Halo universe

The Halo universe is a fictional setting for the video games Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, the future game Halo 3, and the books listed on Halo (video game series).

Location

The Milky Way

Planets

Jericho VII - The location of the battle at the beginning of the Fall of Reach.

Paris IV - mentioned in the books. Sergeant Major A.J. Johnson is a veteran of the battle.

Eridanus 2 – Eridanus 2 is the home planet of the SPARTAN II supersoldier Master Chief. It is mentioned in the 2001 science fiction novel Halo: The Fall of Reach by Eric Nylund.

Harvest – A human outer colony farm planet, first target of the Covenant.

Reach - Reach was glassed in the Covenant war against the human race. Until its destruction, Reach had been the most heavily fortified human world, with 20 'Super' Magnetic Accelerator Cannons (designated Mark V) in orbit, and one of the two United Nations Space Command Headquarters. The Spartans of the SPARTAN II program were trained on this planet. The subterranean facility CASTLE Base was also located on Reach.

Sigma Octanus IV — A colony planet in the Halo series, significant because Installation 04's "coordinates" were discovered there

Earth - Humanity's homeworld, also heavily fortified with 300 Super MAC Platforms and having the second of the two United Nations Space Command Headquarters. Earth is being invaded and probably occupied by Covenant forces during Halo 2 and Halo 3.

Coral - An inner colony which is glassed by the Covenant during the I Love Bees plot line.

Troy - A colony which had prior warning from an ONI Corvette, of an impending attack by the Covenant. Evacuation was slow and had barely begun when the attack occurred and the evacuation was covered up by ONI and the UNSC to prevent hostilities rising from the civilian populace against the UNSC.

Threshold - The Gas Giant Installation 04 (or Alpha Halo) orbited before it's destruction in Halo CE. Two campain levels in Halo 2 are set on a gas mine in low orbit, as well as a multiplayer map set on it's moon Basis.

Substance - The Gas Giant Installation 05 (or Delta Halo) orbits.

Civilizations

The Covenant
United Nations Space Command - The primary human civilization.
The Forerunners
The Flood

Technology

The Halos

File:HaloIslandScreenshot.JPG

View from the surface of Alpha Halo

Travel

For interstellar travel, see Slipspace

Weaponry

M6D Automatic Pistol: A small, semiautomatic or fully automatic sidearm. Fires a 12.6mm semi-armour-piercing high-explosive-squash-head projectile. The M6D has a 12 round magazine and the ability to link up to suit or helmet optics to create a 2x optical smart-link scope.
M6C Semiautomatic Officer's Sidearm: A less expensive version of the M6D without the 2x scope. Fires 12.6mm semi-armour-piercing ammunition.
M7 Caseless Sub-Machine Gun: A short range SMG with caseless rounds and a 60 round magazine. 5x28mm caseless ammunition, cyclic rate of fire 1500 rpm.
MA5B Assault Rifle: An all range rifle designed with a small LCD screen to display remaining rounds. The MA5B has a 60 round magazine. 7.62x51mm ammuntion.
BR55 Battle Rifle: The BR55 is an assault rifle with a 3 round burst and a 36 round magazine. Normally fitted with a x2 optical scope, no smart-link feature.
M90 Pump-action Shotgun: The M90 is a 8 gauge standard issue pump action shotgun. It can carry up to 12 rounds of ammunition.
S2 AM Sniper Rifle:The S2 AM is a 4 round magazine loaded sniper rifle. The rounds can travel up to 500 meters and the optic connection through the hand can give the visor a 2x (replaced by 5x in Halo 2) or 10x zoom. Fires 12.6x114mm APFSDS (Armour piercing flechette discarding sabot) rounds.
M19 SSM Rocket Launcher: The M19 SSM Rocket Launcher is a 2 round reloadable launcher that fires highly explosive projectiles. The 'Spanker'. Upgraded with a tracking system Halo 2.
M9 HE-DP Fragmentation Grenade Standard issue UNSC fragmentation grenade.
Plasma Pistol A Covenant pistol that shoots green plasma. Can be overcharged to do more damage.
Plasma Rifle A Covenant automatic rifle that shoots blue plasma.
Covenant CarbineA Covenant rifle that shoots highly charged projectiles.
Brute Plasma Rifle A Covenant rifle that shoots red plasma, at a significantly higher rate of fire than the standard plasma rifle.
Needler A Covenant weapon that shoots explosive needle-like projectiles that have the ability to home in on targets. When seven or more needles attach to an object, the resulting explosion is lethal.
Particle Beam Rifle An energy-based Covenant sniper rifle, capable of 5x and 10x zoom.
Fuel Rod Cannon A Covenant heavy duty weapon, capable of firing explosive green rods.
Brute Shot A Covenant grenade launcher.
Energy Sword A Covenant Sword made of magnetically shaped plasma energy.
Plasma Grenade A Covenant grenade, which has the ability to stick to opponents or opponent vehicles.
Sentinel Beam A weapon mounted on Foreunner constructs called Sentinels. It fires a red or blue energy beam.

