Project SUNZI

Project SUNZI was a highly advanced biological development program overseen by the Office of Naval Intelligence's heavily classified Biological Warfare Division with the intention of creating a highly lethal and efficient virus strain.
== History ==
By 2548, the Office of Naval Intelligence and the United Nations Space Command saw the deteriorating state of the ongoing war against the Covenant Empire and became increasingly desperate for a way to deliver a decisive, shattering blow to the Covenant and their war effort. Alongside many other programs that were already ongoing or were being greenlit, Project SUNZI was initially proposed as Project HYGIEIA, a program intended to develop a highly efficient medical serum for the rapid healing of major injuries, but was quickly retooled into Project SUNZI after it proved unpopular among the board of directors.
Projcet SUNZI began development in February of 2849 and was initially based upon the long-extinct Ebola virus, however the project was soon expanded to begin development on several other already extant viruses, such as Rabies and African trypanosomiasis. The outcomes of testing were, at the beginning, unpromising and very little was gained in the early days of the project. 
By March of 2552, Project SUNZI had successfully managed to modify aspects of Rabies and Ebola, creating an artificial virus with a lethality rate of almost 96%. This virus, given the name RESHEF, after the ancient deity of plague and war, proved incredibly promising, however it was incredibly difficult and costly to manufacture and the process was extremely lengthy, making it inefficient for deployment on a mass scale against the Covenant, but despite it's inherent drawbacks a plan for a field test of the virus was devised, codenamed Operation: ULTIMA. A number of Spartan-IIs were considered for this operation, but ultimately it came down to two - Rose-788 and Theo-783. However, due to certain circumstances, Theo-783 was chosen to perform the operation with a number of Spartan-IIIs rather than with the other Spartan-II, and while successful, they endured heavy casualties. The operation was a major success and a breakthrough for the Biological Warfare Division, the virus itself managing to eradicate tens of thousands of Covenant lifeforms very quickly before it was quarantined.
A second batch of RESHEF had been developed by November of the same year, however the war came to a close soon after and the project was deemed unnecessary, being shut down and all related material being highly classified or destroyed. RESHEF was transferred into the arsenal of the BWD and would be utilised several times over the coming eight years between the end of the Human-Covenant War and the Forefather War, though in small amounts and primarily against isolated groups of insurrectionists. An accident during the deployment of a small dosage of RESHEF in late 2559 resulted in a large number of friendly casualties and ended the active deployment of RESHEF as the limited number of available vaccines made it an existential threat if deployed improperly.
== Products ==
=== RESHEF ===
RESHEF was an artificial virus developed by modifying certain aspects of Rabies and Ebola with a lethality rate of upwards of 96% for most species and of 99.88% for Humans. It's largest deployment was during Operation: ULTIMA in which it eradicated tens of thousands of Covenant military personnel, and several subsequent deployments during the post-war period saw the destruction of multiple insurrectionist cells. 
=== Trypanosomiasis II ===
Trypanosomiasis II was a modified strain of African trypanosomiasis, however unlike RESHEF it proved to be both inefficient and almost impossible to manufacture. A side-effect of Trypanosomiasis was inducing intense diarrhea, a sympton of the original virus.
=== Trypanosomiasis III ===
Trypanosomiasis III was an attempt to make Trypanosomiasis II both more lethal and easier to produce. Setbacks caused by the rotation of personnel from the T-III program to RESHEF saw the project suffer several delays and inevitably it was considered a failure when the final product failed to live up to the expectations of the overseeing committee. Following the end of Project: SUNZI, T-III was leaked publicly by the high-profile criminal and insurrectionist Kayode Adetola, however no further details about the project were released.
=== EBV-Lyssavirus ===
EBV-Lyssavirus was an offshoot of the earlier stages of RESHEF and was in many ways far more lethal and efficient than RESHEF itself. However, it had several insurmountable drawbacks, such as the almost impossible-to-replicate conditions required to manufacture the virus and the extreme length of the manufacturing process. All samples were destroyed following the closure of Project SUNZI, and the formula and instructions to create the virus were wiped from existence.
== Trivia ==
* SUNZI is a reference to Sun Tzu, the author of the Art of War.