Editing New Phoenix Incident

{{Status|Canon}}
{{Battle infobox
|name=New Phoenix Incident
|prev=[[Raid on Ivanoff Station]]
|conc=
|next=[[Battle of Installation 03]]
|image=[[File:H4-ComposerFiringOnPhoenix.jpg|300px]]
|conflict=[[Post-Covenant War conflicts]]
|date=[[2557#July|July 25, 2557]]<ref name="catalog">[https://forums.halowaypoint.com/yaf_postsm2969311_Catalog-Interaction.aspx#post2969311 ''Halo Waypoint'': ''Catalog Interaction - page 14'']</ref> approx. 1240 UTC{{Ref/Note|Id=time|Once Earth comes into view, it can be seen that the Eastern and Central Time Zones of the United States are in sunlight, while the Pacific is in darkness. The sunlight is just cresting at New Phoenix, indicating that it is sunrise in the Mountain Time Zone region. This would occur around 5:40 AM in late July, which corresponds to 12:40 PM UTC.}}
|place=[[Earth]], [[Sol system]]
|result='''UNSC victory'''
*Promethean threat to Sol system neutralized
*Population of [[New Phoenix]] composed (seven million)
|side1=*{{Icon|UEG}} [[Unified Earth Government|UEG]]
**{{Icon|UNSC Post}} [[United Nations Space Command|UNSC]]
|side2=*{{Icon|Didact}} [[Didact|Didact's]] [[Prometheans#Mechanical Prometheans|Prometheans]]
|commanders1=[[Captain (NAVCOM)|CAPT]] [[Thomas Lasky]]
|commanders2=[[Ur-Didact]]
|forces1=*[[UNSC Home Fleet]]
**{{UNSCShip|Infinity}}
**[[Battle Group Dakota]]
**Multiple squadrons of strike fighters
*[[Orbital defense platform]]s
*1 [[F-41 Broadsword]]
**[[MCPO]] [[John-117]]
**AI [[Cortana]]†
|forces2=*''[[Mantle's Approach]]''
*[[Composer]]
*Hundreds of Promethean infantry
|casual1='''Military'''
*Light casualties, few ships and aircraft destroyed
*[[Cortana]]
'''Civilian'''
*Entire population of [[New Phoenix]] composed (seven million) 
|casual2='''Infantry'''
*All Prometheans killed
'''Material'''
*''Mantle's Approach'' and Composer destroyed}}
{{Quote|And yet, still you fail.|The Ur-Didact to John-117 on his failure in attempting to prevent him from activating the Composer}}
The '''New Phoenix Incident''',{{Ref/SpOps|Id=departure|Departure}} or the '''Fall of New Phoenix''',{{Ref/Comic|Id=HE7|Halo: Escalation|Issue=7}} was a brief engagement fought between the [[United Nations Space Command|United Nations Space Command (UNSC)]] and the [[Ur-Didact]] and his [[Promethean]] forces in close proximity to [[Earth]] on [[2557|July 25, 2557]].{{Ref/Reuse|HE7}}{{Ref/Level|Id=midnight|Halo 4|[[Midnight]]}}

==Background==
Having retrieved the [[Composer]] from [[Ivanoff Station]], the [[Ur-Didact|Didact]] set out to attack Earth in his ship, ''[[Mantle's Approach]]''. The Didact was unaware, however, that [[John-117]] and [[Cortana]], in a [[F-41 Broadsword|Broadsword]] fighter, had managed to breach the ship's shields and make the [[Slipstream space|slipspace]] journey along with it.{{Ref/Level|H4|Level=[[Composer (level)|Composer]]}} 

