Chương 395: 180.Three Minutes to 5 PM

When Hedwig and I got back to the Seitokai, Jess took one look at our empty hands and, instead of asking whether we'd succeeded, said:"So? Did you cremate that ritual-whatever first?" I lifted the clipboard in her direction.

"No cremation," I said.

"We're more civilized than that. We just lawfully erased it from the budget sheet." Jess slapped the table.

"Beautiful! That's what a Seitokai is supposed to be! We don't have to save the nation, but we should at least be able to promptly chop someone's hand off when they try to blow money—""Watch your language," Maki said without looking up.

"... promptly and gently redirect their hands back to the table where they belong."

"That sounds worse than the first version," Lan murmured, adding a neat little slice. I set the revised quote and new notes down on Roy's desk. He reached out, took them, and flipped through fast. The speed didn't look like reading; it looked like checking whether a patient previously declared brain-dead might actually still be breathing. As he read, a little bit of that dead gray finally drained from his face. Just a little. Like a corpse moving from "ready for burial" to "maybe still salvageable."

For Roy, that was about as close to joy as his face got.

"Main PA back to baseline," Roy said as he read.

"Backup speakers addition cancelled. Wiring fee pending site survey. And that..." He stopped, his eyes landing on the item I'd circled in red."'Ritualistic Ambient Soundscape Design' removed in full." I folded my arms.

"You're welcome." Roy looked up at me.

"I wasn't going to thank you."

"You are such an unlovable person."

"My greatest respect for you right now," Roy said, "is not asking whether you deliberately tried to count last night's time at the station as on-duty hours."

"That was an accident."

"The density of accidents in your life is unreasonably high."

"You two, stop," Jess cut in cheerfully.

"Let me confirm something first. When you and Hedwig walked into the Broadcasting Committee just now, did anyone have that 'oh, today's the day I die' look on their face?" I dragged my chair out and sat down.

"Yes." Hedwig sat next to me, splitting off the stack of follow-up notes, and added, calmly:"And not just one of them." Jess lit up.

"Fantastic. Just hearing that makes it worth it. Next time you go, can I hide outside the door and listen?"

"You'll laugh," I said.

"Then you can say I'm the Broadcasting Committee's conscience."

"You're more like their retribution." Jess laughed with zero conscience at all, and the stiff, dry atmosphere that had settled over the office earlier finally cracked a little. Hedwig sat by my side, quietly turning the discussion notes from earlier into formal annotations. Her pen strokes were steady, and her handwriting was offensively pretty. The kind of script that told you, at a glance, this person had received thorough education from the age of five, down to the way her pen paused at the end of a stroke.

Next to that, my "if you can read it, I've done my civic duty" handwriting looked like a different species entirely. I watched for a couple of seconds and couldn't help saying:"Hedwig."

"Hm?"

"Those characters of yours? People would pay to frame them." She stopped her pen and looked at me.

"That doesn't sound like a compliment."

"I told you already—I'm not in great shape. This is the closest thing to a compliment I can produce." A faint glint of amusement crossed her eyes.

"Then I'll accept it." Right. She really was getting better at this. Keep this up and I'm going to have to start testing the vents for some kind of airborne backtalk agent. Just then, footsteps sounded outside. A second later, the door opened and D walked in first. He had the Health Committee's forms in hand, and as he came through the doorway he automatically nudged the door open a little wider, so his frame wouldn't take a bite out of the doorframe.

Harvey followed, quiet as always, holding several sheets of environment-layout confirmations, his expression as calm as if he'd just taken a stroll through a parts warehouse rather than running errand duty for the Council. Jess spun her chair around the moment they came in.

"You're back? Well? Did you rip any doors off?" D looked down at her.

"No."

"What a waste."

"But the Health Committee rep did initially think someone outside was critically injured." I burst out laughing.

"Told you." D passed the forms to Maki, speaking in his usual level tone.

"Overall, pretty smooth. She'll match the tournament schedule—we can get first-aid kits, ice packs, bleed-control consumables, and sideline medical staff all allocated."

"Sounds good," Maki said.

"Problems?" D scratched the back of his neck.

"Two small ones. First, she insists on adding one extra folding stretcher at high-risk venues. Second, she wants to bring the old first-aid instruction board out again, says the text is still correct." Lan's head snapped up.

"That board should've been reprinted last year."

"Yeah," D nodded.

"I said that too."

"And then?" I asked.

