Relationship between Reclaimers and the Forerunner.

[MHYoshimitzu]

Hi, guys. Long time lurker of Bungie and HBO forums, first time poster. I mostly hang around Penny Arcade, and that's how I found out about this new board on HBO. I knew I had to register.

I've been dwelling on a couple things lately, and now that this ARG has brought a few things into light, I'd like you guys to pick at a theory of mine.

We know that the Forerunner dropped the Ark in Africa. Halo 2 didn't tell us when, it just told us where. We now know that it was at the beginning of human civilization. I believe that when the Forerunner did that, they chose us for something. We know because of the ARG that "thousands of other plans were tried and failed," and it seems like the Forerunner feel a lot of remorse about reverting to this supposed solution. The line, "as energetic and tenacious as life is," really shows that the Forerunner value life as a whole. They feel a lot of guilt for not coming up with a better solution. My theory doesn't go into why they decided to choose us, just that they did.

We are their Reclaimers. We were meant to discover the technology left behind by them (read: the Ark) and use it to pick up their work and continue to solve the problem of the Flood. The problem is, we didn't discover the Forerunner tech first, did we? The Covenant did, and they adopted all their technology to go from a medieval level of technology to a space-faring level. "For two enemies now stand, where before, there was only one." I don't know why this line was mentioned in an ARG that was supposed to be in our present time, but it fits. Do we know when the Covenant discovered Forerunner technology in relation to our own timeline? Like it or not, it seems to be a message directed to humanity:

Learn of our past.
Take these keys and dip from the wells of history.
Perhaps through others' eyes, you may find how to save us all.

We were supposed to look at their technology (their keys) and then use it, along with their mistakes (dip into the wells of history to see what they did wrong) to try to create a new solution to the Flood.

With fate we escaped, and fate we may relive.

The Forerunner escaped through death, but if we figure it out, maybe their deaths wouldn't have had to have been in vain.

My timeline goes like this:

-Forerunner encounter the Flood and try their plans, which all fail.
-They choose to build the Ark on Earth as a way for us to continue their work.
-They build the Halos and instruct the Monitors that we are the only race capable of firing the Halos after the Forerunner are dead.
-Halo fires, the Forerunner die.
-The Covenant discover Forerunner tech and adopt it, completely misinterpreting their plans for some sort of "Great Journey."
-The events of Fall of Reach happen, and we discover a Halo for the first time.

All other events fall logically from that point on.

The Library contains some very interesting information regarding my theory. Guilty Spark has a few good lines:

Why naturally the Flood is simply too dangerous to release, and mass sterilization protocols may again need to be enacted. Of course, samples were kept here after the last catastrophic outbreak...for study. It seems... that decision may have been an error.

Could the Forerunner have kept Flood samples alive for us to discover and study? Remember the Flood infection images we got from Server 05.

Guilty Spark's most infamous line also contains some support for my theory:

The installation was specifically built to study and contain the Flood. Their survival as a race was dependent upon it. I am grateful to see that some of them survived to reproduce.

The way I interpret it, through my theory, is that "their survival" refers to the Forerunner. In the beginning, the Forerunner had no choice but to study the Flood in an attempt to create a solution. You can even join the last quote here with this next line to give it a bit more sense: "Samples here were kept after the last catastrophic outbreak... for study; I am grateful to see that some of them survived to reproduce." If we had no samples to study in a lab environment, then we would have no way to get any further in researching the Flood. Guilty Spark is a creature of knowledge; it makes sense that he would want such information available for the Reclaimers to study.

My theory isn't perfect, but that's because we still have a relative lack of information. I don't believe anything I've posted here is a jump in logic and is unfounded. That said, there are things left unresolved:

-Why do humans have an innate sense of understanding Forerunner glyphs and symbols?
-Guilty Spark's lines in Two Betrayals regarding a previous conversation he had with the Master Chief, despite the Chief never speaking to him before.
-ONI's involvement with Forerunner tech and previous knowledge of the Covenant.

Anything I've missed and anything you believe is wrong, feel free to point out. I'd like to adjust my theory as this ARG develops because I know it isn't perfect.

Thanks.

[GLuebben]

I'm intrigued, more and more by this type of theory, with one exception. One that didn't rear its ugly head until the comic was released at the beginning of the ARG:

If the Forerunner were familiar with Earth (i.e., building the Ark here) and Earth was a safe haven from the Flood (I say this, because, as we now know from the comic, humanity existed at the time of the construction of the Ark and it existed in an infectable form) and haven from the Sword Worlds...

Why didn't they just chill out here instead of destroying themselves?

[Anzio_katarin]

Why didn't they just chill out here instead of destroying themselves?

Some may have. Maybe they stayed until the Flood died off, and then jumped out.
They must have been a massive race to have built what we have found so far and what we speculate exists.
Could they not have left and are living on one of the undiscovered worlds?

[GLuebben]

Good point:

Halo 2: Level 15 "The Great Journey" - Chapter 4 "Delusions and Grandeur"

ARBITER (to the Monitor):

The sacred rings... what are they?