==The battle==
[[File:H4-Broadsword-HUD-Autocannon.jpg|250px|thumb|left|John-117 and Cortana inside the Broadsword Fighter assaulting the Didact's ship.]]
As the ship emerged near Earth, the [[UNSC Home Fleet]] was mustered in Earth's defense; including the {{UNSCShip|Infinity}}, now under the command of [[Thomas Lasky]]. Despite this preparation, the fleet's efforts were rendered useless by the advanced technology of the Didact's ship. Earth's orbital defense grid went into Red Alert, but even the [[orbital defense platform]]s proved ineffective. Hunting for the Composer aboard ''Mantle's Approach'', John-117 and Cortana proceeded to destroy the turrets defending the ship's main weapon, allowing the ''Infinity'' to fire upon the Didact's ship to open a hole for the Master Chief's Broadsword. However, the interior defenses made the passage too narrow for the fighter to pass through and caused it to crash, forcing the Chief and Cortana to carry their [[HAVOK tactical nuclear weapon|HAVOK]] payload to the Composer on foot.{{Ref/Reuse|midnight}}

[[File:H4-Infinity-Mantle.jpg|thumb|250px|left|''Infinity'' engaging the ''Mantle's Approach''.]]
As John-117 and Cortana reached the Composer, the Didact activated the device, composing seven million people{{Ref/Reuse|HE7}} in [[New Phoenix]], a major population center in North America. After fighting past significant opposition from the [[Promethean Knight|Prometheans]], the Master Chief was able to approach the center structure, only to be ambushed by the Didact. During the struggle, Cortana was able to manipulate the [[hard light]] bridge on which the Didact stood, trapping him. This bought the Master Chief enough time to activate a [[pulse grenade]] and plant it on the Didact's armor. The resulting explosion knocked the Didact off balance and sent him falling into a slipspace rupture underneath the Composer. As Master Chief activated the HAVOK tactical nuclear weapon, Cortana was able to [[Slipspace translocation|translocate]] the Spartan a safe distance away from the blast. The majority of Cortana's processes remained aboard ''Mantle's Approach'', and were presumably destroyed in the nuclear blast. She maintained herself long enough to bid farewell to the Spartan inside a box of hard light she had generated somewhere outside the immediate blast radius. Master Chief was found by [[Pelican 096|a Pelican]] floating among the debris and was returned to the ''Infinity''.{{Ref/Reuse|midnight}}

==Aftermath==
Due to uncertainty over the finality of the Didact's defeat, the [[UNSC Security Council]] decided to hide the details of the attack from the public, concealing it as an attack by the [[Covenant remnants]] stopped by the return of humanity's greatest hero, the Master Chief.{{Ref/Comic|Halo: Escalation|Issue=8}} Additionally, the [[Office of Naval Intelligence]] quarantined [[New Phoenix]] for a year. Six months later, however, ONI public relations officer [[John Sullivan]] released a statement to the press confirming the Covenant were not responsible for the attack.{{Ref/Reuse|departure}}
[[File:H4 - NewPhoenix Streets.png|The empty streets of New Phoenix in the aftermath of the Didact's attack|thumb|right|200px]]
The UNSC leadership's doubts about the Didact's "death" were not unfounded; the Promethean general had actually survived his fall into the Composer's slipspace rupture. The portal took him to the vicinity of the [[Composer's Abyss]] on [[Installation 03]], where he slaughtered Spartan [[Black Team]]. Allying himself with [[monitor]] [[859 Static Carillon]], the Didact then traveled to the [[Composer's Forge]] through a portal in the Composer's Abyss, intending to acquire new Composers and other instruments for his crusade against humankind. John-117 and [[Blue Team]] were [[Mission to Installation 03|deployed to Gamma Halo]] immediately after the massacre and confronted the Didact in the Composer's Forge.{{Ref/Comic|Halo: Escalation|Issue=9}} Although their confrontation with the Didact proved perilous and nearly fatal, the Spartans eventually managed, with the aid of Static Carillon (who turned on the Didact after the latter broke an agreement between them), to "contain" the Didact as a threat by using five Composers on the Didact himself.{{Ref/Comic|Halo: Escalation|Issue=10}} Despite the Didact's mutations giving him a resistance to the Composer's power, they were unable to stand up to the raw destructive neural physics of five Composers exploding at once, resulting in the Didact being composed himself and his physical death.{{Ref/Novel|Id=Epi5|Epi|5}}

