What's going on?"
Amidst the fanatical crowd, fluttering flags, towering holographic projections, and rows of robot soldiers with glowing red eyes, Fisher found himself in what seemed to be a most unusual place.
He looked down at himself; his previous assault jacket was gone, replaced by a tight-fitting orange and white spacesuit.
"Found it!" After rummaging through his pockets, Fisher found an ID card that read: "Fisher Adams, First-Class Aviation Officer, Mars Defense Fleet."
"Mars, Settlement Defense Front—what am I doing here?!" Fisher couldn't help but smile wryly as he recalled his memories and understood where he had landed.
Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare is a story about the conflict between Earth's Solar System Alliance and Mars' Settlement Defense Front. The Solar System Alliance (SATO) is essentially the space version of NATO, while the Settlement Defense Front is a totalitarian regime that evolved from the Martian colonial army. As luck would have it, Fisher had landed right in the Settlement Defense Front.
"I'm a villain from the start; how am I supposed to handle this?" Watching the holographic projection of Salen Kotch, the Martian dictator who strongly resembled Jon Snow, spewing rhetoric about Earth's inevitable doom, Fisher could only label him an idiot in his heart.
The plot of Infinite Warfare isn't particularly complex; it's still the same old story of a colony rebelling, only this colony is a bit further away, on Mars.
To achieve independence, the Settlement Defense Front secretly built a fleet. With an undeclared war and effective tactics, they defeated the Solar System Alliance, forcing them to cede territory and pay reparations, splitting all the planets in the solar system in half.
With abundant resources, the Settlement Defense Front ballooned in size. To support their massive interstellar fleet, the Martian authorities decreed conscription for all citizens, requiring every male to serve twenty years in the military. With a population of just over a billion, Mars managed to raise several million professional soldiers, while the combined military strength of the dozens of member states of the Solar System Alliance was only slightly higher than Mars's.
Having suffered defeat, the Solar System Alliance scrimped and saved, stretching every penny. Over more than a decade, they rebuilt a large-scale fleet from scratch and specifically developed heavy electromagnetic cannons with a range capable of reaching high-altitude orbit, just waiting for the Martian fleet to arrive at Earth to give them a taste of their own medicine.
But Mars was one step ahead. A group of spies infiltrated the Solar System Alliance, took control of the AA guns, and launched a surprise attack during the Solar System Alliance's Fleet Review Day in Geneva.
The Solar System Alliance's decade-long construction efforts were ruined in an instant. Dozens of warships turned into scrap metal and crashed from the sky, devastating Geneva. The remaining eight warships, led by the flagship UNSA Retribution, broke through the atmosphere, attempting to repel the enemy at the gates. However, Mars not only had a numerical advantage but also a qualitative one. Salen Kotch's secretly built monster warship, the Olympus Mons, a supercarrier, not only had hangars to deploy Jackal fighters but also possessed a high-powered clustered laser cannon capable of destroying asteroids. Coupled with its thick armor, the Olympus Mons directly dominated the battle, destroying seven Solar System Alliance warships, while the kinetic cannons of the Solar System Alliance warships merely scratched the Olympus Mons.
Had it not been for Captain Reyes of the Retribution's decisive action, directly ramming the Olympus Mons and forcing it to retreat, Earth might have fallen under new management.
The subsequent story was simply the Retribution, a single ship, engaging multiple enemies, dragging the Martian Eighth Fleet, which was regrouping for another attack on Earth, back from the front lines, relentlessly pursuing them across the solar system. In the end, at the cost of its own destruction and with only four survivors, it successfully thwarted Mars's attempt to enslave Earth.
Of course, Fisher didn't care who won or lost in the end; he only cared about what good things he could get his hands on.
The timeline of Advanced Warfare is the 22nd century, by which time humanity had developed warp drives capable of four times the speed of light. Warships had artificial gravity systems, and ordinary fighter jets and transport planes could break free from Earth's gravity and fly into space. Even the Jackal fighters equipped by the UNSA, the elite combat unit of the Solar System Alliance, could reach speeds of 41,500 kilometers per hour. Not to mention the Storm fighters that could fight at distances of only a few thousand kilometers from the sun. Just figuring out the composition of the raw materials used to manufacture these war machines would be a huge boon for G.I. Joe. Why is Wakanda so famous in Marvel? Isn't it because of vibranium? If they didn't have vibranium, who would even look at those 'black hillbillies'?
However, Fisher's current predicament was that he was just an ordinary aviation officer who had just returned to Mars after studying on Earth for a period, and he was even part of the Martian Home Fleet. At his rank, the only things he could access were his own Storm fighter and some personal self-defense weapons.
