Dispatches from Chicago: The Old Crow
Detroit Metro isn't used at all these days, and little Coleman Young isn't, or rather wasn't, used much. A few small planes here and there, but Victoria didn't much like the idea of anyone else having planes so close to them. So, they made sure we didn't, and when we had to make choices about what roads to keep up, well, the airport wasn't the priority. Now we suddenly got lots of reasons it is. It's been more than half-a-year, and credit to the engineering corps of Chicago, they have done their best. Credit to us as well, rock and dirt-moving equipment isn't much available here, and a lot of the grunt work was done by our own. Despite that, the downpour has washed away large parts of it.
Still, I take the trip, because this technical is coming to the airport to pick up one Sara Goldblum. Her title is Assistant Secretary of Defense for Munitions. But under that somewhat unassuming title lies one of the key players in Chicago's war machine. Back when the Nazis came, she was one of the two leaders of the "Iron Brigade," the other is the current president. I have been personally invited to speak with her, because, apparently I have become the primary war correspondent for Detroit, a decision that makes me think the claims our city council has gone insane were right.
With myself taking the passenger seat, and the driver's position already occupied, Sara slides into the back gunner's seat, looking far more comfortable in it than I am in the passenger seat, especially when she checks the machine gun, swings it around, then promises me she's locked it 'safe.' Can't help but feel an odd reversal there. I do not think of middle-aged women as being so comfortable in a gunner's seat… guess that's another prejudice I need to get over. We all got our pasts, us from the Victorians, them from the Nazis. Granted, it isn't the same, and I recognize her eyes. It's the eyes of young bucks, angry and wanting to fight them, those sorts of eyes don't- didn't, last long in Detroit. You got other eyes, or your eyes got closed.
Honestly, I'd like to say either of these traits were surprising. But I can do basic math to take the current year and subtract her birth year, and the Iron Brigade shoved the Oshkosh concentration camp guards into their own incinerators, so I had expectations about their leaders.
It's a pleasure to meet you, Sara. I understand you are the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Munitions?
"Yes. I'm the Assistant Secretary of War Excuse Me Defense for Munitions. I'm here because we looked around the office and realized not enough of us had gotten close enough to the fighting to hear the kabooms. Since we're not a pack of Victorian generals, that needed changing. I'm not the first visitor, though. I know the army's surgeon general came through a week ago- did you catch Damilola, or did she get past you?"
Unfortunately, I wasn't given an opportunity with her, and she kept to the military bases. I understand you are down here to inspect artillery? It seemed to be doing some fine work when I saw it. What needs changing?
"It's just like anything else; when you get something new out there, you have to check to make sure it works according to plan. The Commonwealth artillery's equipment changes every year; we could do,
cando, so much more than we've been able to do before. We use different tools, try new tricks. Some of the changes we're only now rolling out, so I'm here to make sure that nothing about them gets in the way of blowing up Vicks."
I understand you were heavily involved in Chicago's early military. How has that changed since becoming the Commonwealth?
"For the better. Bigger, more integrated. I kind of miss the old way, but not enough to be sad it's gone if we can kill more Nazis this way. Or- did you mean the old militia, or did you mean me?"
A bit of both, honestly. No one else had the military might to challenge Victoria until you came along. What changed? When did you decide that you really could take Victoria? What was that like for you? To see that change?
"A lot of it was that we finally started working together, not apart. Victoria can push around any one city they can reach, one way or another. It's the difference between a city and a country- just size. They're not better, they're not smarter, they don't even get that much help from Daddy anymore- but they're bigger. Even if they can't send an army big enough to sack a city, they can put pressure on its neighbors, cut it off from trade and even food, until it withers on the vine. And they like it that way. The way things were even five years ago, they were stronger than any of us- they'd put a lot of work into breaking and killing, with a lot of help from Daddy, to make that true. But now? Well, it's an old saying, I forget where it's from. They're stronger than any of us, but they're not stronger than all of us."
