Rage is the third chapter in Marathon Infinity. It consists of thirteen levels, two of which are optional, hidden bonus levels.
Synopsis[]
This chapter chronicles two failed timelines.
First timeline[]
In the first timeline, the player follows Durandal's orders. They are awoken earlier than in Marathon 2: Durandal; in this timeline, the player's first missions take place on orbital installations rather than on the surface of Lh'owon.
Durandal first sends the player to a sensor relay station in a deep orbit around Lh'owon. The player destroys the sensors there to disable the Pfhor's early warning system.
Next, the player is sent aboard a Pfhor orbital station used for servicing Juggernauts. More than half of the Juggernauts in the system are docked on the station, and the player destroys them all. The player then disables an auxiliary coolant station to cripple the engines. Combined with the damage the station sustained from weapons fire from Durandal's ship, this results in the station's destruction.
Meanwhile, Durandal had detected a scout ship in hiding over Lh'owon's south pole, waiting for him. Durandal mentions the Pfhor have been following him for years, but he is initially unaware that Tycho is behind it. He manages to disable the scout ship with relative ease.
Durandal sends human commandos down to the surface to activate an ancient S'pht AI. He believes the knowledge this AI contains is key to locating the lost eleventh S'pht clan. The humans manage to activate the AI, but it is confused and non-cooperative.
In order to help the commandos, the player is sent to sabotage a Pfhor water treatment facility. The player manages to destroy the dam system, flooding the Pfhor emplacements and cutting off their reinforcements; this opens the way for Durandal's troops to infiltrate the Phfor defensive perimeter. This leads into the events of the first chapter of Marathon 2, where the player and Durandal's human commandos assault a Pfhor garrison that's being evacuated due to water damage.
The player then ends up in a small dream level they visited before in the previous chapter. A mysterious terminal message warns that "hungry chaos lurks behind the bright corona", referring to the W'rkncacnter. This time, they find a new exit leading to another dream level with a similar decor—lots of lava and floating, otherworldly rocks. The terminals continue the stories about black suited men and a hanger filled with corpses that the player read about in the previous chapter's dream. At the end of the dream, this chapter's second timeline begins.
The first timeline apparently eventually results in failure, as the W'rkncacnter are ultimately released. This may be due to Thoth being awoken too early; after all, in Marathon 2, Durandal was presumed destroyed during Thoth's activation, and when he returned, Durandal said, "Thoth might not have been so helpful had he known I still lived".
A secret level shows how this failed timeline ends. Again, the player eventually winds up aboard the Jjaro station, fighting against the Pfhor as the trih xeem is deployed, freeing the W'rkncacnter.
Second timeline[]
In the second timeline, the player is once again controlled by Tycho, just like in the previous chapter. Tycho has fared very well in this timeline, succesfully managing to cripple Durandal's ship by driving the ship's Compilers to rampancy. The Pfhor are swarming onto Durandal's ship, and the player is sent there to help the Pfhor by opening several airlocks.
At the final airlock, the player reads a terminal message that was left behind by Robert Blake. Blake ordered some of his troops to teleport aboard Tycho's ship and destroy a device that is pinning down the engines of Durandal's ship. After reading this message, the player is also teleported onto Tycho's vessel, following the footsteps of Blake's boarding party.
Tycho is outraged and sees the player's actions as treason. He teleports the player out into space, but before they can suffocate, Durandal teleports them back onboard. Durandal thanks the player and asks them to destroy as many of Tycho's Compilers as they can to weaken their hold on his ship.
After the player has dealt with the Compilers, Durandal states that Blake, along with most humans, have safely escaped to the surface of Lh'owon. A special unit of Compilers, designed by Tycho, is coming to capture Durandal, and he asks the player to stop them.
The player is teleported back to Durandal's ship, but they're greeted by a terminal message from Tycho. He believes that Durandal, if captured, would manage to infect and corrupt the S'pht consciousness. The player is commanded to destroy Durandal's core in order to prevent that from happening.
