The corridors of the Central People's Committee building were excessively long.
Perhaps that was why, with every step, a trail of thought followed close behind.
The morning meeting was drawing near, and a file of documents was tucked firmly under my arm, yet I habitually cast my gaze toward the wall where the portraits hung.
This hallway was the chronicle of the Union, etched in wooden frames and oil paint.
The first portrait was Vladimir.
The founder of Communism.
The first among the Founding Fathers.
The man who led and secured victory in Terra's first socialist revolution.
The very architect who bound the Columbian Soviet Republic and the Victorian Soviet Republic together to establish the Union of Terra Soviet Socialist Republics.
He was the first elected Chairman of the Central People's Committee and Chairman of the Supreme Soviet.
Every time I look at that face, one thing comes to mind.
He belonged to no faction, and thus, he could control them all.
Only those who understand the agonizing weight of neutrality choose it. Whenever the cliques were on the verge of tearing each other apart, he restored balance with an invisible hand.
That was possible not merely because he was cautious, but because he moved with greater haste than anyone else.
He successfully oversaw the first and second Five-Year Economic Development Plans, and in the midst of it all, he drove the Great Patriotic War against the Gaulish Empire to total victory.
Victory always remains as a mere formal sentence in history books, but in reality, every such triumph grinds away the years of a man's life.
And toward the end of the war, he incited the Gaulish Revolution, annexing the Gaulish Soviet Republic—which had discarded its monarchy—into the Union.
People remember him as a great revolutionary, but I do not forget that he was also a great administrator.
Revolution is the beginning; administration is the endurance.
He did both.
And so, his health broke.
Resigned due to health issues stemming from overwork.
When I first heard that sentence as a youth, I could not smile for a long time.
It was then that it became clear the Union functioned by grinding its Chairmen into the gears of state.
Nowadays, Vladimir has completely withdrawn from politics.
He currently serves as the Chairman of the Central Committee of the International Communist Party, wandering the world and writing treatises on communist ideology.
The next portrait: Wrangel.
The first head of the Social Revolutionary Workers' League.
One of the Founding Fathers.
If his era were summarized in a single phrase, it would be 'Labor Reform.'
He saved lives with tedious words like workplace safety, welfare, regulations, and inspections.
He also pushed the third Five-Year Economic Development Plan to success and actively encouraged the use of chemical fertilizers invented in the institutes.
Of course, I know it didn't end with mere 'encouragement.'
He drove the mechanization of the countryside even harder.
Agricultural yields leaped noticeably, and grain silos became so full that even with exports, storage space was lacking.
Yet, there was one thing even his era could not prevent.
The housing shortage.
The flood of people moving to the cities and the construction speed that could not keep pace.
Wrangel ultimately could not solve that problem, and he, too, collapsed from overwork.
Resigned for convalescence.
After his resignation, he remained a party elder, and I heard he is now wandering the world with Vladimir.
Third, Maxim.
The first leader of the Alliance for Hopeful Progress.
One of the Founding Fathers.
The Alliance for Hopeful Progress was the weakest faction within the Communist Party.
Thus, Maxim could not lead by force.
Instead, he led through persuasion.
He rose to power by including all parties and factions within a coalition cabinet.
What was remarkable about Maxim was the fact that he actually walked that difficult path.
He led the fourth Five-Year Economic Development Plan to success, building small and medium-sized mobile cities and specialized industrial mobile cities.
He solved the housing shortage and the over-concentration in the capital through urban development.
But his end was just as predictable.
Overwork and failing health.
Coupled with old age, he fainted during a speech.
He resigned the very next day.
Afterward, he served as a medical advisor for the International Aid Bureau of the International Communist Party, and is now traveling with Vladimir.
And the fourth, Robert Jenkinson.
Once Maxim resigned, the Union strangely returned to the era of 'Politics.'
The coalition, maintained by Maxim's leadership, had been masking its cracks; once Maxim vanished, those fissures gaped open instantly.
The Centralist faction slipped through the gap.
Jenkinson seized power through a coalition with the Social Revolutionary Workers' League and oversaw the fifth Five-Year Economic Development Plan's success.
Judging by economic indicators alone, that era wasn't bad.
And then, he changed the immigration policy.
'Send me your wretched.'
He restricted the policy of indiscriminate immigrant acceptance—which the Union once brandished like a badge of pride—to only the intelligentsia.
