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sugarless--girl · 4 years

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For You, I’ll Wait (Anemone x A2)

Summary: Anemone and A2 have a moment together.

Read on AO3

“Hey.”

Anemone nearly jumped at the voice and immediately turned to see A2 laying underneath a tree, almost entirely hidden by the bushes around her. It was strange seeing her with the short hair she initially had those long three years ago.

“Hey, yourself. What are you doing there?” Anemone asked, managing to keep the surprise out of her tone.

“Just, you know. Relaxing.” A2 let out a sigh that sounded too weary to be relaxed. “We can do that now, huh?"

“I—yes, I suppose so.” Anemone said, hovering as she was unsure whether to sit or not. A2 simply raised an eyebrow, neither giving her the option or taking it away.

Even A2 gave her nothing but choices. But of course she did—she was still the resistance leader at the end of the day. Anemone sat down beside her all the same.

“So you’re just relaxing? Not hiding from 9S?” Anemone asked, a slight smile tugging at her lips.

A2 groaned. “He keeps on asking questions! Every time I answer one, he has five more for it! Not saying anything seems to be the best way to keep questions minimal.” She grumbled to herself.

“You should humor him—it’s in his nature to be inquisitive, isn’t it?” Anemone asked, an expected laugh bubbling up from within.

But before it could escape, A2 said, “and look where it got him.” She sighed. “It’s weird to care about someone like this. I don’t like it.”

“You care for 9S, right?”

“Yeah, but that’s all 2B’s memories. Now that she’s back, I’d rather not...you know….”

“Carry the weight of caring for someone?” Anemone asked, smiled wryly.

“It’s not like that.” A2 sighed. “He’s still wary. Even though he knows what happened, it’s not gonna make him like me anymore. And answering questions isn’t gonna change that fact either.”

“He just needs time. Maybe that’s him trying to reach out, you know?”

“I know. I’m just saying he’s annoying is all.”

“Well—” Anemone didn’t know what to say to that. “Don’t say that to his face?”

“Too late.” A2 muttered.

Anemone couldn’t help let out a laugh. “You’re terrible.” It was incredible the amount of lightness she had felt in the first time in years.

“And yet, you’re talking to me.” A2 said, closing her eyes. She looked content and Anemone had to wonder...was she? She certainly hoped her friend had some respite from what she had gone through.

“I am.” Anemone said as she got comfortable next to the YoRHa unit. Or was it ex-YoRHa now that the Bunker was gone? Perhaps, A2 had always been ex-YoRHa once she had become a rogue.

That didn’t matter. She didn’t want to dwell on the fall of the Bunker any longer than she had to—she had good friends there, after all. Instead Anemone sat in silence with A2.

A2 said nothing more. They stayed like that, watching the clouds pass and the birds chirp as they flew overhead. It was quiet. And for once, Anemone didn’t think of the past and didn’t think of the future. All she thought of was about the presence next to her.

***

“Hey, Anemone.” A2’s voice broke the silence between them

“Hmm?”

“Have you ever seen the stars?”

“I—I’m afraid not. I’ve never been to the Kingdom of the Night so...” She had always been fighting where she was currently stationed. The machines didn’t work there so there was no real reason to travel to the Kingdom.

“Ah, Well, humans seem to think it's a big deal or whatever.” Where was A2 going with this?

“You’ve been reading up on humans?” Anemone asked, surprised.

“What’s with the surprise?” A2’s voice sounded both sleepy and annoyed. “But yeah, I have. Bits and pieces. Probably should know a bit more about our creators, right? Even if…they're gone.”

“Right….”She didn’t know what to say to that. It had been a while since Anemone took time to understand who she was fighting for. Did it matter anymore? The humans were gone but they were left behind.

A2 shifted beside her, sitting up now. Anemone didn’t look at her but she could feel the other android’s eyes on her. “Yeah…anyway, they say that the night sky is supposed to be pretty incredible. Think it’s any different from space?”

“Possibly? The sky and clouds might affect how the light filters through to the atmosphere, after all.”

“Huh. You know a lot about….that stuff?”

“I...I guess so. You pick up things when you live as long as me.” Her memory wasn’t perfect. It was fracturing at its edges and yet there were still so many things that came to surface she had supposedly forgotten. Things like information on the sky and clouds and such—knowledge she had determined to be useless for fighting against machines and here she was, remembering it all.

