new hope

The year is 2043, and after many years of small but ferocious regional conflicts, the world is in strife. The United Kingdom is bankrupt, the streets filled with the poor and the starving. Most of continental Europe has clamped down on the citizen population, trying to survive through extreme regulation. In many nations, local military reserve forces have simply declared martial law to be in effect; their police forces have folded under the immense pressure of the situation. The United States is beginning to fall apart at the seams after the assassination of not only the President, but also many key politicians.

Terrorist attacks have increased in boldness, many rivalling the attacks of September 11, 2001, the very catalyst that sparked the tinderbox. Civil unrest has grown to the point where the National Guard has split into rivalling military-political factions, and the regular armed forces no longer have the strength or troop concentration to do anything to alleviate the disaster. Many states are beginning to declare themselves seceded from the United States of America, and some have even locked down their borders and ordered the shooting of any refugees who try to enter from those areas which remain loyal to what passes for a central government, little more than a collection of tyrants all vying for absolute power.

To the East, Russia is in better condition, having nursed its economy back to health with the aid of its overwhelming monopoly on natural resources; the Middle-East has long since been annexed, with strict policing curtailing any hope of freedom but doing little to staunch the overflowing hatred between different religious factions. While some have united against the common aggressor - most surprisingly, the Israelis and their immediate neighbours - other nations are simply descending into nihilistic chaos, with each faction's goal being the total eradication of their rivals.

South and East Asia remain free of occupying forces, but at a heavy price; they are serving as little more than cheap labour and a defensive buffer-zone for Russia. They are utterly under the thumb of the Kremlin, adding millions more troops to the strength of the Russian armed forces. Africa and Central and South America have simply fallen off of the map, millions of starving and diseased refugees being ruled by warlords, rich businessmen who leave rather a lot to be desired in the morality department, and dictators who no longer fear the wrath of the world-policing superpowers.

With the collapse of Britain and the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and many other Commonwealth nations have suddenly found themselves alone in a very different world. Australia responded to the advancing threat of Russian expansionism and home-grown anarchy by both introducing compulsory National Service and finally producing its own nuclear arsenal; New Zealand cut a deal with their trans-Tasman kin, ensuring mutual protection and support as long as one of the two nations remains free. Canada simply ceased all export of its own resources, and at the same time, opened the border to the remainder of the United States completely. With an abrupt influx of skilled workers and a human tidal wave of desperadoes, the ranks of both the Canadian workforces and armed forces swelled. Canada found itself in the position of global superpower, and with a clear rival just across the Bering Strait. Choosing not to follow the United States' example, Canada has forsaken intervention for isolationism, finding a lack of friends to be preferable to the same social destruction as has become apparent to the south and the east.

You are one of a handful of people to escape from the Eastern Seaboard of the United States just prior to the collapse, back when the troubles were only just beginning to manifest themselves. A diverse collection of US citizens, foreign tourists, and deserting soldiers, your group managed to make good your escape by boarding a small day-cruise ship laid up in New York. During the confusion, no attempt was made to stop you; the ship was to sail south-east, to a small, man-made island called New Hope. Part contingency plan, part experiment, New Hope was built during the first two decades of the 21st Century as a self-sufficient, isolationist community to carry on in the spirit of the United States in the event of a massive, uncontrollable collapse of the entire nation.

While the island itself was constructed comparatively quickly, the base upon which it stands was painstakingly built up over the decades by dumping layer upon layer of rock, refuse, building materials, and sand into the sea. New Hope seems aptly named; cut off from the outside world, there is no need to worry about the dire condition of humanity. The small community seems perfect, a private Utopia standing defiantly in the Atlantic, ringed by storm-proof seawalls and governed by the appointed Chief Supervisor. There is no crime, no disease, no misery...

Is it truly possible that mankind has reached perfection on this tiny, artificial island?