SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

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Calisson
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Calisson »

When the third vote was cast, Calisson laid his pipe on the table. No longer time to lose for puffs.

"Sleekdd, you voted too quickly. You should have taken the time to talk with Nelmeer, before you voted.
Same outcome, except it would increase the chances Nelmeer takes the appropriate decision tonight.

Like everyone, I assume that Belial will turn out to be one of the saboteurs. It was not proven technically, but that's still pretty convincing.
If by chance we picked up again the wrong target... well, there would be no further meeting anyway, so there's nothing to prepare for.

Sleekdd, better not divulge your intentions indeed, Meteor might not guess them. ;)

Nelmeer, if ever you were a protector, please protect Sleekdd.
If he is targeted, as himself and I believe he will be, and if he is not protected, then you would have to decide tomorrow, alone, against Meteor or me.
On the other hand, if I am targeted instead of him - but I cannot imagine Meteor doing that unless for sheer revenge - you and Sleekdd will easily know who to vote against tomorrow.
And don't bother to protect Meteor. He cannot be targeted, and even if he could, it would make no sense.
Protect Sleekdd. That's all you need to do."

Pfff!
Just in time before the meeting closed.
Winds never stop blowing, Oceans are borderless. Get a ship and a crew, so the World will be ours! Today the World, tomorrow Nagg! {--|oBrotherhood of the Coast!o|--}
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Tarbo »

Belial calmly reaches in his suitcase while Mioralynthia declares the majority vote against him. He takes out some paper and adjusts his glasses. “I prepared a statement for this possibility; may I?”

Mioralynthia eyes him, then Anleth, and finally nods. “Very well.”

“Thank you,” Belial says, and clears his throat. He turns the papers to the other members and shows the letterhead to everyone present. By the time you realise that these are the fabled A-5's he is holding, you hear the sound of ripping paper.

“Stop him!” the chairelfinn shrieks and gasps at the same time. “Stop that monster!”

With amazing, methodical speed and a deathly, emotionless expression, Belial shreds the forms into tiny bits, claws them in his hand, and tosses them into the air.

A stunned silence follows in the snowglobe of confetti that the meeting room has become. Belial keeps a level but satisfied gaze while pristine white twirls mesmerisingly to the floor.

“Are you done?” Anleth asks, and pats her jacket to clear it of paper.

Belial nods solemnly, picks up his suitcase, and walks over to her. “HR, please.” They leave behind a chairelfinn desperately trying to mix and match the bits of paper.

Mioralynthia discreetly blows a piece of paper off her nose. “I'll accept that as a confession. Meeting adjourned. Please return to your desks; we will let you know what we find out, as soon as—”

“You're a sorceress, you can fix this, right?” your department head pants hastily, picking up the bits and pieces lying on the floor. “Magic can do that, right?”

“...As soon as we are all composed again.”

_______________

    -> Belial
  1. Nelmeer
  2. Meteor
  3. Sleekdd

    Chronological voting record
  • Calisson: -> Meteor
  • Nelmeer: -> Belial
  • Calisson: Meteor -> none
  • Meteor: -> Belial
  • Sleekdd: -> Belial

_______________


    Player list
  1. Meteor
  2. Calisson
  3. Nelmeer
  4. Sleekdd

    Dearly Departed
  1. Lordanubis (loyal) - Morning 1
  2. Deroth (protector, loyal) - Evening 1
  3. Telrunya (loyal) - Night 1
  4. Drainial (loyal) - Day 2
  5. Belial (infiltrator) - Evening 3

It is now Night. Protectors and infiltrators should relay the use of their abilities to me. Morning will come on the 14th of April, around 19h UTC, at the latest.
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Tarbo »

Polce happily walked—almost skipped—to her desk, and took her stamp to hand. “This renovation application? This particular renovation application, Enni? You see this one?”

Enni's eyebrow rose amusedly. “The one you needed an A-5 for?”

“Exactly that one, Enni,” Polce said, and turned to the stack of forms on her desk. “And what do we have here? A stack of—” She froze. No find stack.

Polce hurriedly looked around on her desk, patting down the surface as if they were invisible or eluding her somehow. “Enni? Where is the stack of paper that was on my desk?”

“Hm? Oh, you mean—”

“Yes, the stack that was right here, Enni,” Polce said, her breath picking up. “The one I unwrapped from a brown package and set right here on my desk just a moment ago.”

“Oh, yes, uh, the vampire guy from taxes came by with his badge, and said he needed that stack. Something about a written statement or so.”

“Written... he...”

“Pardon my interruption,” the drachau said as she approached Enni's desk. “Miss Enni? I was told you could inform me about the progress of a certain renovation application.” Behind her, her aide hurriedly paced over to her with a brand new, shiny visitor's badge in her hand.

“Did you add a 404-6 to your request, miss?” Enni asked. “If so, I can give you an update on the progress made on your request.”

“Did I add—” The drachau stopped herself short, and took a deep, calming breath of Zen. “What in Khaine's daffodil eyes is a 404-6?”

Enni's smile was professional, inviting, helpful: a model of helpfulness and civil servitude. “Each 404-6 comes with a serial number we can use to track individual form progress. If you can give me the serial number, I can find out where your form currently is and give you an estimate on the expected processing time.”

The drachau turned her shoulder to give her aid some room to pin the badge to her chest, when she suddenly caught a glimpse of a familiar document. She grinned with a shaky mix of humour and cynicism. “Could you check the progress on the renovation application on the corner of that desk?”

“Of course. Polce, this visitor would like to ask you about the renovation application you're working on.”

Polce, already on her hands and knees to scour the carpet floor for any chance that the vampire missed a form, looked up with a bewildered gaze, and rose to her feet. She looked at the drachau, then at the application form, and then back at the drachau. “This one?” she asked in a small voice, pointing to the relevant application.

“Yes, that one,” the drachau confirmed, and turned to give her aide a lengthy, displeased look. “Ow.”

