A figure cloaked entirely in black enters the Reichstag. He -- and it is clear that the person is a "he" by the timbre of the voice -- speaks very quietly, and most of the Reichstag has to strain to hear him. After a few moments of frustration, an assistant brings him an unusual device, called a microphone, designed to amplify an individual's device, much to the consternation of the Reichstag. He has a clear limp.
Men and women of the Reichstag, particularly Herr Wouters:
My name is Hermann von Leute. Of course, as Herr Wouters insinuated, that is not the name I was born with. However, to satisfy your inane desire for rules and regulations, I have official documentation that my name has been legally altered. I am here today to address the charges of those in the Reichstag that I am not a real person, or that my biographical information is falsified or somehow inaccurate. It is, to the best of my knowledge, correct. I am approximately thirty years of age and my birthplace is, as far as I know, Harper. I was born an orphan, so you will forgive me if I cannot precisely identify who my parents were. My decision to conceal my name is deliberate. I was unusually large, even as an adolescent, and I was initially full of patriotic fervor during the Anglo-German War. One advantage of not having parents is that joining the army, even if your age is questionable, is an easily accomplished feat. I fought with distinction, according to my commanders, and I have commendations under my birth name. I was shot in the leg in the waning days of the war and was transferred to the capital to recuperate. Even to this day, I cannot walk properly.
The injuries to my throat occurred during the fighting in the capital during Ferdinand von Hohenzollern's rebellion. I am ashamed to admit I fought against a man I came to regard as a visionary. His men fought like wild animals, with the bravery and savagery that the working class demands of its champions. One of them slashed my throat, but his blade was dull and he could not finish the slice. Again, I returned to the hospital and learned how to speak again. I was unable to continue serving as a soldier, so I was discharged. With no family, I wandered the streets, homeless. The army at least taught me how to read, and I read Ferdinand's manifesto a few years after I fought him, and it forever changed me.
You men and women, fat with wealth, earned by the sweat of the true Germans, toiling in factories or in the fields, disgust me. You speak of "honoring the minorities" while you offer pitiful scraps to the real majority of Germans: the peasant and the proletarian, the soldier and the sailor. Who cares if Italians are properly represented by a government that truly represents no one? I do not see a single farmer among your number. Soldiers and sailors are in short supply. Herr Wouters was born into a life of privilege. Herr von Bavel-Timmermans became that most morally bankrupt of all bourgeoisie, a lawyer. The new leader of my own party, the KPD, married into the nobility, an institution as archaic as it is corrupt. I will not speak of the plutocrats that fill every other party; I do not have hours to speak.
To the ex-Chancellor, Franz Meningen -- let us stop worrying about liberating Italians, or Frenchmen, or the Dutch, or whomever you favor today but will forget tomorrow: let us begin by liberating Germany. Give the working class the dignity it deserves. Let Germany be a shining beacon to all who seek the freedom to work however they choose, wherever they choose, for whomever they choose, and to take the fruits of their labor home to their families. Not to government bureaucrats. Not to monarchists. Not to the useless parasites, sucking out the blood of the toiler.
I will fight tirelessly, with every fiber of my being, and all the means at my disposal, to promote the interests of the people of Germany, even if it means living in a cesspool of decadence and decay.
At your service,
Hermann von Leute, Assemblyman for Harper
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