That's what I like to tell myself, but that's not what Bungie intended.

: Ancient humans existed
: 100,000 years ago, period. We weren't some space-faring conquering race.

Yup. It's just some weird trick of the universe that human-built ruins kept popping up where no humans had yet colonized. (Cortana letters)

: There may have been something done during re-seeding
: that allowed us to reclaim the Forerunner Mantle from the depths. It's
: almost like we inherited something. There are many, many places you can go
: with this story and with gameplay, especially with the inclusion of the
: evil Didact that could provide the Didact far more depth, not to mention a
: chance to really knock the human story out of the park (either showing
: human success or another failure at the Mantle, give or take a select
: heroic few like the Chief who live up to it or represent what's best in us
: all, blah blah trope-y stuff).

Meh. At the juncture the Halo universe was after Halo 3, chasing after more Forerunner artefacts under the guise of "Reclaiming the Mantle" was decidedly the wrong way to go.