"That's what changed. Partnership. A year ago we were looking about to have another famine in Chicago. Sure, we had more little plants and co-ops ready to make farming equipment than I can even remember, it just didn't matter with no fields. But then... there's a lot of what you might call 'downstate' that was down to farming just for survival, with nothing left over, because they didn't have the equipment. Match made in Heaven. If you wonder why most Commonwealthers like Ron, that has more to do with it than the blowing stuff up. He was running the provisional government when it fed people. I think you know how powerful that is- but I'm getting off-topic. The point is, ever since the Accords, the Commonwealth has been a country, not just one city or a couple of cities. A country that can be about as big and strong as Victoria. Big enough to stop it. Someday maybe strong enough to bury it."
"Now, we'd been building up trade networks for a long time. We had a lot of connections. A lot of us had plans, hopes. And when Ron rolled in, well, that sped things up. Sometimes when somebody's got you tied to a fence, you just need to cut through the knot. His style helps with that a lot. And that got the Accords rolling, and brought enough of us together that we counted up our troops and our ships and our resources and hey, what do you know, it turns out we have enough pepper to stop a Victorian army!"
Now here Sara flashes a smile, one with too much tooth. On a much younger woman, it is the smile that promises direct violence, to be performed by the smiler. Here, I think it promises as much violence, or more, really, but not performed by her. Most likely not, anyhow.
So, our Victoria friends made quite a fuss about you killing their aid workers and planning to expand everywhere. Thoughts?
As a reporter, I have had a number of people bat their eyes at me. Sometimes it is to look innocent. Sometimes, it is to indicate the interest of the romantic type. And sometimes, sometimes it is to brag, to state that they are aware you know what they did, and they are more than willing to be proud of it and would do it again. I think it should be easy to tell which of these eye bats came to me.
"What aid workers? I don't remember the list I went over with General Burns having any aid work- ohh! Oh, those! Those
'aid workers.' "
The sarcasm on those words is acid.
"Well, all I know is, none of them were a tenth as good at actually aiding anyone as they were at, hm, let's see..." She ticks off her fingers one by one. "sabotage, espionage, and assassinating most of a generation of industrialists, oh and at least two state governors. And that was just what they were getting paid to do from home; what some of them did for 'perks' when they got the chance would have scared my hair straight if I hadn't seen worse in the forties."
"Tell me, Mr. Williams. You're three times closer to Victoria than we are. Did you see big boatloads of Victorian aid supplies come for free in the fall of '63, when just about every harvest from the Mississippi to the Appalachians was going to hell? I didn't think so. Well, they weren't passing you up to feed us, I'll tell you that. The only 'aid' we ever got was barter only, for industrial equipment and vehicles we've never yet been able to replace. You ever hear the old one about teaching a man to fish? Well, the Victorians do the opposite. They'll give you a fish and take your fishing rod and tell you to be grateful for it. So I think they can spare both of us their talk about "aid workers." I doubt you've missed your set of strutting, swaggering spies-in-sheeps'-clothing any more than we did. The only difference is that you were forgiving enough to let them leave alive after what they've done, I guess. Gracious of you."
Gracious. A nice way of putting it as she smiles wolfishly. Not sure grace had anything to do with us leaving them alive. But there it is, the polite dance that Detroit's actions were choices. She continues, an enthusiasm I've heard so many times before, usually, on those I don't expect to see the next winter, dead of entirely natural causes.
"Me, I don't believe Retroculturalists deserve a lot of grace."
I nod, and honestly, I'm tempted to leave off there. But I've apparently got readers, and listeners out west now, and I love all those who follow my words. So, I press on, might as well get an answer from the horses' mouth. Or the horses' second in commands' mouth.
Very... interesting. And the expansion plans you carefully didn't mention?
"Well, as far as the Chicago Accords are concerned, applications are still open! Sign up if you like free and fair elections, excessive numbers of political parties, cheap combine harvesters, and grinding Victorian army regiments into sausage! I know I do, though I still haven't figured out what to do with my combine harvester. I don't know a furrow from a ferret, honestly."