"Then she said, 'The wording's right. Ugly colors won't stop us from saving people.'" I went quiet for half a second.

"... That logic is uncomfortably defensible." Roy twirled his pen.

"Extra stretcher needs additional funds?" D answered:"Yeah, but not much. She said if the Seitokai is willing to handle transport and return, she can pull the better-condition one from storage." I leaned back in my chair.

"Fine, that's acceptable. Better than someone actually going down at the venue and all we have is a 'complete process' to drape over them." Maki gave a small nod.

"Reprint the first-aid board. Keep the stretcher." She said it quickly, like she was trimming a leaf. For Maki, this level of problem was probably just a corner of a page curling up. You press it flat and move on. Harvey stepped forward then and handed over his set of forms.

"Same here," he said. I turned to him.

"Temporary toilets and trash cans?"

"All sorted," Harvey said.

"Environment Committee agreed. Temporary toilet numbers follow our original distribution plan. They even gave us two extra sets of trash cans."

"Wow." Jess raised her eyebrows.

"That easy? What did you bargain with?" Harvey thought for a second.

"The facts."

"... Too abstract. Try again." Harvey's face didn't move.

"I told her if trash runs aren't frequent enough, the audience zone will die of the stench first, and only then will it be the competitors' turn to compete." Jess clapped on the spot.

"I hereby declare today's field MVP is not the Vice President. It's Harvey." I nodded.

"Effective. Go on." Harvey pulled one layout sheet out and pointed it out for Maki and Lan.

"Three minor issues," he said.

"First, they want to put one set of temporary trash cans right behind the main stands where it's most convenient—but that overlaps with Lan's drawn spectator fallback route." Lan took the sheet and frowned almost immediately.

"No good. That's a pivot point in the emergency evacuation."

"I know," Harvey said.

"So I told her to hold the spot until the Seitokai approved." Lan nodded.

"Good call." Harvey pointed to the next column.

"Second, the garbage truck run is slotted for 15: 30, but the main events likely won't be done by then. Environment Committee said if they push the truck through anyway, it'll collide with spectator traffic." Roy muttered:"So if we schedule it badly, you get spectators flowing out and a garbage truck coming in to greet them."

"Great mental image," I said.

"The kind that gets us front-page coverage for all the wrong reasons." Hedwig, recording as she listened, asked quietly:"And the third?" Harvey paused.

"Smallest, but also the touchiest," he said.

"One set of temporary toilets is currently planned too close to the equipment transport route for the shooting range. On a normal day it's fine, but if they're moving gear and people are lining up at the same time, it'll choke the whole path." I turned immediately to Lan.

"General Affairs?" Lan already had her route map out, cross-checking for a few seconds. Her frown deepened.

"This isn't a small issue," she said.

"It's a classic 'what looks like one extra toilet that actually turns the whole venue into a clogged pot' problem."

"Zero romance in your phrasing," Jess said.

"There is no romance in the Seitokai," Lan shot back.

"Only flow management."

"No, there's still some," I said. Everyone looked at me. I kept my face straight and pointed at the mountain of forms on the table.

"Our undying love for our process sheets." The room went quiet. Then Jess laughed so hard she nearly fell off her chair. Even D let out a low chuckle. Harvey only let the corner of his mouth tilt, but for him that was practically exuberant. Hedwig turned her head, clearly trying to hold it in, and failed just enough that her shoulders shook once. Maki didn't laugh. But she did tap her pen once against the desk.

"Shimo."

"What."

"If you ever say that outside this room, I'll deny any and all association between you and the Seitokai." If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

"That's harsh. That was a very high-level summation of organizational spirit."

"That was a summation of psychosis."

"I support Maki," Roy said coolly.

"Et tu, Roy?"

"This isn't betrayal. It's financial risk management." I clutched my chest in mock agony.

"You people have absolutely no appreciation for an injured woman's valiant efforts to liven up team morale."

"You looked more like an injury manufacturer last night," Jess said.

"That's a separate topic."

"No, that's the same person."

"Jess, you're getting very bold lately."

"Thanks. I'll take that as a compliment."... Damn it. Even she was picking it up. Maki separated out D and Harvey's forms and held them down in order, her eyes skimming the added notes. When she didn't speak, the whole room automatically slid into a state of: okay, now the person who actually does things is about to hand down the sentence. That wasn't something anyone demanded. It was conditioning. A moment later, she looked up.

"Quick summary," Maki said.

