Back in 2013 I hosted a roleplay that was a semi serious attempt at going through an idea like this, but it died out after several pages worth of work.
I decided planning a comeback over the years to make this roleplay fit into a new pattern. You, and others will boarding on Transatlantic airlines flight #947 on your way from the shining metropolis of New Manhattan the sleek city of the future built over the corpses of six million people who died in a nuclear holocaust in 1978 (in what was once New York). Your planned destination is Oslo, Norway, but things are tense over in Europe with the U.S angered at the utterly genocidal treatment the Britons, and their own citizens received when fleeing Great Britain.
The Soviets had citizens in Great Britain too, and things are about to go over the tipping point. Your flight will be the cause shot out of the sky by warmongering federation forces trying to maintain the quarantine. One billion died in 1978 from a false alarm, and billions more are at stake. The U.S, and the Soviet Union prepare are prepared to take on the worlds 3rd superpower.
For you though it probably won't matter as you will wake up, and struggle for your very survival in the ruins of Albion.
1998s projection for flu outbreaks in december are way off, but the plague spread incredibly fast. There will be no recovery only struggle for control over the isles.
Letter to those who may hopefully find this in the future
Walking death, wind of death, black flu, wasting fever, or simply the pestilence.
These are all the names to describe the plague which tore Great Britain apart in a month.
The first big report came out of Norwich after a bio-terrorist group released something into the air at one of the big malls set up by Holder Industries. The police tried to help contain the victims, but carnage spread throughout the mall forcing the health authority to order a barricade around the place. It didn't work, and while authorities were busy clearing out the mall, and looking for survivors the first cases of infection in the city began to appear.
To many it probably seemed like a cold or flu so they would go to the hospital, and infect the staff there. The staff would go on to infect their family, friends, loved ones, and other acquaintances. Soon all sorts of public places became infected hotspots in under a few days. Those who didn't die began to transform into something else. Its as if the virus inflicted a coma on the body, and when the person came out they weren't the same.
They were still living, breathing, eating human beings, but their mind, and one could even say their soul had been taken over to serve a purpose. The attacks were sporadic at first, but soon got out of control. The military were called in, and cordoned the whole damn place off doing nothing while thousands died or turned. They probably thought if the infection burned out they could come in, and cleaned up. While they were busy playing the waiting game the remaining bioterrorists who had slipped out earlier began to spread the infection in certain areas.
No target was too sacred for them. Churches, synagogues, hospitals, and monuments to history were all open targets. While the military was busy with Norwich the terrorists still around began to die or turn from the infection. The police managed to catch or kill most of them, but those infected slipped by. The first patient outside Norwich was someone who had been in the city, got infected at a restaurant from tainted food, and then took a trip back to their home in Bath, Somerset.
They infected god knows how many people along the way who would go on to infect even more. Once these time bombs went off the police began to notice, and under orders of the Ministry of Health set up quarantine zones. This was after a blood bath occurred in one of the local hospitals. The police in their combat, and hazmat suits patrolling these fenced areas waiting for doctors to come, and assess the infected was ineffective.
The media despite censoring began to leak reports of what we now call the Remembrance Day Plague since it first began on Dec 6th. They day we mourn the one billion who died in the nuclear war which happened primarily because of a false alarm from the Soviets. They dropped hydrogen bombs on what was once New York in 1978 triggering a limited scale nuclear war via a lottery system. Why am I telling you this?
Because if this plague gets out of the country there will be no need for any more Remembrance Days, shiny cars, robotic servants, neat automated houses, and other trivial things the Americans espouse as a right. People tend to forget that we were once under the occupation of a brutal soviet styled government since the revolution in 1948. Our experiment with American styled capitalism, and European Federation aggression has only been in place since 1990.
Reports of missing pets, children, and eventually adults began to pile up around communal message boards. Hospitals began to inspect for the plague, and had police escort them to large camps where they would ultimately die or be executed humanely. No one knows how many people who actually survived the plague were still executed, but the figure is astounding. It is estimated that one camp while putting bodies in the crematoriums didn't notice someone waking up from the infection. Their screams haunted the workers till the point they committed mass suicide.
While other neighborhoods were boarding up, and getting supplies as the police disintegrated others were committing mass suicide. A caravan of ambulances was needed to drag the bodies out of a church. Someone had poisoned the wine, and they drank it all unknowingly given how they died. Others used guns, ropes, pills, and other blunt objects while many began to jump off buildings. The military as they gained control began to burn any bodies on site reserving mass graves for other purposes.
The city of Stockton a former market town turned industrial hub thanks to government collectivization efforts managed to somehow prevent their entire city from being infected. They practically walled it off from the world, and began an extreme rationing program. The military couldn't get anywhere near the place when evacuation orders came. Corporations such as Proseiden, Holder Industries, and Alderman the famous pharmaceutical company began hiring Black Crest securities to guard their assets.
The Delmar family out of their lavish Eastgate estates in Brighton out seized control of the remaining assets of the local government in East Sussex. Some grizzled war vet down in Sheffield (a village within the former Bracknell forest) began gathering a mob to enforce their own brand of justice as the police started to collapse in Berkshire. Apparently the area was full of people who lost a lot of family during the Irish war of independence (1960s), and understandably were pissed.
