11 Jul 2020, 10:52

A European Councillor storming in and threatening a Commissioner before swiftly storming out again was not on Lord Christopher Strathclyde's bingo list. However, the Duxburian and Angleteric delegation torpedoing any proposal which would take a shred of sovereignty away from their governments was. Bonus points were awarded for every time Mikaela Kligenberg mentioned either a hot guy or a reality TV show, or for every use of the phrase 'you guys'. Before long, Christopher was imagining being at home, his small cottage in the Terra Rosarum countryside, surrounded by no one, having to speak to no one, not having to listen to fashion and guy talk, or even worse, stupidity and nationalism. His daydreaming was rudely interrupted by his neighbour, Commissioner Juncker, nudging him to speak.

"We shall be sure to investigate your Pinterest with admirable frequency, Archbishop. The Inimician goverment loves a good building, and it loves a good governmental building even more. Indeed, the only thing the Imperial administration loves more than a good government building is the blowing up of one. It is therefore highly understandable that the current Europolis buildings, which suffer from various deficits already eloquently put forward by those excellent speeches - well, some of them were excellent, at least - preceding mine. Furthermore, nothing in this Union appears insoluable by a committee, and I'm sure the correct buildings would be most effectively designed and constructed by a committee of our bravest and best designers, engineers, and architects. I'm sure the Archbishop would volunteer for this body, and I'm equally confident His Imperial Majesty would aim to make an ever so slightly pink-shaded camp mark on the new buildings. Let it be so.

"As for the Commission terms, if only for practical reasons, the Empire would support all commission posts comprising the same term lengths. The Inimician People have many different layers of government to keep up with as is, and indeed they have a completely renovating constitutional review to deal with usually every two weeks or so. The Inimician position is thus: extend all terms to 8 months, or decrease all to 4. Whichever is preferable, I'll leave to you estimable ladies and gentlemen to decide: who knows, perhaps Cllr Karssen has some ideas, or could threaten us all into adopting a completely different option."