OR1-EP1: Rainbow Nation (7)

Another old emperor of the Britannian Empire, which was trapped in the internal struggle between the royal family and aristocratic groups, has passed away. This is not a great thing in the eyes of citizens of other countries. Ever since Ricardo von Britannia replaced the Tudor dynasty to establish the Britannia Empire, the empire has been shrouded in murder, usurpation and court conspiracy. In history, there has never been a crown prince able to successfully inherit the throne, they were either forced to give up their inheritance rights or were killed. Changing one emperor will not solve the problem, and ten more emperors will not get any better, at least outsiders think so. Citizens living in EU will talk about the gossip that came from nowhere after a meal, and talk about the secrets of the palace of the Britannia Empire. Besides, they don't want to spend their minds to truly understand the country on the other side of the ocean. Just as the indigenous people only need to satisfy their primitive imagination, the Britannian Empire only needs to conform to a stereotype imagined by the public that is backward and closed and enforces the ancient absolute monarchy laws.

"After this meal, let's leave Angola and go to Rhodesia." McNeil and Old Jake were dining at a fast-food restaurant. "We can't find new clues about Lawyer Dias for the time being. If we can know about what Adalbert Herzog did before the incident, we may be able to draw some more accurate conclusions."

McNeil has always disliked fast food, and he didn't want to mess up his recovery to a young body. However, Old Jake's answer is that for people like him who don't know how to cook and live in poverty, eating fast food is already considered the greatest luxury. After obtaining McNeil's permission, they ordered some meat in a restaurant on the roadside and planned the next itinerary.

"I didn't refute you. I'm almost eighty years old, and I will have to hang it on the wall within a few years—sorry, no one will hang me on the wall." Old Jake sipped Coke, pointing at McNeil, "You're right, it's just useless to me. It's so funny to let people who are dying pay attention to their health."

"No, I will think of a way to hang your photo on the wall to be admired by others, and write a line below: An ordinary citizen who has worked hard all his life, and then put it at the door of those luxury hotels to make some blush People take a look carefully."

"I sometimes wonder if there is really a God in the world, or the God has heard my prayer recently." Old Jake looked at the food left on the plate in a daze, "In the past few days after meeting you, I did many things that I have never had the opportunity to do in my life, it seems that you were sent by God to give me a little fun in the last few years of my life."

Old Jake guessed about McNeil's past. An unemployed vagrant with a Britannian accent, with fighting skills far beyond ordinary soldiers, perhaps he is indeed a deserter from Britannia. The old man does not despise deserters. Those who dare to flee from absolute obedience and risk huge risks may also have a sense of courage. However, McNeil never admits these speculations, nor does he want to reveal his identity. Only when others are pressed tightly can he speak symbolically worthless words to divert others' attention.

Human eyes can't tell lies; old Jake believes this. There is always enthusiasm in McNeil's eyes, he is eager to do something, and is always on the road. This kind of person is born to work hard, not getting a moment of peace, and seeking pleasure from pain and suffering is the norm. However, whenever Old Jake compares him with the unfading passersby in his memory, he can't help but feel sad. When he was young, he experienced the largest second war in human history. EU established the supreme authority over most of the world through two world wars. Countless youths were sent to the battlefield for illusory slogans or other unreliable reason to dedicate their lives.

"My experience tells me to think less and do more." McNeil put the empty dinner plate next to the nearby trash can. "If the conditions don't deteriorate, go to Mozambique—"

Several crisp noises interrupted McNeil. More than a dozen unidentified people, heavily armed, walked into the restaurant and aimed their guns at the shocked diners. Among these people, there are blacks and whites. The leader is a middle-aged black man wearing sunglasses. He is carrying a shotgun and looks very prestigious.

"...Hand over all the valuable things. We only want money and don't want to owe lives." The leader said in English, "Precisamos de mais dinheiro parasalvar nosso camarada e continuar a revolução."

Old Jake looked at McNeil in a panic, McNeil shook his head at him.

