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I think I have all the pieces, I was going to keep this to myself, but I no longer can contain the knowlage. (i.e. I need to feed my ego, it's getting a little lean at 4500 kg.)
Where possible I shall include hard quoted evidance, though I might not get it tonight/at this movement. To put it bluntly, I'm almost 101% sure I know who, and what, is Minerva, as well as where she may be, where/what she's operating from and who she now considers her kind.
Firstly, Minerva is a pathological liar (Adam said it, in an interview), a kleptomaniac (says so herself in Someplace Else), and difficult narrator from who to split truth from lies (it get's easier the longer you try).
I'll start off at Someplace Else, since it all began there...
Part One - Someplace Else:
Summery: You spawn in a in a tunnel in Xen, and you are contacted by an unknown entity who starts chit chatting and prodding you around with the carrot of perhaps getting out of here.
Facts, Obvious:
1. You're in Xen. (duhhhh)
2. That entity who contacted you (I'll just use Minerva, it's getting long to type otherwise), was also brought here from someplace else (<_<).
3. You never meet Minerva face to face.
4. Minerva speaks English.
Facts, Not-So-Obvious:
1. You're actually in a massive device of some sort.
2. Minerva tried to steal something (I'm betting this device, you'll see why in the full explanation at the bottom).
3. Minerva knows how to access your HEV's comm sys.
4. Minerva implies she's trapped here.
5. Minerva says she's been here for a while.
6. There's this spot near the end (in the Device's upper control rooms) where you find can a small/semi-hidden tunnel and in it a radio and some supplies (food, ammo, misc. equipment).
7. Minerva says there's another world, very close (hint, VERY) to ours, and that it's hidden due to a quirk of physics, except to beings with advanced teleportation technologies.
8. Minerva keeps talking about this other soldier guy... Who "almost figured it out".
Part 2, (Unnamed)
Summery: This is a little more bothersome to explain because this doesn't occur as game/installment, but this set of evidence comes from the emails and transcripts you can find (previous transmission, main Minerva page).
Facts, Obvious:
1. Something went caused a large seismic shockwave at the Black Mesa Research facility, New Mexico. The Washington Seismic Monitoring institute picked up on it. From the looks it was something big, but the signature was not characteristic of a nuclear device. (AND NO! IT'S NOT THE RESONANCE CASCADE!)
2. Something went wrong at BM that required pausing/termination of some sort experiment, due to inadequate safety procedures.
Facts, Not-So-Obvious:
1. "My adopted forefathers are different, their scattered, discarded playthings more conducive to a meaningful imposition of my thoughts upon our captors." Playthings? Imposition of your thoughts upon the Combine?
2. "I have forgiven my past enemies, but now in repentance I must forgive my colleagues; their actions have brought on more constructed suffering than your world has ever previously known." Yah, thanks, we figured that much already. But your colleges, who are they? They're the ones who 'brought on more ... sufferings than your world has ever previously known'. The BM researchers opened the portal to Xen, alerting the combine...
Part 3 - Metastasis (The title does have meaning, trust me)
Summery: Fun and joy, you get dropped on an island in an HEV suit and the combine are already shooting at you before you could even say "Gordon Freemen". Off you go, Minerva has a job for you today....
Facts, Obvious:
1. There she is again!
2. Hey, same comm sys usage...
3. Again, English comm...
4. The Combine (AKA "Amoral Slugs") have found a planet, and because of that, they've also scared the shitz out of Minerva's pants (so to speak).
Facts, Not-So-Obvious:
1. Minerva keeps referring to Earth as if it belongs to it, or it to it. "Our proud oceans", etc...
2. "You were a trator to our species", Hey! Did Minerva say it was human?
3. "I know they can reach me now, and that makes me afraid.", Oh really? Though I already figured you were afraid.
4. "Light blue touch-paper", Uhh wa?
5. It's usually thought that a goddess doesn't resort to words like 'fuck' and 'shit' when stressed.
6. (This is a big one!) "There is no merciful god; no more benevolent deities to aid us.
We are alone in this battle, so should we dare to take up their ancient, abandoned weapons and become like gods ourselves?"
Final Evaluation:
Minerva was a Black Mesa scientist who worked on teleportation technologies. She attempted to steal a device of unknown origin (I'll just refer it as the Precursor's Device). The attempt went wrong, and Minerva was trapped in Xen along with the Precursor's Device.
Stranded, she digs in and tries to seal herself by shutting off the gravity lift to hide. When you come along, she jumps on the opportunity and uses her comm set to link up to your HEV suit and direct you to restoring power to the Precursor's Device, a hazardous task she didn't want to do herself (no firearms?). The Device reactived, she sends you home packing. Presumably she bails out of Xen and goes elsewhere, my guess is Lux Aeterna (the world beyond the portal in Metastasis). I believe Lux Aeterna was/is a Precursor world.
Time passes by, Minerva adopts the life style (need a better word) of the Precursors, modeling herself after them. They would be her "adopted forefathers". I assume she found more Precursor relics on Lux Aeterna. Minerva is also using Lux Aeterna as a nexus for her operations against the Combine (and perhaps others.... :3), using it as a rallying point for her operatives. ("To say you were one in a thousand would be overstating the odds")
Minerva starts her operations in earnest. She gains access to the Combine network using the Precursor relics she found previously, and arranges for covert operatives to be sown about to places of interest.
This is where the title Metastasis comes in, along with the first chapter called Carcinogenesis. Metastasis the the phenomenon where cancerous cells travel from the primary mass to other points in the body, potentially creating other cancerous masses. Carcinogenesis is the process where normal cells turn into cancer cells. The relation is obvious, Minerva is starting her war on the Combine, attacking specific points, infiltrating and sabotaging critical facilities. You are one of these cancerous cells, Minerva's operatives, traveling to all over the world, systematically killing the combine's inner installations... Carcinogenesis... Converting a combine soldier into an agent of their demise. A cancer indeed... She considers herself a traitor for causing all of this, and tried other ways to redeem herself. She failed, and now this is her final attempt, her last chance at fixing what she helped create.
Now here is where what I'm certain of ends, the old title for MINERVA: Out of Time was Chronoclasm (chasm? clasm? one of these two). Even the current title gives hints. Perhaps Minerva's window of opportunity is closing, perhaps time travel will be involved... I've tried to decipher the writings on the Out of Time page, the ones the gifs/map. Unfortunately I couldn't make them out, even though I spend about three hours on it with GIMP, trying to enhance the image so I can read it. But to no success. Judging from the reference pictures, and the mood set by the main page, I think it's safe to say something went really FUBAR... And Minerva wants to know why....
I have been very careful to limit myself to only hypotheses that do not contradict anything stated. That said, I cannot explain who the other soldier is that Minerva referred to in Someplace Else, nor what functionality the Precursor's Device provides, though I believe it to be an instrument for teleportation, perhaps our own teleportation technologies were reverse engineered from that device....
If anyone can expand on this, or find canon material which contradicts anything I stated, please say so. I just re-read the main page for Minerva today, and that bit about 'adopted forefathers' made everything suddenly click into place, like a mentat evaluating an equation...
EDIT:
Fixed, the NS stories are no longer (if they ever were) considered canon. Thanks to the guy below who pointed that out!
Last edited by LuaPineapple on Sat Sep 05, 2009 2:44 am, edited 2 times in total.
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