In 2019, yet another 'war to end all wars' began suddenly along the northern border of North Korea as Russian troops surged across in force. The unexpected assassinations of Kim Jong-un and his family over the previous summer months had left the isolated communist nation, surprisingly without support from the Chinese, in the hands of a brutal general, a man whose vocal denunciation of recent Russian aggression in Ukraine and Georgia led him to threaten nuclear attacks should North Korea's northern neighbor so much as “spit in our direction.” The Russians took the offensive, invaded North Korea, and within weeks had crushed the shocked and disorganized North Korean military, securing the nuclear armaments and proclaiming North Korea as a province of the new and emboldened Russian empire.

Arrogant and feeling confident, Russian pilots regularly overflew Chinese air space, and when China's demands to respect its sovereignty were ignored, Chinese forces collided with the Russian bear over the skies along their northern border in September, 2019.

The world reacted by reinforcing allies in the Eurasia, including South Korea, Japan, Poland, and Turkey, but most didn't send troops to support either side in combat, preferring to watch with concern while the two powerful military nations began to escalate their fight. India and Pakistan mobilized millions of men, and Israel, Iran, and Egypt started new and frighteningly aggressive wars of words over centuries-old squabbles.

Russia and China soon pulled back into defensive stances, fighting small skirmishes through the winter of 2019, largely in the air and on the seas, the world watching and wondering which power would trigger the nuclear war everyone expected.

Instead, in January, 2020, the first nuke detonated in Pakistan. It wasn't clear who was responsible, but the tinder box which had smouldered for decades along its border with India sent both sides into a frenzy. A second nuke went off in northern India two weeks later, and the two countries committed hundreds of thousands of troops to bloody battles which finally drew in supporting allies on both sides.

During that Spring, Mexican revolutionaries orchestrated a surprising and effective coup, overthrowing the corrupt and lazy Mexican government and, with firm control of the nation's military, instituted martial law. Inspired by events in Mexico and encouraged and supported by the new Mexican regime, revolutions exploded in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Panama, and Costa Rica, leading to an unlikely and tenuous alliance called the New World Empire (NWE), led by Mexico City. It wasn't clear at that time to what ends the new Empire was working.

The world gasped when Israel preemptively attacked its enemies in May, 2020, firing nuclear weapons into Iraq and Iran, battling Syria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and a large breakaway army of Turkish forces. The Israelis used the confusion, both nearby and in Pakistan and India, to secure territory in neighboring countries before stopping their attack and building extensive defenses around Israel's new borders, threatening new nuclear attacks should anyone dare cross their lines.

Military units from the United States were far flung and spread across the globe, stationed in force in support of allies in Poland, Germany, Israel, South Korea, Japan, and a dozen other nations. While the United States and its brethern controlled most of the oceans and major seas, the Russians and Chinese navies were large and threatening that control, though at the time, there had been no direct confrontation with the US or its allies.

It became difficult to sort rumors from truth for most of the world's citizens, and many in Texas were growing concerned about the swelling ranks of the NWE armies. Militia groups in the state began to actively guard the border while the regular and guard units of the US military were distracted across the globe.

Rumors that the US was willing to abandon Texas should the NWE invade grew from little more than shadows and ill-informed conspiracy theorists. A militia unit in Killeen traded a few shots with US Army troops stationed there when the militia demanded access to arms and heavy weapons to use in defense of the state. Other militias moved into towns along the border with Mexico and declared martial law, fighting skirmishes with police and Guard units who were shocked and ill-prepared. It had the makings of a serious insurrection when a Texas Special Guard unit joined a consolidated militia group and held much of Houston for two weeks before US Army troops took back the city.

Martial law was declared across Texas by the governor, which further fueled conspiracy theories. It became an open rebellion two days later when insurgents blew refineries along the coast and, independent of each other, bombed court houses and police stations and assassinated public officials.

Ironically, the chaos in Texas offered the NWE an opportunity it had desired but never believed might present itself. Secretly being heavily-supported, separately, by both Russia and China, and fueled with the fervor of revolution burning up from Panama and the Central American nations, the NWE massed troops along the Mexico-US border near El Paso and south of Sierra Vista in Arizona.

US intelligence fired off desperate warnings of the movements, but the government was slow to react, still unable to believe that the upstart revolutionaries were capable of an invasion of American soil. Over a period of fourteen hours, either Russian or Chinese forces destroyed military and civilian satellites, severely disrupting communications and observational capabilities. Two days later, in February, 2021, the NWE moved in force across the border.

