Editing Librarian

{{Status|Canon}}
{{Pageimage|H4 Librarian Portrait.png}}
{{Character infobox
|variant=Forerunner
|name=Librarian
|image=[[File:H4 Librarian Cutout.png|300px]]
|homeworld=[[Maethrillian]]{{Ref/Book|Id=Enc22|Enc22|Page=365}}
|birth=[[112,329 BCE]]{{Ref/Reuse|Enc22}}
|death=[[97,445 BCE]]
|causeofdeath=Killed by the [[Halo Array]]
|parents=
|siblings=
|spouses=[[Ur-Didact]]
|children=
|species=[[Forerunner]]
|gender=Female
|height={{Convert|289.6|cm|ftin|sp=us}}{{Ref/Book|Id=H4EVG|EVG|Page=17}}
|mass={{Convert|441.4|lb|kg|disp=flip}}{{Ref/Reuse|H4EVG}}
|hair=White{{Ref/Reuse|PoL18}}
|eyes=Violet<ref>[https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/universe/characters/librarian ''Halo Waypoint'': ''Librarian'']</ref>
|affiliation=[[Ecumene]]
|rank=[[Lifeshaper]] ([[Rate|R]]: [[Lifeworker]])
|sn=
|notable=Oversaw the [[Conservation Measure]]
}}
{{Quote|Each one of these souls is finite and precious.
::''And I'm close.''
:::''Close to saving them all.''|The Librarian{{Ref/Game|Id=H3T1|H3|H3:Terminals/One|Terminal One}}}}
'''First-Light-Weaves-Living-Song''',{{Ref/Reuse|H4EVG}} better known as '''the Librarian''', was a highly influential [[Forerunner]] [[Lifeshaper]] and the head of the [[Lifeworker]] [[rate]] for ten thousand years.{{Ref/Novel|Id=C1|Cry|Chapter=1}} She was married to the [[Ur-Didact|Didact]], the [[Promethean]] supreme commander of the Forerunner military.{{Ref/Novel|Id=C6|Cry|Chapter=6}} During the [[Forerunner-Flood war]], she led the [[Conservation Measure]], which sought to index all species in the galaxy and transport them to [[Greater Ark|the Ark]] and other conservation facilities before the [[Flood]] could reach them or the [[Halo Array|Halo rings]] were fired. Frequently clashing with her husband over the morality of the Array, the Librarian died at the end of the war when the rings were activated, willingly stranding herself on [[Earth]] within range of the Halo effect. She viewed the [[human]] species as having special significance and is responsible for grooming humanity to be the Forerunners' [[Reclaimer|successors]]. 100,000 years after the firing of the Halo Array, the Librarian resurfaced through [[Mind transfer|personality imprints]] to help continue guiding humanity towards the [[Mantle]]. The Librarian herself was preserved in the [[Domain]] where she would eventually be reunited with her husband.

==Biography==
===Early life===
Born ''First-Light-Weaves-Living-Song'',{{Ref/Reuse|H4EVG}} she received the name "Librarian" from her teachers because she enjoyed traveling through great stores of knowledge.{{Ref/Novel|Id=string11|Sil|string 11}} When she was born, many Forerunners were confused about why her features made her different from the Forerunners. During her childhood her mother, a Lifeworker who was an expert in the study and nurturing life in ice worlds, died while she was on duty, with her upbringing being taken over by her father.{{Ref/Novel|Id=PoL24|PoL|Chapter=24}} As a child, her first glimpse of the [[Living Time]] was a chaotic nightmare for her, not knowing how to cope with it. She had sleep problems because of those nightmares and cried a lot, with the chemical intervention given by the monitors in her house the only way to console her dreams.Even as a [[Manipular]], the Librarian had a thirst for knowledge and fascination for life. One of her tutors, and who would become her Mentor, was a 4,000-years old Lifeworker named [[Harmony-in-Gifted-Symmetry]], with whom the Librarian would record and analyze her nightmares; Harmony would also teach her in navigate though her nightmares, and help her in understand the Living Time and watch its strings and threads. After adopting her first form, she gained access to the Domain, being greeted not by her ancestors, but shapeless forms.{{Ref/Novel|Id=PoL18|PoL|Chapter=18}}

