[b]CARIBBEAN SEA - SONS SEABASE BRAVO[/b]

The fluorescent overhead lights flickered to life in step with the Chief of Staff, illuminating the gigantic, repurposed, on-base warehouse. It didn't contain war materiel, it didn't contain provisions, no, it contained a portion of Sea Base Bravo's fallen. Dozens of caskets were arranged symmetrically, from wall to wall, a good one hundred square meters of caskets of varying material and design from over the decades, some of smuggled hardwoods and others more functional in design, each draped with the old stars and stripes of the United States of America. Each contained a man who'd fallen or passed away in the line of duty, fighting the desperate fight to resecure their homeland and topple the empire.

Brandley's father, a navy admiral, had been given a place near the center of the room, which was, to Brandley, the man who was responsible for the lives of all those on board, a source of duress. He paid his respects to his father, a man who was still not truly laid to rest, quite regularly. The ritual of mourning was a solemn one, and one that was made stressful, more than anything, by the scale of the room and the number of bodies denied a proper burial on American soil. It was an intense atmosphere. This room was a bitter reminder of the struggle, of the coup, of the continued war. It reminded him of his place in this conflict, as a man who would surely have to send more bodies down here before the battle was done, and as a man who was responsible for the fates of all those aboard and abroad, from the diaspora in South America, to the honor guard defending the mausoleum threshold, and all those who deserved a more righteous American state. These thoughts were poignant, but the poignancy was even more pronounced today, on Judgement Day, as he and those he'd collaborated with had come to call it. 

His boots clicked on the metallic floor, his uniform's fabric whispered, and the room's ventilation system hummed lowly. He kept a brave face on as he walked, though he felt the pang of loss just as sharply as the day his father was deposited here. He could already see the casket from here, he knew its place, and its shape, by heart, even despite its patriotic death shroud. His pace quickened the closer he got, betraying the anxiety in his heart that his stiff posture and stern features masked so well. And, well, before he knew it there he was, at his father's side again, and he choked, just like last time, and the time before it, and the very first time. He was here and he didn't know what to do. Brandley just stood, head bowed, hands balled up into fists.

The stress, the fear, it all came right on back, whirling into his head. They stood on the brink. They had the manpower and the resources, if they shoved hard enough, to send the nepotistic, dysfunctional Imperial military reeling. Such a show of strength will, of course, expose them. The world will see the Sons of Liberty's full length and breadth. Where they're situated, where they're attacking. Everything depended on sustaining that first surge of power, and it was complicated by the fear of collateral damage. Any infrastructure destroyed by the Sons or the Imperials was an asset that would be innaccessible to the American people for an indeterminate amount of time. An ideal victory would involve the destruction of no highways, power plants, or anything of the like, but that wasn't guaranteed. A military success against the Empire of America would be the easy part. The abdication of Emperor Washington would be the start of the hard part. A new government would have to be established. Loyalist groups would have to be destroyed. The American people would have to be cared for. And, above all, foreign nations and sepratist factions must be driven out. America had to be made whole. His father and his contemporaries didn't keep the fight going as long as they did just for the country to be dissected and partitioned.

And, looking down to his father now, Brandley knew he wouldn't accept that outcome either. He sat, across from Admiral Brandley's casket, and thought. A moment's peace that he savored as best he could.

He wouldn't have a moment like it for a long time.

[b]ONE HOUR LATER[/b]

Brandley, his staff, and the leadership from Seabases Alpha and Charlie stood assembled before their soldiers on the flight deck at the heart of the repurposed natural gas and oil platform. A good three dozen officers, all in dress uniform, and opposite them stood hundreds of their subordinates. Flight crews, base security, naval operatives, logistical personnel, it was mostly those who had the luxury of being able to stick around for a few more minutes. The rest of the United States Military's wing of the Sons of Liberty joint offensive, now termed Judgement Day, would hear the words of their commanders by radio whilst stowed away in their vessels and their aircraft. The gritty details of strategic and tactical action had already been hashed out from the top of the chain of command downwards, and now all that remained to be discussed was the parting sentiment. The token reminder of what their cause was, as if they didn't know, of why they fought.

Brandley took the fore, approaching a podium that had been set out on the deck. He gripped it by its sides, securing his place next to it as if he feared being blown away by some errant gale, and he spoke thusly to his loyal allies:

"Thirty three long years of war. For some of us, it's all we've known. My only memories of the country I fight to restore are those of my childhood. Of an absent father, of a departed mother, of my brothers and my sister who were in the same boat, of a country that knew no peace, and a people who were disenfranchised by those who were wealthier. I grew up in the 'dirty thirties', as they were called. Peak oil. Peak water. Peak everything. I made do. I planned to join the military, to serve my country like my father and his father, even with the talking heads and protesting public calling into question the ethicality of such service.

