Human Sphere



The Human Sphere is the collection of worlds, habitats and regions of space governed and inhabited predominantly or entirely by humans. It encompasses SolCore, the Inner and Outer Colonies, as well as various informal settlements. As of 2520, 809 discrete colony sites were catalogued by the United Earth Government as being at various stages of development. These included everything from minor mining outposts to full-fledged colony worlds or habitats, though only a small fraction of the sites included were earthlike garden worlds.

Inner and Outer Colonies
The Inner and Outer Colonies are the two major categories of human extrasolar colonies, historically divided less by distance and more by politics. Still, most of the Inner Colonies were located within a 30-lightyear radius of Sol. Conventionally, the 2390 revision of the UN Colonial Charter, which opened up colonization for a much wider array of actors along with various political reforms is held to be the watershed dividing the Inner and Outer Colonies, with any colonies established since being classified as Outer Colonies. Exceptions to this occur, however, and some colonies founded since have become understood as part of the Inner Colonies' exclusive "club". The Inner Colonies are commonly seen as the most developed human worlds as well as those most closely tied to SolCore, though this too has many exceptions and caveats. Many Inner Colonies have ambitions of their own, and their lack of overt conflict with Sol over the last two centuries has much to do with their better economic status and negotiating position with the United Earth Government. This is largely through them being in control of much of the Colonial Administration Authority's Colonial Congress, which existed almost in balance with the UEG at the best of times; at any rate, both bodies were generally seen as oppressive by the Outer Colonies.

While many of the Inner Colonies house high-end industry, the Outer Colonies have historically been where most of the resources for that industry have been acquired, along with the production of foodstuffs to feed Sol and the Inner Colonies on agricultural colonies, often founded on fertile worlds that receive abundant sunlight. Since the Human-Covenant War, all human systems have had to diversify their industries in order to survive and feed their populations, as the elaborate resource-extraction chains managed by the UEG's institutions have broken down.

Motives for space colonization
Oftentimes colonies are founded for reasons already familiar from human history. There rarely is just one reason; most colonies are formed with one or two primary motivations that come with many secondary ones, such as a colony established as a resource outpost but which also benefits from its location along a commercial corridor, tourism, as well as local scientific phenomena of note.

Some of the more common motives for colonization are:
 * Economic. Mining, commerce, and various industries remain the most pressing incentive for colonization, and the one that attracts most funding and resources. Economic initiatives often come with sweeping land claims, meaning large tracts of land (or rocks) in a system are taken by a handful of actors - meaning other actors will have to go elsewhere for those resources.
 * Scientific. Sheer curiosity and will to explore are often cited as one of the main reasons for humanity's expansion throughout space, and have remained a powerful driver of colony efforts both on a personal and policy level throughout history. Most colonies host some form of science outpost, though large-scale colonization is usually accompanied by economic incentives as well.
 * Cultural, political and religious reasons. Cultural or religious groups regarded as pariahs, or political movements unable to make headway in their homeland, may move to greener pastures to practice their way of life in peace. Often, though not always, such colonies also have a secondary practical way of sustaining themselves, e.g. some form of commerce or industry. Such colonies often intentionally seek out secluded, remote locations.
 * Wealth and prestige. The first settlers will almost invariably be hailed as culture heroes on their colonies, and in many cases being among the first has been a way to power and wealth for oneself and one's descendants (e.g. in the form of land claims).
 * Personal. Most colonists could have lived an average or below-average life on Earth as one of a mass of billions spending their days consuming. On the colonies, they would have the chance for self-actualization and independence.
 * Military. With humanity reaching across interstellar space at a rapid rate, both security and power projection became obvious concerns to United Earth. Military bases and outposts were established to secure commercial corridors and key industries across the UEG's ever-expanding domain, though this expansion was not politically uncomplicated and often clashed with civilian interests.

Earth's overpopulation is cited by some commentators as a major reason for the offworld migrations of the 24th-25th centuries, but this is misleading and reductive, and may have been a narrative spun for political purposes. Population pressure is a function of socio-technological context, and a culture that has the capability to support space colonies could also make Earth more livable. Even with technological advances, shipping large numbers of people through space is expensive, as is the development of colonies on extrasolar worlds. Earth's polar regions, seas or deserts could be colonized and made livable with a fraction of the cost. While prior centuries had dealt major damage on the planet's ecosystem, even by the end of the 23rd century, technology was advancing to the point that much of this damage could be repaired. The development of clean fusion power and new modes of agriculture, along with reforestation and arcology initiatives, as well as new modes of habitation at sea and previously-unsettled lands like Greenland and Siberia, meant that space was not an issue. Instead, the off-system migration had to do with many factors, including the future survival of the human race as well as the economic benefits of off-system resources.

Scale, economics and infrastructure
Even as they house most of a system's population, habitable planets are merely one part of the overall human presence in a colonized system. Every formally-established colony world is surrounded by space-based infrastructure, including orbital elevators, skyhooks and other orbital transit assist systems, spaceports and -docks, and constellations of communication satellites. Much of this infrastructure is set up during the colonization process, often before much of the population arrives. Nearby bodies such as asteroids and moons are typically utilized as well for various purposes; asteroid mining is commonplace, especially for export. Local gas and ice giants or mini-Neptunes are skimmed for helium-3 and hydrogen required in fusion reactors, and various other specific types of planet offer other unique advantages. Major Lagrange points, which usually coincide with slipspace transit points, frequently house ports and fuel depots as well.

As a general rule, space-based resources such as metal-rich asteroids are favored over those located in deep gravity wells due to surface-to-orbit transit costs. Though terrestrial planets are still mined for various reasons, the offworld transportation of planetary resources requires high-capacity orbital elevators to be economically viable. The macroeconomics of an interstellar civilization are a complex topic overall. Although slipspace travel makes interstellar commerce viable, it is not always obvious which resources are economical to ship from system to system, or from the surface of a planet into space. Travel time is generally not the issue, but energy and costs of development are. Few natural resources are so rare they cannot be found in other systems, and in theory, most systems are easily capable of being self-sufficient in terms of natural resources and food production. Still, the relative efficiency of slipspace travel technically makes bulk transit of certain goods across interstellar distances profitable enough for it to be a widespread practice. This was historically accompanied by UEG policies encouraging colonies to specialize, promoting a system of interdependence.

Types of colonies
Human colonies can be found in almost any environment found in space; Earth-like garden worlds represent only a small minority of all human space settlements. Habitability rating is a streamlined system formerly used by the Colonial Administration Authority to classify the suitability of planets for human life. Various terraforming techniques may be used to alter worlds to be more habitable, though no planet can be rendered fully earthlike and the question of how much terraforming is good enough is often a matter of the colonizing party's will to invest in the world. If a world is colonized primarily for habitation, earthlike planets are preferred, but inhospitable environments such as asteroids or icy moons are still settled for various other, primarily economic reasons. Most developed worlds also house notable populations in orbital facilities which serve as spaceports, shipyards, and other industries.

Space colonization in the extreme non-terrestrial conditions such as those of the Asteroid Belt, Mars, comets or the gas giants' moons was the norm prior to the slipspace drive, as earthlike worlds were unavailable. Mars was the only world in Sol deemed terraformable, but the process would take over three centuries. Once they did become available, only those extremophilic colony populations most culturally rooted to their colonial environs (or the most stubborn) survived the resulting wave of emigration to greener pastures. A handful of these post-terrestrial cultures had already come to embrace novel modes of habitation such as space living, and did not even long to a planetary existence. This, along with economic incentives such as work in space-based industries and commerce, ensured that it was often the Solar space-dwellers would go on to permanently settle on orbital habitats and stations even as they moved on to colonize other systems.

Unoccupied systems
At roughly 200 light-years in radius at its greatest extent, human space encompasses tens of thousands of stars, fewer than a thousand of which have settled planetary systems. Many systems within the overall settled volume were cursorily charted either remotely or on site, but there are still thousands of empty systems across human space, largely bypassed as humans sought the most habitable worlds and greatest resources. Most of these systems are of little interest, their planets various degrees of uninhabitable and too unremarkable to establish permanent colonies or resource-extraction outposts. Many do still maintain a small scientific presence, as each system has something unique and fascinating to the scientific community. However, such systems are also common refuges for pirates, insurgents and other delinquents of society.

Astrography
Astrographically, most of the Human Sphere is based within the Local Bubble, a relative cavity in the Solar Region or Gould Belt region of the Orion Arm of the Milky Way galaxy. Before the Human-Covenant War, this sphere of influence reached no further than 150 lightyears at its greatest extent, though probes and exploratory missions had been launched as far as twice that distance.

Human space, and technically the entire galaxy, is conventionally divided into four quadrants centered on the Sol system. These quadrants are then further divided into sectors of space often represented on maps as a radial grid centered on Sol. In the FLEETCOM astrographic system, quadrants are instead called sectors and are subdivided into subsectors. The sector system has been criticized and is not universally agreed upon, especially as its utility grows increasingly limited the further one goes from Sol.

Origins
The first phase of human space colonization occurred during the Golden Age of Space Colonization, beginning in the 21st century. Until the 2300s, human colonization efforts were restricted to the Sol system, and much of the system was settled during that time. This changed with the advent of the Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine in 2291, and the subsequent First Wave and Domus Diaspora, beginning in 2310 and 2362, respectively.

Human expansion rapidly covered a large area of space in just two centuries. Many colonies would seek to diversify their economies to improve their resilience, though certain peculiarities of the UEG bureaucracy incentivized colonies to specialize to certain exports while discouraging economic diversification. This effect was particularly pronounced with the Outer Colonies, many of which struggled to develop themselves beyond their initial industries throughout the 25th century. Recent events have changed this, however, with the dissolution of the CAA and the Human-Covenant War forcing many Outer Colonies to fend for themselves.

Human-Covenant War
The Covenant's first incursion into the Human Sphere was by the privateer vessel Minor Transgression, which stumbled upon the colony of Harvest on the Centaurus-Libra side of human space. Over the course of the war, the Covenant invasion occurred from multiple directions due to the breadth of Covenant space. The Covenant did not fully surround Humanity, but they could afford to come in from about three sides, and so strike at different sides of human space without running into Earth much earlier.

Especially early on, Covenant ships tended to overshoot human space by a large margin. They didn't at first catch onto human expansion patterns and assumed we had spread out much in the same manner they had. This partly explains why the Covenant found systems far from their initial incursion zones early on in the war, such as Chi Ceti, Xi Boötis, and Lambda Serpentis. As a result, the war never truly had solid or well-defined "fronts". The Covenant could vastly out-jump the UNSC, and might -- by accident or by design -- stumble on colonies far from their original invasion channels. Thus, by 2535, the UNSC realized that there was nothing concrete stopping the Covenant from invading any of the Inner Colonies -- even Earth -- at any time, other than the dubious protection provided by the vastness of space: in the spherical volume occupied by human colonies, there are tens of thousands of stars.

