The Citizens felt it before they heard it. 

A Conference™ had taken place. 

Nobody had seen it, nobody dared mention it, but everyone knew. No minutes were shared, no memos circulated, nothing at all was written down — it was as if the Conference had never happened. The only signs of its existence were a faint smell of coffee in the upper corridors, a bin of discarded flipcharts, and, most of all, the subtle unease of Managers returning with new, contradictory certainties. Some Citizens began to say that this very absence of record was the sacred mark of such gatherings: only what was unwritten could truly guide the future.

The Managers’ Return

In the weeks that followed, managers reappeared in their offices, each armed with a different fragment of revelation, delivered slowly and inconsistently as if the Conference had never truly ended. In one team, there were whispers of mergers, spreading in half-sentences that left staff unsure whether their unit would exist tomorrow. In another, assurances arrived that restructuring was nothing more than a harmless exercise in “alignment,” yet the tone suggested something heavier was moving beneath the surface. In a third, managers spoke softly of reassurance, promising that “nobody is losing their position”—yet almost in the same breath they unfurled diagrams of dissolved teams and freshly renamed departments, as if words and drawings inhabited different realities, each new draft contradicting the last.

The contradictions were not mistakes; they were the ritual itself. As different teams shared projects and priorities, these half-truths inevitably crossed paths. What was whispered in one corridor contradicted what was promised in another, and soon the very act of exchanging news only deepened the fog, sowing confusion as deliberate as it was unavoidable. By then, diagrams were traded between departments like talismans, carried from desk to desk, compared in hushed voices as if decoding a set of sacred runes.

Déjà Vu

Among them was Lucius ap A. Ratchik, Ald’s N+3. Frail and pale, with the face of a youth and the body of a convalescent, Lucius cultivated an air of fragility that masked his shrewd instinct for survival. He spoke softly, always just above the edge of hearing, so that his staff leaned forward, straining to catch his words. The act of listening to him was itself a kind of submission.

“The Conference… was not about cuts. No one is losing their position.”

He let the sentence linger, and for a moment relief flickered across the table. Then came the inevitable correction, delivered in the same calm tone:

“…But… we are becoming leaner. Leaner means we can move… differently.”

Nobody asked what “differently” meant. That was the point. Lucius never spoke enough to be pinned down, never firmly enough to be remembered. His meaning bent with the listener, a fluid script that adjusted to whoever repeated it later, and even shifted depending on whom Lucius had spoken with last. A conversation with a superior might tilt his words one way; an exchange with a peer could bend them another. The message itself was never fixed—it floated, always adapting, always reversible. 

He turned a faint smile toward his lower-rank managers, who nodded dutifully, eager to be seen agreeing. To the rest — the field technicians, the small people — he gave only a vague glance, a gesture that was neither warm nor hostile, merely indifferent. They would learn in due time. Or not at all.

Ald Firt, three rungs below, watched in silence. He had seen this before: the return from a Conference That Was Not, the drip of contradictions, the silence that followed. Déjà Vu. 

In Absurdistan, and especially in SHOTE, what was said mattered less than what was never spoken. Ald drained a small sip from his peppermint schnapps flask, muttering under his breath that the only certainty left was the shitstorm to come.

He sensed it like a low rumble beneath the floorboards, the vibration of a storm that had not yet broken—the shit was on its way to hit the fan. 

The Ghost of Confusion

As weeks passed and contradictions grew sharper, dissatisfaction began to stir. To calm the murmurs, a series of Townhalls was organised. They were branded as weekly Q&As, a new feature meant to reassure the Citizens, but they yielded little: the staff tasked with answering were themselves lower‑ranked functionaries armed with the same fragments of contradictory news. The sessions took on the atmosphere of a séance, with participants leaning forward, waiting for clarity from the other side — but only hearing echoes of their own doubts. Their words overlapped, contradicted one another, and left questions hanging heavier than before.

Lionbum appeared only occasionally, stepping into the Townhalls with his carefully groomed, sporty‑casual image, the look of an ex‑diplomat who wished to appear busy, dynamic, and just beyond reach. Each time, he offered no more clarity than before, though he never forgot to end with his favourite mantra: “GO TEAM.” Finally, a special edition Townhall was announced, promising updates on the grand strategic processes. Citizens gathered, hopeful for substance. Lionbum stood before them, immaculate in his curated style, and spoke in allegories once again. He told of trees that must shed branches yet remain whole, of leaner bodies that were somehow stronger, of anchors heavy enough to sink ships. 

The Citizens nodded gravely, as they always did, though no one understood a word. That was Lionbum’s strength: never clear enough to be challenged, never firm enough to be proven wrong.

Ald Firt’s Last Word

Thus, the system got ready to continue moving on for a few more weeks, carrying the weight of unseen decisions, while citizens whispered cautiously to each other:

• “Have you heard the new metaphors?”
• “Yes. They’re… leafy this week.”

Overhead, Hedwig rustled in the rafters as if unimpressed, and Balthazar twitched in Ald’s coat pocket at every cheer of “GO TEAM.”

Ald uncapped his flask and allowed himself a dry smile. “Ah yes… the sacred ritual of strategic realignment. May the Dumbledore preserve us. Restructure today, reinvent tomorrow, and by Friday, no one remembers who ordered the coffee.” he murmured to Balthazar, who blinked back in silent agreement.

And then, amid the unease, he added with a healthy swig when no one was watching: “Well, they say every ending is just the beginning of another consultation process. Chin up, my friends — uncertainty builds resilience. Or at least job applications.”

Like that, the noise of the Conference ended without minutes, without evidence, without clarity. It slipped into memory like steam rising from a broken kettle, leaving only damp patches on the walls of SHOTE. Yet it had happened. And for the Citizens, that was enough. They would bend, as always, until the next Conference returned — or until the next storm of metaphors rattled through the Townhall like leaves in a draft.

Ald, tightening the cap of his flask, muttered one last line as he shuffled away: “Nothing quite like being thanked for your contribution… while they’re hiding the shovel behind their backs.” A few Citizens exchanged glances — one eyebrow raised here, a muffled chuckle there — before they, too, returned to their desks, carrying the ghost of confusion with them.