Horatio Wolfram

From Halo: Daybreak

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Horatio Aldrich Wolfram
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Biographical information

Nickname:

Wolf

Birthplace:

Princip, New Caucasus Republic, Fjord

Born:

July 17, 2477

Physical information

Species:

Human

Gender:

Male

Height:

189 centimeters (6' 5")

Weight:

88 kilograms (194lb)

Hair color:

Blonde

Eye color:

Blue

Political and military information

Affiliation:

UNSC

Occupation:

  • Special forces
  • Drill instructor

Rank:

Master Chief Petty Officer (E-9)

 

Master Chief Petty Officer Horatio A. "Wolf" Wolfram is a veteran NCO whose involvement with Navy's Special Warfare stretches back to the late 25th century.

Biography[edit | edit source]

A native of the New Caucasus Republic on the Inner Colony of Fjord, Wolfram was raised to love his nation and served in the youth wing of the New Caucasian Home Guard since the age of thirteen. At the time, the planet was embroiled in a civil war between two warring blocs (the New Caucasian Republic and the People's Republic of Greater Ossetia)[1], arising from century-old grudges that stemmed from disputes about colonization and mining rights back in the days of the colony's founding.[2] For over four years, Wolfram fought in intense guerrilla campaigns across the harsh outlands of the New Caucasus Mountain Range, gaining many skills which would prove invaluable in his later life, but also witnessing atrocities which hardened him beyond his years.[3]

New Caucasus suffered a humiliating defeat in the war, cementing Greater Ossetia's status as Fjord's central government. Rather than live under a regime they despised, Wolfram and a number of other New Caucasian loyalists emigrated off-world. Ending up on Reach, penniless and without many skills outside warfare, Wolfram eventually enlisted in the UNSC Marine Corps at the age of nineteen. A toughened veteran in his physical prime, he was undaunted by the UNSC's training regimen and was something of a misfit among the other recruits, most of them being fresh-faced youngsters from civilian backgrounds. Even before he had finished boot camp, his impressive performance caught the eye of Naval Special Warfare and not long after, he was conducting missions for NAVSPECWAR's Development Group.

While his loyalties gradually shifted to the UNSC over the years, Wolfram remained bitter about the New Caucasian defeat for decades to come. Ironically, nearly twenty years later, he led a NAVSPECWAR strike team to eliminate an Ossetian leader, Fjord's (now under the name Greater Ossetia) government having since set their sights on the UNSC as part of the Insurrection movement. This, in turn, destabilized the Ossetian regime and, within ten years' time, allowed a rising movement of New Caucasian partisans to rise to power. Still, the partisan group were largely of a newer generation than Wolfram, and in many cases did not share his former ideals; whatever the case, Wolfram had little interest in going back.

Throughout the Insurrection and later the Covenant War, Wolfram racked up an impressive, if largely classified, combat record. He served in active combat duty up until mid-Covenant War, but the Navy has gradually moved him to non-combat roles due to not only his invaluable expertise but also certain health issues he does his best to hide. Since the mid-2540s, he has served as a NAVSPECWAR DI and operations advisor, and has written or contributed to several Special Warfare manuals which are still in use. He served as a handler for a SPARTAN-III Gamma Company splinter contingent after the company's recall in late 2552 up until mid-2553, when he returned to his duties as a Naval Special Warfare instructor for a time.

Between assignments, he requested leave to visit his homeworld for the first time in decades. He had kept up to date on Fjord's development whenever he could, but what he found still came off as a refreshing reminder of lessons he had learned the hard way. The fiery patriotism and warrior culture of the rough and tumble world of his youth was but a memory, and Fjord had very much become a typical Inner Colony where the foremost matter of interest in the local youth's minds was the mounting anticipation for an upcoming instant, wide-bandwidth FTL Slipnet coverage. The once fierce divide between New Caucasus and Greater Ossetia seemed almost absurdly quaint to the vast majority of the current generation.[4] Still, Wolfram did not actually look back on the Fjord of his youth with any particular fondness; he had realized the folly of the old conflict long ago when viewed against the background of a hundred similar wars throughout the colonies -- a mountain of trivial absurdity capped by the arrival of the Covenant.

In 2556, he was assigned to his current role in the operations personnel of the NAVSPECWAR element attached to the UNSC Battle Group Endymion. His assignment was partly due to his prior experience with several of the six Gamma Company operators who were to be reassigned to the battle group. Wolfram always seemed to know how to deal with different people, and the Gammas were no exception despite being considered something of a hot potato in the Special Forces community. Another consideration was his utilitarian attitude toward the ex-Covenant species, given that Endymion's mission volume intersects the Joint Occupation Zone: while he has no love for the aliens, he is enough of a realist to recognize the necessity of cooperation, an attitude he openly cultivates among the battle group's personnel.

