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"I'm afraid we have never been able to keep specimens alive very long, they tended to be badly injured when we received them, and those that were conscious tended to be very difficult to examine..."
Said the Professor as they entered a new room.
It was very long, more like a corridor.
The lights came on, revealing a row of blast doors along the left wall.
"...but I'm sure these will be enlightening enough." The Professor added.
He walked to the first blast door, on it there was a brass plaque, surprisingly ornate for such an ugly door.
On this plaque it was inscribed,
'Gibbaedorsum'
and below it in brackets,
'(Grunt)'
The Professor put his eye to a retinal scanner.
Archimedes voice came.
"Access granted, unlocking security safeguards. Identity confirmed as Piotri Dimitri Arkus Zolkievich, Head Professor of the Covenant Technological Research Laboratories for the Office of Naval Intelligence."
The door hissed up efficiently, revealing a squat little creature encased in what looked like solid glass.
It was a little more than a metre tall, it's little head was covered with downy blue fur and it bore a chunky gasmask, from above the mask were a pair of wide, black eyes. It was hunched over, and it's fore-arms came down to it's knees. The Forearms were really quite muscular, while the upper arm was rather skinny. The legs were of a similar structure. Protruding from each elbow was a large horn-like growth, and also from each knee. The legs were short and stubby, ending in three-toed paw-like feet.
It wore a red little suit of armour upon it's torso, and from the back of the armour there was built a thick dorsal-like fin.
The Professor observed the Chancellor's expression curiously, but was slightly surprised to see she seemed to accept the appearance of the creature without any outward reaction.
The Chancellor commented.
"So, that little thing is one of the creatures responsible for giving us so much grief? I dare say even I could be a match for one of those creatures in a fight."
The Professor rubbed the ridge of his nose.
"Uh, well they are actually quite tough and resiliant little 'creatures' physically, they potentially could give human combatants real difficulty fighting. The problem is the development of their brains. The very central part of the brain is devoted to reactions, and in ratio to a human mind, the Gibbaedorsum has a far bigger ratio of this to the rest of it's mind. This doesn't mean it has better reactions, (although it's olfactory senses are better than ours.) What it means is that the creature can't control it's 'fight or flight' instincts very competently. So if one of these creatures gets frightened- they're going to run. It's also interesting to note that despite this, the rear lobes of this creature's brain are probably the most similar to our own out of all the Covenant races.
They breath methane, and seem to be adapted to a very cold environment. Their metabolic rate is very high, and we would estimate their lifespans as about twenty years. They have vocal chords similar to that of a dog. One of the noticeably different aspects of these creatures is how they feed. Though they have their windpipes in their necks, opening from their mouths, they do not feed from their mouths. It seems the environment they are native to meant any food they consumed was frozen so solid that peristalsis would be difficult through a neck. So these creatures actually feed from a sort of socket-like mouth on the left side of their chests, which has a more direct route to their thick-lined stomachs. In fact, you can see the feeding socket exposed in the chestplate. You should also note that these creature's stomachs have very powerful juices, I dare say they could digest some of the most unpalatable things.
From what we've been told these creatures are the foot soldiers, the canon fodder. They're sent in hundreds to overwhelm enemies."
The Chancellor, stared intently at the little alien, the Professor wasn't sure if it was contempt or fascination that sparked in her pupils.
"Well, on to the next one then?" Probed the Professor.
The Chancellor startled slightly, then nodded.
"Oh! Yes of course Professor."

The next door had engraved upon it,
"Cristacalvus"
Below it in brackets was written,
"(Jackal)"
The Professor had his eye scanned again, and once again, Archimedes began.
"Access granted, unlocking security safeguards. Identity confirmed as Piotri Dimitri Arkus Zolkievich, Head Prof-"
The Professor cut in,
"Thank you Archimedes, but the aural procedure protocol is not required more than once, just open the door."
"Yes, Professor Zolkievich."
The door retracted to reveal a second creature, more hideous than the first, though hardly much taller. It was skinny and frail in appearance, with a mottled-looking skin and a vulture-like head. Two bulbous gold eyes protruded from it's narrow skull, and it's beak-like mouth was lined with many fibrous, razor-sharp teeth. It had a crest of scaly 'feathers' along it's scalp and peculiar hooves on it's feet. In comparison to this unpleasant creature, the previous one looked rather 'cuddly.'
"These creatures have an interesting brain structure also. Apart from it's more developed sense recognition and obviously general superiorities in terms of sentience, this creature's mind is surprisingly similar to that of a crocodile. The eyes have retina with an extremely diverse set of rods and cones, these creatures are able to see in infra-red, and have near-panoramic vision, with about a 30 degree blind spot directly behind the skull. It too, like the Gibbaedorsum, is a very reaction based-creature, it shows excellent reactions, while it seems to lack the ability to 'improvise' in a battlefield situation. The lack of the ability to adapt well to new situations is a particularly lizard-like trait. From what we have been told, these creatures almost always have the round shield devices I showed you in the firing range, and a Covenant plasma pistol. Also they have been known to hold their ground when badly outnumbered, (in a similar fashion to a crocodile I might add.) Despite this, their muscle contractions and overall appearance are very bird-like, jerky and quick. They also have very thick blood, possibly as these creature's skin is surprisingly tough but does not heal easily, and therefore thick blood would be a plus. You can see that these creatures are pure carnivores, I would assume scavengers, as they do not appear to have evolved any particular physical attributes that would make them very competent predators.
They seem to be an assassin or scout race, also perhaps serving as frontline defence."
The Chancellor nodded, and the Professor saw her eyes flicker briefly on to the next door. It was not every day you saw an alien, let alone several kinds, she was eager to see them all.
"On to the next, I suppose." Said the Professor.

