A/N
Awhile back it was revealed that Call of Duty: Space Warfare was one of a number of CoD trademarks that Activision had let expire. In the same article, users joked that the trademark had been 'appropriated' by Respawn Entertainment, hence the creation of Titanfall. Truth be told, I wouldn't be surprised if there's some truth to it, in as much that Titanfall is the result of a concept that Activision wouldn't greenlight for Infinity Ward. Anyway, came up with this. Any chance to poke fun at the games industry is one I'll happily take. :)
Trademark
"Angel City huh? Looks more like demons tore up the place. Heh, get it? Demons?"
"Shut up East."
"Demons, as in, y'know, not angels? As in-"
"For God's sake would you shut the hell up?!"
Ward didn't know what he'd done to deserve this. He didn't know how he got dragged into this bloody civil war. He didn't know why the MCOR was still fighting the IMC when the mining conglomerate had spaceships, Titans, and more spaceships. And he didn't know why he'd been paired up with East as they walked through the streets of Angel City, when East was the type of person that tended to quickly get themselves killed, and others as well. Like a good cop-bad cop show, only they were fighting mechs instead of criminals.
"Hey Ward! Come and see this!"
God help me.
"Come on!"
Ward watched as the prat ran off the road into a ruined store that looked like every other ruined store in the city that was in itself ruined. If they were going to do this every time something caught the nitwit's eye he reflected, he supposed he'd better just shoot him. It would save time, effort, and no-one would ever have to know.
"Look at this!" the newbie exclaimed. "Games!"
Ward did look. And sliding his rifle over his back, he kept looking.
"Man, how old are these?" East continued, walking from one aisle to the next, all of them standing up straight despite the destruction around them. "I thought everyone had gone digital."
"Well, y'know…" Ward murmured. "Backwaters and all that. Plus there's that DRM baloney."
East didn't get the jibe, so Ward kept looking. He looked at a line of console boxes saying "WiiU," none of which seemed to have ever been touched. He looked at a display case showing something labelled an "Xbox One," only someone had crossed out the name and written "Xbone" instead. He-
"Huh. This is weird."
Stopped looking at the consoles, and saw East staring at one of the console racks. He headed over.
"What's weird?" he asked.
"This," the rookie said, gesturing his hands out. "All this."
"This" translated into an entire shelf of games with the words "Call of Duty" in the title. Half of them just had "CoD." Some of them had "Call of Doody." All of them displayed men dressed out in gear that was antiquated by the Outer Rim's standards. Then again, he had seen a similar case of games marked Halo (and someone had written "Gaylo" on them…apparently maturity was in short supply here) with soldiers dressed in insanely advanced armour, so many it balanced itself out. Maybe the people of Earth were bloody Neanderthals and that was why the IMC was invading. He turned to East.
"Nice show," he murmured. "Now can we get moving?"
East picked up a game. Then hit him over the head with it.
"Ow!"
"Look!" the private exclaimed. "Look at this one!"
His left hand headed for his pistol, Ward nonetheless took the game. He looked at the title – Call of Duty: Space Warfare. And at the soldier on front. And-
"What the hell?"
And stared at the display. The soldier looked like a pilot. The mech he was standing on looked like a Titan. The game dated back to the 21st century, yet it was a mirror into the present. Or what would have been the future from the period of time it was created in.
"Weird, huh?" East asked. "Nostradamus stuff we've got here."
Ward remained silent, unwilling to admit that he didn't know what a Nostradamus was. But what he was willing to do was take off his backpack and slide the game into it.
"Hey man, isn't that looting?"
"Yeah, it is," Ward said, putting his backpack back on. "You got a problem with that?"
"Well, um-"
"Didn't think so." Ward turned and gestured for East to follow, as he headed back out to the street.
"But this game is centuries old!" East exclaimed. "Unless there's a store seeling the required console, how you gonna play it?"
He shrugged. "I'll manage. Or maybe I'll crack the code and make a game of my own." He glanced back. "Maybe…Titanfall, eh?"
East opened his mouth, then closed it. Nodding, Ward turned back to the street. For all his faults, at least East knew when to shut up.
And, he reflected, assuming he got the game working and found someone to play it with, East wasn't a newb in that regard either.