Chapter 1.
Born on October 11, 2047 in Salem, New Hampshire (not to be confused with Salem Massachusetts), William Joad had a good and unremarkable childhood. His parents owned a small bakery and operated it together, with occasional help from a young Billy as he grew up. At the age of 16, Billy's father, Tom, injured his back and became unable to work. For the next few years, Billy's mother did the best she could to carry on the business with Billy, but their financial situation started to deteriorate rapidly. The gutted Social Security system could not do much to replace Tom's income. At the age of 18, Billy enlisted in the military to earn a steady paycheck and help support his family. This largely worked: at the time of the great war, the two were still alive and well in Billy's childhood home.
Chapter 2.
After basic training, Billy developed a close friendship with another young soldier, Sandra Smith. After many evenings spent in intense discussion, Smith started by causing Billy to think about the aims of the US government in invading Mexico in 1951. As he was only 4 at the time, Billy had never much thought about it. From there, discussion turned to the unfair treatment of his parents, of indigenous people (who had by this time been almost wiped out through continued internal colonization), and of the other vast swaths of humanity living under the boot of US hegemony and imperialism. Smith, it turns out, was a Chinese intelligence asset. She introduced billy to Marxism, and managed to smuggle him some introductory texts by Marx, Luxembourg, Lenin, Mao, and others.
Once this process had begun it could not be stopped. Everywhere he looked, Billy saw the fetishization of commodities. He saw the slaughter of American Indians in the land he lived and worked on, the starvation of Mexican civilians under unjust sanctions in the oil he filled the trucks with, the sweatshop deaths in the clothes he wore. To say nothing of the endless wars, or the Chinese Internment camps. He entered this world for good personal reasons...but he was a cog in the monstrous machine now. Smith held the key. She imparted to Billy a theory of "Revolutionary Defeatism." Her hope was to spread this understanding of facts and political theory among the rank and file of the military, until the revolutionary potential of the military was high enough. Then the enlisted men and women would kill their officers and return home to overthrow the government that threw their lives away to enhance corporate profits. The Chinese, for their part, had similar movements of secret Maoists, Anarchists, and even the rare liberal republican. The People's Republic, for any of its faults, could provide extremely useful guidance, material, and logistical support to people like Smith. Even if it was taken as true US propaganda couldn't make China look worse than the absolute evil Smith and Billy knew the US to be. She recruited Billy to Chinese intelligence as well. Since Chinese internment began, and particularly since Wan Yang was captured in 2062, Chinese intelligence were always eager for assets of non-asian ethnicity.
Smith then determined that for their safety they needed to distance themselves. They were active members of the military. Other people had seen them together. The pair were never intimate, but they determined to act as though they were and had a violently bad breakup. Billy asked to be transferred to Anchorage to get away from "that hateful cow." Billy never found out that she was executed for treason two years later.
Chapter 3.
He spent the next 8 years fighting communists by day and agitating fellow soldiers and reporting to the Chinese by night. After his first 4 year contract, he renewed and was allowed a short leave in Vancouver, Canada. He met Nora. Nora was a Canadian who was not politically active, but vaguely supported Canadian independence. She just wanted to live her life. She felt like home. Billy was madly in love. He had never felt so at peace in his life as he did with Nora. When Billy was shipped out again, he recorded a holo for her every week and sent it back to her. By the time his 4 year contract came up for renewal again, he simply couldn't handle the now triple nature of his life as soldier, spy, and boyfriend. He quit the army. His Chinese handler was not pleased, but Billy kept them in the loop as he moved to a suburb of Boston, less than an hour from his parents.
Chapter 4.
Nora and Billy got married and had a child. Billy did his best to keep involved with his new Chinese handler, who was rapidly losing interest in him as an asset. He joined the American Legion, as well as local groups interested in Social Justice.
On October 23rd, 2077, he was going to give the above speech at the veteran's hall, when the bombs fell. He was cryogenicly frozen against his will. In 2227 he was awoken long enough to witness the murder of Nora and the kidnapping of their son. In 2287, he escapes the vault.
Chapter 5.
Billy began exploring the post-apocalyptic wasteland, and discovered the last Minuteman, Preston Garvey. Realizing that what Preston was talking about, communities organizing together for defense and prosperity was an un-sophisticated communism, Billy eagerly began to help the Minutemen rebuild and expand. The original minutemen were also revolutionaries, so why not?
The settlers came from across the commonwealth to live together, sharing food and water among themselves freely, and coming to one another's aid in the face of external threats. Their self-sufficient nature meant that helping to guide the settlers would not be a task that would help Billy's search for his son, rather than distract from it.
Chapter 6.
Only a few weeks after beginning to build beneath the banner of the minutemen, Billy met another group; the red guards. Descendants of Chinese Internment detainees and Chinese expats, the group maintained a more or less Marxist understanding of liberation. They knew of the previous CPG, but correctly recognized that it was not a movement of the people. Upon seeing the reformed Minutemen under Preston and Billy, they were eager to set down roots and help to build a base from which liberation could be spread. As the weeks went on, and the investigation to find his son continued, the minutemen and the red guards joined forces. The Commonwealth Free Territory was formed.
Each settlement elects a member [thanks auto-assign!] to work a logistics station [thanks IDEK!]. That member ensures that the settlement's surpluses and deficits are accurately reported to the community of settlements, and that the surpluses are sent to where they are needed, and that deficits are solved by other settlement surpluses (as a side note, this is essentially
Project CyberSIN). Although Billy was appointed General of the Minutemen by Preston, as far as the settlements go, the title is essentially irrelevant [thanks rise of the commonwealth!]. He now serves more as a figurehead than a leader, though for an especially industrial settlement, his guidance can be useful [thanks industrial revolution!]. Billy now spends his time as an adventurer and scavenger rather than a leader; he is still looking for his son. As the Commonwealth Free Territory expands, all will be freed, not only from the physical chains of slavery, the social chains of wages and debt, but the metaphorical chains of hunger, thirst, and exposure.
Which Faction will you "win" with?
Red Guards + Minutemen. (though the red guards faction pack is dead it seems
)
The Railroad seems fine, and may accurately critique reactionary attitudes of ordinary folks against Gen3 Synths. We'll work with them on that, changing people's minds about that will be impotant. But that cannot be our primary focus. Democracy must come first. If the people would not accept synths in their midst it's not our job to force synths on them, it's our job to uncover what causes that prejudice and address it. Democratic control of the means of production includes deciding where and whether to devote resources to fighting, and so demands that the Railroad push the public towards seeing their position as natural allies of the enslaved synths.
The Institute, the Brotherhood, the Enclave (if they were to show up), and Raiders all aim to hoard the product of other people's labor. They must be resisted and ultimately destroyed.