Rise of an Empire

Chapter 1 - The Collapse

The new millennium was what most thought of as a new era and a new start. Technologies, economies, and relations between countries of the world made major advancements. US forces finally stabilized Iraq and pulled out in early 2007, France patched up its relations with the US, Briton, and NATO, at around the same time. Middle 2008, North Korea dropped its nuclear program and opened up to NATO inspections. Late 2008, Fidel Castro dies of natural causes, and to everyone’s surprise, the Communist government is over thrown and replaced with a democracy under guidance and support form the US and several other democratic countries. And in May 2009, Cuba opened its borders to all those who supported them. Little side note, I visited Cuba in July that year, and I must say it’s a very beautiful country. Anyways, economies were gaining strength just for the fact that country relations were good, but also because of all the new technologies. Like, you could run down to a local electronics store and pick up a “HoloPhone”. When you made a call between two of them, a camera sent a live feed to the other end, produced a 3D image of you and played your voice. So it was like talking face to face. I always joked with my wife about getting a set and “screwing around” with it, if you know what I mean. What else, um, every vehicle on the road was now either natural gas, electric, or hydrogen. Combustion engines were useless to civilians once the use of gasoline and diesel fuel was outlawed in December 2009. The international Space Station was completed, and engineers were beginning work on a “moon station”.

Another technological advancement that the US and Briton was working on, of course unknown to the rest of the world, was a new weapon capable of a destruction that can not be described. Now, I don’t really have any hard facts on them but from what I’ve heard, is that they were much stronger than nuclear weapons, but without the radiation. They were apparently launched from huge rail guns, and well moved really freak in’ fast. Supposedly the ideas for these weapons have been floating around for a few years because it didn’t take long for a prototype to be built.

Not wanting to be left behind, Russia and China paid off a few engineers at the British research facility and acquired a set of plans for the weapon when they heard the rumors about them. No matter how tight you can get security, someone’s going to hear about it. Russia finished its site some time in 2011, and China had a site built by the end of January the next year, I think. The one date and fact I know is what has put us where we are today. August 12, 2012, was the day China had set for its live fire test. The test fire impact zone was the side of a mountain some 20 miles towards the northwest. Everything was ready to go and technicians began their system checks early in the morning, and the launch sequence was started shortly afterwards.

Well, considering the idea that this is a “very” long range weapon, and the idiots aimed it at the side of a mountain, who knows what’s going to happen to that mountain. They probably knew something I didn’t; I mean they’re only scientists and engineers. Well, when they fired that damn weapon, excuse the language, shit really hit the fan. When the round hit, the mountain just “shrugged it off its shoulders”, and the round ricocheted and climbed in altitude and continued in a northwest direction at Mach 7. Well, I don’t know about the speed but it was truckin’, a few minutes later it made an entrance, landing in the middle of Russia. Go figure; hit a country that you worked with to get the weapon you just shot at them. Before China could even get on the line and explain what happened, the Russians were already getting their guns locked and cocked. Upon hearing what happened, the US and Briton and several other countries stepped in to attempt a peaceful resolve. But Russia wasn’t going to have any of it, and continued getting ready to launch. In a last ditch effort, the US and Briton powered up their newly developed weapons as a last resort, and believe me, it was the last thing they wanted to do.

So now you pretty much got the world’s superpowers holding guns to each others heads, this wasn’t good. And at this time, damn near the entire world was in a chaotic panic. People did what they could to prepare for the worst; stocked up on food and water, gathered anything useful and ran for shelter. And you also had the looters, those crazy religious people, rioters, and people breaking laws and doing what they want. Oh, and you can’t forget those liberal bastards out there protesting in front of the White House. Well, after a four hour stand off, the US decided that it was going to attempt at taking out Russia’s launch sites. At 9:32 PM, the US launched it’s first set of rounds, Russia retaliated by shooting back, Briton shot, then China, once again, shot a bunch more. Besides that, all I know is that for 7 minutes, it was hell on earth.

People today refer to it as one of two things; the end of the known world or the seven minute war. If I had to take a guess, I would say about 60 to 65 percent of the worlds population had been decimated, with China suffering the worst. Even though, it’s been eight years, I have yet to hear anything about Russia. Briton was almost completely destroyed; half of Scotland, Ireland and Wales are still intact. Mainland Europe, from what I’ve been told, has been completely wiped off the face of the earth. A few people have told me how they hear stories about Europe being a barren wasteland. The US suffered heavily as well, anything west of the Rocky and Sierra Nevada mountains is gone, as well as the entire east coast being obliterated. The Great Plains and Midwest compared to the rest of the world, suffered damage but not as severe. The only thing that kept the area protected was the mountains to the east and west, natural defenses, gotta love ‘em.

Now, these weapons were not only capable of physical damage, but also included a large EMP, Electro Magnetic Pulse. Basically, anything within its range that used or produced electricity was destroyed. At least I’m assuming that’s what it is, because we haven’t been able to make a pinch of electricity since then. We don’t get thunderstorms but maybe once or twice a year and they have to be big storms to shoot any lighting. So here we were in the year 2012, but we might as well be in the mid 1800s. For about the first week after the attack, everyone was in complete distress and didn’t know how long they were going to survive. It was to the point of fend-for-yourself living. Myself, my brother, two good friends were the ones that had to protect our families and support them, and to ensure our survival.

Now that you have listened to what I had to say about how everything came to be, it might be a good time to introduce myself. My name is James Freely, commanding officer of the Imperial Guards of the Erie Empire. Pretty impressive isn’t it? My area of responsibility is the eastern half of the Empire, while my brother, Brian Freely, with the command of the Dark Knights, controls the western half. My two friends, who stuck with us, are Anthony and Henry Thomas. If you didn’t figure it out already, they happen to be brothers as well. Anthony is a Colonel in charge of the Home Guard or police and Henry is the Capitals mayor. Henry and the publicly elected senate run the Empire, while I, Brian and Anthony protect it. I’ll get into more about them in due time, but right now I’m going to take you through a detailed recollection of the past eight years of our lives. The first year of that 8 have been difficult to recall so to save you from any misleading, I’m going to read several journal entries I have made at the time. Then from there I’ll kick it over to the building of our capital. Listen carefully; you might learn a thing or two.