Echo 216

"This is UNSC Pelican Echo 216. Can you hear me?"

- Fernando Esparza tries to hail a friendly signal.

Echo 216 is a Pelican dropship of the United Nations Space Command Armed Forces. During the Battle over Installation 07, it was stolen by civilian contractor Fernando Esparza who was stranded on board for six months near the shattered Installation 07. In May 2560, Esparza and Echo 216 rescued the Master Chief and helped the Spartan and the Weapon in fighting the Banished across Zeta Halo.

Operational history
"Warning. Warning. Warning. Pressure building in lines four, seventeen, and thirty-three."

- An automated alert greets Fernando Esparza as soon as he is jolted awake.

During the Battle over Installation 07, Echo-216 was assigned to the as part of the supercarrier's compliment of Pelican dropships. When the Banished attacked the Infinity and the Jiralhanae Atriox defeated and seemingly killed the Spartan John-117, contracted civilian maintenance technician Fernando Esparza panicked at the news and stole Echo 216 to escape the besieged ship. However, without a Slipspace drive, the vessel was only capable of limited sublight travel; with the Infinity no longer spaceworthy and Installation 07 occupied by Banished forces, Echo-216 and its sole occupant were stranded in space. Not long after the battle, Installation 07 was seriously damaged by a mysterious explosion, and Echo-216 was among those dragged with the massive structure as it jumped to an unknown location, along with a majority of UNSC and Banished forces on and around the ring.

On May 28 2560, Echo 216 was still present near Installation 07, where it had been adrift in a large debris field for the past six months. Nearly powerless, the ship drifted into a collision with John-117, and the pilot was able to use what little power was left in the ship's internal power source to bring the SPARTAN's MJOLNIR (GEN3) armor system online. The armor's fusion reactor in turn almost instantly recharged the Pelican's depleted batteries, restoring functioning to Echo 216's internal lights and systems. Following this event, an attack generated electrical discharges throughout the Pelican, knocking out the power, and enveloped it in a bright light. The pilot sealed himself in the Pelican's cockpit while John-117 opened the troop bay's external door so that he could go on the offensive. The Master Chief discovered the attack to come from the Banished dreadnought Ghost of Gbraakon, attempting to capture Echo-216 for salvage and boarded the vessel which caught the Pelican in a stasis beam. Echo 216 was drawn into a hanger bay where Banished forces attempted to board the ship. Unable to disable the stasis beam, the Master Chief overloaded the dreadnaught's engines which released the Pelican. With the Ghost of Gbraakon self-destructing around them, the Master Chief raced back to the Pelican while Echo 216's batteries recharged. The explosions scared off the Banished attempting to board the Pelican, but the hanger's shield went down before power was restored, sucking Echo 216 into the vacuum along with the other contents of the hanger bay. Once power was restored, Esparza returned and picked up the Master Chief who had been sucked out into space as well.

After reboarding the Pelican, the Master Chief's armor linked to its systems, using Echo 216's sensors to scan the nearby space and to locate the source of a transmission on the shattered Halo ring. Against Esparza's objections, the Master Chief had the Pelican's autopilot take them to a sublevel of the damaged ring where Esparza was forced to retreat from approaching Banished ships, but kept in radio contact with the Spartan before losing his signal. When the Master Chief's signal was reacquired near the wreckage of the, Esparza informed the Spartan that he would have to clear a landing zone for extraction. The Master Chief cleared the Banished from Outpost Tremonius, allowing Echo 216 to safely land. The Master Chief revealed that he had recovered the Weapon to continue the mission to locate Cortana and link up with the scattered UNSC personnel on the ring. Detecting a UNSC distress signal from a Banished structure nearby, the Master Chief ordered Esparza to take him to it, but Esparza was forced to set him down early due to the Pelican drawing too much enemy attention.

After capturing several forward operating bases on the ring's surface, Fernando utilized Echo 216 to deliver vehicles and supplies at John-117's request and assist with UNSC logistics, and to transport John-117 himself between objectives.

