Literature / Icarus Falls

A rather dystopian alternate history work by AnywhereButOTL, posted on AlternateHistory.com.

This world's history diverges from ours when Richard Nixon is fatally struck by a car on October 28, 1967, before he can announce his candidacy for President. Initially, the timeline details the course of the 1968 presidential election without Nixon involved, before turning its focus to the events of the victor's administration. Things go up. And then things go way down.

The narrative unfolds in the style of a a Switching P.O.V. featuring vast plethora of characters, from well-known politicians and world leaders to soldiers to astronauts to common people, as they witness - and sometimes control - a series of increasingly bleak events.

Icarus Falls, as of May 2014, is complete, having chronicled its world's events from late 1967 until the aftermath of the 1972 presidential elections. The author indicated that a sequel was forthcoming. Said sequel, Icarus Rising, has since begun, and is currently in early 1973, with the author intending to take it up to at least 1976. Another sequel, Icarus: 2000, was created due to the author suffering from Writer's Block. Icarus: 2000 takes place in 2000 and consists of interviews from people in a style similar to World War Z. It is currently a Dead Fic.

This series provides examples of:

• Alternate History Wank: Israel gets a big one when they end up conquering Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan through the use of nuclear weapons.
• Apocalypse How: China gets subjected to a class 0 in a nuclear exchange with the USSR.
  • The Soviet republics of Central Asia also get a class when they get nuked in retaliation for siding with Kosygin in the Soviet Civil War.
• The Bad Guy Wins: Zig-zagged with Paladin. While they do succeed in both initiating Operation Scourge and nuking Mecca, the former didn't come off like they planned and the latter ends with all of them being killed, so it's hard to really see them as winning on either occasion.
• Balkanize Me: Mongolia, Tibet, Uyghuristan, Manchuria, Guangdong, and Taiwan (the Republic of China) split up a large swath of China among themselves. Some of the splinter states (and a few neighboring countries to boot) gain unaccounted-for nuclear weapons in the process.
  • After the Soviet Civil War, the Soviet Union loses every country that they lost in 1991 except Central Asia and Ukraine.
  • Icarus: 2000 mentions independent Assam and Khalistan as a result of the Indian Civil War.
• The Chew Toy: A college-aged Bill Clinton, who makes several cameo appearances in the timeline. First he gets thrown through a window by law enforcement during a protest and arrested, then gets carjacked by Director Helms of the CIA.
• CIA Evil, FBI Good: Averted utterly. Both agencies are horribly corrupt and authoritarian, the FBI having been responsible for the unlawful detention and killings of thousands of (mostly black) citizens deemed "subversive", while the CIA sponsors Neo-Nazi terrorism and supports overseas dictatorships. Gets to ridiculous levels when the director of the CIA tries to launch a coup.
• Conditioned to Accept Horror: ROC troops serving on mainland China have to contend with mass starvation, biological warfare, and near-anarchy on a daily basis, and end up coping surprisingly well to the litany of horrors.
• Cop Killer:
  • Dozens of police officers are killed in terror attacks by the Black Panthers after the EPAB is passed.
  • Richard Helms murders multiple police officers while on the run.
• The Coup: One major arc of the timeline features Richard Helms, the director of the CIA, attempting to pull a behind-the-scenes coup against President Bush, having previously forced President Rhodes out of power by blackmailing him with knowledge of his illegal activities. It fails when Bush goes public with what happened.
  • Andropov tries one against Leonid Brezhnev, but it's defeated by Brezhnev's men, with the help of some military officers who happened to be passing through.
  • A group of fascist terrorists launch one in Italy, but only succeed in having the parliament building blow up with them and a large number of Italian politicians being held hostage inside.
  • The Red Army attempts one against Kosygin after he refuses to sack Gorbachev, but it is swiftly crushed.
  • One is attempted against President Bush, but it fails to go as planned. The head of the coup, Donald Rumsfeld, ends up getting both of them blown up by a car bomb.