Despite having near-total air superiority, bombing troop locations and command-and-control centers deep in Mexico, the US was unable to give the NWE forces serious pause for almost two weeks. The invading army fought loosely, units working in concert with each other, but distributed, following the successful tactics and strategies which had overthrown a half-dozen governments just months earlier. Bombers could destroy units which bunched up, but NWE soldiers scattered, minimizing the casualties, using the terrain to hide when the bombs fell, and using Russian-supplied low-light equipment to move and fight effectively in the darkness. The Texas militias fought ineffectively and yielded quickly to the invading forces.

The US finally understood the dire situation too late. The loss of communications and observational satellites was debilitating, and until the Battle of Magdalena, in New Mexico, on March 3, 2021, the NWE had moved without serious opposition across a front of several hundred miles, spreading out across Arizona, New Mexico, and western Texas.

The United States recalled all deployed troops, the invasion of home soil overriding the threats to its allies. The chaotic process involved moving hundreds of thousands of men and women, millions of tons of materiel, from dozens of countries. They arrived in company and battalion strength, often without supporting artillery and armor, first on cargo jets, then, more slowly, on naval vessels. Martial law was declared across the US. The draft was immediately reinstated, though was not initially necessary as millions of civilians volunteered to fight in the defense of the United States. Millions of reserve and retired soldiers, sailors, and Marines were recalled to duty. The military bogged down trying to find a way to give its green recruits a minimal amount of training before sending them to the front lines.

The Russians moved into Alaska and secured the coastal areas and oil fields in less than three weeks before landing forces in British Columbia and in northwest Washington State. The Chinese took Guam and Hawaii the next month.

NWE forces swelled, continuing to receive enormous support from Russia and China, the two nuclear-armed neighbors determined to do less fighting at home and to take advantage of a bloodied super power for a time. It meant both had resources to spend to press hard on a shared foe.

The NWE pushed deeper into the US despite the growing troop levels from the US Army and Marine Corps. Raids on NWE supply lines helped slow the spread of the invasion, but by Fall of 2021, the NWE largely controlled much of New Mexico, Nevada, parts of eastern California, and western Texas and Oklahoma. Russians continued to move down the west coast and secured Seattle and the surrounding environs by the end of 2021. Loss of effective civilian communications networks made it very difficult for local militias and resistance groups to coordinate, and one-by-one, they were crushed and silenced.

The US finally began to push back in January, 2022. The chaos of the command structure had been smoothed out and generals were better able to assess the battlefield and commit troops capable of producing victories. Some NWE and Russian advances were halted and slowly being rolled back in June 2022. For unknown reasons, the US nuclear arsenal was not brought to bear.

It isn't known how many devices were set off, but the nation's capital effectively dissolved when several suitcase nukes detonated on July 2, 2022. It was the only city hit, but the fallout, both figuratively and literally, was devastating. The timing was deliberate and it was clear that the attack was orchestrated to decapitate United States leadership. Millions were dead or dying, including the President, Vice-President, hundreds of members of Congress, several members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and hundreds of other key figures. It sent the nation into utter disarray.

The military pressure which had been pushing back invading armies didn't immediately fall apart. Soldiers, sailors, and Marines kept up the fight, killing and dying while their superiors tried to figure out what to do. The head of the nation's most powerful democracy had just been blow into a fine, red mist, and it wasn't clear who, if anyone, was then in charge.

The NWE exploited the chaos to land troops in Florida and along the other Gulf states. They pushed north, encountering only disorganized local resistance until the 1st Marine Division defeated three divisions of NWE soldiers at the Battle of Crane Hill, in Alabama. A surprisingly effective force of local militias, state and local police, and former Army and Marine Corp veterans managed to bog down two divisions of NWE in the swamplands around Savannah, Georgia, for nearly two months before finally being decimated when the latest Chinese-made artillery and bombers arrived to terrorize the battlefield.

It was both death by a thousand cuts and by a butcher's cleaver across the southern and western parts of the US. No matter how many men and machines the United States poured into the war, it seemed that the NWE had more. With Russia and China supplying arms and equipment, and eager recruits from the southern parts of the new Empire arriving daily by the hundreds and thousands to fight against the imperial Americans and to grab a share of the bounty sure to be there for the taking, the NWE continued to push against the weak points and force north division after division.

