Red Marker

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The Red Marker

"The Marker? This "divine relic"? Made by man."

The Red Marker (designated Marker 3A by EarthGov) is a mysterious device central to the events of Dead Space .

It was a reverse-engineered duplicate of the alien Black Marker, based on the same data hastily compiled by Michael Altman prior to his death.^[2] It was built to understand and utilize the technologies of the Black Marker without the same supposedly defective results of the original project.^[3]

1 History
2 Abilities
3 Trivia
4 Gallery
5 Sources
6 See Also

HistoryEdit

The First Aegis VII IncidentEdit

"They reverse-engineered it a couple of hundred years ago from the REAL Marker, a true alien artifact recovered on Earth. They dug it up, studied it, and made it their own. Then they brought it to Aegis VII, and activated it. And you've seen the result. The stuff of nightmares. They sealed the system, and no one would have been the wiser."

—Kendra Daniels^[1]

After the discovery of the Black Marker, the Earth Government began researching the extent of its capabilities and structure. The research team, which originally featured Michael Altman, studied the Black Marker and reverse-engineered it for their own use. Through an accident in basic decontamination, the team discovered that the genetic code written on the Marker was the code for the Necromorph contagion. It was also observed that the Marker emits a field or "dead space" that prevents the Necromorph DNA from initiating recombination and makes it go dormant. As time went on, some members of the team, for unknown reasons, became infected and were turned into Necromorphs and subsequently got quarantined. The team members became overrun, and most of them were killed by the Necromorph infection. The remaining team, lead by Dr. Eando Dukaj, created a pedestal that one of the members claimed to have seen in a vision, most likely made by the Marker, that could amplify the "dead space" made by the Marker in the hopes of stopping the Necromorph infection from spreading and hopefully giving them a chance at survival. The team succeeded in making the pedestal and locked the Hive Mind and the rest of the infection with it on Aegis VII.

The Second Aegis VII IncidentEdit

Discovered by accident by an illegal mining colony on Aegis VII, the Marker was hailed amongst some colonists as proof to their faith's credibility. Shortly after the discovery of the Marker, cases of insomnia, depression and later dementia began occurring. Despite increasing cases of violence, colony management overrode P-Sec protests and prepared to bring the Marker inside the colony itself. When the Marker was removed from its pedestal, it emitted red light and simultaneously broadcast an across-frequencies scream. Apparently taking the "scream" as a signal, fifty Unitologists committed mass suicide; in a similar event of insanity, an extraction team engineer killed numerous members of his team and other colony personnel.

By order of Captain Benjamin Matthius, the Marker was brought to the USG Ishimura from the colony and a no-fly order was implemented between the colony and vessel. The bodies of all the murder victims were then sent to the ship secretly. The bodies of all the suicide victims were intentionally kept on the colony by the colony manager as leverage to have the Ishimura send him a vessel to transport him to the ship as he felt he deserved to be a part of the Marker's discovery. Days later, Planet Crack was to commence. Upon initiating the planet crack, a blackout occurred throughout the entire colony. Panic immediately ensued and people quickly started being slaughtered. It was later discovered by a colonist that the Marker's inscriptions represented a DNA recombinant code for necrotic flesh that results in the creation of the Necromorphs. With the bodies of the suicide victims as their hosts, the Necromorphs soon began running amok in the colony, killing off and transforming more colonists. The colony soon fell apart and with all the shuttles destroyed in a flight accident, it was soon completely overrun with Necromorphs. In the end, only a few colonists survived, most notably, Brant Harris. He was clearly traumatized by the events and provided rich information for the scientists aboard the Ishimura.

Not surprisingly, the Ishimura soon followed the same fate as the colony and more Necromorphs were produced as a result of the Marker's removal.

Through text logs found about the ship, Isaac Clarke discovers that the Marker is a divine relic of Unitology, a religion founded by Michael Altman 200 years ago. Unitologists view Michael Altman as a martyr due to him being assassinated. The Marker discovered by Altman, however, was black and not red like the one found on Aegis VII. It is revealed by Kendra Daniels that the Red Marker was in fact a manmade copy of the Black Marker, the true alien artifact discovered on Earth. The Marker was then brought to Aegis VII and test fired with gruesome results. It was soon decided that the Marker was too unstable and was subsequently buried deep within Aegis VII. The system was then sealed off. Two centuries later, an illegal mining operation by C.E.C. rediscovered the Marker with disastrous results.

For the two centuries, it had been buried in Aegis VII, the Red Marker had sealed off the "Hive Mind", a massive creature that controlled the Necromorphs through telepathy. Upon removing the Marker, the creature was released and went about killing off the humans of Aegis VII, the Ishimura and the USM Valor with its Necromorphs. The Marker was brought back to Aegis VII by Isaac Clarke in the hopes of once again sealing off the creature as well as the Necromorph infection. Though Isaac managed to return the Marker to its pedestal, which caused it to glow, this action was halted by Daniels, who returned and took the Marker and attempted to flee with it on a shuttle. She was then killed by the Hive Mind; which was then defeated by Isaac Clarke. He then immediately escaped on the shuttle while the Marker remained behind on Aegis VII. It was presumed obliterated when the tectonic load the Ishimura had previously removed from the planet (with a mass of roughly a few trillion tons) was released and fell back to the planet with a cataclysmic impact. The Marker, however, was not completely destroyed and many shards of the Marker were left on the ruins of Aegis VII.