• Crapsack World: And how.
  • A World Half Full: Despite all the darkness, there are a few noticable bright spots. The American manned space program is much further advanced than even our present day, with a manned mission to Mars and a permanent Moon base both scheduled for launch within the 1970s. Thanks to the cool-headed policies of President Bush the domestic situation has improved. The Beatles are still together as of 1973. The Khmer Rouge's reign of terror is avoided because a coup by the Viet Cong takes out Pol Pot, giving Cambodia a stable government that leads them towards an age of prosperity. The NVA's implosion means that Vietnam is united as a democracy rather than a dictatorship. The Berlin Wall comes down several years earlier than it did OTL. And Josef Mengele is apprehended by the Mossad rather than escaping like he did OTL due to Paladin's attack on Mecca causing increased efforts to track down escaped Nazis.
• Dick Dastardly Stops to Cheat: Bush rigging the 1972 election was completely unnecessary; he had already won and was just paranoid that a recount might see him lose his lead. His decision to send G. Gordon Liddy to destroy Humphrey ballots in New Mexico is what causes all his problems down the line.
• Dirty Communists: Averted, despite Cambodia being a Communist country, President Reagan reaches out to its new government for some peace and stability after the Vietnam War ends. Post civil war USSR is also on its way to becoming a more free and prosperous nation.
• Driven to Suicide: Both Henry Kissinger and Kurt Waldheim commit suicide within a day of each other.
• Downer Ending: The first part ends with former president Lyndon Johnson kidnapped by government agents, while investigating voter fraud by President Bush in New Mexico.
• Dying Moment of Awesome:
  • The American and Israeli agents sent to stop Paladin launching their missile both go out like badasses. The Israeli gets his eye shot out and, unable to snipe anymore, charges Paladin firing his Uzi to attract their attention away from the American and is immediately shot in the head. Then the American carries on shooting until his magazine is hit and explodes and Paladin presume him dead. Once the missile is successfully launched, the American, refusing to let Paladin get away, loads up his Uzi, goes down to the bunker where Paladin are holed up and takes as many of them out as he can before the Saudi air force destroys the base.
  • Ariel Sharon, during the invasion of Israel by Syria, Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon, calls in a nuclear strike on his own position and holds the position with his few remaining men until the missile hits, preventing the enemy from advancing any further.
• Dying Smirk: Otto Skorzeny dies with a smile on his face, knowing that the Americans have arrived too late to prevent Operation Scourge.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: For the time being; Hunter S. Thompson has managed to overcome his MK-Ultra treatments for the most part and fled to London, managing to dodge the CIA and FBI in the process.
• Enemy Mine: Robert Kennedy and Barry Goldwater form an impromptu alliance to oppose the policies of the President.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Reagan is horrified when he finds out that President Rhodes authorized Operation Scourge.
• For Want Of A Nail: The death of a then twice failed politician, who lost the Presidency and the California Governorship in 2 years, leads to a very different world. Tell anyone in-universe that Richard Nixon of all people being elected would have butterflied nuclear war, and they'd probably think you're nuts.
  • To elaborate; Nixon was feeling under the weather on October 28th. As the narration makes clear, he didn't have a sharp enough focus to notice the car that did him in.
• Gone Horribly Wrong: The Soviet Union attempts to stop the brewing war with China by assassinating Mao. Unfortunately, his successor ends up escalating the conflict to tragic results.
• Historical Hero Upgrade:
  • Dan Quayle becomes a war hero due to his actions in putting down the race war that erupts in the South.
  • Jerry Brown becomes the first independent President in 1984 under the Reform Party and brings about an end to the chaos of the The '60s and The '70s.
• Historical Villain Upgrade:
  • Lin Biao uses nuclear and chemical weapons against his own people to stop the Nationalist invasion.
  • Leonid Brezhnev also uses nuclear weapons against Soviet cities to try to win the Soviet Civil War.
