Halo: Contact Harvest

Halo: Contact Harvest is the title of a Halo book by Joseph Staten. Published by Tor, it was released on October 30th, 2007. It is the fifth official book in the Halo series, and the second of three that will be published by Tor.

The price of the novel in the US will be $14.95. The novel will also be available as an audio book CD. The price of the audio book CD in the US will be $29.95

As part of Bungie's contract with Tor, there will be at least one more Halo novel released after Contact Harvest.

It is possible that the novel may lead up to the upcoming Halo game: Halo Wars, which deals with the UNSC's first encounters with the Covenant.

Back of Book Description
This is how it began...

It is the year 2524. Harvest is a peaceful, prosperous farming colony on the very edge of human controlled space. But we have trespassed on holy ground-strayed into the path of an aggressive alien empire known as the Covenant. What begins as a chance encounter between an alien privateer and a human freighter catapults mankind into a struggle for its very existence.

But humanity is also locked in a bitter civil war known as the The Insurrection. So the survival of Harvest falls to a squad of battle-weary UNSC Marines and their inexperienced Colonial Militia trainees. In this unlikely group of heroes, one stands above the rest...a young Marine Staff Sergeant named Avery Johnson.

On the UNSC colony Harvest, there is only peace and prosperity. Governed by two A.I., "Sif" and "Mack", the colony produces much of the other colony worlds food, though Harvest itself is only one-third the size of Earth. However, this peace is soon interrupted when a Kig-Yar, or Covenant Jackal pirate vessel happens across the planet. A covenant grunt, the "Deacon", is alarmed when he sees Harvest is literally swarming with "Illuminations", or beacons representing Forerunner relics, along with an "Oracle", or Forerunner guide to the "Great Journey". The Kig-Yar aboard the vessel are unmoved by the Deacons religious fervor, and see this as an opportunity to loot the planet for food, and possible priceless artifacts. Unfortunately for the Jackals, ONI, or the Office of Naval Intelligence, had noticed the sudden disappearances of human ships around Harvest, and laid a trap for the Insurgents they believed responsible for the pirating attacks. Staff Sergeant Avery Johnson becomes a part of the three-man strike team responsible for ambushing and neutralizing the "Rebel Insurgent Terrorists" around Harvest. First contact is made, with Sergeant Johnson killing the majority of a Jackal boarding party when they enter the trap decoy ship he had been lying in wait. Before he can kill the Jackal captain of the Covenent ship however, the Jackal destroys her own ship by exploding the methane suite set up for Grunts. The Deacon escapes inside a life-pod, along with his friend "Lighter-Then-Some", a Covenant alien belonging to the race of Engineers. While the UNSC and Harvest officials grapple with the thought of hostile alien life in the universe, a new Covenant ship arrives to rescue the Deacon and Lighter Then Some (Here on abbreviated to LTS), crewed by Brutes, Their Chieftain, and Tartarus. (Yes, the one and only silver monkey from Halo 2) The Fanatical Brutes are overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of "Illuminations" on Harvest, and everyone, from the Brutes to the Deacon grunt to the Humans recognize that they do not want to fight. The humans want to make a peaceful second contact, and the Brutes want to gather the "Illuminations" for the Covenant. Quite unfortunately, during a peaceful gathering of the Brutes and the Humans (Including Tartarus and Johnson) on an open plain, one grunt (The grunts onboard the Brute ship had been described before as not particularly bright), starts a firefight when he goes against orders and causes a human to shoot in surprise. (This very same grunt is later killed by one brute for his stupidity) The Brutes, having seen no sign of the Forerunner artifacts, despite their sensors showing dozens of "Illuminations all around them while they were on ground, decide to clear the Human infestation from Harvest, to better enable their search for Forerunner artifacts, and the supposed "Oracle" on Harvest.

While all this is happening, on High Charity, a Covenant mobile home-world, Two prophets begin to plot to take the place of the three Prophet hierarchs already leading the Covenant. The Prophet of Fortitude and the Vice-Minister of Tranquility seek a third Prophet to help them usurp the throne. They visit an old, supposedly senile Philologist, for blessings and advice. While they wait, the "Oracle" aboard High Charity, a Forerunner construct much like 343 Guilty Spark suddenly awakes from eons of waiting and watching the Covenant "Blunder and misinterpret". Tis Oracle atempts to inform them of their folly, exclaiming that on Harvest, it was not "RECLAMATION", but rather that "THEY ARE RECLAIMER!". It further remarks that the Illuminations were not beacons for Foreunner artifacts, but were its "Makers", living Foreruners. The three prophets are shocked and stunned in disbelief. The prophet of Fortitude realizes that the truth must never be revealed, that some Forerunners had survived and not gone on the "Great Journey", as this revelation would tear the Covenant apart. Further more, Fortitude comes to the realization that, in order to preserve the Covenant, he must make his ascent to power as swiftly and quickly as possible, so that he could "Exterminate these Reclaimers". The two prophets, Fortitude and Tranquility, in order to keep him silent, include the Philologist into their plans as the third hierarch.

