"This is insanity!"

For the sake of punctuation, the bespectacled chief director slammed his fist on the table. The sound of the impact echoed impotently in the familiar meeting room, and the other man sitting across the table soon cleared his throat. It was a familiar scene, a clandestine congregation between Mensah and Tsephanyah, with the only exception of foregoing those ridiculous cowls for once.

The silence following the younger man's outburst lasted remarkably long, but at last, he ran out of patience and set his elbows onto the table before burying his face in his hands.

"Are you quite finished?"

Tsephanyah's words were snide, but his tone was anything but that, and when the other director didn't respond, he also placed his elbows down to mirror his posture, just without the facepalming.

"It must be a bad joke. A terrible comedy," Mensah groaned and lowered his hands. His eyes were bloodshot, as if he didn't get a wink of sleep, and his mouth was set in a quivering line. "The second advent of Deus should be an event worth a red-letter day in the calendar, so why? Why did it have to happen this way? Out of all the millions of mortals, why did it have to be someone Polemos personally knew?"

"The odds were staggering, but there's not much we can do about it at this stage."

Tsephanyah's disinterested voice made the flames in the bespectacled director's eyes blaze once again.

"Yes, we can! We have to separate them, as soon as possible!"

"And how do you propose we do that?"

"I don't know! That's the problem!" Mensah fumed, his fists shaking and ready to pound the poor table all over again. "Polemos was bad enough alone, but if she indeed is Deus, there is no way we can openly go against them, but we can't leave them together either!"

The blonde Reformist director's eyes narrowed into a displeased squint.

"You are too focused on separating the two, Dolion. Shouldn't we focus on more pressing matters first, considering the—"

"There is no such thing!" Mensah burst out and slammed his hand down once more. "We can't allow Polemos to exert his influence on Deus while he… she is vulnerable!"

"Why?"

"What do you mean 'why'?! He openly colluded with Bel of the Abyss!"

After hearing his colleague's latest outburst, Tsephanyah exhaled a measured breath and placed both his hands onto the table.

"Dolion. There is an idiom I'm not usually very fond of, but I believe it aptly describes your current situation." He levelled a dispassionate gaze at the man and continued in a soft voice. "I believe it goes like this: Let the one not living in a glass house cast the first stone."

That… was obviously a mish-mash of two completely different sayings, yet the other director immediately understood his intent and his brows descended into a furious glare.

"Are you accusing me of something, Acacius?"

"There is a difference between an accusation and pointing out the truth," he responded with a deep frown of his own. "Or are you denying that you personally conspired with one of the noble houses of the Abyss?"

"That is different! Only a fool wouldn't try to exploit and undermine their enemy!"

"So you say, and expect the benefit of the doubt, yet you are unwilling to give the same courtesy to Polemos," Tsephanyah pointed out, his expression inscrutable.

"… On whose side are you, Acacius?" the younger director growled, his balled-up fingers turning white and his eyes thundering, but the other man remained unmoved.

"I'm on the side of our people, as always."

"You know what I meant by that question. Answer it."

Tsephanyah remained silent for a couple of seconds, but at last, his body language relaxed and he simply stated, "Unlike you, I did not rise to my position through fiery rhetoric and ideological support. I did so by carefully maneuvering the treacherous waters of the Directorate, and in that process, I've developed an eye for people." He closed his eyes for a second, and it was hard to tell whether he was reminiscing about something, or steeling himself before concluding his point. "When I look at Polemos, I see a dangerous individual. A harbinger of change, who cares not for our order. Alone, he was a raging river; a power that could carve the landscape, but could still be steered or dammed up with effort. I believed we had time to do just that, and tame him, but now he's no longer by himself. With Deus, we are facing not a flood, but a tidal wave the likes of which we've never seen before."

"And that's why I'm telling you they have to be separated!"

