes.
ELIJAH
An airplane just crashed.
CUT TO:
FLASHCUT: ELIJAH AND AN ELDERLY MAN IN A UNIFORM ARE SEATED IN A HOTEL BAR.
ELDERLY MAN
I've worked here twenty-five years. I know all its
secrets.
ELIJAH
Secrets?
ELDERLY MAN (whispers)
Like if there was ever a fire on floors one, two, or
three... Everyone in this hotel would be burned alive.
ELIJAH LOOKS UP FROM HIS DRINK.
CUT TO:
FLASHCUT: ELIJAH LEAVES THE ENGINEERING ROOM OF AN AMTRAK TRAIN. HE PASSES THE ENGINEER WHO HAS JUST ARRIVED WITH COFFEE.
ENGINEER
Passengers aren't allowed in there.
Elijah doesn't answer and doesn't turn around as he exits train 177.
SLAM CUT BACK TO PRESENT:
David takes two unsteady steps back. Elijah has tears in his eyes as he gazes down at the newspaper. He looks up to David.
ELIJAH (low voice)
I almost gave up hope. There was so many times I
questioned myself. I've made so many sacrifices but
it's all been worth it.
(beat)
There are millions and millions of mediocre people in the world David. Isn't it great that we aren't one of them.
David looks like he stopped breathng as he backs up in the store.
Customers step between him and Elijah. Elijah becomes obscured and then blocked from view.
CUT TO:
EXT. STREET - DAY
David emerges from the store slowly. He braces himself against a parked car and then keeps on walking in a nightmarish daze.
WE PULL BACK as David Dunne blends in with dozens and dozens of ordinary people, walking on an ordinary street, in an ordinary city.