The Fall of Pax Americana

The Story

By Snow Ashe. Commander and Founder of the Keepers

The Fall of Pax Americana

The year was 2022. I was walking down the streets in Downtown Little Rock, the moon's reflection sat in the puddles by my feet. The street lights started flickering. All of a sudden darkness snuffed out the light. Within seconds I heard screaming from young kids and parents trying to calm them. A man in a damp trench coat bumped into me and shoved something that felt like a small piece of paper into my hand. I didn't know what was going on so I headed home. I could hear thunder rolling in so I picked up the pace. Lightning in the distance was igniting my path. Everyone was rushing past me to get under shelter. "Just one more block," I kept telling myself, it felt like I've been walking forever. Right as I walked in, the wind picked up, almost taking the door off the hinges. I took my phone out of my pocket and turned it on trying to figure out what was going on, but I had no service. I was getting a bad feeling in my stomach; something wasn't right. We've had bad weather before, but not to the point where the lights went out across the entire city. I grabbed my backpack, put supplies in it, and went to the gun case to get my grandfathers revolver, rifle, ammunition, along with a sword; just in case. I placed everything on my dining room table, double checking to see if I have packed everything I need. Reaching for my phone again, I feel the paper the man had given me. It read: The Chasers are behind it. You have to reunite The Keepers and figure out how to stop them.
-Theo Howe"

I sighed. It's been 4 years since I last saw the other members of The Keepers. After the last battle, some of our members lost hope in our order and left. Some passed away during the battle and other members thought we would be too weak if we were to be attacked again. I moved up to Little Rock and stayed low for 4 years. The first battle took a lot out of me. I lost one of my closest friends when she left and joined the Chasers even though they killed several of our members and destroyed part of our city in the process.

I looked back at the paper. I flipped it over and sure enough, there was more writing on the back of the note;

"Hurry. Time is running out. The Chasers are becoming stronger as each second goes by. The president is under a lot of stress due to the increase in attacks in major cities. The Government is due to fall any day now."

The weather was still horrific outside. The trees knocked against the windows, the wind tried to blow down the door, and lightning cracked above the house. It didn't faze me though. The next morning, the sky was clear with a couple puddles still on the ground. I loaded my supplies into my truck and headed back to Shreveport, Louisiana to where our old headquarters were. I still owned the building and we still had our main library, war room, armory, and everything else that wasn't destroyed during the Battle of 2018;
after three long days of driving through a storm that stretched across seven states. When I finally arrived at the headquarters I got out and looked around at the exterior of the building. You could definitely tell that no one had been here for a while, the grass was due for more than a trim.

So much dirt and dust had built up on the window that it made it hard to see through the windows. When I went in, everything was how we left it, except for all the dust that developed, but it was as if time had paused itself once we left. Everywhere I looked, there were 3 inches of dust. Books and half-empty cups sat on tables next to chairs. There were files still lying open on the old mahogany table we had found in an abandoned house just outside the city. I could still remember the laughs and talks we had around the table with a few screaming matches as well. Now the place just echoed with emptiness. I headed up to the roof to take a look at what I once called home, a lot had changed over the past four years. New buildings had been built and old ones were torn down or abandoned. But I still recognized it. I had many fond memories in the Shreveport-Bossier City area.