1) NUCLEAR TARGETS
BEALE AIR FORCE
BASE (Yuba City, north-east of Sacramento): SS-N-8 (single 2 MT warhead); On Target; Low Air Burst
SIERRA ARMY DEPOT (Herlong, CA; north-west of Reno, NV): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
SACRAMENTO (Capital; central Sacramento River
Valley, north-east of San Francisco): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
SACRAMENTO ARMY
DEPOT (outside Sacramento): SS-N-8 (single 2 MT warhead); On Target; Low Air Burst
MATHER AIR FORCE
BASE (just outside south-east Sacramento): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
RANCHO SECO 1
NUCLEAR REACTOR (outside
Sacramento): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
CASTLE AIR FORCE
BASE (northwest of Merced, CA; central
Sacramento Valley): SS-19 (MIRVx6 300Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
SAN FRANCISCO (Central Coast, on San Francisco Bay): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
HUNTER'S POINT
NAVAL SHIPYARDS (southeastern
San Francisco): SS-18M1 (single 25 Mt warhead); Off Target, struck Mt. Shasta, CA;
Ground Burst
OAKLAND (east of San Francisco, on the Bay): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
BERKELEY (north of Oakland): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
VALLEJO NUCLEAR
SUBMARINE YARD (NE of San
Francisco, off San Pablo Bay): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
US NAVAL STATION
PORT CHICAGO (Concord, CA;
east of Vallejo): SS-16PS (single 1 Mt ground penetrator warhead); On Target; Sub-Surface
Burst
TRAVIS AIR FORCE
BASE (Fairfield, CA; SW of Sacramento & NE
of San Francisco): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
LIVERMORE NUCLEAR
WEAPONS LABORATORY (hills
south-east of Oakland): SS-19 (MIRVx6 300Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
SHARPE ARMY DEPOT (Tracy, CA; east of Livermore): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target*; Low Air Burst
VANDENBERG AIR
FORCE BASE (Lompoc, CA; north-west of Los
Angeles): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
FORT ORD (outside Monterey): SS-N-8 (single 2 MT warhead); Off target, struck 12 miles E of Fort
Ord; Dud
FRESNO (south-central Sacramento River
Valley): SS-N-8 (single 2 MT warhead); On Target; Low Air Burst
LEMOORE NAVAL AIR
STATION (south of Fresno): SS-N-8 (single 2 MT warhead); On Target; Low Air Burst
LOS ANGELES (Southern Coast): SS-18M1 (single 25 Mt warhead); On Target; Low Air Burst
LONG BEACH (S. Los Angeles; The Harbor): SS-16 (single 1 Mt warhead); On Target; Low Air Burst
TORRANCE (south Los Angeles): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
GLENDALE (hills north of Los Angeles): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
PASADENA (north-east of Los Angeles): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
ANAHEIM (SE Los Angeles): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
SANTA ANA (south-east of Los Angeles): SS-19 (MIRVx6 300Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
MARCH AIR FORCE
BASE (Riverside, CA; east of Los Angeles): SS-N-8 (single 2 MT warhead); On Target; Low Air Burst
FORT IRWIN (Barstow, CA; NE of Los Angeles & SE
of Bakersfield, in the Mojave Desert): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
EDWARDS AIR FORCE
BASE (Lancaster; NE of L.A. & SE of
Bakersfield, in the Mojave Desert): SS-17 (MIRVx4 200Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
SAN DIEGO (Southern Coast, near Mexican Boarder): SS-N-8 (single 2 MT warhead); On Target; Low Air Burst
CAMP PENDLETON
MARINE CORPS BASE (Oceanside,
CA; just north of San Diego): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); On Target; Low Air Burst
NORTH ISLAND
NAVAL AIR STATION (San Diego, on
the Coronado Peninsula): SS-N-17 (MIRVx3 500Kt warheads); Off Target, hit offshore of Imperial
Beach; Low Air Burst
2) MORROW PROJECT ASSETS
Regional
Supply Base Xeta Base:
Located 15
miles due east of Indio.
Morrow Rail
Center R-1:
Location
unknown, but somewhere near the Colorado River. Contains the resources to build
a new bridge across the river as well as rebuild railroads and engines.
Morrow Steel
Mill M-1:
Location
unknown, but somewhere in the Mojave Desert. This mini-mill uses electric
furnaces and scrap steel to make new steels, then rolls, presses, and machines
them. The Project buried a fusion reactor nearby. This facility, once
reactivated, can produce anything from steel rails to flat plate. Nearby
equipment adds the capability for making braided cable, nails, and even small
arms and shell casings.
Service and
Support Team IS-2:
Bolthole
located in a small, caved-in mine shaft north and west of Ludlow, about 40 miles
east of Barstow. A specialized team tasked to repair the railroad lines and
bypasses in the Mojave Desert area. Because of the possibly of severe radiation
hazards, the team was assigned a High Capacity Armored Tractor (HCAT) with an
Engineering attachment trailer.
High Desert
Command Team CA-2:
Located in a
graveyard near the town of Ballarat in Inyo County, under a gravestone marked
"Bruce Morrow". Team still sleeping.
Recon Team
CA-4: 5 men with one V-150 w/25mm. Bolthole
located four miles west of Darwin in Inyo County near a cement plant near the
northern edge of the China Lakes Test Center. Team still sleeping.
Agro Team
CA-7: Bolthole located in Kern County near
Stallion Springs. Awoke around 100 years ago and began doing the good work of
the Project. They formed the "Lazy Eight Ranch" after clearing out some Mexican
bandits and their descendents still live here today.
Engineering/Science Team CA-6: Bolthole
located in Iron Canyon in the El Paso Mountains, about a dozen miles north of
Mojave. Their objective is to establish the reliable supply of water from Owens
Lake through the Aqueduct if possible. Team still sleeping.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: In Iron Canyon in the El Paso
Mountains. The canyon is near Gofer, northwest of the old trading town of
Garlock and over a dozen miles north of the well-known town of Mojave.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Four miles due west of the town of
Darwin in Inyo County at the northern edge of the China Lake Test Center.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Bolthole located near a highway
turnout about 20 miles from Quincy, in a heavily wooded area of the Plumas
National Forest.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Near the town of Ukiah in Mendocino
County.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Inside Kokoweef Cave in the Ivanpah
Mountains in San Bernardino County.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Near the town of Morongo Valley north
of Palm Springs.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Somewhere in Santa Barbara County, in
the thick diatomite strata.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Somewhere in the Sierra Nevada
Mountains.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Near the town of Benicia in the
northeast suburbs of San Francisco.
Unnamed MP
bolthole: Somewhere in the Chocolate Mountains
in the southeast corner of the state.
3) NORTHERN CALIFORNIA
The northern Sierra Nevadas and southern Cascades are rugged mountains that are
snow-covered most of the year and virtually impassable for months at a time, and
that's with modern 4x4 trucks and road graders. A line of 8-10,000 foot peaks,
several active volcanoes, and crushingly thick evergreen forests stretch far
down into the central part of the state, making a natural defensive line, and
making entry into the state from the east quite difficult. Despite this, the
region is home to a number of Amerind Tribes--from Yurok Rangers in the west
along the coast, to Karuk and Shasta Ridgerunners north of the massive Mt.
Shasta Volcano, and fierce Paiute Warriors in the high deserts of the east.
Also, the occasional family of non-Amerinds can still be found on run-down farms
in isolated valleys across the region. And all fall prey to the occasional
Slaver raiding group from across the old Nevada border.
After the
Amerinds, the most notable Power Bloc in the region is The Bear Republic (see
below), and a small, but technologically powerful community centered on Humboldt
Bay, and the old city of Eureka.
Six Rivers
Tribal Alliance: Comprised of
Hupa, Yurok, and Klamath Tribes, these people live in small villages scattered
amid the rugged mountains and river valleys north and north-east of Imperial
Yuryka, as well as the costal lands from the mouth of the Klamath River, north
to the Oregon border. Conflict between this Tribal Alliance and Imperial Yuryka
is not uncommon.
The town of
Mount Shasta: On War Day in 1989, a 25 megaton
SS-18M1 arced in from Siberia aimed for the San Francisco Naval Yards. As if
pushed by the hand of an angel, the warhead veered off course and smashed deep
into the ground directly in the center of this small town. In a millisecond, the
entire town was turned into glowing magma and drifting atoms. The remains
solidified into a freakishly smooth circular plain two miles across. Around this
circle, a ridge of vitrified stone and earth rise sharply then taper off. In all
directions, where the forest had been blown down, trees snapped like twigs and
burned in a flash, nothing grows. 150 years later, the town of Mount Shasta is
still a radioactive wasteland inhabited by scores of Blue Undead, and travelers
must take a wide detour to avoid danger.
Mount Shasta:
This imposing volcano became active
following the nuclear war, exploding violently more than once in the last 150
years. Mt. Shasta, and other volcanoes in the area, woken by the bombs that fell
in 1989, present a barrier--often a fatal one--to folks attempting to travel
either north or south, through the region. Mount Shasta has long been rumored to
be the site of a secret underground complex, the rumored home of an ancient race
with high-tech machines. Legends also claim that the people in this hidden
facility are all unusually tall, blue-eyed blondes.
Yreka:
North of the great volcano, Yreka is
the community and political center of the Shasta Valley Tribal Confederation,
and has about 2,000 permanent citizens, and up to four thousand temporary
citizens, depending on the season. This is the center for an Amerind Alliance
made up of the Karuk, Klamath, and Shasta Tribes. While most of these Tribes
live in small, semi-permanent villages in the surrounding mountains and forests,
here in Yreka they have organized a clinic, schools, an Inter-Tribal Court,
maintained the city water and sewer services, and even have some home-generated
electricity. The Tribal Police has 100 men, but as almost all Tribe members are
armed and willing to act as Militia, should the city be threatened, at any given
time such Militia strength could be 1-2 thousand armed natives.
Northern Paiute
Tribal Range: The Tricorner
Region of North-Eastern California (where the State Lines of California, Oregon,
and Nevada meet) state lines is the home range of the Northern Paiutes and Pit
River Achowawi Indians. They range as far west as the Shasta valley, as far
south as the middle Sierra Nevada's, up into Oregon, and out into the Great
Basin of Northern Nevada. These numerous Tribes wage a constant war with the
Tahoe Slavers (often mistaking any non-Amerind as Slavers), but are hindered by
their traditional (almost Stone Age) weapons.
Imperial Yuryka
(aka Eureka, CA): Before the
bombs dropped from a misty November sky, the city of Eureka, located on Humboldt
Bay, served as the regional center for government--being the county seat and
principal city in Humboldt County--as well as a center for Health Care, Trade,
and The Arts for the far North Coast of California. Historically, this coastal
city, with its bustling commercial district in proximity to the waterfront, was
a center for logging, fishing, and mining, but it was also a nexus of culture
for unique lodgings, restaurants, and small shops featuring a burgeoning cottage
industry of hand-made creations from glassware to wood burning stoves and a
large variety of locally created art.
Eureka was a
victim to its own success, however, as it was home to a large region medical
center; and after the bombs stopped falling, the sick and injured from all over
Northern California flocked there for aid. Within weeks of the bombs the city
infrastructure was overwhelmed by the wave of survivors and refugees, the
medical center could not keep up, and soon plague was running rampant. Panic and
rioting followed, and within a few years, the city was almost completely
deserted.
But just as the
city would have fallen to ruin within the misty forests--a mere handful of years
after the bombs--a submarine of the Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force,
carrying survivors from that devastated island homeland, came into Humboldt Bay.
These Japanese sailors and their rescued companions quickly took control of
Eureka and the coastal plains around the Bay, and established for themselves a
place that welcomed all people of Asian ancestry. "Modern" Eureka is now called
"Imperial Yuryka" by its residents; mostly Japanese, Chinese and Koreans, with
minority communities of Vietnamese, Cambodians, and Filipinos. They have set up
a large community that resembles an idealized Imperial Japan, with some cultural
influences from the other ethnic groups. While these "Imperials" keep mostly to
the coastal plains immediately around Humboldt Bay, anyone traveling within 100
miles of "Imperial Yuryka" is likely to encounter either a civilian workgroup
(miners, lumbermen, hunters, etc.), or a patrol of the "Imperial Marines"
(infantry; armed with semiautomatic rifles, bayonets, and a light machine gun).