More pointedly, the Covenant didn't know what shape the Human Sphere was, or how far human colonies were spread out. So for much of the war, they were essentially shooting wildly in the dark. There were probably more armadas that spent most of their time trying to find colonies than otherwise. It was only later on in the war that they started to pick up on the pattern of colonies. Why they did not rush into the Inner Colonies much earlier was as much sheer luck and the scale of space, as it was the UNSC striking back like a mad dog and ONI counterintelligence operations, such as Operation: WORM BOX. This is also why some outer colonies survived on the side furthest from the initial incursion points (namely within Sector 3); they were saved by their distance to Earth and the other side of the human sphere, all of which served as a buffer. Had the war properly spilled over to Sector 3, it may have taken years longer, even a decade.

Mighty as the Covenant was, they weren't used to carrying out campaigns far outside their borders in mostly unknown territory, and comparatively small as the human sphere was, there were still hundreds more empty systems within than occupied ones; but they did start picking up on a pattern of human settlement being denser toward the core in the later years of the war. Most human colonies were discovered by scout ships and probes, which the Covenant initially lacked in great numbers as they were largely used to conducting war within known territory. Had the Human War been an internecine conflict, a region the size of the Human Sphere could've been pacified in a few years. But the human sphere was several hundred light-years away and had no established routes or Covenant-compatible infrastructure. Everything had to be built from the ground up (though some old outposts existed nearby from prior expeditions centuries past that could be repurposed) and considerable resources had to be devoted to simply sweeping large swathes of empty space. Without a map, or an idea of how the human expansion had proceeded (as it wasn't just a simple bubble!) it can be surprisingly hard to extrapolate in 3D space, coupled with the vagaries of slipspace, which direction they came from.

The question of logistics and UNSC counterattacks is another important factor. Even if the UNSC couldn't prevent colonies from bring glassed, they could hit Covenant supply lines and sacrificed entire ODST divisions in doing so. These assaults were vicious and desperate, forcing the Covenant to constantly rebuild and renew their infrastructure and slowing them down considerably, even as they were near-universally targeted at former human territory. Operation: SILENT STORM was an exemplar that informed UNSC doctrine from then on as well as the entire Spartan-III program. However, it also bears noting that Zhoist was largely a one-time fluke as the Covenant quickly shifted to using much longer routes afterward to throw off potential counterattacks into their territory. Later counteroffensives such as PROMETHEUS and TORPEDO mostly targeted infrastructure erected within former human territory or along the invasion channels, as opposed to the Covenant empire proper. It was only after the war that the UNSC began to have any idea of the regions of space the Covenant was based at in the first place; all they had before were rough estimates and a handful of known systems.

As such, the Covenant's incursions tended to favor established patterns, fitting into overall regions of space identified by the UNSC as Ingress Zones. Not all armadas invading along those routes followed the exact same patterns of jumps, as infrastructure fell in and out of use (or was destroyed); the map shows the most common jump routes.

As part of the Cole Protocol-adjacent Operation: WORM BOX, ONI frequently planted vast amounts of false navigation data leading to uninhabited stars (coupled with the seeding of false signal probes around those stars), many of them at distances unreachable by human ships, leading the Covenant on wild goose chases that often led far outside human territory. These operations were extensive and far-reaching, and gave the Covenant a picture of a human sphere that was far larger and considerably different than it actually was. However, some of the stars charted during these goose chases ended up yielding value to the Covenant, in the form of natural resources or even Forerunner relics, and some would come to host outposts or serve as stopovers along their invasion routes. Some of these outpost-worlds would become quite established, and retain Covenant populations even in the post-war era; this, coupled with the arrival of a refugee-flotilla from High Charity, is the source of the Covenant-majority settlements on the galactic spinward side of human space.

In addition, humans were not the Covenant's main focus until the few last years of the war, so they did not commit nearly as much forces into the war as they could have. For much of the war, the Covenant usually had one or two major fleets operating in the human sphere at a time, and if one was destroyed or depleted, it might take some time for them to muster a new armada.

Finally, the Covenant's culture of secrecy, tribalism, competition, and general one-upsmanship contributed to their inefficiency as a unified force. Despite standing policies to the contrary, it was not uncommon for individual ship- or fleetmasters (or their Prophet overseers) to withhold intel or navigation data from one another in an attempt to win fame for themselves and curry favor with their superiors. As a result, knowledge of new human worlds could well go down with ships or task forces, forcing their successors to start from scratch. This was partly the result of several Covenant commanders not taking the war very seriously, instead seeing it as an opportunity to hound glory for themselves. While this did change toward the final years of the war with the Covenant's advance becoming more centrally enforced, many of the underlying systemic problems persisted until the end.

Still, even with all these factors in play, military strategists have often pointed out that by all accounts, it seemed miraculous the Covenant did not find Earth and the other Inner Colonies much sooner. Much of the Covenant's relative inefficiency is often attributed to the aforesaid political and cultural factors, but some have speculated the existence of forces in the Covenant government actively hindering the prosecution of the war; not mere disgruntlement or opposition to the war, such as that shown by groups like the Compuncta and the Elenchists, but covert resistance as high up as the High Council, and even the Triumvirate itself. Was this a human-sympathetic conspiracy seeking to buy time for the Covenant's enemy? Or a scheme by Truth and his cronies to further his plans of replacing the Sangheili with Jiralhanae as the former increasingly protested at the war? Or perhaps both?

Colonies during the war
The quality of life on the Inner Colonies dropped increasingly during the war and there were frequent food shortages due to the loss of agri-worlds; Earth was able to keep perhaps the best standard of living. As the breadbasket worlds supplying them were lost, Inner Colonies were forced to clear public land and nature preserves for emergency agriculture. This was done even on Earth, a source of controversy as ecoreclamation efforts had spent centuries regrowing the planet's forests. Aquacultural expansion became common as well, and many colonies had to get used to (often monotonous) algae and fish-based food. In general, Inner Colony industries were forced to become more self-sufficient, gradually dismantling the complex web of interdependence built up by UEG and CAA policies over the preceding two centuries.

Reconstruction
After the Human-Covenant War, humanity began the long and arduous process of taking stock of their remaining territories. An estimated 3/4ths of human colonies were glassed by the Covenant during the war to the point they could not be recovered or resettled in the immediate future. Out of these, only a small number were glassed to the point of total biosphere destruction, with these usually being important centers of population, industry and military might. Still, most colonies targeted by glassing operations had their population centers destroyed, and usually suffered many of the secondary effects of glassing, including rampant wildfires, residual radiation as well as smoke and ash thrown into the atmosphere. These issues, coupled with the costs of reconstruction, mean that the resettlement of most colonies may take decades, even well over a century. Since the war, the UNSC and the Phoenix Initiative prioritized the re-development of select strategically important worlds, along with the establishment of new colonies, which has at times proven more viable than the reconstruction of glassed worlds.

The reclamation efforts of the Human Sphere were beset by many new challenges. Due to logistical realities, only a handful of new worlds were settled at first after the war is over, with most initial efforts focused on integrating refugees to existing or reclaimed worlds. Not all of the new colonies were formally set up; there were numerous groups of refugees and dissidents that simply landed on a planet and called it home. Many such worlds are not even known to the UNSC and lie outside the bounds of formally-defined human space.

One of the primary drivers of re-settlement and the founding of new colonies after the war was the displacement of vast numbers of people by the war. For decades, all but the most obscure human worlds felt the impact of these massive waves of migration as millions of refugees from glassed worlds sought a new home. A complicating factor in this was that most evacuation efforts were never under any central authority; UNSC ship may have protected evac convoys wherever they could, but there were hundreds of independent operators in the business, many of them impromptu in nature.

It was often deemed easier and more cost-effective to keep large numbers of people on ice than thaw them out, and this is what smart or well-organized operators did until their cargo can be guaranteed reasonably humane conditions when awake. Unfortunately, most evacuation efforts were anything but well-organized, there weren't often even facilities to freeze all the evacuees, and ship captains (or the companies that run them) were looking to get ride of their cargo as soon as possible, often just dumping them on existing colonies in the absence of better options. However, there were still "arkships" stacked full of almost nothing but cryotubes, built or converted by planetary governments, large companies or the UNSC in the later half of the war. While not all such ships made it, it was suspected even decades later that millions remained frozen, waiting for the right time and place for relocation. This also had very human and personal implications; it displaced people in not just space, but time as well. People would sleep away the years, even decades while their family, friends or relatives go about their lives elsewhere, usually thinking the sleepers dead; and when they did wake, they were separated by years or decades.

New or reclaimed colonies became known for their quickly-erected prefab buildings, with modular elements stacked to build large cities within days or weeks as the Phoenix Initiative rushed to find spaces for refugees to live in. An entire generation grew up in these prefab communities. With many smaller diaspora populations unable to retain their cultural cohesion, the newer generations often grew disconnected from their roots in these blank-slate communities. However, each still formed its own distinct neo-culture defined by that shared experience and the influences that did remain from the original, now lost colonies.

Locations
In the following listing,
 * Colonies that survived the war or have been established since the war have their names marked in bold.
 * Colonies that suffered attacks and/or minor damage, including localized glassing, but survived or could be recolonized with minor reclamation efforts are in bold italic.
 * Colonies that were glassed or have been otherwise devastated and will likely remain inhospitable and/or largely uninhabited for a century or more are in italic. Some glassed worlds have become long-term "deglassing" operations, often involving long-term reterraforming and silicate mining on the side. This also includes worlds that may be recoverable sooner but have not been prioritized by formal reclamation programs for various reasons, including distance, other logistical issues, or instability in their region of space.
 * Worlds and sites that do not fit any of the above categories, or whose status is unclear and/or unexplored, are in plain text. This also includes worlds that are not human colonies, such as Covenant outposts located in or near human territory.

Sectors are listed in clockwise order and grouped by row, based on their distance from Sol.

SolCore

 * Sol system - Home system of humanity.
 * Earth
 * Luna
 * Mars
 * Jovian Moons


 * Alpha Centauri system
 * Ammon - A colony housing various industries. Now largely devastated.
 * Proxima - A politically troubled world, Proxima nonetheless was home to a fairly sizable colony.

Orion-Eridanus Quadrant / FLEETCOM Sector 1
{{Col-2

Galileo Sector

 * Kapteyn's Star / Kapteyn system


 * Luyten's Star system
 * Luyten - an old, near-Earth Inner Colony, Luyten is a tidally-locked world that survived the Human-Covenant War somewhat intact.


