so people think this is a flashback, right? but then the camera pans to the skies and we see gestalt yonah and nier, implying they are already dead by the time this is happening. while it could be that the cutscene is flashback but the scene with the gestalts is current time the way it's shot just doesn't struck me that way? also, the fact that yonah doesn't seem to be sick, but nier already has his hair tied. (in the novel the red and the black we find out nier didn't have his hair tied until yonah got sick and then uh... things happened and he started tying his hair)

so what if after the events of nier replicant, the androids tried to salvage project gestalt, and made another generation of replicants for that cause. since they made replicants for yonah and nier, perhaps they were thinking to somehow get the yonah and nier gestalts back? but then of course that failed and we ended up with the events of nier automata

anyways, thoughts?