The simple answer is Halos are weapons that were created more than 100,000 BC by an ancient alien race known as the Forerunners. But they are not just any weapon - Halos are a Weapon of Mass Destruction on a galactic scale.
A total of twelve Halos (AKA the Halo Array) was designed to combat a particularly devastating enemy known as the Flood. The Flood come from outside the known galaxy and predate the Forerunners. The Flood are a parasitic life form that feeds on any biological life. Once one Flood spore attaches itself to another being it turns that entity into a zombie-like creature. A single spore can multiply rapidly and can quickly unleash…well…a Flood. Despite their advanced technology and weapon systems the Forerunners had no way of combating the Flood with their conventional weapons.
The Halo Array was the Forerunner's answer to the Flood problem. Here's the catch, firing the Halos did not kill the Flood, it killed the Flood’s food supply. In other words, the Halos were designed to kill all biological life in the galaxy. Like I said, a WMD on a galactic scale.
At the time of the original trilogy of Halo games there were 7 halos in the galaxy. Each one could be activated individually, or all 7 could be activated from a single location known as the “the Ark”. The Ark is located outside the Milky Way Galaxy and is therefore safe from the halos devastating effect. Each Halo installation is supervised by a Monitor - a powerful AI that maintains the functions of the Halo. For reference, 343 Guilty Spark (the floating Orb with the green eye) is a monitor that appeared in the original trilogy. Halo 3 culminates in Master Chief arriving at the Ark to shut down the remaining Halos before they fire.
So what happened to the other 5 Halos that the Forerunners built? They were destroyed when a rampant monitor took control of the Halo Array (to be discussed in a later post) and tried to fire them near the forerunners capital world. In trying to prevent the Array from being fired, the Forerunners destroyed 5 of the Halos.
There was a great deal of in-fighting among the Forerunners over the creation of the Halos. It turns out not all Forerunners were happy with a plan to defeat the Flood by destroying all known life in the Galaxy. In fact, many found the very notion to run counter to the “mantle”, the guiding principle that dictated the way Forerunners lived. Think of it as the forerunner equivilant to the 10 commandments. The “mantle is never fully explained, but the Forerunners seem to believe it involves respecting and preserving all known life.
A high ranking member of Forerunner society know as the Master Builder was the primary proponent of the Halos. A military figure ( and the Master builder primary rival) known as the Didact opposed the creation of the halos. The Didact argued that the Flood could be contained in "Shield Worlds". The Didact's wife, an influential Forerunner known as the Librarian, wanted to ensure that regardless of the approach taken to defeat the Flood all known life would be preserved - one way or another.
The Master Builder convinced the Forerunner governing council that the Flood threat was too great to risk containment. More drastic measures were necessary. As a result the Council commissioned efforts to build the ultimate weapon...a weapon that would eventually become the Halos.
However, as a compromise the Librarian convinced the Council to grant her the authority to collect specimens of every species in the known galaxy and keep them safe. Her goal was to ensure that the Galaxy could be repopulated if unleashing the power of the Halos ever became necessary The only safe place from the Halos effect were the Halos themselves. The safest place was located outside the galaxy at the “Ark”. The librarian collected numerous species and maintained them on various Halo Installations, including the Ark.
The Halo Array has been fired only once. Roughly 100,000 BC, after expending all other options to defeat the flood, the Didact (who originally opposed the creation of the Halos) ordered the Array (7 Halos) be fired as a last ditch effort to save the Galaxy from the Flood. As a result the Forerunner species and all other life in the Galaxy was eliminated. The only evidence that remained of the Forerunners existence was their advanced technology - including the Halos, their ultimate weapon.
So the Halos were and are a galactic weapon of mass destruction, that ultimately lead to all biological life in the Galaxy being destroyed. However. the Halos were also effectively zoos that guaranteed life could return to the galaxy after they were fired.
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