Post by Savi0r117 on May 29, 2014 22:23:40 GMT
Name: Cortana
Race: AI
Group Alignment: UNSC
Gender: (By body shape and actions) Female
Age: 8
Apparent Age: 20-25
Bio: Cortana was created using a flash cloned copy of Dr. Catherine Elizabeth Halsey's brain. Twenty flash cloned brains were created, but only one survived; the survivor was used to create Cortana. The neural pathways of the cloned brain were scanned and copied through a process called Cognitive Impression Modeling.[3] Her first words were "When the game is over, the king and pawn go into the same box" in Italian.[1] She is one of at least two A.I.s that were created from Dr. Halsey's brain, the other being her predecessor, Kalmiya, another smart A.I.
Cortana seems to share her creator's memories, thoughts, opinions, and even values. When she was asked by Dr. Halsey to pick a "carrier," Cortana chose John-117 for his neural compatibility. She is not only a facsimile of Dr. Halsey's mind, but also a replica of her physical form, albeit at a younger age.
Meeting John-117Edit
“They let me pick. Did I ever tell you that? Choose whichever Spartan I wanted. You know me. I did my research. Watched as you became the soldier we needed you to be. Like the others, you were strong and swift and brave. A natural leader. But you had something they didn't. Something no one saw, but me. Can you guess...? Luck.”
—Cortana
Cortana first met John-117 prior to the Fall of Reach, when she was integrated into his new MJOLNIR Mark V armor. Together, Cortana and John passed a test that was devised (Dr. Halsey would have called it "sabotaged") by Colonel James Ackerson. The test included armed ODSTs, anti-tank mines, automatic turrets in the razor field, and even a SkyHawk for an air strike. After the test Cortana was installed into the Pillar of Autumn to run the ship's shakedown and oversee the refit of the ship. Afterward it was planned that she would be replaced with the Pillar of Autumn's true AI, but she was forced to take up this duty herself ultimately. While aboard, she took her revenge on Colonel Ackerson by hacking into his system and blackmailing him, hoping that this would send him back to the front lines. She also developed a deep personal loyalty to John-117 that would only grow stronger over their adventures together.
Cortana's primary mission was to aid the SPARTANs in the infiltration of a Covenant vessel and the capturing of a Covenant Prophet. The UNSC would then try to bargain with the Covenant for a peace treaty.
The Fall of ReachEdit
Main article: Fall of Reach
When the operation was canceled due to the Covenant's surprise assault on Reach John-117 was able to fend off Covenant forces at Reach and escaped to the UNSC Pillar of Autumn, while Cortana stayed with Halsey at her excavation site beneath Sword Base. With the Covenant closing in on her lab, Halsey turned Cortana over to the Spartan Noble Team, specifically Noble Six. After fleeing Sword Base moments before it was destroyed, Jun-A266 would escort Halsey to CASTLE Base, while Six, Carter-A259, and Emile-A239 took Cortana to the Aszod Shipyards, where the Autumn was docked.
Although Carter and Emile were both killed by the Covenant's ground forces before making it to the Shipyard, Six would successfully deliver Cortana to Jacob Keyes, the captain of the Autumn, who arrived via Pelican and received "the package". To ensure the Autumn's escape, Noble Six stayed behind and used a Mass driver to destroy a CCS-class battlecruiser blocking the ship's way out and preparing to glass the shipyard, and therefore the Autumn, Cortana, and John. Six succeeded and ensured the Autumn's safe escape. Cortana reunited with John-117 on board.
As soon as Pillar of Autumn escaped the surface and atmosphere of Reach, they jumped into Slipstream Space on a random vector as per the Cole Protocol. However, Cortana secretly inserted coordinates translated from symbols on a rock that John-117 discovered on Sigma Octanus IV, thinking that they were of some significance to the Covenant.
The Battle of Installation 04Edit
Main article: Battle of Installation 04
“Halo doesn't kill Flood. It kills their food. Humans, Covenant, whatever - we're all equally edible. The only way to stop the Flood is to starve them to death. And that's exactly what Halo is designed to do: wipe the galaxy clean of all sentient life.”
—Cortana reveals the true purpose of Installation 04 to John-117.
After emerging out of Slipspace, the two discovered a ring shaped world called "Halo". Unfortunately, Covenant ships had followed them and the fighting continued. Controlling the UNSC Pillar of Autumn's defenses, Cortana managed to destroy four Covenant targets over Installation 04 before the ship's weapons were disabled by Covenant boarders. Following the Cole Protocol, Captain Jacob Keyes, the ship's commanding officer, prepared to abandon ship. Because the Cole Protocol forbade the capture or destruction of any A.I. construct, John-117 was charged with protecting Cortana from the Covenant.