“Hmm.” A2’s hum was noncommittal. It was easy to forget that they had centuries of years apart from each other.

“Hopefully you’ll be able to live as long as I did.”

“...We’ll see.” Was that the wrong thing to say?

Anemone decided to change the subject back to the topic at hand—she didn’t like the idea of hurting A2. “...So what about the stars?”

“Right. So apparently they’re super beautiful or whatever. I didn’t get to see them much on the Bunker. I mean, the time I spent there was for learning how to fight so I didn’t appreciate it at the time. I just wonder if I...you know….lost the chance to actually see them.” A2 was so young but she had lost too much already, hadn’t she?

“You have a point there but...well, we could always go to the Kingdom of the Night and see for ourselves?” The idea sprung from nowhere in particular but she found it appealing nonetheless.

“I…you’d wanna do that? With me?” Anemone smiled at the incredulity in A2’s voice.

“Yes? I mean unless you have—”

“Don’t finish that sentence—I have nothing else going on. You know this. I know this.” The resistance leader didn’t have to look at her to know she was rolling her eyes.

“Yeah, I guess I do. I just—”

“Not sure about it?” Finally, they made eye contact. Anemone felt lost in the pale blue of A2’s eyes. How long had it been since she looked at someone like this? Like she was seeing them for the first time?

Snapping out of her strange reverie, Anemone sighed. “Yeah. There’s still a lot to do here—there’s so much rebuilding to get done and so many new connections to forge.”

“Yeah, and we gotta help Jackass with her revenge quest, huh?”

“I’m not entirely sure how to help her…” Anemone grew silent, thinking about the things they had lost from the war.

“Eh, I’m sure you’ll figure it out. Better you, than me. Right?”

“Sure. But don’t discount yourself—you were responsible for saving us all in the end.”

A2 snorted. “Hardly. I wouldn’t call that saving anyone. I wasn’t sure what I was doing half the time.”

“You tried, nonetheless.”

“Why are you the one comforting me here?” The android said with a sigh. “I wanted to—I don’t know how to explain it. It’s just...you changed so much since I last really saw you. It hasn’t been that long and I just…”

Anemone waited for A2 to continue but when it became clear that she wasn’t going to, she spoke up. “I changed, yes, but you did too. You changed a lot more than me.”

“I’m younger than you.” A2 muttered.

“Yes...and you have....a lot more to see now that we’re a little bit free, I suppose?” Anemone didn’t know how to say what she was trying to say. All she wanted to do was help A2 feel a bit better. Feeling emboldened (or maybe even a little desperate), she held out her hand for the other android to take.

A2 took Anemone’s hand. She threaded her fingers between the other woman’s gloved ones. Both their hands were black but one was due to skin stripped away and the other due to gloves meant to protect. “Coming back to the previous thought….wanna go travel once we’ve got this all cleaned up?”

“Sure I’d like that. But, after you finish helping me with the peace treaties and such.”

A2 wrinkled her nose but clutched Anemone’s hand even tighter. “God, diplomacy is so not my thing. Why do you want me there anyway?”

Anemone laughed. “Why not?”

“Wow, what a great argument. Our resistance leader, ladies and gentlemen.” She said, tone wry and eyes sparkling with mischief.

“That’s why you’re there—you’re the one gonna be arguing.”

A2 tilted her head and smiled. God, it had been so long since she had seen that expression. “Alright, I can concede that. I’ll wait a little bit longer—we have time.” Anemone could feel herself smiling back.

��For now. But I guess that’s enough, huh?”

“It’s enough.” And once more, they fell back into their comfortable silence.

#nier automata #nier a2 #nier anemone #anemone x a2 #a2 x anemone #i wish there was an actual ship name for these two #nier: automata #there are so many ways to tag this fandom #actually no it's not as bad as other fandoms is it......#anyway I hope this ship gets SOME traction #i thought i was pretty big-brained for thinking of them

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why485 · 7 years

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I'm interested to see what you think are plot holes, especially as someone who hasn't gone through half the game. Perhaps put it under a read more? Part of what you may think are plot holes could also be the result of Automata being a (very distant) sequel to the original Nier, which itself is a spinoff of the Drakengard games. Automata's pretty self-contained though, so I kinda doubt it. As for DLC, IIRC it doesn't really add much story aside from some bits about the arena mode.

This is all going under a read more as it’s pretty much impossible to talk about this without getting into spoiler territory in a game where that matters.

