Halo 2 Story

Halo 2 Story

The story of Halo 2 is told through in-game dialogue as well as cutscenes; the back-story to the game can be found in the game manual. Taking place shortly after the events of the novel Halo: First Strike, the game opens with the judgment and torture of a former Covenant Elite Commander, who is being punished by his fellow Covenant for failing to stop the destruction of the ringworld Halo by human forces during the events of Halo: Combat Evolved. It is revealed that the Covenant's interest in Halo lies in the religious belief that the activation of Halo would bring about the "Great Journey", which would allow them to follow the ancient Forerunners to the "divine beyond".[21] At the same time as the Elite Commander is tortured and branded with a mark of shame by the Brute Chieftain, Tartarus, a recognition ceremony is held aboard Cairo Station, a coilgun platform orbiting Earth for the Master Chief and Sergeant Avery Johnson. The two soldiers receive recognition for their bravery during the events of Halo, alongside Commander Miranda Keyes, who accepts a similar award on behalf of her deceased father, Captain Jacob Keyes.

Shortly after the commencement of the ceremony, a Covenant fleet jumps out of slipspace near Earth. The Covenant proceed to send boarding parties towards the orbiting platforms in an effort to disable Earth’s defenses using bombs. After repelling the initial Covenant assault, the Master Chief locates and disarms the Covenant explosives with the help of the A.I. Cortana, while the flagship of the Covenant fleet speeds past Earth's defenses and heads toward Earth itself. The Chief and Cortana join Commander Keyes' ship, In Amber Clad, for its trip to New Mombasa to deal with the Covenant on Earth. Meanwhile, the disgraced Covenant commander is given a chance to redeem himself by becoming a warrior known as the Arbiter.

Before reaching New Mombasa, Cortana decodes transmissions revealing that the flagship they are after carries the High Prophet of Regret, an important figure in the Covenant leadership. Beaten back, the Covenant ship begins preparations for an emergency slipspace departure to an unknown destination. As Regret's ship disappears through the Slipspace portal, Keyes sends her ship after it, just before the portal closes and destroys the city with a massive shockwave. On the other side of the portal, they discover a second Halo installation (dubbed "Delta Halo"). Despite the Covenant's ideas about the rings, the Chief and the crew of the In Amber Clad know that the rings are actually weapons that if activated would wipe out all life in the galaxy. The Master Chief goes to the ring's surface to kill the Prophet of Regret while Keyes and Johnson attempt to secure the Index, an object used to activate the Halo array. The Chief succeeds in killing Regret, but is attacked by a Covenant fleet and captured by a mysterious tentacled creature.

Seeds of discord are sown within the Covenant when the Prophets decide to grant the Brutes the job of protecting the Prophets instead of the traditionally favored Elites. The Prophets of Truth and Mercy send the Arbiter to retrieve the Index on Delta Halo; though the Arbiter captures the key to fire Halo, he is betrayed by Tartarus, who reveals that the Prophets have authorized a wholesale slaughter of the Elites.

The Master Chief and the Arbiter meet upon the release of the Flood, a race of parasitic creatures Halo was built to control. A mysterious and intelligent Flood creature called the Gravemind captures the two soldiers and convinces the Arbiter of the danger Halo represents. Gravemind teleports the Arbiter and the Chief to separate locations in an attempt to find the Index and prevent the High Prophets from activating Delta Halo. While the Arbiter rallies his Elites to fight the Prophets and their allies, the Master Chief arrives aboard High Charity, a gargantuan mobile space station that serves as the Covenant capital city. Gravemind uses the distraction of the Chief's arrival and the breakout of civil war in the Covenant to infest In Amber Clad and attack High Charity. The Prophet of Truth, the sole remaining High Prophet, escapes on a Forerunner vessel; the Master Chief stows away while Cortana stays behind to destroy Halo in case it is activated. Tartarus activates the ring, but the Arbiter, with the help of Elites, Johnson, and Keyes, manages to stop the firing sequence and kill Tartarus. The unexpected shutdown causes the ring to send a signal to the other Halos, setting them on standby so they can be activated from a location known as the Ark. As the Forerunner ship the Master Chief has stowed away on approaches Earth, the game ends as an abrupt cliffhanger, setting the tone for Halo 3. After the credits, Cortana is seen being interrogated by the Gravemind.