"But if nobody signs up, we don't have expansion plans. Trade plans, sure; the Soo Locks could use a hand with some work, and you'd have to see the state of some of the waterworks along the Mississippi to believe them. But not expansion. Nothing's proper Commonwealth soil except for an embassy. Not if the people there don't sign the Accords- or an amended copy of same."
Any thoughts on why so many communities seem so concerned about it?
"Well, the Vicks have been screaming their heads off about it for the past two years. A lot of Americans have gotten into the trap of feeling like we have to believe what they say, to pretend Victoria doesn't lie about just about every damn thing. Even when in our hearts, we know better than to trust them about anything important. But they do lie."
She stops for a moment. And it makes me think, not too long, but now that I'm writing this up, afterward, this line gets me. We all got our sins, and truth be told readers, I've parroted their lies before. I could always justify it to myself. I'm not saying they are true, just stating what they said it. "The Victorian ambassador said", "According to Victorian diplomats", or just writing a transcript of their speech. But at the same time, I knew much of it for what it was, and didn't much speak against em, least not in ways that they would recognize, as I've also said, I never had much respect for Victorian intelligence. I've had a lot of people say I'm suspicious, or defeatist with Chicago, and maybe I am. But I think I'm just as much delighting in being able to be. Thing to think about, at least.
Sara continues on, as if she read my mind.
"I don't suppose that's everything, though. The way things have been in this part of the country for the past thirty years is terrible, but it's something we could get used to, eventually. Each town or city did what it could to survive, looked out for itself, and put up with whatever government it had to if it couldn't get the one it wanted. People got used to keeping their heads down, even if it meant slipping down the ladder rung by rung. And anything that tried to change that, one way or another, was likely to be a threat. Either the Victorians would burn it, or the Russians would bomb it, or it would all turn out to be a trick somehow. Or even all three at once."
"I think a lot of people who didn't join up with the Accords are thinking that way. They're waiting for the other shoe to drop, wondering when we'll shout "AHA!" and hoist the evil flag, or when the Victorians will burn us out. Except that we haven't
done the first one, and we have no intention of letting the second one happen."
"Whatever people say, or whatever they fear, those are the facts. We're not stealing the bread out of our neighbors' mouths. We're not slaughtering our own innocent people, or other people's people. We're not taking tribute at gunpoint. We're not sending "aid workers" to break anything that looks like an attempt to rebuild. And we're not letting Victorian boots anywhere near any part of America we can protect. Because
they do all of those other things. We all know they do."
Moving on from hypothetical expansion to the very real war. I've gotten to see your troops in action thanks to your generosity. Reversing that, what have you seen of the Detroit Militia?
"Personally, less than I'd like. I've read a lot of reports, but you can't learn everything you'd like about troops just from reading an essay."
And you-all, the Commonwealth?
"Hm. Well, a lot of us have seen a lot to write those reports in the first place. I'm guessing you want to hear about that. I can only bounce it back secondhand, but they were good reports."
And what did you think of them?
"Hm, physically or metaphysically?"
Good question, if you believe the Victorians, not much difference between the two. Granted, I am inclined to a slightly more materialistic explanation, but I'd be wrong if I thought that it was nothing. It's doesn't matter if you have guns if you are too scared to fire them.
"Physically, well, if you'd asked me a few years ago, I'd have said you needed more Sten guns. And better bomb-makers. You can never go wrong with good bomb-makers. Oh, and shovels. Now, Ron disagrees with me about Sten guns, but you're pretty well set up for guns now. I should probably talk to someone about IEDs anyway. I'm sure your team has enough shovels now, you would not believe how many- ah, people- I've talked to in the last six months..."
Sara sighs, her face taking on the expression of so many members of the city council when talking about many a project.
"Anyway, you definitely need more big guns. Can't go wrong with a big load of howitzers. We're still kind of hard up ourselves, but you've earned a share, and I think I can shake some more loose for you if some of the new stuff works out. Also,
technicals. Tell anyone in the militia you know.
Technicals."
