Key conclusions
- Pascal teaches children fear machines by emphasizing the importance of experiencing both negative and positive emotions.
- A2 highlights the fear of being alone, recognizing the importance of cherishing time spent with loved ones.
- A bitter irony unfolds as the fear of being alone leads to cannibalization, showing irrational decisions made under stress.
The following contains spoilers for NieR Automata Episode 21 Ver1.1a, which is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.
Goliath is defeated and the children are saved, but A2 receives an urgent message from the Resistance camp. Meanwhile, Lily and her allies isolate themselves from infected members of the Resistance after being exposed to the Logic Virus from one of the machine's crazed children, turning into zombies in the process.
Although Donkey, Popolo, Devola and others come to their aid, Lily decides to stay away and kill the infected to prevent the virus from spreading. A2 arrives on the scene just as the last survivor, Lily, who is also infected, begs A2 to put her out of her misery. 9S receives the final code and realizes that his feelings for 2B were reciprocated, while Pascal is faced with the sight of machine children being cannibalized.
What it means to be human
Most people agree that experiencing both negative and positive emotions is vital to the human being. At the same time, the ability to grow, adapt and learn follows that example. Pascal actively distanced himself from other machine life forms and founded his own village in hopes of leading a more passive and prosperous lifestyle. Because of this, he had the ability to empathize and communicate with other androids, even befriending the Resistance and earning the respect of Lily, who had lost her mates in her own kind. One of the main lessons he taught the machine children of his village was the concept of fear. Fear is what keeps things alive as it acts as a deterrent to activities that might otherwise be deemed dangerous. In episode 18, the machine lifeforms exhibit exactly this behavior in response to A2's reprimands. Interestingly, A2 herself teaches them another concept: being alone.
Fear of being alone
In an attempt to cheer them up, A2 expressed how happy she was that she was not alone; and when they asked what that meant, she explained the importance of appreciating the time spent with your loved ones, as they could easily be alone on any given day. In the ensuing panic, after the surviving machine children are taken to a Resistance camp, one of them shows symptoms of the logic virus. It is implied that he was infected by his own turmoil. In episode 6, the logic virus had an uncanny resemblance to PTSD when 21S tapped into Lily's memories while injecting the cure for her infection. Afterwards, she was also the first of the group to become infected. Under stress, people (and even animals) can make irrational or extreme decisions.
Bitter irony
When Pascal witnesses what is left of the machine children, the first one to be infected cannibalizes the others, stemming from his fear of being alone and the fact that he thought the memory music box he was carrying was broken. Ironically, one could argue that A2 planted this idea in his head, as children in real life often overreact and take things literally. When he thought he risked losing everything, he ate everyone else so they could “be together forever”. The 9S also suffers from this to varying degrees. After meeting up with 2B's old flight unit, he discovers a message that was left for him confirming that 2B's feelings were mutual. But unlike the machine lifeforms and the Resistance, he is truly alone.
Community and family are a star aspect of what it means to be human. And with every meeting there must be parting. Lily, suffering from the same virus that A2 originally saved her from, dies at her hand from a shotgun, the weapon that A2 protected Lily from.