The name for the infected themselves became turned since by all means, but these weren't stupid shambling zombies as some conspiracy theorists from the states thought. No these were people under the control of something else their very body was changing, but the turned seemed relatively smart they began to travel in packs, but they weren't invincible. They had to eat, sleep, and do other bodily functions, but they didn't just eat meat people observed them raiding the abandoned grocery stores to eat food.
I think once the plague began to infiltrate London that the government panicked. The military had to make tough choices in who to evacuate, and they chose the healthy. Cancer patients, diabetics, the mentally ill, the mentally retarded, and those with other conditions such as physical disabilities were either executed or left in the relocation camps to their own fate. Most of them died either by bullets or horrible deaths. Then all the people on life support, those who needed surgery, and those who got a strange bacterial infection (linked to the plague) were all euthanized.
When the chancellor gave that address it caused people to freak out thus delaying the evacuation. Riots broke out across Scotland which hadn't suffered as much from the plague, but the strain caused the collapse of any intact emergency services. The air force began deploying fire bombs on the cities which were out of control, and those which were deemed unworthy to save. Edinburgh got the worst of it with 100,000 dead as a result. The fires raged for days thus causing the military save for several defectors to abandon Scotland completely.
Eventually the power grid collapsed for much of the country while the military guarded the designated ports of evacuation along the motorways. In order to prevent people from fleeing by cars they used buses to transport those selected to be evacuated. The hordes began to overrun the motorways making it impossible to move. The latest estimates before communications collapsed is that ten percent of the estimated evacuees made it their destinations.
The navy tried as hard as it could, but couldn't evacuate in time as the hordes flooded into the evacuation cities. The military used artillery, and bombs to hold back the hordes causing much of the areas to be destroyed or on fire. Not everyone got out groups got lost or killed in the confusion. The fires raged like Scotland, but calmed down the situation in London was worse. Cut off from the rest of the military the remnants in London decided to consolidate their efforts in the militarized Isle of Dogs. During the 1980s the Isle of Dogs had been rebuilt since London was incinerated in atomic fire originally, and was used as a military area.
Neighbors fought over canned goods while gangs ran amok in the streets. Anyone who had a boat left long after the evacuation order was issued the city was a blood bath. Shops closed down as bodies were strewn across public parks, churches, hotels, cars, restaurants, and even the airports. Anyone on the Isle of Dogs was lucky, but eventually the Ministry of Health would be the next target.
The military here had managed to hold them back for a while, but the shots have stopped instead only screaming remains as the infected break through the barriers. I must end the letter here for it isn't safe any longer, but the people here won't suffer for long the security system will let out a toxic gas in a few minutes killing everything in this building.
-Signed,
Dr. Barry Abbot
January 6th, 1999
PS: I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me Francis. I should have gone with your parents to the U.S back when we had a chance, but don't worry I will always love you. Sorry for missing your birthday part.
*The technology of the future today available in much of the world due to our seemingly benevolent mega corporations.
It seemed like an ordinary cold, and flu season, but something else swept up the country. The plague spread mostly by air, water, food, and contact, but rarely by biting since that is an incredibly inefficient means of spreading a pathogen. The plague is very much alive, and people on a smaller scale are getting infected in waves. Those known as the turned have not died out since they seem to be intelligent enough to find shelter, and food.
While you know a bioterrorist group was the one who unleashed the plague no one is really sure who actually made it for them or why. You may just find out while scouring the ruins of Albion.
1) You shall not God-mod.
2) You shall not Flame or Troll.
3) You shall obey the Op and his Co-ops.
4) You shall respect your fellow role-players.
5) You shall develop your characters and act at your whimsy, within reason.
6) Follow the plot, certain things are going to happen. I will not control how you react to them however.
7) Above all please do moderate posting, no one liners or disappearing for a week at a time. Also please be descriptive.
8 ) Finally Have Fun please.
9) Please state the location of where you are in the rp, it makes it easier for me as the op.
1) This is a hardcore survival horror role play taking place another week following the fall of a liberalizing Peoples Republic of Great Britain (January 12th).
2) There will be harsh descriptions of how the society collapsed, and how the factions arose in result of this.
3) This is Britain, and an incredibly alternate history one at that so don't expect to find an overload of guns here.
4) I expect people to understand the reality of surviving during the winter in a collapsed nation.
5) This is not a zombie roleplay please read the letter before making that assumption.
6) I will lay out the lore so please wait on that, and if you have any questions please do ask.
7) Please talk to me before doing an epidemic survivor application. We need a few things to work out that would be essential to plot.
8 ) This roleplay will take us all over a radically different Britain, and the remnants of society are picking up the pieces. Be wary of any factions.
1) Nation name:
2) Character name:
3) Life before the crash?
4) Age:
5) Description or picture:
6) Mental status:
7) Race, and ethnicity:
8 ) Sex:
9) Occupation:
10) Roleplaying sample:
1) Nation name:
2) Character Name:
3) Life before the epidemic?
4) Life during the epidemic?
5) Life after the epidemic?
6) Age:
7) Description or Picture:
8 ) Nationality:
9) Mental status:
10) Race, and Ethnicity:
11) Sex:
12) Occupation before the epidemic?
13) Occupation now?
14) Roleplaying sample: