“The Didact” by TheGameworld
Posted at Halo Nation (links have been disabled, visit article for more information):“Mendicant Bias is trying to prevent us from firing the Array. He speeds back to the Ark, but he won’t succeed. Offensive Bias will stop him, and I will burn this stinking menace in your name. And then? I will begin our Great Journey without you, carrying this bitter record. Those who came after will know what we bought with this [false transcendence] – what you bought, and the price you paid.“— The Didact’s final transmission.
The Didact[1] was an individual who held an extremely high status in the Forerunner society as supreme commander of the entire Forerunner military. He evidently wholeheartedly believed in the “Mantle” the Forerunners held to protect life. He was also the lover of the Librarian, and the one who eventually activated the Halo Array.[2]
Biography
The Didact was a full-rate Promethean of the Warrior-Servant class in the Forerunner class system. He earned his fame in the Human-Forerunner War. After the War, the Forerunners began to research ways of stopping the flood. This lead to the invention of the Halos. The Didact was opposed to their use and was forced into exile by the Master Builder to a Cryptum. His Cryptum was placed on Earth by his wife, the Librarian. It is opened 1000 years later by a young Forerunner of the Builder class named Bornstellar Makes Eternal Lasting .
The Didact passes on his memories to Bornstellar and is later killed by the Master Builder on the San’Shyuum home world. Because of the transfer of memories, Bornstellar becomes the Didact. This revelation is made to him by the Librarian when he meets her on the Ark. From this point, the Didact begins to lead the Forerunner’s fleet against the flood.
During the Forerunner-Flood war, he was constantly trying to convince the Librarian to give up on her mission to save other sentient life from the Halos and return to him “Where it is safe”. His pleas, however, were unsuccessful, and the Librarian ended up destroying her own fleet, stranding herself on Earth to live out the rest of her days in a place she referred to as “Eden”.
Fate
The Didact’s eventual fate is unclear, whether or not he survived the activation or perished, as his location is not specified, be it on the Ark, Requiem , or one of the Halo Rings.
While the Server’s first episode seems to state that the Didact perished, Terminal 7 seems to contradict this, as the Didact describes going on the Forerunner’s “Great Journey” without the Librarian, carrying the “bitter record” of the Forerunner’s failure. Whether this describes an actual physical event and his survival, or a more ideological/religious concept involving the Forerunner’s concept of death and the afterlife that he is describing, is unclear.
Trivia
- A conversation between the Didact and the Librarian can be found inside the Terminals in Halo 3. When the Terminals are accessed, the player is eventually moved to their old conversation that was recorded before the Halo rings were fired.
- In the Iris campaign Server Episode 1, the Didact’s last words to the Librarian can be read moments prior to the Array’s activation.
- The word “Didact” actually means “one who teaches” in Greek. The Didact once taught at the college of Strategic Defense of the Mantle which was a war college. The name Didact could come from the word didactic which means to instruct others in morals. This is rather ironic because he wound up being the one committing galactic genocide, firing the metaphorical gun at the head of the galaxy.
- One of the Terminals located in Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversay has Guilty Spark saying the destruction of Installation 04 will awaken and upset the Didact, this could mean he will make an appearance in Halo 4.
- According to 343 Guilty Spark, the Didact could be a terrifying individual when enraged, to point where the monitor claims that the humans and covenant would almost prefer facing the Flood than the Didact.
- At the end of the Halo 4 Demo/Trailer, The Didact’s glyph appeared and a voice (Possibly the Didact’s) can be heard saying “I have long dreamt of this day, Reclaimer”, possibly making him the main antagonist of the game.
- At the end of the Halo 4 E3 gameplay demonstration, the Didact’s glyph is shown before rotating to an inverse position.
- The flying sphere in the halo 4 E3 gameplay demonstration appears to be a cryptum. This could be Didact’s, and be a currently unwritten story of Didact’s fate.