"And in turn, I'm telling you it's impossible. We have neither the authority nor the means to do so," Tsephanyah countered, his measured voice never rising above an exasperated monotone. "We have been too complacent in our power and influence, Dolion, but we are powerless in front of the wave that's coming. So, to answer your question, let me say this: Only a fool would try to stand in the way of a tsunami, and I'm no fool."

"Hypocrite!"

Mensah's hiss made the older director flinch for the first time, but his demeanour soon returned to his previous, laidback state.

"Aren't we all?"

"… So it has come to this." All of a sudden, all the previous ire drained from Mensah's voice and he let out a long groan and stood up, ready to leave.

"Dolion." Hearing the other man call after him, the bespectacled director stopped in his tracks and met his eyes. "Think hard about what's the best. Not just for us, but all of Elysium. We might not be able to stop the wave, but that doesn't mean we cannot ride it."

Mensah let out an ambivalent grunt in response and turned on his heels. He left the room, followed by the gaze of the other director until he closed the door behind himself, and only then did the tension drain from Tsephanyah's shoulders.

All of a sudden, he looked about a decade older, and his expression practically screamed, 'I hope I put my money on the right horse'. I watched him a bit longer, just to see if there would be any further development, but when he also got up and left, I Far Glanced over to Mensah, to see his side of the aftermath of the meeting.

The younger director seemed to be even more shaken than his more experienced colleague, and I just caught him talking with a younger Celestial woman dressed in an elaborate office lady ensemble. She wasn't familiar, so she most likely didn't have an important position.

"… to pry, but… is it true? Is Deus truly walking amongst us?"

Even as they walked, Mensah directed an exhausted frown at her.

"Yes. Yes, she is."

"She?!" The most-likely-secretary lady responded in a high-pitched voice, and then sputtered, "W-What are we going to do now, sir?"

"… I don't know yet," Mensah admitted, and the two of them soon entered into an elevator.

Since the two of them remained silent after that, I figured I should check on the third corner of the Celestial power triangle, and so I soon shifted my point of view to Savir. The moment I arrived, I was welcomed by cacophonous noise, with dozens of people frantically shouting and running around.

My eyes beheld a… well, I had no idea exactly what I was looking at. At a glance, it was kind of reminiscent of one of those open-plan offices I'd seen in movies, with rows of wooden desks and office chairs in a large, undivided hall. Between those, Celestials dressed in deep blue robes were running around like chickens in a coop that just got visited by a fox. Some of them were empty-handed, or frantically poking at things that looked like three-dimensional computer screens projected into the air by marbles embedded in the desks. The majority though were rushing around, carrying all kinds of items in their arms, from simple sheets and ledgers to rolled-up parchments and even an abacus of all things.

All of that, combined with the rows and rows of huge filing cabinets lining the walls, some of the only accessible by ladders, made me think this was some kind of archive… but then I looked up, and saw the enormous stained-glass windows, the carved columns holding up the ceiling, and the painted classical sculptures and reliefs all around. Then, if all of that wasn't strange enough already, at the very back of the hall, on a raised red marble platform, stood an enormous golden throne in the shape of three pairs of folded angel wings studded with enormous jewels.

In front of that was an equally large desk of some sort, carved of the same red marble as the platform. It was currently covered in all kinds of documents and parchments, providing a stark contrast with the dozen or so light blue holographic panels floating in the air above it, complete with the familiar scanlines and everything.

Behind those, sitting on the above-mentioned throne, sat Director Savir. Her expression was stern, but her eyes were frantic, skipping from one panel to the next, and her hands were similarly trying to keep up with whatever she was trying to jot down onto the empty pages in front of her.

"Ma'am Director! I found the precedent in the three-seven-thee-dash-B case!"

"Good job. Put it over there," she responded tersely, and the Celestial scribe placed the parchment onto the top of the growing pile on her left. "Where's that Legacy Requisition Form?"

"Sorry, ma'am!" I voice responded from the top of one of the ladders. "I can't seem to find it!"

"Look harder!" Savir yelled at the poor guy, her voice easily overpowering the background noise. "We need that for the twenty-three-hundred-dash-K!"