"Money is a small matter, we can still get back." He whispered, "It's important to save our lives."

The waiters and bosses in the restaurant may be used to robberies. They didn't even try to call the police. Instead, they took out a few stacks of banknotes from the cashier and gave them to the robbers. All the tourists in the restaurant were not immune from the fate of being ransacked. Those wearing jewelry were especially unlucky, and they were searched all over the place.

The robbers were surprised to find that the old and the young in the corner of the restaurant continued to talk and laugh. The leader walked towards McNeil, only to see the latter pat a few banknotes by the dining table, and said without looking up:

"That's it, no more."

The leader took the money and looked at McNeil suspiciously as if nothing had happened. It is not the first time that he has done this business. He has seen all kinds of victims, and most of them are scared to death, for fear that these robbers will send them into the coffin with their hands shaking. It was the first time he saw victims as calm as McNeil and Old Jake.

"You two are here to travel too?"

"This is my uncle. He has brain cancer. He will not live for a few days. I will take him out to fulfill his last wish." McNeil sighed. "My uncle has always wanted to travel to Angola. It's a pity that he can't afford the money, even travelling in South Africa. Last month, I helped him sell everything that he could sell, packed his luggage, and waited for death after he came back from the game."

McNeil did not hesitate to come up with a set of lies that he had prepared. Ordinary people have emotions. Even a robber won't become hard-hearted quickly. McNeil said something that both tourists and robbers in the restaurant were touched. It was really sad for those who heard it, and there were tears for those who saw it. The leader took off his sunglasses, wiped his eyes, and returned the money to McNeil.

"Take it... we don't grab money from the poor." He thought for a while, then took out dozens of euros to the old man, "I'm sorry for letting you see the truth about Angola."

McNeil watched the group of people walk out of the restaurant in twos and threes. After riding the possibly robbed jeep and driving away, he came to the counter and asked the collapsing cashier:

"Is it common? Why don't you call the police?"

The other tourists left the restaurant shouting and cursing. They flinched in front of the robbers, and now they finally found a chance to be a hero. The boss explained with a smile, but was unavoidably scolded by angry tourists. Being robbed on the way to travel can almost destroy all the pleasant memories of the entire journey. This experience may provide a lot of material for those who are good at bragging. After they return home without incident, they can publicize with great fanfare how they survived a gang of vicious bandits, and maybe they can make up the details of their fight with the bandits. If bragging is also a felony, those who shape extraordinary experiences by adding fuel and vinegar may fill all the squares of the world.

"I've said before that doing this will hurt ourselves sooner or later, but now it's our turn to suffer." The boss sat at the counter with his head clutched, "How can there be any reason for specially trained saboteurs to save ourselves from disaster?"

"Who trained them?" McNeil became alert.

"Who else can? Only those mad dogs and mental patients who see everyone bite can do this. They have already reached the level of ruining our own territory for their poor salary and reputation." The boss cleaned up. As the endgame, his face was full of depression, "I have seen it with my own eyes, there are French people with a northern accent commanding them..."

Things started to get convoluted, McNeil and Old Jake were still talking about it when they boarded the train to Rhodesia. The indigenous reservation itself is located at the junction of South Africa and other colonies. The neighboring colonies allowed indigenous armed forces to attack South Africa through loopholes in regulations. If this kind of behavior still has the support of Paris, it proves that someone deliberately wants to bring down Governor-general Herzog or the entire South Africa. Herzog has made many enemies in his life, so many that he probably can't remember it. It is reasonable for people with old grievances to take personal revenge, but the stability and prosperity of the entire EU are regarded as a bet, and the price is too big.

"I can't figure out why there are still white men in that band of robbers."

"Boy, if it weren't for me to be too old to hold a gun, I would have nowhere else to do but join them." Old Jake said ashamed. "In the eyes of the Governor-general, there are blacks and whites; here, blacks are just like white people, they are poor people who can't make ends meet."

