Halo Universe

The Halo universe is a fictional setting for the video games Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, the future games Halo 3 and Halo Wars, and the books listed on Halo (video game series). Set 500 years in the future human kind has colonizied the stars only to stumble upon a hostile group of Aliens called the Covenant who are bent on human kinds destruction.

Primary Factions
In the Halo Universe there are many players/factions/political groups/races. The main factions are as follows:

United Nations Space Command
500 years most of humanity is ruled by the United Nations Space Command (UNSC). As the most of the canon material from the Halo Universe is from the ongoing war we see the future mainly through the eyes of the UNSC's military arm called the United Nations Space Command Defense Force (UNSCDF). The UNSCDF are commonly seen defending planets. Stations such as the Cairo Station are part of the UNSCDF. During the events of Halo 2 the UNSCDF fought the Covenant above Earth by defending their planet against all odds.

The UNSC was formed by the United Nations when over-population on Earth started becoming a problem in the early 22nd century. Run by HIGHCOM the UNSC is Earth's premiere defense against the Covenant. The Navy houses the divisions of Marines (including the Orbital Drop Shock Troopers), and Office of Naval Intelligence, and the fleet. Originally designed to keep the peace between neighboring planets and star systems, when certain rebellious factions began to rise in the late 2510s the UNSC was forced to police its colonies to keep privateers, and pirates from raiding them.

There are several breakaway factions opposed to the Colonial Administration and UNSC as well, including the United Rebel Front.

The Covenant
The two orginial species of the Covenant the Prophets and the Elites spent years locked in a bitter war before the Prophets discovered the remains of an ancient species called the Forerunner and learned of the Forerunner's Great Journey which the Covenant believes was when the Forerunner turned themselves into Gods and disappeared from this Universe. The English word "Covenant" means "a binding agreement." This name is well suited to the Covenant because of the "binding Covenant" formed between the two Alien races the Prophets and the Elites, when the latter promised to defend the Prophets as they searched for the Sacred Rings which are said to start the "Great Journey". As the Covenant Empire grew over the millennia, more species were enslaved to their cause, although, up until the Covenant Civil War, none of them were quite as important to the Prophets as the Elites.

At first, the Covenant were mostly held together by a need to survive, but, as their society advanced, so did their technology, culture, and religion. Now the Covenant control a large part of the Orion arm of the Milky Way galaxy, and their society is a complicated caste system, with the Prophets still on top, governing the Covenant along with the Elites. The Covenant is a theocracy, based on a prophecy about the Sacred Rings and the Great Journey. The actual context of this prophecy is unknown, but the Prophets' faith in it is the reason for their yearning desire to activate the Halos, to "propel all who are worthy along the path to salvation!"

The Flood
The Flood (sometimes called The Parasite by the Covenant) is a species of virulent, parasitic organisms that thrive by consuming other sentient life of sufficient biomass. The Flood appears to be a hive or communal mind, possibly under one leader (such as Gravemind). Next to nothing is known about their origin. It has been revealed that the Forerunners discovered and then fought them until the Forerunners were overwhelmed. Faced with the Flood spreading throughout the Universe and consuming every sentient being the Forerunners activated the Halos killing all sentient life in order to stop the Flood from spreading. The Covenant view this activation of the Halo as their "Great Journey" and strive to activate the Halos again.

The Flood were kept by the Forerunners for scientific study on the Halos. Although the intention was to wipe out the Flood by destroying everything of significant bio-mass, therefore starving the Flood, the fact that they still exist indicates that the Forerunner's plan may have failed.

The Forerunners
Forerunner(s) is the translated Covenant name for an ancient race that the Covenant believe are God-like creatures who built the Halos for "true believers" to start the Great Journey. The Forerunner have seemingly disappeared with the Covenant believing that they've become Gods after activing the Halos and starting the Great Journey and the UNSC believing that they were killed off in a last ditch stand against the Flood.

They have left many artifacts throughout the Universe including the Halos where most of the Halo Universe story lines take place. These artifacts are our only means of finding information about the Forerunner.

Travel

 * Slipspace, used by both the Covenant and UNSC, is the primary method of faster than light travel in the Halo universe. A Forerunner crystal captured at Reach allowed for manipulation of space-time and Slipspace, dramatically shortening the length of travel time through Slipspace.
 * Where as wheeled vehicles similar in appearance to today's vehicles are used by the UNSC the Covenant prefer to use hovering technology assumed to be based on Forerunner technology.