Post-Aegis VII IncidentsEdit

Three months after the events on the Ishimura, the USG O'Bannon was sent to the ruins of Aegis VII to complete two missions. The first mission was to find a way to hold the breaking planet together. The second mission was to recover as many shards of the Marker as possible. Ships were sent down onto the planet and one of the crewmen found a Marker shard. He recovered it, but it gave him dangerous hallucinations that caused him to kill a fellow crewmate. Only one ship managed to make it off the planet before it blew up completely and docked back in the O'Bannon. The Marker shard was examined by a scientist on the ship who became affected by it to such an extent that he unintentionally started a necromorph outbreak via his experiments. The terrified and hallucinating doctor returned to his quarters where he killed his wife and baby, thinking they were some of the monsters. The shard of the Marker was eventually thrown into the O'Bannon's core reactor by the surviving crew members and destroyed. This brought about an end to the necromorph infestation aboard the ship.

AbilitiesEdit

It is revealed^[4] in Dead Space 2 that the Marker is actually transmitting encrypted instructions for the creation of the Markers, their blueprints, through its signal. However, not everyone is able to decipher the signal, thus receiving it as mere "noise," images and meanings without coherence, ultimately driving the person paranoid. The reason as to why not everyone can properly decode the Marker's signal is attributed to some undefined aspect of the individual's intelligence.

As of Dead Space 2, it has also become clear that the Markers on Aegis VII and on the Sprawl are sentient to some degree. They do not only transmit the signal described above, but they are also attempting to actually manipulate people, through the use of hallucinations, very specific to the individual.

Notable examples of this Marker's tactic are Doctor Terrence Kyne and Isaac Clarke, urging them to return the Red Marker to its proper place. The Marker always created the illusion of a loved one; Doctor Kyne often conversed with his dead wife, Kendra Daniels repeatedly saw her brother (whether he is dead, or just not positioned to the ship is unknown; however, it is more probable that he is dead, as Kendra states she saw him "waving, like nothing was wrong."), and Clarke saw his girlfriend, the deceased Nicole Brennan, thus making it credible to argue that the Red Marker was helping Kyne and Clarke to return to Aegis VII and stop the Hive Mind.

TriviaEdit

This Marker is actually one of several Markers. In a report to the Commander of the USM Valor, it is referred to as "Marker 3A," possibly being an enumeration in a series or generation with the first being the Black Marker. In the ending of Dead Space 2, it is revealed in an audio playback between two unknown officials that there are several more Markers in existence, stating that The Sprawl is Marker site 12.
Throughout the duration of Dead Space, the monitors located throughout the game will become "possessed," flashing red and having the symbols found throughout the game moving about the screen erratically; when Isaac approaches the monitors, they will turn on and start flashing red with the symbols and turn off when Isaac is at a certain distance. It becomes apparent in Chapter 11: Alternate Solutions that this is from the Red Marker manipulating Isaac, when Isaac meets up with Nicole after Daniels attempts to escape with the Red Marker.
There are some discrepancies between Downfall and the games.
- The Red Marker appears significantly larger during Downfall. In Dead Space the Marker only appears to be 2-3 times the size of Isaac. Whereas in Downfall, it appears to be seveal stories tall, taking up almost the entire height of the Cargo Bay.
- In the movie, the Marker seems to have the ability to repel Necromorphs approaching it, though most likely for gameplay reasons, this ability is absent from Dead Space. Although at the end of the game, when the Marker is put in place by Isaac, it creates a light that kills any remaining Necromorphs nearby.
- It appears to be black in Downfall, or at least a much darker red than in Dead Space, though the text inscribed on it is still a brighter shade of red.
During gameplay, whenever Isaac approaches the Marker, it seems to emit what sounds like several people chanting. What the voices are saying, however, is entirely unintelligible.
In the Dead Space 2 Dementia trailer, the Red Marker appears in Isaac's pupil, showing that the Red Marker still had some role in Dead Space 2. This also signifies that the Red Marker still has some effects on him, even after its apparent destruction.
Red Markers are red, because bismuth was used to replace certain elements in the duplication of the Black Marker^[5]
As of Dead Space: Salvage, the Red Marker is presumed destroyed as a group of illegal miners found the USG Ishimura, its hull shot full of shards from the Marker. And in Aftermath, they scour the planet's unstable surface trying to stabalize it while also looking for pieces of the Marker.
According to Captain Campbell, EarthGov was willing to pay 2,000,000 credits for a kilo of the Red Marker fragment.
The Markers had seemingly different effects during both games. The first one seemed only to want to cull Necromorph outbreaks and keep them from happening, while the second appeared actively to cause Necromorphs to form and Isaac's worsening dementia. This is the result of two conflicting forces surrounding the Markers; in Dead Space: Martyr, these conflicting effects can be seen simultaneously among the scientists researching the Black Marker. While some see dead relatives telling them to stop their research, warning them of "Convergence," others hear whispers "from the Marker" telling them that it offers eternal life through Convergence.
The Red Marker may somehow monitor the Necromorph presence, as logs in the game have revealed that when the Marker was destroyed, the Necromorphs degenerated into an "Organic Soup" as put by a survivor. At the same time, the incident on the O'Bannon showed that the destruction of the shard, which initially caused the Necromorph's presence reduced all of the Necromorphs on the ship to the same organic sludge.
Additionally, both the Red and Black Markers resemble the double helical structure of z-DNA, one of 3 helix forms that active DNA can take.^[6]