"Indigenous people are not human at all."

"Do you think the Council is more afraid of the indigenous people or the African Britannians?" Old Jake looked at the field outside the window, where there were still countless black people working on the farmland. The use of more advanced equipment can improve efficiency, but since some people claimed that doing so would cause a large number of indigenous unemployment, the EU has abandoned the idea of comprehensively promoting more advanced agricultural production models in Africa. After all, it is more important than anything to ensure that these people can be chained in the field instead of wandering idly.

"The indigenous people have never given up the idea of independence. They will definitely choose independence if they have the opportunity." Frankly speaking, McNeil has no sense of belonging to EU or Britannia. He lives in an era when human beings are united into a unified country, and the barriers of race and language are gradually disappearing, so he always disagrees with this kind of discrimination that still stays in the old age. However, he really cannot tolerate the monarchy of the Britannia Empire, so it seems that the EU has at least preserved a little face.

"That's your opinion." Old Jake knocked on the table. "From the perspective of Paris, the African Britannians are always more dangerous than the natives. The natives are a group of uncivilized apes in their eyes. They can be wiped out at any time; the African Britannians have the entire new world standing behind them, what will happen if they decide to help their original motherland?"

Old Jake's voice disturbed the nearby travelers, who looked at the old man who spoke out loudly.

"It stands to reason that you are of the same language and the same species." McNeil found that the old man might have some bad memories, and immediately decided to change the subject. However, Old Jake didn't seem to have the intention to stop. He gasped heavily and continued preaching:

"When I was a soldier, do you know how they treated the descendants of Britannian immigrants? If a Britannian joins the army, his whole family will be put in prison. As long as these people dared to defect on the battlefield, all of his family members will be executed! If I hadn't witnessed this kind of thing, who would believe that this is what our EU can do? We played Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" and our hearts were darker than Absalom!"

McNeil thought of the nightmare that accompanied him in a daze. GDI has never been a charity. In order to establish its authority on a global scale, it uses violent means no less than NOD to maintain order from top to bottom. Whether it was a massacre against NODs or mutants, they never stopped. In the world infested by Tiberium, mutants are the most unpopular group, and their status is like the untouchables in the caste system. McNeil can abandon prejudice for one or two people, but he cannot resist the wave of the entire era. When the mutants thought that GDI would bring them freedom, GDI cruelly used their dreams, and then called them monsters that violated human freedom.

"Sorry."

"No need."

The two were silent for a while, but it was McNeil who first talked about a new topic. Everyone has a heavy past, and only when the scars are faintly painful will they be known to outsiders. They talked about the cause of Jorge Dias's death. The lawyer was hit by a car (apparently, the suspect was Adalbert Herzog) and died of a brain injury. Everyone believed that Adalbert Herzog was the murderer of the car hit, and he must also be responsible for the death of Lawyer Dias.

"Did Dias really be killed by car?"

"The evidence is there, there is nothing to say." Old Jake recalled the report when Adalbert was arrested, "Unless someone else drove the car that caused the accident... But how could Herzog lend the car to someone else?"

"I heard a strange case when I was in middle school." McNeil stated, "It was winter. Someone tried to climb the outer wall of a school building with bare hands for some reason and entered the room through the window. He might be a thief. Or maybe he wanted to go back to get the things he forgot to bring but didn't know how to get in. As a result, he fell off when he climbed a certain floor, broke his spine and was frozen to death in the snow. Until the next day, his body was discovered-this is the conclusion given by the police later. So, did he really fall off accidentally? If someone suddenly appeared and pushed him down, I don't think there would be any People can detect it."

"...You want to say that Dias was killed by a third person on the scene?" Old Jake felt a little creepy, "If this is the case, is that person for sure that Adalbert Herzog will drive and hit Lawyer Dias? Oh no, what is this kind of joke?"

As McNeil said, this is just speculation. In order to confirm these inferences, they must find peripheral personnel closer to the case. There was not much time left for them and Herzog.

TBC