August 1, 2044
Caracas, New Order Venezuela
"I'm telling you, though. It's like the entire mentality of the United Kingdom changed overnight! I've tried talking to Arthur, but he keeps on brushing me off. It's like he doesn't even consider me a nation!"
"Really?" A reply came in the form of a noncommital hum. "It's almost as if you aren't an actual nation, Sealand."
Rihana paused in her walk as she heard the voices come from around the corner of the hallway. The Olympics were currently in full swing, and Caracas was bustling with the athletes and representatives of almost 200 nations. It was late in the evening, however, and Rihana had elected to go back to her room early while many of the other nations remained in their shared hotel's recreation room, celebrating another successful Olympics. Though she loved alcohol and the company of her friends as much as the next person, she didn't want to be hung over and miss her people's first serious water polo match against Germany the next morning.
But it seemed that she hadn't been the only one to have this idea. Though the name Sealand didn't ring any bells with her (he had to be a territory or micronation; he sounded like he was barely 13), the second voice was slightly familiar.
Shaking herself, Rihana turned the corner as the younger child huffed, obviously annoyed. She found herself nearly face-to-face with two nations younger than her. The first to catch her attention was the elder of the two, a young man barely out of his teenage years. He had platinum blond, almost white, hair that fell in short bangs around his face, and was rather pale. What caught her attention the most, however, were his eyes. They were… violet. The sort of dark violet that one could almost mistake for blue, but at this distance that mistake was hard to make. Rihana felt herself pause in surprise as the man blinked at her, also caught off-guard.
"Sorry," she mumbled, embarrassed that she had been surprised like that, especially with forewarning.
"I-it's fine," the man replied. "You're… Somalia, right? I think we've met in passing."
"Yes," Rihana replied slowly, tearing her eyes away from the man as her attention drifted to the 12-year-old boy at the man's side. He was definitely a Kirkland, if his straw-blond hair and monstrously thick eyebrows were anything to go by. "Your name's slipped my mind, I'm afraid. Who are you, again?"
"It's fine. I'm a small nation; not many people know about me. I'm Iceland." The man stuck out his hand, and Somalia shook it. Ah, a northern nation. That explained the eyes.
"I'm Sealand!" The boy chirped. "And don't listen to Ice! I'm a real nation!"
Ah. Micronation it was, then, and almost certainly one from the UK. Somalia ignored the prick in her heart as she nodded along with the boy's words. Micronations didn't tend to live very long in the grand scheme of things.
"Sorry about almost running into you, there," She apologised, already continuing on. "Anyways, I better get going. Have a good evening."
"See you soon," Iceland replied, raising a hand in farewell and continuing on, steering Sealand away by the shoulder. Somalia paused, confused by the parting remark, but they were gone around the corner in moments.
What? What makes you so certain I'll run into you again?
"Alexa, what's Sealand?" She asked, tilting her head.
"The Principality of Sealand, commonly known as Sealand, is a micronation that claims Roughs Tower, an offshore platform in the North Sea approximately 12 kilometres off the coast of Suffolk, England as its territory[1]," came the automatic reply from her earpiece. Rihana hummed, walking back over to her room.
Then she paused.
Stopping just a couple feet from her room, Rihana took out the folded piece of paper that had appeared in her jacket pocket. Paper? That product had become obsolete in recent years, as Hybrid Energy tablets and related products took over the writing market. Iceland must have slipped it to her when they were talking, heaven knows how. If he had used paper, he was taking extra precautions to make sure that his message wasn't intercepted.
Rihana unfolded the piece of paper, subtly positioning herself so that it was out of sight on the cameras positioned in the corners of the hallway. She squinted down at the handwriting (had he used pencil? God, Rihana was starting to feel more ancient than usual; she hadn't written in pencil for at least the last half decade) and read the short message.
Meeting on the roof. You'll want to be there.
Well, then. This was getting interesting. If the conversation she had overheard was anything to go by, this was probably going to be about the UK's odd behavior over the last couple months. She might as well indulge in this favor, though she had no idea what kind of help she would be.