Polce stared witlessly at the pristine renovation application taunting her from the corner of her desk. Finally, she took a deep breath through her nose and raised her stamp. She hesitated, stopped, and raised her stamp again, looking down at the dotted line she needed to hit.

And then, she dropped the stamp on her desk and burst into tears.

The drachau blinked, stupefied. “Wh—? Why are you crying? I'm the one who got stabbed in the breast.” She checked with her aide, who returned a similarly baffled look. “Was it something I said? Something I didn't say?”

°°°

“Nobody's going to try to kill me,” Nelmeer said, sitting in her new chair at her new desk.

“Yeah, I bet you thought that last time, too,” Sleek maintained, and narrowed his eyes, peering between his eyelids from the darkness he was hiding in. “But when they do, this time, I will catch them in the act, and we'll finally know who's causing us headaches. Now hush, or you'll give me away.”

“Fine,” Nelmeer sighed. She wasn't ungrateful for an extra pair of eyes watching her back, but she did feel uncomfortable having... a pair of eyes watching her.

She swung her pencil, her thinking pencil, while looking over the form in front of her. There was something on her mind, a question burning curiously and aching for an answer. She inhaled deeply to ask, stopped, and finally asked anyway. “How do you fit in there?”

“What do you mean?”

“You're in my drawer. Of my desk.”

The two eyes rolled up to her from the darkness of the slightly open drawer. “...Yes? And?”

“You... you can't...” Nelmeer rubbed her nose pensively. “You don't fit in there.”

“Then... how did I get in?”

“This is my question,” Nelmeer confirmed. “How did you fit into my drawer?”

“Easy,” Sleek said. “You took your pencils out.”

“There were, like, two pencils in there,” Nelmeer argued astonishedly.

“Three,” Sleek corrected. “There were three pencils.”

“Oh. Are you, uh, are you alright?”

“Uncomfortable,” Sleek admitted. “You keep your pencils sharp.”

“Yeah, okay, but it doesn't answer my question. You just physically don't fit in that space.”

“If a tree falls in a forest, and nobody's there to hear it, does it make sound?”

“...What? What is even—”

“If a guy is in a drawer, and nobody's there to ask edgy topological questions, does he still fit in the drawer?”

Nelmeer sighed and scratched her brow. “Fine. Fit in my drawer.”

“Shh,” he hushed Nelmeer. “I heard something.”

Nelmeer held still, very still. It was quiet here. Almost... too quiet. And then, she heard a groan, a creak, maybe a crack... from the ceiling. Some chalk dust innocently twirled to her desk.

She suddenly recalled that her new desk was one floor below her previous desk. Exactly one floor, breadth and length. As was the large archiver of demolition.

In a burst of speed, Nelmeer leapt from her chair and away from her desk. Moments later, the giant, overweight archiver crashed down through the ceiling, splintering her new desk and new chair with a shriek of power and malice, and throwing chalk and dust everywhere.

Nelmeer coughed, waving away the fog of dust, and rose to her feet again. That archiver didn't have a dent on it. Indestructible, that ancient office furniture.

“That was a close one,” Sleek said, standing next to her.

“What— How'd—” Nelmeer opened her eyes widely in frustration, hopping up and down on her toes. “How'd you get out of my drawer!?”

Sleek rose his eyebrow, and stared at her.

“You know what? frig it. I don't want to know. Um... where are you going?”

“After him,” Sleek said, and climbed on the archiver and leapt for the fresh manhole in the ceiling, pulling himself up. “If I'm quick, I can still catch him!”

°°°

“Feeling better?”

Polce turned up her nose and accepted the glass of water. She smiled gratefully at the drachau.

“Okay, let's take it from the start,” the drachau said, and leaned against the desk. “Why—” A sudden tremor in the floor cut her off, and she looked about alarmedly. “What was that?”

“I'm not sure,” Polce said. “It's probably the guys from the sixth floor. They've been doing weird stuff lately.”

Suddenly, someone with an iron poker and two wooden blocks sprinted past wordlessly.

“Actually, I think maybe that's them,” Polce said, and set her glass aside.

“Stop!” Another man, completely covered in white chalk, ran after the other as fast as he could, spraying a cloud of dust with every step. “In the name of proper administration!”

“Yeah, that's definitely them,” Polce said.

The drachau blinked, took a snap decision, and shoved her coffee into her aide's hands. “Hang on to this for me.”

“Drachau? Where are you—”

“I'm getting to the bottom of this.”

°°°

Sleek panted quickly, skidding to an abrupt halt on the carpet floor, and hid behind the archiver next to the narrow, long corridor. He wasn't new to this complex, and he knew every sideroad and off ramp that even some veterans missed. If he had anticipated correctly, then... A grin formed on his lips when he heard the infiltrator walk down the corridor.

Exactly as planned.

Sleek waited for the perfect moment to stick out his foot and trip the infiltrator, and pressed his back against the archiver. That is when he saw.

The owner of this desk had been slaving away with form management. On his desk was the sixth revision of the administrative lexicon. Sleek recognised the double-sized, obese ledger anywhere; he grabbed it with both hands, waited a beat, and swung wide and hard for the infiltrator's face.

Sleek's arms and shoulders vibrated painfully when the hardcover ledger connected with his victim's face. A leg scuffed loudly on the carpet as it swung high into the air, and the body gracelessly slammed on its back. “Stee-rike!” Sleek shouted as a dozen forms and part of the cover flung into the air.

Sleek swung from behind his cover, grinning to the bystanders as they gathered piecemeal, and dropped his improvised club to the floor. “That's right, ladies and gentlemen. That's how we deal with vandals and saboteurs on this floor. WHAM! Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.”

The five or so people stared back at him; they were shocked, horrified, frightened, and yet morbidly curious. It was creepily silent, other than a low groan and the soft rustle of the carpet as his victim quietly writhed in agony. One woman rushed over, a panicked expression on her face, and kneeled by the squirming body. The chief administrator of the building turned a pale shade of white, rolled his eyes up, and collapsed to the floor like a wet towel. “Yeah, this is what happens when a pro crosses an amateur. Splotch,” Sleek said. “You'll want to remember the name of the man who bested you: it's Sleek. Sleek from Militant Emergency Health Insurance Requisitions. That's right. Remember that name.

