[u][h2][color=orange]Ingress, Coalition Capital[/color][/h2][/u]

"Executive Chairman Taff Yamo of the Committee on Committee Efficiency", the little nameplate said. It was brass on coral, and sat weightily on his desk*. Taff's foretentacle softly effused a charcoal flavor. He tapped it with a grasper tentacle. Vice Manager Uti Omo appeared in Taff's wetware.

"This is Taff," he said.
[i]"Executive Chairman, I have the Adjustment Team report from Ragnorak Station,"[/i] she said.
"Proceed."
[i]"Chief Xam has successfully enforced edict RL-H3R v.0 by removing the potential vigilante from the equation. In process, he has also potentially begun enforcement of edict CL-34N v.3.2 through the acquisition of ears-only data. Unfortunately, circumstances behind his enforcement of edict RL-H3R v.0 necesitated his temporary removal from Coalition Space. His last-filed expense report mentions a yacht charter for two days ago. We have since been unable to reopen communications. Please find all mandated paperwork attached."[/i]
"Understood. Need anything?"

Uti's headsack pulsed twice.

[i]"...not yet,"[/i] she ultimately said. [i]"Though it is believed that Chief Xam's intelligence actionability window may close rapidly. If we are unable to debrief him in the next 24 hours, I recommend we send another Adjustment Team to locate him and do so."[/i]
"I'll follow up with the Astry Committee and Xenodiplomacy Committee in the meantime. Perhaps they can find him."
[i]"Thank you, sir. His ship's details are attached with the mandated paperwork."[/i]
"Good. Taff out."

He severed the call. 

Taff turned an eye toward the view outside his office. The Central Bureaucracy stretched out for miles. It was all one massive, interconnected building by now, with maglevs arcing from one sector to another. A tuft of massive cranes sprouted from CTN-sector, which was the currently-designated sector for repair and upgrades. His wings fluttered anxiously. He pulled up the current Schema - the combined efforts of all members of the C.C.E. went into the making of this map of the Coalition. It wasn't a map of physical space, but rather, an extensive and exhaustively-researched organizational flowchart that updated live.

"Bring up the simplified statistics," Taff ordered his wetware. The nebula of information was replaced by several spreadsheets.

[code]
Sampling Accuracy: 67%
Number of Committees: 6,730
Mean Edicts/Committee: 700
Crises Brought to C.C.E. this week by Severity:
  Important/Severe/Dire/White-Hot
  33/14/2/0
[/code]

Taff sighed. It was something he'd picked up from Jenny, his executive assistant. "Redisplay Schema," he said. The statistics were replaced by the hierchical cloud of organizations and people. The sampling accuracy had been steadily falling for the past 8 months. Even with the C.C.E. doubling its sampling team and increasing its pool of adjustment teams, they'd only managed to slow its descent. When it reached 50%, Taff had no idea what would happen. The whole point of the C.C.E. was to have a sufficiently high-up view of the Coalition so as to cut out the red tape and ensure reasonability survived. 

Ever since the Xim-Federation war, the Coalition had exploded in new member states. It was no surprise; there was always an upswing during major wars, and with the Federation and Xim being so close to the Coalition, member states had grown at an alarming rate.

[sup]*Cthonic desks are not like human desks. They make maximum use of tentacles, and resemble something closer to gymnastics bars and playground equipment. The Cthon plops itself down in the center of a series of slabs and rods on a rotating platform and spreads its tentacles out in a 230 degree swath. Cthonic brains are wired in such a way to allow multitasking in this fashion, especially for something as simple as paperwork.[/sup]

~o~0~o~

"So closes the 745th meeting of the Xenodiplomacy Committee," Executive President Ima Thurwich said. She cracked the ceremonial shell in half. "I yield the floor to Executive Vice President Mao Thrawk." Ima stalked off the central podium with relief, passing the digital key to Mao. 
"Enjoy your rest period," Mao said as they passed each other.
"Thanks. I'm glad you got here when you did," she said.