I may write an update to this post later on after I’ve beaten the game and had more time to think on it all, as I’ve already re-written half of it because I answered some of my own questions in the process of typing it out. Rubber ducky debugging, basically.

Fair warning, there is a huge amount of text beyond the break because there’s just way too much to talk about when it comes to any one aspect of Nier and its universe. Like it’s a totally unreasonable amount of text for anybody to read. You have been warned.

MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR NIER AUTOTOMATO AFTER THE BREAK

Before I start, it is obligatory that I mention that I’m somewhere in route C. I’ve destroyed one of the resource units as 9S. Specifically, the one in the forest if that makes a difference. I have no idea how far I am in the game anymore because at this point it feels like I’m playing this game’s sequel.

There are a lot of minor questions/problems I have with the game, but there is one issue bothers me the most as it feels like bad writing in a way that’s incongruous with the rest of the game. The best way to describe it is in the form of a question:

Why do YoRHa androids care so much about dying?

I feel like the game contradicts itself on this, and the confusion it’s caused me has taken away from some key moments in the story. The core issue is that the main characters treat dying as if it’s a big deal, when outside of very specific circumstances it really isn’t. For the YoRHa androids, dying seems like an inconvenience at worst because they can just “respawn” based on their most recent backup.

It starts with the very opening of the game. Why does 2B care so much that 9S is dying? She didn’t care at all when her wingmen died in the opening, but the purportedly super serious with “no emotion” super soldier (that’s a whole other post, but my opinion on that has changed a bit since then) is completely torn up and super emotional that 9S is dying. Why does she care? He’s going to respawn at the Bunker when he dies, just like they both do literally a few minutes later when they self-destruct to no real consequences.

Yes, I know that 9S makes a big deal out of the fact that he’s backing up 2B during the fight so she can respawn just fine. He specifically calls out that he hasn’t backed up since before the fight, so he’s going to lose maybe an hour or so of his memory and his memory of the fight. Why is that a big deal? Why is 2B so distressed about the idea of saving 9S even though he’s way gone and definitely going to die? If anything, she should have killed him right there so he could respawn sooner and not suffer in pain. (Although it’s unclear if maybe 9S was the node from which 2B was getting backed up, so if that’s the case then let him finish first. However if that is the case, it implies he should be able to save anywhere and they wouldn’t be in that situation to begin with.)

This happens again at the end of route A/B, albeit with slightly different circumstances. 9S is infected and so he cannot be backed up in his current state to the Bunker. However, he still has a backup from maybe an hour ago before the fighting starting, so why does it matter so much that he’s going to die there? Again, when he comes back he’s not going to remember how he helped save the world, but that’s really not a big deal in the grand scheme of things and 2B will have a super rad story to tell him when he wakes up on the Bunker.

Things get weird though, because 9S saved himself on the machines nearby before he died. I’m very unclear on what happened between the ending of A/B and the beginning of C because he’s back in his body as if nothing happened, seemingly remembering everything, and nobody mentions it. I’m not sure how he got there, what happened to the 9S in the machine, how he got to the Bunker, and so on. If the 9S in the machine at the end of A/B is the same one you see at in route C, that seems like a huge liability and is probably the source of the infection that wipes out the Bunker. This whole thing raises a lot of questions, but this seems like the kind of thing that will get addressed in due time. There are some very important scenes that happened in between A/B and C that, at least where I am in the game anyway, we didn’t see.

For being such a central and defining feature of the plot and the game’s themes, I feel like the mechanics of android death and revival need very clearly defined rules. Which, they do have, but the characters opinions on it seem to contradict it sometimes for the sake of dramatic cutscenes and relationships. They act as if they don’t know how it works when there’s no reason they wouldn’t.

Ignoring the character’s opinions, this is my understanding of how it works:

1. To respawn requires some server in the Bunker. If the Bunker is destroyed, that means all androids lose this capability, and so when they die, there is no coming back.

2. Only YoRHa androids can access the server in the Bunker, which means only androids like 2B, 9S, and so on can respawn. Resistance members universally talk about death as if it is very permanent. I was confused about this for a while, but thinking about it’s easily explained as their designs being too old to be compatible with whatever technology drives the whole resurrection system.

3. Some level of communication must exist between an android and the Bunker at the moment of death. 11B’s death provides this example. After getting stuck, 11B wants to respawn back at the Bunker, but cannot because her communication systems are completely destroyed. 11B is one of the three examples I can think of off the top of my head where the resurrection process fails.