After her first-form mutation, she hoped her features would become more Forerunner-like, but with no success. After her sulking period, the Librarian began to study and trace her abnormalities to its source, with the help of her ancilla, which the Librarian suspected her mentor Harmony had a hand in their meeting. Searching through the Domain, the Librarian heard voices who urge her to look to the beginning, and finally found a clue when one of the voices whispered her to look to the lost rate. She travelled to the [[Master Library]] of [[Keth Sidon]], searching for answers for several days until she crossed with the Theoretical studies, and their conclusions of the Precursors being the creators of both Forerunners and humanity, and that humanity share a genetic structure homogeneous to the Forerunners. The Librarian found the idea preposterous but, even with resistance against the idea, she began her study.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL18}}

She first met the Didact on [[Charum Hakkor]] before the [[Plague War]].{{Ref/Novel|Id=C11|Cry|Chapter=11}} Initially, the Didact's fellow [[Promethean]], [[Endurance-of-Will]], contended the Librarian as the Didact's wife-to-be. While the Librarian later offered him the choice of returning to Endurance, the Didact chose to marry the Librarian instead.{{Ref/Novel|Sil|Page=284, 290-291}} The Librarian and the Didact settled in a large family domicile on [[Nomdagro]]. They had several children, all of whom followed in their father's footsteps and became [[Warrior-Servant]]s.{{Ref/Novel|Id=string4|Sil|string 4}}

Over the course of her career, the Librarian came across countless different and often highly varied forms of life. On a number of ice-covered rocky moons orbiting gas giants, she had discovered small lifeforms which had arisen in the perpetual darkness of the oceans deep beneath the ice sheets covering their surfaces. For three times, she had "liberated" such beings by opening gaps in the ice, allowing the inhabitants of the subsurface oceans below to climb out and witness the extent of space beyond the enclosure of their home environments. In all of those instances, the creatures were terrified by the sheer vastness of space and scuttled back under the ice, even wiping their memories of what they had seen.{{Ref/Novel|Sil|Page=129-130}}

===War with humanity===
{{Main|Plague War}}
[[File:HTMCC-H4 Terminals RequiemWarRoom.png|thumb|left|250px|The Didact and the Librarian in the Prometheans' command center on [[Requiem]].]]
When [[prehistoric human civilization|humanity]] first began to attack Forerunner worlds and vessels, the Librarian stood before the [[Ecumene Council]] and advocated immediate retaliation and total extermination of the enemy. This policy was opposed by the Didact, who proposed to follow the teachings of the Mantle and send humanity back to its homeworld; this proposal was supported by the [[Master Builder]], [[Faber]], and the rest of the Council. The Librarian did not agree with this outcome, but conceded to the Council's decision. As war against humanity commenced, the Librarian found herself fearful for her husband; while humanity had always been aggressive in the past, she observed that they had never seemed as desperately violent as they did at the present.{{Ref/Game|Id=h4terminals|H4|H4:Terminals|Terminals}} During the course of the war, all of her children were killed in battle.{{Ref/Novel|Id=C13|Cry|Chapter=13}}

The reasons behind humanity's perceived violent expansion became clearer in the later stages of the war, after the Forerunners' advance into former human territory brought them into contact with the parasitic [[Flood]] which now appeared to be receding from the galaxy. Upon further study, the Librarian's conclusion was that the humans' intentions had not been attacking out of rebellion, but desperation: they had been attempting to halt the advance of the Flood, destroying infected Forerunner ships and bombarding planets that were in the Flood's path. Furthermore, the Flood's apparent retreat from the galaxy seemed to indicate that the humans had found a successful way to combat the parasite, perhaps even a cure. Despite her initial reaction to humanity's aggression, these realizations caused the Librarian's originally negative opinion on humanity to shift.{{Ref/Reuse|h4terminals}}

[[File:HTMCC-H4 Terminals LibrarianAtWork.png|thumb|250px|The Librarian studying a [[Pod infector]].]]
 
