To succesfuly emerge flex you need /usr/bin/rev command, witch is a part of util-linux package. But flex ebuild does not depend on util-linux package and this should be fixed. Reproducible: Always
you cant have a linux system w/out util-linux
Yes, you can, when you do emerge -e world after bootstrap from stage1 (amd64). I'm sorry I didn't write that.
(1) stage1's are not supported (2) using `emerge -e` to go from stage1 to stage2 was never correct ... if you want to use a stage1, you need to review the documentation to see how to correctly transition to stage2