It was around this time that John learned that Covenant forces had successfully captured Keyes and taken him to the Truth and Reconciliation. John-117 rescued Keyes, who left to infiltrate what appeared to be a Covenant weapons cache located in a swamp.
John and Cortana used the Silent Cartographer to locate and enter Halo's Control Room, where Cortana was uploaded to Halo's core systems. When John-117 asked her how Halo could be used against the Covenant, she hinted that the Halo wasn't what it seemed to be. She also learned that the "weapons cache" Keyes was attacking was really a Flood Containment Facility. She stayed in Halo's systems sending John-117 to find Keyes. After John encountered the parasitic Flood for the first time, he was convinced by the Forerunner Monitor 343 Guilty Spark to activate the Halo. During this time, Cortana apparently absorbed as much data as she could about Halo from its control systems.
343 Guilty Spark helped John-117 retrieve the Activation Index. John, intent on using the Index to eliminate the Flood, returned to the Control Room and inserted the Index into the Halo's control panel. Luckily, Cortana stopped the activation sequence and removed the Index's data, informing him of the true purpose of the Halo Array. Cortana's actions saved all life in the galaxy from total annihilation. At that point, 343 Guilty Spark, seeing that the duo had no intention of returning the Index, tried and failed to kill them to retrieve it.
After enduring prolonged engagements with the Covenant and the Flood, Cortana realized that detonating the Pillar of Autumn's fusion reactors would destroy the Halo. Unfortunately, the reactors could only be activated using codes stored in the now-infected Captain Keyes's Command Neural Interface (CNI). John-117 retrieved the CNI, and he and Cortana managed to detonate the reactors despite interference from 343 Guilty Spark. The two escaped the resulting explosion by racing through the ship's crumbling superstructure in a M12 Light Reconnaissance Vehicle (Warthog) to a hangar bay, where one remaining Longsword fighter was still berthed. Climbing aboard with the Flood right behind them, they barely outran the blast, and watched through the viewports as debris from the reactor breach destroyed the remains of the Halo ring.
Operation: First StrikeEdit
“We're all that's left....we...did what we had to do; for Earth. An entire Covenant armada obliterated, and the Flood - we had no choice. Halo - it's finished.”
—Cortana to John-117 after escaping from Installation 04.
“No...I think we're just getting started.”
—John-117
Cortana and John-117, seemingly the sole survivors of the Pillar of Autumn's crew after the Battle of Installation 04, discovered a small number of other UNSC personnel that had escaped the ring in a Pelican dropship. Knowing that the Pelican wasn't capable of traveling long distances, John-117, along with Cortana and the Pelican's four-man crew, fought their way onto the Covenant flagship Ascendant Justice. Shortly afterward, Cortana took control of the ship. She managed to improve on the ship's weapons and Slipspace capabilities, able to send it to light speed below Threshold's atmosphere. She then returned the survivors to Reach, where the group helped to rescue survivors of the Raid of Reach, including her "mother", Dr. Halsey.
Cortana revealed that she had taken a lot of data from Halo, and the sheer amount of information cut into her processing power and slowed her down. During her time on Ascendant Justice, Cortana exhibited uncharacteristic behavior including anger, distraction, and self-doubt - an indicator that she may have been about to enter rampancy. Dr. Halsey erased some data from her memory to give her more thinking space, including data regarding Sergeant Johnson's immunity to the Flood - a result of Boren's Syndrome.
It was also revealed that during Cortana's time on Ascendant Justice, she had captured a Covenant A.I., decompiled the A.I. and copied two of its functions: the ability to translate Covenant speech, and the ability to create imperfect clones of herself. These capabilities, along with her exclusive knowledge about the Halos, made her extremely valuable to the UNSC.
The Ascendant Justice was effectively fused with the UNSC Gettysburg It was at this point that Cortana learned of a planned Covenant assault on Earth. John-117, along with SPARTAN Blue Team and an expendable clone of Cortana (with all of the data the real Cortana had she was just too valuable to risk), would later execute Operation: FIRST STRIKE.
As it turned out, the Covenant A.I. that Cortana had decompiled had managed to, prior to its capture, send a message over the Covenant Battlenet, warning the Covenant of its ship's capture and sending the necessary calculations for a sub-atmospheric Slipspace jump. The information was later used by the Prophet of Regret to enter Slipspace right above New Mombasa during the Battle of Mombasa.
John-117 and Cortana would later return to Earth, at which point Cortana handed all of the sensitive data in her possession over to ONI, although she held onto the Index and apparently still possessed some data on the Halo network including critical information on the Ark.