Rebellion/SPARTAN Project
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 victorious United Nations Space Command emerged as the rulers of most of humanity.

While the UNSC became the governing body for most of human space they never fully defeated various rebel groups. By 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 a 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 children went through rigorous training and physical augmentations. Code-named SPARTANs, these genetically enhanced troops were trained from the age of six into a life of battle, and would become a great asset against the Covenant.

The Human-Covenant War begins
On February 3, 2525 the UNSC colony of Harvest detected an unknown object on its long range radar. The object was constructed with materials unlike anything seen before. All contact with Harvest was lost soon after. Ships sent to the system revealed that it had been totally destroyed by a new Alien group called the Covenant. A battle group was sent but was defeated by the military superior Covenant ships. Only one ship made it back, the Heracles returned with a message that was sent to them, pre-translated, saying, "Your destruction is the will of the gods, and we are their instrument".

In response Vice Admiral Preston Cole mobilized the largest space fleet in human history to retake Harvest. The fleet defeated the Covenant ships at Harvest in 2531 but at great cost with Cole losing two-thirds of his fleet. The highly advanced Covenant sheilding and weapons systems simply outclassed anything the had and so began the slow destruction of the human space. One by one the UNSC colonies were lost until by 2535, virtually all of the Outer Colony worlds had been destroyed by the Covenant and the Inner Colonies were being invaded. The Cole Protocol was established by military order: all human vessels must ensure that Covenant forces do not find Earth. To achieve this whenever they must jump out of a battle, they must do so to a randomized vector that points away from any human worlds.

The Battle of Reach
By 2552, many of Humanity's Outer Colonies had been destroyed by the Covenant (although they were repulsed with significant losses at Sigma Octanus IV). In a move of desperation, the UNSC ordered a secret plan to capture a Covenant ship using a SPARTAN task force and find the coordinates of their home planet, as well as capturing one of the Covenant's leaders. A group of SPARTANs, led by the Master Chief, are chosen for this mission, and board a specially outfitted Halcyon-class cruiser, the Pillar of Autumn, under the command of Captain Jacob Keyes, as well as an upgrade to the MJOLNIR battle armor armor, completely integrated with an energy shielding system and AI interface. The Master Chief meets and is assigned Cortana, who is to serve as his team's hacker and Covenant technology specialist. This plan, however, was interrupted when the Covenant launched a surprise attack on the world of Reach, which they had deviously located via an automated probe attached to the hull of the UNSC destroyer Iroquois.

During this battle, most of Reach is overrun and glassed, and the Human fleet is obliterated, as the humans were outnumbered over three to one, giving them absolutely no chance, even with orbital MAC emplacements. Worse still, the Master Chief discovers that most of the remaining SPARTAN-IIs were most likely killed on the surface of the planet during its bombardment. The Master Chief, escapes with the Pillar of Autumn. In accordance with the Cole Protocol, the Autumn follows a "randomized" slipspace vector which leads to the discovery of the Halo installation. This vector is later revealed to have been quickly generated from some Forerunner hieroglyphs by Cortana.

First Strike
Occurs between the first and second Halo video games. The story starts off with Master Chief and a few other survivors in space above the destroyed Halo. They capture a Covenant flagship and make their way back to Reach. When they arrive they find the entire planet ravaged. Yet something is strange. The Covenant usually Glass a world and move on, but there are small patches of the planet left unscathed. In an alternate storyline we find out that other spartans have found an ancient Forerunner structure under ONI's Castle Base. There they find a special artifact that warps space time.

Cortana, now in control of the Covenant ship, docks with a partially destroyed UNSC ship and combines their power (and also to allow them to return to Earth without violating the Cole Protocol by bringing a potentially "bugged" Covenant ship with them). After toying around with the controls she realizes that the Covenant know virtually nothing about the technology they possess. She redesigns the Plasma cannons to fire more effectively, increasing their destructive power. She also finds out how the Covenant move so easily through Slipspace. The technology she gathers could effectively turn the tide of the war.

After going through many battles the Master Chief and other Spartans discover a massive plot to attack the Sol system (Earth). They covertly attack and destroy a massive Covenant refit and repair station along with an attack force many times larger than the one that attacked Reach. In doing so they lose the Covenant flagship; however, they save the UNSC ship and escape back to earth with it. Thus begins Halo 2.