Personality and traits[edit | edit source]

Wolfram in combat gear.

A bit cranky and outspoken with his opinions (more often than not underlined by cynicism toward the present direction of the UNSC), his quirks are not always appreciated by the brass, but none can question the experience he brings to the table. As of 2558, he serves in the operations staff of Battle Group Endymion's Naval Special Warfare detachment, officially in a command and senior advisory role, though he is still known to involve himself directly in the field from time to time.

Wolfram's harsh upbringing informed his outlook on life. Having seen the folly of blind loyalty firsthand and watched everything he once believed in crumble to nothingness, he is rather jaded, but ever a realist. Due to his directness, he is respected more than he is liked, and he can be rather particular in his endeavors to correct inadequate performance wherever he sees it. These days, he often finds himself the senior member of any unit he is assigned to (Battle Group Endymion being no exception), and younger officers (which is, in most cases, virtually any officers present or nearly so) often have the sense to defer to his counsel; he is forgiving of honest inexperience, though he has much less patience for inexperience coupled with delusions of grandeur. He has an eccentric, dry sense of humor and often brings up obscure references to history or classical mythology.

He has a characteristic dislike of custom kit, particularly armor or weapon decoration, viewing such ostentation as amateurish. He makes a point to always use standard-issue equipment himself, and occasionally finds subjects of mild ribbing in instances of oft-liberal application of slogans and "warpaint" on armor and weaponry he encounters. Though Wolfram is rarely bothered enough to actually order a subordinate to clean up their gear, his half-informal and often creatively wry reprimands have encouraged many an operator to give up burgeoning careers in equipment personalization.

Notes[edit | edit source]

  1. Fjord's two (former) major nations can trace their origins back to the two first groups of settlers who arrived on the colony in 2372; named after locations in Earth's Caucasus Mountains due to the majority of the first colonists having ancestry in that general region. More specifically, Greater Ossetia was founded by a mainly Terran colonization group, while the stock of the New Caucasus Republic (in actuality a federation of several sub-states) was more eclectic, with prospective colonists drawn from Earth, the Asteroid Belt, and several Jovian colonies. As a result, while the states and many of the primary locations on Fjord follow a Caucasus- or Eastern European-themed naming convention, German, English, Chinese, and Nordic themes have a substantial representation in both the names and the inhabitants' geographic and ethnic origins (insofar as they are relevant in the first place after nearly three centuries of globalization and intrasystem colonization).
  2. More specifically, the war erupted following the escalation of a localized dispute over a small area of land in a primarily uninhabited highland region. Most historians agree that the crisis was merely an excuse to settle old scores once and for all, and the war would have happened sooner or later anyway. The corrupt and ineffectual CMA did nothing of substance to prevent the war from happening, mostly waiting for the problem to take care of itself -- though the lack of instant interstellar communications was an issue whose impact to colonial political processes should not be understated, the warning signs of the coming conflict had been in the air for years beforehand, giving CMA ample time to prevent all-out war had they truly put any effort to the task.
  3. It is commonly agreed that neither side came out looking squeaky clean from the war, despite both succeeding governments attempting to "smooth out" historical records. War crimes on either side have yet to be properly investigated by an impartial authority, as the CMA, CAA, UEG and UNSC have had their hands full with more pressing conflicts over the better part of the last century. With the Covenant War concluded and Fjord under an integrated UEG authority, investigations could potentially begin -- assuming anyone wants to open up old wounds in the first place.
  4. Fjord served as a UNSC staging area and refugee center during the war, and it was the UEG's firm grip that uplifted the planet from a downward-spiraling economic collapse following a grossly incompetent handling of government funds by the 'New' New Caucasian revolutionary regime. A UNSC political council assumed governing functions on the planet in 2535, and the inhabitants put up very little resistance, having been thoroughly fed up with the alternatives. The colony was one of a small number to be attacked by the Covenant but avoid total annihilation; according to Covenant records released by the Swords of Sanghelios after the war, Fjord may have been inadvertently spared glassing by an inter-ministerial power struggle, which delayed reinforcements from being deployed to the planet after the initial expeditionary task force, and thus prevented the world's invasion from being drawn to completion before the whole planet was forgotten in favor of more "attractive" invasion targets. Following the war, local governance has slowly been transferred from the UNSC emergency government to a relatively tight-knit coalition of local states, under the name Fjordian Cultural Federacy, which retains strong ties to the UEG. Small holdouts of loyalists of the old order remain, but their influence on planetary matters is negligible, and it is commonly assumed they are a dying breed.