"I… I'll check the depreciated form cache!"

She let out a grunt and picked up one of the parchments. After skimming it, her mouth widened into a mirthless smile, and she muttered, "Just you wait Leonard…"

That was kind of ominous, but I couldn't exactly figure out what she was trying to do yet, so I continued to observe her. Unfortunately, even after close to twenty minutes, I was no closer to the answer, but every once in a while, I caught her whispering things along the lines of '… just because you're strong…' and '… even Deus can't ignore this…' and, maybe most sinisterly, '… you'll experience the full might of two millennia of Celestial bureaucracy…'

That last one was even followed up by an ominous chuckle, but it didn't take a PhD to figure out that she was plotting something. That was nothing new, but the avenue seemed to be rather novel. In any case, I would've most likely continued to observe her, if not for someone poking my side to get my attention.

Turning over, I found Mountain Girl looking at me, and when she was sure she got my attention, she silently gestured towards the window. Glancing over, I let out a shallow sigh and turned back to Angie and Josh.

While I was busy spying on the three biggest variables, she managed to wiggle her way into the good graces of our hosts, and she even received a jar of pickled olives she was currently sharing with the little kid. The owner of the household and his wife looked upon the two of them affectionately, their previous apprehensions completely melted by her sunny smiles, while Josh was doing his best to play the role of the dedicated bodyguard by standing behind her.

Of course, she didn't completely forget about the original goal of our visit, and after chatting with the Malakim, she finally accepted the obvious state of affairs of the Elysium. I supposed there was no harm in letting her digest that on her own, so I didn't interrupt their talk, but it was time to move on.

"Your attention, please," I called out to my friends, maintaining my Polemos persona, and for some reason that caused Angie to giggle uncontrollably. Ignoring her, I vaguely gesture in the direction of the entrance. "Our escorts arrived. We must take our leave."

"Escorts?" the Celestial girl echoed me and came over to my side, half-empty pickle jar in hand.

For the moment, I didn't explain anything, but focused on our hosts instead.

"We thank you for your hospitality and honesty."

"It… It was our honor, O Second True Archon Lord Archon…" the man sputtered, obviously nervous, and his wife once again lowered her gaze, not daring to look me in the eye. Maybe she was shy?

"You're welcome!" The same couldn't be said about the little boy, and she flashed a toothy smile at Angie. "Will you visit again? I'll introduce you to Bukephalas next time!"

"I'd love to, but…" Angie glanced at me, and when I didn't respond, her shoulder drooped and she muttered, "I'm afraid we're going to be busy for a while."

The smile on the kid's face withered at once, but he didn't say anything. In the meantime, Josh also noticed the commotion outside, and tried to get my attention by subtly bumping into me with my shoulder.

"I know." After whispering so, I gestured to Angie and addressed our hosts one last time. "Farewell."

Before the people outside could get any funny ideas, I opened the front door and walked out, and Angie automatically followed after me while waving behind her. However, the moment she faced forward, she let out a shocked grasp.

"Lord Archon, sir!"

The loud voice of armour guy made her shudder again, and even Josh tensed up. I gestured for them to calm down and faced the four Praetorian Guards and the hundred or so 'volunteer guards' lined up on the street.

"Who are these people?" Angie whispered to me, sounding a little scared of the sudden display.

"Just my honour guard," I told her without any pretences. "You'll get to know them soon."

After an odd huff, it was Josh's turn to whisper, "I don't like the way they are looking at me…"

At first, I had no idea what he was talking about, but then on closer look, I noticed that armour guy, wetsuit chap, hammer lad, and uniform bloke were all subtly eyeing him. I imagined they would be suspicious of the new guy, but instead, they looked expectant and maybe a little… competitive?

"Huh…" I murmured, causing Josh to tense up even more.

"What?" When I didn't respond right away, he repeated, slightly louder, "What? You know I hate it when you do this!"

"It's nothing," I responded offhandedly and took a step forward. "I just realized you might get to know these guys quicker than Angie would, that's all."