At the end of Halo 4, when chief faces the Didact it seems he would of been squeezed to death by the Didact’s magic hands. This does not happen though because Cortana come to the rescue in the form of some of her fractured personalities.
My question is how does Cortana restrain the Didact long enough for Chief to finish him. I don’t think any other AI would be capable of this so how does she do it?
My first theorie is that due to the fact they were on a hard-light bridge, she used the hard-light itself to physically grab the Didact. One problem with this theorie is that Cortana’s AI chip was supposedly destroyed in the console once it got vaporized. I do suppose that she could of stayed in the forerunner ship’s system and figured put how to control the bridge.
My second theorie is that Cortana went through Metastability after the console along with her AI chip was vaporized. Once an AI goes through Metastability, they can be considered fully human but no AI was ever reported to have achieved this besides 05-032 Mendicant Bias and Cortana (its strongly suggested that Cortana did achieve Metastability after seeing Halo 4’s ending). I’m bringing up Metastability because due to fact we know so little about it that it might have other side effects on AI’s like enhancing their capabilities, almost like making them a super AI who are able to make physical contact with the world. We do know that Cortana can touch things now because she touches chief’s chest piece in the ending of the game, so it might be possible she was physically manipulating the Didact due to her supposed Metastability.
I would like to read your theories and opinions on this and to read what you think about my personal theories.
Thank you
> My first theorie is that due to the fact they were on a hard-light bridge, she used the hard-light itself to physically grab the Didact. One problem with this theorie is that Cortana’s AI chip was supposedly destroyed in the console once it got vaporized. I do suppose that she could of stayed in the forerunner ship’s system and figured put how to control the bridge.
Bam, there you go.
Yeah, pretty sure it’s hard light. It’s also how she can surround the Chief in that protective box at the end in order to save his life, and how she can finally touch him.
Yep, it’s the hard light aspect. Evidently the Didact’s ship’s security systems sucked badly enough to allow a Human AI into the system without any issue. Didact admits he knows she’s in the system, his only solution is to blow up the AI pedestal that conveniently allows for a Human AI chip to be plugged in.
Once Cortana’s in the system, she somehow takes control over the bridge’s hard light projectors-- Along with her rampant personalities, which she evidently also has some form of control over-- and uses it to restrain the Didact. Hard light is shown in the Halo universe to be remarkably resilient, when you consider that a Warthog is the size of an Abrams tank, and when you consider the sheer weight of a Scorpion.
So the idea that the Didact is incapable of breaking Cortana’s hold is pretty realistic, although it begs the question of why she didn’t offer the Chief a helping hand or anything to get him back up. Took all of her concentration, maybe. In the end, though, the Didact does break her hold on him, assuming that she doesn’t just relinquish it, given that he attempts to Force Choke you one last time before the grenade goes off.
Cortana being able to touch the Chief at the end is a result of the same technology, although it raises more questions than it answers. Like how a hard light box can protect someone from a nuke that they’re holding, or how the hard light box could be manifested given that the projectors were destroyed. And that’s just considering the Cortana aspect of things.
In Catherine Halsey’s journal, there are missing pages that you come across right after she writes about failing with the testing/use of fractals within an AI construct… perhaps upon a second or third testing, she was able to succeed somehow, and applied this [somewhat prototype] technology onto Cortana’s AI matrix as a backburner to be picked up later?
Perhaps Cortana, after being bombarded by the Gravemind (and catching glimpses of what is seemingly an intact Domain), and while rummaging through the Forerunner ship’s systems (AIs can do a lot of tasks at once, in mere seconds), she was able to reach metastability by shifting her AI consciousness into a slipspace fractal?
tl;tr This was a poor summation of the theories going about in my brain lol.
Also, from Haruspis:
A shard of Cortana enters the Ur-Didact’s armor.
AIs can be split into multiple fragments (or shards), at the will of a human/creator, or by the AI itself (BlackBox, from the Kilo-Five trilogy, splits himself multiple times for various reasons). Are we seeing a shard of Cortana slip into the Ur-D’s armor while the rest of her (in hard light manifestation), distracts the Ur-D himself?
A quote from the linked article above: “The lore nerd within me is also squealing over the potential for a scene where John and Mendicant Bias meet the Ur-Didact and Cortana.”
We’ve got a wild-speculation-errant-rant thread over here that has just touched on this piece of lore also, among other crazy ideas.