At this time, the Librarian's political standing was rapidly rising alongside that of her husband. She had accompanied the Didact as he sterilized remaining Flood redoubts, and had already conducted significant research into the parasite. Thus, she was placed in charge of the ecumene's Flood research and given the prestigious rank of [[Lifeshaper]], becoming the third Lifeworker to ever receive the title. While the remains of humanity struggled in their last bastion of [[Charum Hakkor]], the Librarian appealed to the Council so that humanity and their culture would be spared, as this might be the only way for the Forerunners to decipher their apparent Flood immunity. However, the Council was not supportive of her pleas, deeming humanity as too much of a threat and advocating the complete eradication of the species to ensure that they would not threaten Forerunner primacy again.{{Ref/Novel|Id=string3|Sil|string 3}}

After humanity capitulated at Charum Hakkor, the Council tasked the Lifeworkers with thoroughly analyzing the surviving humans for their supposed Flood immunity. Following this, the humans' mental patterns were to be [[Mind transfer|extracted and stored]] for further study. This would be accomplished via [[Composer]]s, machines originally designed by the Builders in a failed attempt to immunize Forerunners against the Flood. Although more efficient and less cruel solutions may have existed, the Builders and councilors—embittered by losses in the war—ensured that the Composers were all the Lifeworkers had. After the composition of Charum Hakkor's survivors, the remaining humans across the galaxy were gathered and confined to their ancient homeworld of [[Earth|Erde-Tyrene]], where they were subjected to a process of biological devolution. Under orders of the Council, the Librarian and her Lifeworkers would genetically imprint the devolved humans with dormant human essences harvested by the Composers at Charum Hakkor.{{Ref/Reuse|string3}}

Although the Didact agreed with the Council's decision to devolve humanity, the Librarian questioned the justice of this decision, claiming that if humanity had not come in conflict with the Flood, then they might have been able to surpass the Forerunners and take up the Mantle of Responsibility for themselves. In response to her husband's statement that humanity's fate was in accordance with the Mantle, the Librarian responded that the Forerunners clung too tightly to their role of guardianship, and that their unwillingness to let go could be their civilization's undoing.{{Ref/Reuse|h4terminals}}

===Research on Erde-Tyrene===
{{Quote|She comes to us when we're born. She watches over us as we grow, knows good and bad. She joys at our triumphs and sorrows at our passing. We all feel her presence.|[[Chakas]] on the Librarian}}
Seeing great potential in the human species, the Librarian was permitted by the [[Ecumene Council|Old Council]] to set up a research station on [[Earth]]. Over the span of the next ten thousand years, the Librarian helped the human species to slowly work toward re-creating [[Erde-Tyrene civilization|a primitive society]], away from the attention of the Council or the Master Builder.{{Ref/Reuse|C1}} To her great surprise, the humans demonstrated incredible progress and their artificially imposed biological devolution was effectively reversed over the course of a mere millennium, leading the Librarian and her Lifeworkers to suspect that there was something beyond natural evolutionary processes, or the Lifeworkers' assistance, acting in the background. Unwilling to risk the information of the humans' advancement from reaching the Council or her husband, she gradually removed her Lifeworkers from Erde-Tyrene and paid only occasional visits to the planet to study the humans' progress and give them her ''[[geas]]''.{{Ref/Reuse|string3}}

The early humans worshiped the Librarian as a goddess-like figure, believing her to watch over all of the humans and come to each one at birth and assign them a purpose.{{Ref/Novel|Id=C2|Cry|Chapter=2}} In reality, she used [[Lifeworker beacon|an automatic imprinting system]] to transmit her ''geas'' into certain humans instead of physically visiting them.{{Ref/Novel|Pri|Page=374}} She believed that the mammalian-level intelligence exhibited by certain scyphozoa and cephalopoda on contemporary Erde-Tyrene were evidence of experimentation by the [[Precursor]]s.{{Ref/Novel|TF|Detail=Adjunct}}

