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- Jun 23, 2020
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- #1
The Freedom Railway
Infiltrate. Observe. Rescue.
Who are we?
Established in the derelict ruins of City 2 (Old London), the Freedom Railway is a multi-national effort to undermine Combine operations and facilitate movement on those who wish to self-exile from the regime. We are a group which has conscripted vast amounts of human and material resources, into the building of wide-spread network of loosely-connected cells that work to disrupt Combine activity.
Operations we consider within our remit are as follows:
1. Facilitate and extract citizens who wish to break free of the regime, providing a safe transition to resistance-owned settlements.
2. Provide safe shelter for those currently wanted for acts of treason AND non-violent crimes against the regime.
3. Undermine, compromise and sabotage Combine and Loyalist operations.
4. Work in unison with other resistance cells to provide intelligence, routes of safe passage and a steady stream of new members to those who which to directly take on the combine.
Our code:
Infiltration, instead of invasion;
Subversion, instead of conformism;
Free Choice, instead of intimidation;
Espionage by night, instead of armies by day;
and
Freedom, instead of captivity;
Our Rules:
1. We do not work with traitors to the human race, this is anyone who has voluntarily conscripted to Civil Protector or Tier 4 Loyalists or above (unless proven to have significantly acted against the combine).
2. We do not condone acts of violence against other humans, regardless of their status within the Union. You may only harm or eliminate those who pose a serious threat to your own life or others associated with the cell.
3. You are a ghost, you are not to possess anything more than a small concealed weapon on your person. Radio equipment must be left in cell-controlled areas unless authorised by the conductor.
Hierarchy:
Call Signs:
(I'm not saying what they mean here, find out IC)
The Lore:
(Based on City 2 Lore found on the World Map, credit unknown)
Chapter I: Humble Beginnings - (June 2016 - August 2018)
The Freedom Railway has its roots in underground activity and anti-combine ideologies, but started as little more than a charity service. Established in response to growing poverty and hardship seen in City Two, the group initially set its scope on providing food, water and shelter to the denizens of Old London. Formed by Jacob Huxley, a train conductor by trade, the movement found itself settling for the subway stations of the Underground, as they were mostly untouched by the devastation brought by the Combine. Huxley had key knowledge of the underground systems, utilizing his days navigating trains in order to establish safe routes for citizens to traverse in blind of the Combines watchful eye. Going by “The Underground Salvation” at the time, a group no more than ten volunteers in size, aimed to provide support for the thousands of residents assigned to Westminster and parts of the South Bank district. This was not a sustainable practice, Huxley thought, as ration supplies dwindled and as word spread of the group, so did the room in which to occupy desperate travellers. These practices continued, despite odds stacked against them, for a further two years until political tension rose to the threshold in which action must’ve been taken.
Chapter II: Political Instability and Growing Movement - (October 2018 - December 2018)
City Two, a settlement already rife with degradation and political tension, introduced the tyrannical Administrator Delmond Blake who latched upon the dying city and forced it plummeting into the ground. A man who ruled from his iron-clade Westminster palace, enforced his harsh policies on the downtrodden and struggling populace. The Underground Salvation saw an influx of an unprecedented amount of refugees barely clinging on to life, basic rations and space almost completely exhausted. Huxley watched as his stations filled up with many men and women suffering from the imposed regime, it was at this time he decided, along with his fellow operators, to rebrand and repurpose the movement. Now run under the name “Freedom Railway”, Huxley and his group of martyrs planned escape routes through the tunnels and out of the city into the British countryside mostly free from Combine occupation. As the weeks went by, more established routes were made and the group managed to smuggle citizens out by the tens each day, forging new identities in case they were ever caught.
It was at this time that the Freedom Railway grabbed the attention of other resistance movements also operating in the area, most prominently the contraband smuggling Penny Logistics Company and the freedom fighting HMLR (Humanity’s Most Loyal Resistance) group. The Freedom Railway worked with these groups by supplying intelligence on Combine movements through their associates and new initiates for those who wanted to fight, in exchange for supplies smuggled in for their members. The HMLR became more serious about overthrowing the regime, and while not confrontational in nature, the Freedom Railway would assist them in achieving this to end the abhorrent suffering on the streets of London. As the groups prepared for what would surely be a difficult fight, no one would be quite prepared for the bloodshed yet to come.