Battle of EarthEdit
H2 mchief cortana
John-117 about to "upload" Cortana into his neural interface.
Main article: Battle of Earth
“Fortunately for both of us...I LIKE crazy.”
—Cortana right before John-117 jumps from Cairo Station.
After returning to Earth, Cortana served on the Orbital Defense Platform Cairo, where a ceremony for both SGT Johnson and CDR Miranda Keyes was soon interrupted by the arrival of a Covenant Fleet under the command of the High Prophet of Regret, starting the Battle of Earth. Cortana was given control of the Cairo's Magnetic Accelerator Cannon to repel the invaders, and with John-117's help, she successfully deactivated a Covenant bomb that would have destroyed the station. She did this by uploading to John-117's armor again for the first time since the capture of Ascendant Justice. When she did this, she somehow was able to do it through him merely touching the terminal her hologram was on, possibly an improvement as a result of John-117's new MARK VI armor. The same bomb was then used by SPARTAN-117 to destroy a Covenant Assault Carrier. John offered for her to remain behind on the station after she said that his plan was crazy, but she chose to accompany him anyway. She then aided him when he arrived in New Mombasa to deal with a Scarab.
Delta HaloEdit
Main article: Battle of Installation 05
“Don't make a girl a promise... If you know you can't keep it...”
—Cortana when John-117 promises to return for her.
Later, after escaping on board the UNSC In Amber Clad in a Slipspace event, they discovered another ring world, Delta Halo. Cortana gave Miranda Keyes access to all information on the previous Halo Ring, and provided intelligence to John, UNSC Marines, and the ODSTs on the surface of the ring.
After John-117 hunted down and killed the Prophet of Regret on Delta Halo, he, Cortana, and The Arbiter were captured by the Flood's central intelligence - the Gravemind. However, it did not harm them, instead choosing to use the two to stop the Prophet of Truth from firing the Halo. The Gravemind sent John-117 and Cortana to the Covenant Capital Ship High Charity, where Cortana infiltrated the city's computer systems and remained there while John-117 followed the Prophet of Truth. She promised to detonate the crashed In Amber Clad's reactors to destroy the city and Halo if the ring was activated. However, she was left behind as a fail safe because she did not want to chance a remote detonation. As Truth boarded the Forerunner Dreadnought in the heart of the city to reach the Ark, Cortana fought with the ancient Forerunner A.I. 032 Mendicant Bias to prevent the ship from launching without John on board. The firing of Halo was averted by Miranda Keyes, the Arbiter Thel 'Vadamee, and Johnson, while John successfully boarded the Dreadnought and escaped High Charity, leaving Cortana in the clutches of the true enemy, Gravemind, who had by then, overrun High Charity.
CapturedEdit
“Chief! High Charity, the Covenant's Holy City is on its way to Earth. With an army of Flood.”
—Cortana's recording for John.
Under the control of the Gravemind and constantly being tortured, Cortana managed to send a message to John-117 on Earth, stashing it on an Earth-bound Flood-infected ship that crash-landed in Voi. She succeeded in doing this by creating a message and using the Gravemind's link to that ship to transmit it. The Gravemind allowed this and even helped it along in order to lure John-117 in, but was unaware of what the message said. In her message, she stated that the Gravemind was approaching Earth in High Charity, and that it was unaware of the portal generated by the Artifact and where it led to. On the other side, there was a solution to stop the Flood without needing to fire the remaining Halo rings; however, she couldn't give any further information, as the Gravemind might have been listening. Though Lord Hood doubted her plan, fearing it could be a Flood trap, John stated that he trusts her. A joint UNSC-Covenant Separatist task force then entered the Portal, heading to Truth and to Cortana's solution. Ironically, Lord Hood was correct: the Gravemind deliberately let Cortana send the message to lure all of its enemies into one place, and then the Flood would overwhelm them all with the infested High Charity. It was also shown that some of the Cortana Moments were of her defying the Gravemind and some were clones of her that she made to distract the Gravemind to avoid being consumed by him.[4]
Cortana continued to appear to John-117, who successfully recovered her from the Flood Hive that was High Charity after it crashed on the Ark. While John reassured her, Cortana knew that she had taken irreparable damage in some places. Along the way, John-117 had several visions of her seemingly in pain. Surprised that John had against all odds rescued her as he promised after the First Battle of High Charity, as well as being surprised that Chief and Thel 'Vadam (whom she encountered on Delta Halo with the Gravemind) "made nice", Cortana managed to gather herself and produce the Index from Installation 04, which she had kept. With it, Cortana was able to activate the newly constructed Installation 04B, which fired prematurely, causing it to destroy itself and heavily damage the Ark in the process.