The spiral of social and political inaction, coupled with the escalation of the American military and security apparatus at the dawn of the twenty-first century, only intensified as the decades went on, or so the history books will tell us. America became stagnant in all regards, except its ability to kill those it deemed dangerous. The creation of the North American Union did nothing to reverse this trend. It was a move intended to change the course of the disastrous global economic collapse, at least that's the story that was told. The brainchild of the charismatic, ambitious Washington, a president who promised us everything and whisked us away upon the wings of a 'Second American Revolution', one without guns, but with newfound economic prosperity. If it weren't for him spearheading it, reaching across the aisle so ably, it would have never been made reality. It was controversial. More favored by those at the top than at the bottom.

And, in the lens of our contemporary understanding of history, it wasn't a project of peace. This is where the Imperial history books lie. This is where my interpretation is different. It wasn't him taking America in 'a new, better direction', because we know that Mexico soon followed, not seduced in the same manner as Canadian parliament, but dragged, kicking and screaming by its hair, into the fold. This was business as usual on a grand new scale. Overt conquest rather than soft diplomatic controls. The American and Canadian people had been fooled, but Washington had the following to get away with it. This became abundantly clear when the wars continued in South America, in which Washington's most loyal military leaders and their forces were kept in reserve and we, the wild cards and the dissidents, those who questioned his actions too loudly, were sent to bleed for his conquests. He taxed us of our strength and isolated us in Central America, and then he crowned himself Emperor. The north was his. We would have been the bulk of the armed resistance, and he knew it, but now we were exhausted by our criminal war against the Central Americans. His police forces, paramilitaries, and his military inner circle consolidated themselves quickly and came down on us, and while we fought valiantly we could not win then, and so we fled.

The battle was lost, but the war had only begun. The revolution was not decided in Lexington. We nursed our wounds, courted allies at home and abroad, and we prepared for a second clash. We fought skirmishes, we gave the American people a reminder that all was not lost. We made probing attacks. We fostered the strength of our cells across the country, from Rio Grande to Quebec. And it was all for this. All for today.

The Imperial Military suffers the same malaise that the old United States did. It's weak and complacent. It's assured of its own dominance simply by the fact that they have a place on world maps and we don't. We can win this fight, here and now, end a thirty three year long war in one fell swoop, and it is imperative that we do. We're all in, every man and woman who pines for a new America, cured of the ailments of yesteryear, will be offering their strength to this push. You, me, those at your sides. We fight for the idealized republic, the City on a Hill that we've been denied for more than a century, where ideas hold more merit than the dollar. Where the rich man, the poor man, the black man, and the white man all hold the same measure of influence in an election for their representative. Where every citizen can proudly, and truthfully say they live in the freest, most beautiful country on Earth.

Today we set the course of history right. We return sanity to North America, and then to the world. We come as true liberators, we will be merciful, we will show our foe dignity, and we will bring the Emperor to trial for his crimes against the American people.

So, don't delay any longer! Go and restore the American dream! Rally round the flag!"

Those on the flight deck openly cheered. The energy, the excitement, was all released at once and it rebounded from person to person. In that moment they were invincible.

Those at sea, sailing north from the Caribbean, and those already sealed away in their ASTOR suits and aircraft also cheered. They exchanged grins and confident nods. Whatever sacrifice they had to make, they'd make willingly. This was their life. This war was the very essence of their souls. There would be no retreat or no surrender. Washington's reign was simply intolerable.

The tarnished glory of the United States military took flight, embarked to the sea, and arose from the covertly established earthworks on the Texas-Mexico border. It had begun. Nothing of its like had been seen for a long time, not since the Fourth World War, at least. It was the last gasp of a mighty giant, a force that had once straddled the entire world, for better or worse.

[b]EOA - THE MAINLAND KINGDOM - GREAT LAKES SENDING AND RECEIVING STATION[/b]

They were the Sons of Liberty Signal Corps, long embedded at their posts across the Empire, long tasked with the borderline sacred duty of relaying information between cells and to the American people through every medium possible, electronics, parcels, leaflets, etcetera. They counted amongst their ranks former activist hackers, disaffected goverment intelligence personnel, 'redeemed' criminals, and common patriots. Every one of them had a use to them, every one of them strengthened the thin chain that kept the Sons of Liberty held together. And, on Judgement Day, every single one of them was to be called into action. The relaying of strategic intel had been done over the course of years, the delicate procedure of planning for the single greatest offensive in the history of the insurrection was all but complete, but it had still come early. Weeks ahead of its time, in fact. Events in America, Europe, and Africa had led Sons high command to the consensus that now was the time to act.

The burden of keeping everyone on the same page, at least in the mid-west, fell to Jake and Miranda Lee, brother and sister. Once social activists and ardent protestors, but now full-on revolutionaries ever since their fateful run-in with the Imperial Bureau of National Security. They operated the little underground 'Sending and Receiving' station, a carefully placed nexus of communication that had eluded detection for nearly seven years. Of course, Jake and Miranda hadn't been down there for seven years. They'd been switched out, given shore leave. Jake smirked at the thought. 'Shore leave', as if they were at sea. In truth, they were at the bottom of Lake Erie, in a beached submarine that was connected by a few precious strands of cable to an inconspicuous radio installation on the surface. It was a smooth little act. More cunning than the commandeering of old nuclear silos, as had been the prevailing doctrine under Major Thompson, when he still controlled the local Minutemen chapter.

