The British; November 28th

"I'd say you came at a bad time…" my brother's voice trailed off. I pursed my lips and stared at the wall of monitors showing positions of my brother's forces across the Virginias and Maryland. Even this deep inside the Pentagon I could feel the rumble of the artillery batteries outside plastering the former capital. I took stock of my brother's forces.

A pair of armored infantry divisions, eight mechanized infantry divisions, 4 air assault brigades, seven independent mechanized infantry battalions, a military police brigade, four squadrons of strike fighters, and a handful of frigates and patrol boats.

He wasn't as blessed as I had been, my back to the sea with one way to go. Instead he'd been plopped in the middle of northern Virginia. He'd even reorganized his army into smaller corps, of which there were three.

1st corps was currently sprawled across central Maryland and southern Pennsylvania. 2nd corps was moving into southern Virginia, 3rd corps was spread along the Appalachian mountains.

His deployments seemed to favor the north… he had a good barrier in the Potomac, why… the mountains had a lost of easily navigable passes and the south… well he's advancing on Richmond… so maybe he was planning on shoring up his lines at the James river?

It wasn't for me to decide, I lacked the context of his maneuvers, and the pressures that were shaping his actions. It seemed he had everything under control though. I leaned against the desk behind me as I watched my brother directing his staff.

"Felix, can you confirm that there's another horde building up?"

"We are patching into the camera feed now sir…" a colonel said while he leaned over the shoulders of a couple soldiers working at their computers. I suppressed the frown on my face and held my tongue. There wasn't a need to get in your subordinates' space, it often just made them slower and less efficient.

I turned my gaze to the large wall of screens as the camera showed what seemed to be a massive horde spilling out of a subway entrance. I gaped for a few moments. I hadn't had to deal with anything like that in LA…

"Sir, they're also overspilling from the Capital South station." the colonel said as a second screen showed a different horde piling onto a different street. My brother sighed.

"Direct artillery… White phosphorus, follow it with High explosive." I stared at my brother… the hell did he just say? That shits…. Actually… I guess war crimes don't apply in the apocalypse. Was this something I had overlooked? I'll talk with Ivanov about this when I get back.

For now though I watched as the subway stations were plastered with artillery. I had to commend the gunners, even with the changes to doctrine I'd worked in I couldn't hope to achieve that level of accuracy. I suppose I'd gotten used to simply deleting post codes when an enemy I didn't want there anymore. Maybe I could arrange some kind of cross training between the two?

"Why is there always more?" Trevor grumbled, some eleven minutes into the bombardment. I glanced at some of the other screens, most of the capital was a shelled ruin. Shit… San Fransisco didn't look this bad, how long have they been shelling the city?

"Felix, I'll take my leave, let me know if the situation changes." Trevor replied as he walked back over to me, a frown on his face.

"You have to deal with these nests out west? They just keep pumping out more undead into the city…" he grumbled.

"Not in LA, I'll have my forces sweep through the cities again." I replied, we walked out of the office and out of the pentagon. 

Paladins and Abbots were arrayed on the south bank of the Potomac river, undertaking a slow steady bombardment of Washington DC. Trucks laden with more artillery rounds regularly drove up to the guns, unloading rounds into large piles behind the guns. "These rival your artillery?"

I gave my brother a smirk. "No, the two artillery battalions you have shelling DC is nothing compared to what I unleashed on San Fran…"

"Oh? I'd love to see you try and mimic Soviet artillery doctrine… British army desperate for Soviet artillery! I can already see the newspapers." I chuckled.

"I do have a question though…" I turned to my brother. I continued looking at DC.

"Your rank is basically the same as mine… so where are your allied units?" I asked.

Trevor scoffed. "Allied units? Andrew, you are the closest thing I have to an ally… the system won't let me buy any Soviet units." I mused for a moment. The hell did the system consider an alliance anyway?

We fell silent for a minute. Maybe we had to… that would be stupid… unless… maybe the system… it was stupid sometimes… we probably just had to say it out loud.

"Trevor, would you consider yourself an ally of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics?" I asked.

He laughed, nearly doubling over. "Like you aren't the only ally of the American Union?"

I bit the inside of my cheek. "Yes, I consider the American Union my ally."

"Well I'm fairly certain I was the first ally of the Soviet Union." Trevor snickered.

'System Alert! User alliance announced between user Andrew Reichenbacher(ranked 1st) and user Trevor Reichenbacher (ranked 2nd)'

'Alliance update, allied Division requirements met, (Great Britain) access granted to British units! Please see the shop to purchase allied units.'

'System notification, the user controlled factions The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the American Union are now allied.'

"Warsaw Pact? I though you were just the Soviets!?!" Trevor glared at me. I chuckled wryly and held up my hands.

"The rest of the pact only counts as allied to me…" I replied.

"The rest? It says there's only Soviet, East German, and Polish…"

"Oh… well that's the nationality of my current forces, there's also the Czechoslovaks, Hungarians, Romanians, Bulgarians, and Albanians." I answered.

"Spoiled brat." My brother shook his head. He fell silent for a minute…

"Wait… fucking hell… how is your damn army organized?" I laughed. I started teaching my brother Soviet doctrine and organization, something I'd had to learn mostly from scratch. The British followed a similar system to the US army, which I already knew, so I spent the next few hours teaching my brother as he went over what allied units to buy. It ended up being a pair of Soviet tank divisions built around the T-90.