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The Storyline so far-
The year is 2552. Planet Earth still exists, but overpopulation has forced many of her former residents to colonize other
worlds. Faster-than-light travel is now a reality, and Earth's unified government, through the United Nations Space Command,
has put its full weight behind the colonization effort; millions of humans now live on habitable planets in other solar systems.
A keystone in
humanity's colonization efforts is the planet Reach, an interstellar naval yard that builds colony ships for civilians
and warships for the UNSC's armed forces. Conveniently close to Earth, Reach is also a hub of scientific and military activity.
Thirty-two years ago, contact with the outer colony Harvest was lost. A battlegroup sent to investigate was almost completely
destroyed; only one badly damaged ship returned to Reach. Its crew told of a seemingly unstopable alien
warship that had effortlessly annihilated their forces.
This was humankind's first encounter with a group of aliens they eventually came to know as the Covenant, a collective
of alien races united in their fanatical religious devotion. Covenant religious elders declared humanity an
affront to the gods, and the Covenant warrior caste waged a holy war upon humanity with gruesome diligence. After a series
of crushing defeats and obliterated colonies, UNSC Admiral Preston Cole established the Cole Protocol: no vessel may inadvertently
lead the Covenant to Earth. When forced to withdraw, ships must avoid Earth-bound
vectors-even if that means jumping without proper navigational calculations. Vessels in danger of capture must self-destruct.
On Reach, a secret military project to create cyborg super-soldiers takes on newfound importance. The soldiers of the
SPARTAN-II project rack up an impressive record against the Covenant in test deployments, but there are too
few of them to turn the tide of the war.
Existing SPARTAN-II soldiers are recalled to Reach for further augmentation. The plan: board a Covenant vessel with the
improved SPARTAN-IIs and learn the location of the Covenant home world. Two days before the mission begins,
Covenant forces strike Reach and annihilate the colony. The Covenant are now on Earth's doorstep. One ship, the Pillar
of Autumn, escapes with the last SPARTAN-II and makes a blind jump into deep space, hoping to lead the Covenant
away from Earth.
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