  • Ronald Reagan passes the EPAB, leading to the unjust detention of thousands of black people, and covers up evidence that the FBI are killing prisoners.
  • Indira Gandhi is threatened with indictment at the International Court of Justice for a nuclear attack on Pakistan.
  • Jim Rhodes become President and directly oversees Project MK-Ultra and Operation Condor, attempts to undermine the British government by selling weapons to the IRA, finances a fascist coup attempt in Italy that wipes out most of the government, orders the assassination of Hunter S. Thompson and other dissidents and signs off on Helms's plan to wage biological warfare against the Soviet Union.
  • Richard Helms attempts genocide against the Soviet Union using biological agents and tries to launch a coup against Bush.
  • George H.W. Bush rigs the 1972 election and has several people assassinated to cover it up.
  • Anwar Sadat and several other Arab leaders use the attack on Mecca as an excuse to invade Israel with the intention of completely destroying it. Zig-zagged in the same war with Golda Meir. While she does use her nuclear arsenal to wipe out the population of Egypt and destroy Jordan, Lebanon and Syria she was backed into a corner and had no other meaningful options.
  • Donald Rumsfeld becomes a major thorn during Bush's presidency. He tries to launch a coup against Bush and take control of the country's nuclear weapons.
• Hoist by His Own Petard:
  • Lin Biao dies from an illness implicitly caused by exposure to one of the biological agents that he authorized the use of against the rebels.
  • George Bush rigs Donald Rumsfeld's car to explode only to be taken hostage in said car, which explodes as planned.
• Irony: The fact that 69, a number involving people getting screwed, is the number of the post where China gets screwed in their war.
• Karma Houdini:
  • Clyde Tolson dies of a stroke at his desk without his involvement in the deaths of thousands of "subversives" being revealed.
  • Jim Rhodes, while forced out of office, escapes prosecution for his crimes.
  • Icarus Rising and Icarus: 2000 being Left Hanging means that we never find out if Ted Bundy was ever caught, or if Sanjay Gandhi was overthrown.
• Karma Houdini Warranty:
  • Leonid Brezhnev wins the Sino-Soviet War and the International Court of Justice indictment comes to nothing because he isn't present to be tried. Then the Russian Civil War happens...
  • President Bush gets away with rigging the 1972 election and abducting Lyndon Johnson in Icarus Falls. His web of lies begins to unravel in Icarus Rising and he becomes increasingly unstable as he is forced to have more and more people killed to cover it up. Eventually Vice President Brooke survives an attempt on his life and exposes Bush's actions, leading to the collapse of Bush's administration and a coup attempt by Rumsfeld that leaves both him and Bush dead.
• Kill Sat: The United States launches one of these.
• Manipulative Bastard: Ted Bundy is the same manipulator he was OTL, only manipulating Arthur Bremer into shooting George Wallace this time around.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Does Dwight Eisenhower really meet death in his final moments, or is it just a hallucination? Similarly, does Richard Helms hear the sounds of Hell while in a coma, or is it a product of brain damage?
• Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot:
  • One of George Wallace's staffers gets into a scuffle with the police → President Johnson directed the FBI to spy on his opponents.
  • An FBI agent is forcibly painted black by the Black Panther Party → the FBI have murdered thousands of mostly black "subversives" and President Reagan knew about it and covered it up.
  • Suspicious activity, possibly espionage-related, centered around an abandoned Belarusian factory → a Neo-Nazi terrorist plot to destroy the Soviet Union through bio-terrorism.
  • A single burnt ballot in New Mexico → A conspiracy by President Bush to assassinate Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Cesar Chavez, the Democratic and Republican party leadership and Vice President Brooke. Also, the 1972 election was rigged, the CIA committed war crimes in South America, the coup in Italy that wiped out most of the government had American backing, the CIA sold weapons to the IRA and nukes to Neo-Nazi terrorists and the bio-terrorism attack on the Soviet Union was ordered by CIA director Helms and approved by the White House.
