Lawrence Raiders (1983: Doomsday)

The Lawrence Raiders is the official name given to a group of gangs living in the south of Quebec, established sometime between Doomsday (1983) and 1996, when the Canadians sent their first expedition to the region.

History
Little is known about where they came from or when, but explorers in the region have theorised that they were originally a street gang somewhere in south Quebec, perhaps Sherbrooke, Trois-Rivieres, or some other city. Regardless, the raiders began attacking Canadian outposts, mostly on the Gaspe peninsula, sometime in the early nineties.

These raids escalated in severity around 1996, prompting a Canadian expediation to be sent. They fought several skirmishes with the raiders, all of which ended in retreats of one side. A second expedition was sent in 1998, mapping the extent of their control.

In 2001, the Canadian military was enlarged and stationed on the Gaspe peninsula, in order to fight off the raids. This caused a diplomatic incident with neighbouring, but prevented most of the raids. The largest raid to date was in 2003, in which several Canadian soldiers died, but prevented the pillaging of several farms in the region.

A third expedition to the raiders territory was sent in 2005, which vanished without a trace. A fourth, sent just after the third, discovered the leader of the gangs, an enigmatic figure who called himself "le chef supreme". Evidence was found that the Republic of Saguenay may have been helping the gangs keep organised and armed for some reason, though the evidence was far from conclusive.

2007 saw a change in strategy of Canada to the raiders. They began sending in single agents instead of large, heavily armed expeditions. These agents would be able to destabilise their organisation and investigate them further, which was achieved with limied success.

The also sent an expedition in to the region, in an attempt to contact other governments. They eventually met with, after crossing the raiders' territory and fighting several pitched battles.

In recent years the gangs have been weakening, probably due to Canadian efforts at destabilising them. With their decrease in power, the Canadian House of Commons has been debating about whether to persue expansion along the St. Lawrence.

Territory
The raider's territory is not set or defined anywhere, but is rather a vague zone of control that has expanded and receded over the years. At its largest extent, achieved some time around 2000, they streached from the Saguenay border to the Aroostook border, and from the Gaspe peninsula to the nuked remains of Ottawa. In modern times, their control falls short of the Saguenay and Aroostook borders, and extends southwest only as far as Montreal.

Organisation
For a gang of bloodthirsty raiders, bandits, barbarians, or whatever anyone calls them, they are surprisingly organised. This might be explained in part by their leader's strange charisma, but not completely. Recent discoveries point to a possible corrupt politician of some importance in Saguenay, or even a group of them, who are trading arms and assistance for protection from their raids and as a chance to hurt their enemy, the Canadian Remainder Provinces.

Their leader calls himself "le chef supreme", but as they are not one cohesive structure, but rather a patchwork of different "gangs", there are also minor leaders, each with the title "chef" (French for chief).

There are a number of farms in their region which barely can sustain crops to feed the farmers them selves; the raiders impose a "protection tax" in food to feed their members, making life horrible for those farmers who do not go along.