Guilty Spark: A Story of Finding Purpose | From Human, to Monitor, to Immortal

[Music] 343 guilty spark is a character as old as the franchise itself and one of its most important first encountered right after the introduction of the flood spark acted as a guide and information dump device for the player initially an ally sparks true motivations are soon revealed as he turns on the chief only to later become an ally and then an enemy all over again with the conclusion of halo 3 it was thought that spark's story was over however his story had only just begun when halo kryptum the first book of the 4runner saga released in 2010 fans were introduced to dozens of new concepts and characters along with them the ancient human chakus halo primordium would continue chakas's story along with the revelation that cheikas would not only become 343 guilty spark but had survived the events of halo 3 and with the release of halo point of light earlier this year we now have a complete story for spark at least for the moment so today i thought we'd recount spark's story from start to finish ten thousand years after the forerunners had put down an ancient space-faring humanity and devolved them into more primitive forms humans of earth called airdaytyrin at the time had recovered considerably thanks in part to the machinations of the librarian the being that would eventually become 343 guilty spark was originally one of these humans a boy of the homonym species or homo sapiens named chakus he originally lived with his family on a farm outside of morontic the largest city of its day like all newborns he received a geish or jean song a genetic imprint with instructions and sometimes memories that activated when certain predetermined conditions are met sadly early in his life chigus's father was killed by thugs working for a water baron their crops failed soon after forcing chekas his sisters and mother to move to morontic there while his sisters joined the temple of the life shaper as prayer maidens jages would have to make a living doing menial tasks and running cons according to cheikas his less than legitimate activities were all in service to bringing his sisters back home from the temple soon after moving into the city jacobs began having dreams of him attacking and robbing a forerunner and it wasn't long after what another human a member of the diminutive chamanoon species or homofloresciensis approached him known as riser this florian claimed to have had dreams of cheikas the result of his own geish and offered the young troublemaker work and guidance cheykas accepted and the two became fast friends when he was not yet 20 years of age cheikas met what may have been his first forerunner a visitor named born stellar makes eternal lasting or born stellar for short i set out to trick him it was the worst mistake of my young life the young forerunner had come to earth seeking precursor relics and chagus and ryzer were hired to guide born stellar to the jamonkin crater an ancient site nearby that ryzer's people had been visiting for millennia here the gesho within cheikas and ryzer activated awakening the died act the once proud leader of the forerunner military a thousand years before he had lost a political battle over how to deal with the flood a parasitic life form that the ancient human empire had seemingly defeated eons ago one that the forerunners knew would return in his defeat the didact had entered exile his place of rest moved to earth by his wife the forerunner who placed geisha in humans like chagus and ryzer the librarian with the didact now awakened he set out to determine what had happened to the galaxy during his exile dragging born stellar chakus and reiser along with him sensing a larger plan by the librarian they discovered that the flood had arrived in the milky way 300 years prior and though forerunners had largely kept the threat contained it was beginning to push forward eventually however the group is caught by the master builder faber the didact's old political rival and leader of the builder cast within forerunner society faber separates the group sending chagus and ryzer to one of his halo installations gyre 11 where he had ordered experiments on humans with the flood during the old conflict between humanity and the forerunners during which the flood had first appeared on the scene humanity had seemingly developed a vaccine against the flood a way to effectively fight it faber hoped to discover this secret on the ring jakus and ryzer encountered the descendants of humans who had been taken from earth decades prior and learn of the master builders atrocities worse he had brought an ancient captive known as the primordial or timeless one to the ring this being had first been discovered by ancient humanity during their war with the forerunners and according to some accounts had helped in developing the cure for the flood once sealed away it was accidentally released by faber during a test firing of a halo ring then brought to the halo for interrogation the interrogation would be carried out by a powerful ancilla or a.i a contender class called mendicant bias created by both the master builder and the died act it was intended to coordinate the foreign response against the flood in its interactions with the primordial however mendicant turned against its creators and joined the side of the flood jakus and ryzer were captured by these two for the purpose of saving the halo ring they now resided on the ring