Speak Up, Sweetheart

Intro: The Heatwave

It was the year 4023. Ten years had passed since the fatal heatwave that wiped out millions of people across the globe. The world was left in shambles. Many countries remained desolate and unpopulated. A hyper-patriotic man named Penn Caron, who was a very powerful US government figure before the heatwave, took advantage of the chaos and became the dictator of the United States. At the time, people needed direction and leadership since the president buckled under pressure. No one expected Caron’s rule to be so long or so invasive. After Caron had enough followers, he took the country by force.

In the small state of Ehrod, Caron appointed a man named Dirk to dictate his orders. The whole country was connected by a network of powerful people, all under Caron’s rule. National surveillance wasn’t anything new, except under Caron, the people were put behind bars for saying anything that went against his rules. Needless to say, there were many more prisons than there used to be. It was a big-brother-type situation, but as long as people followed his orders and kept to themselves, Caron was a fairly pleasant individual.

After the heat wave, Caron made orders to tear down every state and build skyscrapers. He wanted the whole country to look like an industrial dystopia, but also very shiny and modern. The old Ehrod that was quaint and somewhat old-fashioned was now bustling and new. The population had grown enough to where it looked like a completely normal and busy state like before.

There was one city in Ehrod, called Hillwyn, which Dirk suggested to Caron to be left alone because it was so damaged and beyond repair. Hillwyn wasn't perfect, but it was a tight-knit little city before the heatwave. It was an old city, though, so the heatwave left it in ruins. Now, Hillwyn was filled with antiquated apartment buildings and complexes that were deteriorating, with decaying roofs and peeling paint. Cars were abandoned all over the roads. Litter flooded the sidewalks. It was a wonder that so many people inhabited Hillwyn since it was so dangerous and rundown, but a lot of people had nowhere else to go.

Most states had one city that wasted away but somehow kept afloat. What Dirk didn’t know was that there was a group of people in Hillwyn who were anti-government and were secretly planning to take down Caron. In fact, there were groups like that in just about every state that Caron and his officials were unaware of.

Lightdale was a city in the center of Ehrod and the state capital, not far from Hillwyn. On occasion, people from Hillwyn would go into Lightdale to make big robberies. Sometimes, they made it back to Hillwyn, but most of the time, they were arrested. The type of people who did the robberies put a big target on Hillwyn's back. After a big robbery, Lightdale police would drive up and down the streets of Hillwyn for days, arresting as many people as they found "suspicious."

Because of this, lots of people in Hillwyn stayed indoors, except for work and other necessities. The number of arrests made in Hillwyn became so high that its population was flailing. Dirk would never admit to Caron that Hillwyn should have been renovated with the rest of the state, so his next best idea was to lock up as many people as possible. A huge disadvantage of not renovating Hillwyn was that it wasn’t under surveillance. Besides the police, people outside of Hillwyn generally never went there. Occasionally, a drunk group of teenagers drove through as a dare. They always just ended up with a slap on the wrist from the police.

A vital piece of information that Dirk had that Hillwyn did not was that he began the process of finding someone to infiltrate Hillwyn as an undercover agent. After so many robberies, it became almost impossible to ignore the city’s existence. Something needed to be done, but he figured the police raids were ineffective since people always managed to escape. He wanted something more permanent. He needed a person to get in there and live among the locals and befriend them. Only then could he have full access to Hillwyn’s secrets and really, truly take down those criminals.