wolverfrog youre theory seems completly solid but it isnt. if the precursors were more advanced then the forunners why did they need rescuing from the flood by being taken to the ark? also gdude said about the graveminds quote "child of mine enemy...". the forunners were the enemy of the flood, as was any life form that resisted the hold of the flood. that must mean that we are NOT! biologically forunner but bieng a special species to the forunners they may have "adopted" us as the heirs to all that they created. they saw our potential and here is my theory to the first activation of the hola array. the forunners see our potential and take us to the ark to store us. but i think that they draw the flood away from earth acting as our scape goat. with the forunners gone no one can reactivate the halos in the rise of another flood threat. so the forunners use the humans to activate the rings (sort of giving our species the security clearance if you like) so that we may one day reach the ark and reclaim what was once handed to us like a family heirloom. after this the forunners flee bringing the flood away from earth after the first firing. then the forunners on the ark take the humans and recolonise the earth with its original species. then they leave for good. now here is the part how john 117 is referred to as "forunner" to spark. the human that they used to fire the rings somehow has a biological fingerprint (dna records perhaps) and these are recognised by the systems of the ark and the other halo's. and that the human used is one of johns ancestors (biologically). there fore when activating the first halo (installation 04) his "biological fingerprint" is recognised by the halo from the arks systems and installation 04 (being the ring of guilty spark) shares all data with its respective monitor (spark). this leads spark to believe that john is forunner. this may not explain entirly that the original theory in this thread is wrong but it may not be right either. [Edited on 08.08.2010 3:12 PM PDT]