Minor Transgression

The Minor Transgression was a small Covenant Missionary Ship in use before the Human-Covenant War, one of the ships employed by the Ministry of Tranquility to search the edges of Covenant space for Forerunner relics. The ship was captained by the Kig-yar Ship Mistress Chur'R-Yar, "overseen" by the Unggoy Deacon Dadab, and maintained by the Huragok Lighter Than Some. The rest of the small crew consisted solely of Kig-Yar, led by Zhar.

The Minor Trangression was cruising through space when the human freighter Horn of Plenty dropped out of Slipspace with a malfunctioned drive nearby. When the freighter detected Minor Transgression, Horn of Plenty hailed it, hoping it was a UNSC vessel. Shortly afterwards, Chur'R-Yar decided to attack it, using point lasers to destroy external sensors and communication devices. She then used her vessel's umbilical (a machine that burned through a ship's hull and allowed passage between the two vessels) to board Horn of Plenty and disconnect the main computer from the power grid. While the Kig-Yar raided the freighter's supply of fruits, Dadab retrieved the computer for Lighter Than Some, who was able to recover the freighter's point of origin: Harvest, a human agricultural colony.

When Minor Trangression arrived in the Epsilon Indi system, the ship's Luminary showed thousands of Forerunner relics on Harvest. This was an unprecedented find, and one the Kig-Yar were eager to exploit. They disconnected the Luminary from the ship's communication relay to prevent it from transmitting a true account of how many relics the planet had on it so that they could take some for themselves and sell them for profit. They attacked another freighter that showed a relic onboard: This End Up, captained by Henry Gibson. The Kig-Yar again boarded the vessel via the umbilical, and Henry was killed in the ensuing fight by Lighter Than Some. The Kig-Yar eagerly searched the ship for the relic, but failed to find it, not realizing that it was in fact the humans who were the "relics" the Luminary displayed.

By this time, ONI suspected the raids were being conducted by Insurrectionist forces, and laid a trap to engage the raiders, using a "derelict" freighter as bait, with Staff Sergeants Avery Johnson and Nolan Byrne inside to spring the trap. The Minor Transgression attacked, determined to claim the relics onboard. Johnson and Byrne killed several of the boarders, and Johnson pursued the few surviving Kig-Yar raiders back onto Minor Transgression. While this battle raged, Dadab and Lighter Than Some repaired the Luminary and transmitted a full account of Harvest's relics to High Charity and then fled in an escape pod. Gravely injured and knowing her plans for profit (which included taking her ship out of commission for the mating season and raising young of her own) were undone, Chur'R-Yar ignited the methane meant for Unggoy life-support in a final attempt to kill Johnson. The resulting detonation destroyed the Minor Transgression. Dadab and Lighter Than Some were the only survivors of the original crew.

Trivia
The Minor Transgression was the first Covenant ship to make contact with Humans and was also the first Covenant ship to be destroyed by Human forces.