"Health Committee: keep the extra stretcher, reprint the board. Environment Committee: redraw trash can locations, push the trash run later, move the temporary toilets off the equipment route. Lan, you and Harvey get the new layered map done." Lan nodded.

"Got it."

"So can I."

"D," Maki turned to him, "swing by Health again later and lock down the stretcher and board reprint."

"Got it," D said. Then Maki looked over at Jess.

"Broadcasting needs that revised quote by five. If you're free, go keep an eye on them." Jess's hand shot up.

"Free. Extremely free. The freest thing I can do right now is watch them bury their own 'ritualism.'""Don't poke them too hard," Maki said.

"I'll keep it within legally admissible spectator range."

"That sentence coming out of your mouth is profoundly unconvincing." Finally, her gaze landed on me and Hedwig.

"As for you two," she said, "turn the meeting minutes into formal text, attach our suggestions, and when the new quote arrives, bundle them." I glared at her.

"I thought after a budget fight I'd get at least five minutes of humanitarian break."

"You already took your break walking back from the Broadcasting Committee." I blinked. Jess's eyes lit up like she'd just smelled a once-in-a-lifetime scoop.

"Ohhh," she drawled.

"So you and Hedwig had break time on the way back, huh?"

"Turn that brain off," I snapped at her.

"That was post-battle withdrawal, not a break."

"Sounded like a walk to me—" I snagged a wad of scrap paper and tossed it at her head. Jess dodged with practiced ease, laughing like this was the best day of her life. Next to me, Hedwig's ears went faintly pink again. She didn't say anything, just slid the record sheets toward me, like she was wordlessly reminding me: Vice President, maybe redirect fire away from Jess, or this really will turn into a farce. Of course Maki saw it. She didn't call it out.

She just added, very calmly:"If you still have the energy to mess around, that means today's progress can advance a little further."

"Maki Kushima," I said, full of righteous sorrow.

"You really never let any resource go to waste."

"Thank you."

"Same as always, I wasn't praising you."

"I know." I took a deep breath, swallowed the internal bleeding she'd just caused, and lowered my head to take the records from Hedwig. She angled them toward me, fingertip tapping one line.

"I did a first pass here," Hedwig said.

"See if you want to add that line about 'distinguishing necessity from ideal.'" I looked down. The handwriting was neat, the structure clear, and she'd already pulled out several points I would normally lose focus on. Honestly, working with someone like this made you develop a very dangerous kind of dependence. Let your guard down a little, and she'd quietly catch whatever piece you were about to drop. That was not a good thing.

Not for someone who, in theory, was supposed to maintain a healthy level of paranoia and not let herself be soothed this easily. I coughed, pretending to be unbothered.

"Not bad," I said. Hedwig looked at me.

"Does that count as a compliment this time?"

"... Half of one." She smiled, very lightly.

"Then I'll log it." From across the room, Jess sucked in a very dramatic, very deliberate breath, like she was about to start humming the wedding march again. I didn't even raise my head—just flicked another clipped scrap at her.

"You start singing and I will show you what ritualistic cremation really looks like."

"Vice President, so cruel," Jess said, clutching her head, with no sign of remorse.

"You only realized now?"

"No, I'm just confirming." I rolled my eyes and ignored her, lowering my head to work with Hedwig on turning the meeting into real text. On the other side of the room, Lan and Harvey already had the new venue map spread out, replotting positions for trash cans, trash runs, and temporary toilets. D stood by Maki's desk, going over stretcher and board details with her. Roy, like a finance officer who had died and been dragged back, buried himself once again in numbers—this time with a noticeably steadier hand.

The office slipped back into that strange operational state again. Loud. Busy. Messy. Papers everywhere. Every line of dialogue edged. No one fully slept. No one would ever admit they cared about anyone. But it was also the kind of place that gave you applause when you walked back in the door; that would assign you work the morning after you landed in a police station and quietly slot you back into your old seat.

Put like that, it really did feel a bit like some structurally unsound but inexplicably hard-to-collapse kind of home.... Obviously, I wasn't going to say that out loud. If I did, Jess would have a family-drama tagline for the Council written by morning, and Maki would silently kick me back into the paperwork pile to calm down. So I just kept my head down, adding my crooked notes next to Hedwig's obscenely tidy records, and reluctantly admitted to myself— At least for today, this chaotic place was running...

not badly. At 16: 57, Jess shot out the door like a family member waiting on an execution result and planted herself at the entrance to intercept the Broadcasting Committee. I had been about to warn her that she looked way too much like a tabloid reporter camping outside a courthouse for the first photo, and that she should tone it down. Before I could, she was already pressed against the doorframe, her ears practically sprouting radar.