Stranded in spaceEdit
CortanaHalo4
Cortana, as she appears when the UNSC Forward Unto Dawn begins to deteriorate.
“But you did it. Truth and the Covenant...the Flood. It's finished.”
—Cortana
The Slipspace portal collapsed as John-117, Thel 'Vadam, and Cortana attempted to escape through it, cutting the UNSC Forward Unto Dawn in half. While 'Vadam, who was on the bridge, managed to return to Earth safely, John and Cortana, who were in the hangar, were left drifting in space. Cortana activated a distress beacon, but knew that it could be years before they were found. As John-117 prepared to go into cryogenic sleep to await rescue, Cortana confessed to him that she would miss him.
After the portal collapse in 2552, in the year 2556, she and John are still stranded. Cortana, who is showing signs of rampancy,[5] tries to communicate with John. As he is still in cryo sleep, she is unable to get a response from him. Cortana then begins to file a report on the history of the Forerunners and humanity. After an unknown period of time, they are seen drifting towards Requiem.
Four years, seven months, and ten days after the UNSC Forward Unto Dawn was split into two, Cortana woke John-117 from cryonic stasis.
RequiemEdit
Both Cortana and Chief managed to make it off the Forward Unto Dawn and into Requiem. There, they managed to get a signal to the approaching UNSC Infinity, but the Infinity only ended up becoming stranded with them. After Chief and Cortana linked up with the Infinity and her crew, they were able to disable Requiem's defenses. However, they were contacted by the Librarian, claiming that the key to defeating the Didact lay in John's genes. Due to the Librarian's manipulation of humanity eons before, John-117 was immune to what Didact referred to as "Composing". However, throughout this, Cortana's rampancy continued to grow worse and she began to display outbursts of uncontrollable anger.
Chasing the DidactEdit
After learning what the Didact had planned, Cortana and John-117 became determined to stop him with or without the assistance of the Infinity. Cortana's worsening rampancy led to Captain Andrew Del Rio ordering her decommissioned. John-117 defied orders to surrender her chip and continued his mission. With a Pelican gunship secretly given to them by Commander Thomas Lasky, Cortana and John-117 chased down the Didact. They managed to lower the shield protecting his Cryptum, but when Cortana tried to imprison him again, her rampancy overtook her and she failed to complete her task, allowing the Didact to escape Requiem. John and Cortana followed the Didact by hanging onto a Lich during a slipspace jump and followed him to Ivanoff Station near Installation 03. Cortana took control of the Lich, but again her rampancy got the better of her and she crashed the ship into the station.
When John-117 met up with Doctor Sandra Tillson, Cortana checked the station's inventory for something to destroy the Composer and discovered seven HAVOK Tactical Nuclear Weapons. Cortana later activated the station's defenses, but had a hard time focusing more and more as time went on, having to spout trivia at one point to focus. Eventually the Didact got to the Composer and digitized everyone in the station except Cortana and John-117, who survived due to his genetic upgrade from the Librarian. The event traumatized Cortana who became sure she would be replaced by another AI and would never be repaired. John-117 got her to focus on the mission and she located a Broadsword with which to chase down the Didact.
Appearance: As Cortana is an A.I., she has no physical body. She can communicate through comm systems and project a holographic image of herself from appropriate projectors, such as Holotanks. Her chosen avatar appears to be a naked female human, roughly in her early twenties, with purplish/bluish skin, shoulder length purplish/bluish hair cut shorter at the back, and blue symbols scrolling down her body. In Halo: Fall of Reach, Cortana is said to resemble her creator, Dr. Catherine Halsey as a young woman, with a similar attitude "only unchecked by military and social protocol." When in a different emotional state, Cortana usually changes colors. This was especially noticeable in Halo: Combat Evolved, but less so in Halo 2 and Halo 3. Only in specific instances did she produce the color-changing effect. One instance of this was right before John-117 rescued her. Dr. Halsey stated in her journal that Cortana looks somewhat like Miranda Keyes.[1]
Bungie took a fair of amount of artistic freedom in the evolution of her appearance throughout the Halo Trilogy, noticeably from Halo: Combat Evolved to Halo 2. She had longer hair, a more realistic humanoid figure, a much more feminine appearance, and a slightly different shade of purple. In Halo 3, she became slightly bluer and again her face, hair, and body were changed to look more feminine and realistic. In Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, she has her Halo 3 appearance. In Halo 4, she had darker, more opaque and realistic hair. Her facial structure had noticeably changed, her figure had become considerably more curvacious, and she gained better defined fingers and toes. The circuit-pattern mapping over her body changes between every game as well.