4. When androids respawn, they come back based on their last save/backup. This means that whenever they die, they lose memories of whatever happened between their last backup and up to the point where they died. It sucks, but they’re soldiers, and it’s something they should be well aware of and used to. All things considered, that’s really not a big price to pay for what’s effectively immortality.

As a corollary to this, there are two clear ways for a YoRHa android to permanently die:

1. Communication with the Bunker is completely cut off, meaning that the Bunker will never get the trigger that boots up the backup of an android in a backup body. The only example I recall of this happening to this degree was when an android’s communication system was completely destroyed, which seems to be an extremely rare occurrence.

(This process raises a lot of the same questions that come up when discussing transporters, but I’m willing to overlook that for the same reason most fiction does. It starts getting into questions about souls, which to be fair Nier makes explicit reference to in the Project Gestalt archives. Maybe there’s more to this?)

2. The Bunker itself is destroyed and so the mechanism by which androids respawn is completely broken. There doesn’t appear to be a backup of any kind for this system. As of route C, this is now the case. 2B dies and she’s now really dead. Meanwhile 9S is still alive, but if he dies now, he dies for real.

(This also raises the question of where do androids come from in the first place, which is something I don’t know but I suspect will be answered eventually.)

As an aside, 2B’s memories are in her sword now. It’s not clear how important an android’s “memories” are in terms of the backing up process. If all it takes is nebulously defined “memories” to respawn an android, then 2B will probably come back at the end of the game by restoring her memories into a new body. Whether or not your personality and thought processes are intrinsically stored in those memories seems like a question worth asking but that’s approaching a whole other philosophical discussion.

I could go on and on and on, but I think I’ve covered what has bugged me the most about the game (and then some) pretty well. In the process of writing this post, I ended up answering most of the questions I had going in. Just putting it to proverbial paper has made me think about a couple things and after reviewing a couple things I ended up answering my biggest question which was “how do androids die?”

#nier automata

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xsparklingravenx · 7 years

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Miscommunication

Title: Miscommunication

Fandom: NieR Automata

Characters: 2B, 9S, A2

Rating: G

Word Count: 2,443

Summary: In the amusement park, 2B struggles to deal with everything that comes after.

Post Ending E.

AO3

Amusement Park / City Ruins / Forest Village

The amusement park was dusky but quiet when they arrived, 2B walking behind 9S while A2 took up the rear. It was startlingly different to when she had seen it before, when machines had danced and played around the entrance with a kind of vigour she hadn’t thought possible of them. Now, it was still, the air stagnant with an eerie kind of calm.

The three of them had met up in the City Ruins, 9S nearly bolting at the sight of A2 while she and 2B stared each other down. She held no animosity towards her for what had been done; there had been no choice with the logic virus eating away at her systems. What she couldn’t know was how A2 had felt about the decision; the other android was a mystery, and one that 2B wasn’t sure she could unravel. They were made of different personalities, different experiences, and there was an element of unpredictability about A2 that made 2B uncomfortable in analysing her.

Before all that though, there was whatever had happened between 9S and A2 while she had been gone. He’d given her a brief explanation of what had happened between them in her absence, but it was evident that he could barely speak to her. What he'd said had lacked detail and clarity, and 2B was unsure if it was because he knew now of her true purpose or he had done something that he couldn’t forgive himself for.

They were a trinity of unresolved conflict, and as far as they knew, the only remaining YoRHa left. 2B supposed it would have been stranger if everything between them was harmonious. As it stood, every secret had come out, battles that should never have come to pass had been fought, and furthermore, humanity was extinct. There was nothing left to fight for, and no orders left to take. They were free, but also without purpose.

“There are no Black Box signals in the vicinity.” Pod 042 said. It was the sixth time it had done so, twelfth if she counted Pod 153’s warnings too.

“If you say that one more time, I’ll dismantle you nice and slow.” A2 muttered, her arms crossed against her chest. “We’ve got nothing else to do except look. Accept it and move on.”

2B glanced at the Pod, but it didn’t seem to care for A2’s threats. It had changed somewhere between the bunker being blown up and 2B reawakening on top of that building in the City Ruins. It had gone beyond its programming.

