Michael Robson

"If this really is Humanity’s final stand, I'm glad to be doing the standing."

- From Michael Robson's Personal Log, dated October 11, 2552

Michael 'Smoke' Robson was an serving with the UNSC  during the. Enlisting in the Marine Corps at age 18, Robson was a career soldier who served throughout much of the war and garnered considerable experience and skill along the way. First seeing combat in 2539 at the Battle of Orchid IV, Robson saw action in dozens of theatres against the Covenant, most notably the Battle of Miridem, Battle of Adrastos,, and the. Robson volunteered for the Orbital Drop Shock Troopers in 2543, being assigned to the 15th Marine Regiment. A member of Alpha Company of the 28th Shock Troops Battalion, Robson was promoted to Gunnery Sergeant and given command of a platoon of twenty ODSTs (4th Platoon Alpha Company) in time to be deployed for the Battle of Earth, as a result of severe casualties sustained by the unit during the Fall of Reach. Although serving admirably through his entire career, his most recognised and distinguished actions occurred during the Battle of Sydney on Earth in late 2552.

Early Life
Michael was born on July 11th, 2520, in a leafy suburb of New Monaco, the capital city of. Michael's early childhood, as he later recalled it, was relatively happy and relaxed, with him being brought up by his firm but loving parents. Robson's mother was an enlisted crewman in the, while his father was a mechanical engineer; however his life was changed on March 1, 2526 when the , a UNSC Frigate his mother was stationed aboard, was destroyed at the , with the loss of all hands. Michael's mild-mannered father, suffering an emotional breakdown and unable to properly care for the six-year old child, sent him to live with his aunt and uncle until he had recovered. Michael stayed with them in a small rural town until he was fifteen; his father never 'recovered', and simply became an incoherent alcoholic who barely recognised his son the few times he visited. Instead he lived with his mother's sister and her husband who, having no children of their own, looked after Michael well. He was a keen sports player at his school and was relatively popular, known for being loud and sarcastic, often in a comical way which endeared him to his peers.

In February 2535, the Covenant launched an, which prompted an evacuation of its civilian population. While making their way to New Monaco's space port with a small contingent of ODSTs including Daniel Funderburg, the group came under brief attack by a Banshee; the craft fired its Fuel Rod Cannon and then moved on. A a number of ODSTs and Michael's carers were killed in the air strike which left him seriously injured; Funderburg was then instrumental in saving the lives of Robson and several severely wounded Marines, getting their badly damaged transport Warthog roadworthy and rushing them to help in New Monaco. Robson's condition was stabilised by the time he was aboard an outbound civilian transport, and he was among most of Jericho VII's population in being evacuated successfully; Robson and Funderburg would remain close friends for decades to come. Michael never found out if his father made it to a port or attempted to escape the planet; however, his name was not among lists of those killed, missing or saved.

Enlisting and First Battles
After the evacuation and with nowhere to go, Michael was placed in a UNSC foster home on. In 2538 at the age of eighteen, he joined the UNSC Marines, as military service was mandatory for freedom from foster care. Michael was assigned to the 65th Marine Regiment and stationed on the UNSC Absolution. After a mandatory period of three years, Michael chose to remain in the armed forces, deciding that it was home as much as any place was.

Battle of Orchid IV (2539)
Michael's first combat took place at the Battle of Orchid IV in August 2539, a short but bloody engagement on the planet of Orchid IV. During the battle, the 65th Marine Regiment along with air assets and armour worked with Colonial Militia forces to hold back the advancing Covenant. The defenders fought for more than a day to prevent the Covenant reaching the planet's urban areas, from where hundreds of civilian transports were waiting to escape. Robson was involved in this fighting throughout the second day of the battle and into the third, with UNSC ground forces taking severe casualties. By 06:00 that morning the last wave of transports was ready to depart, carrying some 110,000 civilians; roughly 350,000 others had already been rescued. However, the Covenant fleet was now in position to completely destroy the last group of transports. Ten of the fourteen UNSC Navy ships emerged from hiding and charged the Covenant vessels, while the remaining four (the UNSC Absolution and three ) retrieved the surviving UNSC military force on the planet; of the 214 civilian vessels, a total of 81 managed to escape, escorted by three of the four Navy ships. The two Marathon-class Cruisers, four UNSC Frigates and four UNSC Destroyers charging the Covenant succeeded in creating a diversion to allow some of the transports to escape, but in return were all destroyed by enemy fire. The world was subsequently glassed by the Covenant, but as a result of the actions of the UNSC Navy and ground forces, almost 300,000 of the planet's 400,000-strong population were evacuated safely.

Skirmish at Iophon (2540)
Robson was later involved in the Skirmish at Iophon, a minor engagement over the lightly populated planet of Iophon. The UNSC Absolution was conducting patrol on the outskirts of the system when it encountered and engaged a lone. The Covenant vessel quickly disabled the cruiser with plasma torpedoes and deployed boarding craft, presumably to obtain the Absolution ' s navigational data. Michael and the ship's contingent of Marines waged a protracted battle in the confines of the vessel, eventually subduing the boarders though not without severe casualties to the Absolution's embarked personnel. Reinforcements from Iophon in the form of two UNSC Carriers and five UNSC Destroyers destroyed the Covenant vessel, deploying Marines to the Absolution and ending the costly firefight. Though the Divinity-class Destroyer was defeated, it destroyed a carrier and two destroyers before it succumbed and also broadcasted an emergency transmission into space, presumably signalling its position. The local commander, Rear Admiral John Douglas, was authorised to begin abandoning the planet; five days later a probe left behind reported before it was destroyed that at least three dozen Covenant vessels slipped into the system and moved towards the planet, apparently in glassing formation.

ODST Service
Robson volunteered for the s (ODSTs) in early 2543, having served with the UNSC Marine Corps for five years. The training and selection process was prolonged and rigorous; a brutal basic physical 'training' phase lasted for twelve weeks, which essentially served purely to reduce the numbers of the trainees. By the end of this period almost half of Robson's fellow ODST hopefuls- all experienced combat veterans just as he was- had washed out. Following this was another twelve-week long period of training, in which the ODST candidates were re-taught many things they learned in basic training, including drill, marksmanship/riflemanship, close quarters skills, first aid knowledge, covert operations, aptitude with various pieces of equipment, navigation/orienteering and many other skills. At the end of this period, after a full six months of training, was a 48-hour long continuous physical and mental aptitude test Mental/Physical Fitness Test (M/PFT) in which the skills and abilities of Robson and his fellow recruits were perpetually strained and pushed beyond their limits. At the end of the six-month long ODST training program, Robson was one of 78 individuals to pass both training phases- out of an initial six hundred candidates.