Rihana palmed open the door to her hotel room, ducking inside and opening the drawer next to her bed. Inside was a small, easily disguised pistol that she slipped into one of her jacket's interior pockets. She was out the door again within moments, returning back to the elevator and hitting the button for the top floor. Thankfully, all the nations had been briefed on the layout and all possible exits of the hotel when they'd first arrived as a safety precaution, so she had little trouble finding the stairwell once the elevator door opened.
The cool evening air of Caracas, Venezuela buffeted her face as Rihana stepped onto the rooftop, closing the door softly behind her. The city was alight with activity and traffic, and several kilometers away, she could see the large stadium that hosted most of the major events on the horizon.
"Evening, Somalia. I'm glad you had some form of trust in my friend. Sorry about the secrecy of this whole thing; I wasn't sure if the same could be said for me."
Rihana turned, catching sight of America walking towards her. Behind him, she spotted Iceland watching her with those blue-violet eyes of his. Though America was at least pretending to be in a good mood, the northern nation no longer held any such pretense, gazing at her seriously, as if he expected her to attack at any moment. Sealand was no longer with him.
"Well, I am a rather curious woman," she responded after a moment. She shook hands with the former superpower, watching him carefully for any sudden movements. Her pistol was heavy in her jacket pocket. "I'm assuming this has something to do with the U.K.? That Sealand boy was complaining quite loudly about them."
America shrugged, smile falling until it was hanging by a couple strings.
"Peter—Sealand, I mean—is the youngest of the Kirkland brothers, if you don't know. He's the one who alerted us to the severity of this whole situation, so I thought it was only fair that he be able to help a little bit. It's good experience for him, anyhow."
"Well, I think we can all agree that the UK—England, specifically—has been acting off these last couple of months," Somalia said, doing her best to keep to the point. "What does this have to do with me? And why is this so secret that we're meeting on the roof, of all places?"
"To answer that last question, I had the roof debugged a half hour or so ago. There will be no surveillance up here until midnight at the latest. Secondly, I, speaking on behalf of HERA, need a favor from you."
"And that is…?"
America paused, a slight flicker of sheepishness crossing his features before pulling something out of his pocket. Upon closer inspection, Somalia realized with a start that it was a computer chip. A modern era computer chip.
"You know, you are allowed to use hybrid energy in these sorts of things," she remarked. America shook his head.
"Not worth the risk, I'm afraid. England is in charge of most of HERA's hybrid energy research. It'd be too easy for him to take a peek at what the rest of us are trying to do if we used hybrid energy, or at least notice that something's up. That chip there holds the plans to an invention a couple of my states have been working on. Thing is, we don't have the hybrid-based technology yet to build it on our own. We need some parts that, as of yet, only the Elites' governments have access to."
Somalia took the computer chip hesitantly, examining it with a suspicious eye.
"And if I give you these parts, what exactly do I get out of this?"
"Besides making sure the UK doesn't go on a psychotic rampage? The plans for this invention. Let me assure you, this is something you don't want to miss out on." He winked. Somalia resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "If you agree, Iceland here will be our in-between man. He's a trusted friend of mine, and one England doesn't care much for the smaller nations like him." He seemed to catch his words too late, and winced. "Sorry, Ice."
A shrug. "I'm used to it."
"Don't worry, I like you!" He switched his attention back to Somalia. "Anyways, do you agree?"
Somalia hummed thoughtfully, fingering the computer chip. Distantly, fireworks began to fire above the Olympics Stadium, bathing them in an array of red, yellow, and blue for several seconds before fading away.
"I'll have to think about it," she finally conceded, pocketing the chip. "I mean, I'm in, but the rarity of these parts is the problem. If you or the Italies don't have access to it, chances are it's rather hard to come by, even for us Elites. We'll have to see how many of these things we'll even be able to make."
"Just do your best delivering the parts, and we'll take care of the rest," America replied. Somalia nodded.
"So," she questioned. "How many people are in on this deception? You, Iceland, and Sealand, of course, but who else?"
"Italy Romano and Spain. If you want to count my states, Virginia, Texas, and Massachusetts."