“Now, observe as I reveal the identity of this...” He looked down, and cocked his head with a curious frown. “...this woman who never attended our meetings but looks vaguely familiar somehow.” HR, maybe? He looked for a badge on her jacket, but found the thing half a yard down the corridor, blown clean off by the hit. He chuckled, kneeled and picked it up.

“Alright, 'fess up,” Sleek said. “How did you get Virecladep to give you a badge for a drachau, of all people? I mean, how gullible do you think we are?”

The aide, kneeled next to her charge, spared Sleek a brief moment of disbelief while she washed the loose hair from her face. Sleek, in turn, lengthily gazed at the badge.

His smile froze.

Sleek hunched down next to the aide. “Hey, how're you doing? I'm Sleek. Listen, um...” He folded his hands together and pointed to the woman writhing on the floor. “I don't want to die. As someone who is familiar with her eminence, how would you recommend I handle this situation?”

“Get a head start,” the aide said.

“Uh-huh,” Sleek considered. “How fast does she—”

“She hits eighteen miles an hour. Three hundred yard dash.”

“That's, uh, wow,” he said, nodding appreciatively. “You weren't kidding. That's... that's really something.”

“Go,” the aide clearly intoned.

Sleek cleared his throat and carefully put the visitor's badge down on the drachau's blouse. “You didn't see me, okay?”

°°°

“Thank you all for coming,” the chairelfinn, now composed and calm, greets you. “Please, take a seat.”

Nelmeer pats a last speck of chalk from her hair before she sits down. There are only three of you left; that's quite a bit less from when you started.

“Let's start with attendance. Anubis?”

“Oh, come on!” Anleth bursts incredulously.

“Nelmeer?” the chairelfinn ignores her. “Check. Meteor? Check. Calisson? Check. Sleek?”

Silence.

“Sleek?” she tries again.

“Uh, yeah, he went into hiding,” Nelmeer says. “Haven't seen him since.”

Your department head looks inquisitively. “Why is he hiding?”

Mioralynthia walks into the room with a quiet sigh. “Please excuse my tardiness. Someone mistook the city's drachau for our saboteur, and consequently bodyslammed her with a thirty-pound ledger.”

The chairelfinn presses her lips. “I'll just take him off the list.”

_______________

    Player list
  1. Meteor
  2. Calisson
  3. Nelmeer

With 3 players, 2 constitute a majority.

    Dearly Departed
  1. Lordanubis (loyal) - Morning 1
  2. Deroth (protector, loyal) - Evening 1
  3. Telrunya (loyal) - Night 1
  4. Drainial (loyal) - Day 2
  5. Belial (infiltrator) - Evening 3
  6. Sleekdd (protector, loyal) - Night 3

It is now Morning. Evening will set on the 15th of April, around 19h UTC. Players who have not posted by then are removed from the game. You may vote, but voting only takes effect in the Evening.

Note: Sleekdd was the infiltrator's actual target. Nelmeer was involved for story's sake, because we know she's loyal. ;)

One infiltrator remains. There are no more protectors.

Good luck!
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Calisson »

"Yeah," said Calisson off voice, "everybody at the coffee pot was talking about Sleekdd and the drachau.
I've heard that Sleekdd hunted the saboteur across most of the tower, including the Director's office, digging across ceilings and walls when doors were locked.
It turned out that the saboteur was protected by the drachau herself! But not even her can stop Sleekdd!
He bested the drachau's personnal champion along with a dozen black guards, then proceeded on to challenge the drachau!
They duelled for a while, destroying two or three rooms in the process - it must be true, I've seen forms filled to call carpenters.
Sleekdd was fighting like a giant, using piles of books as clubs. Descriptions were awesome!
Finally, the drachau had to admit her defeat and call for mercy. Being chivalrous, he let her go.

After that, I heard diverging stories.
Some say that he has been appointed as the new bodyguard for the drachau.
They pretend that he is becoming her minion, too, and he did not recover from their first love night.
The other version says that it is already old story, he has been intrigued out before dawn and had to take the first caravan to exile, disguised as a death hag.
This version comes from the cousin of the wife of the very guard that let him out, a trusted elf."

-=-=-

Calisson seated back in his chair.
Still the same chair since the beginning, next to Meteor, far from Nelmeer who had just lost her now famous bodyguard.

"Allright. We're not here to gossip, are we? There's a task to achieve.
Actually, this should be our last meeting, isn't it?
Very strange feeling, that would be the first time I ever participated to any commission's last meeting."
A self-respecting commission would always keep some work - most of the work - for the next session.
But the present commission had been so quick in the progress it had made, Calisson didn't see time elapsing.

"Nelmeer, I begged you to watch for Sleekdd. Unfortunately, you had no chance to keep the pace and fight alongside against the drachau's black guard.
As a result, Sleekdd won't participate to our discussions anymore. Not your fault, really, it was next to impossible for you to watch for him.

Nelmeer, your vote is now the only relevant one. Nothing else matters. Meteor and myself can only vote each other out.
This is a tough decision you have to take. Especially as you are young and inexperienced."

Ignoring Meteor next to him, he became lyric at Nelmeer.
"Nelmeer, I offer you all the help you wish. Just ask, I will always reply. And this extends well beyond the present meeting.
Your attitude throughout the meetings, your courage after being aggressed twice, this speaks a lot about you.
With my help, I am highly confident you can achieve brilliant results.
You would not like to start your career teaming up with someone as weak-willed and elusive as Meteor?
No experience, no ambition, no achievement. Slippery like an eel.
No, stay with me. We must team up together.
We must improve this tower. We must make the administration tower a reference!
This tower must illuminate the city with its enlightments like a lighthouse illuminates the sea!"

Calisson did not realize, but he had turned out to be more like a politician than an archivist.
Was it too much? Would Nelmeer resent all this sudden attention? He would soon know.

