Twelve miles off the coast of New York sits the manmade island known as the Protectorate. It's home to most of the world's superpowered crimefighters, from aliens to robots to demigods, who've built a utopia designed for themselves and their unique lifestyle.
But beneath the surface is a darker reality: the Basement, a prison for supervillains. Building and running this prison is the price the heroes pay for gaining their own country.
A consortium of supervillains organizes a breakout and then conquers the Protectorate—and that's only the start of their plan. Before they're done, they will have taken over America itself, and systematically dismantled all the rights and freedoms its citizens take for granted. Enemies of the state are taken to detainment camps and then sold offworld as slaves; White Christian Nationalism becomes the official religion presided over by a demon posing as a televangelist; and the new President—one no one remembers electing—is a madman who stages public executions and posts insane rants on social media.
But the heroes have plans of their own—and they'd rather die than surrender their country to unchecked evil.
