Lone Wolves was the second season of Halo Infinite's multiplayer component. Though it has already ended, it introduced potential narrative beats that may be referenced in the Halo universe going forward. And while the future of the franchise as a whole and the development of Master Chief's story is in question, we can still look back on this second season and ponder on what it may mean for the future of the lore.
Despite being the primary antagonists of both Halo Wars 2 and Halo Infinite, there's still a lot we don't know about the Banished. Where do the events of Infinite leave the faction, and does Atriox's surprise survival revealed in a post-credits scene mean he will return? What doom does this spell for the remaining UNSC forces and Spartan trainees? Read on if you want to glean a few details from what little narrative content was revealed during the Lone Wolves season of Halo Infinite.
5 Iratus Is The First Banished AI Ever Made
If you're familiar with any of the lore within the Halo universe, you'll know that despite being technologically superior for the majority of the games, the Covenant had mediocre AI (artificial intelligences) at best. Where Cortana was zooming in and out of Covenant battle networks like it was nobody's business, the Covenant possessed lackluster shipboard AIs that barely merited inclusion in the game campaigns.
Infinite has completely changed this with the introduction of the first Banished AI, Iratus. During Infinite's second season, Lone Wolves, we find that a Spartan captured Iratus by inserting the AI's chip into his armor. Iratus is bristly and aggressive, a fun addition to the roster of AI voices you can select in Infinite's multiplayer. However, he's also a dramatic shift in technological prowess for the Banished. Based off a Brute's neural matrix instead of a human's, the implications of this might be more portentous than you'd expect.
4 Iratus Was Constructed Using Data From Lux Voluspa
This isn't directly mentioned in Halo Infinite's multiplayer cinematics. Instead, players need to collect this info from "intel drops" on Halo Waypoint and corresponding YouTube videos. Apparently, a company that deals with creating AIs came under cyberattack. This company, called Lux Voluspa, had been researching what it would be like to have AIs based off of neural matrices other than a human's. Nothing bad could come of that, right?
Obviously things went wrong. The Banished infiltrated Lux Voluspa using unprecedented cybernetic means and stole one of the matrices based off a Brute. They then used this to craft Iratus, and the rest, as they say, is history.
3 Camber Is Now A Banished Shipbreaking Outpost
Breaker is a map introduced during Halo Infinite's second season. It's a nifty multiplayer map, split into roughly two halves that are divided by a player-incinerating blaster that shoots a beam of plasma energy across a gaping chasm that you can risk crossing in a well-timed Warthog leap. It's a ton of fun, but what you might not know is that it's set on a planet that features into the evolving lore Infinite's multiplayer is bringing to the table.
Breaker is a shipbuilding yard that's been broken down, rebuilt, and taken over by the Banished on a planet called Camber. The entire planet was actually a UNSC holding until it got glassed by the Covenant. It's currently occupied by the Banished, but given that Spartans are constantly running training simulations on Breaker, it is possible plans are in the works to drive them out.
2 "Lone Wolf" Spartans Actually Work In Teams
The second season of Halo Infinite's multiplayer was titled "Lone Wolves," and it made it seem like running off and doing your own thing in the middle of a match was the name of the game. Lore-wise, the trailers for this season really hammered home the notion that there were lone Spartans behind enemy lines being bad-asses, and its new game mode, Last Spartan Standing, definitely was the on-theme cherry-on-top.
But despite these notions of going solo, it became clear by the end of Lone Wolves and the beginning of Echoes Within (Infinite's third season), that the "Wolves" work in teams, as Spartans Dinh and Eklund both greet the player's Spartan as "the newest member" of the Wolves. It's just another case of Halo promoting sole heroes (looking at you, Master Chief), when we all know the multiplayer shines when it's a group effort.
1 Spartan Dinh Survived Iratus' Neural Stay
Echoes Within is Halo Infinite's third season, and it confirms that Spartan Dinh survived having Iratus within his neural network. All Spartans have the ability to be paired with an AI, but Iratus was an enemy intelligence, and having him in your head demonstrably proved to be a bad idea, even though it allowed the UNSC to capture and study him. Dinh experienced this first-hand, and cinematics showed him being brought unconscious to the Academy afterward. So in order to draw Iratus out of Dinh, the player Spartan is tasked with running combat simulations on Camber, which would potentially lure Iratus out and contain him.
Echoes Within opens with Dinh grappling with the psychological ramifications of having a Banished AI rattling around his neural interface. The plan to trap Iratus worked, but it seems the AI might have unlocked a deeper mystery for us to uncover. Dinh keeps seeing a closed door in the middle of the desert, and one of the parting shots from Infinite's latest cinematic shows this door appear in the Live Fire multiplayer map. Only time will tell what it means.