had enacted a security protocol in response to mendicant using the halo against the forerunners which would cause it to crash into a planet to avoid this mendicant and the primordial were gathering humans and connecting them directly to halo systems hoping to steer the halo past the planet further imprints of ancient humans who had once fought the forerunners were stored in the genetics of these humans these imprints were brutally removed with a device called the composer and placed in monitor bodies these imprints were offered the chance to fight the forerunners once again by joining the flood at least some accepted this offer right as this was occurring born stuller arrives at the ring though not as his old self during the journey with the died act born stellar had been imprinted with the didex knowledge and memories part of an ad hoc version of the maturation ritual all forerunners undergo this process had been altered by the plans of the librarian turning bourne stellar into a perfect copy of the didact whom had since gone missing now referred to as the iso didact he fights off the flood on the ring shuts down mendicant bias and tries to save the humans unfortunately the trauma endured on the ring in particular the interrogation by mendigan bias and his exposure to the composer had left chigus's body ravaged and on the verge of death to save his friend the iso died act uses the composer once more turning cheikas into a digital essence an ai and placing him in a monitor body as soon as the process is complete now monitor cheikas joins the iso didact for an interrogation with the primordial originally claiming to be the last precursor the primordial had since merged with the flood becoming a gravemind the iso didact asked about the flood the cure and their plans the primordial revealed that no cure existed that during the war between ancient humans and forerunners what had looked like a treatment for the flood was a strategic retreat the torture of humans on the rain carried out under the primordial's direction seemingly to search for human resistance to the flood was simply the flood expressing its joy for misery in a fit of rage the iso died act activates the time prison the primordial was held in forcing it to experience billions of years in a few seconds killing its body only later would it be discovered that since the primordial had merged with the flood its consciousness would live on as part of the greater flood consciousness with halo gyre 11 recovered and now relabeled installation zero seven its human inhabitants would be moved to a new location and monitor chakus would be put in charge of their care he would occasionally work on other projects such as the conversion of the threshold gas mine into a flood research facility however it wouldn't even be a decade later that chigus's life changed once more several years after becoming a monitor the flood had pushed through much of the orion arm of the galaxy and four runners were on their last legs as what was left a forerunner society gathered preparing for the firing of the final halo array tragedy would strike the original died act corrupted by the flood would use the composer on many of the humans under chakus's care only a few saved thanks to cheikas quick actions he would also save the iso didact as the flood closed in around them bringing the forerunner and humans to installation zero zero the ark here the iso died act put chekis in charge of installation 0-4 giving him the new name of 343 guilty spark and compartmentalizing his memories in case i was ever captured by the plot as his new life begins to take hold the iso didact asks cheikas whether he would choose to fire the rings if it were up to him cheikas says yes that they had no choice then departs for his new home the halos fire and the galaxy is lifeless for a time on installation zero four the newly minted monitor 343 guilty spark begins his pre-assigned tasks the halo ring is repopulated using indexed genetic samples gathered during the fight against the flood and flood research using samples stored on the ring continues as best it can as time passes guilty spark loses contact with the other six halo installations and their monitors receiving particularly distressing reports from 2401 pendleton tangent towards the end now completely alone spark only has his tasks at hand but even those eventually run dry he tries spending time in hibernation but even this grows boring the early signs of rampancy ai degradation begin to take root during an experiment testing the ring's recovery ability after exposure to the vacuum of space an unknown alien vessel lands on the ring per protocol guilty spark neutralized the leaking atmosphere jammed any communications and simply waited to see if anything would emerge nothing ever did and the ship was contained within a large sarcophagus lamenting the outcome of these events guilty sparks swears that next time will be different and according to statements from guilty spark himself he would allow sapient beings to land on the ring and record observations in the future but say for such rare happenings he would remain alone finally in 2552 ce major activity finally came to installation 0-4 on september 19 the unsc pillar of autumn appeared near the ring opposed by a fleet of ships belonging to an alien religious hegemony called the covenant fearing damage to his installation from these unknown warring factions guilty spark initially broadcasts a warning to stay