===The Halo Array===
While humanity and Erde-Tyrene faded into obscurity, another political conflict loomed. The [[Builder]]s, led by [[Master Builder]] [[Faber]], proposed the construction of a new form of superweapon to combat a possible Flood resurgence; these weapons would eventually take the form of the [[Halo Array]]. The Librarian was opposed to the weapons, viewing them as contrary to the Forerunners' Mantle to protect all life. Meanwhile, the Didact presented the Council a more conventional - and less genocidal - solution: [[shield world]]s distributed in strategic locations across the ecumene. These fortresses served as major military bases while doubling as biological preserves to which entire populations could be evacuated in times of crisis. Although the Librarian initially supported the Didact's plan over the Builders' Halos, the Council eventually ruled against the Didact and his shield world strategy was denied.{{Ref/Reuse|string3}}

As opposed to potentially losing her prestige by backing her husband until the end, the Librarian opted to retain her status by agreeing to a compromise with the Master Builder. She created a contingency plan for life in the galaxy: the [[Conservation Measure]], which would ensure the repopulation of the galaxy's [[sentience|sentient]] beings in the event of a galaxy-wide Halo activation. After threatening to halt all medical operations in the ecumene if the Builder-controlled Council refused to give in to her demands, she and her Lifeworkers were granted extensive biological preserves on the various installations of the Halo Array, including the rings themselves as well as their construction facilities, two [[intergalactic space|extragalactic]] megastructures known as the [[Ark]]s. Although the Librarian understood the imminent eventuality of having to activate the Halo Array if the Flood expanded beyond control, her husband continued to oppose the Halos on principle, insisting to the very end that the Forerunners could stop the Flood by conventional means. Their refusal to yield eventually cost the Didact and the [[Promethean]]s their position in the Council and they were forced into exile.{{Citation needed}}

===Expedition to Path Kethona===
Following the Didact's exile, the Master Builder quickly began to see his pact with the Librarian as a liability. In order to maintain her political standing and the remaining privileges of the Lifeworkers, she needed to remain as an asset in the eyes of the Master Builder. To this end, she proposed to the Council that more might be learned about origins of the Flood if they organized an expedition to the local galaxy of [[Path Kethona]], theorized to be the origin of the parasite. Furthermore, the journey would serve the purpose of confirming a Forerunner legend of a previous great expedition to Path Kethona ten million years earlier.{{Ref/Reuse|string4}}

The Librarian's proposal was eventually approved by the Council, and the ship ''[[Audacity]]'' was specifically constructed for the journey. With a crew of seven—including the Librarian, a Builder named [[Keeper-of-Tools]], a [[Miner]] named [[Clearance-of-Old-Forests]], and two Lifeworkers named [[Chant-to-Green]] and [[Birth-to-Light]]—the ''Audacity'' traveled to Path Kethona. Upon arrival, they found the satellite galaxy curiously devoid of signs of life.{{Ref/Reuse|string4}} However, during their survey of one star system, they discovered an impressive network of Precursor [[star road]]s. Further scans revealed [[probability mirror]]s of apparently of ancient Forerunner creation as well as an enormous fleet of likewise ancient Forerunner warships, confirming the existence of the previous expedition to Path Kethona. The crew of the ''Audacity'' surveyed the ten-million-year-old Forerunner ships, but nothing could be gleaned from their decayed data banks.{{Ref/Novel|Id=string8|Sil|string 8}}

