MINERVA - read-only archives

See my post in the "what is the world beyond the portal" thread, I figured that would be the appropriate place to post ideas regarding that area.

In summary, that world held/holds the secret to how Minerva became what she is - it's a place where we can all go, to ascend, if you will, and become semi- or non-physical, post-human, technology based beings like her. In doing so, thus immortalizing humanity, she would repent for her earlier crimes (she did call herself a war criminal, remember?).

Someone, somewhere quoted the text that appears after the laser-beam-o-death thing strikes and said it was the HEV suit rebooting.
Personally I thought it was the semi-computerised brain of the dead post-human grunt Minerva re-actualised rebooting - the dude you play in other words. Much like the terminators "mind" reboots in T2.

Also, when she says, "You were a traitor to our species, but also a traitor to the Combine - so just hope you've redeemed yourself in the eyes of whomever, or whatever, you may still hold dear". I don't think the "our species" bit is species specific, I believe it's purely a reference to whatever it is an entity from any species ends up as after the Combine have had their wicked way.
So by "our species" she means Combine/post-Combine, not necessarily Human/post-Human.

I reckon Minerva is basically like The Major [Kusinagi] from the Ghost in a Shell jobbies. Minerva was once a physical entity (species unknown, and definitely not from the world seen through the portal) but ended up inside a machine through Combine experimentation, stripped of memory (by extension individuality and emotion). A biological processor (brain) with an eidetic memory (a hard drive) would be extremely useful/powerful tool I'd imagine, and very Combinian. Much like the grunt you play (post-human) she is post-something and through some kind of accident or whatever became self-aware... again. It names itself Minerva after all. Minerva knows it used to be something else, but probably knows even less about its origins than you do of yours. At least you can tell you used to be human by looking in a mirror or by checking out the bodies hanging from the walls and comparing them to your own. Minerva has no biological body or memory of it, so how can it ever know - like when it says that the world through the portal may once have been its "home, maybe..."

The themes that I took away from Minerva: Metastasis, be them right or wrong, intended or not, were those of morality and justice (two subjective ideas) and of what it is to be sentient - something you have to be in order to dream up and consider ideas such as morality and justice. However sentience and morality do not go hand in hand, but it is your sense of morality that ends up defining you as a being. You can be self-aware and have no ideas of morality eg: a baby.

Up until the laser-beam-o'-death you're nothing more than one of the grunts hanging on the wall; an empty vessel, stripped of memory, waiting to be filled with orders. After you're accidental survival due to the Combine technology implanted in you (nicely ironic), you're no longer fighting because you're told to, you're in it for yourself. GET ME THE HELL OUT OF HERE! Up until that point you were so willing to run into the next gun fight (as Minerva points out) which could so easily spell your end, how can you possible lay claim the level of subjective thought required for sentience?
Your death is a re-birth. The moment you finally understand the difference between life and death and its importance, and Minerva experiences this to. You gain a sense of your own mortality at the one moment there's nothing you can do about it. You are about to die, and this is what Minerva is "truly sorry" about because Minerva, who came to that same realisation/epiphany (but luckily isn't about to be vaporised), will destroy what should have been be a glorious moment for you - the moment you regain your humanity.

However it's been a while since I played Minerva and someone could, and probably will quote some forgotten text that brings my theory tumbling down... feel free to do so.

I would love a response from the man himself...

[edit: typos]

lol - regardless, that doesn't negate my theory completely, thank god.