"Oh, yes." It took her a moment to realize that Spain would know because he had joined HERA eight or so months ago. She'd forgotten about him. "I'll keep this underground, then. I can't guarantee the other Elites won't find out—by the nature of our alliance, I'll have to come clean if directly asked—but I'll do what I can. If this invention of yours is as good as you say, I'm sure I'll want a piece of it."
"Thank you," America grinned, holding out a hand as a spray of red, white, and blue lit up the sky. As Somalia shook it, however, he became much more serious, a tone of worry seeping into his voice. "I mean it. The way England's going, he's going to incite a war between the NSAO and Cuba's Order. I'm sure you've heard about their conflicts; England is not being a very stable intermediary right now."
And suddenly the severity of what he was asking clicked.
"This isn't just you wanting to figure out what's wrong with the UK. You want to take him out of the picture entirely," Somalia realized, eyes widening. This was… very unlike America. Sure, he'd backstabbed his allies before, every nation had, but in the last century or so he'd at least acted extremely loyal to his loved ones, perhaps to a fault, if the whole New Mexico disappearance back in WWIII was anything to go by. Especially now, with his decreased power and the close-knit nature of HERA, this was a desperate step to take.
Iceland shifted, suddenly looking a little uncomfortable and shooting Somalia an annoyed look, while a look of intense guilt crossed America's face before being securely tucked away again underneath a cold facade that she hadn't seen since the Cold War. The tension between the three had suddenly increased, and Somalia very quickly realized that she had said the wrong thing.
"Yes," America finally said, voice cold. "When it comes down to it, I am willing to do what it takes to maintain world security. Are you?"
Somalia let out a long breath as a white sakura flower firework lit the sky.
"I suppose I am," she said.
The chip in her pocket seemed much heavier than just a moment before.
August 12, 2044
New Orleans, Louisiana, USA
The last few months had been exhausting.
America sighed, sipping out of his cup of coffee as he sat in the break room. Just down the hall, the NSAO and Cuba's order were going through yet another round of negotiations over the South American Fog issue. They had been going at it for the last eight months now, and things had only been getting worse and worse in the meantime, each party sticking their feet even further into the mud as time progressed. This particular meeting had started four hours ago, and the five South Americans were still going strong, debating and presenting and yelling at each other. This had to be their fifth meeting discussing the same topic, and yet they still found new things to fight about. He'd finally left ten minutes ago, giving up on trying to mediate for the time being and pawning the job off on Virginia.
Well, it wasn't like he would be able to do anything. He'd given all he could afford to help Venezuela, little as it was, and yet they were no closer to figuring out where the fog came from, much less how to remove it. Any secrets Cuba and Colombia were holding on the matter had yet to be revealed. It was making America uneasy, sure, but not to the level that it was bothering the NSAO. It was fog; it wasn't like their lives were in danger!
They probably will be if Cuba doesn't back down, though, he thought darkly, taking another gulp of coffee.
"Everything normal in there?"
America looked up in surprise to see England entering the room, taking a seat opposite him and going on his phone. He looked rather annoyed that to be here (which made sense because he was not supposed to be here), as if he'd only asked the question to be polite, and even then it was a lackluster performance. He wore the usual black suit that all nations wore to meetings, with a dark overcoat, white polo, and slacks. However, what America really focused on was his friend-brother-father-whatever's face. Sure enough, he was wearing those damned glasses again, the red tint to the frames giving his jade eyes a dull, orange-brown glow. If he looked closer (and he did), he could see the text crawling across their glass frames. No doubt he was looking over some random information or scanning the building. America would be surprised if he was even paying half-attention to him right now.
"You know I hate it when you wear those glasses," he muttered half-heartedly instead of answering, stomach swirling with worry and guilt and disappointment that he had found out about the meeting. He thought of the modern-era phone in his jacket pocket, and the guilt worsened into a rock.
At least he was spared a glance this time. England shrugged, eyes flickering to his phone, which he pulled out as he sat down.
