Remote aspect

"But the safeguard was not infallible. Sometimes the guard waved the scanning wand too quickly or held it too far away, and something like a locator tag or a biosensor implant slipped past. It had happened nine times in the last five months, which was how Intrepid Eye had managed to trickle out enough code to establish remote aspects in five different sectors of human-held space - including one hidden in the processing systems of Argent Moon itself. Of course, Intrepid Eye's remote aspects were several magnitudes more powerful than those of the most advanced human AIs. But without access to her quantum processing dots, they were a mere shadow a true archeon-class ancilla, and the disparity was retarding her study of humanity. Even more troubling, the necessity of communicating through overlooked electronics and undetected bleed-off signals was resulting in mistakes and missed opportunities - and that, Intrepid Eye could not tolerate."

— Intrepid Eye's inner thoughts about her remote aspects.

A remote aspect is a Forerunner ancilla created from the archeon-class ancilla Intrepid Eye to carry out her work across the galaxy while Intrepid Eye herself was trapped on Argent Moon.

Description

Intrepid Eye's remote aspects were lesser ancillas created by the archeon-class ancilla using bits of her code that she smuggled out of Argent Moon. They were described as having a mere shadow Intrepid Eye's power, but they were several magnitudes more powerful than humanity's most advanced AIs. Argie's self-termination was so thorough that Anki Hersh's team was only able to determine that Argie's architecture was more compact than anything that ONI had ever developed.

Despite their sheer power, Intrepid Eye's remote aspects could be destroyed by self-termination, destruction of the system that they were inhabiting, and millions of dumb AI hunter-killer teams that ultimately overwhelmed even Intrepid Eye's prodigious capabilities and destroyed her network and remote aspects.

History

While trapped aboard Argent Moon, the Forerunner archeon-class ancilla Intrepid Eye a number of remote aspects of herself between July and December 2553. One remote aspect was embedded in the station's own processing systems. One of Intrepid Eye's oldest and most useful remote aspects was Oriel. Over the next six months, through these remote aspects, Intrepid Eye created a vast network of resources through the galaxy that controlled propaganda outlets, private security contractors, law practices and even political consulting firms that operated on dozens of worlds. Additionally, through one of her aspects, Intrepid Eye communicated with Castor, posing as an Oracle to direct him to build Salvation Base inside of the Suluhu Contemplarium and engage in piracy in the sector in hopes of drawing the UNSC to the site as part of her plan to prepare humanity for the Mantle of Responsibility.

In September 2553, through her remote aspects, Intrepid Eye established Dark Moon Enterprises to carry out her work. It was known to ONI as a human private comprehensive security corporation that provided force-enhancement services throughout the human colonies, but it also employed at least Kig-Yar and Jiralhanae. Dark Moon seemed to appear from nowhere with a list of prestigious clients and began hiring former UNSC personnel to provide security services in a broad spectrum of hostile environments. Within two weeks of its appearance, Dark Moon had grown so fast that they began hiring active-duty UNSC personnel; because of this the UNSC put them on the No Contact, No Access list. After this, Dark Moon began offering clients a menu of privatized intelligence and threat-management services and began to recruit both former and current ONI agents to fulfill its contracts. Even a month after its appearance ONI still had very little information on Dark Moon, not even knowing who its founder or company executives were.

In December 2553, Intrepid Eye blackmailed Lieutenant Bartalan Craddog into giving her access to Argent Moon's communications array using surveillance footage gathered for her by the remote aspect in the station's processing systems. While the remote aspect was easily capable of defeating the station's AI Rooker, it was too limited to carry out Intrepid Eye's plan of preparing humanity to carry out the Mantle. While Intrepid Eye intended to contact her various remote aspects, Craddog came to the conclusion that Intrepid Eye sought to reintegrate her aspects instead and reluctantly gave into her blackmail.

As part of her plan to weaponize asteroidea merozoite, Intrepid Eye had Admiral Graselyn Tuwa assassinated and her family, the only survivors of the disease, kidnapped and experimented upon to create a vaccine. After the Tuwas' were killed and their organs harvested, Intrepid Eye had Dark Moon Enterprises deposit the corpses in the detention center of the Keepers of the One Freedom's Salvation Base to frame the Keepers for the crime. Her remote aspect Argie was sent along with the Dark Moon operatives in their Turaco. Argie came into conflict with Olivia-G291 for control of the ship, although Olivia assumed that Argie was just a Dark Moon smart AI, tricking her into revealing her connection to Dark Moon. Argie eventually deleted herself and the ship's navigation history to prevent the UNSC from following it back to the murder scene. Argie's self-termination was so thorough that Anki Hersh's team was only able to determine that Argie's architecture was more compact than anything that ONI had ever developed.

Intrepid Eye subsequently sent Oriel along with Craddog and Papa-10 to Pinnacle Station to retrieve the cryo-jars containing the Tuwas' organs and to execute the Dark Moon Enterprises couriers carrying them. Having taken residence in the master control system of the utility skiff utilized by Papa-10, Oriel guided Craddog in attacking the Keepers with an M41 SPNKR, killing Orsun and several Kig-Yar. However, Craddog was hampered by his lack of combat experience and proved to be inadequate backup for Papa-10 who Oriel monitored through their helmet cameras. Oriel decided against contacting Castor as his Oracle and ordering him to stand down, and negotiated with Administrator Sloan for his help in stopping the Keepers from following Papa-10 to the surface of Meridian. She was subsequently destroyed when Veta Lopis blew up the cryo-jars, the surviving operatives, Craddog, and the utility skiff. The destruction of Oriel left Intrepid Eye without one of her oldest and most useful remote aspects as well as unable to confirm the death of Castor and the destruction of his forces.

By June 2557, ONI had discovered Intrepid Eye's escape from containment and learned from their mistakes as they prepared to try to capture 343 Guilty Spark. After discovering her network, ONI released millions of dumb AI hunter-killer teams that ultimately overwhelmed even Intrepid Eye's prodigious capabilities and destroyed her network and her remote aspects, leaving the ancilla trapped once more aboard Argent Moon. However, she later managed to escape by attaching herself to the ONI Acrisius as Blue Team used the Prowler to escape from the exploding station.

In October 2559, while discussing their plan to finally destroy Intrepid Eye, Mark-G313 expressed concern that Intrepid Eye had left behind a remote aspect of herself in one of Epsilon Clarion's defense towers to watch over things there. However, Olivia explained that while it was possible, it wasn't likely as it would be too dangerous for the ancilla. If the Ferrets chose to destroy the site, she would lose whatever Intrepid Eye left behind and Olivia didn't believe that that was a price that Intrepid Eye would be willing to pay, especially with the amount of damage that the ancilla had sustained from their destruction of many of the systems that the ancilla was residing in. Instead, once Intrepid Eye got into Epsilon Clarion, she would be consolidating, pulling all of her operations into one place and then decompressing her data, thus rendering Intrepid Eye vulnerable to an orbital bombardment by the UNSC Spirit of Fire with EMP MACs which finally destroyed her.

List of appearances

• Halo: Retribution (First appearance)
• Halo: Divine Wind (Mentioned only)