Sara risks letting her hands free on the bumpy ride of punctuating every syllable with a stab of the finger to her hand. I didn't ask if Sara believes in God, but I am sure she believes in Technicals.
"They help. A lot."
"But yeah, I know the Viks kept you pretty short on equipment and it was hard to hide things from them. You're definitely getting there, and we'll ship in what we can. Nobody west of Buffalo benefits from a weak Detroit, and yes I'm including Toledo. The world's a better place if we're all strong enough to stand up for ourselves. It keeps the jackboots in the closet where they belong."
"Now, metaphysically? I'll to have to tell a bit of a story to explain. See, the Vicks cast a long shadow. I've felt it too. But the difference between your militia and the way ours used to be is mostly about something else."
She shrugs.
"See, Detroit's militia remind me of some of the old crew from the War on Nazis, just as we were getting started- more like the line units pushing up out of Chicago, not the guerillas I rode with. Except for us having more leftovers from the Good Old Days back then, there's... a lot in common."
"The difference now, though, is that out where we are, we saw the Vicks- Rumford even visited once- but our trouble was mostly the neo-Nazis. They didn't have a sugar daddy to cry to when things started to go sour, though they started looking hard for one, at the end."
She grins, I will give this, when trying to be scary, Sara isn't the worst. On the other hand, I've interviewed Victorians when they wanted to be in the press. I know the grin, the grin of someone who lies to your face and dares you not to print exactly what they said with no questions but what they wish. Who may kill you, perhaps because you did something they disliked, perhaps because you were there and some reporters must be purged occasionally to remind the others. Sara's grin is different, it promises pain for other people, for things they did to deserve it. Revenge rides on this woman's shoulder, I don't think she's had to, or tried to, hide it in a long time.
"When we started beating them, they kept getting weaker. And weaker. We got to finish them off.
All the way off."
"The thing that's missing here is, your team didn't get to do something like that. My team got a chance to push a bunch of Nazi role-players all the way back into their own..." she trails off, her eyes distant and hell-lit... "goddamn ovens. It changed us, to know we could do that, that we didn't have to let them take away every last scrap of our country and turn it all into Hell forever. Because we don't. We can stop them. We will."
And the smile on her face flows from wolf to woman, in the space of three heartbeats.
"You'd have been doing it right along with us, if you'd been there. As it is, you're getting your chance late. But you're doing it, and you can do it again as many times as you have to, until they
never take anything from you again."
I'm going to be honest here, I try not to be an emotional man. At least not when interviewing. Everyone got a fantasy, and everyone communicates it. The way they say the world works, or the way the world should work. It's easy to get yourself caught up in them, for or against. Sometimes that can be dangerous, for some inexplicable reason those who question Victoria's fantasies tended to end up with a case of dead, sometimes with the body found.
But even when it isn't dangerous, I try to avoid it. To many people can sell you on something against your interest. Make you not think. But that said, if I'm to be honest, I wanted to believe. I want that fantasy to be true, to be standing in the sun unafraid. There was a gleam in her eyes that makes me think she means it, but maybe I just so badly want her to.
I find myself distracted, and embarrassingly, come back only after I realize that I missed something she said. Not my finest moment as a Journalist, but we are all friends here, and I'm sure no one here would tell anyone about my embarrassing little slip.
I'm sorry, I didn't quite catch that.
"
I said. I expect the Detroit Militia's starting to learn how that feels by now. You'll be able to tell the difference. I think you'll like it."
I nod, and consult my notes, reminding myself of other questions I had jotted down.
If you don't mind I'd like to go back from the metaphysical to the materialistic. I know we are helping you disassemble that laker. I heard from people back home that a lot of stuff flowing from that, any plans?
"I've seen one really stupid plan cross my desk where we keep all the goods, and about four good ones where we don't. We still don't have a full manifest for that ship, and the Secretary of Commerce is still trying to get his people to figure out if she can be floated off the mudbank or if she's scrap iron. I don't know what we'll do with the ship or the steel; either way that's a question for next year and the year after. I do know that if you've got a hankering for some mortars, they're going to be on clearance for a while. Vicks have a great big love for mortars. Disturbing love. There's probably more mortars on that ship than all of us put together know what to do with. That and bazooka rockets. Stingers. That kind of thing. They were planning to top off thirty or forty thousand men for weeks of hard fighting, so I imagine there'll be plenty to go around."
