Chapter 96

“I’ll tip my hat to the new Constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I’ll get on my knees and pray
We don’t get fooled again.” - The Who, Won’t Get Fooled Again

0845 hours, local time
Wednesday, 18 February, 2015
The Chancellery Complex
The City of Haven, The Province of Oregon
The Commonwealth of Haven

“So, the latest reports indicate that the Undead Guard is now poised to strike, and hard at the People’s Army of Sacramento. The 2nd and 3rd Marine Battalions will be in place by nightfall, and the Army of Western Oregon by daybreak at the latest. They separated from the Marines, of course, in order to stage their own assault, and are moving slower due to their sheer numbers. The logistics require it,” Katrina reported the latest on the war front.

“And our aircraft are ready to strike the enemy from their new bases in Winters and Woodland?” I stipulated next while doing my best to focus on the briefing.

“They are fully in position. Also, we’ve been contacted by the city fathers of Davis. They want to assist us in defeating the Reds and are seriously considering full annexation. They want to know how best to work with us on this matter. I suppose that they must have been paying close attention and done basic recon,” Katrina grinned as she contemplated the benefits of adding Davis to the Province of Cascadia.

“Inform them, that for now, they should simply send medical volunteers. Nurses, doctors, techs, interns, med students. Orderlies. I don’t honestly know the quality of any troops that they might have in combat. Davis doesn’t have the most ... aggressive or martial reputation, as you know. But some top-notch medical and non-combatant personnel could make a serious difference in areas such as triage. Lives could well be saved here, and that could really help some folks in that poor, devastated city called West Sacramento,” I didn’t feel the need to elaborate.

Davis, after all, was viewed as a kind of “hippie town,” and this wasn’t a recent deal. That was all well and good, up to a point, particularly in terms of the idea of “free love,” but the peacenik business had its limits. Sometimes, even the most pacifist folks had to draw a line in the sand, as Bertrand Russell demonstrated during the Second World War. I had no qualms about hurt feelings, as life sometimes didn’t spare one’s vanity or other emotions. Life was hard, not soft. Sometimes, men had to be, too. Demigods such as me twice as much, naturally.

“On a different note, the first overtures from the Restored Nation of Deseret have been made, though limited in scope for now. They’re not particularly ambitious yet. They just want to talk about where to draw the border in Idaho. They’re also speaking with the Nez Perce and other tribes in that state ... or former state, I should say. Who should negotiate with them for us?” Cherry wondered now.

“Sydney Sweeney. She’s an angel, after all, and a naked one to boot. A naked ass teen angel should really make them nice and ... uncomfortable. Which is just what I want, of course. Since she’s an angel, I trust her to hold firm and not budge. How they are going to reconcile the reality of an angel standing in front of them and representing one of their rivals, well, that’s their problem, not mine. I specifically authorize you to deputize her in that role,” I chuckled at the prospect of just how awkward things would be for the emissaries of the LDS theocracy.

“I love it!” God announced himself as he appeared, “yes, do that. By the way, this is simply the first step in their move toward better relations, at least for now. They are really weighing a full rapprochement with you, but they are uncertain as to how to exactly address you, how to handle things such as your obvious supernatural powers, that kind of thing. They haven’t been able to quite square that with their theology, after all. Even so, you’re increasingly harder to ignore. That’s especially true now that you’ve ironed out your differences with the lads in Vegas.”

“Anything else that I should know, Lord?” I asked him next.

“Yes, as it happens. You should know that the city of Worcester, Massachusetts, has fallen to the Salvation Army after a long, grueling winter offensive. This has cut western Massachusetts off from the eastern part of the state. The western section is basically captured by now, but this now places eastern Massachusetts at risk. Some parts of the eastern section fell early on, such as Fall River, but a huge chunk of the eastern, populous, coastal area is still putting up some stiff resistance. It’s certainly quite the butcher’s bill that the Salvation Army has to pay for every meter of ground. Local factions, warlords, cultists, even old-fashioned ward bosses have their own paramilitary forces, not to mention student and workers’ militias by now,” God laid out more details, “Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine are slowly forming loose alliances of cities to oppose the menace that is the Salvation Army and assist the resistance forces in Massachusetts.”