It was in this time that the schism happened in what remained of United States leadership. A new government seat had been established in the Fall of 2022 in Chicago, and representatives flooded in, each wanting to establish his or her position of power in the reboot of the American franchise. It was utter chaos, and before much could be accomplished, fighting started in earnest, leading, in the Spring of 2023, to a splinter group establishing a new state seat in Minneapolis, calling itself Free America.

Military cohesion evaporated quickly as generals allied with one side or the other, and the men and women comprising the fighting units believed the war lost. They deserted in large numbers to find and protect what was left of their families. Tens of millions of people formed ragged bands across the country moving north, hoping to find protection around the Great Lakes in what remained of intact American soil and also within Canada, which had, thus far, been less affected by the Russians in the west.

NWE poured in from the South, moving the front lines dozens of miles a day, joining up with Russian forces around Denver, creating a large island of isolated but stubborn resistance in California, and controlling lands as far north as southern Illinois and northern Missouri, east to the Carolinas, resistance still strong along the coastal US and the more rugged lands of the Smoky Mountains and Appalachians.

The war was effectively over, it was just a matter of determining whether anything resembling the United States would survive. The Russians, however, suddenly renewed their ground offensive against the Chinese, and support for NWE from those powers dried up quickly. Russian forces withdrew from the United States as hundreds of thousands became casualties back home. The resistance in California was able to join up with Free American forces, its army growing strong quickly thanks to the protection of most of the remaining Air Force strength, and effectively abandoned the rest of the western state as fighters moved North to form entrenched lines throughout the Rocky Mountains and parts of the Plains. The Free American capital was moved to Denver.

The spirit of the United States citizen did not die with its government. Groups calling themselves Patriot Brigades formed in hundreds of towns and cities occupied by NWE forces. Guerrilla tactics led them to independently raid supply lines and harass NWE armies, avoiding protracted battles to melt into the countryside. This harassment caused the NWE to pause its northern push in order to protect long supply lines and vital ports and harbors.

Tens of millions of American men and women, some as young as nine or ten, took part in The War. Most of their stories will never be known, the sacrifice, the struggle for their country and families, the horrific conditions they faced, those details were lost along with tens of millions of lives.

This story is about one man and a small handful of people he came to know in the late years of The War.

James 'Hitch' Hitchens was a green 19-year old 2nd Lieutenant in the US Marine Corps when the attacks of September 11, 2001 took place. Along with his battalion, he was part of the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit which was among the first to move into Afghanistan in November, 2001. He led a platoon in an operation to secure Kandahar International Airport, seeing some combat and winning a Bronze Star, as well as a Purple Heart when he was plastered by RPG fragments. While on leave, recovering from his injuries, he married a fellow Marine named Julia in 2002 and the next year, his wife gave birth to a daughter, Willow.

He was promoted to 1st Lieutenant before joining the invasion of Iraq in 2003, winning another Bronze Star, then later a Silver Star, and another Purple Heart when a bullet took a small chunk out of his neck. He skipped from the field hospital without orders so that he could rejoin his men in combat around An Nasiriyah.

Hitch served in Iraq in a variety of capacities until 2006 when he was promoted to Captain and sent to teach at a special recon school. He continued to teach and attended various training schools, and was soon promoted to Major, finally leaving the service in 2011 to open a private survival school in the Badlands of Montana and to spend more time with his wife and daughter.

In 2019, as the world caught fire, at the age of thirty-seven, Hitch was called back to active duty and promoted to Lt. Colonel, taking over 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marines, part of the 2nd Marine Division bound for Israel. 2-2 was a Reconnaissance Battalion, and Hitch's experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq, combined with the specialized training he had received made him an intelligent, effective leader. His wife, Julia, was also recalled to duty, but her station was classified as part of an Intelligence operation. His daughter, Willow, stayed with a neighbor in Montana, joining a Junior ROTC program at sixteen.

During his deployment in Israel, Hitch learned of Julia's death but was never given the manner or location. Despite his grief, he refused to be relieved of command.

When the US recalled all its overseas forces in 2021, 2-2 deployed to Arizona and fought as a line company against NWE forces moving north. Along with other elements of 2nd Marines, they pushed into Utah and won the Battle of Lake Mead only to days later be outflanked, fighting to a draw the First Battle of the Colorado. Hitch was wounded as his Battalion executed a fighting retreat, an artillery shell hitting his vehicle and forcing him to be evacuated to a field hospital outside of Flagstaff, Arizona, for treatment of burns on his left arm and torso.