See here for some examples of
Japanese Yuryka-built weapons in use.
Imperials are
very cool and reserved towards outsider Asians--always polite and respectful
when first met, unless made to feel otherwise--but they almost ignore
non-Asians. Imperials have very little contact with people outside their
community; they don't fear outsiders, they don't hate them or resent them, they
just don't care anything about them, and so choose to ignore them. Diplomacy is
difficult, but not impossible. Over the years, a few Traders from Weaverville,
in the Bear republic, have had occasional dealings with Imperial Yuryka,
contributing to that community's rising wealth and status. As well, fishermen
from the Principality of Juneau up in Alaska have been entering the area,
occasionally even competing with Yuryka’s own fishermen for coastal stocks.
The Sierra
Nevada Mountains define the eastern frontier of the Bear Republic. East of the
Sierra Nevadas is a forest wilderness, occupied only by Pit River Tribe Indians,
Tahoe Slavers, and isolated Hillbilly Cannibal Clans. The area is known for
being backwards and poor. There is very little trade traffic and people when met
are dirty, timid, and impoverished looking. Many small towns have been destroyed
by rampaging bandit gangs, and forest fires pose a constant threat.
Tahoe (aka
Truckee, CA): This is the actual seat of power for
the Tahoe Slavers. The Slavers are mean, selfish people who deal in human lives.
However, they are not fanatical and place a high value on their own hides (they
will not fight to the last man for anything). They do not kill people
indiscriminately since this would be a gross waste of income and these people do
not waste anything when it can be sold. They range far and wide into the
mountains of California and the deserts of Nevada to capture their slaves. This
is not a nice place to end up. The Tahoe enclave produces homemade automatic 12
gauge shotguns, fed from 10-shot magazines. These weapons are relatively new,
being a product of the Tahoe local technology.
The Coast Road: The long and winding ribbon of
Interstate 80, stretching from the ruins of San Francisco to the shores of the
Inland Sea in
Utah. Through the
mountains between the ruins of Sacramento and Tahoe, the Coast Road is
infrequently traveled because of rockslides, washouts and bandits. The violent
Slavers at Tahoe also serve to keep traffic down.
NEW!
A
companion sourcebook for the area around
Tahoe and across Nevada
on the Coast Road.
Herlong: This town was mostly demolished by the
nuke strikes on nearby Sierra Army Munitions Depot. Today, just a few dozen
families still live in the immediate area, and they avoid the ghostly cratered
remains of the depot for fear of "wandering vengeful spirits". It is rumored
that there are still some surviving chemical and biological weapons at the
depot, but with the damage it received, that is unlikely. Only the presence of
so many Amerinds in the surrounding mountains has kept any Slaver raid from
completely wiping out this little community.
Nevada City:
Strange things have been rumored in the
old Mayflower Mine east of the town. Frightening noises and "devil-men" have
been reported by locals brave enough to enter the long tunnels.
The "Biblemen": The name for an ultra-religious clan
who are found up in the thick mountains. They can be found in most large towns,
passing out handwritten tracts and preaching on corners. They sing and pray at
nights, which either bring a crowd or force the people to kick them out. There
are perhaps two or three hundred all together, scattered around Northern
California. You will not, however, find them anywhere within a hundred miles of
Tahoe. Brother Mark is the informal leader of the Biblemen. He is a small,
skinny man who is quick to declare anyone a sinner and a heathen who doesn't
believe in the bible.
The Maidu Tribe: a small Native American group who
reside in the central Sierra Nevada Mountains east of the Bear Republic. They
live in small camps along the old Nevada border, in the drainage area of the
Feather and American Rivers. Their numbers have never been large, a few thousand
at most, but in recent years they have been decimated by raids from the Tahoe
Slavers.
4) THE BEAR REPUBLIC
The Bear
Republic is a tight association of trading towns in the Sacramento River Valley,
with the center of Government located in Redding. The Bear Republic occupies the
northern Sacramento River Valley (aka Central Valley), from Redding, south to
the Sacramento Wastes. Several significant Bear Republic communities are found
in the Southern Cascade Mountains north of Redding, but Bear influence comes to
a complete halt at the Mount Shasta volcano. The Sierra Nevada Mountains define
the western frontier of the Bear Republic. East of the Sierra Nevada's is a
forest wilderness, occupied only by Pit River Tribe Indians, Tahoe Slavers, and
isolated Hillbilly Cannibal Clans. The few communities in the Cascade Mountains
along the western frontier of the Bear Republic are all found on the east-facing
slopes; the Bear Republic makes no claims on any coastal territory. Each town is
technically independent, but all swear loyalty to The Bear and help each other
out with security and trade. Beyond the valley floor, the mountains are thick
with bandits and isolated hamlets of woodsmen. The Bear Republic trades heavily
with the California State Republic, south of the Sacramento Wastes, which makes
up 90% of their trade. The larger central valley towns are all strong members of
The Bear, but the further into the mountains one goes, the lighter the touch of
The Bear becomes. The old I-5 and State Highway-99 are the main arteries of
travel and trade inside the Bear Republic and are reasonably well maintained by
Bear engineers and maintenance crews.
Mountain
stronghold: Formed in the days immediately
following the War as a regional cooperative to survive the nuclear autumn, the
towns of the northern end of the Sacramento Valley realized early that the best
way to survive was to pool their resources. Redding had quickly become the
center for Emergency Operations, and it was at Redding that folks got together
to decide what to do, once it was realized that they were out of contact with
either State or Federal authority. In the mid-20th Century a semi-serious
Secession Movement had started in the region, calling for the creation of an
autonomous "Bear Republic". It was the arguments of these folk that carried the
day, and soon the confederation of towns was calling itself The Bear Republic.
Times were often difficult, and more than once internal and external pressures
threatened to tear The Bear apart, but the hearty folk of the region would not
give up their dream of independence.
For the last
sixty years or so, the Bear Republic has stabilized and is now a relatively
secure area of farmers and tradesmen, nestled in the valley beneath the stunning
mountain peaks. Communities are generally small; the policies of the nascent
Bear Republic tried to keep every community viable--so every community found on
a pre-war map of the region is likely to still exist, though the population may
only be a handful of people and a couple of families. Every town is run by a
Mayor (who may or may not be an elected official), and in the smallest the
Militia often doubles as the local Police force. In larger towns--communities
with large populations or wealth enough to influence the affairs of their
neighboring towns--the title of Mayor is superseded by that of Governor.
Currently, the Bear Republic towns of Redding, Dunsmuir, Burney, Weaverville,
Red Bluff, Chico, and Williams are led by Governors. Though technically all
towns are seen as equals within The Bear, Redding is still the largest
community, and it is here that the Legislature meets (made up of appointed
representatives of the Governors and Mayors; often the Governors or Mayors,
themselves). Bear politics is notorious for its high-energy political face-offs
and rampant graft.
Governor Vincent
Puddy: The Governor of Redding, and the de
facto current leader of the Bear Republic, is a tall man in his 40s, who is
cursed with a face as ugly as his mind is brilliant. Governor Puddy is known
behind his back as "The Inbred" for the supposed relationship of his biological
parents, and is openly referred to as "That Basterd" by his political opponents.
Militias:
All Bear Republic towns provide
manpower and supplies (according to their abilities) for a common militia. Each
town in the valley has a Bear Militia garrison, responsible for their stretch of
the trade routes and the surrounding forests; they know their territory very
well and are highly motivated. Though the Bear Militia in each community is made
up of personnel from that town, all are sent for their initial training to a
full-time Bear Militia training facility outside Redding, called Camp Grizzly.
The Bear Militia has adopted a standard camouflage pattern for their uniforms
(base green with random blobs of black, and reddish-brown), and equipment is
mainly civilian-style hunting gear and police issue weapons, with the occasional
bit of old-style military equipment, usually in support roles. In the event of a
major invasion, the militia units at each town are expected to combine into one
army, under the leadership of the Command Staff at Camp Grizzly.
Trade: The Republic's main trading partner is
the California State Republic to the south, with routes going through the
mountains to San Jose or taking the risky Davis Trail--a narrow strip of
moderately safe terrain running through the Sacramento Wastes and the ruins of
the town of Davis. A few adventurous traders risk the trails east over the
mountains to some select mountain towns. And a couple of caravans a year make
the dangerous journey north to Klamath Falls, Oregon, but the forest trails
through the Cascade Mountains are so thick with bandits and Karuk Indians that
fewer traders per year are making the attempt. The Bear Republic economy is a
silver-based coin system--4 copper Cubs equals 1 silver Quarter Bruin, 4 silver
Quarter Bruins equals 1 silver Bruin, and then there is a 10 Bruin gold coin,
the Golden Bear. The Mountain towns produce lumber and ores, and the valley
towns produce meat, crops, and factory goods.
Technology:
the technology of the larger towns of
the Bear republic is a solid C--it is a source of civic pride with the Governors
to be able to brag about their cities having electricity, as well as working
city water and sewer service (although the quality of these services is often in
question). In the smaller towns, especially up in the mountains, the level of
technology tends to slide down to D. All the major communities of The Bear are
linked to a basic telephone system, though only the wealthy and powerful tend to
have phones in their homes. Public Phones are available in most shops. Redding
is the major Armory town, while Chico has spent the last 25 years establishing
itself as The Bears "Motor City", now almost all automobiles in The Bear are
manufactured in Chico (though they are very basic vehicles, with an expected
lifetime of about 3 years, before total break-down).
See here for some
examples of Chico-built vehicles in use.
See here for some examples
of Redding-built weapons in use.
Relations with
Neighbors: the Bear Republic has tried for years
to establish official relations with Imperial Yuryka, but the Imperials want
nothing to do with them. Relations with the various Amerind Tribes along The
Bear's frontiers are as changeable as the weather, but mostly stay just this
side of open warfare. Usually. There are open relations, and Trade, with the
California State Republic, to the south, but the folks of The Bear just smile
and shake their heads, whenever some CalState do-gooder starts yakking about the
"Reuniting of Old California". They have heard tales of the Republic of
California, down around Bakersfield, and don't much like what they've heard, but
officially, there are no relations between The Bear and Bakersfield. It is an
"open secret" that there are Bear Traders doing some business with Tahoe, to the
east, but the "official" policy is Don't Ask, Don't Tell.
Redding: The capitol of the Bear Republic is
Redding, a largish town of 4,000 citizens and the headquarters of the Bear
Militia. Redding has a fairly good medical facility and an industrial capacity
that produces ample alky-fuel, as well as guns and ammunition, and a variety of
other consumer goods. The militia garrison, Camp Grizzly, is based at the former
Redding Municipal Airport, and has a standing force of 275 men, augmented in the
summer months by anywhere from 100 to 200 recruits from all over The Bear. Most
of the Militiamen are transported in trucks, but Redding maintains a prestige
force of 60 Horse cavalry here, as well. The town is led by Governor Vincent
Puddy (see abouve), and the Commandant of Camp Grizzly is General Archie
Richfield (the only General in the entire Bear Militia).
McCloud: This small mountain community of 100
is home to a saloon called "The Hitching Post", run by a kindly woman named
"Mama Pru", who often lets straggling travelers stay upstairs for free. It is an
honest establishment frequented by Gypsy Truckers and Bikers, all of whom
respect Mama's "no guns, no knives" sign above the door. Mayor Benny Wank runs
the town, while his brother, Lt. Freddy Wank, commands the 10-man Bear Militia
Unit.
Dunsmuir: This small town near the southern
edges of the Shasta crater was protected from the blast by a steep ridge. In the
intervening years, it has grown to be the largest town of the north, possessing
800 residents. The strength of Dunsmuir's position comes from the discovery of
significant metal deposits that were uncovered by the eruptions of the volcanoes
in the area. The town is led by Governor Nate Scott, who keeps the local
garrison of 100 Militiamen, commanded by Major Kenny Brown, equipped with the
best gear Redding can manufacture, including a Chico-made Armored Car.