back however upon discovering the human vessel spark prepares a safe passage for the autumn to land sadly the message is never received and the autumn is forced to crash on halo the covenant meanwhile managed to land forces on the ring and begin exploring the superstructure the halos represented the ultimate goal of the covenant what they believed to be the tools used by foreigners to achieve godhood and left behind for others to follow in their footsteps and to that end the covenant sends search patrols across the ring for a moment guilty sparks seemed content to ignore the covenant but as they explored deeper and deeper into the ring they began to risk unleashing the flood guilty spark attempted to make contact with the covenant reaching out to one of their ai and warning of what the ring held but it was no good when the flood was finally unleashed he began seeking out a reclaimer a human with the librarian's jean song to activate the halo ring and trigger the rest of the array the first reclaimer spark attempted to recruit was sergeant marvin mobuto who sadly died during his trek through installation 04's library guilty spark's second attempt would prove more successful recruiting an augmented human soldier a spartan 2 known as john 117 the master chief guiding the green armored titan the pair is able to recover installation of forest index from the library and bring it to halo's control room when the master chief attempts to activate the ring he is stopped by his ai companion cortana plugged into halo's control systems the day before the spartan had been forced to leave her when he was rushed out to try and save jacob keys captain of the pillar of autumn cortana explains the true deadly purpose of halo after which the spartan refuses to activate the ring with no other choice guilty spark sends his sentinels after the spartan and ai to recover the activation index save his head dispose of the rest in the meantime the monitor begins to explore other options including trying to recruit the covenant to work with him however upon discovering the chief in cortana's plan to blow the pillar of autumn's engines and destroy halo guilty spark does all he can to stop the reclaimer he is unsuccessful and installation 0-4 is destroyed the ring ripping itself apart after the autumn's destruction destabilizes its spin escaping the destruction guilty spark heads for the nearby gas mine of threshold the gas giant installation 04 once orbited upon arriving the monitor is surprised to find a contingent of covenant troops artifact hunting squads deployed during the battle of installation zero four initially attacked by the few kig yar in the group spark begins vaporizing them before a sangheili warrior cuts the kick yard down and apologizes for the transgression at guilty spark's request the sangheili brings the monitor to his commander cecil refumey simply meaning to follow protocol and explain the present situation guilty spark reveals the true nature of the halo array shattering cessna's beliefs and prompting the sangheli and his followers to break off from the covenant after attempting to broadcast this newly discovered truth covenant leadership sent an arbiter a mighty sangheli warrior after cesa and his followers this arbiter makes quick work of the heretics and spark is captured by the covenant brought to the covenant's leadership three high prophets of the sanshiyum race the prophet's probe and prod guilty spark eventually forcing him to reveal how to activate a halo ring and where a ring's index can be recovered from and it wouldn't be long after that the covenant discovered a new halo installation zero five and another fight between them and humanity broke out on its surface unlike on installation zero four the flooding on installation zero five had been free for some time enough time to build a grave mind a compound central intelligence for the flood with access to the flood's total collective knowledge past and present when fighting broke out the flood soon followed even spreading to the covenant's nearby holy city station of high charity as the flood continued to spread guilty spark was brought to installation zero five's control room along with its activation index and forced to watch as the halo was activated luckily a new alliance between humans and sangili born from a betrayal of covenant leadership who tried to replace the sangheili with the vicious gerald hanai allowed commander miranda keys to stop the activation of halo as she had removed the index in the middle of the ring's charging sequence however the rings sent out a standby signal to all other installations now guilty spark explained the array could only be activated from the ark and the only way to get to the ark was a portal on earth with earth already under attack and the prophet of truth now the last of the covenant's high prophets on his way miranda keys the sangheili arbiter and remaining human forces on installation zero five rushed back to earth meanwhile guilty spark remained at installation zero five coordinating with the newly formed sanghili fleet of retribution to contain the flood outbreak on the ring the surface of the ring would be burned with coveted plasma and any ships attempting to escape would be shot down the fleet was largely successful but when a single ship slipped by and headed for earth the fleet and guilty spark pursued on earth the monitor was reunited with the master chief the reclaimer he had once tried to kill protocol