-=-=-

OOC: Easy votes for Meteor and myself. Only Nelmeer has a real decision to take. But meanwhile, we can still roleplay it for the fun!
OOC: I could not post yesterday evening after I read Tarbo's post. Chuckling too much! :lol:
Winds never stop blowing, Oceans are borderless. Get a ship and a crew, so the World will be ours! Today the World, tomorrow Nagg! {--|oBrotherhood of the Coast!o|--}
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Meteor »

"Hmmm this is troublesome, Sleekdd wasn't the other one we were after, which means..it's Calisson, or myself, coming from Nelmeer's point of view. Why I gave you the benefit of the doubt for being someone who spoke out openly and frequently much to many other's agitation is beyond me. Now I simply regret that decision." Meteor was all serious now, as he gave Calisson a hard stare, knowing his own impending doom to be coming soon. It was ironic, his only request was not to be sent off for teamwork rehab, he rather die a random death than be sent off, and now, his fight had led him to the one ending he's been striving to avoid. Ironic to be the last one before being sent off.

He clicked his tongue in annoyance, he didn't want to try defending himself, it was too troublesome. He sighed and prepared himself for the worse.

"No doubt you'll be siding with Calisson more." He said it bitterly, getting up ready to leave.

OOC: Pretty much!
What's mine is mine, What's yours is mine.
Now that we understand each other, lets get down to business.

Jacks -Shade
- WS 5 - - S 3 - - T 2 - - D 6 - - I 5 -

Equipment
Short Sword, MC Long Sword*, Dagger, RxB & RHB [20/10] MC Shade Cloak, 4 Throwing Daggers, 3x Healing Vials, 451C, [3]Dark Venom, [4]Unseen Chains, Food, Dark Steed- Spike

Skills
Basic Stealth, Awareness, TWF, Suithenlu Khythan, Ride

Magic Item
Eye of the Jabberwock

*Magical properties possibly imbued
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Nelmeer
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Nelmeer »

"Yes, Nelmeer -- the fate of the infiltrators, the integrity of the council and the future of the A-5 forms rests solely on your metonymical shoulders and your entirely too fallible judgment. But, you know, no pressure. Have a break. Have a Kit Kat." She took herself up on that (she honest-to-Khaine said "I take myself up on that!") and proceeded to unravel the red wrapper.

After a little thought and a lot of chocolate, she ventured: "Metchawr, wha abby teftmt to vaw fah you im theer pwofes av..." Off everyone's perplexed looks, she swallowed her bite and tried again. "Meteor, while I'd like nothing better than to vote for you in light of your obsession with Sleek, your abrasive tone to me, and your general unwillingness to cooperate, I regretfully report that I'm leaning more toward Calisson." She pecked at the last few microscopic fragments of chocolate. She then devoted a few seconds to suffering beautifully -- in keeping with her thesis 'First World Problems and the Women Who Love Them' -- staring at her empty wrapper as if it were a dead mouse. "Calisson unvoted Meteor yesterday," she mused aloud, "but he did not change his vote to Belial. Meteor, on the other hand, did not hesitate to do so. Not only that, but Calisson made a show of urging me to protect Sleek, like he was trying to assert his innocence." She raised a cynical eyebrow. "He may have oversold it."

Nelmeer set to making a hideous origami dragon out of her chocolate wrapper, but left Calisson the open request "Try to convince me otherwise."

OOC: I hope I'm allowed fourth-wall-breakage here. :p
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Calisson
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Calisson »

Nelmeer had required some clarifications.
Calisson replied. "I pledged I woud always reply.

Two questions, two answers.

About my vote yesterday.
As you may remember, I said precisely that I was ready to vote either Meteor or Belial, along with the majority of you.
At that time, Belial had one vote, Meteor had one vote.
Then I withdrew my vote, tilting effectively the balance against Belial.
I had no time to vote again, Belial had been already voted off by a majority.
Meteor knew that either Belial or him were going. He had no afterthought voting Belial.

About oversolding the protection of Sleek.
Sure I did. I always do. Is there any example of anything I did not oversell?"
At this stage, Calisson hesitated. Would he oversell this argument, too?
"Now that you're telling me, I'm wondering if it might not be counter-productive to develop this last point."

Noting the relief in the eyes of Mioralynthia, Calisson realized that he might have guessed well.
He closed his mouth that inadvertantly had started to open.
Winds never stop blowing, Oceans are borderless. Get a ship and a crew, so the World will be ours! Today the World, tomorrow Nagg! {--|oBrotherhood of the Coast!o|--}
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Meteor »

"It felt strange to be suspected for being the least suspicious, and I have kept myself consistent and true to this point. Sleekdd always remained my prime suspect, Devan and then Belial were my secondary suspects after proven wrong. I was also asked to change vote so there was a resolution for Belial, I've only ever changed, or voted for someone who remained being my suspects. Now that we're left where we stand, naturally you and I have to suspect each other. At least I didn't have to randomly suspect someone for being the least suspicious." Meteor laughed at that last bit.
What's mine is mine, What's yours is mine.
Now that we understand each other, lets get down to business.

Jacks -Shade
- WS 5 - - S 3 - - T 2 - - D 6 - - I 5 -

Equipment
Short Sword, MC Long Sword*, Dagger, RxB & RHB [20/10] MC Shade Cloak, 4 Throwing Daggers, 3x Healing Vials, 451C, [3]Dark Venom, [4]Unseen Chains, Food, Dark Steed- Spike

Skills
Basic Stealth, Awareness, TWF, Suithenlu Khythan, Ride

Magic Item
Eye of the Jabberwock

*Magical properties possibly imbued
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Tarbo
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Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Tarbo »

Laboriously, the aide swapped out the cool, damp cloth from her drachau's neck, and pulled some hair from the bloodied face and into her bun. The white piece of cotton held to her nose had mostly soaked in red. The drachau's dismayed look was pale, her eyes sunken, her voice nasally dampened. “Where is he?”