“Well, that will likely make it a lot tougher to expand beyond Massachusetts, assuming that they prevail. I can only imagine that this is the high watermark of the Salvation Army and its power on this continent. That’s good news. What else is happening, man? Anything else worthy of note?” I inquired of the Almighty.

“Well, the East Texas Republican Army has launched its offensive against Galveston, clearly aimed at getting access to the Gulf of Mexico as its next big phase of expansion. They don’t want to be landlocked in their proposed republic, which they are tentatively, and in their quite unoriginal fashion, naming the Republic of East Texas. They hope to drop the ‘East’ part in time, but for now, that’s the plan. They’re definitely a more rightist kind of faction, but that’s hardly a shock. The Lone Star State has never been a left-leaning kind of place.

“As for Florida, the Pensacola Free State has increasingly gained territory and influence in the northern and central part of the state at the expense of a collapsing Scientology regime based in Clearwater. The Battle of Daytona Beach has been particularly savage, with extensive property damage and loss of life, but the outcome has ultimately been decided. The Church of Scientology just doesn’t have the resources to hold the place in the face of a rising Pensacola Free State. This whole business has probably been aided by both the United Citadel and the Savannah Republic, which have sought to put paid to folks in Clearwater at last.

“Incidentally, John Travolta and Kelly Preston have both been found dead at their own hands. I have sent their souls to Satan, who has resurrected them as his own playthings. No shocks there. I figured that he’d go for it and he did. They apparently couldn’t stomach the obvious downfall of the Church of Scientology and imminent defeat of David Miscavige, made worse by his denunciation by a now revived Hubbard, Tom Cruise, and Shelly. That has had a truly demoralizing effect on the Church, its members, and its troops, as has the serious loss of manpower and ground. Yes, they’ve already turned on the Church, John and Kelly have, to no one’s surprise.

“Virginia now has a bilateral treaty with Delaware as well as the one that it has with Maryland, which, of course, already has one with Delaware. New Jersey also has a treaty with Delaware, naturally. Virginia and Maryland are now negotiating with New Jersey about a similar deal. There is even talk of a multilateral peace conference to resolve any outstanding issues and develop a better relationship for the future. This could, hopefully, bring stability to that region, if nothing else.

“In Pennsylvania, the parties that seized and occupied Harrisburg after the fall of the feminist regime there are busy quarreling over their occupation zones. Western Pennsylvania is mostly a mix of fundie and other dangerous factions and eastern Pennsylvania is largely under a number of puppet states answering to the Mafia in New Jersey. They are likely to break out into open conflict by now. The various cities and towns in West Virginia are increasingly more open to cooperation with each other, working toward the basis of creating a new state government. It will take some time to establish anything like that, of course. As for Ohio, the various survivors’ communities, full of humans and demons alike, continue to emerge and are beginning to network with each other to create more of a future for the Buckeye State.

“The cities of Owensboro, Lexington, Louisville, and Frankfort are leading the way in Kentucky in terms of stamping out the gangs in their parts of the state, or former state, at least. Covington is trucking along under its kind of cult state, which is threatening other areas such as Ashland right now. The chaos in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana hasn’t eased up at all, though, and the Upper Peninsula has fully declared itself the Upper Peninsula Free State, which hasn’t been recognized by anyone yet. Its leadership might be flawed and a bit corrupt at times, but at least it’s free of the kind of militancy and fanaticism of the Seventh-Day Adventist backed Covenant Republic of Michigan. Dearborn is now a ghost town, the entire population having either fled or been slaughtered. The Black Guard continues to control Detroit and Flint, of course, setting up a black nationalist state there.