A New Gravemind
Chapter One: Atonement
A.N. This is an edit of the first chapter of A New Gravemind, in order to make it a bit more cannon compliant.
I do not own Halo. All rights to Halo and any related media is the property of 343 Industries and Microsoft Studios.
Chapter One: Prologue
I was normal like you once.
Like you I had family and friends, superiors and subordinates, teachers and peers, allies and enemies. I went to school, studied history, math, science, music, art, and literature. I grew and changed just as you do. I was nothing special, nothing unique, or so I had thought. I loved, laughed, cried and raged just as you do.
I still do these things. But now my life is different. I was taken.
He, for there was no other way for me to imagine him as, took me from my life. He told me that I was special, that I had something within me that no other human that has ever existed has. He told me he searched for a long time, countless planets and galaxies and realities for the thing that made me different.
What he did not expect was for me to know what he was, but I did and once he told me that he had searched countless realities for me an explanation formed, confirmation of one of the theories that exists in my world.
The multiverse theory. It states that there exists and infinite number of universes layered on top of one another, and that anything that can happen will in at least one of these universes. They could be so similar to ours that the only difference could be that I chose not to eat breakfast this morning in that reality, or so different that the laws of physics don't even exist.
The universe he came from was one I knew intimately. I had thought it was just a game until then.
The game was Halo and he was Offensive Bias.
The contender-class ancilla created to combat its brother, Mendicant Bias, who had been corrupted by the Flood, a parasitic organism that infected all organic life. He was created by the Forerunners, a species that once spanned his galaxy and acted as the custodians of it through there code known as The Mantle.
He told me that they had discovered a way to control the Flood, to tame it. Despite the loss of Mendicant and the advancing tide of the Flood, Forerunner Lifeworkers continued to study the Flood, in the hopes of finding a solution. They had discovered that it was possible that the human genome could mutate enough that it could take control of the Flood, a natural Gravemind. With the humanity of the time devolved and either placed on Erde-Tyrene or composed into Promethean Knights by the Ur-Didact, it was decided that they would search beyond their own plane of existence to search for the one human that possessed the unique genetic traits required to be able to conquer the Flood. So it was decided that there would be probes sent out into the multiverse in order to find that human. This plan was set in motion by the Iso-Didact, the Forerunner Manipular who became something of a second coming of the Ur-Didact and did not hold the same hatred of humanity and the arrogant belief in Forerunner superiority over humans. It was he who ordered for me to be taken from all that I knew in order to combat the Flood. On his order Offensive Bias was sent to my Earth to retrieve me.
And so I was taken from my home, my friends, and my family, to a universe that I had always thought was fiction and had dreamed of existing in. I had gotten my wish, but at a cost that I found was greater than I had ever considered. Offensive had done his research and made it look like I had fled my home, removing things I had felt were important from my home and duplicating them and placed them in bags that went in my car. He then made a clone of me, a copy that had only the purpose to die. He had the clone drive away in my car and drive off a bridge. He let me leave a note for my family, explaining what had happened and to not mourn me. I told them everything because there was no chance that anyone else would believe me but them. I told them to play the games and read the books to find out where I was going and what I was trying to prevent. I hope they understood.
He took me back to his universe and brought me to that Ark and I met the Iso-Didact and what remained of the Forerunners. They told me why I was taken and what they were trying to accomplish. At first I raged, how dare they take me from all that I knew to solve their problems? That they would presume to play God in my life. It took time, but I eventually came to terms with my situation and I grew to understand their plight as I watched whole star systems be consumed by the Flood, heard as the number of dead or infected rose into the trillions, and in the end I found that I could not fault them for what they had done to me. What was one life in return for the salvation of a species? Of a galaxy? In the end I consented to their plan, and allowed them to perform their procedure.
But my hesitance came at a price. As I wallowed in self pity and rage, the Flood pressed onward. The Parasite broke the Maginot Line. The final line of defense from the Parasite had broken and worlds were consumed in its never ending hunger. Though I and a few tens of thousands of Forerunner were safe on the Lesser Ark, the decision was made that even I succeeded in gaining control of the Flood, the galaxy would still have to be wiped clean and reseeded.
Nonetheless the procedure went forward. I was strapped to a table while medical ancilla hovered around me and I was rendered unconscious.
