/halt

Pause the running mission. As of v0.4 the canonical way to halt is via the CLI, which kills the entire process tree including in-flight Driver/Inspector children — not just the runner Node process.

Two modes

• Graceful (default): SIGTERM the runner → wait 5s → SIGKILL if still alive. The runner's signal handler also kills any active claude -p children, so the whole tree is gone within ~5 seconds. Mission state is saved as paused.
• Force (--force): Skip the grace period — SIGKILL immediately. Use when you can't wait the 5 seconds.

Procedure

Step 1: Check State

Read .chariot/state.json.

• status: "running" → can pause
• status: "paused" and runner_pid is null → "Already paused."
• status: "completed" → "Mission already completed."
• No file → "No active mission."

Step 2: Invoke the CLI

Don't try to kill the runner from this session — invoke the chariot CLI which does the right thing (PID tree termination, grace period, state update, child cleanup):

node {plugin_root}/bin/chariot.js halt

Or with force:

node {plugin_root}/bin/chariot.js halt --force

The CLI:

1. Marks state as paused (intent of record)
2. Sends SIGTERM to runner_pid (or SIGKILL if --force)
3. Polls for up to 5 seconds for graceful exit
4. SIGKILLs if still alive after grace
5. Clears runner_pid from state
6. Logs to worklog

Step 5: Log

Append to .chariot/worklog.md:

- [HH:MM:SS] **halt** Mission paused (user request). Runner stopped.

Step 6: Report

Chariot paused.

Progress: {completed}/{total} ({percent}%)
Current task: Task {N.M} — {title}
Remaining: {count} tasks

Run /chariot:resume-mission to continue.

Step 7: End

End your response immediately. Do not do any additional work.