‘Halo’: Here’s Why Cortana Saved Makee

We’re more than halfway through Season 2 of ‘Halo’ and Episode 5 was kind of a filler with only a few important things revealed. One of the notable subplots of the episode was Makee’s and Var ‘Gatanai’s disagreement regarding their failure to capture the second keystone. At one point, Var ‘Gatanai threatened to take Makee back to High Charity so she could face the consequences of her own incompetence but decided to drop it at the last second due to the images that Cortana projected. Why did Cortana decide to save Makee?

Makee no longer enjoys high status in the Covenant Society

Back in the finale of season 1, we learned that despite Makee being pampered by the Covenant, was still trash in their eyes and they couldn’t wait to get rid of her. Things got a bit more complicated when Makee failed to project the whole map that leads to the ringworld, and she was seemingly killed by Kai.

We never saw Makee actually die so it didn’t exactly surprise us that she survived the ordeal and got captured by the Covenant again, this time with a mission to retrieve the keystones that were lost on Raas Kkhotskha.

Makee successfully retrieved one of the keystones that she captured in Visegrad but failed to retrieve the other one that was held at the UNSC headquarters as Ackerson evacuated it from the planet. Makee however did manage to capture Cortana, in part to have something to show to the Covenant and partly because Cortana is the biggest database of human knowledge in existence. Due to her unique connection with Master Chief, Cortana also knows everything that John knows and has seen everything that John has seen, including his experience with the artifact.

Makee wasn’t alone on these missions, she was accompanied by the Arbiter of the Covenant, Var ‘Gatanai who was displeased with Makee’s results and the fact that she denied him the glory to be the one to kill “the Demon” two times.

Makee tried to convince Var ‘Gatanai that Cortana was more than enough of a consolation prize for failing to deliver the artifact. Makee also made some thinly veiled threats to Cortana implying that if the Covenant decides to get rid of Makee due to not being useful again, the same thing will happen to Cortana as well, because this means that she also wasn’t useful.

Near the end of the episode, we saw that Makee’s ship was returning to High Charity as Var ‘Gatanai was ordered to see the Hierarchs and state a report based on their results. Makee started panicking and tried to convince Var ‘Gatanai that it was his destiny to find the Halo, not the Hierarchs, but Var ‘Gatanai did not care.

He did not care about Cortana or the fact that Makee is supposed to be the Blessed One, he was bound to follow his orders. Then, in the last second Cortana projected the image of the Halo world that both Makee and Master Chief saw in their visions and it was beautiful.

It was beautiful enough that Var ‘Gatanai was impressed and asked Makee how she was doing it, Makee answered that it wasn’t her, it was his faith and destiny. In reality, it was Cortana. But nevertheless, Var ‘Gatanai decided to turn the ship around. So why did Cortana do this?

Cortana knows that Master Chief would save Makee

Well first, Cortanad is not your average AI and does have a sense of self-preservation she also knows that being deleted would mean that she could no longer do her primary function. Still, it seems counter-intuitive to help your “enemies,” but I assure you that Cortana did not save Makee from hot water because she suddenly decided to switch sides, she did it for Master Chief.

Being merged with him, Cortana is aware of Chief’s feelings toward Makee, she felt everything that he felt while they were sharing a body, especially when she took over in the last few minutes of Season 1. Cortana is also aware that Master Chief would help Makee, no matter the risks. Makee saved Master Chief two times now when it was reasonable to expect that she wouldn’t because they did not exactly part way under the most pleasant terms. Makee likely also has feelings for Master Chief still, but her feelings might land her in trouble with Var ‘Gatanai since he already pointed out that she intentionally saves “the Demon.”

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