I was still aware however. I was trapped within my mind, cut off from the outside world, though I know what was being done to me, I could still see it and feel it. First they injected me with a serum that would increase my brain capacity to extreme levels, in order to be able to process the consciousness of the Flood. They optimized and upgraded my body, activated genes that were long dormant or not yet in use at my humanity's stage of evolution. I screamed in my mind as I felt my bones extend, muscles expand, and what body fat I had burn away in order to facilitate these changes.
They then activated the gene that would allow my control of the Flood and my mind became much larger, but still I was alone. It was akin to standing in an empty room the size of a planet. I could feel the emptiness so deeply it was like a shard of ice was thrust into my very soul. Next came the hard part. Introducing the Flood virus into my system so I could connect with the Flood.
The pain was unlike anything I could have ever conceived…
Voices, so many voices! Screaming, crying, shouting out in pure agony, pleading for freedom but knowing it was not possible. They felt my entrance into the consciousness and knew what I had come for, what I would do. They begged and pleaded with me to release them, overwhelming me for a time until it spoke.
"You Will Be Silent!"
It was a million voices speaking as one, the voice of evil and death. It was the Gravemind. I felt it try to take control of me and felt it's frustration and anger as it failed. It knew why I was there, to dethrone it from its place. It had long ago convinced itself that it had become a god, and it refused to give up.
"Creation of my enemy, child of other stars, you are naught but flesh and hope yet you challenge a god." It spoke, nestled within its arrogance that it was untouchable.
"Gravemind, you know why I am here, you are at an end."
"No! I am invincible! I am victory everlasting! I am the timeless chorus! I am a god among insects!" It roared as it tried to once again take control of my mind.
"You will not win; you know it now more than ever. You no longer serve a purpose and you are long due in death's hall." I said. I lashed out with my mind and began to destroy its consciousness. It screamed in denial, promising me death and destruction. This soon became pleas for mercy and attempts at bargaining, promises of wealth and power. It was reduced to quiet whimpers and pleas until it was almost nothing. "Do you have any last words, parasite?" I asked.
It whispered weakly to me, using its final breath, "You may have won this, spawn of my enemy, but know this, you now hold power beyond imagination. If you are not wary and indulge in your existence, I will return. What you know as the Flood is the manifestation of its genome. If you fall, that hunger and lust for power will burst forth and because of you, the Flood will be truly invincible, and consume all life that exists. I am what the Flood is at the genetic level and I will wait. I will be the voice of evil, the devil at your ear, whispering of death and destruction and hunger. If you fall, I will return. And my victory shall span all of existence!
With that the Gravemind died. Its consciousness and that of its victims passing on into the void, leaving me with all their knowledge and memories, as well as their hunger. I was left with all of the empty husks that were left behind. If one were to look upon any Flood infested world, there would be silence. All of the Flood forms would be standing still, as though frozen in time.
Then I felt it.
The Array.
The Halos had been fired.
A cleansing flame swept the galaxy and the Flood burned.
And I burned.
I felt each Flood world, each Flood form, each Flood cell tear apart as the Halos did what they were meant to do, rid the galaxy of of the Flood and all that could support it.
Agony beyond what any single life form was even capable of experiencing crashed upon my mind. But I was no ordinary individual mind. I held within me the capability of a galaxy of minds. Trillions of minds that though abandoned of any consciousness were still at my beck and call. And I felt each of them get snuffed out. To this day I still wonder how I did not go mad. How my own mind did not break from the strain.
Eventually it stopped. The wave of energy from the Halos had passed and in the wake was left an empty galaxy. Devoid of all intelligent life, and I was left with but my own mind and what meager samples of the Flood that were still kept. I felt those small spores like one would feel a layer of dust. And I even withdrew my mind from those miniscule particles, leaving naught but the most basic of instincts behind that even I could not remove. All that was left was instinct embedded in the genetic code of the Flood genome.
And so I was back in the vast empty room that was my mind. A room that contained in one small corner the memories of my own life, and all of the knowledge that had been held within the Gravemind. it was silent without the voices of those trapped by the Flood calling out, and though I was glad that they had found peace, I knew that the silence that felt so wrong to the part of me that was the Flood would remain so long as I never spread the Flood myself. And if for some unforeseen I was to infect another, I would do my damndest to not trap their minds within this void.
It was with this final thought that I would withdraw from my mind, only to feel the full instinct of the Flood fall upon me. Only to feel the savage hunger that was the Flood. And so I was overwhelmed, and all I could think, all I could feel, all I could comprehend was but one primal thought; feed...