 * Ross 128 system - M4V red dwarf. Has at least one terrestrial planet, likely to be tidally locked.


 * Sirius system
 * Kaulua Colony - A catch-all name for the local exotic matter mining operations, with the largest center being a spindle habitat. Has a population under 10 million by 2565.


 * Procyon system


 * Asimov / 82 Eridani system
 * Andesia - A wealthy colony headed by a corporate council. Has a population in the hundreds of millions.

Kepler Sector

 * Epsilon Eridani system - hub system outside Sol. Connected via slipways to many major systems.
 * Beta Gabriel - an Europa-like ice world with a subsurface ocean, Beta Gabriel has little permanent population to speak of, aside from marine laboratories and research outposts, and was thus spared most of the Covenant's attentions in the Epsilon Eridani invasion.
 * Circumstance (Epsilon Eridani IV) - a waterworld with several seastead-cities and aquatic farms; founded as a lesser agri-world to feed Reach and Tribute, but later became quite prestigious as a center of law and culture. Attacked and abandoned during the Fall of Reach, but quickly recolonised.
 * Reach - Deemed recoverable only within a span of centuries, the UNSC's crown jewel is now a mass grave. In the immediate post-war years, small communities of Covenant stragglers remained in its orbit and groundside facilities, and hundreds of salvagers pick apart the orbital debris field, including the husk of a refueling and refit platform left unfinished as the Covenant pushed on to Sol and eventually the Ark. Still, securing Reach's orbital space will be a priority project for the UNSC following the war, as the system continues to be a major slipstream node and Sol's gateway to the greater galaxy.
 * Tribute (Epsilon Eridani III) - a mainly industrial colony and Epsilon Eridani's lesser population center, Tribute was spared the brunt of the Covenant invasion as the Covenant focused all their might on Reach. Still, most of the planet's cities and industries were glassed, though a number of smaller settlements survive, and the glassing was not widespread enough to destroy the planet's ecosystem and climate. Post-war, it has become Epsilon Eridani's most notable resettlement project, with hundreds of thousands of refugees flowing in from across the Human Sphere.

Newton Sector

 * Gliese 163 system - red dward star home to at least five planets, including two large super-earths.


 * Cyrus / HD 40307 system - K2.5V orange dwarf. The Cyrus planetary system was once a prime candidate for development, but its location just around six light-years from the restricted Zeta Doradus made its location inconvenient for a trafficked center. Following the classification of Onyx, the UNSC reduced the system's civilian presence, and by the Human-Covenant War, only a few facilities belonging to the UNSC and military contractors remained.
 * Cyrus VII - Once hosted a UNSC Army base and training facility known for its extreme conditions.


 * Zeta Doradus system
 * Onyx - secret training and research world for ONI, later discovered to be a Forerunner shield world. Planet dissolved into an enormous swarm of Sentinels which now surround its inaccessible core. The Zeta Doradus system remains off-limits and has been flagged as a navigation hazard since 2553. The latticework of Sentinels comprising what was once Onyx are quick to respond to close probing but the UNSC has managed to establish a listening post several AUs out-system.

Hubble Sector

 * Anu system (p Eridani)
 * Gilgamesh - a famed tourist destination and tax haven with a blooming illicit technology sector.


 * Bosporus system (58 Eridani)
 * New Constantinople - a fairly prominent population center at the often-ill-defined border between the Inner and Outer Colonies, first settled by Eastern Orthodox colonists who heavily influenced its culture. Housed a prominent UNSC Army garrison. Later a waystation between the Inner Colonies and the Orion-side Outer Colonies. Served as an industrial center. Site of a battle in early 2537, which saw participation by the Spartan-IIIs of Alpha Company. May or may not have been invaded more than once. Vice Admiral Whitcomb was also famed for his accomplishments in a battle there, but it was most likely glassed either in 2537 or a later date. Recovered after the war to some extent.


 * Eta Leporis system


 * Gliese 86 system - connected via the New Eridanus route to Epsilon Eridani and Chi Eridani.
 * Erdenet - although the colony world of Erdenet suffered major damage in the war, its strategic location has prompted interest from governmental, corporate and military reconstruction efforts.


 * Sarona / HD 69830 system
 * Kholo - Invaded and glassed by the Covenant during the war. Kholo was one of the colonies to suffer a planetwide ritual glassing.


 * Gamma Leporis system
 * Crystal - A relatively urbanized colony with a prominent underworld presence. Attacked during the war, though glassing was not total, and corporate revitalization plans were already underway by the mid-2560s.


 * Hawking system (Gliese 250/HD 50281)
 * Camber - Attacked and glassed by Thel 'Vadamee. Was an industrial center, with a population of 5.4 million.


 * Laputa / Gliese 185 system
 * Verne - a high-oxygen jungle-world mostly covered in an impenetrable tangle of plant life and hostile fauna, Verne was home to several dozen arcologies rising above the jungle canopy, most of which now lay in ruins. However, the ecosystem remains intact, and the planet is now home to numerous unsanctioned independent settlements within and above the canopy. The planet retains a population estimated to be under 10 million.


 * Rana / Delta Eridani system
 * Lagos - a small colony world supposedly glassed in 2541; likely "ghost colony" created by Operation: WORM BOX data


 * Tabit system (π3 Orionis)
 * Heavensward - a low-gravity world with colonies largely cresting the peaks of towering mountains, where an island of tolerable conditions existed. Though destruction was not total, costs of reconstruction are high due to the exotic conditions, leading to more ordinary environments being prioritized.

Gemini Sector

 * 61 Ursae Majoris system
 * Ruthersburg - a small mining world that is now molten thanks to Covenant bombardment. Undergoing expansion as it is discovered to be part of the newly-opened Mirabel Slip route. Has a population of under 10 million as of 2565.


 * Bilani system (HR5256) - connected via slipways to Groombridge 1830 and 61 Ursae Majoris.
 * Minab - Former agri-world. Attacked and glassed in 2550.


 * Chalawan / 47 Ursae Majoris system - connected via slipways to 61 Ursae Majoris, Sarona and Leonis Minoris.
 * Sargasso - A resort world, attacked in 2546.


 * Groombridge 1830 system
 * Lemuria - Also known as Groombridge 1830 II, was the location where Cole's fleet recovered a Sangheili survivor in 2530 and, subsequently, led to the creation of the Cole Protocol.


 * Theta Ursae Majoris system - connected via slipways to 61 Ursae Majoris and Anaria.
 * Juneou - Agri-world that has substantially expanded its agricultural operations in the post-war era. Has a population under 100 million.

Yellowstone Sector

 * Gamma Doradus system - connected via slipways to HD 53143 and Zeta Reticuli.
 * Far-Gone Colony Platforms - one of the locations defended by SPARTAN-III Alpha Company. Had a population under 10 million by 2565.

Enuma Sector
A largely uninhabited sector located in between the major slipways of the Eridanus and Dorado-Carina expansion regions.


 * Soell / Iota Horologii system
 * Threshold - gas giant housing various Forerunner stations in its atmosphere.
 * Halo Installation 04 debris field
 * Basis

Typhon Sector

 * Fairfax system - a planetary system around a red dwarf star
 * Fairfax II - former refinery world, with thousands of square kilometers of industrial machinery drinking the petrochemical-rich seas. Due to the planet's unusual topography, Fairfax II was known to the Covenant as Bath'tet.

Mirata Sector

 * Acropolis system
 * Eirene - Attacked some time prior to 2537.


 * Chi Eridani system - connected via the New Eridanus Route to Gliese 86 and 68 Eridani, as well as other slipways to Bosporus and Dagmar's Star.
 * Norton's Crossing - Norton’s Crossing is a colony with an ugly and bloody history. More battles were fought there during the Insurrection wars than any two other colonies combined. Battles were fought between the UNSC and paramilitary groups, between the paramilitary groups and the colonial government, and between the paramilitary groups and other paramilitary groups that dared to fight for the wrong revolution. Something about the planet drew in violent idealogues from light-years around. Norton’s Crossing recently voted 62% to leave the UNSC. According to exit polls, the majority of the population hopes that the violence will die down if the UNSC removes its presence from the colony. However, sources within the colonial government warn the UEG that the only thing keeping them afloat is the UNSC troops patrolling the cities and countryside. Without that aid, they will likely fall to the same rebels who took Elysium City several decades ago. Has a population under 100 million by 2565.


 * Dagmar's Star system
 * Carrow - former agri-world. Evacuated during the war, but was either never attacked or was bypassed by the Covenant due to the absence of colonists. Settled by a group of ex-Covenant in the immediate aftermath of the war. Has a population under 10 million.

Anatoli Sector

 * 71 Orionis system - connected via slipways to Delta Geminorum, Acropolis and 13 Orionis.
 * Gaia - a world with a rich alien biosphere that was unfortunately incompatible with human biology. While the temperature was tolerable, the atmosphere was toxic to humans, and local microbiota caused intense allergic reactions. Since terraforming would have meant destroying the native life, colonies were located in enclosed arcologies. The planet was once hypothesized to have hosted a naturally-occurring fungoid network consciousness within its fauna and flora, though no concrete evidence of this ever surfaced. Glassed during the Covenant War.

Galian Sector

 * 15 Leonis Minoris system - has a combined population of under 10 million by 2565. Connected to Theta Ursae Majoris via the Mirabel Slip route.
 * Sahara - A largely desertified world housing a lesser colony that survived the war with far less damage than its neighbors due to its low population.
 * Demeter - An agri-world glassed in the Covenant War.
 * Herschel - The system's primary mining and industrial center; glassed during the war, but may be recoverable in the near future.


 * 22 Lyncis system
 * Partition - undetected for centuries prior to the end of the Human-Covenant War despite being near the major slipways to the Armstrong Expanse. Crash site of the ammunition ship UNSC Diadochi.


 * Delta Geminorum system - used as a staging area by the Covenant in the final years of the war.



Eridanus Sector

 * Feresa system - connected via slipway to Eridanus.
 * Taras - a small, rugged mining colony lacking a breathable atmosphere. Used as a base by the Secessionist Union and later elements of the United Liberation Front. Glassed shortly after Eridanus II.


 * Terrel system
 * Mamore - a colony with a long history of rebellions. Has a population under 100 million.


