A decade ago, a bright flash of light would take four American states from different worlds and different times and place them onto a virgin earth, completely uninhabited by humans. Expansion from these areas has been slow, hampered by unrest and supply problems at home, and although there are often farms that dot the fringes of the established borders and the banks of the great American rivers and occasional short resource-gathering expeditions from companies, those who venture further out into the truly untamed wilderness either return to civilized lands or are never heard from again.
What was ISOTed?
1857 Maryland, Charles Jennings, the Army of the Delaware (from Charcolt's Hard Graft)
1867 Nicaragua, Elijah Greywater (from Charcolt's Hard Graft)
1964 New York, Jimmy Falstaff (from Prussian1871's A Time for Greatness)
1968 Michigan, Charles Clarence (from TransUral Empire's Winter in America)
The Big Three
The New United States of America - While the states of Michigan and New York had been transported from different worlds, they found themselves with very similar cultures and technology levels, and they found themselves in very similar situations - while they were mostly able to keep the peace in the suburbs and urban areas, their primary metro areas of New York City and Detroit would both fall into a significant period of unrest. Due to these circumstances, representatives from both states would convene and draw out an agreement in which they would unify and form the United States, with Michigan's own president-elect Charles Clarence becoming President and New York governor Nelson Rockefeller becoming Vice President.
Although the NUSA is certainly the strongest nation on paper, it is still wracked by political divisions. A new political movement led by talk-show host Jimmy Falstaff is capturing the minds of the youth vote, drumming up anti-"establishment" sentiment as President Rockefeller tries to move past the race riots and relocations of his predecessor's tenure, while threading an uneasy path between conservatism and liberalism. More worryingly, however, the states of Michigan and New York have proven to have divergent interests, as New York tries to increase its soft power while Michigan is intent on consolidating its hold on the Great Lakes. Whether the NUSA will survive, and what will come up after a potential collapse, is up for debate.
The State of Maryland - For Maryland, the flash would come just as Charles Jennings and his Army of the Delaware were making their way to Richmond, sure that they would overthrow the tyrant Bradley. Thus, the supply issues that would have been normally encountered were confounded, with the Army of the Delaware ultimately having to gain most of their food from hunting, foraging, and fishing in the forests and ocean around Maryland. This would also lead to a somewhat awkward arrangement between Jennings and civilian governor Henry Winter Davis to control the state, that would only be made further awkward when the Navy - both the Naval Academy and similar naval vessels and a squadron from Nicaragua defecting after it declared its independence from a non-existent United States - was added into the equation, while Maryland continued to govern itself by its state constitution. Maryland would have two important achievements under Governor Davis - the signing of the Treaty of New York with the NUSA and the abolition of slavery. The situation would be cleared up after the death of Governor Davis and the subsequent election of Charles Jennings, who therefore held all of the executive power in the state.
There are large political divisions in Maryland, too, with these divisions being based on whether one was an army man, a navy man, or a civilian. The cooperation of Davis and Jennings and subsequent election of Jennings has meant that an alliance of the army and civilians has dominated Maryland, but nonetheless Jennings' recently-convened Maryland Constitutional Convention has so far been deadlocked over debate over what the government should be. While the Treaty of New York, with its assurances of peace and free trade between Maryland and NUSA, is broadly popular in Maryland, it does have its support. Most notably, however, there are many within Maryland who hold a firm distrust of the navy and its various "expeditions" to see if there's any other human-inhabited part of the world, especially since its settling of Bermuda.
La Segunda República Federal de Centroamérica - The Flash would come during the last night of Elijah Greywater's long governorship. At least in the capitol of Managua, news of the event would not come until the afternoon, by which time Greywater's successor had been sworn in as governor and Greywater was on his way to his private villa. When news had arrived, though, Greywater was urged to return to Managua. After encouraging the US Navy detachment in the Nicaragua Canal to head north to confirm shaky reports of some American presence in the Atlantic, he would promptly declare independence from the United States, declaring himself the President of the Second Republic of Central America, in a single stroke helping to reach back out to the majority-Spanish-speaking population of his new nation and establishing the pretext for rapid expansion. Greywater has cracked down on what few parts of democracy can't be overriden by his machines, and he has ensured continued Grenadier dominance of the Republic.
While Greywater's political machine, charitable acts, jingoistic expansion, and crackdown on political opposition have made him very popular within Central America itself, he is not popular with whatever semblance of an international community there is. Central America would be a pariah, if not invaded, if not for the fact that Greywater holds the strategically vital Nicaragua Canal, which allows for a much easier crossing to the Pacific, and his nation is the producer of tropical goods that are very much desired in his northern neighbors - coffee, sugar, bananas, and more, and that Central America is far away, leading to difficulties with supply. Despite Greywater's cleverness in leveraging these factors, it has not stopped his fellow nations from peacefully but actively stifling Central American influence in the Caribbean, and ensuring that Greywater cannot completely recreate the fantasies of the Golden Circle.