"I told you," He replied after a moment, clearly annoyed. "We're trying out a new strain of hybrid energy. The glasses are one of the inventions we're testing. Don't get your panties in a twist." Alfred frowned deeper, but at this point England clearly didn't care much about it. "Besides, last I checked it was my turn to mediate the negotiations. Why in the world did you think it was a good idea to reschedule it without my knowledge?"
"Last time you mediated, Sealand breaking in at the last minute was the only thing that stopped an all-out war, so no, I don't trust you with the NSAO and Cuba's Order." Alfred regretted the harsh, biting words almost as soon as he had spoken them, but knew in his heart that he was right. That specific occurrence had been three months ago, in May.
"The NSAO is being entirely unreasonable," England snapped, setting down an arm almost violently on the table that separated them as he turned to fully face him. "Cuba is under no obligation to inform us of all the advancements he makes."
"Sure, that's what you said when Russia and India forced me to make PXT 2020 available worldwide. I'm sure you can remember what happened because of that."
England looked like he wanted to bite back, but seemed to think better of it as he leaned back in his chair, the fight in him draining just a bit when he realized that he didn't have an answer for that. America tore his gaze away from his ally, taking a large gulp of his coffee, finishing it off, and shooting a text to Virginia to see if everything was alright.
"Why aren't you mediating, then, if you're so adamant on hosting the peace talks?" England finally asked, looking tired. "You have a continent to worry about, don't you?"
"I'm on break," America shrugged, doing his best to appear as if the question didn't bother him as much as it did. He should have waited an hour to take his break; Virginia would have been more than happy to run the former empire off. "Virginia's with them right now."
"Well, let's hope she works better than you. If they don't come to some sort of agreement soon I daresay there'll be a war, that, mind you, would not be my fault. And if Cuba attacks first, NATO could get pulled in and then we'll have a World War IV on our hands only twelve years after the third. It'd be a new record." He paused for a moment, typing rapidly into his phone. "I'd like to inform you, by the way, that I'm actually here for trade talks. We're meeting tomorrow to discuss how to put your country on the new strain of hybrid energy." His lips twitched upwards, and America could sense a tinge of hopefulness coming off of him that he hadn't seen since March. But it was twisted, uneasy. America most certainly did not want to try out this new form of hybrid energy; he suspected that it had something to do with England's change in demeanor and did not want to test that theory on himself. "Sorry for the late notice; originally it was supposed to be a diplomatic meeting on the human side of things, but since I found out that I'm no longer mediating—" his voice lost the positive tinge to it, replaced with a slight anger. "I realized that we'd be meeting soon anyways."
America didn't reply immediately to that, leaning back in his chair. Ah, that explained a lot. He'd made England much more angry with this change than he'd initially expected, enough that he'd taken on the meetings over hybrid energy consumption as an excuse to meet with him in person.
Oh well. He'd cross that bridge during their "meeting" tomorrow. Or maybe he'd get Delaware to come for him…. Now that was tempting.
His phone vibrated, and he checked it to find that Virginia had responded.
It's not going well, Dad. They're threatening to shoot missiles at each other. AGAIN. Get me out of here before I punch someone.
He sighed through his nose and texted back:
As long as you come out here and deal with the angry Brit who just showed up.
It took her five seconds to reply.
Deal.
November 3, 2044
-23.651850"S, 57.567975"E, Indian Ocean
The ocean was rocky. It swelled with the rapidly lowering air pressure, rocking the ship Jett Kirkland was standing on, and a particularly adventurous wave crashed off the starboard side, sending a spray of sea salt into the air. The sky was almost filled with clouds, with dark cumulonimbi forming to the east and spreading out until only a sliver of clear sky remained, hugging the western horizon. There was no land in sight.
Jett Kirkland stood on the top deck of the HMAS Albury[2], his gray parka fluttering about his torso as he leaned on the guard rail, eyes scanning the ocean below him. Some of his men were out with him, some keeping lookout, cleaning the decks, and others were gathering the last bit of sonar equipment that they had deployed earlier that day. Most of them were inside, though, preparing to head for Saint Denis, Réunion[3], where they would weather the incoming tropical storm in the small island port.