Communications

The MJOLNIR Armor is able to communicate with any other suit in any battlefield situation. Special monitoring stations on high class battleships, such as the Pillar of Autumn, can also communicate with the MJOLNIR armor. The suit uses cybernetics to tell what or whom the Spartan wants to communicate with, then transmits an automatic wavelength decoder (the static sound on Red vs Blue) to contact the selected source. In the Red vs Blue story line, this communication system is used by an AI called O'Malley to transport himself from one suit of armor to the other. This allows him to possess whoever is wearing the armor.

History

Early Conflicts

In the years 2160-2200, various governments and factions fought for control of Earth and its first Colonies. As overpopulation and unrest on Earth mounted, new political movements formed including the Jovian Frieden and Koslovics led by Vladimir Koslov, resurgences of Fascism and Neo Communism which waged the Interplanetary, Rain Forest Wars Campaign and Mars clashes and were defeated by the United Nations Space Command.

The human colonization of the Orion Arm

In the years 2170-2291, the United Nations Space Command (UNSC) successfully develop humanity's first faster than light drive, the Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine. For the first time in history, the rapid colonization of other worlds is made possible. By 2390, 210 worlds had been occupied by humans, and were being actively terraformed to suit man's needs. These worlds are to become known as the Inner Colonies. By 2490, the UNSC's fledging Interstellar Empire had expanded to between 800 to 1000 planets throughout the Orion Arm of the Milky Way Galaxy. During this period, the planet Reach becomes one of the two headquarters of the UNSC military and government (the other was Earth itself), and is destined to become the most heavily fortified world under human control and the Inner Colonies became the heart of the United Nations Imperial Government.

In addition, there were Brushfire Wars in the Outer Colonies in which Rebel Insurrections including the one at the Eridanus System led by Colonel Robert Watts were suppressed.

Shutting down piracy

At the time of 2517, The UNSC was facing extremely low morale due to piracy and the Brushfire Wars. In order to remove the rebellion without a significant sacrifice of human life, Dr. Catherine Halsey moves forward with the SPARTAN-II project. 75 gifted children were abducted and replaced by flash-clones, and drafted into the UNSC. The Spartans went through rigorous training and physical augmentations. On September 12, 2525 Spartans were sent to the Eridanus II system to capture Colonel Robert Watts. The mission was successful, and therefore significantly reduced the pirate threat.

The Human-Covenant War begins

On February 3, 2525, first contact was made with an alliance of alien races that referred to itself as The Covenant. On that day, a single Covenant Warship exterminated the surface population of the Outer Colony of Harvest. Three UNSC battleships and a Colonial Military Administration scout ship, the Argo, were sent to investigate this incident and in doing so, engaged the Covenant ship in battle. Only one, the Heracles, managed to return to Reach badly damaged. The Heracles returned with a message that was sent to them pre-translated by the Covenant saying, "Your destruction is the will of the gods, and we are their instrument". By December of the same year, the UNSC mobilized a massive fleet under the command of Vice Admiral Preston Cole, with orders to reclaim the Harvest Colony and impede the Covenant advance. Cole won the battle and reclaimed the glassed planet, but it required the sacrifice of over two thirds of his numerically superior fleet.

Covenant ships possess several technological features which make them far superior to their human counterparts. First, they have superior maneuvering and tracking abilities when employing faster than light travel (ships in Halo, like many other science fiction titles, achieve faster than light speeds by moving through an alternate realm. In Halo it is called "slipspace"). Although the Covenant and humanity use essentially the same techniques to enter slipspace, the Covenant are unaware that their engines can be used much more accurately than human technology.