Arrayed around the two of them, in the dimly lit crew compartment, were a dozen monitors. They had far too much information to manage, even with this much screen space, but they made do. After all, they really couldn't complain. The submarine was intended to house far more than just the two of them, and so in reality it was quite spacious. They had made a little home of it. Occasionally they'd strike out into Detroit's suburbs, much to their handler's chagrin, and go shopping. Television subscriptions and a honest-to-god internet connection were both out of the question, but they'd amassed for themselves a gigantic library. They had become well-read during their deployment.

Sadly, there had been no time for reading in the last week. Jake and his sister had been on an endless cycle of shifts and caffeine, switching in and out to ferry such communiques as tactical advice from the Caribbean holdouts all the way up to the Cascadian People's Army in eastern Washington and so-called Jefferson, as Miranda insisted on calling it. It was NorCal to Jake, though. This was in response to radar and thermal imagery from Cascadia down to the Caribbean, which was unusual. Cascadia's soldiers, a bunch of racist rednecks in Miranda's opinion (she loved the Southpaws and frequently listened to Green-Cap Radio, and Jake suspected this contributed to her bias), were very stingy with information, but it seemed a particular aircraft had spooked them into seeking assistance.

That was only an anomaly in this week's agenda, however. What had really kept them busy was the impending Sons of Liberty assault. Judgement Day, as it had been called oh-so ominously. Jake liked it, it captured the character of the offensive. It was a reckoning for both sides, and it was really a reckoning for the two of them. Chatter from rural militias intermingled with that of the big players, everyone had something to communicate to everyone, and a lot of it hadn't even gotten through yet. The Bower siblings had all of their couriers scurrying to-and-fro throughout the midwest, dozens of people roaring down highways with 'terrorist communiques' under the guise of roadtrips, vacation, commutes, etcetera. They, meanwhile, managed the electronic side of things. Monitoring enemy monitoring, ensuring a safe end-to-end transger. While it'd be simpler, and occasionally safer to simply go from point A to point B with a lot of this, Jake pondered, thumb running the rim of his half-full coffee mug, it wasn't always necessarily so. They were being trusted with the crossroads of Sons of Liberty communication, they were the lynchpin between east and west, between north and south, but they were also safely submerged, embedded in muck, and armed with a pair of sledgehammers should they need to scuttle the servers and hard drives. The likelihood of them dropping the whole world of the Sons of Liberty into enemy hands was close to zero. Unless Miranda was a spy. She was a dirty socialist after all, Jake thought, with a widening grin.

He had, this shift, presided over the peak of inter-cell communication, and now sat idly as it all dried up to bare bones status reports. The attack had commenced on all fronts, and now was a time for action. Occasionally, for the 'fun' of it he'd open an older report and sift through its code-cant contents. Half of the stuff contained within was gibberish to him, though he got the gist. Inter-cell communication was often times at least partially coded for an extra layer of safety.

His eyes did keep wandering back to that radar signature, and that, presumably, drone-based thermal imaging from Washington. It wasn't Imperial Military. It wasn't Sons. And, furthermore, it was way out in the boonies. Weird. According to the attached text it was in a settlement that was entirely off the grid. One that, according to the most cursory surveillance, still inhabited by some sort of populace.

Funny, he thought. Funny and also just a little scary. If someone else, like Japan, was bringing war to America's shores, the antics of Judgement Day could quickly spiral out of control, Jake imagined. Apparently, whoever the Cascadian Peoples' Army was consulting with on Seabase Alpha concurred with him. They demanded eyes on the craft and the settlement. They also suggested to prepare to meet the foreign group with force.

Jake grimaced. He was more interested in a change of regime than the Sons of Liberty's 'American Dream', but a third party spooked him. He knew the Sons, he appreciated what they stood for. He knew the Southpaws through his sister's passion for them, and he could sympathize. He grew up upper-middle class, but he understood the plight they fought against. They were almost romantic, discounting the high-profile murder. 

An unknown was just that. An unknown.

And, for the time being it'd stay that way. Another work order had just come in, and this time he wasn't just playing go-between. It was an order for a general, nation-wide broadcast. He, and his peers across the nation, would near-simultaneously put the word out for all to hear. A radio signal.

"ALL EMPIRE OF AMERICA CITIZENS ARE ADVISED TO REMAIN INDOORS. ALL EMPIRE OF AMERICA CIVILIAN AIRCRAFT PILOTS ARE ADVISED TO LAND. COMBAT OPERATIONS ARE COMMENCING NATIONWIDE IN THE INTEREST OF YOUR FREEDOM. DO NOT ENDANGER YOURSELF. REPEAT ... "

It went on for perhaps an hour. Looping. Just to get the point across.