What about training exercises for the equipment we'll be getting? Any chance of our militia seeing that?
"It'd be a good idea. They've been training hard all winter; I don't see why that should change after the Victorians get a kicking. And mortars are tricky. So are bazookas."
So, tell me, are the rumors true? Does Burns use Victorian intestines as condoms?
She shrugs and gets a grin of mischief that only a woman far too old for anyone to tell her to act her age can get.
"Heh. Well. You know how he rolled in around here?"
She waves her arms, indicating, well, all of Detroit.
"I read the reports, and believe me, he was juuust like that three or four years ago too. Same style, different day. You know how he is about wargames. And my rule is, I like my men tricky enough to spot about a third of my ambushes. Maybe two fifths. If he can see more than half of them in a war game, he's way too sneaky for me to date."
Sara gives a grin, perhaps the only one that even begins to approach something like embarrassment, and she is for a moment far away, remember what I can only assume to be an experience every bit as humiliating. Then she shakes her head and chuckles and turns back to me.
"So, to answer your question, I wouldn't know. Ask someone who took him to bed. Though I will say it sounds unsanitary. Do you know how many untreated intestinal parasites they have in Victoria? Me neither. Bleh!"
Fair enough. What about defending a village from Nazis by his lonesome while taking out a tank on foot? One of my younger nephews was talking about it, said it was in a book and everything.
Sara is once again far away. This time not with embarrassment, but with, perhaps, a ting of nostalgia. Thinking, and I must admit I am perhaps speculating far too much on another's state of mind, or an earlier time. Before the collapse, before the Nazis. I'm tempted to interrupt to ask on that, but this interview has far too many topics already, and the collapse is one of the few things we don't lack for writings of.
"When I was a girl, we had what we called 'comic books.' Good to know they're back. Now, do you want me to break that down piece by piece? It sounds about..."
She begins counting on her fingers.
"Hm, just about exactly half true."
Gotta admit, half true was more than I was expecting, and I find myself pressing on a topic I didn't plan to spend much time on.
Which part is the most true, and the least true?
"Most true? He's defended villages. I've seen a few. Least true? Well. I don't
know that he ever blew up a tank himself. It's not impossible, but it's tough. But what's really impossible? If you've met some of the people who've been with the Devil Brigade the whole way here... they'd never have let him fight anything alone. He'd have had to sneak away from his troops, and some of them are pretty good at following 'sneaky.' I should know. Even if he turned fifteen feet tall and green and strong enough to swat an army all by himself, it wouldn't change anything. He wouldn't have been fighting alone."
Got to see some of that down south. Now, I'm sure that Alex will be happy to tell me if anything I say trends on military intelligence. But given you already let me broadcast it, I assume that the fact that the Victorian's traded a CMC division for a river is well known. And thoughts on that or the shape of the battle to come you care to share?
"We're looking forward to the next time they throw down with us. So are the buzzards."
I will confess to wanting more, but I knew this topic wasn't likely to get much. Plenty of words have been spilled from me on the subject of civilians and military plans. I know it's rational. I know it makes sense. Still, wish I knew.
Anything else you can say? The next lines at the outskirts of Detroit, and I think it would bring comfort to a lot of people to have some idea what's going on. I've been hearing from the Militia that they are scrambling and can't talk to me. Plans for another assault?
"Hm. Well, I won't tell you what he's doing. But I'll tell you what
I would do if, say, what was left of the whole Victorian army came roaring up in one big wave, trying to rush us like they rushed us back from Leamington to Essex. You may remember how that turned out for them..."
"My reputation is as a sneaky commander, but sometimes, you have a hammer and your problem really
is a nail. If I had the forces we have here, I'd get everything ready and meet them with a wall of guns at the first good line on the road north. If Detroit Militia units were being called up, it'd be to be a part of that wall."