Weaverville:
This small community of 500 people
barely qualifies to be led by a Governor. But, despite its small size--and
perhaps because of the insightful leadership of its Governors for the past 30
years--Weaverville is a very wealthy mountain town. Weaverville is based on
lumbering and raising sheep (for meat, milk, and wool), but 30 years ago a
crafty Trader out in the western woods ran into a lost and desperate officer of
the Imperial Yurykan Marines. The Trader saved the life of the Imperial Officer,
and turned that Debt of Honor into a small, but lucrative, trade in Yurykan
porcelain. The Trader's family has maintained those ties to this day. In fact,
Governor Nicky Kelso is a descendant of that lucky Trader. As might be expected,
Weaverville has a deep respect for Imperial territory, and has few problems with
them. The garrison of 50, led by Captain Ronny Kitchener, spend most of their
time watching for rogue Amerinds looking to earn their stripes by making off
with some Weaverville sheep--and the occasional Mountain Maiden.
Burney:
This community of 900 people is based
on nearby mines. Burney is the source of much of the iron and silver that feeds
the needs of The Bear. Governor Cox Wilhelm rides roughshod over this unruly
town of miners, gamblers, and scoundrels. Captain Grady Fines is a hard man who
enjoys the freedom that Governor Wilhelm gives him to "enforce" the public
peace. Captain Fines sends his 100 man unit out on town patrol armed with
truncheons--and permission to use them whenever, and however they see fit. Most
civil penalties for lawbreakers involve a number of days strapped to an ore
cart, pushing it around the mines.
McArthur:
A typical mountain town in the Bear
Republic, McCloud boasts 300 citizens, almost all wackos and six-tooth rednecks.
The Mayor is Buddy Gromman, the only person in town who wants the job, because
the locals pretty much do things their own way, and ignore the "bureaucracy" of
the Mayor. Similarly, the commander of the militia garrison, Lt. Justin Fort, is
a lazy, slovenly fellow, and his command of 30 Militiamen follow his lead,
barely practicing the most basic of their training. Most of the Militia spends
their nights drinking and carousing instead of guarding the town. This is both
unfortunate and dangerous, as McArthur sits astride one of the few passable
trails leading eastwards (the old State Highway 299).
Red Bluff:
Just south of Redding, Red Bluff is
located on the Sacramento River, at the junction of I-5 and State Hwy 99, the
two north-south corridors through the region. As such, Red Bluff is an important
trade town and watering hole. This community of 1,000 is led by Governor Alice
Wineridge (the only currently serving woman Governor; she and her husband are
very wealthy Traders). Roughly 100 soldiers make up the militia garrison, led by
Colonel Wainright "Uncle Winny" Poundstone, and headquartered in an old stone
bank building south of town.
Corning:
Once just a small rural community,
Corning is now a large fortress town of 2,000 citizens--but that number is
widely spread out around the near countryside, where they raise some of The
Bear's best produce and beef. Governor Tommy German, a wealthy and successful
rancher, leads this community. The militia garrison here has 60 men, led by
Major Ronny Stadtler. This force can be supplemented, as needed, by calling up
about a dozen of the local cowboys, to act as Horse Scouts.
Chico:
A large town of 2,000 people led by
Governor Mac Raddigan. The town's industry is geared towards "heavy" industries;
the smelting and casting of metals, manufacturing and servicing vehicles, etc.
The militia garrison here has 200 men, led by Colonel Roger Blakeson, which is
headquartered in a compound centered on a heavily fortified old television
factory along the side of the highway. Chico is also home to a number of Traders
who "Deal Up In The Mountains", i.e. trade with the Slavers at Tahoe.
Williams:
The southernmost large town in the
Republic, with a population of 1,000 led by Governor Scotty Drysdale. The local
Militia force currently numbers 150 troops, led by Colonel "Whip" Jackson, but
both the Governor and the Colonel are trying to recruit a larger force to deal
with a bandit problem.
The countryside
to the south and east of Williams, down to the Sacramento Wastes, is infested
with bandit groups. The main bandit gang in the area, calling themselves "The
Maulers", has undergone a major leadership change in the past year. The moderate
leader was killed by a homicidal maniac who has now begun to attack the more
isolated towns and farms of the area, burning and pillaging them. So far these
bandits have completely razed several towns, including Sycamore and Grimes. It
is thought that these thugs might be based in the ruins of Yuba City, and plans
are being made to hunt them down--something that no one feels like doing.
Dunnigan:
A small, fortified town--the
southernmost point in the Bear republic--which acts as the "port of entry" for
caravans coming up from the south. The population of this town is only 100,
mostly Bear Militiamen and their families, with a handful of nearby farms trying
to eke out a living trying to supplement the garrison's supplies. The town's
current Mayor is also the garrison commander, Captain Bowdy Kenyon. The garrison
of 60 is unusually busy, what with having to provide escort against the local
bandits, or enforcing The Bear's tariffs on incoming caravans.
5) THE CALIFORNIA STATE REPUBLIC
The so-called
"California State Republic" is the economic center of the state, and probably
the most peaceful of all the empires in the state. The corners of the CSR are
Davis, Stockton and Santa Rosa, with all the land in the middle well-traveled
and filled with farms and cattle fields. They trade with the Bear Republic,
Bakersfield and San Jose, and pretty well dominate the merchant routes in the
region. Like the Bears, the cities and towns in the California State Republic
share security and commercial concerns, with policy coming out of the capitol in
Davis.
History: The CSR was originally just a line
drawn in the sand by desperate citizens trying to save their homes from hoards
of refugees fleeing the nuked cities. The Governor was in Davis when the bombs
came, and he rallied the citizens together in the face of the crisis. Over the
first few weeks, scattered military units came in, adding their firepower and
authority to the Governor's martial law. Once things stabilized, Stockton and
Davis were slowly linked. Santa Rosa joined later, about 2010, and the
California State Republic was formed.
Convoys:
Along with regular trade routes up and
down the lower valleys, the CSR has organized convoys of trucks and horse-carts
to carry goods out into the surrounding mountains to trade with the settlements
up there. These are occasionally hijacked by bandits and have to be heavily
armed and escorted. The more wealthy private citizens in the CSR also hire out
their own convoys for household goods, often dealing on the black market for
drugs and weapons.
The ruins of
Sacramento: Most of Sacramento was demolished in
the war, the rest has been abandoned by the locals. The rambling ruins are
visited frequently by salvagers from the California State Republic, and nearly
every week some amazing technological gem is unearthed.
Davis: The capitol of the California State
Republic, having been chosen for its relatively intact university campus and
defensible entrances. About 6,700 people now live and do business within its
defended walls. Davis has the advantages of constant trade, active political
control and a large militia body keeping the trouble to a minimum, making it a
favorable place for people to live. The Davis area is protected by a large
militia with around 500 armed men. The government holds court in several
buildings of the UC-Davis campus and there are even some basic classes taught to
citizens at the school. The Governor is still elected every eight years, though
only landowners can vote. Much effort is expended to remind people of the past
glory of the state and the nation, including annual festivals and even trivia
contests for kids.
Stockton: This city is the trading center for
agricultural and manufactured goods traveling south to Bakersfield and points
along the coast. The militia has 400 men, and they control the routes into and
out of the city. Many of Stockton's 6,500 people lives in the large farming
centers which surround the town. The local militia wear white hats, and are
called "White mice". South of Stockton along I-5 is a large roadblock, which is
mined and fortified, that all incoming caravans and travelers must stop at and
be inspected. Bribes and informal tariffs are common here.
Lodi: Another large farming community in the
CSR, noted for having a 200-man elite militia unit garrisoned here. This unit is
a "rapid-reaction force" that is kept in reserve in case of emergencies. It has
not been used in that capacity for a generation and the men usually just patrol
the roads south to Stockton.
Santa Rosa: Always considered the weak sister in
the CSR, Santa Rosa is a largish farming town with a lot of problems.
Radio CS: The CSR has a large radio station.
They salvaged every other station for almost 100 miles for parts. Now it's the
most powerful station west of the Rockies. It plays weather reports and music as
well as frequent commercials for products sold in the area. For official
transmissions, the use the old California State Police frequency.
David Radison: Perhaps the richest trader in the CSR.
He is just 30-years old, but has spent his life working hard to get where he is.
He lives in a mansion just outside Dixon that is a showcase for pilfered art and
sculpture. Radison has a private security force and numerous working vehicles.
He still has to pay taxes to the CSR government, but has the freedom to operate
as an independent trader most times.
6) SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
This lovely
bay, ringed with urban areas from the mountainous spine of the San Francisco
Peninsula in the west, across to Oakland and Berkeley on the east shore, and
from San Pablo Bay in the north to San Jose in the south, is a mixed bag of ruin
and rebirth.
The war: The bay area took a large number of
nukes, on all sides of the bay. The zones of total destruction caused by the
nuclear hits were massive and much of the blasts were kept focused and contained
by the mountains and hills that surround the bay area; what wasn’t destroyed in
the blasts was completely burned to the ground in the chaos and riots that
followed. The few survivors on the mainland side of the bay fled east, into the
surrounding countryside. Very few made it as far as what would eventually become
the California State Republic.
The ruins of San
Francisco: The city,
nestled on the northeastern tip and eastern shore of the peninsula, suffered
under the impacts of the three MIRVs from a sub-launched SS-N-17 which exploded
low over the city in a triangle of fire and death. East to west from 3rd Street
to Great Highway and north to south from Market Street down the peninsula to
Pacifica and San Bruno, there is nothing but charred clumps of rubble and mutant
rats. Golden Gate Park, Lincoln Park and similar urban greenspaces went up like
dry tinder in the resulting atomic firestorms. Most of the former streets in the
city are impassable to all but foot traffic, and even then they are incredibly
treacherous. The smaller communities on the bay, far to the south of San
Francisco, were spared both blast and radiation, but were quickly overwhelmed by
refugees. Route 101 and I-280 heading south out of the city are both choked with
burnt and abandoned cars to this day and are still impassible for large
stretches.
San Francisco
Survivors: North of Market Street the situation
is a little better. While the tall buildings were blown down, many of the
smaller buildings along the waterfront remained intact - barely. The streets are
not much more passable here than elsewhere in the ruins of the city, being
little better than cow paths between rubble heaps, but in this small area near
the wharfs, an effort has been made to make these trails a bit more passable. It
is along this northern sliver of the peninsula that life still clings. Clustered
along this northeastern edge of the peninsula, a small community of people of
Taiwanese origin ekes out a meager existence. They are descendents of a group
from a Taiwanese cruise liner that was at sea at the time of the War, and spent
five years wandering the Pacific Rim before limping into San Francisco; out of
supplies and leaking badly. The survivors patched the ship up as best they could
and found enough fuel to half-fill one tank. The crew drew lots and 200 people
stayed in San Francisco while the other 100 sailed away on the ship, promising
to return the next summer with more supplies from further south. The next summer
passed, and the next, and after a few more years, the Taiwanese left in the Bay
Area realized that they were on their own (the liner battled a winter storm off
the Southern California coast and lost). The community currently numbers about
70, total, and is getting smaller each year. About a dozen of them have some old
firearms and ammunition stockpiled which they have used conservatively to keep
them safe so far. These folks survive on fishing the Bay and catching rats in
the city ruins.
San Francisco
Bay:
The War left this huge harbor a mess,
though over the last 150 years most of the wrecks have been broken down or
carried out to sea by the tides. A tour of the various harborages today would
reveal only few reminders of the atomic horror of 1989. The half-sunken remains
of a US Navy cruiser lie on her side in the soft mud of the marshlands that were
once the Alameda Naval Base, while the fire-scarred, imposing hulk of an
aircraft carrier sits low in the shallow waters nearby. The shadowy silhouettes
of a number of freighters, as well as several smaller ships, are visible in the
shallows all around the Bay – many locatable by their rusted radio masts still
sticking up from the bay water. A large rusted-out Hyundai container ship rests
in the middle of a street on the Oakland waterfront, pushed there by a
nuke-induced tidal wave. The famed ocean liner SS Queen Mary sits in the
silt mud off the mouth of the Coyote River in Fremont, where she was beached
following the nuclear attacks; she’s in such poor condition that not even the
Federal Union, in San Jose just a few miles south, has shown any interest in
salvaging her. The Queen Mary is slowly being broken by wave action and
salt erosion, and may soon collapse under her own weight. However, despite her
ragged appearance, this greatest of ocean liners may yet hold luxury treasures
deep within her hull.