"Are they here yet?" she asked.

"You sound like you're waiting on news that your mortal enemy finally kicked it," I said.

"Same difference," Jess said, completely unapologetic.

"If that 'ritualism' doesn't die today, I won't sleep well tonight."

"You don't usually sleep with a clear conscience anyway."

"That's different. Conscience is a personality issue. This is a matter of principle." I ignored her and went back to finishing the last lines of the meeting memo I'd drafted with Hedwig. Hedwig sat beside me, going over the phrasing of our recommended revisions one more time. The way she worked was vicious—quiet, precise, no wasted movement—like someone had dropped an invisible frame over a chaotic scene, and all the pieces trying to fly everywhere had reluctantly slid back into their boxes.

For the Seitokai, that was a blessing. For someone like me, who'd started getting used to having someone there to catch what I dropped, it was a problem. Maki sat behind her desk, merging the Health and Environment revisions into the master chart. Roy was hunched over the budget like a financial ghost pinned back to the mortal realm, working new numbers through. Lan and Harvey had the venue map spread out, murmuring over trash runs, spectator fallback routes, and toilet relocations.

D stood by the cabinets like a heavily armored logistics node waiting for the next deployment. The air in the office was tight, but not panicked. It felt like someone working with a screwdriver and a hemostat at the same time, trying to keep a machine on the verge of collapse from falling apart. Footsteps sounded outside. Jess straightened like a guard who'd finally seen the prisoner truck pull in, and yanked the door open.

The Broadcasting Committee Chair stood outside, a new quote and revision notes in hand, her expression a blend of I really don't want to see you people again today and I really don't want the President to come down here personally either. Another committee member hovered behind her, clutching supplemental documents, looking more honest than she had back in their office. Jess scanned them once, then stepped aside with an almost offensively cordial gesture.

"Welcome," she said.

"Here to process the ritualism deregistration?" I put my pen down on the spot.

"Jess."

"Okay, I'm quiet," she said. She might have said so, but the grin on her face said she was having a great time. The Committee Chair clearly choked on that line, but knowing this wasn't the day to pick a fight, she had no choice but to hand the documents over.

"Revised version," she said.

"Redone per the Seitokai's suggestions." Maki reached out and took them. She didn't say anything at first. Just looked. That kind of quiet was the most torturous. If Maki wasn't rushing to speak, it usually meant she was deciding whether what she held needed fixing—or burial. Roy took the duplicate copy. Lan came over to look as well. Hedwig slid our freshly typed notes out of the way, making room for the new quote.

I stayed where I was, arms folded, watching the three people in the room with the legal authority to approve other people's lives and deaths review the sheet. It was a little scary, honestly. I had spent last night in custody because I'd hit too hard. But watching this, I was starting to think the thing that really killed people wasn't fists. It was three administrators comparing numbers under sunset lighting. After about thirty seconds, Roy spoke first.

"Main PA back to original spec," he said. Lan nodded.

"Backup speakers back to four sets." Maki flipped to the next page.

"Independent wiring remains under 'pending site survey,' not booked as fixed expense." I added, helpfully:"And the ritualistic whatever—" Hedwig chimed in, quiet and clean.

"Removed in full." The Committee Chair said nothing, but the muscles in her face tightened. I got it. Spending an afternoon personally burying the best-sounding line item you'd come up with wasn't fun. Jess let out a tiny, celebratory cheer. Maki glanced at her. Jess immediately raised her hand.

"Sorry, I'm just expressing heartfelt congratulations for the continued health of the school budget."

"Your heartfelt is loud," I said.

"But sincere." Roy's pen stopped over one column.

"There's one more minor issue," he said. The Committee Chair froze.

"Where?" Roy turned the sheet and pointed.

"The windscreens for the MC mics—this line was changed from rental to consumables. Reason?" The Chair blinked, clearly not expecting us to notice something that small.

"Because..." she hesitated, "the old batch is pretty worn, and we thought for safety we should just replace them."

"Quantity?" Roy asked.

"Six."

"How many MCs?"

"Two." The room went still. I turned to look at her.