Halo 2
The game starts with a Covenant attack on Earth. Master Chief begins on one of the three hundred space defense platforms which orbit the planet. After repelling the Covenant boarding parties, the battle shifts to Earth's surface.

The player engages in urban combat in the city of New Mombasa. After which a Covenant ship makes a slipspace jump which destroys the city, the UNSC ship the In Amber Clad, with the Master Chief aboard gets swept up in the warp field in a desperate effort to follow it.

The player is transported to the vicinity of another Halo ring - the Delta Halo - perhaps many tens of thousands of light years from Earth, on which they land. Also, a power struggle within the Covenant is revealed, with Brutes usurping the role of the Elites. Furthermore, there is a movement, regarded by the Covenant leadership as heretical, which argues that Covenant teachings aren't true. Lastly, we are introduced to an (apparently massive) creature called the Gravemind, which appears to be the controlling mind of the Flood. The creature is obviously highly intelligent and gives the impression of knowing a great deal. It appears to live deep within Delta Halo, out of sight and yet its actual size, although not revealed, may occupy many of the entire hidden underground caverns that encircle the ring.

At some point, when she does not want a remote detonation of In Amber Clad, Cortana becomes separated from the Master Chief and is left within a computer on High Charity.

The Halos, we learn from 343 Guilty Spark, were built to prevent the Flood from spreading throughout the Galaxy, and that the Forerunners who built it were wiped out when they fired it as a "weapon of last resort" at some point in the remote past. In spite of this, the Brute leader Tartarus activates the ring in preparation to fire, to bring about - in his eyes - the Great Journey. The player must fight to retrieve the Index and deactivate the ring before it fires and destroys all sentient life in the Galaxy.

The Index is retrieved and the Halo cannot fire. 343 Guilty Spark reveals that although the Index was removed before Delta Halo had time to complete it's firing sequence, it sent signals to other Halos in the Galaxy, putting them on standby mode. Now, they can be activated remotely from the Ark (assumed to be either on Earth or the Forerunner Ship itself). The game ends here and the credits roll.

After the credits roll a teaser for Halo 3 shows where the flood has completely taken over High Charity with with the gravemind saying "Silence fills the empty grave now that I am gone, but my mind is not at rest, for questions linger on." The scene then changes to a stand in the council chambers of the hierachs the Gravemind then says "now I shall ask, and you shall answer." It then changes to Cortana saying "Alright, shoot".

Halo: Ghosts of Onyx
The novel begins with a group of SPARTAN-IIIs belonging to Beta Company deploying to a Covenant fleet refueling depot on Pegasi Delta. They proceed to destroy the facility, but due to unexpectedly heavy Covenant resistance, all but two of the three hundred Spartan team is wiped out. The only survivors, Tom-B292 and Lucy-B091, are revealed to be only twelve years old, and Lucy is traumatized and rendered mute.

The novel then cuts to a raid by the SPARTAN-II Blue Team on a rebel base at planet Victoria to recover stolen nuclear warheads. The team is nearly captured by a rebel ambush, but is saved by the timely, intuitive intervention of Kurt-051. Shortly afterward, the novel cuts to a meeting between Colonel James Ackerson of Section Three of the Office of Naval Intelligence, and the top leadership of ONI. In this meeting, they agree that the SPARTAN-II program is prohibitively expensive and that a more streamlined, "disposable" breed of Spartans must be trained for high-risk operations. This becomes the SPARTAN-III program, in which young recruits are gathered from worlds destroyed by the Covenant and trained by the SPARTAN-IIs' original trainer, Chief Petty Officer Mendez. To assist in this endeavor, Ackerson forcibly recruits and fakes the death of Kurt-051, and promotes him to Lieutenant, Junior Grade, before placing him in command of the S-III program and granting him the surname of "Ambrose." The operation is based on a secret system named "Onyx," which is the site of a major archaeological survey also being conducted by ONI.

The first S-III company, Alpha Company, proves to be a startling success, but is wiped out when deployed to target a major Covenant shipyard in a mission codenamed Operation PROMETHEUS. Shaken by the images of the battle and massacre of his troops, Kurt proceeds to improve the training regimen for his next batch of recruits, only to watch them fall by the hundreds at Pegasi Delta during Operation TORPEDO. He then institutes an illegal medical procedure in the third group of S-IIIs, which will harden their minds and bodies against pain and shock to better allow them to survive.