"But then, Ron might do something a little more complicated than that, and he may not expect all the Victorians to have the stomach for another march north. Hard to blame them if they didn't, after all."
Planning to get more use out of those steel shells?
She smiles.
"You noticed. Well, we've brought them here, and they're ready to go- lacquered and lubricated for the Victorians' entertainment, even. I can't imagine Ron isn't planning to hit them with a shell or two... thousand.
So, assuming we win, where do you see Detroit and Chicago standing?
"Chicago's going to be in the same place it always was, right between Lake Michigan and the Illinois River. We're going to keep tooling up and rebuilding, because we aren't planning to stand around and let Victoria bully us, or anyone we can help, ever again. Not even if the Vicks go crying home to daddy for better weapons, da? We'll wipe the walls with them as many times as we have to until they get the idea. Americans aren't for pushing around, or for whipping, or for shoving in the kitchen.
She snorts.
"Even if it weren't for that, we could use all the rebuilding we can get. there isn't a single place in North America that's all of what it ought to be. I-" She stutters a bit. "I'm just old enough to remember things more or less the way they were supposed to be, before it started falling apart, even if I was a little girl then. You know how it is for my generation. We were too young to stop what happened. Maybe before we all die, we can be old and sneaky enough to get most of it back..."
Goldblum trails off. I recognize that, got it when my mother talked to me about America or my grandmother about my namesake. That wistful nostalgia for a better time. America don't mean much to me, sadly, and I don't know better times. But the way so many talk with wistfulness for it, makes it seem like some mythical Camelot. Saw a role like that once, the good president Obama, whose kingdom fell to ruin thanks to the Russian knight Trump, he was stabbed with a poison syringe, and not rest beneath lake Erie, ready to rise again when the time is right.
"And as for Detroit, you'll have less Vics, and more howitzers if I have anything to say about it. I don't know, how much do you like combine harvesters and about forty-seven political parties? If you want to join the team, we'd be idiots to say 'no.' "
Actually, that brings up a number of questions. A lot of people, even myself, tend to use the term Chicago and Commonwealth interchangeably. Or at least use them to denote pre-accords and post-accords. But I understand that there are parts besides that, what's that like? How are they governed?
"A bit like things used to be, though not exactly. The Commonwealth has states, the states have cities and counties. Some of the borders aren't where they used to be, but Chicago is just one state, with a big city in it, out of many. Maybe out of more, if people want to sign up. Maybe not. Either way, that's how it usually works. A big area forms a county government with a county seat; a city may, or may not. As they like. Cities and counties are part of a state. We drew up the state lines for the places that signed the Accords already, and we'd redraw and add if new members come in. The state governments answer to the Commonwealth's- Chicago's as much as any of the others."
What about power centers? Would Chicago hold all primary government offices?
"Whatever happens, we're going to have to put them
somewhere. Where, exactly, and how centralized those offices are, depends on how Congress votes. Right now, Congress is elected from a patch of land that's mostly within one to two hundred land miles of the city of Chicago in all directions. That makes Chicago the city a convenient place to put everything. If the shape of the Commonwealth changes, the convenience starts to change."
"When I was a little girl I was an American. I've spent most of my adult life as a cross between a Wisconsinite and a Chicagoan. And I love that- but I'm not married to it, if it means I get to feel like an American again."
There's that thoughtfulness that wistfulness again. Always a bit of an awkward divide here. Between those who remember, and who those of us who it's just a set of stories about when we were strong and powerful. Doubly awkward for those in Detroit. Windsor and Detroit, used to be two different cities, two different countries. People right across the river, yet they were an entirely different country, even as those all the way in Texas were American. Not sure there is any way to talk about it, to cross the barrier between those for whom it's a memory, and those for whom it's a mythology. I let her have her recollection for a bit, as she let me have my peace earlier, before returning to more mundane questions.
I heard that there is a five-year process for joining?