"Lieutenant Colonel Fisher!" Just as Fisher was deep in thought about how to gain an advantage, a rough male voice with a slight South American accent interrupted him.
"?" Fisher turned to see a black military transport plane that had, at some point, landed on the open ground behind him, surrounded by a crowd of onlookers.
The person who called out to Fisher was a lieutenant, wearing a silver oak leaf on his shoulder, but he looked to be over 40 years old.
"Lieutenant Colonel Fisher, please come with me. General Lefrançois wants to see you!" Seeing Fisher still in a daze, the lieutenant had to raise his voice a few more decibels.
"Alright! Please lead the way!" A psychic flame surged in Fisher's eyes, and then the lieutenant felt a bit sleepy, but as a soldier, he quickly shook off this hint of sluggishness and waited expressionlessly for Fisher to board the plane. However, he himself didn't notice that his attitude towards Fisher had become a touch more respectful.
Upon receiving Fisher, the transport plane's six ion thrusters immediately spewed hot exhaust and lifted off, the turbulent air kicking up dust that covered the surrounding onlookers.
However, these onlookers dared not show any complaint or even a hint of dissatisfaction. The Martian Settlement Defense Front was military-first, with clear class distinctions, and the upper echelons held absolute power over the lower ranks. The transport plane that came to pick up Fisher even had the Devil's Emblem of the Martian Home Fleet Command painted on it.
The reason the Martian Settlement Defense Front, with a population of just over a billion, could contend with the Solar System Alliance was due to two massive fleets suspended in the sky: the Martian Home Fleet, responsible for defending the homeland, and the Martian Eighth Fleet, responsible for offensive and suppression missions.
Of these two fleets, the Martian Home Fleet was established first and achieved immortal military exploits during the First War of Independence (which Earth called the Secession War). However, after the war, due to the rapidly expanding cosmic territory, the Home Fleet's functions became somewhat overextended. Therefore, elite sailors and warships were drawn from the Home Fleet to form the Eighth Fleet, specifically responsible for territorial patrols and defense.
However, later, as Salen Kotch, who had returned from studying on Earth, gained control of the Eighth Fleet and used it as a stepping stone to climb to the top of the Martian hierarchy, the Eighth Fleet's goal was no longer simply to defend territory. Resolutely and thoroughly dismantling the Earth fleet, slaughtering the Earth population, and destroying Earth's deep space facilities—these were the goals Salen Kotch set upon taking office.
This ambitious high-ranking general from Mars hoped to achieve the unification of Earth in his lifetime. For this, he would stop at nothing, even willing to send false signals of peace talks to lull Earth into a false sense of security. To train Martian officers, he even bribed some officials within the Solar System Alliance, who gave them the green light, agreeing to allow Mars to send officers to study at Earth's military academies.
Fisher's current identity was thanks to him, the only drawback being that Fisher was a member of the Home Fleet.
In fact, Mars itself was fraught with internal conflicts. The Home Fleet, due to its good benefits and fewer missions, attracted many old soldiers who just wanted to coast by, and was also known as the stronghold of the conservatives. The Eighth Fleet, with its radical ideology, was known as the young Turks. However, despite constant clashes between the two factions, the destruction of Earth was their shared consensus. The conservatives believed that destroying Earthlings was a long-term task, and Mars needed to fully digest the territory and resources it had swallowed over the years before continuing its attack on Earth, while the young Turks believed that Earth should be decisively taken down in one go, and then the fruits of victory could be slowly savored.
The representatives of these two factions were Admiral Lefrançois and Admiral Salen Kotch.
The transport plane roared over vast urban areas. Silver-white buildings, nestled on the red Martian surface, shimmered in the sunlight. The continuous structures completely enveloped Olympus Mons, Mars's highest peak, at the center. In front of the urban area was a towering space elevator, connecting the ground to the Martian Settlement Defense Front's orbital shipyard.
This was a miracle of engineering, and also a tragedy. This elevator was built after the end of the First War, with the Martian colonial army enslaving millions of Alliance prisoners of war and civilian laborers. Countless people died during its construction due to vacuum conditions and sudden accidents. After the elevator was completed, the colonial army even executed all remaining survivors, and their bodies were thrown into the sun.
As the transport plane flew past the space elevator, Fisher suddenly felt a violent fluctuation from the Star Beacon. Through the psychic flames attached to his eyes, Fisher seemed to see one figure after another, emaciated and fragmented. These figures were quickly absorbed by the Star Beacon's light, as if they were being turned into fuel and fed into the beacon.
"This thing can do that?" Fisher was dumbfounded, looking at the flames that burned even more intensely than before.