 * Beta Eridani system


 * Eridanus system (HD 13808) - in addition to the agricultural produce of Eridanus II, the system housed some local industries and mining operations. Connected via the Eridanus Spine to Bosporus and Kozani, and by other routes to 51 Eridani, Terrel and Icarius.
 * Eridanus II - rural agriworld. While remote, it had a relatively high level of development and standard of living for a large segment of its population. Though the colony was known for its Insurrectionist ties and served as a regional center of Insurrectionist operations, most of the rebellions grew out of the populations outside the well-developed urban centers as well as out in the asteroid belt. Glassed in 2530. Has an estimated population of 510,000 after the war.
 * Eridanus Asteroid Belt - housed various mining facilities and even a small shipyard. Many of these facilities were automated, though a handful also hosted human habitats. Some of these served as hideouts for rebels after they were driven off Eridanus II. The system's spacer population, scattered across numerous outposts in the asteroid belt, acted as a major hotbed of rebellious sentiments in the system.
 * Eridanus Secundus - Insurrectionist/independent asteroid habitat. Survived the attack on Eridanus II in 2530, but was presumably destroyed by the Covenant in 2552.
 * Station Jefferson - destroyed/disabled by Blue Team prior to 2530.


 * Thebes system
 * Henkries

Coeus Sector

 * 13 Orionis system
 * New Harmony - one of the few places the UNSC won a naval battle, which led to the discovery of K7-49 shipyards. Later glassed. Industrial center.


 * August system
 * August II - home to Insurrectionists that occupy the nearby asteroid belt, which was attacked by the Covenant and led to the discovery of several nearby worlds.


 * Icarius system
 * Fractus Asteroid Belt

Oceanus Sector

 * Anaria / 23 Ursae Majoris system
 * Nova Odessa


 * Weinland system
 * Rampart - Former military center.


 * Zumthor system
 * Nestor's Landing

Evros Sector

 * Aparna / 86 G. Eridani system - connected to the Eridanus system via the Eridanus Spine.
 * Dwarka - Former minor agri-world. Glassed soon after the Human-Covenant War began, home to some sort of Insurrectionist cell.

Mitanni Sector

 * Kozani system - connected via slipway to Feresa.
 * Tiberias

Hadrian Sector

 * Padavona system
 * Blessing - former agri-world. One of the first worlds to be glassed in the Orion theater.


 * Pi1 Orionis system - a blue dwarf star housing no hospitable worlds.
 * K7-49 - an asteroid used by the Covenant as a forward shipyard during the war; facility destroyed by Spartan-III Alpha Company in 2537. Now abandoned, though the asteroids and other bodies in the system may be used as hideouts by various fringe elements both human and alien.


 * Tianxia / Phi2 Orionis system
 * Shenzen

Amur Sector
Outlying part of the Great Bear region.

Lethe Sector
Part of the Eridanus ingress region.


 * Achernar - possible Covenant waystation.


 * Iota Eridani - possible Covenant waystation.

Palaia Sector
Part of the Orion ingress region.

Erebus Sector
Part of the Eridanus ingress region.


 * Phi Eridani - blue giant.
 * Shawat Lun - formally known to the UNSC as Phi Eridani I; part of the outlying Covenant supply network.

Exoni Sector

 * Mu Orionis system
 * Bialan - Ex-Covenant FOB. Now abandoned. May have squatters.


 * 29 Orionis system
 * Ni'herai - Ex-Covenant FOB. Now abandoned. May have squatters.

Moksha Sector
}}

Vela-Scorpius Quadrant / FLEETCOM Sector 2
{{Col-2

Cronus Sector

 * Palache / Gliese 667 system - connected via the Murano Route to Guniibuu and Cervantes.
 * Asphodel - has a population in the tens of millions.


 * Delta Pavonis system - connected via Apell's Trace to Sol and Yaytsa, as well as by slipways to Palache and Beta Hydri.
 * New Carthage - Primary colony world of the Delta Pavonis system and the largest surviving Inner Colony by population. Urbanized, focused on specialized industries and formerly reliant on Outer Colony produce, though the crisis brought on by the Covenant War forced the populace to convert large swathes of the planet's wilderness into farmland or refugee settlements. Has seen massive population growth since 2525 due to steady refugee streams from the Outer Colonies of Quadrant 2. Formerly one of the most stable Inner Colonies, the challenges brought on by the war have put considerable strain on the local government, even as the planet remains unscathed by Covenant attack. Has a population approaching one billion as of 2565.
 * Aphelion - A lesser colony world in the Delta Pavonis system, Aphelion has a notably elliptical orbit. It is a small, mostly automated resource-extraction colony that also acts as a stopover for transfer orbits to the system's outer ice giants at certain times of the local year.


 * Epsilon Indi system - a mostly uninhabited system due to the lack of habitable worlds or major resources worth exporting. However, there is a minor human presence on various bodies.

Sagan Sector

 * Beta Hydri system - connected via slipways to Delta Pavonis and Sigma Octanus.
 * Beta Hydri VI - Inner Colony attacked in the final years of the war. Was not a major world, though had a decently sizable population. Was not fully glassed and was scheduled for reclamation under the Phoenix Initiative.


 * Gliese 588 system - red dwarf star; slipspace waystation between Sol and 61 Virginis.

Malabar Sector

 * 18 Scorpii system - connected via the Primary Libra Route to Guniibuu and 23 Librae as well as a slipway to Epsilon Scorpii.
 * Falaknuma - held only a small naval base, was the location where the Rubble's Habitat Exodus arrived. The human colony was destroyed in the late 2530s.


 * Cervantes / Mu Arae system - home to a planetary system named after characters in Don Quixote. The system hosts various industrial operations around the giant planets and asteroids. Connected via the Murano Route to Palache and by forks to Erebus and Agathos.
 * Port Eliza - an orbital asteroid-habitat and one of the more prominent stopover ports in the system. Orbits the gas giant Rocinante.


 * Ectanus 45 / Nu2 Lupi system
 * Chi Rho - Military and industrial center. Host to Vice Admiral Jean Mawikizi's last stand.


 * Hesperia system (HD147513)
 * Coral - Coral is a garden world so named for the organisms resembling terrestrial corals that are its preeminent native biota. While large parts of the planet were protected as nature preserves, major population centers existed on its scattered continents. Coral orbits in an unusual position at the gas giant HD 147513 b's L4 Lagrange point. Surveys have noted that the planet's habitability, as well as the stability of its biosphere, are rather unusual for its orbital position. Coral has a ring system of small rocky and metallic bodies, which hosted mining efforts. Coupled with an abundance of asteroids across the system, it has been speculated that these are the remains of a rocky planet that was torn apart by HD 147513 b's gravity as the gas giant migrated inward to its current elliptical orbit. Coral has a famously large Forerunner structure on its surface, one of the first the human public were aware of. The planet was attacked in September 2552, and though its population centers were attacked, it was mostly spared glassing due to the Covenant's interest in the Forerunner relic on the planet. Following the Covenant War, UNSC research into the Forerunner structure has resumed, though resettlement has been low-key.

Galari Sector

 * Gamma Pavonis system
 * Ningbo
 * Gamma Pavonis VII


 * Yaytsa / Beta Trianguli Australis system - connected via Apell's Trace to Delta Pavonis and Alpha Circini.
 * Siberia Prime - A frigid industrial world famed for its past civil wars and disastrous terraforming project.
 * Siberia Secundus - A secondary world of little importance.
 * Sudarski - a gas giant mined for helium-3 and hydrogen for the local sliplane traffic. Until the export boom of the 2480s, the Sudarski fuel stations were the primary location of interest for outsiders.
 * Vysokiy Arkhangelsk - The primary orbital platform over Siberia Prime, constructed from one of the colony ships that founded the planet. By the time of the HCW, the platform was the nucleus of a commercial shipyard.

Kelvin Sector

 * 61 Virginis system
 * Miridem - an Inner Colony glassed in 2544. Large cities included Antioch, Cyrene and Syracuse. Most of the initial settlers were Martian, though there was considerable immigration from across Sol in the colony's early decades. Widely-spoken languages included Novala and French, though there was notable variety among the major cities. The planet used to be something of a hotspot of telecommunications and cybersecurity technology in its neighborhood of space.


 * Alpha Corvi system - connected via the Primary Hydra Route to Niven and Hydra.
 * Hollow Point - One of the last Outer Colonies hit before the Inner Colonies were attacked.


 * Gliese 433 system - Red dwarf; has at least three planets.


 * Niven System (HD 102365) - connected via slipways to Gliese 588 and Alpha Corvi.
 * Minister - an obscure, rugged Inner Colony located far away from major trade centers, Minister was an underdeveloped world with few exports and high emigration rate. Its sole call-to-fame was that the UNSC repurposed it as an overcrowded refugee world during the Human-Covenant War. Has a population under 100 million.


 * Zavijava / Beta Virginis system
 * Roston - an industrial world that supplied the war effort in Sectors 2 and 1, before its glassing in the late 2530s.

Asteria Sector

 * Alpha Mensae system
 * Lodestone


 * Sigma Octanus system - connected via slipways to Epsilon Eridani, Beta Hydri, and Zeta Reticuli.
 * Sigma Octanus IV - Attacked in July 2552 in a rare UNSC victory, though the colony was temporarily evacuated and never attacked again as the Covenant subsequently focused their attentions on Reach. However, the damage the colony suffered during the battle as well as the orbital debris field took years to clean up.


 * Zeta Reticuli system - Linked to Kapteyn's Star and Bellbrook along Morita's Pass and Sigma Octanus and Gamma Doradus via the Core Trunk.
 * Roswell - A relatively small Inner Colony with some fringe interest as to purported alien ruins there. Debate persists as to whether said ruins are genuine or fabricated by an early colonization firm; regardless, the inhabitants generally regard the ruins as genuine, and use them as a common point in the world's marketing.

Prana Sector

 * Agathos system - connected via slipway to Cervantes.
 * Eudemon


 * Erebus system - connected via slipway to Cervantes.
 * Erebus VII

Dolinar Sector

 * Charybdis system
 * Charybdis IX - Corporate-run mining colony, glassed in 2535. Had some importance to the war effort in its sector due to its mining industry.


 * Epsilon Scorpii system
 * Kashmir - An agri-world with a population of several tens of millions, Kashmir has become increasingly important in supplying Quadrant 2's Inner Colonies after the war.


 * Iota Pavonis system - waystation between Gamma Pavonis and Brunel.

Camina Sector

 * Iota Pavonis system - best accessed via jumps from Charybdis or Yaytsa.
 * Ample Pastures - Agri-world.


 * Alpha Circini system - connected via Apell's Trace to Yaytsa and Athos.
 * Svoboda - Minor waystation colony, likely low in habitability. Settlers may have had relation to those of Yaytsa.


 * Eta Crucis system - waystation between Alpha Circini and Morgenstern.
 * New Caracas - A hot, largely desertified world housing a lesser colony that evaded destruction despite most systems around it being razed.

Dhawan Sector

 * Eta Corvi system
 * Kingston - former CMA base world.