The question was factual, serious, and left to gently marinated in a subtle hint of frustration and anticipation. Tarbo looked up from his cup of coffee, leaning relaxedly against the kitchen cupboard. “Who?”

“Sleek,” the drachau said, keeping a piece of cotton against her nose. “Sleek from Militant Emergency Health Insurance Requisitions.”

Tarbo pouted his lips and shook his head. “Haven't the faintest. I don't work here; I'm with Lynthia.”

“Oh? Then why aren't you with Lynthia?” she asked, and handed the bloody cotton to her aide, who quickly gave her a fresh one.

“She asked me to help keep this... thing running,” he said, and looked around himself. “Honestly, I can't tell the crazy stuff that's supposed to be happening from the crazy stuff that's not supposed to be happening. Balls to the wall snafu, back to front. Coffee?”

The drachau dapped the pristine cotton against her nose, and sighed. “If you see him, bring him to me. He and I need to talk.”

“Sure,” Tarbo acknowledged, and watched her and her aide leave. Or, perhaps, he craned his neck to watch them leave for as long as he comfortably could.

Peaceful moments calmly passed while Tarbo enjoyed his coffee. He leaned further back and stretched.

“Is she gone?” Two eyes cautiously peeked from the darkness in the kitchen cupboard.

“Looks like,” Tarbo said. “She seems nice.”

Sleek snorted. “Nice? That's what the Aztecs said. 'Cortez seems nice.' Oh, man... oh man, oh man, oh man,” Sleek moaned. “What am I going to do?”

“She'll leave the building at some point. That's when you can come out of that cupboard.” Tarbo frowned amusedly. “By the way, how did you fit into—”

“Do you tell Picasso how to paint?”

“Fair enough.”

°°°

The day simmers into evening. The sky darkens slowly, and the red sun lines the purplish clouds as they pass over the city. Maybe it'll rain. Maybe it'll pass by. The weather can be fickle like that.

“Well then,” Mioralynthia says with a deep breath for energy. “Nelmeer, it seems the final decision rests with you. If you'll let us know your choice, we will take it from there.”

_______________

    Player list
  1. Meteor
  2. Calisson
  3. Nelmeer

With 3 players, 2 constitute a majority.

    Dearly Departed
  1. Lordanubis (loyal) - Morning 1
  2. Deroth (protector, loyal) - Evening 1
  3. Telrunya (loyal) - Night 1
  4. Drainial (loyal) - Day 2
  5. Belial (infiltrator) - Evening 3
  6. Sleekdd (protector, loyal) - Night 3

It is now Evening. Night will set on the 18th of April, around 19h UTC.
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Nelmeer
Slave (off the Altar)
Posts: 20
Joined: Sat Mar 16, 2013 6:15 pm
Location: North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Nelmeer »

Nelmeer sat back in her chair thoughtfully. Decisions tumbled around in her head like clothes in a dryer. "Calisson's arguments... much like his scientific method... don't convince me," she said at length. She cast her vote. Then she sent up a quick prayer to Khaine (and a few other gods, just to be safe), pulled on a long pair of gloves to keep from biting her nails, squeezed her eyes shut, and waited.

VOTE: Calisson
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Calisson
Corsair
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Location: Hag Graef

Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Calisson »

Calisson rose both eyebrows. He had misunderstood Nelmeer's previous statements and did not realize that he had become the main suspect.
How strange, he thought. Being suspected because of arguing too much, how can I argue away from suspicion?

"Nelmeer?

Sorry, I realize only now that you have not clearly understood my attitude yesterday.

Maybe I was not clear enough about my reasons for urging you to keep an eye on Sleek.
Remember, at the time, I did not know how many protectors were there, one or two. Only you knew it, and you did not tell.
Sleek was one, that was next to certain, but what about you? You had shown some qualities that could have belonged to a protector.
In case you had taken upon that noble task, I wanted to make sure that Sleek and you would make it to the next day.
Do you think a saboteur would have advised the very action that would lead to his certain discovery the next day?

Afterthought, you turned out not to be a protector able to prevent Sleek from harm.
But how could I have known it beforehand?

Oh, and about suspecting me for not voting against Belial, be honest, any other attitude was no less suspicious.
Do you punish me from starting voting against Meteor yesterday? I had all reasons to vote him, no reason to wait or to vote anyone else.
Once you voted against Belial, I reacted, but did not overreacted.
Had I voted Belial immediately after you, how would you have judged such a hastly change?
Then everyone voted Belial off, rightfully. Now, imagine I had jumped last in the wagon and cast the overkill vote, it would have been like buying cheaply a virginity. I did not need to give Metor arguments to attack me the next day, assuming Belial was the right one, as he turned out to be.
Meteor had an easy task to buy his innocence. He did not care who was sent off, as long as it was not him.
I thought you would undestand that, really, I'm puzzled to find out what I did that you don't concur with.


But your vote has significance much beyond my own welfare.
Do you really want the tower to be run as desperately ineffectively as it has been so far?
What improvement do you expect by siding with someone as Meteor?

More importantly, do you really wish to reward and promote the total lack of cooperation, the constant low profile attitude that he has always shown?
And do you want to punish the openness, the share of analysis that you have benefitted with me?
Which attitude did help you more, if you had to balance?


Nelmeer, whether you stick with your decision or change it, that will be a decision you will have to live with for a long time.
I just wished I could side with you for an improved administration tower, but I cannot if you reject me."

-=-=-

OOC: Meteor had so little to do, that's unfair. :(
Winds never stop blowing, Oceans are borderless. Get a ship and a crew, so the World will be ours! Today the World, tomorrow Nagg! {--|oBrotherhood of the Coast!o|--}
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Meteor
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Location: Hell

Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Meteor »

"Well...I don't know if running the place as it is has any real benefits either, all this, certainly too troublesome for me. But I question the consequences of this place being run by someone with such a strong sense of logic and influence as yourself. If you prove to be a saboteur, to Nelmeer mostly, since I know which of us are, then I fear this place will eventually fall under your entire influence, for better or for worse, possibly worse, since the sabotages so far have warrant such a meeting, which in turn, has cost us a lot of innocent victims. You've already orchestrated these meetings quite well, a little too well, I can only fear for what you'd do to this entire place if you were to get away from here. As low profile as I may be, it just means I do my job, not run the place, quite simple, and as usual, not troublesome.