They all had. There was something more to them now than what had been there before any of this had happened. It was why 9S had suggested they go travelling. The underlying reason was to see if they could find any other YoRHa units, as he was convinced there were others out there. "I met another scanner, 4S." he'd said, and if one had survived, surely there could be more. Even though the Pods kept coming up short when they scanned, he seemed driven. It wasn’t as if they had any other plans.

The silence between them was uncomfortable as they picked their way through the amusement park. 2B had taken it in at a basic level the first time, but now she was aware of the absence of the fireworks that had exploded into rainbow showers, how the sky looked so empty without them there. Brightly coloured balloons still swayed in the wind, tied to old stalls that once may have been manned by a person or a machine in cheerful garb. 2B decided not to think too deeply about it.

Something caught her eye. She paused by one of the stalls to pick up an old gear that might be useful in upgrading a weapon, but 9S didn’t stop. He went ahead without a word, Pod 153 following him obediently.

“Stupid kid.” A2 said, kicking away the debris at her feet. “Thought he'd be thrilled to have you back.”

2B looked up towards the castle where they had danced with Simone. That had been so long ago now, before anything had come to light and 9S could still look at her and grin. Their dynamic had changed so much. 2B didn’t know to talk to 9S, and outside of his initial thrill that she was alive, he seemed to have no idea how to talk to her back.

“It’s never that easy.” she said, turning half way. She could see A2 out of the corner of her eye, see the way messy hair obscured a face identical to 2B’s own. “What am I supposed to do?”

A2 shrugged. “Why ask me? When I shared your memories, I did what you wanted. Now you’re here, it’s not my problem.”

“Unit 2B should be blunt with Unit 9S.” Pod 042 said. “Pod 153 agrees, and suggests that you take up the issue with him.”

2B nibbled at her lip. She had already considered doing so, but the potential fallout had stopped her from taking action. “Would be better than you two shuffling around each other pretending the other doesn’t exist.” A2 said.

She didn’t know how to respond to that, so she didn’t. Without a sound, 2B stepped forward, going down the same paths that 9S had taken. He’d gone down the back alleys, where the machines had taken breaks and sold her items before. She heard A2 sigh and then footsteps as she followed.

It didn’t make sense that A2 was with them, but that wasn’t a surprise. Nothing added up anymore. 2B should have been dead and yet she was here when the bunker was gone. They were on Earth and they were living like the humans once would have; with one single life to do with as they pleased. It didn’t mean that everything was perfect. She missed 6O’s constant nattering away in her ear.

“Why did you come with us?” 2B asked.

A2’s response came after a few seconds of silence. “Because I can’t be with the ones I want to be with.”

There was something hidden behind those words, something sorrowful and sad that 2B wasn’t privy to. She felt no need to ask. There was plenty of time for them to figure each other out. If A2 wanted to elaborate, she could elaborate in her own time. “I see.”

“You can, though.” A2 said, and when 2B turned her head to look at her, there was a forlorn expression on her face. “Would be pretty stupid to waste that chance moping about because the two of you can’t fix what’s up. And anyway,” she shook her head, her voice softening. “He knows it wasn’t what you wanted to do. He knows you hated it.”

Together they climbed the fairground rides, following the only path 9S could have taken. Pod 042 lead the way, hovering a few feet in front of 2B at all times. They hopped over the buildings, and then stopped in the area where the tank used to drive through with balloons spilling from its sides.

“Unit 9S is by the roller coaster.” Pod 042 said, even though she could see that from where she was stood. He was sitting cross legged with Pod 153 in his lap, his arms wrapped around its rectangular body. “Would Unit 2B like me to speak with Pod 153 and tell him to come down?”

“That won’t be necessary.” she said. “A2, I’m going up there to talk to him. Give me a moment.”

A2 shrugged as if it didn’t matter to her, but 2B could feel her watching as she went up the stairs. 9S didn’t react to her as she approached, but Pod 153 shifted in his arms, freeing itself. “I will go somewhere else for the time being,” it said, before floating down the stairs.

Reaching up to her visor, 2B tugged it off as she sat beside 9S. Doing this while masked felt wrong, as if she was hiding something from him when the last thing she wanted was to keep anymore secrets. “You’ve been acting off with me,” she said.

He traced one of his gloved fingers against the rickety boards of the floor. “You’ve been acting off with me too,” he said, but it was a poor defence. She saw the sides of his mouth tighten. “A lot happened.”

“It did.” she agreed. “I’m just sorry I wasn’t there for you when you needed me.”