Race: AI
Group Alignment: UNSC
Gender: (By body shape and actions) Female
Age: 8
Apparent Age: 20-25
Bio: Cortana was created using a flash cloned copy of Dr. Catherine Elizabeth Halsey's brain. Twenty flash cloned brains were created, but only one survived; the survivor was used to create Cortana. The neural pathways of the cloned brain were scanned and copied through a process called Cognitive Impression Modeling.[3] Her first words were "When the game is over, the king and pawn go into the same box" in Italian.[1] She is one of at least two A.I.s that were created from Dr. Halsey's brain, the other being her predecessor, Kalmiya, another smart A.I.
Cortana seems to share her creator's memories, thoughts, opinions, and even values. When she was asked by Dr. Halsey to pick a "carrier," Cortana chose John-117 for his neural compatibility. She is not only a facsimile of Dr. Halsey's mind, but also a replica of her physical form, albeit at a younger age.
Meeting John-117Edit
“They let me pick. Did I ever tell you that? Choose whichever Spartan I wanted. You know me. I did my research. Watched as you became the soldier we needed you to be. Like the others, you were strong and swift and brave. A natural leader. But you had something they didn't. Something no one saw, but me. Can you guess...? Luck.”
—Cortana
Cortana first met John-117 prior to the Fall of Reach, when she was integrated into his new MJOLNIR Mark V armor. Together, Cortana and John passed a test that was devised (Dr. Halsey would have called it "sabotaged") by Colonel James Ackerson. The test included armed ODSTs, anti-tank mines, automatic turrets in the razor field, and even a SkyHawk for an air strike. After the test Cortana was installed into the Pillar of Autumn to run the ship's shakedown and oversee the refit of the ship. Afterward it was planned that she would be replaced with the Pillar of Autumn's true AI, but she was forced to take up this duty herself ultimately. While aboard, she took her revenge on Colonel Ackerson by hacking into his system and blackmailing him, hoping that this would send him back to the front lines. She also developed a deep personal loyalty to John-117 that would only grow stronger over their adventures together.
Cortana's primary mission was to aid the SPARTANs in the infiltration of a Covenant vessel and the capturing of a Covenant Prophet. The UNSC would then try to bargain with the Covenant for a peace treaty.
The Fall of ReachEdit
Main article: Fall of Reach
When the operation was canceled due to the Covenant's surprise assault on Reach John-117 was able to fend off Covenant forces at Reach and escaped to the UNSC Pillar of Autumn, while Cortana stayed with Halsey at her excavation site beneath Sword Base. With the Covenant closing in on her lab, Halsey turned Cortana over to the Spartan Noble Team, specifically Noble Six. After fleeing Sword Base moments before it was destroyed, Jun-A266 would escort Halsey to CASTLE Base, while Six, Carter-A259, and Emile-A239 took Cortana to the Aszod Shipyards, where the Autumn was docked.
Although Carter and Emile were both killed by the Covenant's ground forces before making it to the Shipyard, Six would successfully deliver Cortana to Jacob Keyes, the captain of the Autumn, who arrived via Pelican and received "the package". To ensure the Autumn's escape, Noble Six stayed behind and used a Mass driver to destroy a CCS-class battlecruiser blocking the ship's way out and preparing to glass the shipyard, and therefore the Autumn, Cortana, and John. Six succeeded and ensured the Autumn's safe escape. Cortana reunited with John-117 on board.
As soon as Pillar of Autumn escaped the surface and atmosphere of Reach, they jumped into Slipstream Space on a random vector as per the Cole Protocol. However, Cortana secretly inserted coordinates translated from symbols on a rock that John-117 discovered on Sigma Octanus IV, thinking that they were of some significance to the Covenant.
The Battle of Installation 04Edit
Main article: Battle of Installation 04
“Halo doesn't kill Flood. It kills their food. Humans, Covenant, whatever - we're all equally edible. The only way to stop the Flood is to starve them to death. And that's exactly what Halo is designed to do: wipe the galaxy clean of all sentient life.”
—Cortana reveals the true purpose of Installation 04 to John-117.
After emerging out of Slipspace, the two discovered a ring shaped world called "Halo". Unfortunately, Covenant ships had followed them and the fighting continued. Controlling the UNSC Pillar of Autumn's defenses, Cortana managed to destroy four Covenant targets over Installation 04 before the ship's weapons were disabled by Covenant boarders. Following the Cole Protocol, Captain Jacob Keyes, the ship's commanding officer, prepared to abandon ship. Because the Cole Protocol forbade the capture or destruction of any A.I. construct, John-117 was charged with protecting Cortana from the Covenant.
