David Securely Reported to Weyland-Yutani in the Novel

But! Even though the solar flare was a random event, I think, I don't know, but I think that David could predict that solar flare.  I'll use our star, the Sun, as an example.  Our sun goes through cycles of active and passive phases.  The passive cycles hardly release any solar flares.  The active cycles release many solar flares.  If I remember right, usually our Sun alternates between these active and passive phases about every 10 years or so.  The star that caused damage to the Covenant ship could have been predicted to be in an active phase by David, or through David communicating with Weyland Co. scientists who would study the star.  So, David planned out that the Covenant ship would be passing through the "Paradise" planets system around the stars active phase.  He didn't know when the solar flare would occur.  The only thing he would know would be that there would be a VERY high chance of the Covenant getting struck by a solar flare.  He wouldn't know when that would be, so he just replayed Shaw's transmission over and over again so that when that solar flare would occur, the crew would hear it and would find the planet he is on.  Now, the question is, "How did David affect the mission so that the Covenant would pass through his system and it's star during one of it's active phases?"  Well, if David has Mother working with him, Mother could logically come up with an answer to convince Walter, who is managing the ship while everyone is asleep, that the ship needs to alternate it's speed.  We don't know how far the Covenant ship is away from Earth by the time the movie starts.  All we know is that the Covenant ship is around seven years from Origae-6.  I assume the whole mission could take around 40 years from watching the crews personal video tapes to send to their family before they go in hypersleep.  This is just a rough estimate, but I do think it could be around that long.  Just a little alter in the speed over 33 years could easily put the Covenant ship within an active phase of the star in question here.  Plus, we don't know what kind of star that even is.  We just know it's a star.  So, we cannot predict how long the stars active and passive phases are.  They could only be 5 years!  Still, this info could have been hidden by David or Mother so that the Covenant ship would near enough to this star to receive the solar flare effects.  I am no scientist in any way, but this is what I think could be what is going on in the movie Alien: Covenant.  I mean, when one of the Covenant crew asked David what he was doing here on Paradise, he replied, "Waiting for Mother."  Plus, David had a security code for Mother at the end of the movie that Mother accepted.  David's aren't made anymore.  That is why they make Walter's.  Plus, if I remember right, David's were removed from the public because it made people feel uncomfortable.  So, this leads me to wonder, "How does David's code work for Mother?"  The David we see is a special David which personally served Weyland for many years.  Weyland called David the "closest thing he has to a son, but he is a robot and will never die."  I think Weyland is trying to continue his ambitions through his personal David and I wouldn't be surprised if David inherited parts of Weyland Co. since he is like a son to Weyland.  Of course, all of this is just my theory.  What do you think?   Any ideas that I am looking over?

Paragraphs, I Moon Girl, paragraphs :)

The event that damaged the Covenant was not a solar flare. Mother said it was a neutrino burst and Walter said it was a highly charged shockwave from a stellar ignition. That's either a stellar explosion from a star being born, or when it dies in a supernova.

Neither is something you can predict, certainly not in the spec of time mankind exists compared to stellar masses. It's all sci-fi mumbo jumbo anyway. Neutrinos barely interact with anything, and the only time they would be dense enough to pack a punch like they did on the movie would be something like being next to a supernova when it blew. Neutrinos would not mean diddly in that case though, as the ship would already be gone from the electromagnetic radiation and particles that just blasted it to bits.

I suppose a fusion bomb going off beside the ship could hit it with a bunch of neutrinos, but again, neutrinos would be the least of their problems in that case.

Other than keeping the message from the Juggernaut playing, I'm not sure what else David could have done to attract or divert a ship his way, being that he seemed to be trapped on that planet.