Silence, awkward and cold, stifled the air between them. When 9S spoke, it was stilted. “I did awful things.”

He glanced over at her and then away. She didn’t judge him for not removing his visor; if he wanted to hide his eyes, then that was his decision. “A2 stopped you, and you regret it now. It’s in the past.”

“You don’t understand.” he said. And she didn’t, because there was so much that he still wasn’t telling her, so much that only he’d experienced. “I know what I’m capable of. I don’t feel like I’m me anymore.”

In another life, where the bunker still existed and 2B still followed orders, he would never have gotten this far. She would have killed him and had his memories wiped and he would be none the wiser. Looking at him now, she begun to wonder if taking his memories was a blessing, if it saved him from this kind of agony.

She felt bad the second she considered it. No, it was no blessing, and she was cruel for even considering that it might be. “You still look like you to me.” she said, although she had no idea what she was trying to do for him. She was an executioner model, not one made to comfort. “I wanted to talk to you. To tell you I’m sorry.”

“I already know.” 9S said. “A2 told me, up on the tower. ‘She hated to keep on killing you.’”

2B felt choked, hearing him say it. “That’s right. It was killing me too.”

“I believe you. I do, 2B. ” 9S said, but he still wasn’t looking at her. He reached behind his head and undid his visor. When she saw his eyes, they were glassy, as if he wanted to cry. “I’m not stupid, I know what you were made for, I get it, but it just…there’s something in me that wants to hate you. And I don’t. I don’t hate you. I could never. But it’s…”

“It’s still there.” 2B said, reaching out to rest her hand on his cheek. He stilled beneath her touch. “You don’t have to forgive me. Just know that I won’t ever hurt you again.”

Closing his eyes, he reached up with his own hand and rested it on top of hers. “I just wanted this. I just wanted you back. I didn’t know what else to do, 2B.”

There was an ache deep inside her chest. She didn’t have a heart, not like the humans once did, but she still felt like something was broken within her. She took her hand from his cheek and pulled him close against her. He let her guide him, his head resting against her shoulder.

“It’ll be different this time.” she said into his hair. “It’ll never end that way again.”

She held onto him until he pulled back of his own accord, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “You done up there?” A2 called from below. “These pods are driving me nuts, I swear to everything--!”

“Unit A2 should consider the fact that without us, she would not be here.” Pod 042 said.

9S winced as A2 turned her anger on it. 2B didn’t think her words would have much of an effect. The pods lived as they wanted to now, and a lecture wouldn’t change their opinions. “She’s so loud.” 2B said.

“Yeah…uh, 2B?”

“Hm?”

“I know there are no YoRHa units here, but I actually wanted to see if the roller coaster still worked.” 9S stood and kicked the side of it. It squeaked. “It looks like it still does, so…maybe we could ride it? Properly?”

2B glanced over at it, her lips parting in surprise. She and 9S had ridden it before, but they had been fighting at the time, machines striking at them from every angle. “All of us?”

He nodded and then hesitantly leant over the railing. “Hey, A2? Could you come up here for a second?”

She took her time, still berating the pods. When she got to the top, she looked down at him through her hair. To 2B, her eyes were as icy and guarded as always. “What?”

Going over to the cart, 2B lifted the bar that covered the seats to inspect it. It seemed sturdy enough. “You ever been on one of these things before?”

A2 looked at it, one eyebrow raised. “No, but I’ve got your memories of it. It didn’t look very fun.”

“We’re going to try it again.” 9S said, following 2B on. “There has to be some reason humans enjoyed this, right?”

2B sat, waiting. She wasn’t dropping the bar back down until A2 got on. It was a quiet stand off between the two, until eventually A2 let out a sigh and said, “Fine.”

She dropped down next to 9S as Pod 153 and Pod 042 settled in the cart behind. 2B lowered the bar over the three of them and held on when the ride began to move. It began slow, picking up speed as it ran the length of the rails laid out before it.

“Come on, I’m here for the thrill!” A2 cried impatiently. The ride climbed higher and higher, the sky clear above them, and then stopped suddenly at the top.

She could see the entire park, impressive and wide. Once, human children would have played here with smiles on their faces and joy in their lungs. For a moment the world was frozen in place, incredible and beautiful.

The ride lurched forward, 2B gasping as 9S grabbed for her hand. Wind whipped through her hair as the pods let out a monotone scream. “It is customary to yell on a roller coaster.” Pod 042 said.