On this doors plaque there was engraved,
"Torusconstatum"
and below it in brackets,
"(Hunter)"

The scientists glanced at one another knowingly, this was certainly the most physically impressive creature.
When the door retracted and revealed the behemoth inside it the Chancellor stepped back in shock.
This was a huge size jump from the previous two creatures.
The Professor allowed himself a brief smirk, he too had been surprised when this creature had arrived at his labs, ONI had had to make a custom cryo container to send it to them in.
It was an armoured monster, like a melding of a medieval knight with some kind of exotic artillery.
Most of it's body was covered in it's steely blue armour, in some places you could see exposed parts of the creature's contrasting orange body. It's head was small in comparison to it's body, hardly exposed, the whole top of it's head was shielded by a cap of armour, from beneath the rim of it there was merely a small patch of orange, and a pair of enraged, electric blue eyes.
On one arm it sported a large canon like the one that had been on display in the firing range. On the other there was a daunting plate of what might as well have been part of a warship's bulkhead, it was huge. It was shaped like a cross between a shield and a weighty broadsword, and looked designed to plough it's way through ranks of soldiers.
The Chancellor said slowly, horrified.
"So these are what we send our soldiers to fight?"
The Professor didn't answer, the Chancellor didn't need an answer to that question. Instead he began to talk about the interesting points of the creature's physiology.
"These creatures are not quite as bulky as they appear under their armour, but they are still incredibly muscle-bound. Their thick skeletons have fascinating joints that allow them to extend and contract, and with the addition of their armour this means that in combat they can retract their armour to reduce vulnerability. What baffled us for quite a while was their digestive system, it seemed insufficient to be able to draw enough nutrients to allow them to sustain such muscles, much less actually grow them in the first place. However upon examining the antennae they sport on their backs, we found the answer. These antennae appear to be 'roots' of a description. They have extremely elastic and dense pores to intake nutrients, and tracts similar to those in the small intestine inside them to draw nutrients into the body. Perhaps on these creature's homeworld, when there was a lack of animals or plants to feed on, they simply lied on their backs and plunge these antennae into the soil. Their metabolism is perfectly attuned to this form of sustenance intake, and is capable of creating complex amino acids from simple acids found in the soil, thus allowing the phenomenal muscle growth. Their eyesight is notably poor, as the retina appear to be incredibly sensitive, and a film across the exposed eye filters out most UV light. These creature's brains are nearly as small as that of the Cristacalvus,. However the Torusconstatum brain seems to have developed not in the characteristic fashion of a predator, but actually more like a grazing animal. It seems all that muscle bulk is environmentally required if perhaps not to overpower prey then maybe to uproot trees or compete for mates, we aren't entirely sure. However it is certainly the armour that makes these creatures so powerful, without it they would be simple enough to defeat. You see with all of that muscular tissue, they have an awful amount of capillaries flowing through every part of their bodies. If you were to puncture one of these creatures it would certainly bleed to death soon enough, with such a high blood pressure going to supply it's muscles with oxygen. From what we have been told from field reports, these creatures always come in pairs. I believe that each of the pairs are actually mates, who will stay together for most of their lives. Perhaps mating requires an extensive prologue of companionship to assure compatibility.
I don't think we really have a military term for the role these creatures play in the Covenant army, I would probably call them an assault race, able to mash their way through swarms of soldiers."
The Professor finished, and paused for a moment to admire the powerful appearance of the creature. Finally he said,
"Let's move on to the final specimen."

The Chancellor looked upon the final door with wary anticipation, it was obvious to her that these doors were ordered in terms of the specimens' physical size and therefore probable importance within the Covenant caste. Whatever was beyond the door before must be the most impressive.

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