"You planning for them to transform mid-show, or swap heads after every segment?" Her mouth twitched. The committee member behind her, the one clutching extra documents, was visibly fighting not to crack. Hedwig scanned that section of the notes and said, even as ever:"If it's only to avoid degraded materials affecting recording quality, the number should be recalculated. Please adjust this to a range of two to three, with a note explaining replacement conditions." Lan nodded.

"Cap it at three. Any more and it's not safety—it's stockpiling." Roy slipped the last blade in, smooth as anything.

"The Seitokai does not bankroll stealth inventory refreshes."... Good. That one was sharp. The kind of line that made you want to argue and then realize there wasn't a single foothold in the logic. The Chair could only nod in the end.

"I'll hand-correct and sign it." Only then did Maki set her pen down.

"Fine," she said.

"If you get that done and back to us in five minutes, we can close this line today." At that, the Chair visibly exhaled. Loud enough that I suspected if someone had a mic behind her, you could've recorded it as ambient SFX. Jess flashed her a blinding, highly insincere smile.

"Good luck," she said.

"You're only one windscreen away from rejoining civilized society."

"Jess," I said again.

"I'm being very restrained."

"That's the least believable sentence you've said all day." The Chair practically fled the room with the forms, dragging her colleague with her. Once the door closed, Jess spun around and slapped both palms on the desk.

"Case closed," she announced.

"This isn't a courtroom," Roy said.

"Then call it administrative enforcement."

"It's not that either."

"You are impossible to talk to, Roy."

"I'm not here to talk." I leaned back and let out a long breath.

"At least that branch is clean," I said.

"Not yet," Maki said.

"After they fix that last bit."

"You really do have a talent for puncturing people's relief at the precise second they exhale."

"Thank you."

"Is it just me, or are you getting more deliberate lately?" Maki ignored me and flipped to the next master sheet. Less than five minutes later, the Chair came back again. This time she practically threw the adjusted form onto the desk and tried to leave as fast as possible, like staying a second longer might cause new red lines to appear on the page. Roy double-checked the numbers. Lan confirmed the item names. Hedwig clipped the corrections into the file.

Finally, Maki stamped a confirmation note on top and said, flat as ever:"All right. Broadcasting passes." Jess, for once, gave them a couple of polite claps. The Chair's expression looked less like someone being congratulated and more like someone being granted medical parole after a public sentencing. After she left, the office finally loosened for real. Not because we were done, but because the branch most likely to grow crooked—the one most worth sending to be burned—had finally been cut.

Outside, the sky was already sliding into evening. The light through the windows had shifted from harsh white toward orange. The hallway noise had thinned. Whistles from the field came only in short bursts instead of full-strength blasts. We hadn't turned the lights on inside yet, so the room sat in that in-between glow, like everyone was holding one last half-breath. And the Seitokai's specialty was always stretching that half-breath into another two hours.

Maki split the newly integrated master sheet into several stacks and slid them in order to Roy, Lan, Hedwig, and finally to me.

"For this evening block, fold in everything we cleaned up today," she said.

"Roy, redo the master budget. Lan and Harvey, overlay the latest environment and equipment routes again. Hedwig, formalize the meeting transcripts. Shimo—" The second I heard my name, a bad feeling hit.

"... What."

"You consolidate all the adjustments from today's field runs into a Vice President brief. We'll open with it tomorrow." I stared at the stack. Then at Maki.

"Maki."

"Hm."

"Sometimes I really think, in your head, 'the person is alive' just translates straight to 'still usable.'""More or less," she said.

"You could at least hesitate." Jess laughed so hard she collapsed half over the back of her chair.

"Condolences, Vice President."

"If you're that free, I can find you more work."

"I'm suddenly very busy, thanks." D had wandered over to the water dispenser. He glanced at the empty hot-water container, then at the room full of people being slowly boiled alive by paperwork, and asked the one practical question of the hour:"Anyone want a drink? I'm heading down." Coming out of D's mouth, that sounded bizarre. Like a heavy APC designed to ram walls asking if you'd like it to pick up a latte on the way.

"Something sweet," Jess said at once.

"You don't deserve it," I said.

"Why not?"

"Because you enjoyed the show the most today."

"That was moral support." Harvey didn't even look up. He just held down the corner of the venue map and said:"Black coffee." Lan thought for a moment.

"Hot tea." Roy was even simpler.

"Anything. As long as it's drinkable."

"Tragic," I said.

"The finance officer has given up making specific requests of life."

"I have one left," Roy said.

"No 'ritualism' in next year's budget."