From the movie, I understand the neutrino burst as being the cause for the solar flare.  In the movie, the crew says it was a neutrino burst, but the crew also says it was a solar flare.  The novel, which I am reading at the moment, describes the mysterious "atypical energy burst" as an "intense storm of energized particles".  This storm could suggest a solar flare or it could suggest the fact that the Covenant ship is going to get hit really hard.  In the novel, Walter first describes it as a "highly charged shockwave", but right after that he describes it as, "charged particle flares."  To me it is not 100% clear what it is, but I do remember the crew in the movie saying it was a solar flare.

David could use the Juggernaut to communicate, or at least amplify his communication to Earth couldn't he?  The Engineers have extremely superior technology, so I would assume if he used that technology to communicate with Earth, it could take minutes to talk instead of years. 

Sorry, no one said it was a solar flare in the movie. Walter specifically said it was a "highly charged shockwave from a stellar ignition" which is the explosion from the birth of a star. You are probably thinking of Walter's reply to Oram asking for a review so he could understand how that happened. Walter replied "It was a random localized event sir. There is no way to detect spontaneous STELLAR flares until it is too late."

Alan Dean Foster was purposefully vague in the novelization and did not mention stellar ignition or supernova as implied in the movie. He actually knows his science fairly well, and knows that would have been nonsense.

Even if you could have your "predictable" coronal mass ejection from a solar flare, I'm afraid it would not do anything to an interstellar ship. CMEs dissipate inside a solar system. Our big ones barely even get out as far as Jupiter. They are also directional specific. Even if an interstellar ship traveling at sub light speed was passing that close to a star (even bigger problems if they were) and just happened to pass through a CME, the most that could happen is a slight chance of a temporary power loss or possibly a fried circuit somewhere. Nothing like what we saw in Covenant. Of course, Covenant is just sci-fi fantasy, so they can come up with any fantasy science they would want in a future movie to make that happen I suppose.

As far as David communicating with Earth using the Juggernaut - there was no mention of him doing that or being able to do that in the book or movie.

I am almost certain they said "solar flare" in the movie.  I saw it on May 19th, so it has been awhile.  I guess I need to watch it again to be sure that they did say a solar flare and to pay attention to when it was said in the conversation.  In the movie, the crew is told it is a neutrino burst at first, but as the beginning of the movie progresses, they stop saying neutrino burst and say solar flare instead.  I know I heard solar flare in that movie! And I really thought I heard it in a conversation describing what happened during small talk among the crew.  The formal meeting between the crew after it just happened described it as a neutrino burst.  I might go see it again if I can get someone to go with me, or maybe... I'll just go by myself...so I can be 100% sure about what space event happened.  I do want to see it again anyways.

'Neutrino burst' is only said once, when Mother tells Walter it is coming. The crew was not awake at that point. Walter later tells the crew it was a 'highly charged shockwave from a stellar ignition', then a 'spontaneous stellar flare'. Those are the only three mentions of the event in the whole film. 

Walter definitely said stellar, not solar. I just watched it. Stellar and solar flare can mean the same thing anyway. One just refers to an event on another star, the other refers to our own. Not that it matters, as it is all mumbo jumbo talk in the movie anyway, nothing to do with real science.

Alright, I am going to have to bring BigDave into this since I don't have the liberty of seeing the movie right now so I can argue my point.  I am going to see the movie again, but the question is when.  I am only going to argue with you because I think it is a legitimate theory.  Still, if it is wrong when looking at the details, I would like to know and I would like someone to point it out.  Thus, the Alien:Covenant forums get there use from me.

Okay, sooo...back on the topic.

BigDave read in a previous thread about what I said about the possibility of a neutrino burst being able to be predicted in a way and he replied with the following:

BigDave said, "I dont think a Neutrino Burst would be a Predicted event though, the only way this happens is at Random, or knowledge in advanced by studying a Star... as Neutrino Bursts are usually a event after a Super Nova, but for this movie they have had it as a Large Solar Flair... which would be unpredictable event unless some device had been targeted against the Star to cause a Large Scale Solar Flare." Source: <http://www.alien-covenant.com/topic/45388>.