• My Brain Is Big: A group of young Kurdish soldiers encounter a boy with this condition in a circus sideshow. Though whether it's a genuine example of this trope or simply a kid with hydrocephalus who happens to be extremely smart is unclear.
• Nuclear Weapons Taboo: Unlike real life, nuclear weapons get used quite a bit throughout the twentieth century. The taboo was forever and completely broken with the Sino-Soviet nuclear war. Since then - a mere three in-universe years - over two hundred nuclear weapons have been used, not only in the aforementioned Sino-Soviet war, but also by the collapsing North Vietnamese government in Hanoi, the collapsing People's Republic of China, in an Indo-Pakistani War, in the Soviet civil war, by Nazi terrorists, and by Israel. The only silver lining - if it even is that - is that so far nukes have only been used in regional conflicts, and not to start World War III.
• Nuke 'em: The Nuclear Weapons Taboo is broken with alarming regularity. First the Chinese and the Soviets launch nukes at each other, then the NVA use a nuclear mine to keep the Viet Cong rebels out of Hanoi, then the Chinese use them on various rebellious states, then the Indians nuke Pakistan^note who for their part nuke Dhaka to keep it from falling into Indian hands and Reagan is forced to nuke Delhi to end the war, then the Soviet government use nukes against cities captured by the New Red Army and attempt to detonate their entire arsenal, then Paladin nuke Mecca, and then finally Israel use nukes to stave off an Arab invasion.
• Police Brutality: Becomes a major plot point after Congress passes an anti-crime bill that greatly expands police power. The Woodstock festival ends in a riot that causes 29 deaths as police and FBI agents attack the crowd with tear gas and plastic bullets, arrests of suspicious looking black men without due process becomes routine, and most disturbingly, the police carry out extra-judicial killings estimated to number in the thousands. Naturally, once the story leaks, nationwide riots ensue.
• Sanity Slippage: Happens, in rather tragic fashion, to President Bush. The increasing stress of managing a world that's on the brink 24/7 causes him to lose entire days of sleep and begin to abuse his power, constantly afraid that the nation will collapse without him.
• Slashed Throat: How Leonid Brezhnev dies.
• 13 Is Unlucky: Subverted; Apollo 13 ITTL goes off smoother than IOTL. It helps that Apollo 12 was the unlucky one, having been scrubbed after being struck by lightning twice.
  • However, the Apollo 13 crew did find some Soviet artifacts this time...
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: A few of the altered Presidents fall under this.
  • President Reagan is an example, especially when he passes a draconian security bill called the EPAB to ensure the nation's safety after a devastating series of race riots that kill hundreds, and refuses to repeal it even after evidence surfaces that reveals that the FBI and other police units have been using their powers to kill thousands of suspected 'subversives' in prison.
  • President Rhodes, is another example, allowing the CIA and the FBI to experiment with mind control on people arrested for subversive activities, including Hunter S. Thompson.
  • President Bush slowly turns into this under the strain of trying to clean up the mess left by his predecessors. He eventually rigs the 1972 election and killing several people to cover it up.
• Western Terrorists:
  • A series of riots, bombings, arson attacks and murders of police follow the passage of the EPAB.
  • A group of Italian fascists attempt The Coup against the Italian government with CIA support.
  • The Paladin organization, a group of Neo-Nazis who launch terror attacks against the Soviets and Arabs.
• Wham Episode: The 69th post, which concerns the Sino-Soviet War of September 30, 1969.
  • And again when the EPAB is found to be constitutional and massive race riots grind the nation to a halt and kill thousands in response.
  • And once again when the Nazi terrorist group Paladin succeeds in nuking Mecca.
• You Are Too Late: Happens twice with Paladin, first when the American strike team arrives at the factory in Belarus far too late to stop them releasing the toxin, then again when the Saudi airstrike comes a few minutes after the missile is launched at Mecca.
• Young Future Famous People: Bill Clinton, Al Gore, George W. Bush, and Vladimir Putin, among others, all make appearances in the timeline.

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