Timeline
T-20 Years
Tyson Defense Dynamics (an arms manufacture working exclusively with the US military) and the Stanford Weapons Research Labs merge, forming the core of what will come to be AmeriCorp. A new religious movement started in Europe and based largely on a strict patriarchal, highly moral and exceedingly anti-crime and drugs stance sweeps across the American south. Young and rising Senator William Kaye publicly converts. The Soviet economy begins to crumble. The World economic slowdown begins in earnest.
T-19 Years
AmeriCorp branches out, beginning to work for both the military and private contractors. Civil war breaks out in Russia. China threatens to step in and are dissuaded by the UK, the current president of the UN. On Christmas Day, the US President and Vice-President are assassinated. As calls for harsher gun and drug laws begin to come ever louder from the south, Democrat-Presidential Candidate Laurence P. Warner arranges for William Kaye to stand for Vice-president as part of a major PR campaign.
T-18 Years
Diana Boyd (Anvil) is born. The Christmas Day assassins are cornered and killed by FBI agents, before they can be questioned. Conspiracy theories abound. Warner is elected President in a landslide victory. Plague begins to sweep across Africa. Calls for humanitarian aid go unheeded: the UN is too busy trying to prevent the Russian civil war spilling throughout the rest of Asia; the US pleads internal problems. Prompted by the Vice-president, the Warner 'War-against-crime' begins as he starts implementing stopgap laws. Day to day running of the Oval Office falls into Kaye's hands. Crime levels drop slowly for his first six months in office at which point they begin to rocket exponentially. Warner panics and over-compensates. Students begin to react against the apparent creation of a police state. Public protests become riots as the police move in.
T-17 Years
In the wake of the plague, the African Nations unite under a single government. After only eighteen months in office, Warner stands down (pleading medical problems) and William Kaye is sworn in as President. Russia collapses into hundreds of splintered states. Britain dissolves the UN and begins recreating the British Empire, extending east into Asia. China begins to extend west and north. The United African Nations allies itself with the Middle East against encroaching European forces. NATO collapses. In the US, Kaye redirects the people's fervor against the South American drug cartels and, by association, the whole of South America.
T-16 Years
AmeriCorp, now almost wholly run by private investors, removes itself from government and military control. In the main, it now apparently focuses on AI and cybernetic research; in practice, it continues its weapons development. As the Chinese/Russian/British war begins to escalate, other European and Asian countries collapse, their economies ruined by pressures from the new Empires and the UAN. Japan isolates itself from the outside world. The US begins sanctions of the South American countries; naval forces, recalled from around the world, form an unbreakable sea wall. The drug cartels begin to fight back. Terrorist attacks on US targets increase geometrically. Canada attempts to disassociate itself and is promptly and systematically seized by US troops. Again, calls for international help are ignored.
T-15 Years
Ulysses Boyd (Hammer) is born. Ignoring protests against the annexation of Panama and Mexico and the withdrawal of its international forces, the US isolates itself from the world stage. As sanctions against the South continues, conditions for the ordinary people drop from bad to unbearable. In the up cry, the South American governments turn from trying to wipe out the drug cartels (and end the sanctions that way) to aiding them against US forces. The US declares a state of war. With full support, the US army marches into Venezuela. They are massacred. In a burst of patriotic fervor, US citizens begin to sign up. Josh (Cyberblade) Ironside enlists and his older brother Michael follows to keep an eye on him.
T-14 Years
The war continues. Expecting direct confrontation, the US army is massacred by the guerilla warfare tactics of the so-called New Army. Throughout the US, Students side with South America, accusing the government of Human Rights violations. AmeriCorp begins supplying high-tech weapons to both sides. The South American People's Alliance -- the New Army's political arm -- appeal for help from foreign powers. Rapidly approaching a third world war, there is no response from Europe, Asia or the UAN. Australia, threatened on one side by the US and on the other by Asian unrest spreading rapidly in its direction, refuses to get involved. The New Army takes Mexico, then Texas by land and Florida by sea. With the South effectively blockaded, the New Army begins to spread up the coastlines. In many cases they are actually aided by US citizens.
T-13 Years
Kaye is sworn in for his second term as President. The US becomes polarized between those who support and those against the war. Civil unrest leads to rioting in the streets of every major city. The US violates international law by using biological weapons while fighting in the Amazonian forests. The SAPA condemn them publicly while the New Army privately retaliates by using the same weapons in the streets of Washington. The military refuses government orders to use nuclear weapons on their own cities. Kaye begins referring to the war publicly as a jihad. For everyone else it becomes one of two things: a war of attrition or a last-ditch fight for survival.
T-12 Years
The draft is activated in the US. US supporters of the SAPA and New Army sympathizers go to ground, forming their own terrorist factions. Beth (Blind Justice) Armstrong enlists herself in the Military Intelligence unit known as Shadow ops. Karl (Over-Ride) Hiesel enlists himself in the near mercenary "Death's Head" squadron, a collection of the elite and the most famous unit. Maria Desiré, a commander for the New Army, is approached and recruited by Shadow Ops. Select black ops units within the US military begin to take control behind the scenes. Kaye begins recruiting scientists into military weapons research. In the middle of a hostile takeover, AmeriCorp volunteers their services in order to keep their elite staff intact. Davis Boyd, owner of the small-time cybernetics business Delta-Beta industries, formerly affiliated to NASA, is added to the team, along with a handful of scientists from the fields of cybernetics, artificial intelligence and biochemistry. The British-Chinese war begins to slow down -- but by this time the two powers control Europe and Asia between them. The war degenerates into chaos as the military lose confidence in their leaders.