“Noted.” 2B said as the roller coaster began its ascent again. 9S’s grip on her hand was tight, but when she looked over, he was smiling. Beside him. A2 looked less despondent than usual; her eyes were wide with ecstasy. This was how things were meant to be.

Squeezing 9S’s hand, she said, “Ready?”

The roller coaster stopped at the highest point once again. 9S looked towards her, his smile not faltering. “Ready."

#Nier Automata #Nier #2B #9S #A2 #My Writing #pls enjoy!

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something-very-special · 7 years

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Ask Response-stravaganza!

So I got a buuuunch of Asks in the last couple of days and a lot of them are spoiler-y by nature. Rather than hiding them all until I feel more comfortable addressing them (which won’t be for a couple of months, honestly), they’re all going under a big ol’ SPOILERS AHOY! read more break.

So here we go.

SPOILERS AHOY!

Anonymous: I agree that 2B and 9S's bond is mainly that of a broken family but there also seem to be a few hints at attraction there (e.g. the comments about 9S's heart rate increasing at the beginning of route B). Also, even though Adam's line certainly referred to "kill", the wording itself does carry some ambiguity and connotations that seem intentional - considering the hatred and love aspects of 9S's (admittedly complex) feelings, Adam may be referring to several things here, possibly all at once.

I absolutely believe the context was meant to be ambiguous. This is also why it’s really funny seeing how people reacted to it, and how they kind of project onto it. (And I certainly had the same reaction the first time I saw it, hah hah.)

I like to think that the censored word is actually a number of verbs all at once -- ‘fuck’ and ‘kill’ certainly aren’t the only two four-letter verbs out there -- which is why it’s censored the way it is; it’s an accusation of multiple natures, potentially meaning multiple things, open to a bevy of equally valid interpretation.

But.

In context of the story, whatever is hidden behind that line of asterisks is something that 9S doesn’t want to acknowledge. If it were something related to love or even lust, 9S has already proven that he gets flustered in such a context-- the aforementioned ‘heart rate’ response, and his conversation with the Little Sister. However, in conversation with Adam, his response is violent. It’s violent denial. I don’t think he’d be so aggressive if Adam’s main point had not been trying to stir up his more negative feelings.

So, in context of everything Adam may have said, and in context of what we as the audience could take away from it? I do believe ‘you want to **** 2B’ can (and was intended to) mean a broad range of things. But in context of what 9S heard? Not so nice.

Anonymous: thank you for your in depth thoughts about 9S. I found him to be really unlikeable at first and then somewhat tolerable by the end. but my final lasting impression of him was that he just unsettled me for some reason i could not pin point. With your thoughts, I was able to understand him a bit more. though he will still be my least liked character, i can't deny his whole arc is really thought provoking (also you mentioned that A2 was very underutilized, a sentiment I concur with whole heartedly)

Oh, I’m glad. I know 9S can come across as being a brat (which I think is more of a knee-jerk reaction to his youthful design), and a racist jerk (which is definitely intended in-game, by his dismissal of the very concept of the robots having their own egos), but he’s definitely got a lot more going on. I had the fortune of accidentally tripping the Mother and Son quest early, so other than 9S being kind of a jerk toward Pascal the first interaction I saw between him and the machines was trying to comfort the little child machine, which was adorable and probably instrumental in my own opinion of him. (Made watching him go from “Shh, shh, don’t cry” to “I WILL MURDER EVERYTHING” pretty disturbing, and heart-wrenching.)

Yeah, A2 needed more love. I think I understand why she was kind of incidental, but still...

kantan-kt: Do you think that 9S died in route C? If you continue to route E, the pods tell the player that all yoRHa black boxes are offline. Doesn't that mean that A2's sacrifice was in vain? ;~; But then again, he did stop his data upload to the yoRHa server so maybe there's a chance that he's alive?

When you enter Ending E from the Chapter Select, it continued directly from Ending C, implying heavily that his black box was offlined. However, A2′s work seemed to be less about keeping him alive (which wouldn’t really be accomplished by hacking into him, since the damage kind of came from repeatedly stabbing him in the final fight) and more about retaining his memories and eliminating the logic virus the clone-arm imparted into him-- saving his soul, if you will, even if the body still died. Kind of ties in to the considerations of something greater than themselves, and the direct contemplation in a few of the sidequests about heaven, and whether they, as artificial life, would qualify for such a thing if it exists.

