When you're finally up on the moon, looking back at the Earth, all those differences and nationalistic traits are pretty well going to blend and you're going to get a concept that maybe this really is one world and why the hell can't we learn to live together like decent people?

Frank Berman

Orbis Unum

Section 1: Egypt

W3N Weekly

Author: William Frank

Part 1-published June 16, 2035

There are no borders these days. There were once, back when the world was divided into nation-states, when the Global Defense Initiative and the Brotherhood of Nod weren't the only powers in this world. One day there may be borders again, given rumors of GDI planning to divide the world into areas based on the level of tiberium contamination. But right now, at this point in time, there are no boarders. Or at least, that was what I thought in Africa.

During the Second Tiberium War, a GDI airman once commented that flying over Africa, all one can see is miles of nothing. To be frank, I think the most can be said for many places on this planet-barren wastelands, rendered lifeless due to the spread of tiberium, where only the hardiest and/or most desperate reside. But this was a delusion on the continent. Invisible boundaries exist along the east coast of Africa-with the Brotherhood of Nod fractured, the area has become rife with different war bands. Some are merely in it for their own survival, not necessarily antagonistic to GDI, but not friends either. Others claim to follow the word of Kane, either ignoring or disputing the fact that there are dozens of similar factions who appear to do the same. Either way, it was in Western Egypt that I discovered the nature of this factionalism. Once, the country (in name only of course) was a stronghold of Nod, mainly due to their control of Cairo. Now…well, the gunmen who pulled our group to a stop told a different story.

I can't name the truck that pulled up to greet ours. It was an antique, dating back to even before the First Tiberium War. My translator told me to stay in the car as he got out to meet them, clad in a strange mix of turbans and Nod body armor. I don't know what he said, but it mattered little. I was in a realm where the divide between combatants and non-combatants meant as little as to whether you had a passport or not. And considering that no-one in this part of the world was left to administer immigration and emigration, that meant my status as a journalist meant nothing.

It was strange. There was a refugee camp a few miles to the east-I would have thought that there would have been some level of interaction (violence) between this group and the refugees residing there-those who had fled the fighting in Egypt as the war drew to a close and more recently, the cyborg armies utilized by CABAL. Egypt didn't look set to remain in GDI hands, especially if the rumors of dividing the world in accordance with tiberium contamination turned out to be accurate. The situation in this part of the continent was indicative of the rest of it. In the last century, wars had been fought over access to land, water and tribal identity-the legacy of the imperial era that the Brotherhood exploited to its advantage. If Kane was…Cain, then GDI was Abel and despite what the Bible said, it would take more than one of them to be swept out of the land. Yet the continent was dying. It would be left to the war bands and mutants that roamed it. So it puzzled me as to why this group was being so restrained in its activities.

Thousands of years ago, a tribe's strength could be measured in the number of cows they herded. Now, it could be measured by the size of their armory.

The camp we were herded into was a place in the Libyan Desert-as in, an actual desert rather than a wasteland. It instantly struck me how…normal, it was. Granted, there was a piss load of guns, tanks and pretty much every piece of GDI and Nod hardware under the sun, but there were also many women and children there. Historically, it wasn't much of a surprise. The Brotherhood was a cohesive fighting force in retrospect-a shadow nation with a rule of law, however barbaric it would seem by our standards. If not for their mad quest to accelerate the spread of tiberium, I think it would have been within my right to say that their presence in north-east Africa would have benefitted the area. But that was then. While hostilities between GDI and Nod lasted until at least 2034, most had accepted that the Second Tiberium War ended in 229, with Kane's death in Kenya. As always, there were rumors to the contrary, that the self-proclaimed Messiah perished in Cairo and that it was far more than a simple base raid. Regardless, the Brotherhood was fragmented. So people had to band together, lest women be raped and burned and children be turned into conscripts.

As I said, hostilities had come to an end in 2034. So it was therefore a surprise that I was only in the camp for three days, before a Steel Talons force ploughed into the area. It wasn't for me or my translator-no, it was simply a "clean-up." I have to ask, what of? The unit was pretty pissed, I could tell that much, what with the death of General Joshua Mitchell in the liquid tiberium accident last year that recently turned central Australia from desert to wasteland. But even if that was a Brotherhood operation, these people weren't aligned. So why bother?

I don't know. To my knowledge, they were just trying to survive. So were elements of GDI's military that had been put to shame in recent actions and their use of antiquated technology. Social Darwinism at its finest. The stronger force pushed the weaker out.

InOps Analysis

Source: Classified

The publication is typical of rumors that have been spreading through the civilian population in recent months, though I feel it nonetheless presents some data of interest. Firstly, it confirms that Africa is indeed headed for a power vacuum-politically unstable even prior to the First Tiberium War, courtesy of the Brotherhood of Nod, this publication demonstrates how quick a descent into chaos its northern states are making. I respectfully advise that we reconsider our standing in northern Africa-the events of last year are testimony to the fact that the Brotherhood of Nod is still a force to be reckoned with. Although Kane is dead, all indications point to a reunification within their ranks-a reunification that the loss of Marcion has not helped. Regardless, any notion of Kane's downfall being anywhere else but Kenya should be actively discouraged. The Tacitus and Kane's intended use of the tiberium missile are to remain confidential for the foreseeable future.

It is also worth considering Frank's highlighting of the situation in Australia. We already have enough editorials clogging every damn newspaper from Sydney to Melbourne, but Frank's mention of dissent among the Steel Talons offers a new angle, especially when the official line remains that the liquid tiberium accident in Central Australia was indeed an accident. As the likes of New Zealand and Indonesia are being stretched to breaking point in the continuing refugee crisis, I believe the situation will get worse before it gets better.

And by the way, what does "Orbis Unum" even mean?