The famous
Golden Gate Bridge miraculously still stands, but was severely mauled by the
atomic blasts. The San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, however, is down in the
water; a hazard to most deep-draft ship traffic into the southern end of the
Bay. The San Mateo-Hayward and the Dumbarton Bay Bridges are still up, though in
questionable condition, and are controlled by the Federal Union in San Jose.
Northern Bay
Area:
San Pablo Bay is a shallow tidal
estuary that forms the northern extension of San Francisco Bay. It receives the
waters of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers, via Suisun Bay and the
Carquinez Strait on its east end, and it connects to San Francisco Bay on its
south end. The northeastern shores of this bay, at the mouth of the river, are
the location of the blasted ruins of Vallejo, California, where the former US
Navy submarine base is now a radioactive wasteland – part of the larger
devastation called the Sacramento Wastes.
Santa Rosa:
At the time of the War, the survivors
from the small communities along the northern and western shores of San Pablo
Bay fled here, to this mountain valley town. Santa Rosa barely survived these
times, and most likely would have fallen prey to the warlords of the Federal
Union in San Jose, from the south, if they hadn’t appealed to the Governor at
Stockton (see the California State Republic, below) and been assimilated into
the California State Republic. Today, Santa Rosa is a large farming community of
1,000 residents that, while technically part of the California State Republic,
it’s isolation from the bulk of the CalState by the wastelands of the
Concord-Vallejo-Oakland blasts causes this community to act semi-autonomously
most of the time. The only access from Santa Rosa territory to the rest of the
CalState is via the San Joaquin River– past the flooded crater of the old Port
Chicago Naval facility at Concord – down to Stockton; and regular cargo and
passenger steamship travel is a source of pride. Santa Rosa is also noted for
maintaining a 200-man elite militia unit trained as a “rapid-reaction force”,
rather than a simple garrison unit. It has not, actually, been used in that
capacity for almost a generation – the last time the Federal Union tried to
conquer the area, 40 years ago – and the men usually just patrol the roads to
Napa. The unit was founded by survivors of the 91st Infantry Division, up from
Ft. Baker (see below).
Napa: Once one of the most lucrative parcels
of agricultural land in all of California, the Napa Valley suffered
significantly from the nearby Concord-Vallejo-Oakland blasts. Napa is now home
to approximately 300 farmers, and is mostly thought of as a “weak sister” to
Santa Rosa, but it still produces acceptable grapes, wines and raisins, despite
its many problems.
Fort Baker:
Fort Baker Military Reservation, at the
northern end of the Golden Gate Bridge, was home to the US Army 91st Infantry
Division at the time of the War (though they were beginning an operational
scale-down). The forces stationed here that survived the initial blasts did what
they could, but the damage to the Golden Gate Bridge prevented them from
crossing over to the City. Eventually most of the 91st drifted north to the
Santa Rosa area – the CSR Army unit stationed in Santa Rosa has even inherited
the green pine tree on a shield of brown Unit Emblem of the 91st. The seaside
Fort, itself has been sacked many times in the intervening years by salvagers
looking for left-behind military equipment.
Fort Baker –
and the remains of the Golden Gate Bridge – in the 22nd Century are now occupied
by an independent clan of about 140 people. The main occupations of the group
are gardening in the various greenbelts of the area and fishing. Traders from
Santa Rosa are not uncommon at this community, and the Federal Union has some
resident Trade Representatives here, spying on Santa Rosa and keeping tabs on
what comes and goes from the Bay, and making sure that the Bridgers people don't
push their luck. These “Bridgers”, as they call themselves, have also occupied
the nearby Golden Gate Bridge, where they monitor and occasionally “Tax” ship
traffic that passes under the northern, less damaged, stretch of The Bridge.
The Golden Gate
Bridge:
Considering the proximity of the blasts
over San Francisco, The Bridge is remarkably intact, although just barely. The
suspension cable anchors on the southern, San Francisco side of The Bridge were
damaged with the rest of the city, and the atomic blasts then pushed the
southernmost tower of The Bridge to lean slightly to the north. The cables
released by the destruction of the anchor points flew out and wrapped themselves
around the southern tower and fused to it in the heat of the atomic fireballs.
Just over half of the roadway of the center span of The Bridge has thus dropped
and now hangs mostly submerged, impassable to all but boats of the shallowest
draft, while the stretch of roadway from the southern tower over to the shore is
completely gone. The northern tower remains fairly intact, although, when it
assumed the majority of the weight of the bridge – when the southern cable
anchors let go – it was wrenched in place, and now lists to the east a few
degrees, and the mostly-intact roadway from the northern shore, to the tower,
and out to where the roadway meets the water now cants perilously to the east
and is fit only for foot travel by the brave at heart.
Despite all
this damage, the northern half of The Bridge is intact enough to allow ships to
sail under it into the bay. The “Bridgers” of Fort Baker have set up a system of
ropes and pulleys, and set up numerous suspended gondolas, which they can lower
down to water level to interact with passing vessels. With this system they
impose “tolls” on the vessels; threatening to drop things on the ships, if they
do not pay. According to tales, the only time this was tested, the Bridgers
dropped a large load of very ripe…fertilizer…on the objecting ship. The Bridgers
don't really ask all that much in tolls, or otherwise interfere with the passing
ship traffic – as they do not wish to discourage commerce into the area – so
most folks are willing to pay up.
Eastern bay
area: The eastern suburbs of the Bay Area
were devastated by nukes over Berkeley and Oakland, plus others over various
military bases up in the hills of the region. Over the last 150 years, these
eastern hills have been slowly repopulated and the area now supports a modest
population of salvagers and squatters in camps of a dozen-or-so people. The
region is claimed as part of the California State Republic, but representatives
of that government are few and far between. The thick urban ruins along the
shore of The Bay still remain mostly abandoned, save for a few isolated
communities of scavengers who have found pockets to stay in, gleaning the ample
salvage. These various enclaves rarely venture into the worst parts of the
destruction.
The Carl
Vinson: Sitting in the shallow, muddy waters a
mile southwest of the old Alameda Naval Base is the huge, rusting hulk of the
USS Carl Vinson, an aircraft carrier that was caught in the blasts over
the bay and pushed down into the silt in the shallow water. Most of her
electronic equipment and weapons – along with anything else that was up on her
flightdeck – were either torn off or melted by the atomic fireballs (she looks
like there was a fire on board), and the hull was badly damaged. However, while
the external damage is massive, much of the internal space of the huge vessel
remained intact. The shallow waters around the Vinson are home to
numerous small and mid-sized marine mutations (possibly caused by the ancient
nuclear reactor in the belly of the ship). At night, pale-blue, man-shaped
lights can be seen scrambling across the deteriorating flightdeck in the
performance of some macabre ritual lost to time. The Federal Union has sent
expeditions here, in the past, hoping to recover some technology from the past
still buried in her bulk; none have ever returned…although the number of blue
ghosts on the flightdeck did increase.
Yerba Buena
Island & Treasure Island:
Yerba Buena
Island sits in the San Francisco Bay between San Francisco and Oakland, roughly
in the middle of the western and eastern spans of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay
Bridge. At the time of the War, this small island had a significant military
presence in the form of a United States Coast Guard station on the southwest
side of the island facing the East Bay; the remains of barracks, radio and radar
stations, and an octagonal lighthouse are scattered across the island, and
remain today. With a 360 degree field of view and the submerged wreckage of the
bridge filling the narrows to either side of this little island, it is ideal for
controlling the lower Bay – and the Federal Union has not missed this fact. 5
years ago, an expedition from the Federal Union established a standing garrison
of a 100-man Naval Regiment and a fleet of small boats in the old Coast Guard
facilities – facilities which they are studying quite fervently.
Treasure Island:
An artificial island that was built in
the early 20th Century with fill dredged from the bay then dumped on the shoals
on the north side of Yerba Buena Island, to which it is connected by a small
isthmus. This roughly rectangular islet at one time had a raised walkway,
circumscribing almost its entire area, but the intervening years – as well as
the War damage – have turned this one-time suburb into a marshy ruin.
The Federal
Union of San Jose:
Bombs fell all
around San Francisco Bay, they fell on the west shore, they fell on the east
shore, they fell on the north shore – but, oddly, no bombs fell on the south
shore, on the Santa Clara Valley. This is odd, as at the time of the War, the
Santa Clara valley, and its largest city, San Jose, was nicknamed “Silicon
Valley”, and was one of a handful of places in the entire country where the
highest technology on the planet was being developed – hard to believe that a
Soviet Missile wasn’t targeted here. This good fortune (if it could be called
that) caused San Jose to become the center for Federal Emergency Services,
immediately following the War. Thousands of survivors flooded south into San
Jose. City and County officials were quickly overwhelmed, and handed authority
over to Federal Emergency Services officials…who did their best for the
thousands of folks clamoring for aid and shelter. It wasn’t near enough. Soon
factional struggles and street fighting led to open revolts.
Eventually a
man named Edward Guzmann, a local Labor Union leader in San Jose, formed a power
bloc strong enough to make him absolute leader. Using the aegis of the Federal
Emergency Services, as well as his own Labor Union, “President” Guzmann
established the Federal Union. With the steel fist and velvet glove of a true
tyrant, he formed a military-based society that forced order and discipline upon
all the citizens. It worked. Medical aid was provided, food was grown and
distributed, shelter was found or constructed, and everyone worked towards a
vague promised “better tomorrow”.
The Federal
Union firmly controls the entire Santa Clara Valley – which has lost its high
tech moniker of “Silicon Valley”, and returned to its productive agricultural
roots. The Federal Union also controls, and has rebuilt, the large salt ponds
all along the shores of the South Bay. Salt, and the trading of this valuable
mineral, is part the lifeblood of the Federal Union, second only to Olive Oil
production. The Federal Unions only port facilities are the ancient landing at
East Palo Alta, though there are plans to update the facilities. At “Palo Alta
Port”, the Federal Union conducts infrequent, though lucrative, trade with
survivor enclaves from as far away as Juneau, South and Central America, and
even a few ships from Asia; mostly the odd clipper or tramp steamer from China
or the Philippines. The Federal Union also trades extensively with the
California State Republic, but also frequently contests them for the best trade
routes and salvage rights in the region.
While the
Federal Union is run like a police-state, Capitalism is King. Anything can be
had for the right price, here; even the major crimes are financial – smuggling,
failure to pay taxes, and failure to report recovered technology. There is a fee
or tax on everything in San Jose, on top regular prices being inflatedly
expensive. Of course, with all this wealth, the government does maintain public
services such as police patrols, water utilities, a certain amount of public
transportation, the heavily subsidized agriculture projects, and, of course, the
Federal Union Legion.
The Federal
Union Legion, or just “The Legions”, is a military force based upon a 100-man
Regiment. There are currently 5 Army Regiments, and an additional 2 Naval
Regiments – one based at Palo Alto Port, and a second, newer Naval Regiment
stationed out on Yerba Buena Island, in The Bay). Each Army Regiment is
commanded by a Major, assisted by a few Captains and several Lieutenants; while
promotion by merit does happen, more often than not promotions are purchased
from a superior officer. Each Army Regiment maintains 100 infantry troops
equipped with pikes and muskets in a ratio of 1 musket for each 4 pikes.
Logistical troops and camp followers often increase the numbers for each
Regiment, with this number varying from Regiment to Regiment. Officers are often
mounted, but the Federal Union has not, to date, ever fielded a cavalry force.
The Naval
Regiments are exact copies of their Army cousins, including using the same
Ranks. The 100 fighting men of each Naval Regiment are trained in the use of
“Boat Pikes” (simply long handled Boat Hooks) and hand axes. The Naval Regiments
are also the only force in the Federal Union trained in the use of cannons;
sweep guns and the Federal Union 1-Pounder (a muzzle-loading black-powder gun)
being standard artillery.
The 1st
Regiment is an honor guard unit, assigned to the capitol of San Jose, and under
the direct command of The President. This prestige unit is equipped with a
variety of still operational pre-war automatic weapons, including a barely
operational V-300, which The President rides in during parades. The 2nd through
5th Regiments patrol the trade routes and the perimeter of the Santa Clara
Valley. The 1st Naval Regiment (technically the 6th Regiment) is headquartered
at Palo Alto Port and maintains 3 two-masted, six-gunned sloops-o-war, while the
2nd Naval Regiment (technically the 7th Regiment, created only 5 years ago with
a heavy emphasis on “technicians”) is headquartered out on Yerba Buena Island
and maintains a group of 6 single-masted, four-gunned ketches.