 * Hydra system (297 G. Hydrae) - setting for the Hydra System Massacres, in which the system's two major colonies engaged in a bloody war with one another followed by a messy UNSC intervention. Located 58LY from Sol.
 * Bomogin
 * Samarkand

Harmon Sector

 * Csere's Star / AK Pictoris system - The meta-colony around Csere's Star has a good claim to the whole star system, as it includes an inhabited world and no less than seven inhabited moons. But for all the colony’s spread, it has a very weak heavy industry. It cannot establish any naval presence, and will have to rely on mercenaries or alliances with ex-Covenant groups for its defense. Csere's Star is also a system of great strategic importance, as it is the natural route of invasion for a number of loyal colonies. UNSC HIGHCOM estimates that if Csere's Star allies with a faction hostile to the UNSC, it will require ten times as many naval resources to defend the new border compared to just occupying that one system.
 * Jastolo - A mining colony undergoing a slow terraforming process.
 * ''Marmalade Skies - a gas giant with several orbital colonies.


 * HD 53143 system
 * Deep-Space Anomaly #0198 - an anomaly logged originally by probes and later discovered to be a Forerunner facility related to Onyx's internal slipspace network.


 * Bellbrook system (HD 65907) - connected via slipways to Zeta Reticuli and Csere's Star. Houses some waystation outposts.


 * I Carinae system - F3V yellow dwarf star.


 * Beta Pictoris system

Marani Sector

 * 16 Librae system
 * New Tharsis - Named as such for its vast volcanic plateaus similar to Mars' Tharsis. Hab rating IV. Industrial center.


 * 23 Librae system
 * Madrigal - an Outer Colony in the 23 Librae system glassed in 2528.
 * The Rubble - an asteroid settlement built by the survivors from Madrigal in the trailing trojans of the gas giant Hesiod in the 23 Librae system, with the assistance of ostensibly independent Kig-Yar traders. Destroyed in 2535.


 * Brunel system
 * New Llanelli - Small agriworld glassed in 2546.

Gasparo Sector

 * Athos system - connected via Apell's Trace to Alpha Circini and Kolaqoa.
 * Passage - Former waystation colony.


 * Circinius / HD 128020 system - 92LY from Sol.
 * Circinius IV - UNSC base world home to the Corbulo Academy of Military Science.


 * Delta Muscae system - connected via slipway to the Athos system.


 * Peloponnesus system
 * Arcadia - initially invaded in 2531 and glassed in 2547, Arcadia is now of little relevance. Salvagers, pirates and various peripheral elements of the Covenant meta-civilization have been active in the system as well as its immediate neighborhood after the war, and may use Arcadia or some of the other planets and planetoids in the system as hideouts.

Merida Sector

 * Bayard / 88 G Centauri system
 * Cote d'Azure - one of the first 8 colonies attacked by the Covenant, during the first four years of the conflict.


 * Morgenstern / 120 G Centauri system
 * Freiberg

Rawadi Sector

 * Algorab - connected via the Corvus Track to Eta Corvi and Hydel.


 * Dana / Iota Crateris system - connected via the Primary Hydra Route to Hydra and Surya.
 * Hat Yai - Known for its tropical qualities, glassed in 2528 or 2529.


 * Marduk - a black hole and a navigational hazard.


 * Ubazi system - connected via slipway to Dana.
 * Cadence

Eforo Sector

 * Caspian system - connected via slipway to Escurial.
 * Bohemia


 * Escurial system (HD 77370) - connected via slipways to Csere's Star and Caspian.
 * Boundary

Delbara Sector

 * Dinni system - waystation along Halliday's Bypass between the Federley and Messino systems.


 * Messino system - a system charted by frontier independents from Isbanola; waystation of the Navarro Spur and starting point of Halliday's Bypass; connected to the Marisova, Brunel and Dinni systems.

Mauro Sector

 * Epsilon Librae system - connected via slipway to 16 Librae.
 * Nimbus Platform - A colony-habitat founded around a local industrial and scientific operation.


 * Pasana system - waystation along the Pasana Slip between Brunel and Heimdall.
 * Gaer's World - Independent human colony, has a population under 10 million.

Polona Sector

 * Dofida system


 * Ephyra system
 * Netherop - an unoccupied world home to the ruins of a pre-spaceflight alien culture. Due to the planet's hothouse conditions, the native civilization's fall has been attributed to a self-induced biosphere collapse caused by dramatic overindustrialization and possible resource wars, hinting at a slow, grim end. Despite being one of the few worlds with alien ruins within the pre-war human sphere, Netherop has been studied relatively little, and the region's post-war instability has kept comprehensive academic excursions few.


 * Igdras system
 * Etalan - also known as E'gini to the Covenant, most of Etalan's colonists had embraced a nomadic lifestyle and large urban communities were few.


 * Kolaqoa system
 * Biko - also known as Borodan to the Covenant, has four satellites including Seoba.


 * Qusdar system
 * Mesra - Former mining colony. Most settlers were of a specific religious and ideological sect.


 * Redstow system
 * Redstow VI - Minor colony and a base of operations for the Galodew Emancipation, a large Insurrectionist cell, glassed by 2526.

Aureo Sector

 * Atreus system - connected via slipways to Salvatori and Glint.
 * Midvale - The prime breadbasket world for its entire sector, attacked during what would later be known as the 'Week of Slaughter.'


 * Glint system
 * Nuevo Cuzco


 * Salvatori system
 * Viridian

Lurone Sector

 * Hydel system - connected via slipway to Algorab.
 * Campbell's Landing - located in a navigational hazard-zone known as the Scab, with all colonists living in a 'habitat hotspot' around a single resource-rich world. Had a strong Insurrectionist presence due to its remoteness.


 * Pi Hydrae system
 * Pi Hydrae II - formerly home to a Covenant fuel depot and mustering base.


 * Surya system - endpoint of the Primary Hydra Route
 * Jagati
 * Indra Asteroid Cluster - Home to raw materials extraction operations as well as shipyards.

Rowena Sector

 * Beta Volantis system
 * Yihsin - home to a former Covenant mining operation and outpost.


 * Bubup / HD 38283 system


 * Gamma Mensae system


 * Helos system - connected via slipways to Csere's Star and Mandell.
 * Helos Secundus - Minor military center.


 * Mandell system - connected via slipway to Helos.
 * Pumice - A volcanic world formerly home to a minor mining/industrial colony.

Vevina Sector
Was the first sector hit by the Covenant.


 * Federley system
 * Second Base - one of first two colonies to be glassed after Harvest.


 * Heimdall system - connected via slipways to 23 Librae and Federley.
 * Harvest - first casualty of the Covenant, was subjected to intense fighting as the UNSC attempted to hold it.

Grenadi Sector

 * Aksum system
 * Asmara - one of the first eight colonies destroyed by the Covenant.


 * Elah system
 * Amasa - also known as Alay'oso to the Covenant, destroyed by Fleetmaster Nizat 'Kvarosee.


 * Gibson system
 * Green Hills - mining colony with a huge BXR influence, one of the first colonies hit after Harvest.


 * Polybius system
 * Bliss - one of the first Outer Colonies to be glassed in 2526. Home to a silicate mining operation after the war.


 * Uklun system

Earle Sector
Part of Ingress Zone Charlie.


 * Beta Corvi system
 * Gialatan - home to a former Covenant fuel mining operation.


 * Einjel system
 * Einjel V - formerly home to a Covenant forward base and garrison.

Upada Sector
Comprised most of Ingress Zone Alpha, the initial Covenant incursion into human space.


 * Merthold system - known to the Covenant as Idal'wun.
 * Narske - former Covenant base


 * Delcamp system - known to the Covenant as Vashuak. Waystation of the Tempest Crossing.
 * Raashor - former Covenant base

Aruna Sector

 * Rongo system
 * Rongo II - housed a Covenant forward base before Operation: HIGH TIDE.

Vasto Sector

 * Meleika system - waystation of the Tempest Crossing.
 * Irshnom - former Covenant ingress base; retains an ex-Covenant presence.

Olwen Sector
}}
 * Olwen 741 system - known to the Covenant as Dursos; waystation of the Second Incursion.
 * Qoreth - Covenant supply base.

Sagittarius-Cygnus Quadrant / FLEETCOM Sector 3
{{Col-2

Athena Sector

 * 61 Cygni system
 * Sunburn - A metal-rich rocky world, Sunburn is named as such for its scorching conditions and occasional solar flares from its parent star, the A component of the 61 Cygni system. Nevertheless, it hosts a colony centering around the extraction of rare metals, along with various manufacturing industries. As Sunburn is tidally locked to 61 Cygni A, most habitation is centered on the twilight line. Though Sunburn was attacked by the Covenant in the final weeks of the war, it was never glassed, and was reclaimed some time after the war. The planet had a population of around eight million by 2565.


 * Aneirin / Gliese 876 system
 * Gliese 876 c - housed several minor colonies on its moons.
 * Crail / Gliese 876 b - one of the two gas giants orbiting within Gliese 876's Goldilocks zone, Crail's system of moons was home to several colonies.
 * Imber - Roughly two-thirds Earth's size and mass, Imber is Crail's largest and most habitable satellite, able to maintain a natural strong magnetic field, oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere and earth-analog biosphere. It was the most populated colony world in the Aneirin system before its glassing in 2550.
 * Criterion - Criterion is a metal-rich rocky moon with a nitrogen-rich atmosphere that was undergoing conversion toward habitability even as conditions remained frigid and barren. It largely hosted mining industries. Criterion was used as a UNSC fallback point during the battle for Imber.


 * Hellespont system - sacrificed to prevent the Covenant from discovering their encryption had been cracked, although some warning was afforded to sensitive ONI and UNSC assets.
 * Troy - Attacked and glassed by the Covenant in 2552.
 * Harmony - Attacked by the Covenant in 2552, though was deemed recoverable after the war and prioritized for reterraforming and settlement.

Tethys Sector

 * 70 Ophiuchi system
 * Ballast - a fairly prominent Inner Colony, known for being cold, wet, and windy, but a very stable place to live. Known as being the double-lucky planet, as it was untouched by both the Inner Colony Wars and the Human-Covenant Wars, though its position became more precarious during the Great Schism. Has a population in the hundreds of millions.


 * Guniibuu / 36 Ophiuchi system
 * Cascade - fairly populous Inner Colony. While first settled in the late 24th century, its terraforming to its current state took over a century. Cascade experienced an economic boom in the post-war era due to the growth of key industries there resulting from the loss of so many other industrial centers. Has a population in the low hundreds of millions.