dictated my response the ship that had broken through the fleet of retribution's blockade around installation of five contained a message from cortana a message uncovered with guilty sparks help it spoke of a solution for the flood at the ark one that wouldn't require the remaining halo rings the covenant had successfully activated the portal to the ark and the sanghili with some human support followed arriving at the ark guilty spark did what he could to support the unsc and sangili forces with his compartmentalized memories spark had little knowledge of the ark itself nor the authority to command its systems however he soon discovered evidence of one of the ark's various functions replacing lost halo rings as the unsc and sangili made their final push against the covenant the flood arrive on the ark traveling there using the former holy city of high charity for a brief time it forms an alliance with the master chief and the arbiter to stop the activation of the halo rings upon their success however the flood returns to its normal behavior almost immediately after escaping the flood's betrayal the master chief discovers the replacement halo ring and decides to light it to wipe out the flood on the ark then we are agreed while spark oversees the final preparations for the ring the chief works to recover cortana who still holds the activation index from installation 0-4 from the ruins of high charity when the spartan and his allies arrive guilty spark notes that the installation requires a few more days to safely fire but his warnings are ignored never minding that it would violate protocols guilty spark would not see his ring destroyed once again and lashed out however he was no match for the spartan using a spartan laser the master chief was able to crack guilty sparks casing and seemingly destroy him as the ring activated however 343 guilty sparks core remained intact enough saving the monitor from destruction and awakening his sealed memories in november 2553 the unsc detects a transmission from the ark and sends the unsc rubicon to investigate the rubicon discovers the remains of guilty spark bringing them aboard spark relates his history to the ship's crew biding time as he infiltrates their systems and takes control of the ship believing that the librarian was still alive spark departs for shield world 0-459 the etran harborage to retrieve an upgrade seed capable of upgrading an existing ship with forerunner tech it would be necessary for the trip ahead as he departs spark leaves behind a record of this story as told to the crew which would be recovered by the unsc unfortunately for spark the harborage had been destroyed more than 20 years before by the unsc spirit of fire not that it would matter as a complication in transit caused the rubicon to crash land on a former forerunner world called gyronose a while spark was able to transfer his mind into an armored a bipedal android the rest of the rubicon crew perished in the crash after burying the dead spark sets up a distress signal spark would end up spending three years on gyronose a finally found by a group of human salvagers and outlaws led by one ryan forge after being recovered and introducing himself to an understandably shocked crew spark is able to work out a deal in exchange for helping the salvagers who are currently being chased by humanity's office of naval intelligence or oni they would help spark with his goal with the etron harborage out of the question spark brings the salvagers and their ship the ace of spades to another forerunner world trinil recovering in upgrade seeds spark uses it on the ace of spades giving it a forerunner overhaul with the upgraded ship the crew is able to sneak into a 4runner complex beneath mount kilimanjaro on earth as they reach the end oni operatives find them spark abandons the salvagers in a dire moment entering a life worker pod only to discover an imprint of the librarian a copy of her mind not the living being spark is disappointed but asks if there is any way to reunite with his old friends from 100 000 years ago the librarian instead helps spark see the value in his new friends then leaves him with a gift before departing for the absolute record spark returns to save his friends and they escape from earth though now is top of the list fugitives wanted by the unsc months later the crew of the ace of spades had been searching for the unsc spirit of fire the ship ryan forge's father had served on during their time on earth spark had recalled the fate of the ship having come across records of it at some point during his time as 343 guilty spark he had agreed to help ryan search for her father but they were now at a dead end having grown close with the ace of spades crew spark requests they follow up on the gift given to him by the librarian a key of sorts pointing at halo installation 0-7 the crew agrees and they depart making a quick trip to the ring thanks to their forwarder upgrades finding the halo's silent cartographer the key is inserted into the console revealing new coordinates and a new key at spark's suggestion ryan puts the keys together they merge and a portal opens sucking ryan in with no hope of preventing her from being pulled through spark grabs the key hoping that coordinates it contains would lead them to ryan it doesn't however bringing them to the human colony world of new carthage and pointing to a location beneath the headquarters of hannibal weapons systems one of humanity's largest