It was controversial, but it had the consistency of policy. The Union attempted to face reality.
Then came Siesta.
The coastal city was granted independence as the Siesta Soviet Republic, and that republic was opened to foreigners.
A tourism boom.
Foreign currency.
Jobs.
The statistical figures looked beautiful once again.
The problem came after.
Intervention in the Bolivarian Civil War.
He supported the communists to establish the Bolivarian People's Government, backing them against the Singas Dynasty.
On the surface, it was internationalism; in words, it was justice.
However, it was revealed that he had secretly sold military supplies not to the People's Government, but to the emirs of the Sargon Empire for personal profit.
We only realized where the bullets intended for the People's Government had gone far too late, through the accounting ledgers.
I thought then: This man wasn't governing a country; he was brokering it.
In the end, he was impeached.
Since then, we have lived our lives continuously sewing up those torn seams.
Finally, John Russell.
In the portrait, Russell looked weary.
That face was always weary. In meetings, in emergency briefings, even when telling a joke, he looked tired.
But he was competent.
He purged corrupt politicians, including Jenkinson, regardless of their faction, and sought to change the perception of the Centralists.
Cleaning out one's own factional filth with one's own hands is the most dangerous task in politics.
Enemies aren't born from the outside; they are created from within.
Yet Russell did it despite knowing that.
Even in the Bolivarian Civil War, he did not escalate the fight.
He mediated a ceasefire between the Singas Dynasty and the Bolivarian People's Government and brought it to fruition.
I muttered absentmindedly.
"He's a tired soul, but a capable friend."
It was at that very moment.
From the end of the corridor, a secretary came sprinting, screaming at the top of her lungs.
"Comrade Chairman has stopped breathing!"
Catastrophe.
***************************
As I opened the meeting room door, cold air struck me first.
Someone was weeping silently; someone was clenching their jaw tight to keep from crying; and someone was already flipping through the next schedule in their mind.
I had seen those faces—where mourning and calculation shared the same room—too many times.
John's medical officer stood by the door.
His eyes met mine for a brief moment, and with a very slight nod of his head, he spoke the words: 'It's over.'
No one dared utter the word 'death' aloud yet.
The medical officer left. And then the Chief of Security closed the door.
The sound of the door shutting was exceptionally loud.
It was as if that sound made even the portraits in the hallway hold their breath for a second.
The Chief of Staff spoke.
"Comrades, from this moment, we are transitioning to an emergency measures meeting."
Someone spoke immediately.
"First, we mourn."
Once those words were spoken, several people in the room nodded almost simultaneously.
Mourning was a duty, and simultaneously, a safety mechanism. If we did not mourn first in this space, we would appear as something less than human to those outside.
My throat hitched once before I spoke.
"Comrade John Russell... used every fiber of his body for the Union until the very end. He was a tired man, and he worked a tiresome job, but he never let that exhaustion burden others. At least, that is how I shall remember him."
The representative for the Social Revolutionary Workers' League spoke in a low tone.
"Our lines were not perfectly aligned. But that he cut away corruption without regard for faction... we must acknowledge that. If we don't, we all become filthy."
The secretary for the Alliance for Hopeful Progress picked up the thread.
"The ceasefire. The truce he forged in Bolivar... its value, both in figures and in lives, is immense."
Someone lowered their head for a moment; someone rubbed their eyes with the back of their hand.
And that period of mourning lasted for an exactly appropriate length of time.
Too short, and it would seem cold-blooded; too long, and it would expose the other true objectives lurking in the room.
The Floor Leader of the Centralists quietly placed a sheet of paper on the table.
The paper had a schedule written in bold letters.
'Charter Article —. Acting duties in case of a vacancy in the Chairmanship. Emergency summons of the Central People's Committee. Notification to the Supreme Soviet. Consultation with the Party Central Executive Committee.'
He slid the paper into the center of the table.
The sound of the paper sliding lightly scraped away the lingering echo of mourning.
"Comrades, I respect your emotions. But a power vacuum will not respect our people. Let us set aside trivial sentiments for now."
The words were jarring, yet they were true.
I swallowed a curse.
If he just refined his tone, he might sound like a person—does he speak harshly on purpose?
Or does he simply know there is no leisure for pleasantries right now?
