Marathon Traxus Contracts Guide

Bungie's Marathon extraction shooter runs on a faction contract system. Pick a contract before each raid, complete it inside the match, extract alive. Fail to extract: progress gone. These five contracts all trace back to Traxus, one of six factions. Traxus priority contracts demand looting, hacking, killing, and not dying stupidly. You'll spend most of your time on Dire Marsh and its darker twin, Night Marsh.

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You can run only one active contract per raid. In a squad, contract progress is shared: use that.

Hostile Takeover 1

Two objectives. One involves unlocking a cosmetic skin you've probably never touched. The other forces you to fight your way out instead of sneaking past bots like a coward.

Part 1: Anti-Caution Shell

The anti-caution shell Marathon setup is locked behind a Codex achievement. Here's the exact path: read it once, don't wing it:

1. Go to Factions in the menu, select Traxus, then open the Vendor.
2. Equip the Sponsored Kit loadout: it's a pre-packaged set Traxus provides.
3. Enter any raid and extract successfully. Die and you reset.
4. Open Codex, navigate to Faction > Traxus, locate the completed achievement.
5. Claim your reward: the skin is tagged anti-caution category.
6. Equip the skin. Now go kill 15 hostiles while wearing it.

If the tooltip doesn't say "anti-caution": it's the wrong skin. Kills won't count. You'll notice after 15 bodies.

Part 2: Guarded Exfil

After the 15 kills, you need to use a guarded exfil Dire Marsh location to complete the contract. Guarded exfils are contested extraction zones surrounded by UESC enemies and occasionally camped by hostile runners. The tradeoff is better loot nearby: relevant if you're not already geared.

Check your map. Guarded exfil markers are distinct from standard Crew Exfils. Walk in, clear the bots, extract. Entire quest done.

Economic Espionage 1

Three objectives, none of which are quick. Budget your raid time. The anomaly reverb Marathon step alone can eat 10 minutes if RNG hates you.

Step 1: UEC Credits

Loot containers or kill AI bots: they drop UEC credits. You need at least three. Don't overthink it.

Step 2: Hack the Network Tower

1. Locate a UESC Network Tower on the map. The one near EI Uplink is the easiest to reach on Dire Marsh.
2. Climb the ladder to the top.
3. Interact with the terminal. Costs 3 UEC credits.

In Season 2 Night Marsh, hacking towers requires encryption certificates dropped by UESC kills: same principle, different currency name.

Step 3: Kill 3 Anomaly Reverbs

These are anomaly-tier enemies near the central Anomaly zone on Dire Marsh. They spawn there most of the time. If the zone is empty, watch the blue anomaly matter icon on your map: head there when it appears.

Combat note: reverbs fire hard-hitting projectiles. You can shoot the projectiles mid-air to nullify them, or just dodge. How to defeat anomaly reverbs: shoot them in the body, not just the projectiles. Three down, quest complete.

Don't farm the anomaly zone without ammo. You will regret it.

Operational Focus 1

This is the Night Marsh version of the tower hack. Same concept as Economic Espionage's tower step, padded into its own contract. The extra condition: wait 10 minutes post-hack before extracting: is what turns it into a survival exercise.

How to Complete

1. Load into Night Marsh (Dire Marsh Night variant, Season 2).
2. Loot AI enemies or containers for UESC Server credentials (three required). Same idea as certs: check enemy drops first.
3. Navigate to the UESC Network Tower at EI Uplink. Climb up.
4. Hack the terminal using 3 server credentials.
5. Wait. Do not extract. The contract requires 10 minutes inside the raid post-hack before successful exfil counts.
6. Extract alive.

The how to hack UESC network tower mechanic is consistent across both day and night versions of Dire Marsh: the currency name changes, the tower location does not. Night Marsh has reduced player count but heavier AI presence and Anomaly hallucinations that can genuinely confuse navigation. Bring a flashlight.

Night Marsh runs on an 18-minute timer in Sponsored Survival mode. A 10-minute post-hack wait is not trivial. Plan your route before dropping.

Light & Shadow

Drones. This quest runs on Night Marsh and revolves entirely around shooting down hazardous drones Night Marsh until one drops what you need, then depositing it. Pure RNG tolerance test.

Step 1: Hunt the Hazardous Drone

1. Deploy into Night Marsh (Night Dire Marsh raid).
2. Wait a few minutes. A notification appears on-screen: "Hazardous drone detected: [location name]". A quest marker shows up.
3. Move to the marker. Shoot the drone down.
4. Check the drop. If no anomaly specimen container: move on. A new drone spawns. Repeat until it drops.

The drones also drop generic cargo containers. Ignore those. The one you want is visually distinct. The Marathon anomaly specimen location is inside that specific container.

Step 2: Deliver to Decon

Once you have the specimen, open your map and locate the nearest decontamination unit (Decon): also called the incinerator, introduced in Season 2. Walk up, place the specimen inside, wait a few seconds. Delivered. Quest complete.

Traxxas quest routes delivery to the decon. If you're running the alternate trader version: same mechanic, possibly different delivery point.

Nearly identical to Light & Shadow. Same map. Same drone mechanic. Same anomaly specimen. The only difference is which Marathon faction contracts guide tree it belongs to: Traxus or one of the other traders. Follow the same steps:

1. Night Marsh. Wait for hazardous drone alert.
2. Shoot drones until the anomaly specimen drops.
3. Deliver to the decon incinerator on the map.
4. Extract alive.

If your quest source is Traxus, delivery goes to the decon. Other traders may route differently: check your active contract objectives before running across the map for nothing. Extraction completes the quest. Both contracts are repeatable and count toward Traxus reputation grind.

 | Quest | Drone Step | Delivery Point | Map | Light & Shadow | Shoot hazardous drones until specimen drops | Decon / Incinerator (Traxus) | Night Marsh
 | Research & Development | Identical | Decon or alternate delivery point | Night Marsh

Both quests require successful extraction. Getting the specimen then dying to a camper resets everything. Extract first, grieve later.