Minerva Sector

 * Chandrasekhar system (HR 9038)
 * Parvati - an Inner Colony world with most human habitation concentrated on a series of canyon systems and caverns due to the inhospitable weather conditions on the desert plains that covered most of the planet; a further terraforming and climate-control project was ongoing, but would still have taken over a century to take effect. Settlers hailed primarily from Earth's South and Southeast Asia, and generally tend to have stocky builds due to the planet's higher-than-standard gravity. While only the human settlements were glassed in 2543, this destabilized what little artificial ecosystem Parvati had, making short-term resettlement unlikely beyond domed habitats.


 * Alderamin / Alpha Cephei system
 * Bounty - glassed by the Fleet of Particular Justice.


 * Alpha Lyrae / Vega system
 * Atlas Moons - a colony cluster centered on the moons and orbital facilities the gas giant Atlas, housing industry critical to the war effort. Atlas has dozens of moons, of which its four major ones are the most notable. Most of the moons were named after the mythological Hesperides. The moons were the site of a prolonged siege in 2547-2548 in which Admiral Whitcomb participated. The moons were largely abandoned during the siege, but the relatively intact status of many of the colonies and facilities had them marked for resettlement after the Human-Covenant War. Remains a military and industrial center.
 * Hesperia - A water-world whose oceans are kept liquid by tidal heating, resulting in constant underwater volcanism. It was used for localized aquaculture.
 * Thetis - Thetis is a cryoworld with an atmosphere rich in methane and ammonia.
 * Asterope - The largest of the Atlas Moons, Asterope is a "dirty snowball", an icy world flecked with deposits of iron and other metals.
 * Antheia - Antheia is the most distant and hospitable moon of Atlas, and housed the largest population.
 * Vega - a minor mining colony.


 * Errai / Gamma Cephei system
 * Mesa - glassed during the Covenant War by the Fleet of Particular Justice.


 * Eta Cephei system
 * Pharos - a small hothouse world colonized for its rich metal deposits, Pharos had undergone some terraforming to make its climate tolerable to humans, if only barely. Pharos hosted an extensive mining industry along with various manufacturers of materiel for the UNSC, assuming a critical importance in the final decade of the war as a military center on the way to the Outer Colonies in the Cepheus-Cygnus theater. The planet was eventually invaded by the Covenant. Though most of the planet's barren surface was spared from glassing, the industries and military facilities were destroyed. Large-scale redevelopment is unlikely in the near future, though some mining companies have expressed interest in resuming operations.

Heraklion Sector

 * 72 Herculis system
 * Ariel - a barren world home to a research outpost; while invaded, it was never glassed, and may become more prominent as a climate-modification and settlement project in the post-war era. Has a population under 100 million.


 * Alcides / Zeta Herculis system
 * Neos Atlantis - the UNSC's primary naval yard for the immediate future following the loss of Reach and Mars' industry. Industrial and military center. Has a population under 100 million.


 * Beta Comae Berenices system
 * Fjord - suffered a minor Covenant attack which destabilized the already struggling local government, precipitating a full CAA takeover in the post-war era, one that was welcomed by most of the locals after decades of incompetent administrations from the world's two opposing political factions. Fjord's home star has assumed some strategic importance as a waystation system in the post-war era. Has a population under 1 billion by 2565. Was already an industrial center, came to house an increasing UNSC presence in the later years of the war.


 * Gaelic system (Beta Canum Venaticorum)
 * Falkirk and Sgothein - two Scottish colonies of the Gaelic system, these worlds were notable for being Inner Colonies that were disillusioned from the UEG and UNSC due to the invasions of the Inner Colony Wars, which devastated their economy and industrial base. While Falkirk was terraformed, Sgothein only received basic atmospheric remixing due to its status as a mining world. Their populations have a strongly patriotic, slightly isolationist culture, with a particular hatred of interstellar corporations. Both colonies were badly glassed in mid-2551.
 * Ffyniannus - the sole reclaimable colony of the Gaelic system, Ffyniannus was a cooler, more temperate world that shared Falkirk's misgivings with the UEG. Although its sibling worlds were hit hard by the Covenant, Ffyniannus managed to evade their attention long enough for a large-scale evacuation to be completed.


 * Glitnir / Mu Herculis system
 * Forseti

Attican Sector

 * Beta Aquilae system
 * Lenapi - has a population under 100 million.


 * Trappist / Trappist-1 system - Home to various scientific and mining operations.

Ossian Sector

 * Bari / Gliese 673 system
 * Manus - Manus was a skipover. It was a planet with only marginal resources, and therefore was ignored during the outward migrations from Earth. It found use as a dumping ground for refugees at the beginning of the war, and a stable population was established over the years. At the end of the war, the Manus colonial assembly passes a vote 170-88 to leave the UNSC, which was affirmed by 67% of the population. The population of Manus isn't ideologically pro-independence. Instead, there is a widespread hostility towards paying taxes to the UNSC for defense. The theory goes is that Manus is deep enough in UNSC territory that it shouldn’t have to worry about attack from outside threats. Worse than that, the colonial government of Manus plans to bring in investment capital from UNSC worlds by turning Manus into a tax haven. The UEGDR estimates that by taking advantage of the same agreements that other independent colonies have made with the UNSC, Manus will drain enough revenue from the UNSC to launch two battlegroups every year. Not that they will be launching those battlegroups, but that will be money drained from the defense and reconstruction budget and likely wasted on casinos.


 * Psi Serpentis system
 * Scytale - The major human colony in the Psi Serpentis system. Shares the system with the gas giant Viperdae.


 * Lambda Serpentis system
 * Jericho VII - Suffered a minor attack in 2530; attacked for the second time and glassed in 2535.


 * Mathani / 12 Ophiuchi system
 * Emerald Cove - A tropical "paradise world", Emerald Cove is a fairly notable Inner Colony. The planet has no large continents, with most of the land area scattered across hundreds of thousands of islands. Emerald Cove has no glaciation and experiences no temperatures below freezing. Most of the islands are formed by volcanic activity, which remains frequent. Though native biota was limited, the introduction of terrestrial plant and animal life was particularly successful, transforming much of the planet into a tropical paradise within a century. Climate control measures were used around major settlements to curtail intense tropical storms. The colony was abandoned in 2542 due to a threat of Covenant invasion. The Covenant established an outpost on the world in the late 2540s, but the planet was never glassed; since the war, Emerald Cove has attracted several Covenant stragglers, but due to its intact state it was prioritized for reclamation and resettlement by the UNSC and retaken shortly after the war.

Menelaus Sector

 * Harmachis system
 * Estuary - Glassed by the Fleet of Particular Justice during the war.

Hermes Sector

 * 16 Cygni system
 * Masaq - a former agri-world glassed during the Human-Covenant War.


 * 17 Cygni system


 * Cygnus system (Gliese 777)
 * Cygnus II - shares its system with New Jerusalem; the system's lesser colony (likely airless or undergoing terraforming?). Attacked by the Covenant but was not glassed. The world's major community was resettled after the war. An agent of the fetcher Oliver Birch was stationed here after the war.
 * New Jerusalem - invaded in mid-2552, but not fully glassed before the war's end. Due to its relatively light damage and strategic location, it was prioritized for reclamation.


 * Epsilon Cygni system


 * Tau Cygni system


 * Theta Cygni system
 * Nubion

Erinyes Sector

 * Diadem / Alpha Comae Berenices system
 * Paradise Falls - Ironically named, as the world is reportedly hostile. Has a population under 10 million.

Hypatia Sector

 * 14 Herculis system
 * Ford - The colonial government on Ford is staunchly anti-UNSC and pro-independence, but the leadership and the general population want to secede peacefully. They are willing to sign a non-aggression pact with the UNSC, but the Fordian government isn’t powerful enough to make that stick. The colonial law enforcement and military organizations are either compromised or incapable of policing the system, so terrorists and pirates regularly seek shelter on the planet. These non-government forces regularly launch attacks on UNSC colonies and shipping. Has a population under 100 million.


 * Orrichon / Eta Coronae Borealis system
 * Sedra - A relatively unremarkable Outer Colony noted for its autonomy-minded citizenry and independent militia, though they remain part of the Phoenix Initiative.


 * Tau Boötis system
 * Sandtrap - An arid world, Sandtrap nonetheless has a breathable atmosphere thanks to its rudimentary ecosystem. The planet was surveyed in the early 26th century, though mining companies have only taken interest in it since the 2540s. Since then, BXR has established an operation there, and in 2558, Traxus partnered with Mimbani Frontiers and several corporations to begin terraforming the planet and developing its infrastructure. By 2565, Sandtrap's settlements had a growing population of several million. The Tau Boötis Development Consortium has invested millions of credits to the planet's advertising campaign, and a subcontracted marketing agency has suggested renaming the planet to be more attractive to settlers.


 * Voy / Rho Coronae Borealis system
 * Thalassa - An oceanic world home to scientific and aquacultural operations colonized just before the Covenant War, it has a population approaching 10 million by 2565.

Vesper Sector

 * Phoenicia / HD 192263 system - Waystation of the Aquila Trunk route and the Aquila-side termination point of the Pegasus Traverse.
 * Hardscrabble - Hardscrabble's location in space is ideal, which has led to development disproportionate to its inhospitable conditions.

Poseidon Sector

 * Epsilon Cephei system
 * Bhuj

Atlas Sector

 * Orgeluse system
 * New Reach - the first new major colony settled as part of the Phoenix Initiative, as well as the one with the most direct UNSC presence, making it something of a hub in the expanding Cygnus Verge. Military center, has a population under ten million.


 * Hestia system
 * Meridian - glassed beyond recovery, but remains home to a silicate mining operation and houses an orbital port that has become a confluence of newly-emerged slipspace lanes as well as a staging point for further expansion out into the Cygnus Verge. Orbits the gas giant Hestia V.

Augeas Sector

 * Naxos system - termination point of the Navarro Spur.
 * Naxos Disk - a circumstellar disk home to fledgling mining operations as well as minor independent/pirate hideouts.

Geryon Sector

 * Estori system
 * Terceira - Independent human colony with a population under 10 million.


 * Moorhaus system
 * Second Milan
 * Spoketown - Space habitat with a population under 10 million.


 * Nereus system - A mostly uninhabited system used as a hideout by pirates and various fringe elements.
 * Nereus X


 * Tisiphone system
 * Barugi - Abandoned and quarantined due to runaway pandemic.
 * Nephis - A moon-colony similar to those on the Jovian Moons; economy largely based around zenostium mining.

Thule Sector

 * Maribor / 16 Cephei system
 * Hebron - Has a population under 10 million by 2565.


 * Iota Cephei system
 * Nyoo Oktaaviya - Rocky, dense world with unusual atmospheric disturbances. Working idea was that they favoured mechs due to long tracked/wheeled vehicles being unable to easily function in their environment. Has a population under 10 million by 2565.


 * Euboea system
 * Carcassonne


 * Valia system
 * Conquer - abandoned but never glassed.

