In the sixth episode of Halo Season 2, Master Chief infiltrated the UNSC base in Onyx to get his armor. He was confronted by a brainwashed Kai and almost beaten to within an inch of his life. By the time Kai learned the truth about what Parangosky and Ackerson had done to survive the Covenant attack on Reach, Master Chief had approached the piece of the Artifact that was kept in Onyx. A Covenant priest, Uto’ Mdama, expressed his doubts regarding Makee’s allegiance to the Covenant, and although the Arbiter backed her up, the priest tried to get her killed. That forced the Arbiter to step in and battle the priest and his soldiers to save Makee. It was revealed that Cortana was working with various people. She was informing Parangosky about everything that Makee was doing. She was helping Makee stay on the path to finding the Halo planet. And she was guiding Master Chief to the Artifact in Onyx, as well as his suit. Kwan Ha and Halsey traversed the caves of Onyx and met Miranda. Soren and Laera tracked Kessler to a place called Thermopylae. Now, let’s find out what Master Chief and Makee saw after touching the Artifact.
Spoiler Alert
Parangosky Sends Spartans To Their Death
Episode 7 of Halo Season 2 begins with a conversation between Makee and Master Chief on a projection of the ring-like planet, and we finally get some confirmation of what it’s going to be used for. Makee says that if the Covenant controls the planet (it’s called The Ring), then they’ll use it to destroy humankind, and if the humans get to it first, they’ll do the same to the Covenant. But Makee theorizes that The Ring is capable of not just destruction, but creation as well. That’s why she doesn’t want it to fall into the hands of the Covenant or the UNSC. She wants Master Chief’s help to wield The Ring as a symbol of peace and life. Since Master Chief doesn’t respond, Makee interprets it as his way of saying that he doesn’t see eye-to-eye with Makee. Master Chief doesn’t get the chance to explicitly state what his stance is because he is surrounded by the UNSC soldiers, while Makee is surrounded by Sangheili Elite soldiers. The shockwave of their separation from the Artifacts is felt by everyone on Onyx. The Covenant priest goes after Makee with the intention to kill her, but Cortana distracts him long enough for Makee to sneak up behind him and kill him. Then, Cortana proceeds to show the map to Makee, and she spots The Ring, probably because her powers have been restored.
Ackerson informs Parangosky about Master Chief’s arrival, and it’s already clear that Margaret wants to push Ackerson under the proverbial bus for the debacle on Reach, thereby making him Master Chief’s target. Before Ackerson can process Margaret’s heel turn into absolute villainy, the UNSC learns that a huge chunk of the Covenant’s Fleet has surrounded the ship Makee is in, who is probably around The Ring, which is in the Soell system. Without giving it much thought, Margaret decides to deploy the newly-trained Spartans. Ackerson protests this decision, because the Spartans are not ready to take on an entire Covenant fleet, but Margaret apparently doesn’t care. She orders Ackerson to find Master Chief, and he storms out of the control room. The first wave of Spartans dies within seconds of engaging with the Covenant. Margaret doesn’t waste a second before sending the second wave, thereby causing Ackerson to wonder what her game plan is.
Briggs goes in to arrest Master Chief. When he refuses to surrender, Briggs orders the soldiers to shoot him down. Since Master Chief has learned that blindly following orders is a bad practice, he gives the same education to those soldiers. Surprisingly enough, they listen to him and tell Briggs to get her own hands dirty if she wants to do something unethical. As Briggs pulls out her gun to shoot down Master Chief, Kai intervenes and knocks her out. Amidst all this warfare, we see Miranda, Kwan Ha, and Halsey trying to understand what the cave actually is and what is the function of gates that have some kind of puzzle-like lock on it. At Thermopylae, Soren tells Laera that the arena is essentially a Spartan training program where he, Kai, Riz, Vannak, and John went from being kids to being Spartans. He says that Kessler is going to go through the same ordeal, which is why they shouldn’t intervene and allow their son to get beaten up until he learns if he is a fighter or a loser. Laera points out how messed up all this is and tells Soren that he doesn’t actually want to unlearn everything that Halsey has put him through; he actually idolizes her, and that’s why he wants Kessler to become a Spartan and not a normal human being. This is a good way of putting things into perspective and showing how excessive warmongering and machismo can corrupt one’s mind.
How Does Parangosky Intend To Kill The Covenant?
Perez is seen suiting up to face the Covenant. She notices one of her fellow soldiers panicking a lot, and she does her best to calm her down. Kai tries to justify her actions to Master Chief, but he keeps moving towards his suit with the help of Cortana. Halsey gives a little insight into the experiments that she was conducting in the cave. Apparently, she found an alien DNA that was a hybrid of something human and otherworldly. So, she needed someone who had the same DNA structure as that’d help her unlock the doors. That was why she started, as Kwan Ha aptly puts it, collecting kids from all over the galaxy, experimented on them, and then prepared them to be the key that’d unlock these gates. Unfortunately, things didn’t pan out the way Halsey wanted them to be. Hence, they have to take the conventional route and unlock the gates by solving the puzzles around them.
