Sentinel wall

A Sentinel wall, with the Library in the background.

Sentinel walls,^[1]^[2] also known as quarantine walls,^[3] are massive walls on Halo installations intended to serve as means of containment if primary measures fail in the event of a severe Flood outbreak. As their name suggests, the walls house numerous Sentinels to both repair the facility and keep the Flood from spreading beyond the wall; they also serve the function of generating an energy barrier around the Library. A Sentinel wall surrounded the Quarantine zone around the Library of Installation 05 to keep the Flood from spreading.^[4]

Function[edit]

The wall appears to have been designed to keep the outbreak of Flood around Delta Halo's Library contained within the Quarantine Zone. It is honeycombed with tunnels for the Sentinels to travel through. Sentinels and Enforcers keep the Flood contained, while Constructors keep repairing the damage that the Flood inflict on the wall. In addition to the massive physical wall, the Sentinel Wall also projected an energy barrier known as the containment shield. This shield could only be deactivated from a console deep within the wall's interior, locked in place by a series of plug locks.^[4]

History[edit]

Battle of Installation 05[edit]

Main article: Battle of Installation 05

At some point, a containment failure on Installation 05 led to a Flood outbreak in the region surrounding the Library. A series of defensive barriers were activated in order to confine the Flood;^[5] this presumably led to the sentinel wall's containment shield being activated. During the battle on Installation 05, the Arbiter was sent into the wall to deactivate the shields keeping the Flood in the quarantine Zone in order to allow other Covenant forces fly over the wall towards the Library. Despite the efforts of the robotic keepers, the Flood were released when the Arbiter penetrated the defenses and deactivated the containment shield around the wall.^[4]

Production notes[edit]

A section of the sentinel wall is clearly visible on the Halo 2 campaign levels Delta Halo and Regret, as well as the multiplayer map Containment. On the level Regret, the sentinel wall can be visible and seen beyond the Prophet of Regret's Forerunner temple, denoting its massive structure and size.

Gallery[edit]

A Kez'katu-pattern Phantom approaching the Sentinel wall, with the Library in the background in Halo 2.
A portion of the interior of Installation 05's sentinel wall in Halo 2.
The chamber housing the containment shield's controls in Halo 2.
A section of Delta Halo's sentinel wall seen from the ground level in Halo 2.
The sentinel wall's containment shield deactivates in Halo 2.
Close up of the sentinel wall's containment shield in Halo 2.
A small section of Installation 05's sentinel wall in Halo 2.
A smaller Forerunner wall surrounding the Ark's Cartographer in Halo 3.
A sentinel wall surrounding a Library and Forerunner dreadnoughts in Origins from Halo Legends.
The sentinel wall around the Library in Halo 2: Anniversary.