Australian Outback

From Command and Conquer Wiki

The "Outback" refers to remote and arid areas inside the nation of Australia. Historically, exploration of Inland Australia has been sporadic, with the vast majority of the country's population living in coastal cities, such as Sydney. Even by the time of the First Tiberium War, the Outback was not fully explored, except by the aboriginal people. Mining operations and tourism were the largest economic projects in the Outback, with such peculiar features as Ayers Rock being large tourist draws.

Following the global spread of Tiberium, the already inhospitable Outback became a virtual no man's land to GDI, who continued to control the large coastal cities. However, Nod began to see potential in the region. Although the sparse resources posed a challenge, the difficult terrain would more than likely cause GDI to overlook Nod activity. The Outback became a vast training ground for elite Nod troops. Notably, Intelligence Officer Ajay was born and grew up there.

By the time of the Third Tiberium War, GDI had only began to build a presence in the region, storing surplus Nuclear weapons where they thought Nod could never reach them. Meanwhile, Nod had significantly expanded it's presence, with Ayers Rock being a Nod Headquarters second only in importance to Temple Prime. However, this massive buildup drew the attention of GDI, and assaults on Ayers Rock began. Kilian Qatar, who commanded the Nod A-NZ forces, requested backup, which was denied to her by Kane.

After the destruction of Temple Prime, Qatar recalled all remaining Nod military personnel to Australia, in a desperate bid to rebuild Nod's powerbase one continent at a time. First, GDI had realised that storing nuclear weapons in a remote area in the Outback was only cutting the base off from reinforcements, and sent a convoy to move the bombs to Sydney. However, Kilian, wanting to "level the playing field", now that GDI's Ion Cannon network was back online, sent some Elite troops into the outback to capture these weapons. Acclimated to the harsh terrain, these units quickly achieved their goal. However, at the same time, all of GDI's Ion Cannons in the Southern Hemisphere began charging. Ajay believed that GDI was planning on eradicating Nod once and for all, but instead, the Cannons began shooting at extra-terrestrial spacecraft approaching Earth at extreme speeds.

The Scrin managed to survive this attack, however, and while the anxious Nod forces waited for evac, the aliens made planetfall nearby. Despite immense resistence from an enemy unlike any they had ever seen, the troops managed to hold out until Nod Carryalls arrived to retrieve the hazardous cargo.