Forsaken Solitude

Forsaken Solitude was a maximum security prison asteroid located in the far reaches of Sangheili space. The small facility was used exclusively for criminals guilty of crimes so heinous no redemption was believed possible. Due to its location on the far edge of the Covenant Empire and its toxic methane atmosphere, few Covenant databases even bothered to include it as a viable destination. Prisoners at Forsaken Solitude were doomed to live out the rest of their lives in tiny, isolated cells, never again to emerge from the darkness. With the breaking of the Covenant during the , however, the organizations paying for and supplying it disappeared almost overnight, and in desperation, the prison's masters advertised the facility to the strongest emergent factions. Quickly, its cells were filled to overcrowding with the vilest scum of all species, and its jailors—once the honorably-sworn keepers of the most blasphemous heretics—became discontent mercenaries.
When this proved not enough to sustain the facility, its guardians had the good fortune of discovering the asteroid held rare mineral crystals underground, and wasted no time pressing their charges into service as slave labor. Inmates were thrown into the dark crags and tunnels beneath Forsaken Solitude's surface and denied food or water until they returned with a crystal. Those who failed would either be executed upon return or starve to death in the crevices below, and being thrown back time and again ensured each prisoner would eventually succumb. Stories of its fearsome conditions spread across the galactic frontier, becoming one of the most notorious and dreaded prisons in the galaxy, until in 2556 when it became host to two particular inmates: Tal 'Zerex, a Sangheili gladiator, and Gavin Dunn, a common smuggler. With outside help from Dunn's crewmates aboard the Chancer V, the pair broke out in an escape that utterly destroyed the facility, rendering the site practically unsalvageable.
Abandoned by those who still had ties to it, the prison asteroid was uninhabited for more than a year, its coordinates almost forgotten until it was rediscovered by a group of pirates who refurbished the facility and used it to imprison hundreds of captives, including renegade Amber-G330. A short time later, Forsaken Solitude was recaptured by the Storm Covenant's Kru'desh Legion under the command of Simon-G294. Simon freed Amber, recruiting her and the other inmates into his ranks. Kru'desh warriors would later fill Amber's cell with the terrorist known as the Reaper in retaliation for his attempts to commit xenocide against the Sangheili.
Category:Covenant