- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
Posted by: ThePBM
Ok so the bottom line is, how could the monitors even consider the first time it fired to be a success? It appears that more flood have died at the hands of MC than by starvation
How do you know? Flood could have been swarming all over Threshold and every other planet within Halo's firing range. Let me try to explain how I understand the past of the Halo universe:
"After exhausting every strategic option..." 343 Guilty Spark. Strategic, huh? That sounds like warfare to me. See, The Flood as we know it in Halo is simply an outbreak of a parasitic organism which is contained to anywhere that has the correct atmosphere. Containment has nothing to do with strategy; it is simply cutting off a limb so the body will live. War is strategic.
I think the Flood stole Forerunner vessels and fleets, repaired them (the Flood were repairing the Truth and Reconsiliation in Halo 1, remember?), inhabited them, morphed ships into 'one of their wretched Hives' (Truth); there was plenty of evidence of that in High Charity. They probably reached every corner of the galaxy and 'flooded' over planets, consuming all possible life that would support them, and obliterated any opposition. They were only fueled by what they consumed, nothing of what they did themselves (except repair and rebuild what they consumed), and, seeing this, the Forerunners built the Halos to counter the Flood. Weapons had failed, destroying the Flood outright had failed. Unorthodox methods needed to be taken.
So, the Halos were fired. All the flood quickly died after being starved of all their precious food. But the Halos were (probably) first built 'to study and contain the Flood' (343 GS, Halo 1). The Forerunners most likely found some way of preserving the Flood and kept them in a controlled enviroment, with Moniters to make sure they are kept in check. And they would have stayed contained and controlled, continuing to be studied, except something happened.
The Covenant landed on Halo, pursued the Forerunner Installation's secrets, and released the Flood. And that is where we get to 'today'.
So, going back to your question: How do we know that there were not two groups of flood: one that was very large and uncontained which was starved to death after the firing of the Halos, and a second, very small portion that was contained on Halo (and given certain means (maybe chemicals?) to survive without their conventional food). The Halos being fired might have been a huge success at a great cost.
[Edited on 5/30/2006]