A New America
65 years. It’s now been roughly 65 years since they took over. We’re no longer a free country, land of the stars and stripes, land of the strongest army on the planet, or even the continent.

I have to go back a little though. Back to when it all started. 2140. America has just surpassed China in employment rates and technology for the first time in over 100 years. American’s were ecstatic, filled with patriotism, and nationalism. President Hernandez promised that we would never again fall into a recession comparable to the ones in the early 21st century again, and we believed him. On the other side of this event, were those who thought that things were getting too good to be true. How did we outsmart China? They had as many honor students as we had students. Something wasn’t right, but no one could figure it out. Why would they let us win so easily? They were planning something, but most were too blind to see it, including myself.

I grew up in the suburbs of North Dakota, in Grandforks, close to the city, but just far enough. It was the kinda city where everyone knew everyone. My father was an officer of 13 years at the time and loved his job. My mother was a stay at home mom and was amazing at what she did. She made the home as warm as it was. Other from my parents I had one brother, we weren’t close at all, but I’d do anything for that kid. The only common ground we had was baseball.

I remember the day everything changes, as if it had just happened a few short minutes ago. Confusion, disbelief, horror, the emotions that just about everyone went through across the United States that day, probably in a similar order too. It was around 11 on a Saturday morning; we had just had our family breakfast and me and Sid wanted to get in a round of catch before being forced to go to Mass. We hated it. I threw the ball and he just looked slightly above my head and dropped his hands by his pockets. “Come on! That was right to you!” I said, not knowing what was happening right above my head. After he didn’t reply I just turned around, thinking he was looking at some dumb crap behind me. Lord was I in for a surprise. When I looked up the sky was no longer bright and full of hope; but rather thousands upon thousands of black parachutes at all different heights, and planes covering the clouds dropping man after man. What was happening? I ran inside and got my dad to come out to see. He thought it was a dumb joke. Up until that day, I’ve never see that man timid. His instinct kicked in and he sent us to get our mother and lock ourselves in the safe room in the basement. It was the first time we actually had to use it. He ran down with us there to retrieve his weapons and his walkies. After locking us in for good, he said that he loved us and would be back.

Minutes turned into hours, and hours turned into days. Where we were was meant to protect us from atomic warfare or just chaos in general. Every couple months he had use go through different drills to make sure we’d be safe. It had now been a good 6 days and we had gone through about a tenth of our food supplies. We tried to ration them, not knowing how long we’d be held captive in our own homes. My mom found an ion powered T.V. and turned it on to NBC. What we saw just killed us. Red all over the screen, some kind of Asian militants taking the place of the anchors, we watched as they read over their declaration over the United States of America…

“If you are watching this, you are in an area that the US government has no control over. I am Xiongnu Zheng. China is now in control of all American citizens, and truly hope that you will all comply with our orders. Any who oppose our orders, will be imprisoned or punished with their lives. Continued updates will be transmitted over all radio stations and news stations across the country..”

My mother turned the T.V. off in disbelief. We were in a soundproof shelter, and were separated from all of civilization, but wouldn’t be able to sustain ourselves for much longer. We needed to find our dad and figure out what to do. But we couldn’t just walk out, are they in our house? Are they blocking our roads? What do we do?