weapon manufacturers the crew and spark work together to sneak into hannibal and access the 4runner facility beneath the building only to find yet another map in key fragment but no ryan before they have much time to process this however the group are discovered by oni the crew ensures spark is able to escape new carthage knowing that he is best suited to save ryan wherever she may be before separating they make plans to meet up in two weeks the crew making spark promise not to return for them until those two weeks were up it isn't long before spark finds his friend the new coordinates leading him to the same world ryan was brought to erebus 7 a world with a particularly nasty form of intelligent and carnivorous life the planet had once been studied by the unsc but the research teams eventually stopped communicating as did remote contact teams sent to investigate as it turns out ryan had been saved by a few unsc survivors from these teams when spark arrives to retrieve ryan they briefly moved the unsc survivors to a nearby outpost returning to arabis 7 spark filling in ryan on what she's missed they decide they can't do much for their comrades on new carthage at the moment so ryan and spark finish their quest arriving at yet another 4runner facility the pair are confronted by a monitor known as the precept it had been watching and judging them and now deemed them worthy of what the key truly unlocked bastion a forerunner shield world hidden from most other forerunners bastion contained the final secret of the librarian a way to reseed the precursors eons before ancient forerunners had waged a war of genocide against their creators the precursors however two managed to survive and hide away aided by forerunners who had refused to take part in the slaughter though these precursors would die their bodies germinated becoming seeds for the future the bastion project intended to move these seeds to another galaxy where they could bloom untainted arriving at bastion spark and ryan meet with three ai fragments of imprints of once-living forerunners one more ai the true imprint of a forerunner named keeper of tools arrived soon after having been trapped on another shield world called genesis upon arriving keeper prepares the starship eden which carries the precursor seeds for launch unable to trust the other ai fragments with bastion's remaining secrets keeper offers the job of monitor to spark a job spark readily accepts though he is sad to part ways with his new friends with ryan and the ace of spades crew he feels he cannot sit idly by while those around him eventually fade away spark is functionally immortal while his friends are not being monitor of bastion would give him a new purpose and though he was a monitor once more this time it is his choice after seeing ryan forge off one last time bastian makes a slip space jump to a new unknown location its secret's now safe with the monitor simply known as spark and that concludes the current story of 343 guilty spark from his time as a human then a monitor then monitor again when spark was first resurrected in halo primordium i can't say i was exactly happy about it but i was intrigued with the potential story we might get of course when both halo 4 and halo 5 came and went with nary a mention of guilty spark or cheikas my attitude towards the resurrection soured i hate resurrecting characters thought dead and i hate it all the more when nothing comes of it spark just sat in limbo for years finally however halo renegades and point of light after that came along and continued spark's story and character arc it explored the mind of a former human who had been forced to live for millennia while everything around him crumbled away and how such a mind would deal with that loss and loneliness and it gave spark a new purpose i don't know if there are any plans for him beyond point of light at this time and if there weren't i'd almost be content with that spark's story feels complete now and while i wouldn't mind seeing him once more i'd also be fine if this was his conclusion now before we wrap up there is one thing i need to address from the video you'll recall where i mentioned sparks seemingly being fine with the covenant exploring installation 0-4 and having previously let alien beings land on the ring this comes from conversations from the universe a bonus included with halo 2. aeons of inactivity and perfect stability then everything happens all at once a primitive homogenizing swarm calling itself the covenant has landed on installation four apparently seeking something specific exploring meddling i have seen it all before they'll record what they see and then they'll leave these statements would seem to conflict with sparks behavior in cea's terminals where he actually threatens the pillar of autumn with destruction before discovering the ship to be human it's hard to reconcile these two sources but i did the best i could 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Channel: Halo Canon

Views: 185,384

Keywords: halo, canon, CE, combat, evolved, anniversary, Halo1, bungie, 343, 343i, Guilty, Spark, xbox, 360, gaming, Halo (series), Halo: Reach (Video Game), Video Game (Industry), Master, Chief, Cortana, official, ToaFreak, Toa, Freak, Lore, didact, librarian, forerunner, One, CEA, ODST, Orbital, Drop, Shock, Trooper, books, comics, games, Halo 3 (video Game)

Id: T74FJMCvvik

Length: 27min 46sec (1666 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 15 2021