During the [[Requiem Campaign]], the UNSC ''Infinity'' recovered a Forerunner [[Durance]] called the [[Didact's Gift]] from the Covenant. The device, said to contain the "soul" of a [[Promethean Knight]], revealed images of [[New Phoenix]] during the attack, indicating that the consciousnesses of the composed New Phoenix residents had been transferred back to Requiem and converted into new Prometheans. Adding to the mystery, the images also revealed that another [[Requiem slipspace artifacts|Forerunner artifact]] had been present in New Phoenix during the attack.{{Ref/SpOps|Memento Mori}}

On [[2558#March|March 24, 2558]], eight months after the battle, the [[city]]'s quarantine was lifted. A "Rebirth" ceremony was held in the city, presided over by [[President of the Unified Earth Government|UEG President]] [[Ruth Charet]].{{Ref/Reuse|HE7}}

After being sent to the outer boundaries of the [[Domain]] following his own digitization, the Didact discovered that the humans composed in New Phoenix had ended up in the human rift alongside the [[Ancestors]]. This gave the Ancestors hope that humanity had survived, although they were unable to find out for sure as the composed essences were unable to communicate yet. [[Forthencho]], after learning that the Didact was responsible for this, told the Promethean that it would take centuries for the newcomers to settle and even longer for them to pull themselves together as the ancient humans had done. Having regained his sanity, the Didact felt remorse for what he had done to them.{{Ref/Novel|Id=Epi22|Epi|22}} The Didact later welcomed the essences of those composed in New Phoenix into the Domain along with the rest of the Forerunners and humans, giving them a home, a place to heal and rest, to commune and explore.{{Ref/Novel|Id=Epi26|Epi|26}}{{Ref/Novel|Id=Epi27|Epi|27}}

==Gallery==
<gallery>
File:H4-Concept-Midnight-Composer.jpg|Concept art of the incident for ''[[Halo 4]]''.
File:H4-Infinity-Firing.jpg|''Infinity'' firing her fore weapons.
File:H4-Midnight-Composer-Panorama.jpg|The Composer is used on Earth.
File:HTMCC-H4 John117VsDidact.png|John-117 and the Ur-Didact fighting aboard ''Mantle's Approach''.
File:New Phoenix population composed.jpg|[[Gabriel Thorne]] having a nightmare of New Phoenix's population being composed in ''[[Halo: Escalation]]''.
File:HINF-Poetry4.jpg|A hologram of John-117 and Cortana after the ''Mantle's Approach'''s destruction on [[Installation 07]] in ''[[Halo Infinite]]''.
</gallery>

==List of appearances==
*''[[Halo 4]]'' {{1st}}
**''[[Spartan Ops]]'' {{mo}}
*''[[Halo: Escalation]]''
*''[[Halo: Spartan Strike]]'' {{Mo}}
*''[[Halo Mythos]]''
*''[[Halo: Legacy of Onyx]]'' {{Mo}}
*''[[Halo: Renegades]]'' {{Mo}}
*''[[Halo: Shadows of Reach]]'' {{Im}}
*''[[Halo Infinite]]'' {{Mo}}
*''[[Halo: Outcasts]]'' {{Im}}
*''[[Halo: Sunrise on Sanghelios]]'' {{Im}}
*''[[Halo: Trial of Reckoning]]'' {{Mo}}
*''[[Halo: Epitaph]]'' {{Mo}}
*''[[Halo: Meridian Divide]]''
**''[[Meridian Homecoming]]'' {{Mo}}
*''[[Halo: Empty Throne]]'' {{Mo}}

==Notes==
{{Ref/Notes}}

==Sources==
{{Ref/Sources}}
{{Post-Covenant War conflicts}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:New Phoenix}}