Needler
From Halopedia, the Halo wiki
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Needler[1] |
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- "Luckily—listen to me "luckily"—the needles only detonate when they’re embedded in living tissue. Now that’s lucky because it’s not gonna blow a hole in the wall you’re hiding behind or tear the tires off of the vehicle you’re trying to escape in."
- — Anonymous UNSC E2-BAG/1/7 serviceman[6]
Needlers, sometimes known as Needler pistols,[7] are a class of single-handed, fully-automatic infantry specialized weapons developed by the Covenant that launch kemuksuru—also known as Subanese crystalline shards—that are capable of homing in on targets.[1][2] The Covenant and its remnants formally designated the needler as needle launcher or shard launcher,[3][4] while the United Nations Space Command's Office of Naval Intelligence has typically type-classified encountered needlers variants under the designations of Type-33 Guided Munitions Launcher (T-33 GML) or Type-56 Guided Munitions Launcher (T-56 GML).[1][5] Nicknames for the needler include Pinkies and Shrimp Shooter.[8][9]
Overview[edit]
Design details[edit]
- "Anything stuck with enough needles will blow sky high—and if a Foxtrot is unlucky enough to be carrying grenades, those are gonna cook off too."
- — Anonymous UNSC E2-BAG/1/7 serviceman[6]
While there are multiple known patterns of the needler, all patterns share the same general design, which revolves around the needler’s function to fire individual crystalline shards.[1] The top of the weapon contains the needler's distinctive ammunition, Subanese crystals, with the exposed needles protruding from holes in the upper cowling of the weapon chassis. The bottom of the weapon, which contains the power supply, doubles as a stock,[2] with an extended handguard on some design patterns.[1] The two main components converge at the muzzle in front of the grip. The muzzle is situated between an upper and a lower channel brace; the channel braces extend outwards around the muzzle, presumably to prevent the muzzle from being blocked.[2]
Ammunition[edit]
- Main article: Kemuksuru
- "I caught three in the leg as I was diving behind a broken wall—they lodged right in there where the greave meets the boot. When they went off, it damn near broke my ankle and flung like little splinters of glass or crystal or whatever all up my left side—the corpsman was pulling [the shards] outta me for the better part of two hours."
- — Anonymous UNSC E2-BAG/1/7 serviceman[6]
The needler fires shards of kemuksuru[10]—colloquially known as blamite or Subanese crystal—a pink crystalline substance mined from the interiors of Suban, one of Sangheilios' two moons.[1][2][3] The exposed crystals are held within the upper cowling of the weapon,[1][2] allowing the user to use the sharpened ends of the exposed shards as an improvised melee weapon.[11][12]
Upon impaling a target, the crystalline shards become chemically reactive, and detonate after a few seconds.[1][4] Injuries inflicted from the exploding shards are gruesome, as microscopic pieces of crystals can become embedded in tissue.[6] If multiple shards make contact with a living target in quick succession (i.e., previous shards have yet to detonate), then a chain reaction occurs—their chemical properties "supercombine" and the shards detonate simultaneously through a process known as “proximal resonance instability”,[2] causing an immediate and violent explosion that is almost always lethal.[1][4] While the shards are devastating to living tissue, they are relatively ineffective against energy shielding,[13] and ricochet off most surfaces, hence little risk of causing hull perforations.[3][14] The properties of the shards can be modified through unspecified means; for example, certain variants of the needler fire calibrated crystalline shards that can embed in armor.[15]
