Six old Halo fics
Apr. 29th, 2019 09:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
general_radixI mentioned these on my old tumblog and on the Pfhorums, but didn't get much of a response, IIRC. I'm also currently at a loss for what else to talk about at the moment. XD;
All six are by Apeman and were posted to halo.bungie.org between January 2000 and September 2001. The first set is comprised of "Of Gods and Heroes", "Untitled", and "Untitled 2"; the second, "Bracelet of Gods", "The Mantled Wings of Angels", and"The Desperation of Dreams". The first set deals very heavily in speculative Marathon/Halo connections, and while the second is more rooted in actual H:CE, they were still written prior to its release, and some Marathon elements remain.
The last times I linked to these, I wanted to hold off discussion until other folks had commented, but I think this time I'll stick some of my thoughts under the cut to try and actually get discussion going. XD;
* One connecting element between both sets are the Sons of the Jjaro, one of their engineered species who have an interest in Installation 04; they're allied with the crew of the crashed Pillar of Autumn. The Sons clearly aren't the S'pht, though I'm not sure if they were based on a cut Halo beast, were meant to be the Nakh, or were wholly original.
* The possibility is brought up that Installation 04 might be a red herring, with the Covenant's real interest lying in the star it orbits. Hopefully not because a W'rk was sealed in it...
* Cortana is described in the first set as frequently rambling about ancient myths and societies, and seems to share many memories and experiences with Durandal despite her existence not entering the records until long after the Lh'owon campaign. The protagonist knows that something's up, and at one point speculates that Cortana and Durandal might be the same entity; it seems to not actually be the case, but they do seem to have an anima/animus thing going on, and I suspect that Apeman did intend for them to be directly connected.
* Speaking of the protagonist, he shares the Security Officer's habit of having weird dreams and being very efficient in combat (implicitly)...because he IS the Security Officer, suffering from an inconvenient bout of amnesia. As soon as he realizes that Robert Blake (oh yeah, Blake's present on Installation 04, too) could be carrying some part of Durandal--presumably his primal pattern--Durandal pops in to jog his memory.
* Like most pre-H:CE fics, Cortana has a bit more mobility here, as she boards another ship in "Untitled 2". Presumably, she comes back to aid Master Chief later; given the above revelation, the possibility mentioned below, and her obvious reverence for the "Tenth Mjolnir", I wonder if she was meant to have ulterior motives for doing so like in most other theories.
* The second set of stories mostly follows a group of normal Marines as they try to survive the Covenant forces. These fics were written closer to H:CE's release, so maybe by then it was clear who you'd play as, but it seems that a lot of folks were expecting the final game to focus on the Marines, with Master Chief as a very powerful supporting character (the E3 2000 trailer certainly implied it).
These fics weren't so close to release that it was clear that Master Chief isn't a cyborg, or at least not quite a battleroid, because he's primarily described as "the cyborg" here. Maybe he was also meant to be the first set's protag and also the SO? (I'll bet you anything, the E3 2000 trailer was just old enough that "MC = SO" was still part of the plan...)
Also: if anyone wants to comb HBO/its forum archives for any speculative tidbits I might've missed, please share them here! (Even if I turn out to have already seen them, I'm always up for debate. XD)
All six are by Apeman and were posted to halo.bungie.org between January 2000 and September 2001. The first set is comprised of "Of Gods and Heroes", "Untitled", and "Untitled 2"; the second, "Bracelet of Gods", "The Mantled Wings of Angels", and"The Desperation of Dreams". The first set deals very heavily in speculative Marathon/Halo connections, and while the second is more rooted in actual H:CE, they were still written prior to its release, and some Marathon elements remain.
The last times I linked to these, I wanted to hold off discussion until other folks had commented, but I think this time I'll stick some of my thoughts under the cut to try and actually get discussion going. XD;
* One connecting element between both sets are the Sons of the Jjaro, one of their engineered species who have an interest in Installation 04; they're allied with the crew of the crashed Pillar of Autumn. The Sons clearly aren't the S'pht, though I'm not sure if they were based on a cut Halo beast, were meant to be the Nakh, or were wholly original.
