I've been thinking about the storyline of Brink but I find that some of it doesn't quite make sense. Most of the missions take place on different days for each side, making both sides of the story contradict each other. For example on the Security side for Container city, the incident took place on Day 4 while on the Resistance side the mission took place on Day 7. It doesn't make sense if the mission took place on on different days for both sides. Some theories I think may explain this:

- Either they both happened and there were two fights in container city occurring on different days, which would mean both sides were right. Security would take an actually bio weapons sample on Day 4, while on a second visit on Day 7, they would be stopped by the Resistance from taking the real vaccine.

- Brink has some kind of parallel universe story element, where both campaigns take place in their own universe, therefore everything actually happened for both sides to avoid contradiction.

- The story is told by an unreliable, bias narration, then a lot of the events might not have happened in the right order, or at all. We maybe missing out on the proper canon.

Not sure which is actually the right theory, but my money is on the first and second one. That being said however, the missions on Day 1 and Day 3 (Aquarium and Terminal) are consistent for both factions as each campaign have them take place on the same days. That's the hole in my first theory, because in the battle there can only be one victor, or no victory at all for anyone, in order for the story to move forwards. So maybe the second theory may be correct, but I'm not sure if Brink is written as that kind of Sci-fi.

The "What If" (Sec: Resort and Refuel, Res: Shipyard and Reactor) hypothetical missions make sense if the players' side loses those missions in the story. You can think of the "What If" missions as playing the losing side of the canon. Plus it makes it easier to deduct with side actually won in those missions. So for example on the Security's side, they failed to stop the plane, therefore the Resistance Campaign of Refuel is part of the canon. Then on the Resistance version of Shipyard, that being a "What If", where they fail to hit the tower with the missile, but they get the chopper's NAV computer on Day 6: Resort. The failure on Shipyard actually progress the storyline for the Resistance.

So what are your thoughts?

I'm going for parallel universe, because where the maps are doubled up in the story they are meant to have different outcomes that change the overall situation, suggesting they are meant to be mutually exclusive events.

Oh forgot another 2 points.

The pilot Nechayev seems to appear in Security Tower twice on different days following the chronological order of the days. Day 2 on Resistance side he is sprung out of the prison, but then on Day 5 on the Security campaign he's kept in prison. Neither missions on both sides are "What ifs" and unless Nechayev decided he missed prison food and wanted to go back to Security Tower on Day 5 (though I might not hold it against him since he'd end up living in the slums again), this is a drastic contradiction to the campaigns if they are meant to be one story/universe. So in a way, the parallel universe theory seems more plausible.

However, the woman Ishmael state "the Resistance triumphant and the Security victorious... more or less" when completing both campaigns. She is either able to be in both parallel universes, or if the whole story took place in one world, she is implying both campaigns happened in the same universe. I doubt that we'd have technology to travel to parallel universes in 2040s, but it is the Ark after all, the marvel of mankind's technology.

-Decisions made by you (either to Save the Ark or Escape it) effect how these events are perceived.
-The Founders want people in the dark. And there is a lot of information left out one great example is the CCity mission.
Is the bioweapon/vaccine really what the leaders say it is?
Have the Security been duped and are really taking a vaccine from innocent people?
Are Resistance members serving a much darker cause than just escaping The Ark, but does Chen intend on destroying it? Does Chen know about the mission , to the main land years ago and this is just a ploy to see The Ark crumble? Is the vaccine a bioweapon?
-The story is told in a parallel universe. (i.e. What if missions).
-The story is told by an unreliable source.

I dig the way they did this. It let's us decide who is right and who is wrong. ( I personally believe The Founders are self serving and Chen is mad with power and pride).

Did we ever find out what the C City thing was? They just dropped it.

We may never know.

But looking back at the first trailers from long ago, I thought the glowing green thing at the end would have been something more out of this world, as oppose to just being a vaccine/bioweapon. Or maybe it still is the extraordinary glowing green thingie... but put inside an orange bag. That, or maybe the vaccine/bioweapon is radioactive.