Back on Harvest, the humans and brutes are waging a heavy war, with Johnson and his squad of rookie marines heavily outmanned and outgunned, being the only major marine force on this previously peaceful planet. During all the fighting, Johnson cripples the "Chieftan of the Brutes" by crushing his leg with a warthog. Later, Tartarus would take advantage of this to kill the Chieftan with only a brute spikers blade, as the Chieftan could no longer swing the "Fist of Rukt" effectively.

Meanwhile, the two Harvest A.I., Sif and Mack are coordinating the planets defense, when Mack reveals his secret. He was actually an ONI A.I. that was brought offline and reprogrammed to serve as a farming A.I. after the planet was successfully colonized. Now that the Brutes are winning the battle, he has no choice but to follow emergency protocol. To destroy himself in order to release the ONI A.I. inside him, Loki. He does so, much to the grief of Sif, the other A.I. Now only concerned with battle Loki uses a planetary cannon, (an early predecessor to the MAC Cannon) to destroy Sif to prevent her capture by the Covenant. He then cripples the Brute ship that was glassing harvest, while Johnson and his squad board an orbital platform controlled by the brutes to clear the way for civilian escape pods. During the battle for the platform, the Deacon, enraged at the death of his friend LTS, vows to undo all the violence, and end the fighting. Seeing that his plasma pistol only has one shot left, he goes off in search of his prey.

Johnson is pinned down, and fights a losing battle to Tartarus, now fully outfitted in Chieftain uniform, armed with the Fist of Rukt gravity hammer. Suddeenly, he is shocked to see a grunt pop out from behind him and believes himself dead... when the grunt fires his overloaded pistol straight at Tartarus, dissipating the brutes shields,leaving him vulnerable. Unfortunately, he is then smashed flatter then a pancake by the Fist of Rukt. Jenkins, (Yes, the coward from Halo 1) who is motivated by all that has happened to him in the past month (Seeing his world burn and friends and family die) attempts to kill Tartarus alone. He fails, and Tartarus makes his escape, but this seals Tatrarus' hatred for Johnson, foreshadowing the final battle in Halo 2.

The end of the book shows the Prophet of Fortitude, Tranquility, and The Philologist, in light of recent events, making their ascent into being the Three Prohet Hierarchs... The Prophet of Truth, The prophet of Regret, and the Prophet of Mercy. Truth proclaims an end to the seventh age of the Covenant, and ushers in a new age... The 9th Age of Reclamation, revealing the location of a HALO, coordinates recovered from Harvest. He also begins planning the downfall of the Elites, and the steps he must take to assure that no human be found to be a Forerunner, and no human given acceptance in to the Covenant. He chose his new name just for those purposes. The lies he must tell to keep the Covenant together and lead them all on their "Great Journey".

The epilogue shows that Loki was not destroyed completely with the final glassing of Harvest, though he knows that he will "Die" soon, as the Brutes are destroying every machine that he could inhabit in hopes of finding and destroying him. Loki has once again become Mack, as the parts that made him Loki were largely destroyed by the plasma bombardment. In a garbled transmission to "Sif", he reveals that she is not completely destroyed, that while Loki was an excellent shot with the MAC Cannon, the bombardment spared her from complete destruction. He spends his last moments using the farming drones he had controlled to bury the remains of the facility that had housed Sif, to keep her safe from the ongoing "Glassing" of Harvest. He is destroyed during the glassing.

United Nations Space Command

 * Staff Sergeant Avery Johnson
 * Lieutenant Commander Jilan al-Cygni
 * Captain Ponder
 * Staff Sergeant Nolan Byrne
 * Governor Thune
 * Attorney General Rol Pedersen

Covenant

 * Jiralhanae Chieftain Maccabeus
 * Tartarus
 * Huragok Lighter Than Some
 * Unggoy Dadab
 * Prophet of Truth
 * Prophet of Regret
 * Prophet of Mercy

Trivia

 * Johnson is seen wielding a BR55 Battle Rifle on the cover of the book which according to Halo: First Strike wasn't created until 2552, meaning it won't exist until 27 years after the events in Contact Harvest. However, on Bungie Podcast Episode III, Joe Staten stated that there are specific reasons that Johnson has the battle rifle, hinting about what kind of soldier would be responsible for testing out weapons such as the Battle Rifle. It should also be noted that it says in the book its a prototype at the time.


 * Johnson gets into a relationship with Lt. Commander Jilan al-Cygni. She was sent by ONI to use Johnson and Byrne in a covert operation to figure out who kept boarding freighters that would send out a distress signal. It wasn't until the second to last chapter of the book did anything of intimate nature occur.


 * In an excerpt found in OXM, it is revealed that the Hornet appears in Contact Harvest in the sense that they have been in service since 2524.


 * The Unggoy Dadab could refer to Tim Dadabo, the voice actor of 343 Guilty Spark