The Announcement

America is in decline. Wages and jobs have all but disappeared, and inflation is rampant. The twenty bill has replaced the one dollar bill. Emboldened by an ambivalent Congress and an inept Supreme Court, the newly-elected, socialist-leaning President issues broad sweeping executive orders effectively naming him the first dictator of the United States. Two men, worlds apart, go about their daily lives, both unaware that, together, they hold the key to what's to come...Jackson Reise sits hunched over his work table when he hears the bell on the shop's front door jingle as it opens. He walks through the curtain and sees a man standing at the counter holding a laptop. Lucious Delacroix is elbows deep rebuilding a car engine when he hears the cacophonic warble of the National Emergency tone on the radio. Like most people, he ignores it at first, but the words "Martial Law" catch his ear and he listens intently to THE ANNOUNCEMENT until his cell phone begins to ring. He answers. A voice whispers a single word: Terminus.