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Fury Three (fury@satx.rr.com) writes:
Earlier today I was wandering around the swamp and hills of 343 Guilty Spark, intrigued by the Flood's early appearances near the complex entrance. After riding the Pelican onto the ridge, I found some interest in the strange glowing trees in the area. The color of the glowing spots reminded me (Rather hauntingly) of something, as it does everyone: Flood.
The plant life's resemblance to Flood gave me an idea--What if the Flood evolved on their own within Halo, in this swampland particularly? Most theories say the Flood were found/created/etc., then the Halos were built to contain them. What if the Forerunner created Halo as an experiment, to see what kind of life would develop in the ring's evironment, and kept a significant population on it to do the research? There's any number of reasons they undertook this experiment--To learn to develop anything from exotic plants to real estate to biological weapons. Anwyay, something did evolve, consuming the Forerunners--The Flood. After a number of infections, the Forerunner contain some Flood infections for study, exterminate the rest, and the Flood become top research priority. Again, there's any number of reasons they did this: For the sake of science as part of an effort to better understand life, to determine what went wrong in their giant ring-farm's evolutionary fast lane, or perhaps even to utilize the Flood as a weapon.
By now the Forerunner were well aware of how dangerous the Flood are, and built a weapon into Halo, so that if the Flood escaped they could be destroyed before getting anywhere. The key to this weapon was placed in tight security, to keep the Flood from getting to it. After some time the Forerunner complete or abandon the Flood project, put the Flood in permanent containment in case they need to do more with them later, and leave Halo, apparently forever. Before leaving, they set up a network of AI constructs--Sentinels, led by the Monitor, 343 Guilty Spark. Perhaps the Monitor's role lives up to it's namesake, and he was supposed to call home if the Flood escaped by some chance, while the Sentinels held them off as best they could. But as we all know, in the 100,000-plus years that follow, GS goes insane.
The Forerunner's long scientific presence may explain why there are no signs warning of the Flood in the compound on 343 GS (And presumably elsewhere, as Cortana brings up in AotCR), because anyone working there would be there to study the Flood, and the facility/ies the Flood were located in were probably sealed up to the point where you'd have to use a good deal of force to get in--why put a warning sign up for the contents on the other side of some 50 inches of tempered glass, locked airtight blast doors, and metal?
Why, indeed? Who would have expected a cyborg warrior to show up bristling with weapons and grenades? ;-)
The mention of the Monitor's possible "call home" intrigues me. What if he did call home? What if his masters sent someone or something out to him? We weren't there much longer after the Flood got out, could it be that the alarm has been raised? Are the Forerunner on their way? Time will tell...
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-mnemesis