Sam Reagan: The current “Federal President, Union
Chairman and Friend of The People” is a distant relative of former California
Governor Ronald Reagan. Sam, who comes from a wealthy family and was one of the
youngest and most successful Regimental Majors in Federal Union history, was
"elected" 24 years ago in a landslide vote, after a fairly bloodless coup. He is
a tall man of regal bearing, with a handlebar mustache and dark, thinning hair
that has gone gray at the temples. He has an intelligent gaze that holds all the
warmth of a hungry shark. Since achieving power, Reagan and his cronies have
become insanely wealthy. This has not been a bad thing for the Federal Union,
however. Reagan is a sharp as a razor and as ruthless as a rattlesnake when it
comes to making trade deals and writing contracts. His policies have increased
the average GNP, and taxes are at their lowest levels ever. Reagan
resides in the "Royal Mansion", formerly the Mission Santa Clara, which by the
22nd Century is now a solid fortress, with heavy concrete perimeter walls and
armor plated facades.
The Big Gun: A massive, former US Army M65 280mm
"Atomic Annie" howitzer, an enormous 85-ton monster designed to fire tactical
nuclear shells and one of only twenty originally produced in the 1950s. This gun
has been sitting in a field near Moffitt Field airbase facing roughly out to sea
since 1989. While it is functional, no one has anything even remotely capable of
moving it or turning it around. In the early days of the Federal Union,
President Guzmann touted possession of this weapon as insurance of both the
Federal Unions superiority and its safety – the only problem being that they
didn’t have any ammunition for it. The “Big Gun” is now in the possession of the
1st Naval Regiment, which has kept the gun clean and lubed for all these many
decades with the hope that one day some shells might be found for it. It has
become a symbol of the Federal Union, with its likeness on their flag. The “Big
Gun” is also a popular tourist stop for people traveling between Palo Alto Port
and San Jose. Though the gun can only be viewed from a distance, all who view it
are led to believe it is operational, by the guards stationed around it.
The Shells: Just a few weeks ago, a sleazy
wandering arms trader named Nehmiah Scudder sailed into the Federal Union. He
carried with him some drawings and measurements of some particularly large
artillery shells. It seems, however unlikely, that Scudder had encountered a
cache of shells for the Big Gun during his travels. Though he would not tell
anyone where he found them, he has offered to arrange the sale of them to the
Federal Union for a fortune in gold and young girls. President Reagan and his
advisors are in a state of euphoria over this amazing stroke of luck and just
might give him what he wants. Negotiations are still in progress.
The truth is
that Scudder is sleazier than anyone can imagine. Scudder learned of forty 280mm
“Practice Shells, Explosive” while in the fortified town of Hawthorne just
across the border in Nevada
while playing cards and drinking with the Mayor of Hawthorne. The
Mayor was commiserating that these shells were probably the most powerful
weapons on the planet, but he had no gun to fire them with, and they were too
old and unstable to dismantle. During the course of their drinking, Scudder was
able to discern that the Mayor would gladly trade the shells for just 100 pounds
of viable Seed Corn for each shell. Of course, the Mayor of Hawthorne also
mentioned that, as of their last inspection of the forty shells twenty-one of
them were confirmed as being “condemned” as too unstable to move, and just
nineteen are still capable of being fired. Of those nineteen, two were listed as
“questionable” -- they may well explode in the barrel of the gun when fired --
but the remaining seventeen are fully operational. Scudder feels that this last
bit isn’t worth mentioning. The problem for Scudder is one of size and ease of
movement. The shells stand a little over 4 feet high and weigh about 550 pounds
each, so a heavy wagon would only be able to hold one, each. Moving 19 heavy
wagons them any distance would not only take an organized effort, but it would
be hard to hide from prying eyes.
7) CENTRAL CALIFORNIA COAST
South of the
blast zones, along the forested coastline and south of the San Francisco
Peninsula, there are a number of notable settlements. These include...
Rio del Mar: There is a population of "starving
artists", disenchanted people from various places, wanderers, and some
ex-California State Republic dissident exiles who have taken over a large
automobile ferry beached on a shallow sandbar in Monterey Bay and renamed it the
Elba. They number about 120 souls, and are led by an Elder named “Friar
Tuck”. The “Elbans” will sometimes trade their various expertises for goods or
food, although they usually prefer to just be left alone. The Federal Union of
San Jose often exiles its “disenfranchised” (dissidents who have powerful enough
friends or relatives to prevent them from just disappearing) to this area;
taking them to within sight of the Elba and dropping them off with only a
warning and a good-bye.
Half Moon Bay:
Located about half-way up the Pacific
(western) coast of the San Francisco Peninsula, the old coastal ruins of Half
Moon Bay are now home to a small community of rather...unique...people.
When all the
bombs started falling around San Francisco Bay, on the other side of the Santa
Cruz Mountains, many folks in Half Moon Bay "ran for the hills". In the case of
a group of "Trekkies" attending a small convention being held downtown, they
literally ran off into the mountains to the southeast of Half Moon Bay.
Believing that the city would soon become a site for violence and civil
disorder, they fled as fast as they could. Eventually (quite by accident) they
stumbled upon Komori Hokura, a small Shinto shrine and retreat, located
at a mountainside scenic overlook near the edge of the Burleigh Murray Ranch
State Park. The small group of Shinto priests – who had been watching the
mushroom clouds climb high over the mountains and were waiting as one world
ended for the next to begin – welcomed the refugee "Trekkies". For months
afterwards, as the world outside their mountain forest retreat died, these two
groups intermingled, and ultimately thrived; eventually evolving into a new
Shinto Sect "The Way of Vulcan". This "Way" adopted the traditional Shinto
beliefs and integrated them with the "Trekkies" (fictionalized) traditions of
"Vulcan" logic and reason, peace, and emotional control. They practice emotional
control and have become culturally "Vulcan"; fusing the elements of the
fictional society with a large amount of social culture adopted from traditional
Japanese behavior.
Decades after
the Bombs, descendants from this group moved down out of the mountains to
re-occupy the ruins of Half Moon Bay, there becoming fishermen and farmers,
while the Komori Hokura remained their spiritual center. Many times this
small community has been threatened over the years, but always these spiritual
folks have used peaceful, logical means (mostly patience) to overcome and
survive their trials. Outwardly these folk appear not only peaceful, but
pacifistic. As invaders have learned, they are quite capable of violence; they
just find its use both personally objectionable, as well as a last resort for
when logic and reason fail. In fact, many of these people practice a martial art
form called properly called Shinto Muso-ryu, but often just called Cane Fighting
by the locals.
The fishermen
of Half Moon Bay are aware of the "Imperial" enclave to the north, at Eureka,
but while these "Vulcans" may appear to be culturally similar to Japanese, the
majority of the population of Half Moon Bay is not Oriental, and so keeps as far
away from the Imperial "Asian Purists" as they can.
Site-Q: Half Moon Bay is also home of a
veteran Snake-eater
Team. Their Site was located in a tiny mountain valley, in the shadow of Gazos
Mountain, near where the South Fork Gazos Creek joins with the main Gazos Creek,
just south of Butano State Park. About three years ago Captain Richard Jennings
awoke from his cryotube to a dimly-lit scene of total chaos. Fourteen of the
bunker's cryotubes were open, and semi-humanoid creatures were feasting on the
occupants. Capt. Jennings grabbed his bug-out kit with one hand, and hit the
emergency wake-up override in his command tube to awaken the remainder of his
team with the other hand.
Then he started
shooting.
In their groggy
condition, the awakening Green Berets did their best, but 6 more men were
butchered by the hellish creatures as the soldiers attempted egress. Ten
survivors--including Capt. Jennings--made it to the weapons lockers on the next
level and outfitted themselves as best they could. They then returned to the
habitation level and opened up. After killing all the mutant things they could
find, they surveyed their situation.
The "things"
had apparently tunneled into the base on levels 2 and 14 and had been blundering
their way around--they found dozens of dead bodies that had probably suffocated
from the pure helium atmosphere inside the bunker, before the break-in. The
Vehicle Elevator was smashed beyond repair, as were most of the vehicles. The
beasts had rampaged through the food storage and medical storage areas. The
Geo-Thermal plant was off line and the batteries were failing, and the lowest
level was half-flooded. The beasts had also rampaged through the support weapons
level and the small arms area, destroying almost everything, and damaging most
everything else. Capt. Jennings and his men outfitted themselves with whatever
was salvageable, then opened the roof vehicle access hatch and extracted the
only still-usable Hummer by sheer muscle-power. First Sergeant Otis Macelheanny,
the highest ranking NCO left in the unit, who had been reconning the lower
levels, emerged to announce that several hundred more of those mutant-things
were spewing from crude tunnels hacked through the sidewalls of the bunker, far
below. Unhappily, Capt. Jennings set the base self destruct system as his men
piled themselves and their meager resources into the Hummer, and then they ran.
Behind them, a lance of flame shot hundreds of feet up from the ground, as the
terrain bucked and shook around them, and the bunker fell in upon itself.
Unsure of the
world situation, they followed the barely discernable mountain roads down to the
small California town of Pescadero - or what was left of the small town of
Pescadero. Capt. Jennings and his men were puzzled by the oddly "aged" look of
the ruins, but they had been briefed to expect to find a United States
devastated by War. These Snake-Eaters decided to make camp in Pescadero, and try
to figure out just what was going on. That night, a few hours before midnight, a
large group of wild-eyed, pale-skinned, blood-thirsty psychotic people attacked
the camp (it wouldn't be until days later that Capt. Jennings would find out
that this band of maniacs was called "Children of The Night" and that they
thought themselves to be "Vampires"). The fighting was intense, and the
"Children" took heavy losses, but the Green Berets successfully fought them off,
and kept them at bay until the morning sunrise, when the "Children" withdrew.
The cost to Capt. Jennings men had also been high; two more men had been killed
brutally. The Green Berets left Pescadero and headed north, finding the
settlement of "Vulcans" at Half Moon Bay later that day (FSgt. Macelheanny
laughed for 30 minutes, when he found out who these people thought they were,
and didn't stop until Spec-5 Ted Finocchio, one of the two Medics, finally gave
him a sedative shot). The settlement at Half Moon Bay was well set-up, friendly,
welcoming – and would be utterly defenseless against a concerted attack from the
"Children of The Night" to the south. Capt. Jennings made the decision to stay,
and assume the duties of defending this peaceful, if (in his opinion) deluded,
community.
In that first
year, the Site-Q A-Team scouted the area, learned that the Children of The Night
hunted the coast and mountains to the south, and had a central HQ somewhere in
the Pigeon Point area. They also learned of the "Badges"-dominated community
down at Santa Cruz, and its advocacy of Slavery. Under normal circumstances,
these Green Berets would have relocated to the Santa Cruz area and begun
insurgency operations against the slavers, but they had already promised to be
the protectors of Half Moon Bay, and besides, the self-called "Vulcans" just
made lousy soldiers. So, Capt. Jennings has made it known that any slave who can
get to Half Moon Bay will be freed, and get their protection – and, with the
help of a few fishermen and their boats from Half Moon Bay, the Green Berets
have even made a few slave raids on the outer settlements of Santa Cruz; freeing
dozens, in the past two years. It is from this group of freed slaves that Capt.
Jennings and his men are building a Militia to both exterminate the Children of
The Night, as well as, eventually, take on the Troopers of Santa Cruz.
Pigeon Point
Light Station: On the Pacific
coast, about halfway between Half Moon Bay and the Santa Cruz Trooper outpost of
Davenport, is a decrepit-looking lighthouse, located on a fog-prone spit of
land. This is home to a large clan of Children of The Night, currently led by a
brilliantly psychotic bitch named Queen Hemofeelya. Though never more than a
couple dozen Children are ever here at one time, their total number is over a
hundred. The bulk of the clan is usually out hunting for humans or other large,
red-blooded animals, to bring home and feed the clan with. Over the years, they
have established hundreds of "hidey-holes" along the coast and up in the
mountains, so that they can prowl a large swath of the San Francisco peninsula
without getting caught by the sun (while they won't burst into flames, they
really are super-sensitive to UV radiation, and can be critically sunburned in
mere minutes).
