Spartans, the resident super soldiers of the Halo franchise, have come to define the series since the world first laid eyes on the green-armored, faceless hero of Master Chief 20 years ago. Since then, Xbox’s signature franchise has grown to include many more armor-clad titans like Halo 5’s Jameson Locke, Halo: Reach’s Noble Six, and most recently, Halo Infinite’s Laurette Agryna.
While it’s not apparent how involved Agryna will be in Halo Infinite's campaign, if at all, the game's multiplayer trailers make it clear that she’ll be a major player in said mode as the leader of the Spartan Academy. The multiplayer mode's Season 1 trailer also offered a bit of insight into this brand new character’s background — specifically, her motivation for becoming a Spartan.
Halo Infinite: The Origins of Laurette Agryna
As seen in Halo Infinite’s Gamescom 2021 trailer, Agryna makes her living training incoming Spartan recruits, but it wasn’t always that way. Cut between shots of the Spartan commander instructing her trainees is footage of a young Agryna struggling to survive in a Covenant-occupied city. While running for shelter, the teenage Spartan-to-be nearly comes face to face with a trio of Brutes; the situation worsens once one of them spots her.
Thankfully, a pack of Halo's iconic Spartans arrives just in time. As one of them shields Agryna from gunfire using an overshield, the others begin to quell the Brutes, giving Agryna a chance to run for cover. During her escape, however, she’s knocked unconscious by a stray plasma grenade. Luckily, the Spartans are still standing by the time she wakes up, after which they proceed to escort her to safety. It’s almost certain that this particular incident is the one that motivated Agryna to become a Spartan later in her life. Based on her own experience of being saved at a young age, she likely saw it as an opportunity to defend those who can’t defend themselves.
One noteworthy trait of Agryna’s is that she has a prosthetic leg as an adult. The trailer doesn’t draw too much attention to it, but eagle-eyed viewers can see it any time the Spartan’s lower body is in frame. The circumstances surrounding the character’s loss of limb have yet to be revealed, but it’s possible such an event could be further explored either in Halo Infinite’s campaign, or in future seasons of the game's multiplayer.
What Kind of Spartan is Laurette Agryna?
Agryna’s path to becoming a Spartan differs greatly from the likes of Halo’s other notable super soldiers like Master Chief or Noble Six. As the Spartan program has developed, how one becomes a Spartan has changed too. Master Chief — a Spartan-II — had a particularly unethical upbringing. He was abducted from his home as a child, and upon reaching puberty, he was subjected to extensive physical augmentations. Furthermore, Chief was one of the luckier ones; many of the children brought into the Spartan-II program were killed by the augmentation process. The Spartan-III program was able to lessen the augmentation procedure's mortality rate, but maintained its predecessor’s questionable recruitment practice.
But the UNSC’s Spartan-IV program, which Agryna belongs to, eliminated the previous programs’ exploitative use of children. The updated, safer augmentation procedure now allows adults to become Spartans, enabling combat-seasoned soldiers to become even more effective on the battlefield. Notable Spartan converts include Halo 5’s protagonist, Spartan Jameson Locke, as well as the core cast of Halo 3: ODST, nearly all of whom are Spartan-IVs as of Halo 5.
Like the story behind her prosthetic leg, it’s unclear when Agryna became a Spartan-IV. In fact, information is very limited on this character. That said, given her prominence in Halo Infinite’s trailers, it seems like only a matter of time before she gets fully fleshed out.
Halo Infinite will launch on December 8, 2021 for PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.