T-11 Years
The British-Chinese war collapses into cold-war tactics as the two sides pull back to lick their wounds. The US is protected from the economic fallout by their war-effort. Student protestors are arrested and used as warm bodies for biological and cybernetic weapon research. An initial breakthrough in neural interfaces appears to be a dead end when it reduces subjects to a vegetative step. Research continues.
T-10 Years
AmeriCorp officially reveals the first cyborgs. Boyd claims that the AC Interface Chip is still too unstable. Kaye disagrees; illegalizing non-government sanctioned research into the area, he orders malfunctioning cyborgs to be dropped into the battle zones, knowing they will still do plenty of damage to the enemy. Davis is fired and only his own political influence prevents him from being indited for treason. Despite the governmental edict, he continues his research with his wife. Kaye creates what will later become the Commission for the study and regulation of Cybernetics. The first cyborgs are formally deployed on New Years Eve. Kaye promises the war will be over within weeks.
T-9 Years
The cyborgs prove to be as much a danger to their own men as they are to the enemies. The name "burner" is coined by a war-journalist. After an apparent accident destroys Boyd's main lab, his wife disappears. A silent runner bombs a joint operation between various military and Shadow Ops units, including the Death's Head squadron. The Ironside brothers take the brunt of the explosion. Over-Ride undergoes the cyborg process. Blind Justice refuses a set of targeting devices to replace her eyes and disappears, apparently cutting of all contact with the Shadow Ops. Cyberblade is created and chosen for a new all-cyborg Death's Head Squadron; he refuses until Ironside is asked as well. Kaye starts a third term as President.
T-8 Years
The first sighting of Covert occurs on the eastern front.
T-7 Years
Shadow Ops members prevent the assassination of William Kaye and in doing so strengthen their political leverage.
T-6 Years
Boyd officially reveals the Boyd Neural Interface Chip. AmeriCorp try to discredit him via their political clout, but fail. Stable cyborgs are deployed along the east and western fronts. Davis begins work on replacing AC chips with BNI chips. Jacob Black, AmeriCorp director, is given a place on the Commission. Kaye attempts to block the use of BNICs and is ousted by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The Shadow Ops promptly stage performs a coup d'etat, masquerading as a joint civil and military action against a government failing its people. In actuality, the elite military intelligence group has been moving sideways into civil roles for almost three years.
T-5 Years
After only eight months, BNIC Hunter-cyborgs force the South to surrender before they have no land left to fight for. South America is now desolate. Calls for economic and humanitarian aid go unnoticed. Cyborg soldiers return home expecting accolades; Students, SAPA supporters, bomb the celebrations, activating burners. Public outcry goes up against the cyborgs.
T-4 Years
The first cyborg riots. Further creation of cyborgs is outlawed. The terrorist group Death Tech appears, claiming to seek civil rights for cyborgs; formed entirely of ex-Death Head Squadron members they are in fact fanatically loyal to AmeriCorp who still controls them. Los Angeles is declared a state, containing the whole of southern California, the area once occupied by the New Army. The Commission recruits the Ironside brothers; Cyberblade agrees but Michael refuses, taking a position on the force. Maria Desire joins the commission (as a PR move by the government). Anti-cyborg hysteria sweeps across mainland US.
T-3 Years
The British Empire and the Chinese Republic declare each other allies as unrest begins to shake the UAN. Attention begins to settle on the Middle East where tensions between the Arab and African nations begin to reach boiling point. The US attempts to reenter the world stage and is ignored by the UAN, blocked by the British and condemned by the Chinese. Without the war to boost it, the US economy collapses. Rebuilding slows and in most places simply stops. Australia moves in to help rebuild South America. Japan comes out of isolation and, within six months, has become the technological capital of the world.
T-2 Years
A peacekeeping force sent in to stop riots (in what used to be downtown San Francisco) turns burner, destroying vast sections of the old city. Michael Ironside is made detective. A burner blows up the Empire State Building. The Commission implements a zero-tolerance policy; merely being suspected of becoming unstable condemns AC cyborgs to death. BNIC cyborgs, indistinguishable from their AC counterparts are turned into fourth-class citizens by public pressure. Cyborg/human relations continue to deteriorate. William Kaye is apparently assassinated.
T-6 Months
Mesh, an illegally created cyborg, is brought on-line by the Corp using a BNIC taken from a corpse.
T-3 Months
The Death Tech, under the direct orders of Jacob Black, attacks Davis, almost killing Diana and Ulysses. Davis puts them through the cyborg process, violating the law. Shortly after he abandons his children and goes into hiding. AmeriCorp places him at the top of their want-list. The Commission declares Boyd public enemy one. Ironside puts himself on the case. Careful PR prevents the manhunt becoming common knowledge. Hammer begins his quest for his father.
T-2 Days
A burner ignites in the middle of a residential district, destroying a local school. Ironside is put on the case.
T-1 Days
Mesh's programming kicks in and he attempts to assinate a Commission member.
T-0
Cyberblade is arrested. Used Parts begins.