As Kwan Ha proceeds to touch one of the buttons on the puzzle, it begins to glow, thereby indicating that she has the traces of the hybrid DNA that Halsey has been searching for. Maybe that’s why she has those visions of the old lady. Maybe she is one of the ancestors of the species that built these gates. How did this species with the hybrid DNA reach all over the galaxy? I don’t think that’s a big mystery because the answers are intergalactic travel and intercourse. Halsey and Miranda have a brief conversation about Jacob Keyes, and Miranda accepts his death in a pretty mature fashion. Kwan Ha pulls out one of the beads from the puzzle, and a holograph of the stars in space form before their eyes. While Miranda and Halsey think it’s a map of the stars, Kwan Ha comes to the conclusion that it’s actually a clock. She organizes the dots on the holograph according to her “feelings” (which is probably her psychic connection to the cave and those who have built it), and that unlocks the gate, which leads them to a bridge that connects to a chamber of sorts.
By the way, if you have played some games, you will know that they have these puzzle-based missions. So, Kwan Ha, Halsey, and Miranda’s whole arc in this episode feels like an homage to that. Ackerson is also on a kind of puzzle-solving mission because he is trying to unpack what’s going through Margaret’s mind. When he runs a simulation on the Spike that is supposed to deactivate a Covenant ship (the simulation that the Spartans practice on), it is actually going to create an unimaginable explosion that will destroy everything in its vicinity: The Ring, the Covenant, and the UNSC. Basically, if the humans can’t get the Ring, then Margaret will not only disallow the Covenant from getting the Ring, but she will also stop the Ring from existing. As Ackerson decides to act on it, he is cornered by Kai and Master Chief, and the latter almost chokes him to death. He manages to somehow relay what he has learned to the two Spartans, but Master Chief doesn’t want to trust him; he just wants his suit. When they get to the chamber with the Spartan suits in it, Kai and Master Chief have a brief conversation about Vannak, and how Master Chief feels guilty for making him blindly follow orders and bringing him to his demise. Then, he turns to Ackerson and essentially orders him to go out and tell the truth about Margaret and their involvement in the destruction of Reach.
Master Chief Goes For The Ring
Kai and Master Chief have a conversation about what they need to do to deal with the matter at hand. Kai wants to enter the battlefield with her fellow Spartans, and Master Chief wants to get to the Halo to stop it from being controlled by the Covenant or the UNSC. How? I don’t know. Master Chief wonders what Kai will do if she is the one who has to administer the Spike, thereby killing everyone. What is she going to do? Kai tells him to focus on his mission and let her think about her mission. At Onyx, the unlocked chamber turns out to be a laboratory, and in that laboratory, they see a dead alien body lying there and holding onto a device of some sort. They don’t get the chance to explore the lab because it starts to crumble. Miranda, Halsey, and Kwan Ha make a run for it. While running back to the caves, Halsey notices a whole city underneath the bridge. Kwan sees that all the white dots in the holograph of the space are turning red. She says something vague about “growth” and runs away. What is Kwan up to? Your guess is as good as mine.
Halsey does that stupid scientist thing with that stupid look on her face where she thinks that she is at the helm of something revolutionary, but there’s a good chance that, like always, she is going to make a big mess of it and then pretend like she is a victim of her own curiosity. Miranda and Halsey head back to the lab and pledge to figure out the history of that city in the caves. Miranda manages to partially unlock the device that they’ve acquired from the corpse of that alien in the lab, but Halsey ghosts her for some reason (Halsey is annoying). The Fleet begins their attack on Makee’s ship, and seeing how the Arbiter is still standing beside her, Makee decides to brand herself with the insignia that the Arbiter uses on himself to prove that both of them are bound to each other and the purpose of taking over the Ring. Kessler enters Thermopylae, but Soren doesn’t allow him to go through the grueling ordeal of fighting a bunch of grown men. Soren takes them all down and tries to save Kessler from any potential trauma. However, that plan backfires as Laera and Kessler are captured by the people conducting the fights in Thermopylae.
At the end of Halo Season 2, episode 7, Perez tries to convince Master Chief to join them as they face the Covenant. But they go their separate ways because their missions are different. Ackerson confronts Margaret, and it’s clear that she isn’t going to stop sending wave after wave of Spartans to their deaths. Master Chief takes one of the UNSC ships and heads over to the Halo. Ackerson tells Margaret that Master Chief is going to tell the true story of the destruction of Reach and that nobody is going to believe Margaret’s propaganda. Kai leads the Spartans in the general direction of the Covenant, while Master Chief heads towards the Halo. I won’t lie; this episode was a little messy. Except for the revelation that Margaret is truly evil, it mostly spent its time leaving open endings that will hopefully be resolved in a satisfying way in the season finale. Well, next week, we will certainly get to know what happens when Makee, Master Chief, the UNSC, and the Covenant converge on the Halo.