Conducting additional scans of Path Kethona, the crew discovered one system harboring a planet with the possibility of life.{{Ref/Reuse|string8}} To their surprise, it turned out that not only was the planet home to [[Sedaaro Forerunner|descendants of prehistoric Forerunners]], but the entirety of the planet's biota was based upon Forerunner genetics. No advanced technologies were in evidence, even the sapient Forerunner relatives being limited to [[Technological Achievement Tiers|Tier 7]]-level technology. The Librarian decided to venture to the surface of the planet and make contact with the natives in one of their settlements; she went as far as removing her [[Forerunner personal armor|armor]], against the crew's objections. A large crowd quickly gathered around the Librarian and the armor-clad Chant-to-Green, expressing curiosity at the modern Forerunners' anatomical differences. However, the situation turned alarming as an old woman suddenly bit the Librarian in the forearm. Clearance, who had been holding position nearby, swiftly retrieved the Librarian and Chant in a [[Seeker (vehicle)|seeker]] and took them to the ''Audacity''.{{Ref/Novel|Id=string10|Sil|string 10}}

Although the others were highly concerned for her well-being, the Librarian soon learned that the purpose of the old female's bite had not been hostile: the microbes transmitted into her [[blood]] carried information which enabled her to understand the locals' language and even their way of thinking.{{Ref/Reuse|string10}} With this newfound ability, the Librarian returned to the town and queried the old female, named [[Glow-of-Old-Suns]], about their origins.{{Ref/Reuse|string11}} Glow led the Lifeshaper to an organic repository of information maintained by moss-like microbial growths, which had recorded the locals' history ten million years back. Here, she learned the true nature of the ancient Forerunner expedition: ten million years earlier, the Forerunners had [[Forerunner-Precursor war|rebelled against the Precursors]], and after exterminating all of their creators in the Milky Way, they had chased the Precursors down to Path Kethona. However, some of the Forerunners who served in the fleets objected to the complete destruction of the Precursors as a crime against the Mantle and were either summarily executed or abandoned on the planet. Those who had carried out the extermination of the Precursors until the end never returned to the Milky Way, leaving the inhabitants of the planet as the only survivors of the expedition.{{Ref/Novel|Id=string15|Sil|string 15}}

Following this revelation, the Librarian and the rest of the crew returned to the ecumene aboard the ''Audacity''. She would not reveal the disconcerting truth to anyone until in her testimony to [[Catalog]] over nine hundred years later; although she was asked to testify earlier on, she rejected the request, suspecting that the Master Builder could somehow use the information for political gain due to the Builders' control over the Old Council and the [[Juridical]]s.{{Ref/Novel|Sil|Page=29}} Officially, the mission was deemed a failure, as the crew had not discovered the origin of the Flood.{{Ref/Reuse|string15}}

During the genocide of the species in [[Path Kethona]], two Precursors had found shelter and were found by the Forerunners who hid them and tried to heal them. However, the Precursors were beyond their ability to save and although the Precursors possessed the ability to heal, they chose to let nature take its course. After dying, the two Precursors became flora that was later studied and encoded, seeds that germinated for a million years. Sprouts that climbed to the surface took even longer and bloomed only in the last million years. Unlike the [[Primordial]], these Precursors celebrated joy and life instead of relishing in suffering, pain and death. As a result, the blooms are not left corrupted with violence and misery but instead are clean, beautiful and bright.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL44}}

Driven by her own ''[[geas]]'' from the Precursors to fix the path and set right what the Forerunners did wrong, the Librarian located the specimens while in Path Kethona searching out the origins of the [[Flood]] and, returning home with the specimens, the Librarian kept her discovery out of her report to the Ecumene Council.{{Ref/Novel|Id=PoL44|PoL|Chapter=44}}

===Research on Bastion===
The Librarian enlisted the help of the crew of the ''[[Audacity]]'' to transform a small [[shield world]] in its construction phase, [[Bastion]], and make it what it needed to be to nurture this eventual new species.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL44}} The Librarian created Bastion to resemble [[Earth]] completely.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL39}} The Librarian had the starship ''[[Eden (spaceship)|Eden]]'' built to carry the Precursor seeds and blooms to a world outside of the Milky Way galaxy that was ideal for planting and growth and where they couldn't be reached by the Flood. There, in some distant future, life on the planet would emerge and grow sentient, following the complete genetic code of the Precursors and rebirthing the race. However, they would be utterly free of genetic memory and would be able to build a new civilization with a clean slate.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL44}} Bastion became the Librarian's secret laboratory away from the Ecumene Council and their rules and regulations containing the Librarian's most dangerous research and experiments.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL41}} This included studies and experimentation on [[Ancestors|ancient humanity]], the Forerunners and the Precursors, ingenious observation and trials, studies with [[Living Time]], working [[Composer]]s, [[Cryptum]]s and other endless mysteries.{{Ref/Reuse|PoLEpilogue}}