This clan of
Children of The Night routinely kidnaps people (mostly slaves) from Santa Cruz,
as well as takes the occasional "Vulcan" from Half Moon Bay. The particular
infection that creates these Children makes them quite psychotic and murderously
aggressive towards anyone not inflected as they are. They also have an almost
supernatural ability to sense their type of infection in others. The incubation
period for this brand of infection is actually quite long, taking several weeks
before symptoms start to manifest. The most dangerous thing about these Children
of The Night is that their adrenal glands are pumping them full of adrenaline
all the time – their senses are thus heightened, their speed is rather high, and
their strength is almost unbelievable. Needless to say, if they don't die from
violence, none of these people live past the age of 30, as their bodies’ just
burn-out.
Santa Cruz:
The ruins of Santa Cruz are home to a
clan of Badges that are descended from the Santa Cruz County Sheriffs
Department; the current ruling Sheriff is a large thug of a man named Emil
Stone. These "Troopers", as they call themselves, still manage to operate and
maintain a fleet of rattletrap, alky-powered “Patrol Cars”, with which they seek
out any wanderers who are camping in their territory and attempt to enslave
them. Slaves – or “Cons” – are put into chain gangs that maintain the networks
of roads and outpost “County Farms” used by the Troopers. If the wanderers
appear to be too strong they will be issued paper tickets for camping
violations. The Troopers will also attempt to collect "fines" from such
wanderers; as much as they think they can get away with. The Troopers of Santa
Cruz have a non-aggression pact, of sorts, with the Federal Union of San Jose.
In exchange for some weapons & other trade goods from San Jose, the Troopers
maintain a watch on the coast, and will alert San Jose if they encounter
anything odd. A Federal Union “embassy” is maintained in Santa Cruz. The
Troopers have recently become concerned about the presence of the Snake-Eaters
at Half Moon Bay. There has been talk of "teaching those freedom loving hippies"
a lesson, maybe even alerting the Federal Union to their presence, but so far it
has been just that; talk.
Davenport:
A small community notable as being home
to a northern outpost of the Troopers from Santa Cruz. There is also a seedy bar
called "The Whaler" out on the edge of town, which while being a frequent
watering-hole for off-duty Troopers, is also known for harboring refugees and
escapees from the Troopers' rather harsh brand of justice. In an anachronistic
continuation of ancient history, the code phrase to gain entrance to the bar's
secret underground hide-out is "Please don't throw peanut shells on the floor".
Watsonville:
Home of a small neo-wiccan religious
cult that worships a male harvest deity by the name of "Jolly Green Giant".
8) SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY
The San Joaquin
valley is mostly uncontested and crossed by vital trade and travel routes
between Bakersfield and Stockton. Interstate 5 is the main caravan route,
Highway 99 is used but you have to bypass the horrid mess that is Fresno.
Madera: Home to a thriving Oiler town, begun
fifteen decades ago by a US Navy sailor named Paul Williams, who was on leave
visiting his mother when the war started. His mom lived in Firebaugh, a small
town a few miles to the west of Madera, out in the country. There was a general
call, just before the end, for all military personnel to report to their duty
stations, but Paul never got that call before the nukes began to fall. He knew,
once the reports of the nuke strikes started rolling in, that it was hopeless to
even attempt to get back to his base in San Diego. He also knew that there would
in all likelihood be a period of desperation and anarchy as panic set in to the
surviving populace. Paul began preparing his family and friends, he was a
natural leader, intelligent and fit, and most people readily followed his lead.
Once he had all of his family and friends gathered around him, he began
organizing everyone...creating duty rosters, foraging teams and training a
combat team. And, unfortunately, in the times to come, they had many
opportunities to put thier knowledge to practical use. It was only due to the
early organization of Firebaugh that saved anything resembling the best of
humanity. From Paul's initial small group, other like-minded people began to
gather, and grew until the group became a village, and then a town. To be sure,
there were many trials to overcome, but having an early start on organizing
attracted others. Many of these people came with crucial knowledge and skills
which became vital in the years to come as the community grew. Starvation was a
real and horrifying reality initially, but thanks to some favorable winds,
fallout was minimal. The farmland around Firebaugh was still fertile, and with a
strong farming heritage in the region, starvation was held at bay. Eventually,
enough food was to produced for trade with other small communities. Eventually,
they grew so big that they outgrew the tiny town of Firebaugh. The nearby larger
town of Madera along Highway 99 appealed to them and they moved nearly
everything and everyone to that mostly abandoned town. Madera had a small oil
field and refinery complex, which were slowly reactivated over the next few
years. This provided a trickle of fuel and oil to be traded to local
communities, and eventually to larger empires like the California State
Republic. Paul's legacy finally outgrew him, and councils were formed to run the
community. He was slowly marginalized until finally he could see he was no
longer needed. He was happy enough to care for himself and his immediate family
as everything he worked so hard to create took on a life of its own. 150 years
later, Paul's community is still here and still just as viable. Much of the
town's citizenry either live within a fortified ring around the refinery or
spread out in farms in the surrounding county. The mayor, a descendant of
Paul's, drives around in an old Jeep Cherokee, repaired Frankenstein-style over
the last 150 years. Most of the oil pumped and refined from here is shipped
north along Highway 99 to Stockton where it is distributed further and is a
major reason why vehicles up north keep running. They are often menaced by
roving gangs from Fresno, but have never lost a battle.
The ruins of
Fresno:
Nuked during the war, the city is still
largely a rubbled wreck. The few less-damaged parts are controlled a large,
well-armed Chicano clan. While not much on discipline or organization, the clan
has some old machineguns and mortars that have been passed down from family
member to family member. Trade caravans have largely bypassed the city, swinging
wide to the west on Highways 198 and 145. The clan occasionally hits a convoy
but usually takes high losses in the effort.
Emptiness:
Between Fresno and Bakersfield there is
virtually nothing, towns such as Tulare, Delano and Calico are long-ago deserted
and looted. The nearby Lemoore Naval Air Station was nuked, polluting the fields
and streams for miles, further reducing the chances of finding anyone here.
Trade caravans that run up and down Highway 99 barely notice the dusty ruins
alongside, but keep a wary eye out for bandits and sudden dust storms.
Bakersfield: The effort to evacuate survivors from
Los Angeles was met with strong resistance from central California cities like
Bakersfield, who had enough problems of their own. The local National Guardsmen
were called on to keep the migrations manageable and used force whenever
necessary. In the first decade after the war, Bakersfield was the capitol of the
grandly-named "Republic of California", a regional empire with big dreams. When
the Mexican invasion came north in the years after the war, it was often the
Bakersfield soldiers of the Republic that went out to battle them. They stopped
the Mexicans south of them and pushed them back. They returned to Bakersfield
soon after the battle, not wanting to risk loosing control of the city in the
absence of the military. However, the big plans for rebuilding the area, as well
as a bridge across the Colorado River, never came to fruition and the Republic
was disbanded by 2010. The Republic collapsed because it tried to hold onto too
much. It spent a lot of effort to keep together a region that had been pretty
insular even before the war. Bakersfield struggled on as a survivor city for the
next century, never fading but never really growing to match its potential.
Bakersfield is now a large and strong city of some 5,200 people at the southern
end of the valley, a thriving center of commerce and the hotbed of shady deals
and black marketeering.
Governor Lake: Twenty years ago, "Governor" Lake
began a ruthless consolidation of power in Bakersfield. One of the first acts
was to gain control of the oil fields there, which had been run by a wealthy
group of families for many, many years. These wells provided much of the oil and
gasoline for the larger California State Republic to the north and these
families were filthy rich because of that. With those revenues now flowing into
his coffers, Lake is growing stronger by the month. the California State
Republic keeps its own people in the area to run or repair vital oil refinery
equipment. Lake thinks this is an insult to his people and is slowly building a
justification for taking what is "rightly" theirs. As the CSR is dependent on
oil from Bakersfield, any threat to this supply will surely be met with action.
Lake is also getting old and wants to be the one to reunify California. Lake is
very much an "end justifies the means" sort of person. He believes California
(and the United States) needs to become one again, and the only sure way to do
it is militarily. Bakersfield's militia has long controlled a lot of military
equipment left from before the war. Although most of it hasn't worked for
decades, Lake has quite enough rifles and howitzers to make taking the city and
the refineries difficult. Providing ammunition could be a problem, though.
9) SOUTHERN PACIFIC COAST
Monterrey
peninsula: Along the Monterey peninsula, most of
the historic old towns have been long ago burned and looted by refugees. The
plaid waters of Monterey Bay are now home to the "Kon Tikis", a collection of
boaters working together for mutual survival. They fish the waters of the bay
and only occasionally venture further inland than the coastal strip.
Soledad: The old sprawling Mission Neustra
Senora de la Soledad is home to the "spiritual nexus" of the "Church of the Holy
Mushroom Cloud". The church is more of a cult anymore, one that demands cannibal
sacrifices of its followers.
Hunter Ligget
Military Reservation: Abandoned for good in 2008 by the last
remnants of the military, this base is now home to a mixed bag of small-plot
farmers and squatters. Mother Nature has done a good job of reclaiming this
base, and stubby oak, blue grass, and scrub brush have taken over most of the
area.
Fort Ord
Military Reservation: The SLBM aimed
at this former basic training center both missed badly and was a dud. The
warhead shattered on impact, a dozen miles to the east in the rugged Diablo
Mountains. This is home to about 220 farmers and hunters who till the wide open
grounds of the base and still live in some of the old barrack buildings.
Vandenburg Air
Force Base: The satellite
launching facilities at Vandenburg AFB were nuked during the war. The warheads
were all ground-bursts, causing extremely localized heavy damage and wildly
indiscriminate fallout. Towns as far away as Ventura, Santa Barbara and Santa
Maria were damaged by the resulting forest fires that swept through the area.
The Castle: William Randolph Hearst's enormous
palace along the coast near San Simeon, is now held by about 165 religious
followers called the "Holy Army of Allah". They are led by a militant Black
Muslim named Mamud Abdur-Ali, and he claims to be the legitimate Governor of
California for some reason. They lead a very difficult life and follow a very
strict set of dietary laws, forbidding them to eat any meat or drink any
alcohol. They are busy repairing the castle and salvaging goods from the local
towns, none of which are currently inhabited.
10) LOS PADRES NATIONAL FOREST
In the rolling
hills and valleys of this evergreen forest north of LA, there are numerous
isolated settlements, living off the plentiful game and fish still to be had.
The larger towns deeper in the forest have mostly been abandoned as being too
vulnerable to bandit attacks and wildfires.
Ojai: Despite being burned and abandoned at
various times over the years, Ojai has lately become a thriving trade center. As
the clearing house for animal pelts and salvaged goods coming out of the forest,
Ojai is relatively wealthy, with a steady population of 400 people.
Santa Barbara: Badly burned by wildfires in 1989 and
again in 1995, the remnants of this once beautiful town is home to an unsavory
clan of xenophobic fishermen. The town is known locally as "Rattown" because of
the multitudes of rats in the area. The clan is a couple hundred strong and very
tight-knit, requiring you to eat a live rat to gain entrance. They are known for
stringing up victims around their territory as a warning to others, and most
people avoid it completely.
Ventura:
This large town along the southern edge
of the forest was once a cantonment of a Mexican Army mechanized brigade, which
crossed the border over a century ago. Assimilated for generations, there is
little left of their prior unit structure and only a few old weapons and
vehicles still in service. Ventura receives infrequent ship traffic from western
Mexico and other California coastal ports, and the docks are kept open year
round. Ventura is a tough town, with frequent shortages of food and fresh water.
Violent crime is common and at night, knife-fights are prone to erupt without
warning. Because the "lights have stayed on", people have been reluctant to
leave Ventura.
Santa Clarita: Another pocket of farmers and small
game hunters, many of them descendants of a shattered Mexican Army regiment
whose survivors dug in here 120 years ago and never left. The town currently has
some 200 residents.