Mnemosyne Sector

 * 43 Cygni system
 * Sigil - a superterran world named as such for the elaborate carving of a network of circular, labyrinth-like glyphs spanning two continents. While initially believed to be Forerunner in origin due to their various superficial similarities to Forerunner symbology, the megastructure has been dated to be millions of years old and does not correspond to known Forerunner techniques. The structure appears to be an inert carving engraved into the planet's crust, and no intact technology or other evidence of habitation has been found. Sigil's atmosphere of oxygen, nitrogen and argon is being steadily stripped away by its parent star, though conditions still remain hospitable in the vast canyons formed by the carving, which also house many distinct ecosystems. The biota in these canyons shares a common ancestry, but they have evolved in isolation for millions of years since the carving was created. Sigil was originally charted by Covenant explorers of the Fleet of Particular Justice during the war and is settled on the condition that Concord scientists are able to study the artifact under joint control with the UEG. By 2565, the planet only had a scientific and military presence of just above ten thousand, though once the artifact was confirmed to be secure, the Phoenix Initiative opened it up for development and settlement.

Elmaro Sector

 * Sverdlovsk system
 * Komoya and Talitsa - Orbiting the gas giant Vitalyevna, independent human colonies with a combined population of under 100 million by 2565.


 * Tanielu system
 * Binterall - Independent human colony. Has a population under 10 million.


 * Vidani system
 * Mindiria - Has a population under 10 million.

Isbanola Sector

 * Cordoba system
 * Gao - independent human colony, industrial center. Hub of the Via Casilina Community alongside Venezia.


 * Elduros system
 * Aleria - independent colony, has a population under 100 million.


 * Lacaze system - former waystation system between Cordoba and Elduros; now superseded by Shaps and the Via Casilina.


 * Orso system
 * Venezia - an Outer Colony that becomes perhaps the most notable melting pot of the human and ex-Covenant civilizations. The original settlers were mostly an offshoot of the group that colonized the nearby Gao. While originally smaller than Gao, largely serving as a waystation and mining outpost, Venezia's population grew dramatically as a result of the migrations caused by the Covenant War. In the war's later years, a group of Covenant traders using the now largely defunct Tempest Crossing ingress route found their way to Venezia, followed soon after by other peripheral elements of the hegemony, including defectors, merchants, smugglers and pirates. For much of this time, Venezia remained cut off from the UNSC at large, only resuming contact in the post-war era. Has a population under 1 billion, industrial center.


 * Shaps system - though remotely observed for centuries, the Shaps system was first visited by spacers from the Madara Fringe either during the war or the later years of the Insurrection. The diminishing UNSC presence in the Outer Colonies during the war meant that the system did not garner significant attention until after the war, when the Forerunner ruins there began to draw considerable interest. However, any intact technology has long decayed or been picked clean by scavengers. While not officially occupied by any major party, Shaps is home to a presence by groups from both the worlds of the Via Casilina Community and the Strewn Shore. Not officially policed since the UNSC formally withdrew its forces from most of the Madara Fringe, Shaps is an attractive hideout for pirates. Via Casilina's makeshift navy has made perfunctory attempts to secure the passage of trading ships through the system's IJPs, though the Via Casilina captains' frequent ties to the very elements they should be policing mean that this can only be so effective. This has also deterred various universities' attempts to study the ruins in more depth, with any research missions having to go through ONI.
 * Myer's Moon - Hosts a minor human presence.
 * Shaps III - A pseudo-habitable planet, Shaps III's surface hosts the ruins of several large Forerunner cities. Study of the ruins dates them as one of the more archaic Forerunner sites discovered in the modern era; there are indications that the planet has been uninhabited for at least 150,000 years. Though their architecture differs from latter-day installations, it is recognizably Forerunner. While no intact technology remains, the infrastructure appears to have been of a considerably lower technology level than other Forerunner worlds, perhaps from an earlier period of their galactic expansion. These findings, combined with the system's location well outside major Forerunner expansion regions has fueled many scientific theories and debates regarding Forerunner origins. Since the world's discovery, a small human colony has established itself in the crumbled ruins, though they share the planet with various minor groups from the Strewn Shore.
 * Pydoryn - gas giant.
 * Taram - One of the moons of Pydoryn, Taram hosts the remains of a Forerunner facility and was used as a base of operations by the Keepers of the One Freedom for a time. The structure appears to date back to the same overall time period as the ruins on Shaps III and the other minor Forerunner sites in the system.

Alandro Sector

 * Yuna system
 * Glacier - Minor independent colony.


 * Marisova system
 * Monte Rosso - Has a population under 10 million by 2565, is an independent human colony. Named as such by its Venezian and Gao settlers for the red supervolcano dominating its face.

Lumoria Sector

 * Argus system - Located dangerously close to the navigational anomaly known as the Haldean Fissure.
 * Argus V - Formerly-unoccupied world. Original plans was to use it as the new training grounds for SPARTAN-III Delta Company. Connected via sliplane to Beukert.


 * Beukert system

Minos Sector

 * Rho Cygni system
 * Shambala - a corporate colonization project, Shambala only has a token UNSC presence. Has a population under 10 million by 2565, though it is touted to be one of the most promising new colony worlds.

Vitali Sector

 * Yeoh system - a mostly-unoccupied system, though has been known to house rebel elements.

Rivera Sector

 * Indola system
 * Neluse - the most prominent initial contact point between traders from the Strewn Shore and the humans of the Madara Fringe.

Pinada Sector

 * Lawder's Star system - Waystation for the El Camino on the way to the Sagittarian Flight


 * Pincoya / HD 164604 system - Waystation for the El Camino on the way to the Sagittarian Flight

Akinya Sector

 * Arethusa system
 * Fulcrum Station - Initially the UNSC's furthest outpost in the Cygnus Verge, since became a hub for further expansion efforts in the region.


 * Epsilon Lyrae system

Rigale Sector

 * Ponsi system - Connected via the El Camino to Lawder's Star.
 * Diluvial - Independent human colony established after 2525.


 * Salvacion system - Connected via the El Camino to Solis.
 * Primavera - Independent human colony established after 2525. Has a population under 10 million by 2565.


 * Solis system - Connected via the El Camino to Salvacion and Lawder's Star.
 * Medina - Independent human colony established after 2525. Has a population under 10 million by 2565.

Ulgen Sector

 * Ulgen 102 system - Named Thanqar by the Covenant.
 * Gracious Auspice - originally a fabricated Operation: WORM BOX "ghost colony", the body that would be named Gracious Auspice turned out to actually house Forerunner artifacts upon Covenant inspection, and became a remote outpost that has since established contact with the Strewn Shore.

Manaia Sector
}}

Cepheus-Auriga Quadrant / FLEETCOM Sector 4
{{Col-2

Copernicus Sector

 * Tau Ceti system
 * Strauss' World - One of the oldest Inner Colony worlds. Glassed during the war.
 * Marathon Station - A spaceport set up by the survivors of the invasion of Tau Ceti in an old asteroid habitat over the glassed Strauss' World.


 * Teegarden's Star / Teegarden system - M7V red dwarf. Has at least two roughly Earth-mass planets in its habitable zone.

Argo Sector

 * Ionia / 107 Piscium system
 * Actium - an Inner Colony world glassed in 2545 after a several-week-long battle.


 * Petrova / HD 4628 system
 * Skopje - An Inner Colony glassed by the Covenant in 2547 after a battle.


 * Archird / Eta Cassiopeiae system
 * Archird II - an ice-ball world also called "Josaphat's Folly" after the billionaire Josaphat Pirandello who spent his lifetime and fortune searching for theorized alien ruins that ultimately weren't there. The planet is most notable for its orbital habitat-conurbation popularly known as the Swarm. Originally designed as a hub of mining operations in the planet's metal-rich ring system as well as the operations on the surface, the Swarm became a secondary waystation during the settlement of the Outer Colonies, and eventually gentrified into a high-technological hub. The colony was established by East African conglomerates, though it has a prominent East Asian population, and some of its elements have since become fairly cosmopolitan. Having survived the war, the Swarm is now a gateway to the Via Serena trade route bound from Sol to the Pleiades Corridor, and has seen a fairly dramatic increase in population with transitory settlers and refugees, most of whom have been dumped by the local government on Josaphat's Folly in rapidly-erected dome-cities and habitats built in the old ice warrens dug by Pirandello's explorers.


 * Desdoron / Gliese 892 system
 * Desdoron V - former Inner Colony.
 * Mariposa - a ringed gas giant.
 * Gingham - One of Mariposa's colonized moons, named as such for its peculiar surface patterns.


 * Groombridge 34 system
 * Phocis - Minor colony mainly founded around a military base. Shares its system with the abandoned Station Delphi.


 * Mu Cassiopeiae system - binary system of a G5V primary, red dwarf secondary


 * Soyuz system (Lalande 21185)
 * Baikonur - A middling Inner Colony of questionable significance to the greater Human community, beset with issues of botched terraforming and endemic corruption. Partially-glassed; now has a population under 100 million with a notable relatively-friendly Jiralhanae population.

Epicuros Sector

 * 111 Tauri system
 * Victoria - colony world formerly housing the home base for General Graves, one of the three generals of the ULF. Glassed during the 2540s.


 * Aeolus system
 * Endymion - a frontier world with comfortable middle-class settlements and farmland, as well as an elite education facility known as Endymion Gifted.


 * Alpha Aurigae / Capella system
 * Capella - shares the system with the Origami Asteroid Field. Defended by Cole's fleet in 2526, where he secured a costly victory. Eventually glassed.
 * Origami Asteroid Field - shares its system with Capella. Has a population under 10 million by 2565.


 * Gliese 176 system
 * Micronesia - a meta-colony consisting a number of mining outposts across the system's asteroid belts. Had Insurrectionist activity prior to 2525. Survived the war.


 * Kroedis / 10 Tauri system
 * Kroedis II - Non-garden world, with conditions slightly more hospitable than those of Mars. Attacked by Thel 'Vadamee. Had a population of more than 15 million.


 * Lambda Aurigae system
 * Roost - resort world known for its fishing.


 * Theta Persei system
 * Greydowns - the name of two moon-colonies orbiting a gas giant, primarily founded around resource-extraction operations such as fusion fuel mining and zenostium harvesting. It had a population of almost 77 million by the time it was attacked by Thel 'Vadamee.

Artemis Sector

 * 19 Draconis system
 * Hellas - one of two colonies, along with Fumirole, where rebel forces were known to use rumbledrugs in an attempt to counter the SPARTAN-IIs.


 * 26 Draconis system
 * Levosia - Outer Colony and exporter of refined selenium and technetium, operations crucial for the building of slipspace drives. Historically rebellious, and site of the Callisto Incident in 2494. If the mining/refining (both?) operations remained intact during the war, the world would've remained a strategic asset. Glassed in the 2540s.