The Librarian would eventually split up the [[coordinate key]] that granted access to Bastion, the ''Eden'' and its mission, and unrestricted access and control over the [[shield world]] and its caretakers.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL41}} One piece was kept by her [[mind transfer|personality imprint]] [[Kilimanjaro Forerunner complex|below]] [[Mount Kilimanjaro]],{{Ref/Reuse|Ren48}}{{Ref/Reuse|Ren53}} one was placed in the [[Cartographer#Installation 07|Cartographer]] on [[Installation 07]]{{Ref/Reuse|PoL16}} and the last piece was placed in [[New Carthage Forerunner Way Station|the way station]] on [[New Carthage]].{{Ref/Novel|Id=PoL28|PoL|Chapter=28}} The Librarian assigned the [[Precept]] to [[Erebus VII Forerunner complex|the complex]] on [[Erebus VII]] to test anyone attempting to use the key to find Bastion,{{Ref/Reuse|PoL35}} placing an illegal [[personal slipspace unit]] connecting Erebus VII to Installation 07.{{Ref/Novel|Id=PoL19|PoL|Chapter=19}} The [[Lifeshaper]] favored the ''[[Eiyaa-Mahtuhaa]]'', making them a hurdle to overcome as part of this test. If the test was passed, the coordinate key would be imprinted with coordinates leading to Bastion and access permissions for those who passed the test.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL35}} This was likely a contingency plan by the Librarian to ensure that the rebirth of the Precursors would happen as the Librarian was supposed to return to Bastion and launch the ''Eden'' herself.{{Ref/Reuse|PoL41}}

===Forerunner-Flood war===
{{References|section}}
{{Main|Forerunner-Flood war}}
At one point after the Didact went into exile in a [[Cryptum]], the Librarian devised a complex plan to bring her husband back in order to fight the resurgent Flood. She imposed a ''[[geas]]'' on certain humans, causing multiple generations to attempt to pass the defenses surrounding the Cryptum, which she had relocated on Earth.{{Ref/Novel|Id=C34|Cry|Chapter=3-4}} Finally, she secretly assigned an [[ancilla]] to manipulate [[Bornstellar Makes Eternal Lasting]], a rebellious [[Manipular]], to go to Earth in search for treasure and open the Cryptum.{{Ref/Novel|Cry|Chapter=1}}{{Ref/Reuse|C34}} While the original Didact was believed to have been executed by [[Master Builder]] [[Faber]] some time afterward, he had performed a [[Forerunner mutation|mutation]] to Bornstellar and thus imprinted Bornstellar with his consciousness.{{Ref/Novel|Cry|Chapter=15-16}}

During the war, the Librarian traveled to the [[San'Shyuum]] world [[Janjur Qom]] to gather specimens of their species for storage. The Librarian's visit caused unrest among the San'Shyuum, who began [[Battle of Janjur Qom|an uprising]] against the Forerunners soon after.{{Ref/Novel|Cry|Chapter=25}} Following this, the Librarian traveled to the [[greater Ark]], where she later met with Bornstellar Makes Eternal Lasting, now almost completely under control of the Didact's personality. The Librarian told Bornstellar that the Didact had been executed by the Master Builder and that the emergent [[IsoDidact]] was now all that remained of him. However, this was later revealed to be untrue, as the original Didact, now identified as the ''Ur-Didact'', had in fact survived, resulting in the simultaneous existence of two Didacts.

After [[Installation 07]] was [[Battle for Gyr