Covenant fringe

The Covenant fringe is a name given to the large grouping of species, entities and civilisations known to the Covenant and considered under its holdings, though for various reasons are not inducted into the hegemony as proper client species. While applied fairly commonly, the reasons a species or civilisation may be considered fringe are varied and oftentimes inconsistent. In some cases, whole species are considered fringe despite being fairly well integrated into Covenant society, while other labelled-fringe elements may include more distant Covenant splinter civilisations (be it in distance or culturally) still formally within the Covenant, though in the hazy delineation between "Covenant" and "Not-Covenant".

In the Covenant's later years, the fringe definition was most commonly applied to species which had yet to be brought into the fold of the Covenant; in many cases, this reason may be as simple as the necessary bureaucratic apparatus having yet to finish shifting to accommodate the introduction (and subsequent upheaval) caused by inducting an entirely new civilisation into the hegemony. While the doctrine of Universal Conversion decrees that all species should be converted, the timeline and specifics of the conversion are relatively open-ended and interpreted on a case-by-case basis. The Unggoy and the Jiralhanae occupied a fringe status for centuries before their formal integration into the Covenant's hierarchy. The outbreak of the Human-Covenant War saw much of the fringe remain static, as efforts were reshifted into evaluating the human threat. In general, peer civilisations (that is, civilisations of a power, opposition or distance enough to not be considered a part of the Covenant's holdings) are not considered Covenant fringe, though in some cases (such as the Cix-Tu) there is a grey area. As such, groups such as the Gryunjalla are not part of the fringe, but are instead known as Ulterior civilizations.

With the splintering of the Covenant and the collapse of its rigidly enforced caste system, the term "Covenant fringe" has ceased to have the distinctive meaning it once held. It still sees scholarly use and occasional references to fringe entities are made by high-ranked members of entities such as the Concord of Reconciliation. Many of the species considered within the fringe have little in the way of population, resources or technology (or any combination thereof) when compared to more established Covenant and thus their worlds are particularly vulnerable to the conquests of the post-Covenant warlords.

Species

 * Cix-Tu — At one time, the Cix-Tu were considered a target for imminent induction into the Covenant for humanitarian reasons; toppling the Imperial government that controlled the Cix-Tu empire. However, the outbreak of war in the Solis Nexus and then with the Jiralhanae saw this mission put on the backburner, and eventually forgotten within the machine of Covenant politics. The Cix-Tu are now considered a tentative fringe element.
 * Dazreme — A primitive, pseudo-aquatic species that share their world with the Xar-Shaa, with whom they have a mutually-beneficial relationship. It appears that the Dazreme originated as land-based bipeds but are rapidly adapting to a fully aquatic existence due to their homeworld's rising sea levels. Although the Covenant sometimes employ them in undersea relic retrieval roles, their small numbers, refusal to part with the Xar-Shaa, and lack of general utility have slowed their assimilation.
 * Ikjuttar — A fringe civilisation on the trailing end of Covenant space, the unique circumstances of their civilisation has left the Covenant mostly content to keep an eye on them, with the Covenant largely suppressing knowledge of their existence internally. Officially, their conversion was considered "ongoing".
 * Rhiln — A species that was once a rough technological peer with the Covenant. The Covenant fought a war with the Rhiln's compound intelligence, ultimately bringing the Rhiln into near-extinction and bringing the survivors into the fold as part of the Covenant fringe.
 * Sharquoi — A protosapient species employed on some Covenant worlds for labour. While above fauna, the Sharquoi's limited intellect is generally considered too low to be capable of comprehending the Covenant religion, and thus ineligible for client status within the Covenant.
 * Xar-Shaa — An Enigmatic deep-sea civilisation that exist in a symbiotic partnership with the Dazreme. While they have extremely niche uses in conjunction with the Dazreme, the Xar-Shaa are too alien and too restricted to high-pressure environments to ever see widespread assimilation into the Covenant.
 * Yonhet — An amphibian species, the Yonhet led a paleolithic-equivalent existence at the time of their discovery by the Covenant, and have been undergoing a slow-burn 'civilizing' process since. Their small numbers and lack of physical prowess meant they were never elevated to a full signatory species. Regardless, they were formally converted to the Covenant religion, and occasionally served the hegemony in auxiliary roles.
 * Ior — A tri-limbed arboreal species sometimes used by the Covenant as assassins and snipers.
 * Humanity — While humanity was never given the chance to be recognized by the Covenant's usual standards, the Great Schism has changed this to many ex-Covenant even as the hegemony proper has ceased to exist as an entity. Following the war, some ex-Covenant groups and individuals have referred to humans as a fringe species and some indeed seem to regard the UNSC in the same capacity the Covenant would a fringe society.

Groups
In some cases, certain splinter groups of the Covenant were considered a part of the Covenant's fringe. These elements are typically those located a great physical distance from the core centres of Covenant space, such as the most remote outlying colonies. In some cases, particularly divergent realms have been described as fringe entities - typically those culturally removed from the greater Covenant whole and in danger of seceding entirely. Marcher societies only partly connected to the Covenant collective were also categorized as Peripherals, while realms with little to no contact were known as Outliers or Strays. These realms did not last long within the Covenant, with High Charity exerting its influence over these disloyal subjects to bring them back into line. The more decentralised eras of Covenant history typically had more fringe realms, while those eras with higher degrees of centralised authority had fewer.

The groups known as Peripates often display some overlap with Covenant fringe entities, with many of these migrant colonies and worldships situated on travelling asteroids or large spacecraft having little to do with the major wider affairs of the Covenant. These elements are not confined to the outer periphery of Covenant space, often traversing the core regions of their home systems and surrounding stellar neighbourhoods. Some of the more isolated Kig-Yar asteroid colonies and sub-species are similarly grouped in with fringe, alongside select Lekgolo and Yanme'e swarm/ hiveworlds.