The Second Battle of the Colorado was a resounding defeat for the Marines, and upon hearing of the loss, Hitch attempted to rejoin his unit immediately, still in tremendous pain but unwilling to let his Marines fight without him. Word arrived ten minutes before he left that his daughter, who was fighting with an Army National Guard unit in Washington State, was missing in action after the Battle of Chelan and assumed dead. Hitch was devastated.

As he always found the strength to do, Hitch pushed down his grief and got back to The War. Before he could meet up with his battalion, the commanding officer of the 2nd Marine Division, likely working from faulty and misleading information, relieved Hitch of his battalion command. In a two-sentence explanation, he proclaimed that the First Battle of the Colorado had been fought 'tentatively' and without 'necessary aggression.' Despite the fact that Hitch's men were outnumbered three-to-one and were unable to bring their artillery into the fight, the fault was placed on his shoulders. Hitch challenged the General directly in front of his staff, and it earned him a demotion to Major.

Hitch was hurt to lose his command and his silver oak leaf, but he refused a staff assignment in the rear, convincing his replacement at 2-2 to instead give him command of Bravo Company, replacing a Captain who had been killed during the movement to the East. Hitch's company fought a vital defense over eight days during the Third (and final) Battle of the Colorado. By the time the decision was made to retreat east again, Hitch had been wounded three more times and had only fourteen men in any condition to fight.

The battles for Mead and the River were a tremendous blow to the United States. It gave NWE access to much-needed supplies of water and other resources in the southwest. The Marines did their best to keep up a fighting retreat, but the decimated division had seen its potency dissolved and dissipated along the Colorado. Around Tulsa, Oklahoma, they gained reinforcements and dug in to fight with green replacements. There they stayed for the better part of two years.

The schism in US leadership, both political and military, took place over this time, and the confusion it brought to the front lines made it all-but-impossible to maintain discipline. The General who had demoted Hitch sided with the government in Chicago, but two of the man's direct subordinates broke away to Free American soil, taking hundreds of Marines with them.

Hitch saw with frustration what the split and the growing number of outright desertions were doing to the defense around Tulsa. NWE forces were massing for another attempt to overrun and destroy the units dug in there, and Hitch knew it was fruitless to stay in place. Civilians had already fled north, leaving a ghost town. A handful of men remained in his company, no more than sixty, most of them exhausted from two years of battle. Those who stayed with him disappeared with Hitch in the night, moving quickly East, harassing a division of NWE moving up from the south for a few weeks before retreating into the hills of Northern Georgia, Southeastern Tennessee, and Southwestern North Carolina.

They fought as a guerrilla unit for several years, using the mountains as a weapon to draw in platoon-sized units and crush them, or as backwoods sanctuaries after a raid for supplies. The local population, what still remained, was hardy and completely supportive of Hitch and his fighters. They had taken to the moniker Turtletown Patriots, so-named after a town which had served as the backdrop for several small skirmishes.

By 2027, The War had become a stalemate, little movement on any front as the NWE became overdrawn, the excitement and rush of the previous eight years exhausted by millions of deaths and the lack of both fresh recruits and the support of foreign powers. Despite internal struggles, the NWE maintained control over most of the southern and western US, fighting set-piece battles against both Free American forces and United States regulars, as well as putting out fires started by the dozens of Patriot Brigades still struggling all over the country.

Hitch was exhausted, as well. He'd had enough. Wounded over and over, he'd escaped serious harm and death as much by luck as by skill. He'd lost his wife, his daughter, and all but three men from his original Bravo Company. What little information trickled in made it clear that whatever was to come, his part in the fight was over. The company disbanded officially in June of 2027, most going to ground in the dense mountains in the area, some joining Patriot bands in Chattanooga or Atlanta or Asheville.

Hitch stole a pickup truck and as many supplies as he could take with him and withdrew deep into the mountains northeast of Mountain City, Georgia. He built a dugout shelter into the side of a lesser peak on a long ridge, and for the next five years, survived, alone, on hunting, fishing, foraging, and occasional raids of NWE depots.

He rarely saw other humans. Mountain City still held a few, and once or twice a year, he bartered hides and meat for grains, oil, medicine, and other supplies. Otherwise, he avoided contact with others and did his best to survive on his own.

Hitch's story starts in late April, 2032. The war rumbled on much as it had five years earlier, and Hitch, approaching his 50th birthday, had largely let the global crisis of power and invasions disappear into painful memories. He thought his days of combat, of friendship, and of love, were all behind him.

He was wrong.