Recover the Tacitus

Recover the Tacitus is first GDI mission in the campaign. It takes place in Egypt after the Second Tiberium War, during period called Firestorm Conflict.

EVA briefing
The Kodiak was lost en route to the Philadelphia. We believe it has crashed somewhere in the area. The Kodiak was carrying the recently recovered Tacitus when it went down. Take a small team and locate the crash site and determine if the Kodiak can be repaired. Recover the Tacitus at all costs. Be advised, there are reports that NOD forces and hostile Tiberian life forms have been sighted in the area. The ion storm is still in full force, so advanced units cannot be used.

END TRANSMISSION.


 * First Objective: Find the Kodiak and determine if it can be salvaged.
 * Second Objective: Recover the Tacitus and return it to the pickup zone.

Background
The Second Tiberium War was over and GDI captured the Tacitus from Nod's Cairo stronghold. However Nod's chemical strikes on Europe had left a horrifying legacy. With predictions that the atmosphere would become toxic to humans within a year, GDI researchers had placed all remaining hope on the Tacitus to find a cure to halt the Tiberium problem.

The Forgotten leader Tratos made an urgent contact with Dr. Gabriella Boudreau to bring the Tacitus to him so he can translate the device faster and help GDI in finding a solution. From GDI's makeshift base in Cairo, the Tacitus was transported to the Kodiak. Unfortunately an ion storm had disrupted the Kodiak's capabilities and struck the ship. To make things worse, the ion storm had disrupted communications between the GDSS Philadelphia and GDI forces on the ground. Since the Kodiak was the only vessel to link the Philadelphia to Earth, this left the Southern Cross base commanded by General Paul Cortez to assume central command until contact with the Philadelphia had been re-established. General Cortez called upon a young commander from Project Lazarus to head the Firestorm Taskforce to find the Kodiak and recover the Tacitus, whose last signal came from the northern shores of Egypt.

Aftermath
The Tacitus was recovered but the Kodiak was damaged beyond repair and all its crew (sans its commanding officer Michael McNeil) were killed. While the Tacitus was beginning to be studied, another crisis was unfolding.

Trivia

 * This, somewhat surprisingly, is the only mission in the whole campaign in which Nod are the enemy. This is because most of the the rest of the campaign is focused on CABAL, with a few missions dealing with subfactions and Tiberium lifeforms as enemies.
 * The Kodiak, oddly, is noticeably larger on screen than in Weather the Storm.
 * There is a ruined Nod airbase on the northern route to the Kodiak. The Helipads are useless, but capturing the Radar will reveal the whole map.
 * The Nod MCV mentioned by the mutants arrives after reaching the Kodiak and will deploy on whatever route the player took to reach the Kodiak, encouraging the player to find the other route back. Therefore, visiting the airbase on the way will mean Nod will build their base there despite Tiberium being much more limited in that location.