"That's a very reasonable request," Hedwig said softly. She was sliding the Broadcasting corrections into a fresh file. The side of her face was very calm in the evening light. Annoyingly calm. Look at it too long and you started to feel like it was unfair, this office having a picture that clean in it at all. I dragged my eyes away and pretended I was focused on how to structure the memo. D looked at me last.

"You?"

"Me?"

"What do you want?" I had been about to say "whatever," but the first image that floated up was last night's paper cup of ice-cold metallic station water—and the fact that my brain had been running flat-out all day.

"Hot coffee," I said.

"Something a living person would drink." Jess cut in immediately.

"She probably needs sugar."

"You keep talking and you'll be drinking hot water," I said.

"That's cruel." D made a small sound of acknowledgment and turned to Maki.

"President?"

"Same." Same. No brand, no sweetness, no temperature specified. As long as she could finish pushing today through, I doubted she cared if she was drinking coffee, tea, or something designed to clean machine parts. D nodded and headed out. Once the door closed, the room went back to the rustle of paper, the scratch of pens, and the occasional soft confirmation. Time went slippery at times like this.

You weren't sure if you were working or conscripted into some collective service system, using coffee and paperwork to prove you still existed. I lowered my head and started drafting the Vice President's brief. Broadcasting item cuts and justifications. Health Committee's extra stretcher, board reprint. Environment Committee's trash can relocations, delayed garbage run, toilets off the equipment route... line by line, the mess grew a spine. Halfway through, a hand slid an attached sheet over beside me. Hedwig.

"This can go in with it," she said.

"That way you don't have to re-explain the Broadcasting part tomorrow." I looked at the sheet. Neat, clear, bullet-pointed, and even that "distinguishing necessary vs ideal expenditures" section I'd been too lazy to phrase properly was already sketched out. I looked up at her.

"Hedwig."

"Hm?"

"You're going to make people want to nail you to the Seitokai permanently." She watched me for half a beat.

"That doesn't sound like normal gratitude."

"This isn't a normal place." Her mouth curved, very slightly.

"Then I'll treat it as thanks."

"Hey, you two," Jess's voice drifted over, extra obnoxious, "if you're going to express gratitude, keep it within a range where I can still pretend I don't get it." Without looking up, I flicked a paper clip at her. Jess yelped and ducked, laughing. Maki finally raised her eyes and glanced our way once.

"If you still have energy to play," she said, "that means tonight's progress can be pushed further."

"Maki Kushima, you really are some kind of administrative weapon that doesn't power down," I said.

"Thank you."

"I'm past correcting you."

"Good. You're finally learning to save time." Knew it. The worst part about arguing with Maki isn't losing. It's that you know you'll lose and still can't stop yourself from testing the wall with your forehead. It's a self-destruct instinct. Not long after, D came back with a bag full of drinks. Hot coffee, hot tea, black coffee—even Jess's too-sweet one hadn't been "forgotten." Paper cups and cans clinked lightly, and for a moment the room actually felt like a place where humans might keep living.

I took my coffee. The heat bit into my palms, making me flinch, but it felt good. Jess took her first sip and sighed theatrically.

"Ah—civilization."

"Your bar for civilization is low," I said.

"Because I watched someone hold a funeral for 'ritualism' this afternoon. Being able to drink something sweet now, I'm content." Roy took his "whatever" cup, took a sip, and actually paused. I eyed him.

"What, poison?"

"No," Roy said.

"I just didn't expect D to actually manage to buy decent coffee." D stood there, expression flat.

"That didn't sound like a compliment."

"It isn't," Roy said.

"It's surprise."

"That's worse," Jess said immediately. Soft laughter rippled through the office. Not loud. Enough. Enough to pull everyone's heads a little way out of the papers grinding them down. Outside, the sky darkened further. The lights in the Seitokai office finally came on. The cold white beam washed over everyone, making the fatigue on each face clearer. Maki was still on the sheets, Roy still recalculating, Lan and Harvey still overlapping maps, Hedwig still cleaning up transcripts.

I cupped my perfectly hot cup of coffee and finished the last line of my brief. Looked at like that, we were still going to be here a while. But at least that damned "ritualism" from Broadcasting had been burned. Legally, procedurally, and with full notes attached. Thinking of it that way, even the pile of work in front of me didn't look quite so hideous.... For tonight. If anyone came in tomorrow with a new excuse to pad their budget, I was still going to seriously consider burying them in the process charts.