So even if you ignore Ending E and its possibility of restoring the three characters -- which obviously A2 would not have had any knowledge of, herself -- no. Even though 9S is also confirmed dead at the end of it, her work was not in vain.

Anonymous: On the BBE's Artbook, Commander talks about Jackass making an android combined from two other androids...Do you guess who they are talking about?

I haven’t taken a chance to really look through the art book yet (didn’t want to spoil myself), but I’ve seen this mentioned and I have to say I don’t actually have a guess. I can’t think of anybody in the game, including sidequests, that would match this description. The only thing I can think of is her lamenting the death of ‘White’ on the bunker, but I can’t think of anything solid.

I look forward to somebody figuring it out, though. That’s pretty awesome, in a legitimately terrifying kind of way.

Anonymous: I thought about something and would like to hear your two cents on it. I personally find that 2B lacks character development, she barely says anything about her throughout the entire game, however, once you learn what her true purpose is, you have to look at the core of most sidequests in the game to (indirectly) learn about her since said sidequests are more or less related to 2B (and 9S to some extent). The "YoRHa Betrayers" and "Amnesia" are the most obvious that come to mind. Any thoughts?

This is a two-parter, but the Asks split themselves quite neatly.

Regarding this, this is one of the things I really like about both this game and the original (and I remember hints of this in Drakengard, too). There’s plenty of clear development between the characters, but there’s also a lot of unspoken, subtle stuff. I’ve recently mentioned the relationship between Nier and the members of his party, and what’s really brilliant about it is that most of the interpersonal bonding is done without dialogue, or else entirely through subtext. The entire chunk of game from the fight against No. 6 to the post-fight against Kaine in the Lost Shrine is brimming with gorgeous body language and perfectly constructed dialogue that never feels the need to speak too much about what it’s trying to say. It requires-- I don’t want to say thought because it sounds pretentious, but it does require paying attention, especially for the relationship between Emil and Kaine (which turns out to be incredibly powerful even, what, 8000 years later, and I’m completely sold on it for this one hour-long stretch of game).

The same occurs with 2B. We’re introduced to her in a very mechanical context, and she comes across as being stoic, flat, no-nonsense. It serves a pretty good foil to 9S being the most emotional and ‘human’ of the main characters, but 2B herself isn’t emotionless. I marked this even back in the demo; she says ‘emotions are prohibited’ but becomes extremely worked up over 9S being hurt. Seems like a clear contradiction, especially when they ‘just met’, and given how generally well-written and strong the narrative is seems too contradictory to have been unintentional, especially for being right at the start of the game.

There are definitely hints and intrigue throughout, and these little bits from the sidequests and from her more errant dialogue and reactions paint a very interesting and complex picture, especially in conjunction with the “Amnesia” sidequest, which not only reveals the existence of the E-series YoRHa (which 2B dismisses, incidentally) but that they are highly psychologically unstable due to the rather grisly task presented to them. (That was all one sentence and I’m sorry.)

I quite like how her characterization was ultimately treated. It’s not overt, but there are enough indications of what lay beneath to make her at least interesting, and once you’re given full context about her nature it retroactively makes her more unusual decisions and reactions quite a bit more fascinating, and telling.

I was running out of space with my sidequest ask earlier, I thought about another obvious one that might be related to 9S? It's the "Confidential Intel" which ends up pretty badly, where some resistance member wants to build an S android since he always wanted a family, which can be associated with 9S wishes in a way? Maybe this is too far fetched but it all feels too coincidental that most sidequests share the same themes as the main characters' struggle, if that makes any sense?

Oh! Yes, actually, I completely follow. I admit I didn’t make that connection (although I did that quest with 2B so I wasn’t yet in the realm of familial pining), but it does make sense. I imagine something could also be read into the Resistance member’s desire to have somebody to protect.

...now that I think about it, I wonder if an E-unit was sent after them? The Scanner has confidential intelligence, after all, something that could be catastrophic if leaked, and while I interpreted his ‘p-please...’ at the end of the quest being a misfiring need to get away from his ‘family’, it might have been linked to their request: “Don’t tell anybody about us”, “Please”, because if somebody learns where they are the Scanner has to be eliminated, and his protector will go with him.

Got a bit away from the point. But yes, I think that’s entirely possible. Thank you for bringing it to my attention!

#NieR: Automata #Meta #Talkin' 'bout vidya games #Seriously though you guys give me really good discussion. I love this.

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