Tehachapi
Mountains: This mountain range northwest of Los
Angeles was the site of a secret US Air Force underground base. It is located at
the mouth of Little Oak Canyon, about 25 miles northwest of Lancaster. It was
partially powered by the Kern River hydroelectric project, but the power went
off 150 years ago. No idea of its condition is known.
The Channel
Islands: Sparsely populated before the War, the
Channel Islands saw an initial influx of refugees, stranded sailors, and
castaways in the first months after the bombs fell on the mainland. For a time
there was even a large US military presence, as the bases in LA and San Diego
were unusable, but within a few years they had all either left for the Orient or
had gone ashore and taken sides with one of the numerous "true governments" of
California. The Channel Islands were far enough away from the Los Angeles-area
strikes to be unaffected by the blast effects, and the steady offshore breeze
protected them from any fallout, so they had the unique chance to survive. For
another century, the fortunes of these islands rose and fell, often with the
sudden rapidity associated with life at sea. A plague in 2058, another in 2062,
a horrible raid from pirates in 2103, another plague in 2113, and even the Great
Storm of 2129, which flattened half the buildings on Catalina and sank most
every boat in the harbor. Today, 150 years after the War, the Channel Islands
are doing fairly well in their isolation. The society is based on the sea, with
fishing and small-scale farming taking up most peoples' time. In total, there
are perhaps 800 people living on the islands, with around 600 of those on
Catalina.
The Star of
India: That Great Storm of 2129, along with
wrecking most of the islands' infrastructure and setting them back economically
for a decade, also sank the pride and joy of Catalina's sailing fleet. The
Star of India was a iron-hulled, fully-rigged windjammer, originally build
in 1863 and for many years a popular tourist attraction in San Diego.
Fortunately at sea when the bombs fell, the ship survived and fled to Catalina.
Her crew of highly-trained sailors possessed nearly-forgotten skills in
shipbuilding and sailing, which were to prove invaluable to the citizens of
Catalina as the decades wore on and the need for low-tech sailing vessels became
apparent. Used at various times as a hospital ship, a whaling mothership, a
tradeship for runs as far away as Costa Rica, a tender for a depleted destroyer
squadron of the Seventh Fleet, and even the personal battleship of Mad King
Carlos before he was executed by the ship's captain in a mutiny, the Star,
as she was known to most, had a long and eventful life. On the day of the Great
Storm of 2129, however, she was far from home, searching for halibut off the
Cortez Bank, and was never seen again.
That is, until
last month, when a fisherman returned to Catalina with a wild story of having
seen a gleaming white clippership racing along the wind at full sail off the old
ruins of San Diego. He had tried to hail her, and while he could see crewman at
the rails, the ship didn't stop and kept on cutting northwest along the coast.
When shown pictures of the lost Star of India, the fisherman positively
identified her as the ship he saw. News of this has the citizens of Catalina in
a tizzy, and word has been passed to all outlying islands and fishermen to keep
a look out. More ominous news has come just this week, however, as a lone
survivor of a fishing boat has washed ashore, reporting a terrifiying tale of
being sunk by cannon fire from a huge white sailing ship...
The tanker: Just 30 miles offshore from Ventura is
Anacapa Island, the easternmost of the Channel Islands. In 1989, immediately
upon news of the first nuclear strikes, the crew of an Amsterdam-flagged oil
freighter off Oxnard moved out to Anacapa Island to wait out the war, finding a
little spot nestled away to anchor. Taking a vote, the crew decided that they
would go ashore and the 20-man crew dispersed, leaving their ship to rust at
anchor. This tanker has long since been pushed aground by storms and broken in
half, but about 15% of the crude oil is still in the hold, constituting a big
asset to whoever finds it first. The wreck has been known to the local Islanders
for decades, but they have no use for the oil. Ventura's local fishing boats are
constantly in the area, it is a miracle that one of them hasn't stopped to
investigate the wrecked tanker yet.
11) LOS ANGELES
Mostly still
under development...(going to wait until the latest module comes out, which
should detail this area)
KC and his
Sunshine Band: Palos Verdes was radioactive slag like
the rest of the LA Basin until fairly recently. About 30 years ago, the
radiation suddenly receded and grassland, plants and even fruit trees Are now
growing there in appreciable numbers. The reason for this incongruous fact is
due entirely to the actions of one "man". Born Kevin Clarkson in 1955, (KC as he
is now known) was in downtown Los Angeles on that fateful November day when the
bombs fell. Instead of dying on the spot, KC became a Blue Undead.
For 120 years,
KC was wandering his small patch of ruins, until an earthquake shook the area 30
years ago. KC fell into a small chasm and found himself in a small lake of
corrosive toxic waste (buried in the sub foundation in the 1970s by a
unscrupulous contractor). After crawling out of the pit, he discovered to his
amazement he was no longer tied to the same quarter mile area. Also, as if
awaking from a long stupor, his memories and consciousness slowly returned. It
was clear an Atomic War had occurred, but he had no idea how much time had
passed. Unknown to anyone (including him) is that that fateful bath in toxic
waste changed KC into a Blue Undead Plus. He still feeds on radiation, but now
actually consumes all of it in any given area, leaving the area fertile and
prime for reclamation. He still wanders the slagged ruins of LA proper, however,
in a vain attempt to find his long vaporized wife and children. If you meet him
he will be quiet and have a haunted, far-off look in his coal-black eyes. Where
ever he travels (always on foot), within days, grass, weeds, flowers and even
trees begin to grow and flourish. Strangely, whomever touches his person dies of
within hours of what appears to be extreme starvation, and he shows up as normal
on dosimeters and Geiger counters.
A group of
Stubs have taken to following/worshiping him. The followers are only seen during
daylight hours and as such KC has dubbed them his "Sunshine Band". He is often
heard to mumbling about what the land looked like in the past and talks to the
ground as if it were his friend and companion. KC now associates the land and
his children as one and the same. Curiously, people who talk to him without
touching him leave feeling refreshed and find former ailments no longer an
issue. He carries a long walking staff, wears ragged robes and truck tire
sandals and a ancient, tattered, sun-bleached fedora. A Project Science Team
would find KC to be a "Rosetta Stone" in researching all aspect of
radiation-related phenomenon.
12) AZATLAN EMPIRE
The Aztlan
Empire was formed in the first few years of the nuclear autumn. MEChA,
"Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan" or "Chicano Student Movement of
Aztlan", was a blatantly racist student activist group originally championed by
Hispanic students already living in California. One of the many slogans used by
these student groups was "Por La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada" ("Everything
for the race. Everything outside the race, nothing"). The more militant of these
student groups fought to create an independent Aztlan state during the period
right after the war. Having little success, they petitioned the Mexican
government for assistance. The Mexicans, in trouble themselves and looking for a
reason to get all those well-armed men out of the country and away from plotting
coups, sent the Army across the border. They occupied San Diego quickly and
marched north, finally being crushed south of Bakersfield. The students filled
the gaps in the Mexican Army lines, forming "MEChA" paramilitary units that
fought with fanatical enthusiasm, if not with tactical skill. The Aztlan Empire
was soon formed, and even prospered for a while, consolidating its territory
generally south of Interstate 40. However, creating an empire is not as easy as
feeding one and keeping revolutionaries from longing to create the next one. The
Empire collapsed in upon itself some 100 years ago, and all that remains today
are scattered enclaves that still claim a common heritage. They even had their
own flag, an eagle holding a machete-like weapon and a stick of dynamite on a
green and crimson field, that can still be found flying in some towns, and as a
"battle flag" when militia units go into action.
The ruins of San
Diego: This vital port city and military town
was targeted by two nuclear missiles during the war. One, aimed at the naval air
installations, missed a little to the south and detonated its MIRVs in a
triangular airburst just offshore of Imperial Beach. The resulting shockwaves
pummeled Coronado, the Silver Strand State Beach, and miles of beachfront into
radioactive dust before the steaming waters of the Pacific rushed in to fill the
craters. A few hours later, another nuke, this one a single warhead, came flying
in. The warhead ground burst in San Diego's East County, demolishing most of the
area. Flash-lit grass fires and bursting natural gas lines devastated large
portions of the north side of the city, combining with the raging firestorm from
the East County hit. From Imperial Beach, north to the Soledad Freeway, and from
the Pacific east to the Sweetwater River, all was eventually charred into rubble
by the fires. Some areas of San Diego were spared the worst, however. Parts of
Mission Valley, the campus of San Diego State University, central La Jolla, and
bits of North County were not too damaged and were able to retain populations.
Invasion and
occupation: If twin nuclear attacks weren't
enough, the Mexican Army soon crossed the border almost without a shot fired and
occupied the city ruins. The city was declared capitol of the new "Aztlan
Empire" and there was much rejoicing. It was short-lived, however, and soon San
Diego fell back into a dirty, violent form of anarchy. 150 years later, there is
little remaining of the glory days of the Aztlan Empire in California, just a
few scattered settlements in the southern edges of the city and the big enclave
on Coronado Island.
San Diego today: The eastern part of the city from La
Mesa down through Lemon Grove to Chula Vista is still a vast stretch of broken
radioactive terrain with entire ranges of hills and small mountains that once
characterized the region swept clean. What remains has been reclaimed by nature,
either by tangled mutant sagebrush or by vast tracts of blowing sand and ash.
The actual bomb crater is still there, now half-filled with stagnant,
radioactive water. Central San Diego, below Balboa Park, is a confused mix of
semi-ruined buildings, burnt-out shells, and slippery rubble fields. The West
Mission Bay Causeway is down, blocking the entrance to Mission Bay. The Coronado
Bay Bridge is also down, awash in currents of refuse and dead seabirds. The rest
of Coronado and the bridge's onramps are completely submerged as far south as
the former amphibious base where the Mexican garrison is. The world-renown San
Diego Zoo is now animal-free, the exhibits having long ago become dinner for
hungry survivors. The empty buildings and paddocks of the zoo are occasionally
home to refugees and bandits. The Imperial Beach nuke played havoc with the US
Navy Fleet based here, and today the harbor is choked with the half-exposed,
grounded remains of rusted and burned-out transports and warships and even some
nuclear submarines. Tidal changes expose more crumbling wrecks each day. All the
leaking chemicals, oils and fissionable materials have made the harbor a haven
for mutated corals and fish.
Life in the
ruins: Across the entire area food and water
are both fairly scarce, and the city's total population has dwindled to about
1,000. Nomadic clans farm open plots and scavenge the ruins, but it is a hard
and short life. Ruthless groups of bandits, most armed only with iron hammers
and crude spears, make this area their hunting ground, culling the weak. The
warrens beneath San Diego are swarming with Maggots, who frequently emerge at
night to raid and pillage the nomadic tribes and bandits with equal furor.
Aztlan Enclave: Today, the sole remaining enclave of
Aztlan power is on Coronado Island at the old USN amphibious base. Once occupied
by a regular Mexican Army brigade, this unit converted to militant Catholicism a
few years after the war ended. Today, the descendents observe strict Catholic
rituals within the confines of the base, but are infamous for their bloodthirsty
rampages of looting and plundering into the local ruins. Some 280 men and
dependents currently live here, but their numbers fluctuate widely as new
converts (slaves brought back on raids and given the choice to convert or die)
come in and old members die or are killed in raids into the ruins. They are
generally a motley bunch, with mismatched uniforms and ancient Garand carbines
and they have little but pulled carts for transport, all of their vehicles
having broken down over the last few decades. Despite their weaknesses, they
have tried as best they could to repair the fences around the base and have dug
in emplacements to guard the approaches.
Camp Pendleton
Marine Corps Base: When the bombs
fell, the base's resident unit was overseas. By the time of the Mexican
invasion, the remaining Camp staff was severely weakened by radiation, disease
and desertion. A MEChA unit from UC-SD, flanking a Mexican Army motorized
brigade, drove on the Camp and after a sharp, quick fight, rolled over the
hastily prepared defenses. For a while, the conquerors took pride in marching
around the base in their new Marine uniforms, driving their Marine tanks and
shouting slogans. Once the gas and the food ran out, however, the students
settled down and became farmers and fishermen. Today, most of the Camp is
overgrown, but some rusty Amtraks and tanks still poke up out of the brush.
Along the coast are a healthy number of fishermen.
