The Dawn of a System: Redux is a story by AlternateHistory.com user "Noravea" that was first published on February 4th, 2014. An epic piece planning to cover decades of American history, this work is the culmination of nearly two years of planning and a previous version. The remake of a previous version of the story, this version will primarily cover the Caeus family and various other major characters that over time will play an important role in United States political history and world history.
It can be found here in its new version. The Dawn of a System: Redux
Tropes:
- Age Lift: Compared to the original version, Eva Caeus is about 10 years older, being born in 2014. Caeus' wife Abagail Blake is also older to the point where she is Caeus' senior by 2 years, rather than being around 10 years younger than Caeus.
- Author Avatar: Sort of. Caeus' moderate, economically liberal, socially progressive views has been described by the author as being close to their own political viewpoint.
- Break the Cutie: Nicholas Caeus himself, with him being abused by his father.
- Butt-Monkey: British Prime Minister John Pitt.
- Characterization Marches On: Most characters have been majorly overhauled in this version. To wit, Anastasia Volkova was a blood-drinking axe crazy dictator in the first version. In the reboot she's the voice of reason to Ivan Repin's madness. She even going so far as to try to protect a young Georgian girl after her family is killed by Russian soldiers.
- Cheerful Child: From what little we know of her, Adriana Caeus (Nicholas' younger sister) can be described as this before her death.
- Continuity Reboot: The Dawn of a System: Redux
- Curb-Stomp Battle: The Russian invasion of Georgia
- Domestic Abuse:
- Implied with Amanda Morris' first marriage
- In Chapter 16, Abigail Blake hits her husband after he gets second thoughts about going into elected politics.
- The Dreaded:
- So far, Nicholas Caeus' father has been described as this. While he is dead at the start of the story, he still is present enough that the sound of his voice or the mention of his name could make Caeus turn pale in an instant.
- Establishing Character Moment: There are a lot of these...
- Nicholas Caeus is first shown as a campaign manager for a moderate Republican running a hopeless campaign on Long Island. He flatly states that it doesn't matter if he looses this one race, so long as he gets his moderate message out he can't loose in the long run.
- Clay Vinson is introduced with a speech where he quotes Eugene V. Debs and calls for "the nationalization of major industries and a single-payer healthcare system".
- Amanda Morris' first scene is stabbing her husband through the neck with a piece of glass after a car accident so that she can escape their horrible marriage and have a political career of her own.
- Everybody Has Lots of Sex: Subverted.
- Henpecked Husband: Lots of examples of this
- Nicholas Caeus to his wife Abigail Blake, who despite being the opposite politically has more influence with him than his advisers. In the one instance where he tries to be independent, she hits him.
- Heroic BSoD:
- Nicholas Caeus in the prologue after his sister's death.
- Lady Macbeth: Abigail Blake is by far the most prominent example. While she obviously loves and cares for her husband, she will go to immense lengths to achieve his or her own goals, even going so far as to emotionally and physically abuse her husband to get her way
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Averted. Numerous actual political figures appear in the story and many of them such as Marco Rubio, Vladimir Putin, and Bill Clinton die in the course of the first version, and likely the same in the second.
- Our Presidents Are Different: Unclear due to new start, but...
- President Obama is President Minority.
- President Huntsman is President Jerkass.
- President Warren is President Awesome.
- President Booker is President Corrupt and Lunatic
- President Caeus is President Geek and Personable
- British Prime Minister Pitt is PM Focus Group
- Politician Guest-Star: Played straight with some exceptions. Most of the story is this, with most politicians before 2033 being real politicians who are famous in their respective states and regions. However, at the local level, its fictional characters dominating.
- Promotion to Parent: Nicholas Caeus with his little sister Adriana due to their father being generally a terrible one.
- Speech Impediment: In the prologue, Abigail Blake appears to have a really bad stutter. Since six years have passed and she has yet to appear in a speaking capacity again, it is unknown how bad it is in 2016.
- It appears that Abigail's stutter has been largely reduced by some of the more recent chapters
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Tear Jerker: Lots and lots of examples in this.- Chapter 16 is definitely one, with Abigail Blake having a miscarriage, and then Nicholas Caeus losing the child to a drunk driver just days before he was going to adopt him. This all happened in six weeks.
- Basically Nicholas Caeus' whole childhood could be this, especially since it has a massive impact on the story despite not actually happening during the course of the plot.
- Some of the stories during the economic crisis of 2029. Also during this time period images of the Venezuelan War.
- Western Terrorists: The First and Third Insurrections. The first being Right Wing Militias and the third a bungled army mutiny against President Caeus