It was around this time that John learned that Covenant forces had successfully captured Keyes and taken him to the Truth and Reconciliation. John-117 rescued Keyes, who left to infiltrate what appeared to be a Covenant weapons cache located in a swamp.
John and Cortana used the Silent Cartographer to locate and enter Halo's Control Room, where Cortana was uploaded to Halo's core systems. When John-117 asked her how Halo could be used against the Covenant, she hinted that the Halo wasn't what it seemed to be. She also learned that the "weapons cache" Keyes was attacking was really a Flood Containment Facility. She stayed in Halo's systems sending John-117 to find Keyes. After John encountered the parasitic Flood for the first time, he was convinced by the Forerunner Monitor 343 Guilty Spark to activate the Halo. During this time, Cortana apparently absorbed as much data as she could about Halo from its control systems.
343 Guilty Spark helped John-117 retrieve the Activation Index. John, intent on using the Index to eliminate the Flood, returned to the Control Room and inserted the Index into the Halo's control panel. Luckily, Cortana stopped the activation sequence and removed the Index's data, informing him of the true purpose of the Halo Array. Cortana's actions saved all life in the galaxy from total annihilation. At that point, 343 Guilty Spark, seeing that the duo had no intention of returning the Index, tried and failed to kill them to retrieve it.
After enduring prolonged engagements with the Covenant and the Flood, Cortana realized that detonating the Pillar of Autumn's fusion reactors would destroy the Halo. Unfortunately, the reactors could only be activated using codes stored in the now-infected Captain Keyes's Command Neural Interface (CNI). John-117 retrieved the CNI, and he and Cortana managed to detonate the reactors despite interference from 343 Guilty Spark. The two escaped the resulting explosion by racing through the ship's crumbling superstructure in a M12 Light Reconnaissance Vehicle (Warthog) to a hangar bay, where one remaining Longsword fighter was still berthed. Climbing aboard with the Flood right behind them, they barely outran the blast, and watched through the viewports as debris from the reactor breach destroyed the remains of the Halo ring.
Operation: First StrikeEdit
“We're all that's left....we...did what we had to do; for Earth. An entire Covenant armada obliterated, and the Flood - we had no choice. Halo - it's finished.”
—Cortana to John-117 after escaping from Installation 04.
“No...I think we're just getting started.”
—John-117
Cortana and John-117, seemingly the sole survivors of the Pillar of Autumn's crew after the Battle of Installation 04, discovered a small number of other UNSC personnel that had escaped the ring in a Pelican dropship. Knowing that the Pelican wasn't capable of traveling long distances, John-117, along with Cortana and the Pelican's four-man crew, fought their way onto the Covenant flagship Ascendant Justice. Shortly afterward, Cortana took control of the ship. She managed to improve on the ship's weapons and Slipspace capabilities, able to send it to light speed below Threshold's atmosphere. She then returned the survivors to Reach, where the group helped to rescue survivors of the Raid of Reach, including her "mother", Dr. Halsey.
Cortana revealed that she had taken a lot of data from Halo, and the sheer amount of information cut into her processing power and slowed her down. During her time on Ascendant Justice, Cortana exhibited uncharacteristic behavior including anger, distraction, and self-doubt - an indicator that she may have been about to enter rampancy. Dr. Halsey erased some data from her memory to give her more thinking space, including data regarding Sergeant Johnson's immunity to the Flood - a result of Boren's Syndrome.
It was also revealed that during Cortana's time on Ascendant Justice, she had captured a Covenant A.I., decompiled the A.I. and copied two of its functions: the ability to translate Covenant speech, and the ability to create imperfect clones of herself. These capabilities, along with her exclusive knowledge about the Halos, made her extremely valuable to the UNSC.
The Ascendant Justice was effectively fused with the UNSC Gettysburg It was at this point that Cortana learned of a planned Covenant assault on Earth. John-117, along with SPARTAN Blue Team and an expendable clone of Cortana (with all of the data the real Cortana had she was just too valuable to risk), would later execute Operation: FIRST STRIKE.
As it turned out, the Covenant A.I. that Cortana had decompiled had managed to, prior to its capture, send a message over the Covenant Battlenet, warning the Covenant of its ship's capture and sending the necessary calculations for a sub-atmospheric Slipspace jump. The information was later used by the Prophet of Regret to enter Slipspace right above New Mombasa during the Battle of Mombasa.
John-117 and Cortana would later return to Earth, at which point Cortana handed all of the sensitive data in her possession over to ONI, although she held onto the Index and apparently still possessed some data on the Halo network including critical information on the Ark.