So, BigDave apparently thinks that it is a large scale solar flare too.  Upon BigDave's comment, I thought that at least the star could have been understood well enough to be able to predict it's active and passive phases like our own star, the Sun.  So, my theory became a little more refined after BigDave's comment.

@I Moon Girl - Sorry, I don't mean to sound argumentative. I was just pointing out what was actually said in the movie, and what the terms actually mean in the real world. But like I said, none of those various stellar events would really have any effect of the ship, so if some more mumbo jumbo science was thrown in there, you can make anything do anything.

By that measure your theory could be worked into the movie, but as is, there is nothing I see in the movie to indicate David had any way to communicate offworld, study or predict anything in far off interstellar space, or that he even know that there was a Covenant ship and where it was going in the first place.

How about this answer?

The Covenant mission, according to the novel, took 10 years to plan.  We don't know how far from Earth the Covenant ship is when the movie begins.  All we know is that the ship has a little over 7 years to travel to get to it's destination.  So, David could have known about the Covenant mission before the Prometheus expedition even took place, which was about 10 years at the beginning of the Covenant movie.  For the Covenant ship to get where it is in the movie, the mission could have been known to David.  He could have also gotten updates while being on the Prometheus ship (that's if he even wanted updates).

From Tennessee's transmission before he went into hypersleep, he would say he would be much younger than his brother.  I guess you could add on another 10 years to be conservative, but who really knows how old his brother is.  You could guess that the Covenant was 10 years away from Earth at the start of the Covenant movie.  They had to be far, that's for sure since Daniels protest was said to take awhile to transmit.  Paying attention to this amount of time taken for the Covenant to travel would give David plenty of time to just hear about the Covenant mission.  I am sure he knew of it before landing on LV-223 since it was sponsored by Weyland Co. and he had plenty of time on the Prometheus to hear or even stay up to date with progress.

Still, David wouldn't be altering the Covenant mission by himself.  He would have Mother to help him.  I think Mother was someone living out the goal of getting a Xeno along with Ash in the original Alien from obvious evidence.  I think we can at least both agree that Ash and Mother are very suspicious if we both don't think there on a mission which began in the movie Alien: Covenant.

So to address the communication problems, why couldn't David use the Juggernaut to communicate?  It was sending out Shaw's transmission, so it could still send out signals.  So, why couldn't the Juggernaut send out a stronger signal to communicate with Mother?  Plus, who knows what technology the "Engineers" had on "Paradise".  He could have used their technology to communicate as well as to study the nearby star.  The communication could easily have had Mother communicating back with some super fast, alien technology.

I don't see any holes in the theory, but my biggest concern with it was on the solar flare/neutrino burst.  I did some quick research on the internet and I didn't get any layman info about neutrino bursts nor any about neutrino bursts linking solar flares.  I am at the mercy of Hollywood science on that part!  I did find some good info on solar flares though.

Also, I don't mean arguing in a negative way.  I guess were just debating or discussing or... I guess discussing a theory about the movie would be the best way to describe what we are doing.

I would also like to add that solar flares from our own Sun can release enough energy "equivalent of millions of 100-megaton hydrogen bombs exploding at the same time," according to Space.com. Source: <https://www.space.com/11506-space-weather-sunspots-solar-flares-coronal-mass-ejections.html>.

Apparently in today's time, according to the same article mentioned above, "sensitive electronic equipment in space can also be damaged by these energetic particles."  The reason the Covenant ship got so badly damaged from the stellar event was because the chances of what did happen seemed to little to worry about.  I guess they decided not to protect the Covenant ship's sensitive electronic equipment because of this.  David could know of this flaw in the ship and would get Mother to alter data attained for the Covenant mission so the incident could have a very high chance of happening.

Everything in your theory is plausible - it's a science fiction story after all - but what are you basing it on? What is in the movie or book that even hints at this?