 * Ament / Gliese 69 system
 * Solaris - a minor colony revitalized to some extent after the war due to its opportune location as a waystation of the Pegasus Traverse.


 * Bhaakto / HR 511 system
 * Alluvion - former industrial and military center attacked by Thel 'Vadamee.


 * Iota Persei system
 * Iota - known for the bloody UNSC's final retreat from the colony.


 * Sigma Draconis system
 * Fumirole - invaded, but survived total glassing. Due to the system's location, the UNSC prioritized industrial reconstruction and bolstered its military presence post-war. Connected via sliplane to Epsilon Eridani, Draco, and 26 Draconis.

Apollo Sector

 * 85 Pegasi system
 * Monsoon - A high-gravity world named for its tropical rains and dense vegetation. Home to a bewildering array of native biota, some of which impeded colonization; namely, native bacteria and the spores of many of the local flora are highly toxic to humans and other Earth fauna. Rather than destroy the native ecosystem via terraforming, the planet was declared a nature sanctuary and the small human presence was largely of a scientific nature.


 * Iota Pegasi system
 * Tiamat - anomalous gas giant. The Tiamat system has attracted salvagers to its former colonies and a small group of ex-Covenant fanatics seemingly interested in Tiamat.
 * Bolder - moon of Tiamat and former agri-world. Glassed beyond recovery.
 * Calvary - former UNSC outpost-world and minor mining outpost.


 * Siaya / HD 166 system
 * Tortuga - an airless moon with a single major port city within an enclosed canyon, Tortuga has become an independent free trade port along the Pegasus Traverse.


 * Titawin / Upsilon Andromedae system
 * New Holland
 * Laguna - A colonized moon of a gas giant set up since the war. Has a population under 10 million by 2565.


 * Paris / 54 Piscium system
 * Paris IV - conquered by the Covenant in a protracted siege. The site of a major defensive line in its region.

Tannhauser Sector

 * Heiles / 39 Tauri system
 * Trinity


 * Nussbaum / 104 Tauri system
 * Backwoods - A relatively minor colony. Backwoods suffered only localized glassing, and many of the original settlers as well as others sought to reclaim the colony after the war.

Pelagius Sector

 * 56 Aurigae system
 * Verent - a colony founded right before the Human-Covenant War. Few of its population escaped the attack.

Nomos Sector

 * 50 Persei system - stopover of the Perseus Way, linking to Avalon and Alpha Aurigae.
 * Marrow - orbits the gas giant 50 Persei VI.

Tychus Sector

 * Pi Ursae Minoris system
 * Sansar


 * Draco system (HD 193664) - connected via the Draco Trunk to Sigma Draconis and Eta Draconis.
 * Draco III - an ocean world known for its gold-tinted seas. The Covenant conducted an infamous massacre of its population by hunting Unggoy and Kig-Yar, which led to the SPARTAN-IIs wiping out the Covenant forces. Suffered moderate damage in subsequent glassing but was prioritized for recolonization, along with the establishment of a UNSC base due to the system's strategic location.


 * Frisco system
 * Tirol

Summa Sector
Site of a deep-space incident in 2528.


 * 51 Pegasi / Helvetios system - currently a waystation along the Pegasus Traverse, the 51 Pegasi system formerly hosted a minor human presence, mostly in the form of research and mining before being taken over by the Covenant in 2539.
 * Dimidium / Bellerophon / 51 Pegasi b - the firsty exoplanet to be discovered by mankind, Dimidium is a "hot Jupiter", a gas giant orbiting close to its star.
 * Pegasi Delta - an arid, inhospitable moon, Pegasi Delta is nonetheless unusually large and temperate for a satellite orbiting a hot Jupiter. Its surface regolith and oceans are rich in light elements, which it is constantly bombarded with from both 51 Pegasi and Dimidium. Though uncomfortably hot at the best of times, the satellite retains a tenuous yet semi-breathable atmosphere thanks to primitive photosynthetic life present in the oceans. The moon's surface is scorching hot and blasted by radiation while on the day side of Dimidium. Conditions remain hostile even when Pegasi Delta passes in the gas giant's shadow, but during this time, humans can survive on the surface with minimal protection for a short duration. However, the levels of radiation far exceeded safe limits for habitation despite Pegasi Delta's robust magnetic field. It is likely that Pegasi Delta was formerly an inner planet of the 51 Pegasi system captured into Dimidium's orbit as it migrated inward, and may have been more hospitable in the ancient past. Pegasi Delta had been charted by human explorers and the system had a low-key presence comprised mostly of independent miners and researchers before it was taken over by the Covenant. In the early-to-mid 2540s, the moon housed a Covenant refinery destroyed by SPARTAN-III Beta Company in Operation: TORPEDO. Pegasi Delta has been largely uninhabited since, though pirates and salvagers are known to have used it as a stopover, and a corporation associated with the Phoenix Initiative has contemplated the possibility of establishing a fuel mining operation there.
 * Salient - a minor moon of Dimidium home to a waystation established since the war, built partly on former Covenant infrastructure established since the destruction of the Pegasi Delta refinery.


 * Ensei / 6 G Piscium system
 * Long Shot - reclaimed after the HCW, became a military outpost and expansion stopover.


 * Tay system
 * Dundee

Gandhari Sector

 * Chi Ceti system
 * Chi Ceti IV - Housed UNSC mining operations and ONI's Damascus Materials Testing facility. Was attacked by the scouting frigate Unrelenting in 2525, which saw the SPARTAN-IIs use their new Mjolnir suits to destroy it. The Damascus Facility was abandoned during the battle, with its data cores wiped. The system was since unoccupied due to being compromised to the Covenant, though a minor UNSC presence was reestablished post-war.


 * Sigma Ceti system
 * Behemoth - Former Covenant outpost world destroyed by a UNSC counterattack late in the war.

Anderson Sector

 * 9 Aurigae system
 * Leviathan Ring - Covenant shipyard-complex destroyed in the final months of the war.


 * Algol system - binary star system.
 * Algolis - former military-industrial centre, home to a weapons research facility. Located in the Algol System, Anderson Sector, Sector 4.

Clavain Sector

 * Avalon / 12 Persei system
 * Nouveau Montreal - a small, fairly insignificant Outer Colony that had the fortune of being spared the war even as other worlds around it burned. Likely saved by its obscurity, though refugees from its neighborhood flowed in throughout the last decade of the war. Assumed newfound importance in the post-war era as the only world left standing in its sector, though its government remains ill-equipped to handle the influx of commerce and people through the system. To prevent its own economy from collapsing, the world has made deals with post-Covenant entities, with a Chikri-Merkaa Conflux-based spacer guild aiding in the reconstruction and expansion of its orbital docks. This will later make it a fairly popular base of operations for Outer Vigil ships operating in the Perseus-side Joint-Occupation Zone.

Amari Sector

 * Eta Draconis system
 * Oban - used as a place to resettle refugees after the Human-Covenant War, used as a staging ground for UNSC Navy exercises. Has a population under 10 million by 2565.


 * Eta Ursae Minoris system

Anvar Sector

 * Lysander system
 * Far Isle - Destroyed with overwhelming nuclear bombardment in 2490. Mostly unoccupied since then.

Verso Sector

 * 34 G Tauri system - hosted a former Covenant outpost

Handel Sector

 * HD 40979 - hosted a Covenant base destroyed in a UNSC counterattack c. the late 2540s.


 * Quyen system
 * Sangam - a collection of asteroids originally mined by the Covenant during the war and since settled largely by refugees from Sector 4. Became more important as a waystation for the Pleiades Corridor.

Leggat Sector

 * Alamer system
 * Scrimshaw - A cold desert world with a striking appearance resembling patterned ivory; home to a minor colony.


 * Rubicon system
 * Cusp - A barren world housing a minor human colony established since the war as a waystation of the Pleiades Corridor route, Cusp was founded as a UNSC Naval outpost intended to police the unofficial settlements, trade ports and pirates operating in the system since the war, as well as to support missions further out along the Pleiades Corridor. The route's strategic and commercial value quickly made Cusp one of the fastest-growing hubs of the region as the UNSC struggled to keep up with the unsanctioned elements operating in the Theian Crescent. By 2565, its population was approaching 10,000, and the establishment of mining and fuel harvesting operations across the Rubicon system was well underway.
 * Typhon - A former human mining colony later host to a Covenant supply base eliminated in a counteroffensive in the later years of the war. Scavengers and pirates made their home in the devastated Covenant and human infrastructure afterward.


 * Taube system - minor waystation system.

Trautmann Sector

 * Athi system
 * Eldoret - Minor agri-world. Has a population under 10 million by 2565.

Elbrus Sector

 * Pozar system - waystation of the Pleiades Corridor.

Hoberman Sector

 * Glasir system
 * Losing Hand - initially consisted of a small, semi-unofficial fringe settlement with an independence-minded population. A world with a primarily oceanic environment with little in the way of large landmasses, it only has a relatively narrow habitable band around the equator and a relatively cool climate, whereas much of the northern and southern hemispheres are covered in ice and have frigid temperatures. Any possible landmasses beneath the ice sheets are largely hypothetical. A terraforming company has contemplated the possibility of warming up the planet to free up more space for habitation, but melting the ice sheets would cover the few landmasses the planet currently has. As such, development has stalled under the Phoenix Initiative, though the planet has seen immigration by miscellaneous small groups, mostly of refugees, which settled on archipelagos across the planet.

Tangaroa Sector

 * Bouvet system
 * Furthest Point - Has a population under 10 million by 2565.

Anodos Sector

 * Gaudi system
 * Amethyst Skies - established after the war around a former Covenant ingress outpost; notable multi-species presence.

Marquand Sector

 * Arona system
 * Rholaan - A garden world hosting a Covenant outpost whose former occupiers still remain though have ceased hostilities, Rholaan was discovered by the Covenant based on falsified Operation: WORM BOX data. While monitored by the UNSC, Rholaan is too far from major UNSC centers of development to be contemplated for settlement for the moment.

Skaldi Sector

 * Skaldi 342 - An unremarkable star with no habitable or resource-rich planets around 60ly spinward of the closest human colonies that had previously only been catalogued in automated sky surveys. In 2547, telescopes picked up evidence of a colossal relativistic impact on the system's second planet, and the Prowler was sent to investigate. The system hosted a small research outpost to investigate the extragalactic artifact responsible for the collision between 2551 and 2559, before being abandoned after the station's crew elected to try and eject the artifact from the system. The small infrastructure base in the system has been proposed for use as a stepping stone for further expansion into the spinward reaches of the Orion arm.

}}