The representative for the Liberty League tapped the table with a finger.
"I trust the Centralists aren't planning to swallow everything under the pretext of a 'vacuum'?"
The Centralist Floor Leader raised an eyebrow slightly.
"If we start bringing up factionalism in this room, the people outside will curse us all equally—as bastards calculating parliamentary seats atop John's coffin."
The Liberty League representative smiled cynically.
"If we don't, someone else will. That is politics."
Those words froze the room for a moment.
The word 'politics' looked like a blade just then.
But whether it was a blade or something else, if you didn't grasp it now, you would be cut.
The Chief of Staff intervened cautiously.
"We need a press briefing. We must decide when, in what terms, and who will announce the death."
I didn't remember who first suggested the names.
Only that, so naturally—far too naturally—a few names were tossed around.
Who would be the Acting Chairman. Who would preside over the emergency cabinet meeting. Who would report to the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet. In what tone the International Communist Party would be notified. Who would take responsibility for guaranteeing the Bolivarian Ceasefire Agreement. Who would confirm to the military and security forces that there were no vacancies in command.
Between those names, I saw people mourning while simultaneously sizing each other up.
The voices used when speaking of John were different from the voices used when discussing the Acting Chairman.
When speaking of John, the voices were low, yet when speaking of the Acting Chairman, they were high and fast.
The low voice was grief; the fast voice was opportunity.
The secretary for the Alliance for Hopeful Progress glanced at me and spoke.
"How about Comrade Arthur? He was close to John, and he has the trust of the Centralists... right now, we need the face of 'stability.'"
The representative of the Social Revolutionary Workers' League added a word.
"What we want is not a single-faction cabinet. If that was the final lesson John left behind, we must respect it. Let us decide everything from the acting system to the principles of the coalition."
The Liberty League representative was quick to follow up.
"Exactly. John died of overwork. So let's change the structure where one man carries it all. To do that, we just have to distribute power from the start."
At that moment, I realized everyone was saying the same thing.
'Distribution of power.' 'Coalition principles.' 'Stability.'
They were all speaking of John's death as an opportunity.
For some, power distribution was a sincere belief; for others, power distribution was a tool to secure their own share.
And the two were difficult to distinguish.
In politics, especially so.
The Chief of Staff spoke again.
"We have no time. Reporters have already arrived in the lobby. We cannot hide this. Before rumors of political assassination start flying, we must be the first to speak the truth."
I felt my mouth go dry.
Only then did the reality that John was truly gone reach my bones.
Until just a moment ago, it felt like an accident that needed processing, but the mention of a press briefing made the irrevocable nature of death feel visceral.
Death is a personal tragedy, but in politics, it becomes a schedule.
Leaving his death behind, I raised my hand.
"Very well. Whatever we do here, there is one thing we must decide first. Let us not make Comrade John Russell a victim. At least for the first briefing. We must say both who he was and how the Union will responsibly fill that void."
The Centralist Floor Leader took my words and pushed the paper to the center of the table once more.
"Then, who speaks?"
I hesitated for a second.
In that hesitation, I felt my name already rolling around the room.
The feeling was chilling. People were watching my mourning, but they were also watching the utility of my mourning.
Finally, I looked up.
"I will do it. But on one condition. We finalize the Acting Chairman system today, but the coalition shall be implemented step by step. If you don't like it, you can change it later, can't you?"
The Liberty League representative curled the corner of his mouth.
"Fair enough. But in return, you'll be prepared to pay the price for that coalition when the time comes?"
I did not smile at the joke.
I didn't have the leisure to smile.
The representative of the Social Revolutionary Workers' League nodded.
"Agreed. A pragmatic solution has finally emerged from this room."
After the contents of the briefing were decided, the Chief of Staff checked his watch and spoke.
"The briefing is in five minutes."
I rose from my seat.
The speech felt heavier in my palm.
I couldn't tell if the weight was because of the paper, the people, or the man who had just stopped breathing.
Walking toward the door, I thought of the portraits in the corridor.
Those faces had each run the country in their own way, and eventually, their bodies broke, or their names were torn, or they simply walked out of the world.
And now, John Russell's face would join that line.
I grasped the doorknob.
Reporters were waiting outside.
And the people in this room were preparing to tuck away their faces of mourning to pull out their calculations once again.
And I was no exception to that reality.