And besides, you're always quick to speak, I'm a bit surprised you didn't say much after unvoting me when Belial became a suspect. Of course, it'd make you suspicious too, since you'd be seemingly trying to defend a saboteur, but on the same note, both Belial and Sleek claimed they protected Nelmeer. So if you wanted to protect one protector, wouldn't it be logical to protect the other? It could also be concluded that you didn't vote for Belial because you knew he was your saboteur, and merely just unvoted me, knowing you don't need to vote to remove Belial."
What's mine is mine, What's yours is mine.
Now that we understand each other, lets get down to business.

Jacks -Shade
- WS 5 - - S 3 - - T 2 - - D 6 - - I 5 -

Equipment
Short Sword, MC Long Sword*, Dagger, RxB & RHB [20/10] MC Shade Cloak, 4 Throwing Daggers, 3x Healing Vials, 451C, [3]Dark Venom, [4]Unseen Chains, Food, Dark Steed- Spike

Skills
Basic Stealth, Awareness, TWF, Suithenlu Khythan, Ride

Magic Item
Eye of the Jabberwock

*Magical properties possibly imbued
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Nelmeer
Slave (off the Altar)
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Joined: Sat Mar 16, 2013 6:15 pm
Location: North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Nelmeer »

"You're right about one thing, Calisson," Nelmeer sighed. "I don't wish to reward Meteor's blithely indifferent behavior. The prospect of his cheering along with us, and feeling entitled to do so, annoys me to no end -- as much if not more than the prospect of losing." She sighed again, gazing at Meteor with a morose, inconsolable expression, as if he were a ruined sandcastle which contained an injured warhawk which was pecking a dead butterfly. "That said, I can't get past his bullheaded pursuit of Sleek and see him as guilty. I think a saboteur would be more erratic in his votes, would seize opportunities to vote for Deroth or Drainial, would avoid voting for Belial, would come up with elimination methods that just so happen to exclude everyone but himself... see where I'm going with this?" The elf shrugged listlessly. "If I'm wrong, we'll find out in due time. We need only wait for Meteor to vote." Wooden-faced and staring straight ahead, Nelmeer pulled a balloon out of her pocket, puffed some air into it, twisted it into a scimitar, leaned way over to Meteor, and popped it in his face. (She'd always wanted to do that.) She then slumped back into her seat.
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Meteor
Executioner
Posts: 1956
Joined: Sun Jul 18, 2010 10:57 am
Location: Hell

Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Meteor »

"And I don't like you either" Meteor said dryly when Nelmeer popped her kiddy toy in his face. "I thought it was clear Calisson and I would be voting against each other and awaited your vote to finalise things for the day? Well just to be clear, I too vote for Calisson, even though it irks me to admit I've been wrong about Nelmeer too."

Meteor sighed as he slumped back into his seat, seeing as though he wasn't going to be sent off, surprisingly.

Vote: Calisson
What's mine is mine, What's yours is mine.
Now that we understand each other, lets get down to business.

Jacks -Shade
- WS 5 - - S 3 - - T 2 - - D 6 - - I 5 -

Equipment
Short Sword, MC Long Sword*, Dagger, RxB & RHB [20/10] MC Shade Cloak, 4 Throwing Daggers, 3x Healing Vials, 451C, [3]Dark Venom, [4]Unseen Chains, Food, Dark Steed- Spike

Skills
Basic Stealth, Awareness, TWF, Suithenlu Khythan, Ride

Magic Item
Eye of the Jabberwock

*Magical properties possibly imbued
User avatar
Calisson
Corsair
Corsair
Posts: 8820
Joined: Fri Mar 14, 2008 10:00 pm
Location: Hag Graef

Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Calisson »

Calisson stood up.

"And so I have to quit. That's very disappointing.
You're both deceiving. Everyone has been deceiving.
With this inquiry, we had a wonderful opportunity to have all of the tenents of this dramatically poor administration be sent off, one after another.
Meanwhile, we could have transformed our department into something much more efficient. As efficient as a warship.
With elaborate logics and patient archive researches, it could have been even possible to guess the needs of the administrated people, in anticipation.
Imagine, no need to ask them for a form. No need to ask them to ever come to the tower.
The improved administration would have know all their needs even before they would have suspected them!
The aim was to solve the needs by surprise, just like corsairs raid unsuspecting villages and solve their existence before they realize they're dead.
That would have been the world most advanced, universally knowledgeable, top efficient administration.
Only smoking ashes and headless corpses would be left where we would have acted.

But, for you small confort, Meteor, and for your lack of vision, Nelmeer, you're comitting this poor city to endure more of our inefficient administration.
I needed only one of you to understand that. But no, you're just deceiving.
Well, what the two of you have gained by now is to cope with nine people's work until we come back."

Then he looked at Anleth and prepared for her to escort him to wherever was required.
"I'll explain you, you'll understand, for sure."
Winds never stop blowing, Oceans are borderless. Get a ship and a crew, so the World will be ours! Today the World, tomorrow Nagg! {--|oBrotherhood of the Coast!o|--}
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Tarbo
Morathi's Best Friend
Morathi's Best Friend
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Joined: Tue Oct 04, 2005 5:06 pm
Location: Flanders, Belgium

Re: SAU 19: On the Brink of Madministration

Post by Tarbo »

“Thank you for your votes,” Mioralynthia concludes. “Calisson, follow the captain, would you kindly? She will see you to HR.”

Calisson rises from his seat and raises his chin subtly. “Before I leave, may I make a parting statement for the record to include?”

A collective, discordant sigh fills the meeting room. The chairelfinn presses her lips and inhales bravely. “He is entitled to a parting statement,” she tells the sorceress.