Battle of EarthEdit
H2 mchief cortana
John-117 about to "upload" Cortana into his neural interface.
Main article: Battle of Earth
“Fortunately for both of us...I LIKE crazy.”
—Cortana right before John-117 jumps from Cairo Station.
After returning to Earth, Cortana served on the Orbital Defense Platform Cairo, where a ceremony for both SGT Johnson and CDR Miranda Keyes was soon interrupted by the arrival of a Covenant Fleet under the command of the High Prophet of Regret, starting the Battle of Earth. Cortana was given control of the Cairo's Magnetic Accelerator Cannon to repel the invaders, and with John-117's help, she successfully deactivated a Covenant bomb that would have destroyed the station. She did this by uploading to John-117's armor again for the first time since the capture of Ascendant Justice. When she did this, she somehow was able to do it through him merely touching the terminal her hologram was on, possibly an improvement as a result of John-117's new MARK VI armor. The same bomb was then used by SPARTAN-117 to destroy a Covenant Assault Carrier. John offered for her to remain behind on the station after she said that his plan was crazy, but she chose to accompany him anyway. She then aided him when he arrived in New Mombasa to deal with a Scarab.
Delta HaloEdit
Main article: Battle of Installation 05
“Don't make a girl a promise... If you know you can't keep it...”
—Cortana when John-117 promises to return for her.
Later, after escaping on board the UNSC In Amber Clad in a Slipspace event, they discovered another ring world, Delta Halo. Cortana gave Miranda Keyes access to all information on the previous Halo Ring, and provided intelligence to John, UNSC Marines, and the ODSTs on the surface of the ring.
After John-117 hunted down and killed the Prophet of Regret on Delta Halo, he, Cortana, and The Arbiter were captured by the Flood's central intelligence - the Gravemind. However, it did not harm them, instead choosing to use the two to stop the Prophet of Truth from firing the Halo. The Gravemind sent John-117 and Cortana to the Covenant Capital Ship High Charity, where Cortana infiltrated the city's computer systems and remained there while John-117 followed the Prophet of Truth. She promised to detonate the crashed In Amber Clad's reactors to destroy the city and Halo if the ring was activated. However, she was left behind as a fail safe because she did not want to chance a remote detonation. As Truth boarded the Forerunner Dreadnought in the heart of the city to reach the Ark, Cortana fought with the ancient Forerunner A.I. 032 Mendicant Bias to prevent the ship from launching without John on board. The firing of Halo was averted by Miranda Keyes, the Arbiter Thel 'Vadamee, and Johnson, while John successfully boarded the Dreadnought and escaped High Charity, leaving Cortana in the clutches of the true enemy, Gravemind, who had by then, overrun High Charity.
CapturedEdit
“Chief! High Charity, the Covenant's Holy City is on its way to Earth. With an army of Flood.”
—Cortana's recording for John.
Under the control of the Gravemind and constantly being tortured, Cortana managed to send a message to John-117 on Earth, stashing it on an Earth-bound Flood-infected ship that crash-landed in Voi. She succeeded in doing this by creating a message and using the Gravemind's link to that ship to transmit it. The Gravemind allowed this and even helped it along in order to lure John-117 in, but was unaware of what the message said. In her message, she stated that the Gravemind was approaching Earth in High Charity, and that it was unaware of the portal generated by the Artifact and where it led to. On the other side, there was a solution to stop the Flood without needing to fire the remaining Halo rings; however, she couldn't give any further information, as the Gravemind might have been listening. Though Lord Hood doubted her plan, fearing it could be a Flood trap, John stated that he trusts her. A joint UNSC-Covenant Separatist task force then entered the Portal, heading to Truth and to Cortana's solution. Ironically, Lord Hood was correct: the Gravemind deliberately let Cortana send the message to lure all of its enemies into one place, and then the Flood would overwhelm them all with the infested High Charity. It was also shown that some of the Cortana Moments were of her defying the Gravemind and some were clones of her that she made to distract the Gravemind to avoid being consumed by him.[4]
Cortana continued to appear to John-117, who successfully recovered her from the Flood Hive that was High Charity after it crashed on the Ark. While John reassured her, Cortana knew that she had taken irreparable damage in some places. Along the way, John-117 had several visions of her seemingly in pain. Surprised that John had against all odds rescued her as he promised after the First Battle of High Charity, as well as being surprised that Chief and Thel 'Vadam (whom she encountered on Delta Halo with the Gravemind) "made nice", Cortana managed to gather herself and produce the Index from Installation 04, which she had kept. With it, Cortana was able to activate the newly constructed Installation 04B, which fired prematurely, causing it to destroy itself and heavily damage the Ark in the process.