Chapter III: Operation: London Bridge and the Battle of Westminster - (July 2019)
During the fateful month of July, the combined forces of London’s resistance groups took on “Delmonds Dynasty” in a full-frontal assault across South Banks and Westminster. In solidarity, hundreds, perhaps even thousands of freedom fighters rose from the subways and marched on towards the military-controlled regions, first of which were South Banks and Waterloo. Operation: London Bridge saw an unexpected, albeit poorly planned skirmish across the bridge in an attempt to capture the Combine stronghold. Heavy casualties piled up as the combined effort of deployed Overwatch Soldiers and Conscripts were unable to hold back the resilient fighters hellbent on ending the tyrannical regime. The resistance forces pushed their way through the region, crossing the bridge into Westminster and making a move towards the heavily guarded St James Palace.
The Palace stronghold was by far the most difficult of the captured locations, armed with the finest of Combine technology, the most skilled Overwatch Forces and the highest titanium walls, truly a test of ideological perseverance. After a long and bloody two hour battle, the gates of the palace fell and opened up the storm of freedom fighters to pillage and plunder its lavish commodities. The garrison swept the castle and after thorough searching found the Administrator, curled up cowardly and begging for mercy. A HMLR member raised his weapon without hesitation and shot Delmond in the head, laying his dynasty to rest. The resistance groups raised their rifles to the air, for they had achieved a small win in the face of the combine, but a big victory for their beloved London. As the army looked behind them, they saw streets laying with the blood and bodies of combine, resistance, and innocent civilians in what can only be described as nothing less than a slaughter of humankind.
Truly, there were no winners.
Chapter IV: Spread Across Europe - (August 2019)
After the calamity, it took no more than one month for the Combine to retake control of the city with assistance of City 13, the city now placed in emergency measures. Unable to resume civil life after the wreckage of most infrastructure following the brief war, it was determined that the zone was uninhabitable for human life and City Two’s residents were to be evacuated and placed into different combine-controlled settlements. The combine chose City Thirty-One, Fifty-Seven and Fifty-Eight as their filter cities, due to their underpopulation issue at the time. For those who did not wish to be relocated, the Freedom Railway worked tirelessly to smuggle more people, as fast as they could, out of the city and towards resistance-run camps, most of which by the HMLR now situated in Watford. The group sought to use this relocation to its advantage, in which case, skeleton crews were established to be relocated to each of the three cities to branch out and make an intelligence network to means of sabotage, subversion and people smuggling to “safe” resistance controlled areas.
Before long, "Stations" were set up in each of the three cities by group leaders, known as “conductors” with a team of specially trained operatives working against Combine operations. Cells were known to sabotage loyalist events, disrupt Combine communications and leak patrol routes for ambush. The groups maintained long-range frequency radio contact for vital communications, but refrained from doing so too often for fear of being discovered. The Freedom Railway established interconnected supply lines for vital resources shared between outposts and back to Headquarters, located in Waterloo Station. The outposts grew to five cities just before Christmas of that year, in which the number held steady until later on in which a sixth, final outpost was to be constructed in City 24. It was at this time that Huxley, now the commander of a multinational resistance effort, lost contact with HMLR with fears of ongoing raids near Watford.
Chapter V: City 24 Station Established - (January 2020 - Present)
Operators within City Three and City Thirty-One became aware of a mass relocation to City Twenty-Four, following re-habitation efforts made in the area through an intelligence leak of one of their informants. Between them, they made preparations for a centralized outpost within the city for better movement of supplies and refugees around their network. Led by one newly-elected Conductor with the bare necessities of supplies, the group assisted with the establishment of a new network for the citizens of Geneva to benefit from. The conductor used the confusion of the mass relocation to his advantage in escaping the confines of the main city and searching for a new place to set up.
Recruitment:
All recruitment is done in-character, however, if you wish to register interest before the server opens please message oceanman101 on discord so we can register as a resistance group.
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