“Of course he is,” Mioralynthia mutters under her breath, and nods once to Calisson. “Please proceed, mister Calisson.”

Calisson clears his throat and stands up straight. “Colleagues, ladies, gentlemen, it is with grave sadness that I find that my many attempts to help and further our efforts have led not only to your suspicion but to the belief that I, before all others, must be sent off for the betterment and amelioration of our situation, our department, and the whole of the administration that, if I may point out, has been severely but not irreparably disrupted by what bystanders could arguably call 'shenanigans,' a somewhat disrespectful denomination of our predicament, though it is hard to argue with those who do not fully appreciate the intricacies of our working procedures, as I can unfortunately recount with some enthusiasm the many opportunities my lesser esteemed colleague had to make a difference of any significant nature to aid our plight, but has categorically and blithely refused to do so under any circumstances other than by direct and immediate hostilities to his person in the form of threats, idle or otherwise, that have forced us to waste valuable time in pursuit of enabling one man, a single and singular man, to bring us to the affair of—”

“What have I done?” Mioralynthia lamented.

“—casting his vote in a well-thought and capable manner, though I would hesitate to call his recent behavior...”

°°°

Nightfall. Dying sunlight shone its reddish hue into the deserted offices from the west. Ghostly white beams from the growing moonlight softly stroked carpet and empty desks from the east.

Sleek quickly chimmeyed along the wall, and threw a careful look around. With the suppleness of a shadow, he turned the corner and hastily slipped from desk to desk. Again, he cautiously aimed his look around, scanning the environment. All clear.

Slowly, silently, Sleek took the keyring from his coat pocket and, hunched and crouched, made his way to the exit. He was a mere few steps away from leaving this floor and dissipating into the grander complex and its many, maze-like floors. He stood and swiftly turned the corner.

“Sleek.”

Sleek shrieked off-pitch, briefly showing the inside of his throat before he got the better of his panic reaction.

“Sleek from Militant Emergency Health Insurance Requisitions,” the drachau said, and nudged him back against the wall with her finger.

“You, ah, you remember the name,” Sleek said with an awkward grin.

“Oh yes, I do,” she chuckled with a decidedly hostile look in her eyes. “Sleek, you and I are going to have a little chat.”

°°°

“...and therefore, I believe that the final guilty party is, in fact, not myself, but my lesser esteemed colleague, who has deemed it altogether too troublesome to partake in any conversation or effort not directly related to himself or his immediate well-being, further fueling the belief that if anyone is required and, I dare say, encouraged to reevaluate his team spirit and contributions to the group effort, so that in the future, we are no longer dependent entirely on his despondent lack of cooperation in any part of our proceeding, requiring us to not only drag and pull a figurative dead weight around our speeches and reciting, but to, at any juncture in our investigation, take into account that one of our own is less than sufficiently interested in even following our progress sufficiently to make a founded decision, if any decision at all, based on what one of us charitably called a tenuous grip on reality that he has no interest in improving, it should be Meteor, if not only to provide him with the proper encouragement to escape from his self-deluding spiral of destructive and anti-social behavior, then surely to punish his mental absense in a period so defining in the operation of the centralised administration envisioned and lined out by our most esteemed drachau's predecessor, where his refusal to cooperate deserves nothing less than the stern rebukes we have attempted to correct him with, but that he has single-mindedly dismissed as argumentative and troublesome, a word he insists on using to describe any interaction with his environment whatsoever, leaving me—and indeed, many others—with the impression that his single goal in the workings of this administration is to get by with as little effort as possible, even less than arguably plausible, in blatant disregard of the impact this may have on any station or responsibility touched by his lack of engagement, and growing the suspicion that, if anyone in this room were to be suspected of contra-productive or even treasonous behavior—because that is, after all, why we were all gathered here in the first place; let us not forget that important fact—it should not be the humble servant pleading his case at this very moment, but the one who so ardently refused to make or take any stance at all, least of all a well-founded or argued one, and relished the opportunity to rid himself of anyone who he envisioned to be troublesome to him now or in the foreseeable future which, as I repeat, is not a quality that we should encourage in our positions held in such high esteem and to the stoutest requirements of our station, but that we should strive to dim and even eradicate before it grows into the view that our colleagues—or even the outside world, should others learn of this behavior—have of us, leading to a further degradation of our abilities, diminishing of overall employee morale, and throwing the entire foundation of our orderly approach to work into the complete disarray he found so tiring and troublesome to begin with, leaving us with no other conclusion than that, if we are to truly rid ourselves of the negative influences and destructive goals and intentions of the ones in our mids, we should start with the man we call Meteor, and should not resort to attempts to befuddle our logic by false inverting implications and associations, such as claiming that I must be guilty of harassing our personnel and even our very way of working because I appear to be the very least likely suspect, because that will leave us in the very chaos we are attempting to avoid by having these deliberations in the first place, for which I, now that I have the opportunity, would like to thank our present members, Mistress Mioralynthia and Captain Anleth, who have both braved our intricate structures and remained stalwart in face of the many challenges that we have all endured together, and I applaud their direct, responsible, and objective contributions to our process despite the attempts of some to undermine and dismiss the importance thereof—”

Anleth stared at Calisson as someone would at a hideously maimed corpse: horrified yet too intrigued to look away. Nelmeer rested her head on the table, scratching the ink from her notes with her nails and suckling her fingers after each letter, hoping to be carried off with lead poisoning. Mioralynthia's mind had seemingly boarded a train to happier places, the glazed look in her eyes giving merely token presence. Meteor shared her effort on the other side of the spectrum, and sat sloughed in his chair, showing all occupants his perfectly trimmed nostrils as he calmly snored his way through Calisson's speech.

“...and thereby rest my case as concluded and whole,” Calisson concluded, and reached for his glass of water.

“Bravo!” the chairelfinn exclaimed, and applauded for him. “Mister Calisson, I admire your clarity and directness. Would you like to chair the new committee to oversee the rewrite of our procedural handbook and regulation?”

