The Rise of Icarus

I give you my first world, a world that I made not just characters in a city street or fictional refugees in an Ice Age but a real, dystopian world. All that is familiar to you on this map is gone, it’s now replaced with biblical terms, towns and references. Ancient Rome is renewed in spirit but not in the desire of conquest, with the exception of trying to conquer Evil with Good. The rest are Territories of lore and tribe and even neutrality.

I give you, ICARUS

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NEW ROME

A democracy of sorts, a remnant of what once was, the safe haven and one of two destinations for the Underground Railroad. It’s leader is General Glenn Wyatt, resistance fighter and adopted father of our Protagonist; Christobelle. It’s towns and cities are known by Roman and historical figures. Many of its people are displaced by either the Earthquakes or the War of Principles. Many more are asylees smuggled out from the Rogue State of Antioch

ANTIOCH

A defiance that, in 2049 has spanned for nearly two hundred years came to a head at the end of Civil War II, the South never did rise again it such simply would plateau in its own space. Thriving on its own, drifting on it’s own like a landlocked island, sitting like a Queen in a Christian version of Luxor is the Commissioner Magdalena Marr, unhinged, tyrannical, dedicated and dangerous.

GALILEI

Industry forged by the sale of an Apple still carries on, the last Watchman of both education and technology. It is America’s archivist as well as it’s own futurist, this is as stark a contrast from the rest of my dystopian landscape as you can imagine. Peaceful, rigid, minimalist as Asian influences can suggest but very much an ally to New Rome

THE REPUBLIC OF TEXAS

Larger than life, in everything it ever does, lives somewhat independently but looks in every so often. Pretends to mediate over the armistice but does shady deals from all sides to sustain itself. Maybe a friend or foe depending what the day brings, not necessarily an enemy to New Rome, not necessarily a friend either! Location of many rights violations, it is the Genesis location of our story and Christobelle Wyatt’s beginnings.

ORISHA

An agricultural safe haven for anyone that needed it, unofficially known as a respite for those haunted by the war, and for anyone that wanted to farm. Protected only by the needs of sustainability by the other territories, it is home to another resistance fighter and friend to the Wyatts. This state is named after one the African Pantheon, Oko – God of Agriculture.

ABRE ROUGE

A State in Canadian Stewardship, a hub of French Americans, asylees from Antioch and Quebecois officials. The past will haunt our Protagonist here, after Antioch’s Attack on New Rome this will be where armistice fails and the war beginning again in earnest. This is where Christobelle must prove herself as a diplomat and as a soldier.

KEYAH (Free Nation)

Home of the First Nation tribes and of New Rome’s Military Academy, Phoenix Valley. The people are on a tightrope, given a large swathe of their land back in the hope they would stay neutral like the Amish had done. But they were a warrior people and would do no such thing, among the Chief elders is Askuwheteau: The strongest of all the paternal figures in our Protagonist’s life, he sees danger upon the horizon and has the mettle to face it all, to protect all that matters to him.

PARAMOS

Bandit country, no man’s land, a home of Mercenaries and disgruntled militia men. All that need a devil’s bargain come here to make a barter, a constant threat for neighbouring Keyah. As mercenaries hardly ever yearn for a Utopia where everyone gets along.

Amman (The Briar Patch)

A world between worlds, for anyone who wants to be lost and never found again, the bitter Conservative, the haunted Veteran, the Wary Amish all reside in a place time forgot. Often a pit stop for the Underground Railroad before reaching either the sanctuary of Orisha or the busy suburbs of Galilei’s Shining Citadel.

PUNTO DE DIAMENTE

A rogue state within a rogue state, orderly in the fascistic sense much like it’s neighbour. However tyrannical it wants to be, climate change had made the task impossible, flooding most of the Southern tip. But the people adapted, including guerrillas trying to get their home back on their own terms

Eden’s Gate

Hardly touched by the war but nonetheless ever reminded of it, the ghost of America resides here along with international diplomats and Army associates in a stationary position but not for long – A paradise wrecked and reminded of the reality below, but still a paradise for those that crave peace.

And there you have it Icarus of 2049.…

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