Second, Covenant ships possess resilient, recharging shields, which must be destroyed in order to physically damage the ship. This is quite difficult, as they can withstand a near-direct nuclear explosion.

Third, Covenant ships employ more powerful weapons, including a form of guided plasma, which can often destroy human vessels in a single hit. It should be noted that the Covenant also uses plasma to exterminate the surface population of a planet (a process known as 'glassing').

The Cole Protocol

Quoted from Halo: The Fall of Reach, page 135:

United Nations Space Command Emergency Priority Order 098831A-1
Encryption Code: Red
Public Key: file/first light/
From: UNSC/NAVCOM Fleet H. T. Ward
To: ALL UNSC PERSONNEL
Subject: General Order 098831A-1 ("The Cole Protocol")
Classification: RESTRICTED (BGX Directive)

The Cole Protocol

To safeguard the Inner Colonies and Earth, all UNSC vessels or stations must not be captured with intact navigation databases that may lead Covenant forces to human civilian population centers.

If any Covenant forces are detected:

1. Activate selective purge of databases on all ship-based and planetary data networks.
2. Initiate triple-screen check to ensure all data has been erased and all backups neutralized.
3. Execute viral data scavengers. (Download from UNSCTTP://EPWW.COLEPROTOCOL/Virtualscav/fbr.091)
4. If retreating from Covenant forces, all ships must enter Slipstream space with randomized

vectors NOT directed toward Earth, the Inner Colonies, or any other human population center.

5. In case of imminent capture by Covenant forces, all UNSC ships MUST self-destruct.

Violation of this directive will be considered an act of TREASON, and pursuant to UNSC Military Law Articles JAG 845-P and JAG 7556-L, such violations are punishable by life imprisonment or execution.

/end file/ Press ENTER if you understand these orders.

The SPARTAN Project

Several decades before contact with the Covenant was made, the UNSC military embarked on a secret project to create a group of elite soldiers that would deal with occasional unrest in the Colonies. Code-named SPARTANs, these genetically enhanced troops were trained from the age of six into a life of battle, and became a great asset against the Covenant. While humans suffered defeat after defeat in space, they could almost always prevail with the help of the SPARTANs in ground engagements. The main character of Halo's gameplay, the Master Chief, is a veteran SPARTAN.

All SPARTANs were given special armor designated MJOLNIR Mark V, which, in laymen’s terms, can increase their strength and speed. They were the only ones who could wear it, as those without the proper SPARTAN body training or body augmentations (like the SPARTAN upgrades) killed themselves with strength-enhanced convulsions, this is shown through a vicious scene in Halo: The Fall of Reach where an ordinary marine is testing out the armour and is told to move his right arm to his chest. Without the special enhancements that the SPARTANs have, his arm is thrown at an incredible speed above his head and moves past his shoulder, shattering the bones in it. He is then thrown into a series of convulsions and is killed.

The Battle of Reach

File:Pillar of autumn.jpg

UNSC cruiser Pillar of Autumn

By 2552, many of Humanity's Outer Colonies have been destroyed by the Covenant (although they were repulsed with significant losses at Sigma Octanus IV). In a move of desperation, UNSC orders a secret plan to capture a Covenant ship using a SPARTAN task force and find the coordinates of their home planet. A group of SPARTANs, led by the Master Chief, also known as Spartan 117, are chosen for this mission, and board a specially outfitted Halcyon-class cruiser, the Pillar of Autumn, under the command of Captain Jacob Keyes. This plan, however, is interrupted when the Covenant launch a surprise attack on the fortress world of Reach which they had deviously located via an automated probe attached to the hull of the UNSC destroyer Iroquois.

During this battle, half of Reach is overrun and glassed, and the human fleet is obliterated. Worse still, the Master Chief thinks that all of the SPARTANs but himself are killed on the surface of the planet (the SPARTANs are revealed to have survived in Halo: First Strike). The last remaining SPARTAN, the Master Chief, escapes with the Pillar of Autumn. In accordance with the Cole Protocol, the Autumn makes a blind slipspace jump, and emerges in the vicinity of an unexplored and remarkable world: Halo. Although considered a blind jump, the Pillar of Autumns AI, Cortana, found the coordinates in a Covenant battleship and decided to make a blind jump, again revealing Halo.

References