“Madam chairelfinn, I would be honored to,” Calisson happily accepted. “In fact, it inspires me to practice my acceptance speech. May I? I expect to address it in the following fashion—”

“If I may interrupt?” With Sleek and the chief administrator in tow, the city's drachau entered the meeting room, trying to match descriptions to the people she found within. Sleek was strangely devoid of traumatic injuries, in full possession of all his bodily extremities and, aside from his pale face, in perfect seeming health. The chief administrator, however, was draining a bottle of water to cope with the massive amounts of cold sweat he was losing.

“Yes!” Mioralynthia answered with more than a respectable amount of enthusiasm, and she quickly corrected her demeanor. “Yes, please do interrupt. Drachau,” she greeted the new arrival.

“Mistress,” the drachau returned the greeting. “Sleek informed me about what's going on in here, and I have to say—”

“Oh, we're done!” the chairelfinn happily announces, and stands from her seat, smiling broadly at the drachau. “Proper procedure and protocol have saved the day yet again!”

“It's night,” the drachau drily remarked.

“Semantics. Mister Calisson, here, had been chosen to follow courses to learn proper team spirit, loyalty, and engagement so that he could once again thrive in our administrative wonder. In the meantime, I would like him to rewrite our regulations, because I have found him to be an example to us all.”

“Oh, really?” the drachau scoffed, and walked up to Calisson. “An example to you all?”

Calisson lengthily eyed the drachau unimpressedly, took his stamp to hand, and applied it to her an unbloodied part of her white blouse. “Beep.”

She stared witlessly at him, and blinked slowly.

“Beep,” he repeated as he stamped some other part of her blouse.

“Are... you insane?”

“Not at all. I will rewrite our regulations, and you do not conform to our dress code. Beep.” Before he could add another mark, Anleth locked his arms on his back, and forcefully escorted him from the room.

“Alright,” the drachau calmly started, and turned to her aide. “Summon my guard, and tell them to assemble in this building. Administrator, I need you to wake everyone in this building.”

“Um... but, um...” The chief administrator wobbled over to her. “Does the drachau mean current personnel or—”

“Everyone!” she screamed, her fingers twitching in rage. “Now!”

°°°

“But... but-but, but...” It was all the chief administrator managed to blurt out as he ran after his drachau. “But... but!”

“I want every desk scoured, every folder turned out, every archiver stripped, every last due form found and distilled into giant, honking stacks of overdue work created under your very nose! And Khaine help you if the stack of incompetence is taller than you are!”

“But, but... our procedures! We streamlined everything for efficiency, for transparency, for throughput and service,” the man panted. “Surely, the drachau recognises that we merely follow the dream of her esteemed predecessor, a great visionary?”

“My predecessor? I visited him before I came here. Do you know what he was doing? He was building a raft out of his bed to be lifted away on a sea of pixies. He had a supply of cotton balls he'd throw at the leprechauns that try to steal his shoes. My predecessor, good man, is batshit insane.”

Two soldiers passed by, carefully balancing ginormous stacks of paper on the desk they were carrying out.

The chief administrator swallowed, and looked the drachau's aide over. “Um... how tall are those heels? Any chance I could borrow them for a moment?”

°°°

“And thus the story ends,” Tarbo says, and digs into his fish filet. “Not a moment too soon.”

Polce sighs happily, whirling her wine in her glass. “Three weeks. Has it been three weeks already? Time flies. How much of it is still standing?”

“I hear they're taking apart the sixth floor now,” Telrunya says, and sniffs his coffee discerningly until he catches the scenty whiff of caffeine. “Started with the corner office. I loved that corner office.”

“You have a corner office now, don't you? At your new job?” Nelmeer asks, and looks out the tall window into the sunny noon. “Summer is coming.”

“I never understood people's infatuation with corner offices and sunlight,” Belial says, and sips from his cup of heated, watered down blood. “It's... troublesome.”

“Hey, that's my word!” Meteor exclaims.

“You call that troublesome?” Deroth says. “Maybe sunlight burns your skin, but HR 'team spirit' sessions burn a hole in your soul.”

“We're getting free therapy sessions now,” Devan consoles him, and cuts his apple, making sure not to spill any ketchup onto the restaurant's pristine white table cloth. “And I've got to say, I have a therapist I don't mind examining me, if you get my drift.”

“It had to be done,” Calisson says. “That monstrosity had to be destroyed from the inside. It took planning, it took foresight, it took accomplices, and one majorly ticked off drachau.”

“She's actually sort of nice,” Sleek recalls. “In a... broad sense.”

“Speaking of her, what happened to the chief administrator?” Anleth asks. “The one she offered to hang from the tower to be taller than the stacks of paperwork?”

“Oh, I saw some transfer requests pre-approved by the drachau,” Mioralynthia chimes in. “Held a few names I recognised.”

“Hey, guys,” Anubis says as he walks in, and takes off his coat. “Boy, it's been a while. Feels like I've been gone forever!

“So, what'd I miss?”

°°° Meanwhile...

Layer upon layer of ice and snow pack the rocky ground, stretching out a chill blanket over the never-ending plains. A biting, freezing blows past with a haze of hail, howling and whipping around guards that thanklessly patrol the northern borders.

In this inhospitable frost, one man patiently sets up a ticket machine pointing to the Chaos Wastes in the north, squinting his glass eye as he estimates how long a line he should be able to accommodate.

“Bloody prima donna cowboys.”

_______________

    Player list
  1. Meteor
  2. Nelmeer

    Dearly Departed
  1. Lordanubis (loyal) - Morning 1
  2. Deroth (protector, loyal) - Evening 1
  3. Telrunya (loyal) - Night 1
  4. Drainial (loyal) - Day 2
  5. Belial (infiltrator) - Evening 3
  6. Sleekdd (protector, loyal) - Night 3
  7. Calisson (infiltrator) - Evening 4

The Council is victorious! Happy days are in Naggaroth's well-administrated future!

Thank you all for playing, and I hope you had a good time!
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