This piece is an artifact from the future. Not long after the dust of the destruction from the Neo-Jihadists had settled, North America collapsed into civil war. The New Republic and the CRI (Coalition of Rugged Individualists) battled for control of territory and any remaining infrastructure, both claiming to be the underdog, and both better-funded and more powerful than either was willing to admit.
The Jihad destroyed nearly everything. The internet is gone, telephone communication is only possible within small communities if it’s available at all, and television simply requires too much valuable electricity to allow a set to be kept on very long, let alone produced. The only reliable systems of communication are radio broadcast and print, and even then, they’re prohibitively expensive — and therefore controlled by the factions. Mostly.
A third faction exists, officially classified as “terrorists” by both sides. They’re a loose network of rebels, made up mostly of punks, hackers, journalists, and a few other malcontents who refused to swear allegiance to either side during the Jihad. While they’re referred to as Anarchs by both the New Republic and the CRI (and occasionally as The Fourth Estate, if you’re sure nobody is listening) , they’ve never actually claimed a name, preferring to mark their work with the phrase “We are Anonymous. I am Legion.” Mostly, they work to interfere with both factions, griefing both sides with everything from transmitter sabotage to bizarre Dadaist performances impersonating typical faction propaganda displays. As time went, their actions and techniques became highly sophisticated.
Being that radio transmission is the only form of communication left that’s faster than gossip, “number stations” have experienced a renaissance during the Second Civil War, mostly because, historically, their codes were notoriously hard to break. This is an example of an intercepted short-wave transmission typical of that time. It’s impossible to say where it came from, or from who, without deciphering the code.
This story concept, “universe”, entities mentioned, and general story idea is hereby released into the public domain. However, if you decided to use any or all of the text of this post in a creative work, please contact me and let me know. I just want to see where it goes, if it goes anywhere. The audio portion of this post is not a part of the public domain, and rights are reserved on portions of the audio that are inextractable from the rest of the piece. Please contact me for more details.

Braindouche 005: RPM track 3 -- Decimated Data Stream [4:01m]:
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