2286 was the year that everything changed. That was the year when the Canadians, in their homes of ice, emerged once more onto the world stage. None could say why exactly they began to move. Some said that they moved based on omens, by strange signs in the stars. Some, from The Pitt, claimed that they had been stirring for longer, their agents having come south before in the previous decade. That this was a war long in the planning. Considering the reputation of Canada, of little america, not much weight was placed on it. Not until the long winter came.

The simple truth is that there did not appear to be any reason, not from the outside. Records were slow to be compared, but in the end? The Brotherhood of Steel shared what they knew, and it chilled the blood of those wise enough to realize just what it meant. For it had not been a singular force that marched in the long winter, but three. Three armies numbering in the tens of thousands, with uniform armor, weapons and transports. Three armies worthy of the old world and held to a professional standard, who brought winter with them.

The brotherhood did their best to investigate where they marched. Because it was obvious to those that knew how to look, to see. For the path each of the armies took was scrubbed clean of radiation, narrow corridors were the taint of nuclear weapons had been removed, as if they had never touched the land. But in each place, the army lingered for a few days, there had been a site of occult significance close by. Most of it rumors, superstition and exotic old world technology, not any actual supernatural powers. But there was no other explanation. The Canadians came, did something, and left.

And then they returned into the mist and snow shrouded trees of their homeland. The only communication they had on their march were demands to stay out of their way. Soldiers in simple combat armor as strong as power armor brushing those that would slow them aside, great bears of snow and ice shattering walls, geese that breathed a mist able to trap entire tribes in ice, packs of wolves that faded in and out of the shadows... all of it uniform. No gross deformities. As if the process to twist and reshape them had been perfected and taken far beyond anything the old world scientists had considered possible.

And then the Glowing Sea exploded and changed. From the crater at its heart was a plain of ice and snow, liquid nitrogen, oxygen and hydrogen dancing and twisting in strange currents in the air, the land itself a great frozen eye, scrubbed clean of any structures or identifying marks, the broken remains of titanic ghouls and monstrously massive deathclaws, radscorpions and creatures known as gigapedes left as little more than ice sculptures. Some of the Atomites spoke of the forces unleashed, of powers that eclipsed anything that sane minds could contemplate.

Blooms of frost and ice echo at the Dunwich Building and Dunwich Borers, the sea rising to cover and freeze large portions of Point Lookout, even as unnatural blizzards pound and batter Appalachia like the manifest wrath of some vengeful god. But there was no explanation given, other than rumors and the traces of rumors, of dark things that should have been left buried, of horrors that man would be wise to not know. Some look at tales from a century back, if they had clashed with forces in Appalachia before. There were no records of what exactly happened there. But some wondered.

Arthur Maxson

A part of him was panicking. This was not the result of people taking and misusing technology from the old world, no, this was the Enclave all over again, a remaining piece of the old world that endured despite the Great War. One that was seemingly untouched or unbothered by the passage of time, and had access to all the horrors and tools that the governments, whose powers and science vastly outpaced their restraint and morality (as otherwise, they would never have used nuclear weapons, never used the vaults as sick and twisted experiments, never created the Super Mutants or Deathclaws) possessed. Who could in fact make more horrors to unleash into the world.

Because much of what he was able to glean about the materials of the Canadians? It was likely newly made. The tales, rumors and legends mostly, stated that the north never actually FELL, that it passed untouched through the ruin that claimed so much of the world. But, that was not what was drawing his attention, not what was important. Rather, why were they acting now? What did all the places that they lingered for have in common other than sinister reputations? He closed his eyes and wished he could talk to Albert. But the Lone Wanderer had to live up to his title, and he was not sure where his friend was.

Then again, he had taken Sarah's death hard, having gotten roaring drunk and vanishing for a few weeks, only to return with some exotic energy pistols and the claim that they were alien technology. He was humored, but... the man was effective and had a nose for trouble and mysteries, able to find and uncover things almost seemingly by accidently, while able to extract himself from trouble with some ultraviolence. "We need to find Albert. Frankly, I'm sure that we would be able to gather more information, but..."

Well, he shrugged. "He'd also probably end up sharing a bottle of whiskey with them while they told him their life story." Because the Lone Wanderer was just that kind of man. "While we will probably end up frozen alive."

Shaun

On the one hand, the abilities shown by the northerners was... impressive. While there were other technologies able to remove radiation, none of them were as swift or as effective as what they seemed to possess. A GECK could accomplish it, but those were rare in the extreme and beyond their ability to replicate in this fallen world, each of them a work of genius that grasped principles that they were still clawing towards recovering. But at the same time, such tools should not be in the possession of the Canadians. This was not due to patriotism and bigoty towards a nation long dead, but rather the simple fact that Canada had been less technologically developed, all of the great minds of the pre-war era being American.

But, they still possessed the technology, strange forms of energy being detected in the frozen areas. Areas that seem to defy and deny standard laws of physics and rational explanations of the universe, suggesting laws and complexities that were uncomfortable to fully contemplate, as they suggested much of what they took for granted was at the very least flawed, or based on faulty assumptions. Which yes, was grand from a research perspective, even as it forced them to look over existing models and data in the light of the new revelation. Such was why the cold, the ice and the snow?

A part of him pondered his father, locked away in the cryogenic chamber in vault 111 and what could have been. Perhaps, even as they dispatch their own resources, it would be a useful time to free their father, to see if he would have any insights as he explored the Commonwealth. Perhaps, if his father found his way to him, they would be able to talk about their findings and share notes? Truth be told, it was as close to a father-son bonding activity, even with the years separating them, that he could imagine.

Mr. House

Now, he would be among the first to admit that he had apparently very much underestimated the Canadians, as he was a realist. To be entirely fair, as he listened to his contacts? He had not expected all of this, for an entire nation to have survived. And in possession of some of the strange abilities that it was advised that you did not look too closely into. Truth be told, this changed few of his plans or policies... other than the fact that things were happening and it would be wise of him to prepare. For what exactly, he was not sure.

On the other hand, he had finally managed to get the strip in order, and he did not want to be invaded by a proper military!