Stranded in spaceEdit
CortanaHalo4
Cortana, as she appears when the UNSC Forward Unto Dawn begins to deteriorate.
“But you did it. Truth and the Covenant...the Flood. It's finished.”
—Cortana
The Slipspace portal collapsed as John-117, Thel 'Vadam, and Cortana attempted to escape through it, cutting the UNSC Forward Unto Dawn in half. While 'Vadam, who was on the bridge, managed to return to Earth safely, John and Cortana, who were in the hangar, were left drifting in space. Cortana activated a distress beacon, but knew that it could be years before they were found. As John-117 prepared to go into cryogenic sleep to await rescue, Cortana confessed to him that she would miss him.
After the portal collapse in 2552, in the year 2556, she and John are still stranded. Cortana, who is showing signs of rampancy,[5] tries to communicate with John. As he is still in cryo sleep, she is unable to get a response from him. Cortana then begins to file a report on the history of the Forerunners and humanity. After an unknown period of time, they are seen drifting towards Requiem.
Four years, seven months, and ten days after the UNSC Forward Unto Dawn was split into two, Cortana woke John-117 from cryonic stasis.
RequiemEdit
Both Cortana and Chief managed to make it off the Forward Unto Dawn and into Requiem. There, they managed to get a signal to the approaching UNSC Infinity, but the Infinity only ended up becoming stranded with them. After Chief and Cortana linked up with the Infinity and her crew, they were able to disable Requiem's defenses. However, they were contacted by the Librarian, claiming that the key to defeating the Didact lay in John's genes. Due to the Librarian's manipulation of humanity eons before, John-117 was immune to what Didact referred to as "Composing". However, throughout this, Cortana's rampancy continued to grow worse and she began to display outbursts of uncontrollable anger.
Chasing the DidactEdit
After learning what the Didact had planned, Cortana and John-117 became determined to stop him with or without the assistance of the Infinity. Cortana's worsening rampancy led to Captain Andrew Del Rio ordering her decommissioned. John-117 defied orders to surrender her chip and continued his mission. With a Pelican gunship secretly given to them by Commander Thomas Lasky, Cortana and John-117 chased down the Didact. They managed to lower the shield protecting his Cryptum, but when Cortana tried to imprison him again, her rampancy overtook her and she failed to complete her task, allowing the Didact to escape Requiem. John and Cortana followed the Didact by hanging onto a Lich during a slipspace jump and followed him to Ivanoff Station near Installation 03. Cortana took control of the Lich, but again her rampancy got the better of her and she crashed the ship into the station.
When John-117 met up with Doctor Sandra Tillson, Cortana checked the station's inventory for something to destroy the Composer and discovered seven HAVOK Tactical Nuclear Weapons. Cortana later activated the station's defenses, but had a hard time focusing more and more as time went on, having to spout trivia at one point to focus. Eventually the Didact got to the Composer and digitized everyone in the station except Cortana and John-117, who survived due to his genetic upgrade from the Librarian. The event traumatized Cortana who became sure she would be replaced by another AI and would never be repaired. John-117 got her to focus on the mission and she located a Broadsword with which to chase down the Didact.
Appearance: As Cortana is an A.I., she has no physical body. She can communicate through comm systems and project a holographic image of herself from appropriate projectors, such as Holotanks. Her chosen avatar appears to be a naked female human, roughly in her early twenties, with purplish/bluish skin, shoulder length purplish/bluish hair cut shorter at the back, and blue symbols scrolling down her body. In Halo: Fall of Reach, Cortana is said to resemble her creator, Dr. Catherine Halsey as a young woman, with a similar attitude "only unchecked by military and social protocol." When in a different emotional state, Cortana usually changes colors. This was especially noticeable in Halo: Combat Evolved, but less so in Halo 2 and Halo 3. Only in specific instances did she produce the color-changing effect. One instance of this was right before John-117 rescued her. Dr. Halsey stated in her journal that Cortana looks somewhat like Miranda Keyes.[1]
Bungie took a fair of amount of artistic freedom in the evolution of her appearance throughout the Halo Trilogy, noticeably from Halo: Combat Evolved to Halo 2. She had longer hair, a more realistic humanoid figure, a much more feminine appearance, and a slightly different shade of purple. In Halo 3, she became slightly bluer and again her face, hair, and body were changed to look more feminine and realistic. In Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, she has her Halo 3 appearance. In Halo 4, she had darker, more opaque and realistic hair. Her facial structure had noticeably changed, her figure had become considerably more curvacious, and she gained better defined fingers and toes. The circuit-pattern mapping over her body changes between every game as well.