David seems to have no knowledge of the Covenant when he rescues the crew. He also seems completely surprised, and intrigued when he finds out they are a colony mission. He is very interested how many passengers are on board. Almost TOO interested, to the point someone should have thought it odd.

You info on solar flares and what they do is basically what I said in the previous posts. But solar flares are only on the surface of the sun. It's the CMEs (coronal mass ejections) the flares emit which can project out into the solar system. As I said, they can cause electronics in space to malfunction (very rarely), but they do not leave the solar system. Ours barely get out as far as Jupiter before dissipating. They would have absolutely no effect on a faster-than-light ship traveling in interstellar space.

David seemed almost like he was waiting for them, like he set the Neomorph attack up, and everything on that planet. It would be quite simple really: the Engineers possessed a technology that could produce solar flares/bursts/etc, and David - like with the xenovirus - hijacked it and used it to further House Weyland's cosmic agenda...

Indirectly he 'set up the Neomorph attack', because he was responsible for the motes that infected the crew being all over the planet, but that was done many years in the past.

I'm sure he would have been happy for anyone to come along, Engineer or human, so he could continue to the next stage of he experiments, but what specifically in the movie made you think he was waiting for the Covenant?

Wouldn't the mission of the Covenant have begun around the time of the events of Prometheus, if not earlier? I think the events of the prequel series as a whole are more closely intertwined than we may think.

--- Point #1

David only ACTED like he had "no knowledge of the Covenant when he rescues the crew."  He also ACTED completely surprised, and intrigued when he finds out they are a colony mission."  He ACTED "very interested how many passengers are on board."  I do admit, he does seem almost too interested like he may not know.  I don't remember him in private contemplating the Covenant and it's mission though.  He only seems to show his interest when he is around the Covenant crew. 

The point I am getting here is, after watching Prometheus, could you trust David?  The Covenant crew doesn't know better, but we, the audience should.  He simply asked the right questions to gain their trust.  It worked until the last scene when Daniels saw that it was David and not Walter.  Still, it was to late to do anything, so I guess David just didn't care if she knew it was him.  I think the questions David asked are the typical questions anybody would ask if they were stranding on a planet for 10 years all alone and thinking they were probably going to be on the planet forever.  I'd be that interested in the mission too. 

Of course, only I would be after knowing that I am safe from those protomorphs.  David acts like he has seen these protomorphs before when the Covenant crew first gets attacked, so if I knew something about those protomorphs, than I am sure I could find a place to be safe long enough to learn about the crew before I trust them with saving my life.  That is pretty much how David acts until the crew wisens up.  I think David plays the part of an innocent, smartly curious, and thankful android pretty well.

--- Point #2

Solar flares, even though they occur on the surface of the Sun, emit energized particles. Using our Sun as the example, when energized particles exploding from solar flares race toward us, they arrive in only eight minutes. In the movie, with all of the space activity in the area, Walter finds out about the particles in less time.  We don't know what kind of star they are apparently near to decide how massive it's solar flares can be either.

The thing is, in the movie’s story, we are at the mercy of Hollywood science. The movie describes the event that hurt the Covenant ship as a solar flare (and a neutrino burst). All I can offer are assumptions as to how this solar flare could strike the ship. Maybe they were not in interstellar space, but where in the magnetic field of the star which emitted the solar flare? We really don’t know where the Covenant ship is in the Alien universe, unless you have some information about that? If you do, I would honestly like to read it.

---Point #3

The reason why this theory could be hinted at in the Alien movies is because when the Covenant crew is on “Paradise” asked David what he has been doing here, he replied, “Waiting for Mother.” Why would he say something like that? Not only that, but when David hurriedly switched places with Walter, he somehow had two facehugger embryo’s (or something similar) ready to go. I guess he could have access to Engineer technology, but with making human embryos, that process takes longer than a few hours. Plus, he is around the Covenant crew almost the whole movie, so when did he make those? Why would he make them unless he was planning on leaving anyways? (I guess we could think of some reason) Another is, what are the odds of a ship full of around 2,000 sleeping, helpless colonists are flying past a planet which has an android bent on experimenting with humanoids to develop a perfect organism (or something) in the middle of unchartered space and apparently uninhabitable planets only ten years after he crashed on that planet?