After extracting John from a deactivating Forerunner Spire, the Master Chief and Esparza came under fire from Banished anti-aircraft cannons, damaging Echo 216 and causing the Pelican to crash land in the middle of a debris field from the Battle over Installation 07. As the Pelican's systems reset from the shock of the crash, Esparza and the Master Chief split up, with Esparza attempting to salvage a working slipspace drive from a trio of wrecked D80 Condor dropships in the debris field, and John proceeding to assault the AA guns so that they could safely take off again. However, after the Master Chief destroyed the guns, he discovered Echo 216's location had been compromised by the arrivals of Hyperius and Tovarus, twin members of the infamous Hand of Atriox "Spartan Killers", and rushed back to the crash site to intercept them before they discover Esparza. The Master Chief defeated the Spartan Killers, but was informed by a distraught Fernando that none of the Condors had intact slipspace drives to salvage, leaving Echo 216 hopelessly stranded on the ring; he also lamented having stolen Echo 216 to escape the Infinity, claiming that it could have been used to save other UNSC personnel rather than just himself. After calming Esparza down and reassuring him, the Master Chief had the pilot take them to the next location, the Command Spire on the ring's surface which could deactivate the ring's repair network.

Esparza continued to utilize Echo 216 to support the Master Chief as he attempts to access the Command Spire, eventually taking it to pick the Master Chief up after he finished his task in the structure. However, just as he arrived to extract the Spartan, a cloaked Jega 'Rdomnai entered the cockpit and hijacked the Pelican, steering Echo 216 away from the Master Chief and towards Escharum's headquarters, the House of Reckoning, where Esparza was captured and interred as bait to lure the Master Chief into a final battle with Escharum, and the Pelican was impounded to be dealt with later. The Master Chief and the Weapon besieged the House of Reckoning, doing battle with and killing both 'Rdomnai and Escharum and rescuing Esparza and the Pelican.

After recovering Echo 216, Esparza used it to carry the three away from the House of Reckoning and to the Silent Auditorium, where the Harbinger intended to use the partially-completed structure to search for something on the ring. Esparza deployed the Master Chief at the Auditorium, but, due to the heavy defenses set up by the Banished at the site, he ordered Esparza to pull back and wait for his word for extraction.

Three days later, after locating the Master Chief's signal again, Esparza tracked down the Spartan and picked him up in Echo 216, preparing to assist the Master Chief in further operations against the Banished on Zeta Halo. Esparza then flew the Pelican back to Outpost Tremonius to regroup with other UNSC personnel.

Specifications
Echo-216 appears to be an older model D77-TC Pelican, as opposed to the more modern D79-TC Pelicans which had previously been assigned to the UNSC Infinity, as noted by its more traditionally shaped cockpit with walk-through access from the troop bay in contrast to the rounded twin-cockpit design with limited troop bay access found on the D79. It is armed with a single 40mm chain gun on a chin-mounted pintle, though the weapon is never seen to be used, possibly being either out of ammunition or completely non-functional, as at one point pilot complains to John-117 that they are unarmed. It also has an onboard AI, which monitors the vessel's condition and alerts the pilot to system abnormalities and damage. In a critical incident, the AI can also perform a system reset in response to large shocks or impacts in order to reactivate the vessel after crash-landing.

Like many Pelican dropships, Echo 216 is very robust, surviving months on end in the vacuum of space with heavily depleted batteries and moderate combat against Banished forces, at one point even taking multiple hits from Banished anti-aircraft artillery and crash-landing in the middle of a debris field, and at another point having its flight controls stabbed by an Elite's plasma sword during a hijacking. Despite both of these incidents, the ship remained fully operational and flightworthy after only relatively minor repairs. After the Master Chief's fusion reactor recharged the Pelican's batteries, it was able to recharge itself after being rendered powerless by the stasis beam of a Banished dreadnought, although the pilot noted that the batteries were charging slowly. Nevertheless, full power was restored within only a few minutes. Notably, Echo 216 appears to be the only functioning Pelican remaining on Zeta Halo as of 2560, the rest having been shot down or destroyed following the battle between the Banished and UNSC; Glibnub, the Banished Unggoy in charge of Propaganda broadcasts, in particular makes note of this, and claims that the Banished AA Guns "are very excited about shooting it down."

Production notes
"Our real, concrete, goal was to speak to the theme of rebirth. The pilot resuscitates Chief. Chief brings life and courage to the pilot. The Pelican is brought back to life by Chief. It speaks to the potential of the world we're creating."

- Dan Chosich

Trivia

 * Echo 216 has the same terrain awareness and warning system (TAWS) sounds as Boeing aircraft.

List of appearances

 * Halo Infinite