There is no aspect of the Halo Array that does not exude some level of mystery.
Each artificial world is a feat of such scope and ambition so as to eclipse near anything
else in the explored galaxy.
They are one the few remaining links to a lost age, holding the secrets of a forgotten
legacy.
And like so many secrets, those on Installation 7, the Zeta Halo, are best left forgotten.
Like the other rings in the Halo Array, Installation 7 has a diameter of 10,000 kilometers with
a foundation of superdense material forming its central structure.
An elaborate latticework of scaffolding and cantilever structures is laid over this foundation,
used to support the artificial landmasses of the ring’s inner side.
A myriad of tunnels and caverns riddle the foundational structure of the ring, acting
as transit conduits and maintenance corridors.
Hard light, more formally known as boson-photon fields, are used to further stabilize the
structure against the gravitational pull of other stellar objects.
The ring’s ecology was initially believed to be reminiscent of Venus with a desert-like
landscape perpetually shrouded by dense cloud cover.
The first on-site survey of the ring however revealed an environment very similar to Earth
with verdant forests, clear skies and oceans reminiscent of the pre-industrial Pacific
Northwest, humid jungles comparable to those once found in the Amazon, and mountainous
plateaus similar to the formations of Central Asia.
It is believed that this change is the result of some sort of repair or rejuvenation protocol
that was just completing at the time of its discovery.
Its defining characteristic however is the severe damage still visible, with the ring’s
bare foundational latticework periodically jutting into the natural scenery.
Large sections have simply broken away leading to strange interplays between the ring’s
artificial environment and deteriorating foundation.
Despite its precarious nature, life has still managed to thrive across the ring.
It is home to numerous transplanted flora and fauna from a variety of planets including
Earth.
These range from bees and mosquitoes to larger alien creatures resembling deer and rhinoceros.
Massive aquatic creatures have also been sighted in its various seas and oceans.
It is the presence of ancient human ruins and artifacts however, that provide the first
clues as to its original purpose.
When compared to the remainder of the surviving Halo Rings, Installation 07 exhibits many
conspicuous irregularities.
These are appreciable within the foundation’s infrastructure and its material composition
but are also present in its more subtle aspects.
The aesthetics of its protruding structures and technology, or even within the machine
language used by its computer systems all bear slight deviations from other known Halos.
While only a few left in the galaxy would recognize the implications and meaning of
these aberrances, the history of Installation 07 is expressed in its foundation and remaining
structures, across every mountain, every tree, every grain of sand.
Like the rest of the Halo Array, the ringworld was first constructed by the ancient Forerunners,
a component of their ultimate weapon designed to eradicate all life in the galaxy.
But unlike the other surviving Halos, Installation 07 is the only surviving ring from the first
Halo Array, originally consisting of 12 such megastructures, each far larger than any of
those that survived.
At the time of its construction, Installation 7 measured 30,000 kilometers in diameter,
unwieldy and structurally dangerous beyond the limits even of the Forerunners.
Together with the other rings in the array, it served a secondary purpose as a biological
preserve, collecting specimens from across the galaxy to safeguard biodiversity once
the Halos had been activated.
Installation 07 was dedicated mainly towards humans, which in time came to develop numerous
communities and even primitive cities on the ring.
During their cataclysmic war against the Flood, as their own society began to collapse, the
Forerunners placed Installation 07 under the command of one of their AIs “Mendicant Bias”,
with one of its primary cores housed on the ring itself.
But the ring’s original designer, a being known as “Faber-of-Will-and-Might” began
to use it for his own personal experiments, treating the human population as specimens
in his increasingly brutal experiments.
The abductions had a tremendous effect on the native human population, with those taken
said to have been brought to a “Palace of Pain” where unspeakable horrors occurred.
Faber’s intention was to find a cure for the Flood, but he was driven from the ring
before any meaningful progress was attained.
Evidence suggests that the ring was relocated several times across its history, but where
and for what purpose cannot be said with certainty.
It is known that it was fired at least twice , and this partial activation of the Halo
array awoke something in the Charum Hakkor system.
Some kind of primordial being either from a race that predated the Forerunners, or perhaps
a higher form of the Flood.
It manipulated Mendicant Bias for control of the ring, accelerating the experiments
on the human population.
Whether through the actions of the Primordial or through some other means, a Flood outbreak
nearly consumed the ring with entire sections of the natural preserve overtaken by their
parasitic growths.
How this outbreak was eradicated is likewise lost to history, but evidence suggests that
the Ring was involved in an enormous battle, perhaps against the Forerunner’s themselves
and fired at least once more.
The damage to the structure was severe and the ring was broken down and reconfigured.
It was reduced in size to the 10,000 kilometer diameter of the newer, more effective halo
array, of which Installation 07 was now a functional part.
At the end of the war against the flood, it activated a final time, wiping out all sentient
life in the galaxy save for those few preserved on its surface.
When the importance of the Halo array became known to United Nations Space Command, a sizable
effort was made to locate Installation 07.
It was discovered on November 28th, 2553 and became home to a small UNSC research contingent
thereafter.
The value of the ring was not solely to humanity however, and the Banished, a covenant splinter
faction, seized control of the ring some time after.
The Banished have declared their triumph over the few remaining UNSC forces present near
the ring, but there are signs that resistance to their conquest has not fully abated.
Entire outposts and bases of the Banished have been wiped off the face of the Halo.
This is the work, it is whispered, of a Demon, one who at the height of the Human-Covenant
war halted the Great Journey of the Prophets and now hunts all those who make war on mankind.
Yet while these rumors from Banished soldiers likely distort a less dramatic truth, they
may unwittingly describe a force still present on the ring.
More than its ultradense foundation or its scaffolding or the soil and rock of its surface,
Installation 07 is built on secrets.
As its structure decays, some things best forgotten, might instead reawake.