Calliope Anderson crossed her legs as she sat in Kapi'olani Regional Park. The United States wasn't what it once was. She wore her Air Force uniform, and she was the woman who had brought the world to its knees. Her peaked cap gave her a fascist aesthetic, and her aviator sunglasses practically came with mushroom clouds reflecting in them.
She smoked a cigarette and, as she often did, reflected on the past. The heavens were high, and in her Presidency of the United States of America (Boston) she had sent more people than necessary up there. Her Huawei phone played a video of Kendra Oswald botching an interview. "You got away with it too, huh?" Calliope said with a chuckle.
She eyed a flagpole with the Stars and Stripes, and underneath that the PRC flag flew as a sign of "respect". She didn't run this island chain, and she certainly didn't run the former US. A skinny but well-formed man thirty years her junior sat down next to her, and she pressed red-stained lips against his neck. "Heya," she said.
"Callie," her boytoy said. "How're you finding Hawaii?" he asked.
"Better than Australia. A hell of a lot better." She chuckled a bit. She looked thirty-five. She was actually more like sixty-eight. People joked she was a vampire. She preferred that to people joking that she was a pedophile.
"It pisses me off," the boytoy said. "Besides, the wrong people won."
"The civil war?" Calliope asked. She stroked her chin. "No shit. If the ChiComs had given me the nuclear weapons I requested, we would have blown the Reds, the Deads, the other Feds, the Christofash, and everyone else to Hell. I guess that's the problem with being a hawk."
"Mommy, the Christers weren't that bad," he said. "I was a Christer."
"No, you weren't, you're like eighteen." Calliope did the math in her head. "You'd be nine when the Christofash fell."
He looked down. "Eight year olds can hold rifles," he said.
"Sick fucks," Calliope said. "Wish I could have just nuked them. Used up all the damn warheads on Sacramento and Denver. Not that they didn't deserve it."
His eyes were a bit glassy. "Don't get so mad. The Christers and the Boston Gov were both trying to bring back America. The problem was the Reds, and look what they've done with the place. The Christers, Boston Gov, Sacramento Gov, Denver Gov, Miami Gov, and the Deads should have teamed up on the Reds."
Calliope rolled her eyes. "Look, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it was the Christofash who helped the Reds win. People saw the Christofash doing their Looney Toons shit and saw that the Reds were fighting them, so the commies got to look good. Maybe if there was no Christofash we could have won."
"Won for what? Degeneracy? Tyranny? So gays can pork each other and men can wear dresses? No offense."
Calliope, a transgender woman, stood up. "Great, I thought you might be a chaser. Fuck off." She missed when she could order anyone she didn't like shot.
"You're a degenerate?" he asked, his fists balling up. They were in public, so he didn't throw a punch.
"I thought you got that from all the rainbow militarism," she said.
"I thought that was a lie!" he said.
"Nothing you can do about it," Calliope said, sitting back down and gesturing for him to walk away like he was a dirty countertop in need of dusting.
I still feel like a whore, sometimes, waving my trans status like it made me woke and progressive for the Boston Government. It never should have mattered.
Of course, the Reds saw through that woke shit, said it was pinkwashing and fake feminism. Like I wanted to be a goddamn trans icon. I just wanted to be a soldier, but you do what you have to do to appeal to the useless civilian shits.
Her phone got a news update:
Socialist Republic of America appoints new head of the Congress of Councils
Socialist Republic of America condemns US government in Hawaii
Socialist Republic of America tries Harry Strecker for war crimes
Dumb bastard.
