Unidentified Forerunner machine

"The location decoded from the Forerunner glyphs turned out to be a Forerunner device able to open multiple portals."

- Mission briefing for E-5 “Portal Control”

This unidentified Forerunner machine is capable of opening and closing slipspace portals when interfaced with another Forerunner device known as the Conduit. At least two of these machines were located on Halo Installation 03, and another one at an ONI facility in New Phoenix, Arizona, though it is likely there were many others spread across the Milky Way galaxy. These devices were contested by the UNSC and Covenant forces and their allied Promethean automatons during the Battle of Installation 03 and the Skirmish in New Phoenix in late July, 2557.

Battle of Installation 03
One of these machines was embedded within a Forerunner complex known as the Altar. The Covenant inserted the Conduit into the machine, which activated other similar slipspace portal-generating machines elsewhere on the ring and across the galaxy, including one residing in New Phoenix’s ONI facility. During the battle, an unidentified Spartan-IV Headhunter managed to breach the Altar’s defenses and retrieve the Conduit from inside the machine.

A second machine was located in a jungle on the ring, and was used to enable Covenant and Promethean forces passage directly to New Phoenix. An unidentified Spartan-IV operative was deployed to halt this threat, traveling through a portal generated by this machine to follow the Covenant and Prometheans to the city.

Skirmish in New Phoenix
At some point prior to July 2557, the UNSC managed to locate one of these machines, and subsequently secured it at an ONI facility in New Phoenix for study, where it lay dormant until the Altar was activated on Installation 03. This remotely triggered the machine to generate portals that allowed Covenant and Promethean forces to invade the facility from the Halo. The Spartan Headhunter, having secured the Conduit from the ring, traveled to this facility and assisted scientists in repelling the alien threat by inserting the Conduit into the machine, resulting in a massive shockwave that shut down the portals.

Description
The main portion of the device is spherical in shape and adorned with Forerunner designs and symbols. When activated, the device glows blue along its lateral lines and a column of hard light protrudes from openings on the northern and southern tip of the sphere. At the front of the sphere is another opening for interfacing with the Conduit.

Connected to and surrounding the sphere are three upstanding pylons, which gives the machine an overall resemblance to the Z-8060 particle cannon, albeit on a much smaller scale. These pylons appear to be movable, as the machine located in Installation 03’s jungle keeps its pylons close and folded, whereas those located at the Altar and in New Phoenix have theirs extended outwards to support the inclusion of hard light bridges and walkways, respectively. Both the pylons and the sphere generate energy and electricity when the machine is activated.

List of appearances

 * Halo: Spartan Strike