343 GUILTY SPARK:

Weapons of last resort, built by the Forerunners to eliminate potential Flood hosts, thereby rendering the parasite harmless.

ARBITER:

And those who made the rings? What happened to the Forerunners?

343 GUILTY SPARK:

After exhausting every other strategic option, my creators activated the rings. They, and all additional sentient life in three radii of the galactic center, died ...as planned.

If 343 Guilty Spark is only familiar with what was proposed to be the "infection array" and perhaps its galaxy, he would only know that Forerunner died within that galaxy's center, right? So, perhaps, maybe some Forerunner were preserved on Earth and these messages are meant for them.

[endejas]

Since Halo 1, I've always speculated that the firing of the Halos was done by one person. 343 Guilty Spark, on Two Betrayals says:

Last time, you asked me, if it was my choice, would I do it? Having considerable time to ponder your query, my answer has not changed.

I always wondered why the original Reclaimer would hesitate on firing the Array. Of course you'd be wiping the galactic slate clean, but such a person would be determined of his job.

Then there's the whole Shield Worlds. It seems, according to my interpretation of Ghosts of Onyx, that the Forerunner had every intent to stay alive. Structures like the Ark and Onyx only solidify my point.

[Anzio_katarin]

I always wondered why the original Reclaimer would hesitate on firing the Array. Of course you'd be wiping the galactic slate clean, but such a person would be determined of his job.

Then there's the whole Shield Worlds. It seems, according to my interpretation of Ghosts of Onyx, that the Forerunner had every intent to stay alive. Structures like the Ark and Onyx only solidify my point.

Well any being of conscience would certainly have some remorse for wiping out everyone and probably everything they knew. Firing squads down through the years were storied to have a blank in one of the guns, chosen at random, so members of the squad could tell themselves "I had the blank"

Any of the old nuclear doomsday scenerios back the days of MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction) has people going to a fallout shelters to wait out the time until we could repopulate the Earth.

It's interesting that the scenerio of one Halo firing, fires them all. Seems like a lack of failsafe system on a doomsday device. One renegade gets their hands on the key and wipes out eveything, Not just their part of the galaxy, but everything. Makes for a great story though

[VectorScalar]

Interesting points, MHYoshimitzu. It got me thinking:

What if the Flood were created by the Forerunners, but then got loose (think 28 days later)? The Forerunners tried to fix their mistake and built the Halo system while trying other methods. Things get screwed up at the end and the forerunners who were supposed to 'ride in the ark' were infected by the flood. AdjutantReflex was simply an AI running the ark who acted as a 'failsafe' and activated the Halos...before the Forerunners had planned, but according to their wishes.

AR might be trying to be creative about how to handle the 'awakening' of the Gravemind by contacting present-day humans, since the forerunners aren't present.

Of course, why program monitors to see humans as reclaimers if the plan is to live through the Halo firing in the arks?

[Kfc21]

If the humans were supposed to find and continue the forerunner's work, doesn't that make the title Reclaimer make a lot more sense now?

[MHYoshimitzu]

Since Halo 1, I've always speculated that the firing of the Halos was done by one person. 343 Guilty Spark, on Two Betrayals says:

Last time, you asked me, if it was my choice, would I do it? Having considerable time to ponder your query, my answer has not changed.

I always wondered why the original Reclaimer would hesitate on firing the Array. Of course you'd be wiping the galactic slate clean, but such a person would be determined of his job.

Then there's the whole Shield Worlds. It seems, according to my interpretation of Ghosts of Onyx, that the Forerunner had every intent to stay alive. Structures like the Ark and Onyx only solidify my point.

If the Forerunner truly wanted to make the Flood harmless, they would eliminate everyone and everything the Flood could get its hands on and use as a host. Guilty Spark even says so in Halo 2.

These Shield Worlds... what are they, really? Would a race who has "exhausted every other strategic option" really still believe that they could save themselves, after all the failures and hopelessness? I wonder if the Shield Worlds are merely remnants of a solution the Forerunner had tried before, and the events of Ghost of Onyx was merely an early defense against the Flood, a failed solution.

[endejas]

Yes, but it's a conclusion that would come both ways. Either the Forerunner wiped the galaxy clean by firing the Halos, or they would let the Flood wipe out the galaxy and then starve.

I think the Forerunner's plan was to accelerate the process and save the species that they could save. Humanity, the Covenant client-species, developing species with no knowledge of the Flood would be allowed to live as others perished in the Flood pulse.

My theory on the actual firing of the Halos being the work of one person branches from the evidence I've posted above. I'm thinking the plan to activate the Halos was to go through, and they were close to going through with it, but not exactly ready yet. The Forerunner (and any other intelligent species allied with them) were still in space when one lone Reclaimer went on to 04 and convinced Guilty Spark that containment was necessary.

Maybe he knew that if the Forerunner were to survive they would continue to experiment with the Flood. Of course this is all my own speculation, but I really think it's extremely viable.