Jett frowned as the last of the Albury's equipment was loaded onboard, her propellers whirring as she gradually began to increase her speed and turn to the northwest. Desperation and frustration were twin vipers in his core, slithering and coiling around him as he hoped against hope that this last run of the sonar would reveal to him the quarry they were looking for.
"Think you'll be inside for dinner? Or are you just going to stare out at the ocean like a brooding superhero?"
Jett turned over to see Zachary, wearing the same kind of parka he was, walking over to him, feet braced against the rocking of the boat. His small stature compared to the large parka made him look several years younger than he actually was.
"...Shut up, Zach," he muttered, glancing back out over the ocean. Another wave crashed against the Albury's hull, this one larger than the last. Though they were too high up to get wet, a thin spray of water sprinkled the upper deck in a brief burst of mist. "I'll go in once the rain starts."
"That won't be too long." Zach tilted his head back to gaze disinterestedly at the sky, his hood falling back to reveal his curly brown hair falling around his ears, messy and unkempt. "But I'd prefer it if you went inside. You aren't doing much out here and there's work to be done."
"Let me mope."
"Moping time's over." Zach clapped him on the shoulder. "Work time."
"What is there to work on?" Jett questioned, slamming his hands down on the railing and relishing the feeling of the misty, freezing cold metal on his palms. "This was supposed to be a new form of travel; something to revolutionize the world! Now it's sitting somewhere at the bottom of the ocean, and we can't even find it."
"Jett, no one could have predicted us losing the HM-32." Zach's eyes softened somewhat. "Especially so suddenly. All the tests runs had gone near perfectly. It's not your fault."
"600 million dollars[4], down the drain in an instant!"
"That's where the work comes in, bro. Come on, Mella's waiting for us."
Jett sighed, finally releasing his grip on the guardrail and trying to massage some feeling back into them. He brushed past his brother, leaving him to catch up with his brisk pace. He lowered the hood of his parka as they entered the bridge, the door clanging shut as he then unclasped the edge of the parka and took it off entirely, draping it on an unoccupied chair.
"Alright, Mella," Jett sighed. "How are things going on your end?"
In the corner of the room, a black-and-white hologram of Melokuhle flickered, the nation in question sporting a contemplative look. She turned her attention from a tablet in her hands to her adoptive brother as he spoke.
"About as well as yours," she sighed. "Which is to say: terribly. After this storm passes through it's going to be even harder to find any debris." Jett sighed, shoulders sagging. Zach pulled up a chair for him, and he took it with a nod of thanks. "What do we do now? This was our only prototype. Do we just go and make another? I could help you, but it'd be tough to find the materials again."
"No, it's not worth it," Jett huffed as Zach sat down in his own chair. He sluggishly drew a hand over his eyes. "We don't want to go to all this effort again for the plane to just get sucked up by the tides and kill a dozen more people."
"We'll have to just rely on our modern tech for now," Zach added. "It'll be difficult; we just don't have the capability to search every square kilometer of the ocean. But if we find even a piece of it, we might be able to figure out why it lost power so suddenly."
"Makes sense," Mella nodded in approval. "We better get to the bottom of this. I'm willing to help you as much as possible to retrieve your plane."
"That brings me to my next point," Australia said, straightening as he shared a glance with New Zealand. "We'd like to formalize this as an alliance—an economic one, of course. We've decided to call it the Deep Sea Alliance."
"Count me in," South Africa grinned. "I suppose we have a date to make it official?"
"December 18th," Australia smiled back tiredly. "Hope to see you there."
[1]-Credit to Wikipedia for the description of Sealand
[2]-Not a real ship, but named after the city of Albury, Australia.
[3]-Réunion is an island around 500 miles east of the coast of Madagascar, and is a territory of France.
[4]-Australia is using his own currency in this reference; the plane cost just over 400 million US dollars using September 2019 conversion rates. To put this in perspective, the current most expensive US military plane, the F-22 Raptor, costs $350 million per plane to make. Even when split between them, Australia and New Zealand lost a lot of money.