* The possibility is brought up that Installation 04 might be a red herring, with the Covenant's real interest lying in the star it orbits. Hopefully not because a W'rk was sealed in it...
* Cortana is described in the first set as frequently rambling about ancient myths and societies, and seems to share many memories and experiences with Durandal despite her existence not entering the records until long after the Lh'owon campaign. The protagonist knows that something's up, and at one point speculates that Cortana and Durandal might be the same entity; it seems to not actually be the case, but they do seem to have an anima/animus thing going on, and I suspect that Apeman did intend for them to be directly connected.
* Speaking of the protagonist, he shares the Security Officer's habit of having weird dreams and being very efficient in combat (implicitly)...because he IS the Security Officer, suffering from an inconvenient bout of amnesia. As soon as he realizes that Robert Blake (oh yeah, Blake's present on Installation 04, too) could be carrying some part of Durandal--presumably his primal pattern--Durandal pops in to jog his memory.
* Like most pre-H:CE fics, Cortana has a bit more mobility here, as she boards another ship in "Untitled 2". Presumably, she comes back to aid Master Chief later; given the above revelation, the possibility mentioned below, and her obvious reverence for the "Tenth Mjolnir", I wonder if she was meant to have ulterior motives for doing so like in most other theories.
* The second set of stories mostly follows a group of normal Marines as they try to survive the Covenant forces. These fics were written closer to H:CE's release, so maybe by then it was clear who you'd play as, but it seems that a lot of folks were expecting the final game to focus on the Marines, with Master Chief as a very powerful supporting character (the E3 2000 trailer certainly implied it).
These fics weren't so close to release that it was clear that Master Chief isn't a cyborg, or at least not quite a battleroid, because he's primarily described as "the cyborg" here. Maybe he was also meant to be the first set's protag and also the SO? (I'll bet you anything, the E3 2000 trailer was just old enough that "MC = SO" was still part of the plan...)
Also: if anyone wants to comb HBO/its forum archives for any speculative tidbits I might've missed, please share them here! (Even if I turn out to have already seen them, I'm always up for debate. XD)
no subject
Date: 2019-04-30 04:15 am (UTC)All of these fics are intriguing and refer heavily on the E3 trailer. Especially with Master Chief's voice being robotic and referencing Cortana at the end. The Cortana letters helped influencing the fans into believing she was a rampant A.I. like Durandal.
From what I've seen of Bungie's early work of Halo. There were going to be more Marathon tie ins than what came into being. The Drinniols from Marathon were supposed to be in the game. The sprites still exist!
The Drinniols and the Covenant were supposed to be another section of the Pfhor Empire humanity had to fight off while still learning how to travel faster than light.
The game itself was supposed to be a RTS game like Myth. It would of had more vehicles, animals, and weapons for the marines. Jason Jones then decided to make the game an over the shoulder shooter but the team couldn't get the weapons to aim and fire properly in a PVP battle. So they had to tweak the game again to make it first person shooter. @_@
As for the story... Bungie had to shorten it enormously to fit the time restraints Microsoft demanded. So all of the extra Marathon backstory was cut. But the little details did remain for the fans!
A Mark 4 cyborg? Too 1995! You are now playing a "Look a Mark 5!" "Bad Cyborg!"
"They're everywhere!" Bobs.
"The Master Chief has gone Rampart! Take him down boys!"
The Marathon logo is literally everywhere in the Halo game...
The connections are all there. But Halo turned from a possible Marathon Universe into it's own enormous universe filled with Forerunners, Precursors, Prometheans, and Flood.
Best to reload that shotgun, it's time to dive feet first into hell. ^_^
no subject
Date: 2019-04-30 12:43 pm (UTC)