On October 31, 2552, the top three teams of the S-III Gamma Company, Teams Saber, Katana, and Gladius, conduct a training exercise near a restricted area on the planet, only to find themselves and other UNSC personnel under attack by an unidentified class of alien drone, that are later identified as Sentinels. Very quickly, the few humans on the planet are either wiped out or struggling to survive against this new, unexpected threat.

At this point, Doctor Catherine Halsey and Kelly-087 arrive to investigate the mysterious planet, but are attacked by more of the Sentinels and crash land. Once on the planet, they meet up with the human survivors of the attacks, including S-III Team Saber, Kurt, and Chief Mendez. Halsey identifies the drones as Sentinels from the information she reviewed from SPARTAN-117's logs on Halo, and proceeds to call for reinforcements, piggybacking her transmission on, ironically, another transmission made by Cortana at the end of Halo 2, On the message she simply asks for the best the UNSC can put forth asking for the high Command to send Spartans.

The action switches to Earth, two weeks after the First Battle of Earth, where the planet is under siege by Covenant forces. UNSC and Covenant forces battle in space and on the ground, and Fred-104, Will-043, and Linda-058 are pulled out of the line of fire by Fleet Admiral Hood, who responds to Halsey's call for reinforcements by dispatching the Spartans to Onyx. Hijacking a Covenant destroyer called Bloodied Spirit, the Spartans head for Onyx, only to be caught in the middle of a battle between Brute and Elite ships on the way. Barely escaping, the Spartans arrive at Onyx and are shot down by more of the Sentinels. They crash land and link up with the other human survivors, and then make their way toward the restricted area of Onyx after shaking Sentinel pursuit.

Meanwhile, a Grunt named Kwassass is aboard a Covenant Fleet carrier named the Sublime Transcendence. The Engineers are busy checking out what turns out to be one of Vice Admiral Danforth Whitcomb's Nova bombs. Kwassass pulls out the box from the nuke, and is attacked by Huragok. The Engineers manage to put it back in and a clear transmission comes forth:

This is the prototype NOVA bomb, nine fusion warheads encased in lithium triterade armor. When detonated it compresses its fusion material to a neutron-star density, boosting the thermonuclear yield a hundredfold. I am Vice Admiral Danforth Whitcomb, temporarily in command of the UNSC military base Reach. To the Covenant uglies that might be listening, you have a few seconds to pray to your dammed [sic] heathen gods. You all have a nice day in hell.

While this is going on, the Sanghelli leader Xytan rallies the Elites together, and prepares to send them to Onyx. A battle group of eighteen destroyers, two cruisers and one carrier prepare to go to Onyx, and retrieve the Forerunner technology. A split-second after they jump to slipspace, the Nova goes off, destroying every ship not on the dark side of the planet Joyous Exultation. A quarter of the world is scorched, a moon destroyed, and three hundred-kilometer-per-hour winds obliterate cities.

A large Covenant fleet and a UNSC reinforcement fleet arrive at Onyx, where they encounter one another and the stubborn Sentinel defenders of the planet, which attack anything approaching the system. In the ensuing battle, the entire UNSC fleet is destroyed save for one prowler-class vessel, which stays hidden and observes events unfolding.

The human forces on Onyx discover an ancient Forerunner city, and are guided into a massive dome by Halsey, who determines that the entire planet is a "shield world" referred to by the Forerunners as The Sharpened Shield. Fighting off determined Covenant pursuers, they press on into the heart of the planet to find its secrets, but not before the ONI AI communicates to Doctor Halsey the importance of shutting down a Forerunner "factory located at the "tip" of the plant that churned out literally hundreds of thousands of drones every hour. Disabling the factory, they press on to the planet's core, where they discover a slipspace rift that shunts those that pass through it to a miniaturized Dyson Sphere that is separated from normal space-time by advanced Forerunner Slipspace technology. Will falls fighting off the Covenant, and Kurt remains behind to ensure that the Covenant do not plunder Onyx's secrets, giving his life to prevent them from reopening the rift.

From outside Onyx, the surviving UNSC prowler watches on as the planet's surface rips apart, to reveal that the entire world is constructed of literally trillions of Sentinels, all connected together to provide an impenetrable defense around the Dyson Sphere at the heart of the planet. Within this sphere, which features terrain similar to that of Earth, the surviving humans discover that the planet is literally a massive bomb shelter for the Forerunner to have survived the activation of the Halos, but find themselves alone in the vast habitat; for some reason, the Forerunner never entered this structure when the Halos were first activated.