She is quiet for a second and takes a moment to scan the horizon before answering, or perhaps merely not facing me, when she turns back, her expression is neutral.
"As of right now, that is true. I'd be stepping on the toes of about three too many Cabinet secretaries if I said much about the strange mysteries called negotiations and bargaining and fast-tracking, so I can't make promises."
She pauses again, shorter, this time.
"I can't. But I can hope. This city's sure as hell earned it."
What if we want to join an alliance, but aren't ready to incorporate? Could you see that?
"I could see that."
What about Toledo? You see movement on the warlord after this?
Sara gives a grunt as she thinks about it.
"After a Victorian army's been through, and everything else that's already happened, I don't think things will be the same for Toledo as they were before. That much I can say for sure. So things are going to move. If I honestly thought I knew which way, I'd tell you. But I don't."
And if we lose?
"I'd be worrying about that more if the Vics still had two armies closing in on the city. I doubt I'm giving much away by saying Ron's planning to cut off Victoria's right one along with their left one, too. But maybe I'd have come back and joined the guerillas. I bet I can still give pointers on how to put the L in an L-shaped ambush."
That wolfish grin, the one that promises joyful wrath, comes out again.
"Seriously. I know Sara, and I know, well, a lot of Congress. We're not going to stop this war while there's a Victorian stomping-boot west of, oh, the eighty-second meridian's a pretty popular dividing line back in Congress. Eighty-one. Eighty. Something like that. Me, I disagree, I say we should keep fighting until we've pushed them about three or four hundred miles out into the Atlantic, but I'm Crazy Cousin Sara for a reason. When the smoke clears at the end of this war, Detroit won't be on Victoria's side of any line the Commonwealth's willing to stop at."
"So if they suddenly pull a long string of miracles out of their butts and start winning for a change, we'll keep on coming back. And back. And back. Until they either give up or run out of warm bodies, if we have to. Because if you keep at it, you really can get ALL the Nazi goon squads. It's hell while they're around, hell, but you can get every last one, until none are left, if you don't back down. And the Commonwealth is done backing down."
Anything else you'd want to say?
She gets quiet for a minute, considering but continues quickly.
"Once, about a hundred years before your time or mine, this city used to be called the Arsenal of Democracy- for a good reason. It'd make an old lady happy in her declining years to see it happen over again. Detroit's making the world's news right now because of its position. Maybe we can make Detroit famous for its heavy metal again."
I'm left wondering about this. Had it come from all the nostalgia about America in our interview? Thinking back to what could be? Always did love that bit of our history, showing we are more than the Victorians think of us. I love the fantasy, our Camelot, and Sara sells it well. Granted, my more cynical side points out I talked about this before in my articles so maybe she's just read up on them.
Final question, I hear rumors there was a Victorian Assassin up in Chicago. As a person who apparently has, and I can't imagine why, annoyed the Victoria's with their writing, Any advice?
"Hmm. Well, again, I'm the crazy one, but my advice is to set traps, like for any other kind of rat."
Her eyes narrow, and again, it is a good stare, harsh and full of promises, but it lacks a certain cold wrath. A certain believe that you are inherently a stain, to be done with as others please. Her stare still thinks I'm human.
"Has someone been telling tales?"
Just what the papers published on the trial. Are there tales I should have heard?
"I tell you what, if you're still writing newspaper columns in ten or fifteen years, and I'm still kicking around, I'll tell you. For now, I think I'd better keep it my secret." She winks.
It is with that that the technical stops, and we go our separate ways. She to her artillery, and me to other interviews. In the end, we both have things to get through, and with the Victorians hanging over our heads, far too little time to do it.
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All Credit to
@Simon_Jester for the Crossover idea, writing Sara's portions, and a good deal of editing on mine.
To expand: The Warlord came to power amid escalating fears of Detroit once it because clear that they had a lot more ability to sustain a military (population+infinite trade tariffs works FTW). The Warlord was elected, but found it trivial to justify, to himself and the City, never leaving, and he threw absolutely everything into the military. He may, or may not, have intended a war at some point; you do not know.