Escondido: A thriving trade town now, home to
some 1,200 people. Travelers and merchants from Mexico often use Escondido as a
waystation.
Mount Palomar
Observatory: While most of the outbuildings have
been destroyed by forest fires, the telescope itself has remained intact. For a
long time it was a cantonment of the Aztlan Army, but they pulled out several
decades ago. Today, the observatory is home to a group of Mexican "astrologist
monks", who use the telescope to view the heavens and look for portents of
things to come. These monks will resist any attempt by outsiders to enter the
"holy sanctum" (the observatory).
13) THE MEXICAN BORDER
The strip along
the border with Mexico is a rugged land of scrub oak and sagebrush, mixed with
majestic pine forests and steep mountain valleys.
Manzanita Indian
Reservation: Lately, the
newest generations of the Indians here have been moving out into the Cleveland
National Forest to the west, claiming the land as their own.
Pine Valley: The main watering hole and caravan
repair shop on the trade route between the Pacific Coast and Mexicali. Some
2,000 people live here, almost all Mexicans.
Potrero: Home of the "Ocho Sols", a rather
vicious clan of Mexican slavers. They were formed nine years ago when a man
named Max united three small slaver clans in the area under his rule. His
followers are armed mostly with shotguns and melee weapons and have a handful of
motorcycles; Max himself drives around on a classic 1961 Harley Davidson
motorcycle.
National
Parachute Test Range: Home of a
mixed race enclave with some 300 residents. This old training base just north of
the border is a graveyard of rusting military equipment and discarded wrecks. It
is now an important caravan waystation, lying as it does along the route to
Mexicali. The residents, many of them descendants of the American military
staff, have worked hard to make the base an attractive place for traders to
stop. They have built a crude water-treatment plant and fortified the perimeter
with fences of barbed wire and piled-up rubble. The people here trade salvaged
military equipment to the caravans in exchange for water, foodstuffs, and other
goods not readily available to them.
14) MOJAVE DESERT
Though 150
years have passed, the Mojave Desert is still very much that--a desert. From the
Sierra Nevadas south to the Mexican border, the arid Mojave desert of
southeastern California is a mixture of crumbling ruins and isolated farming
settlements. Bandits and highwaymen are a constant danger to the traders, and
life is often cheap and short.
Burbank Banzai
Clan: Before the war, land sailing was a
past time for yuppies and thrill seekers. The Burbank Banzai social club formed
in 1958 as an outgrowth of the growing interest in Sand Railing. 3-wheeled carts
with a small sail, chutzpah, and a lack of common sense were all that was
required. Speeds of 40 to 50 mph were not uncommon, and sitting three inches
from the ground made it seem like three times that speed.
On the day the
modern world ended in 1989, the Burbank Banzais were attending their end-of-year
exodus to the flats near Las Vegas with about 600 fellow speed freaks,
designers, builders, engineers and reluctant spouses and children. This caravan
rode out the strikes in the high desert and due to the EMP, had the only
reliable transportation in the area. They ran messenger service for the
sheriff's department, ferried EMTs here and there and basically filled in while
awaiting help from the government types. After three weeks, however, it became
painfully clear help was not forthcoming, and local authority was quickly
breaking down. The surviving military units said they were moving west to
Bakersfield and the Banzai folks were welcome to come along.
Working their
way as close to their homes in Burbank as they could, they were shocked to see
that the entire LA basin had been obliterated, and where Burbank once stood
there was now only a molten and bubbling field of rubble. They retreated to
Palmdale where some owned businesses and reinvented themselves. Since they made
the only reliable transports in the region, their services were much in demand.
In 1995, the
community was overrun by lead elements of the Azatlan Army, and the Burbank
Banzai became the banner of the resistance. On improvised sail cars, the battle
was brought to the surprised Mexicans. Tactics were created, designs improved
and weapons modified to become deadly and much feared. Those hard times created
a Clan Mentality within the club and a closed society of sorts was formed. They
kept the old name as a tribute to their fabled lost homeland, though few, if
any, people anymore know what a "banzai" is. Over time, the clan spread its
reach and today commands and oversees the desert trade routes from Lancaster
south to the Mexican border and east to Pahrump and south to Yuma. They protect
trade caravans and haul freight themselves. Their craft range from tiny 1-person
"fighters/scouts" to massive 8-person "freighters" capable of carrying up to a
metric ton. The larger craft are equipped with retrofitted aircraft wings for
more efficient propulsion and they can tack up to 60' into the wind, whereas the
smaller 1 and 2-person craft require sail and can tack only 45' into the wind.
Their weapons range from black powder muskets, throwing knives, shuriken’s and
crossbows, to razor sharp swords and piano wire strung between vehicles to deal
with Infantry or Calvary.
Encounters with
the Burbank Banzai clan can be either fleeting as they fly by you at 40 miles
and hour, or productive if you have something to trade/sell or have information
they would need. As the Mojave is such a huge and desolate area, stretching for
many hundreds of miles in all directions, encounters with these Land Sailors
will be quite rare.
Palm Springs: This former desert resort survived
initially because of the wealth of its mostly affluent residents. Over the
decades, this wealth allowed the town to buy protection and security. Now, some
3,000 people live in this area, and do quite well for themselves. Trade is
conducted locally and occasionally with Bakersfield and Mojave. The town now has
60 full-time police officers and some 100 part-time militiamen who drill once a
week and keep themselves armed and ready. Their paramilitary forces are the
descendents of several dozen California highway patrolmen who were instrumental
in organizing the city's first defense force. 150 years later, they still have
some old CHiPs equipment, including a couple of Police Harleys that are coveted
by local Bikers. Barbed wire barricades and pit bunkers have been erected along
the roads leading into the town to discourage marauders and violent refugees.
Palmdale: A secret facility exists
semi-underground a short drive north of Palmdale, though few locals can tell you
exactly where. It is a multi-layered technology center over eight levels deep
and the size of a small city. It was formerly the Northrop Corporation's
underground testing center. It is unknown if it has been looted already.
Twentynine Palms
Marine Corps Base: Underneath
this nuked base is a suspected pre-war military complex, out in the desert
southeast of Ludlow. Locals in the area have spoken of a tunnel-like structure
caused by rushing water in ancient times that leads to lost caches of military
gear. Attempts over the years to lower people down this shaft have resulted in
the ropes being mysteriously "cut". Others report a "poisonous blue gas" that
comes from below to keep people from descending.
Needles: Initially flooded out by the Colorado
River when Hoover Dam was hit, Needles was rebuilt some ten miles to the west at
the junction of I-40 and Highway 95. The new Needles is now a depressed farming
town just barely subsiding. With almost no goods to trade, Needles is little
more than a small tribal community, although one that believes in the high
ideals of pre-war America.
Bishop County: This is the name given to the region
north of Mojave, up the Owens River Valley and north into Bishop. It is
primarily an agricultural region now that the Los Angeles aqueduct no longer
sends its water to Los Angeles. It is also very protected, since it is flanked
on two sides by the Sierra Nevadas on the west and the desert on the north. This
has allowed a weak representative government to survive. Towns pretty much do as
they please, and many hold elections for mayor every few years. Bishop County
also holds various mineral deposits, partially thanks to active volcanism since
the war. Transport is typically horse-drawn wagons utilizing the intact rail
line, with an occasional steam engine. There were plans for an electric trolley
at one time, but the electrical costs made it impractical. There is some
banditry, but not in any serious sense. It's more like mugging the non-local
population. The Los Angeles Aqueduct runs south out of the Owens River Valley.
Farmers distrust any water coming down from what is left of the California
aqueduct, since at one time it was heavily contaminated from the nuclear hits
near Merced to the north. This is no longer the case, but it has been so long
since it was cleared of debris should anyone start using it, it would
practically dry out.
Mojave: Now a thriving trade center and small
manufacturing town out in the desert. It is relatively populous because the
local farmers have access to farm equipment, fertilizers, and pesticides, and
thus most residents of the area live in town. There is some trade between it,
Bishop County and Bakersfield, and Mojave still receives water from the Los
Angeles Aqueduct. The town "officially" belongs to Bishop County, however, and
pays taxes to it. This irks the townspeople to no end, but those taxes "pay" for
the water, so nothing is done about it. Also, the people here are a little bit
worried about Bakersfield's recent rise in power, which could mean another war
to reunify California. While Mojave does have know-how, a lot of it isn't in
demand. For instance, they have the ability to make most farming chemicals, but
only the ones worth the expense of transporting are worth making in any
quantity. Heavy machinery is not beyond them, but most work is put into keeping
electrical generators and water pumps operational. Most public buildings are
either serviceable, or stripped of anything that could be of use, nothing has
gone to waste in the area. The militia is called the "Marines", and they got
their name and their equipment from the old pre-war Marine Logistical Base here.
The militia is well-armed and trained and they even have an old California NG
M48A5 tank, currently immobile on a flatbed truck that broke under its weight.
The grandly-named Eagle Air Freight Company has its operations at the Mojave
airport and the "Eagles" are currently working to refurbish aircraft and return
them to flight. The airport itself is a crazy mismatch of planes that found
their way here in the years after the nuclear war, including a Bell helicopter,
an F-4 Phantom, a 200-year old P-38 Lightning that escaped from an airshow, a
couple of C-130s, some civilian jetliners, and even a massive C-5 Galaxy. It's
certain that they will have at least something flying soon, though doubtful it
will be one of the jets.
California City: A smallish farming town of some 140
people, subsiding on farmed creek beds and chicken coops. There is some trade
going on with Mojave and Bishop County.
Barstow: For a few years after the war, Barstow
hung on, and was absorbed by the "Republic of California". As the Republic
struggled for existence, Barstow's power faded as well. When the Republic
finally collapsed in 2010, Barstow was left to its own devices. Barstow has
since become the hub of trade in the immediate area, thanks to its centralized
location and effective militia. Barstow is a stop-off point for caravans north
to central valley enclaves, east to the Colorado River, and south to the large
coastal cities. At any time there are around 200 to 400 people in town,
depending on the weather.
Fort Irwin
Training Area: This nuked military base is now just
empty, barren land. This large area was used to train troops, but there is
little evidence left that such took place. Most intact military hardware was
removed many years ago, but there are copious numbers of wrecks to be salvaged.
Out amongst the rusting dummy target tanks of the gunnery training range there
is a small enclave of New Age hippie travelers from San Jose who have settled in
the area to practice their alternative drug culture. These people were headed
for Texas when they
decided to camp here for the winter and "expand their minds".
Tecopa: A small farming settlement has been
founded here along the railroad tracks outside of the old town. Known only for
having a whore house. Recently the whore house has been taken over by a large
gang of Bikers known as the "White Shirts". The gang has about 50 members but
are so unorganized that they pose less danger than expected and spend more time
killing each other over the five women in the whore house than they do raiding.
Desert Center: Typical of the small disorganized
trading outposts in the southwestern area of the Mojave desert. About 20 people
live here, barely surviving from season to season.
Deep Springs: Along the
Nevada border, this town is home of a
"school" for "Communist homosexuals". Currently, nine families live here,
descendents of several pre-war gay communes that dotted this area. The community
survives due to the small spring-fed lake that the name comes from. Local rumors
also hint that Deep Springs was the home of an ancient underground base, with
hidden entrances near the bases of nearby mountains. The locals have called this
base "Yellowfruit" for generations, though none of them can tell you where this
strange name came from.
"Site-M": Indeed, the Deep Springs mystery base
is a Snake-eater
base named Site-M. The men are still sleeping, unaware of the local situation
above them.
"Site-D": Site-D is an abandoned Snake-eater
base, located somewhere in Death Valley. Its exact location is unknown, as the
living staff was killed by an earthquake a week after the war. In the
sand-filled base are some two dozen cryotubes, holding ten Green Berets. None of
them are still alive, and much of their gear has been exposed to the elements
and decayed.
"Site-I": The
Snake-eaters also have a small intact
bolthole somewhere beneath Argus Peak several miles northwest of the old town of
Trona on the former grounds of the China Lake Test Center. It is known as Site-I
and was built in the mid-1980s. The men are sleeping peacefully here, waiting
for their wake-up call.
People who have
contributed to this entry:
John Raner
Chris Van Deelen
Ken Wheeler
Clive Henrick
Karl Zohler
Vince Tognarelli