The UNSC Archives - Unspoken video features Lance Corporal Chris Preston. A UNSC Marine who fought in the first battle of New Harvest, Preston lost the ability to speak because of a throat injury inflicted by Jackals. Using sign language and help from an AI, Preston messages the parents of David Dominguez, a fallen marine who fought alongside Preston in defending a civilian freighter from Covenant forces, as well as assisting in the acquisition of vital alien technologynote specifically a Kig-Yar Point Defense Gauntlet or Jackal Shield, which resulted in the development of the MJOLNIR armour's energy shielding system.
Preston conveys how much David was a brother to him, how his actions helped save hundreds, if not thousands of lives, and that in the end, David never stopped thinking of his parents. All throughout, Preston is evidently struggling to hold his emotions to deliver the message and the music only serves to intensify the tragedy of the tale.
What's even worse, as Preston recalls, he couldn't even offer words of comfort to the dying David because of his throat injury before passing out. By the time Preston woke up, his brother was gone.
Post-Release
Cortana's Arc Words: "If you knew how you were going to die, how would you live your life differently?"
Echo-216 has been drifting outside a broken Halo ring, and while he's fixing a hull breach, a holo of his wife plays, as she and his daughter send their love. He'd probably been holding onto that recording as he was expecting to die. Later we learn they never survived.
Master Chief remembers Cortana telling him in Halo 3, "I chose you because you were special. I knew we would be perfect together. And I was right."
When Master Chief is awoken by the Pelican pilot, one of the first things he does is open his hands—and sees Cortana's empty AI chip. Nevertheless, he plugs it in anyway, almost as if hoping against hope he'd find her on there, without the rampancy or delusions of becoming the next Galactic Emperor. The chip boots up and... no AI detected.
Chief: Enough! Pilot:When is it enough, Chief?! [gestures at the wreckage of a dropship] When we're in there? Because that's where I belong. In there. With them.
Chief:(to The Pilot) I should have protected Cortana. Stopped everything from going wrong. I failed her. I will not fail you.
The fate of four Spartan-IV soldiers. Their last stand almost remind you of Noble Team from Halo: Reach.
Spartan Griffin's death, as Master Chief gently cradles him.
The auditory/visual flashbacks of the long-passed events of Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 4 deeply stir one's emotional heartstrings, especially how Chief sounds when he answers Weapon's question of "What happened to him?", briefly summarizing Jacob Keyes' horrific fate... and when Cortana left him for good after the Didact's defeat...
The Chief tries to initiate The Weapon's deletion routine when The Harbinger tries to compromise her but is stopped at the last second. The Weapon is understandably pissed that the Chief would do such a thing especially since he hasn't explained why he doesn't trust her. Even Echo-216 is shocked when he finds out.
The command codes for the Weapon's protocol are "Red Flag", "034" and "Samuel". To those who are not familiar to the lore, Samuel-034 was John and Kelly's childhood friend during their training days and the first SPARTAN-II to die fighting the Covenant. From John's speech tone when he says the code, he is still saddened over the death of his best friend even after thirty years.
Operation: Red Flag would have had the remaining twenty-five Spartan-I Is still active board a Covenant ship, use Cortana to pilot it to the Covenant home world, and kidnap the high Prophets to force a cease fire. Why didn’t Red Flag happen? The Covenant invaded Reach, and the majority of John’s Spartans were killed defending it. Red Flag symbolizes the loss of the closest thing the Spartans had to a home, as well as much of John’s adopted family.
Cortana destroying Doisac, the Jiralhane homeworld in front of Atriox for his defiance. The sorrow and rage in Atriox's voice makes it clear just how badly Cortana has pushed him.
Cortana: Look upon Doisac one last time and remember: you chose this path.
(cut to the hologram showing Doisac being completely destroyed)
Atriox: (a look of sheer rage crosses his face, but overall calmly, yet angrily replies) As did you... Cortana.
Even Master Chief and The Weapon are appalled by Cortana's actions, with Chief hanging his head in sorrow and The Weapon in disbelief that Cortana would do such a thing.
After the scene, the lines the Brutes yell become about revenge.
After the above scene, The Weapon undergoes a Heroic BSoD after discovering that she's not only an imitation of Cortana but is Cortana's clone, revealing why the Chief doesn't trust her completely and causing her to Freak Out at the possibility that she'll become like her, enough that she accepts being deleted and asks the Chief to do so. It's only when the Chief refuses to delete her and finally tells her that he'll trust her that she recovers.
The subtle details that make it clear that Chief still isn't completely over what happenned to Cortana. Before this scene, when the two are arguing over the aforementioned deletion attempt by Chief, Chief turns to the Weapon at one point and says, "Cortana..." at which point trailing off, so the Weapon finishes with, "...is gone." However, take note of Chief's stance and the tone of his voice...he wasn't bringing Cortana up in the argument...he accidentally addressed the Weapon as Cortana, though the Weapon didn't notice. His trailing off was likely a result of his realization of how much the Weapon was reminding him of Cortana.
Another part happens during the Freak Out, when the Weapon finally makes the connection; Chief quietly confirms her suspicions, clarifying that the Weapon is Cortana ""as if [she and the Chief] had never met", with heavy implications that the poor guy sees his very existence in Cortana's life as the proverbial nail that caused all the destruction and sufferings of the last few years.
Cortana's echo after Harbinger's been finished. One line strikes particularly hard:
Cortana:(smiling) Look at us. We just keep saying goodbye, don't we?
In Multiplayer Training, the UNSC military academy has been named the Avery J. Johnson Academy of Military Science.
video features Lance Corporal Chris Preston. A UNSC Marine who fought in the first battle of New Harvest, Preston lost the ability to speak because of a throat injury inflicted by Jackals. Using sign language and help from an AI, Preston messages the parents of David Dominguez, a fallen marine who fought alongside Preston in defending a civilian freighter from Covenant forces, as well as assisting in the acquisition of vital alien technologynote .