Cabinet Room
Well, well, here’s everybody. Your entire Cabinet is assembled at the meeting table, shuttling papers around like crazed hamsters. The giant video screen is showing a grid of little boxes with a person in each one, Brady Bunch-style.
The entire room went all deer-in-the-headlights the second you entered the room.
One of the Cabinet secretaries (maybe the Education one? I don’ know) beams at you. “Oh Hello Mr. President! And how are you enjoying your first day? Oh! I see you have the gift we left for you, I hope you like it!”
>x secretary
There are twelve Cabinet members/secretaries/whatevers here. They all do what you tell them, which is all that matters.
>x education secretary
This is a little embarrassing, but you don’t really remember which one does exactly what thing. They are all excellent, fiercely devoted advocates for your cause though. Really good people.
>x attorney general
Yah…maybe she’s that one? She seems pretty good.
>attorney general, hello
One of the secretaries (maybe the Attorney General, who knows) says, “Good morning, Mr. President! How can we be of service today?”
>a screen
One of the secretaries says, “Just a little telecom test, to if our global network is up and ready for you. Which it is. Phew! Haha.”
>a election
A secretary says, “Yes. All the puzzle pieces really fell into place for us, didn’t they.”
Two secretaries wearing super-similar ties high five each other.
>x tie
Everybody has blue on. Except you.
>x screen
The screen displays a giant grid of Brady Bunch boxes, each subtitled with a country name; looks like you’ve got at least half the United Nations patched in here. Beneath the screen is a little A/V maintenance panel.
The man in the Chinese box sees you staring. “Hello Mr. President! So nice of you to join us! We are testing out our new conferencing software! It looks like it’s working quite excellently!”
>x boxes
There’s a bunch of boxes filled with important people on the screen. The Chinese box man seems the most excited to see you.
>x chinese box
The man in the Chinese box is standing in a room a lot like yours, except it’s Chinese. Behind him is a similar room of Chinese people blinking at you. Behind them, a row of huge Chinese windows looks outside to China.
>x China
Very Chinese. The room they are in looks pretty high up; all the Chinese people down on the parade ground look like Chinese ants. A decidedly non-Chinese monument rises off in the distance.
>x French box
There’s a bunch of boxes, from all sorts of countries. The Chinese box guy seems the most excited to see you.
>x chinese windows
Looks pretty Chinese outside. Except for that giant obelisk. The giant obelisk looks exactly like the Washington Monument.
>x monument
Not Chinese.
That’s interesting. There’s an obelisk in the background of every Brady Bunch box.
>x projector
The projector is projecting its little heart out.
>get projector
It’s built into the table.
>turn off projector
One of the secretaries politely brushes your hand away. “Haha! Oh, our Mr. President, always the prankster.”
>g
One of secretaries stops you. “Oops! Nuh-no, sir. Haha.”
>x panel
The maintenance panel is closed.
>open panel
Inside the panel is the typical maddening Escher-like array of ethernet whazzamabobs, blinking indicatorizing and extension cordery.
>get whazzamabobs
They are far too terribly tanglified to take.
>get indicators
The indicatorizers are impossibly intertwined.
>get cords
After tracing its mind-bending path over and under and under and over, you finally manage to thread one of the extension cords out of the panel. The screen is still working, so I guess you haven’t messed with anything important.
(Your score just went up by one point.)
>g
The rest of the cordery is a lost cause.
>x indicators
You assume the blinky blinks mean “everything is cool.”
>show hand to secretary
A dozen chairs scrape the floor in unison as the Cabinet rises to their collective feet. Each secretary raises their hand in reply. Their hand pyramids look a little less homebrew than yours. The Cabinet’s eyes flutter in their collective eyelids.
“E PLURIBUS UNUM!”
One of the Secretaries scrambles up on her chair, poking holes through the leather with her heels. “By the all-knowing grace of the Framers, the Poor Richard has made himself known to us!”
The Chinese guy on the screen is standing on his Chinese chair too, along with everybody in all the Brady Bunch boxes. Haha! Jesus. “We are honored to serve. We know you shall not quail in your duty.”
You do that thing you do: stick your lower lip out a tad, nod and squint your eyes in a way that hopefully looks like you know what they are talking about.
>w
As you turn to leave, one the Secretaries presses something into your hand. “Take this. For Doom’s Day.”
>l in hand
you are carrying:
A small brass bald eagle.
>x eagle
About the size of your fist, with wings raised in flight. It has a little nub with threads in the bottom, like a screw.
** { Use the pole to turn on the detector. – The eagle screws into the top of the pole. Before having the eagle up there on the pole, it almost reaches but not quite, something you also notice while waving the flag. } **
>push button
The detector is too high up to reach.
>push button with pole
You hoist the pole up to try and push the button, but it’s way up there.
>climb on desk
You get up on the desk.
>push button with pole
You hoist the pole up to try and push the button. So close! It’s like three inches away from the top of the pole.
>x pole
Your standard ceremonial flagpole. Except this one is missing the decorative doodad on top.
>x top
(of the flagpole)
There’s a threaded socket on the top of the flagpole. Looks like somebody stole the pole topper.
>screw eagle
Yah man, screw that brass eagle!
>screw eagle to pole
OK, it’s on there.