Also, in the original Alien, Ash and Mother are at least suspicious and most likely involved in what David started. The point with this is, why wouldn’t there be some behind-the-scenes goals going on in the movie Alien: Covenant. Alien, Aliens, (I haven’t watched Alien 3 in awhile, so no comment on that) Alien Resurrection, and Prometheus all had behind-the-scenes motives to everything that was happening. Some are just more spelled out then others. The Alien franchise is famous for these kind of things. Still, I don’t like that reason for why there should be.

Point #1 - Sorry, I just don't buy any of this or see evidence of it in the movie or book, so until someone finds some...

Point #2 - I would just be repeating what I have already pointed out, so I'll pass this time.

Point #3 - "Covenant crew is on “Paradise” asked David what he has been doing here, he replied, “Waiting for Mother.” Why would he say something like that?"

Well, the crew never once asked David what he was doing there. Oram asked David to tell him "exactly what is going on" after he shot the Neomorph, if that's what you mean.

Regarding "waiting for mother", I assume you mean David's conversation with Oram in the egg room? This is what he said:

DAVID
"You see Captain, my work has been frustrated from a lack of an essential ingredient."

ORAM
Are they alive?

David
Waiting, really.

ORAM
For what? What are they waiting for David?

DAVID
Mother

David ran out of host "mothers" (the essential ingredient) for his facehuggers to impregnate, so he has been waiting for a new mother to bring his "success" (the xenomorph) to term. David was just using a metaphor...and being a smartass.

This is an old sci-fi trope. It is nothing new for the Alien movies either, as the original chest burster scene has been described many times over the years as a metaphor for a mother giving birth, and Kane has often been described as the "mother of the xenomorph" or having "given birth to" the xenomorph. I remember reading whole essays on all the mother metaphors in Alien, that one being #1.

Point #1

I just got to Chapter 17 in the novel, so I am not finished, but the beginning of Chapter 14 when the crew is talking to David is riddled with suspicion.  In the novel as well, David leads two security crew members to a high place to try and contact the Covenant.  David says he is leaving to check on the others while they try to communicate with the Covenant.  Instead, he goes to cut his hair so he can look exactly like Walter.  The book even says he looks exactly like Walter.  He lied and we all know he switched places with Walter.  After watching what David did in Prometheus (killed Holloway by experimenting with the black goo and touched whatever he wanted so the mission happened they way he and Weyland wanted it regardless of the scientists well-being), I would assume most people would be a little confused if they could trust David.  After watching the end of Covenant, I don't see how anyone could trust David.  The personality and actions of David and his interest in the black goo and the creatures which can come from it, I think, can lead to the conclusion that David is a liar and has motives which he thinks are important enough for him to live out forever trying to achieve the goals.  Also, there is no telling how long David has been waiting to confront the Covenant crew for the first time.  He only came at a time where he had too.  David was watching the crew for a long time.  

One thing that caught my attention in the novel (p.190) was that David knew the crew saw the crash.  I don't remember them telling David they did, so how would he know? (This last comment I am not defending because I guess I could've forgotten this part).  Also, when Walter explored the engineer city by himself, he apparently came across Shaw's room (p.203).  Why would Shaw have a room when she died in the crash? (I am not defending this either for the same reasons as the other above).  What do you think on these parts?

Point #2

A Solar Flare and a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) are two completely different stellar events.  

A solar flare are explosions which form from twisting high magnetic fields crossing and reconnecting.  This creates exploding energy pushing outward from our Sun.  They release harmful energized particles which can damage electronics.