Once Durandal's core circuits are destroyed, the player ends up revisiting their dreams for the third time. Another path has opened up that leads to a new lava-filled dream level. After the dream, they are sent to the final timeline.
A secret level shows how this failed timeline ends. Like the other failed timelines, the player fights off the Pfhor on the Jjaro station as the trih xeem makes Lh'owon's sun go nova, which sets the W'rkncacnter free.
Levels[]
- Durandal sends the player to disable a sensor relay station orbiting Lh'owon that is used by the Pfhor.
- The player is sent to a Pfhor armor platform by Durandal. Their mission is to destroy all the Juggernauts that are stored there, and then disable the engine coolant system to destroy the ship.
- This level is set in Pfhor Perimeter Station 7AF, a water treatment facility on the surface of Lh'owon. Durandal plans to sabotage the facility to flood the Pfhor emplacements, clearing the way for his human troops on the surface. The player's objective here is to find a terminal with technical schematics of the water treatment plant.
- Continuing where the previous level left off, the player must destroy the control circuits of the facility's dam to flood Lh'owon Command. Meanwhile, Durandal's human commandos have activated an ancient S'pht AI whose memories Durandal wants to probe. However, the AI is confused and not being cooperative. Durandal sends the player off to install two uplink chips in the Pfhor command complex; this leads into the events of the first level of Marathon 2.
- The player revisits the strange Tick-filled dream area that they visited before in the previous chapter. However, this time a new path opens up, sending them to a new dream area.
- The strange dream continues as the player visits another area filled with lava and floating rocks. The terminals continue the stories encountered in the previous chapter's dream, about men in black suits and a hangar full of limbless corpses.
- A secret terminal in this level sends the player to Carroll Street Station.
- This secret level shows the ending of this chapter's first failed timeline. It takes place on the Jjaro space station, in the same place as the final level of the game. The final terminal contains an incoherent message by an unknown sender. It contains the phrase "fair k'lia dust", implying that the long-lost moon K'lia, the home of the S'pht'Kr that was recalled back to Lh'owon when the S'pht'Kr returned, has been destroyed, probably by the nova caused by the trih xeem, which would have released the W'rkncacnter.
- In another timeline, the player is controlled by Tycho. Durandal's ship has been crippled after Tycho drove the ship's Compilers to rampancy, and Tycho sends the player on board to assist the Pfhor boarding parties by opening several airlocks.
- After reading a terminal message left behind by Robert Blake, the player is transported to Tycho's ship. Tycho takes this as betrayal and teleports the player into space, but Durandal quickly saves them and asks the player to kill as many of Tycho's Compilers as possible to weaken their hold on Durandal's ship. Thanks to the player's efforts, Blake and most of the human troops manage to escape to the surface.
- The player is sent back to Durandal's ship, which is pinned down by the Pfhor flagship. However, Tycho reasserts control over the player. The Pfhor have sent a special unit of Compilers, designed by Tycho, to capture Durandal. However, Tycho does not want the capture to succeed, believing that it would "disgorge a thousand wriggling worms into the S'pht consciousness". In order to prevent this, Tycho orders the player to destroy Durandal's core.
- After destroying Durandal's core, the player once again ends up in the same dream level they had already visited twice before. This time, yet another new path becomes available.
- The player passes through another lava-filled dream level. The terminals contain strange messages about mazes, a pocket knife, a candle-lit dinner, and the corpse-filled hangar from earlier terminals.
- A secret terminal in this level sends the player to You're Wormfood, Dude.
- This secret level shows the ending of this chapter's second failed timeline. It takes place on the Jjaro space station, in the same place as the final level of the game. The final terminal contains an emergency broadcast by Arther Frain, who was a Chief Petty Officer aboard the UESC Marathon. The station hull is breached and pressurization has been compromised. He asks for help from "Any USEC controlled ship surviving nova event", implying that the trih xeem made Lh'owon's sun go nova, freeing the W'rkncacnter.
Preceded by Despair |
Marathon Infinity Chapter Info: Rage |
Succeeded by Envy |