Mao climbed the podium and gathered his tentacles into one almighty stalk, splaying them out near the bottom. It was the most comfortable way to stand for long periods of time. He waited for committee members to filter in and out of the X.C. Hall before slapping the podium with a tentacle. "This marks the beginning of meeting 746 of the Xenodiplomacy Committee," he said. "We shall begin this meeting with the state-of-the-galaxy report, followed by subcommittee reports, followed by crises collection. Ammendments to the speaker schedule are being forwarded to you now. Please note that the current committee state is green, and therefore no alerts may interrupt this order of business unless they are blue or higher."

Mao's wetware immediately supplied the acrid flavor of an indigo interrupt alert. Damnit, couldn't the universe wait for his meeting to start?

The chairman of the Subcommittee on Foreign Affairs stood. His skin was mottled with the gray patches of age.

"I recognize chairman Sito," Mao said.
"I have taken the liberty of ammending the schedule. I submit to you the following reports," Sito said. 
[hider=Attachment][u][center][color=lime][h1]
I̩̮̗̭̭͈͘n͏̻f̨̬̩̘͔̮ơ̮r҉̩̘ͅm͕̥̱̱͔̕at̻̤̫̟͙i̥͔͇̞̺͜o̝̣̗̤n͔̖̳ ̵͇̦͉͎͎̼͚R̴͙̯͈̞e͍̥̣p̼̪̳̤̙̥̞ơr͇͎̹̜̙͎̪t̵[/h1]

[sub]Form INFO-B*[/sub][/color][/center][/u]
[hr]
[b][color=8b40b2]Priority: Indigo[/color][/b]
Number of Relevant Sub-Forms: Two (2)

[u]Subform 1:[/u]
Subject Entity: Various as-yet-designated ships (xrf: DB f.a.c. 3341)
Verb: Visitation detections near border worlds
Object Entity: United Federation of the Sol System (UFSS)
Source: Syndicated Corporations of the Valhall System (Syndicate)
[indent][sup]Source Subtype: Arms merchants[/sup][/indent]
Other: N/A

[u]Subform 2:[/u]
Subject Entity: Confederate diplomatic vessel
Verb: Exploded by unknown entity
Object Entity: N/A
Source: Broadcast from UFSS
Other: Event happened within UFSS space

[hr][sup][color=lime]*For reports involving entropic-level events, please use form INFO-C[/color][/sup][/hider]
"Based on this data and historical patterns, it is possible that the Solarans are building an alliance against the Xim," Sito said.
"I recognize chairwoman Yanna, of the Subcommittee of Diplomats." Mao said.
"If you excuse the interruption," Yanna started, - [[code]35 to 18 in favor of excusing the interruption[/code]] - "I believe that a few chance meetings seen by arms merchants is insufficient to alter our diplomatic stance toward the Solarans."
"Of course it is insufficient," Sito said. "It raises an interesting possibility worth watching, however." [@Sigma][[code]28 - 25 in favor of increased intelligence operations against the UFSS[/code]]

The undersecretary representing the Committee of Lies and Spies tapped on a wetwared foretentacle furiously.

"Moving on to the ammended schedule-item number two," Sito said, "I move that we request the Committee on Committee Efficiency investigate the possibility of a rogue committee's responsibility for the destruction of the Confederate vessel."

For the first time in Mao's tenure, he could hear the conference room's environment systems.

"That's absurd! What reasonable person would destroy a diplomatic ship? We've survived this long through dedicated neutrality!" Yanna said.
"And who would claim that our current system of governance is reasonable?" Sito countered. "I've heard reports of senior committee members failing to attend meetings because they forgot which committees they were a part of! It's a wonder we accomplish anything. Who knows what would happen should a Coalition member state happen to disagree with one of the thousands of edicts. Why not a rogue committee? Perhaps some felt a need to take diplomacy back into their own hands. I'm simply asking to request an investigation by a committee that I, frankly, had only ever heard of when my assistant forwarded me its name!" [[code]40 to 13 in favor of requesting an investigation[/code]]