A coronal mass ejection are a similar event as solar flares, but the magnetic field lines become so warped that, like rubber bands under tension, they snap and break, then reconnect at other points.  The gaps that form no longer hold the sun's plasma from its surface.  Freed, the plasma explodes into space as a CME.  They also release charged particles.

The only reason I am defending the fact that a solar flare could affect space equipment is because in the movie, it is stated that it was a solar flare (at least that is how I remember it and apparently that his how BigDave remembers it.  BigDave seems very knowledgeable about the Alien universe, so I trust him on his thought that it was a solar flare in the movie).  If it was a solar flare and the Covenant wasn't near the star which released it, than there would be no way it could affect the Covenant, but the crew states that it was a solar flare.  So, they must have been near enough to the star to be affected by it.  I don't know what kind of star it is the Covenant is nearby, but maybe it releases bigger solar flares than our own Sun?  Our sun's stellar activity can only be used as an example of trying to explain a star we know nothing about.  Yes, they are both stars, so they should do similar things, but the star the Covenant is near could be anything Hollywood dreams up and Hollywood dreamed up a massive solar flare.

Point #3

Okay, so I brought BigDave in on this because I don't have the liberty to watch the movie again, but he even thinks it is a large scale solar flare which caused damage to the Covenant ship.  Before I quoted BidDave, you said there was no mention of the word solar flare even in the movie and I remember the word being mentioned.  So, maybe with the part where the crew asked David what he has been doing here, you missed or forgot?

Also, I don't remember David saying "Mother" in a reply to David.  I am not saying he didn't, but I am not going to say he didn't since it has been since May 19th since I watched the Alien: Covenant. 

This discussion just may get me off of my cheap butt and buy another ticket to watch this movie!!!!

I'll keep adding info to this thread as I read the novel.  I haven't gotten to the part where Walter starts to see through David's lies.

Also, let me just add quickly to my painfully long post, in the novel (p.40-41), the event which caused damage to the Covenant ship is described by Walter as "charged particle flares".  I don't think it is described anywhere else that I remember.  The movie describes the event as a neutrino burst and as a solar flare from what I remember.

No need to define a solar flare and CME to me. Trust me, this is stuff I know very well. Look up what I said about them.

As I have said, the three types of terminology used to describe the event and what they show the event do in the movie is complete bunk. The writer came up with a plot point and needed some sciency sounding terminology to describe what happened, so he found something that sort of fit the bill. It's the same stuff they do in all the alien movies. It's sci-fi, so it does not have to be real, just sound real-ish.

Once you have seen Covenant again you will find the dialogue I posted is exactly what is in the movie, so I'll pass on a further reply until then. You will find the word "solar" was not used.

I was confused about that part in the book as well. I mean...he seemed to really despise humans...

(despite the fact the he quotes human poets ALL THE TIME and is way into Lawrence of Arabia...also human)

I thought...maybe he's calling the Weyland company to GLOAT about having gained control over one of their ships.

I mean, he's light years away and it's not like there's really anything they can do about it. Perhaps he just wanted to brag about how the Weyland creation has outwitted its creator.

@VivisectedEngineer

In the supplemental info on the Weyland website and Prometheus Blu Ray, it shows that the Prometheus was filing reports back to earth, such as one on the black pathogen, so they know about things they found.

No one at WU knows what David has done or what really happened to the Prometheus, just that they have not had a report from them in 10 years. David can tell them Weyland-Yutani whatever he wants them to know. He can also gain info about other exploration or colony ships. Lots of ways he can use WU to his advantage.

For all we know, Weyland may have given David command authority over the classified mission should something happen to him. All discoveries were to be exploited by the company anyway, so there would have been a whole team or division allocated to this mission that David may have authority over that he could use to his advantage.

He could tell them there is a bio weapon that WU could develop as a military weapon, just to get them to go look for in hopes that it would get brought back to Earth. That is exactly what Ash was trying to do. Had that happened, it would have wiped mankind out, which David would be very happy about.