United States of America

Flag of the United States

Map of the United States

The **United States of America** is a country in North America and the primary setting of the *Langdomverse*. It is bordered to the north by Canada and to the south by Mexico. The U.S was the source of the Langdom Bioweapon and the first country to collapse during the pandemic, setting off a chain reaction that led to the rest of the world descending into chaos.

Twenty-five years after the dissolution of the U.S. government, only two governmental entities remain: the Sylvania Republic, located in the north, and the Republic of Texas, in the south.

## History

### Pre-Pandemic

Considered to be the only world superpower left after the end of the Cold War, the United States was an economic powerhouse and a world leader in technology and entertainment, among many other areas.

In 2014, the U.S government began work on a biological weapons project to develop a viral weapon-of-mass-destruction to be used against America's enemies. Known as Project Babylon, the project recruited several biologists who were among the best in their field, including CDC scientist Robert Schrader; the scientists developed this new bioweapon under the pretence that they were decoding the sequence of an enemy state WMD so the U.S could create a way to combat it. Over the course of three years, the scientists created several strains of the bioweapon, using a rabies virus as a template and splicing it with DNA from several pathogenic organisms, including influenza and HIV viruses, to make it an incredibly virulent superweapon. When a human was infected by the virus, it would drive the person completely and irreversibly insane, leaving behind only their most basic animal instincts to hunt, kill, eat and procreate and completely eradicating the person that they once were. Those in this state became known as "Turned".

In July 2017, the virus was stolen by the government, who unleashed it on the town of Langdom, Missouri to simulate a mass-release. In just under 24 hours, almost all of the residents were killed or infected, and despite the government's efforts to contain the bioweapon it was able to spread outside of the town and across the world, using the cotton in banknotes as a transmission vector. As the virus spread across the country and all over the globe, the government made attempts to control information concerning cases, deaths and the status of several major cities. In September, the WHO declared the situation a pandemic. Due to the vector on which it spread, the virus became commonly known as "dollar rabies", with the pandemic being dubbed the "dollar pandemic".

### Dollar Pandemic

By October-November 2017, the pandemic was approaching apocalyptic levels as cities became overrun and the federal government began to collapse. As the bioweapon carried itself on the cotton in banknotes, it precipitated the largest economic crash in history, preventing other nations from properly containing or mitigating the spread of the virus. In the U.S, the collapse of the government, combined with their campaign of misinformation and censorship, resulted in the formation of the Civilian Response Front, a paramilitary group dedicated to restoring order through democracy and the rule of law, led by Robert Schrader, the lead scientist responsible for the creation of the bioweapon. In response, the federal government created a new branch of the military, the FRF, and gave it authority over all measures related to containing the bioweapon, such as the numerous quarantine zones dotted around the country.

The failures of the government led the upper-midwest states of Wisconsin and Minnesota to secede from the U.S and unite to form the Sylvania Republic. The FRF, at that point the only remaining remnant of the federal government, attacked the SR in an attempt to preserve the United States, and although the SR collapsed it also caused a complete collapse in social order nationwide, leaving the citizens of the U.S in turmoil as they were forced to fend for themselves and survive by any means necessary. By the end of 2017, all communication broadcasts went silent as the entire world fell into the darkness of the apocalypse.

By the winter of 2019, eighteen months after the bioweapon was unleashed on Langdom, only three major factions remained in the U.S: the CRM, the FRF and a loosely-organized group called the Patriots, an affiliation of several large right-wing conspiracy groups who waged war against the CRM. With no government to help them, survivors either formed roaming bands of refugees or established fortified communities of their own, often coming into conflict with rival groups over resources and territory.

### Local Events

#### Houston, Texas

> *Main Article: Spiral*
>
>

Houston was one of the first major cities to fall during the dollar pandemic, with the entire city becoming overrun in less than two days. Despite the sudden chaos, a small group of survivors led by soldier Michael Carver managed to secure a single apartment building from which they began scouting the city for supplies and survivors.

#### Northwest Oregon Containment and Exclusion Zone

> *Main Article: Zone*
>
>

In the very early days of the pandemic, the U.S government sealed off a large portion of northwest Oregon from the rest of the world by building a gigantic containment wall, creating the NOCEZ. The survivors within, unable to leave the Zone, established several large communities dotted around the region, and, in addition to dollar rabies, had to deal with another microorganism known as "black mold".

#### Baltimore, Maryland

> *Main Article: The Langdom Files: American Dreams*
>
>

Lying near the waters of the Chesapeake Bay, Baltimore was severely damaged due to infrastructure failure that led to a large portion of the city becoming overgrown and flooded.

## Notable Locations

### Illinois

* Carbondale, Illinois
	+ Station Alpha

### Maryland

* Baltimore, Maryland
* Station Delta

### Missouri

* Kansas City, Missouri
* Langdom, Missouri

### Nebraska

* Searchlight Ranch
* Shire Estate

### Oregon

* NOCEZ
	+ Sheridan, Oregon
	+ The Hill
* Portland, Oregon

### Texas

* Houston, Texas
	+ The Tower