Under his harshening supervision, the chairs, tables, umbrellas, banners, and bandstands all went up in time for Serdon Miloz, Cloton Zvolo, Yutak Zvolo, and Wedding Singer Vritia to tune their instruments and pump up the attendees who trickled in as the sky's light turned rosier. Spectacle hopers prepared the edges of their seats for serious use while story readers described the appeal of the two prospective newcomers to story ignorers and non-officers.

“R Tanpendan is one of the new bat guys with fancy buttons and Vanna Jad Albrulin kicks monsters in a library. She goes barefoot.”

“Barefoot, you say.”

“Yes, barefoot. She keeps one leg way up in most of her poses to emphasize the kicking aspect.”

“Capital.”

The hour of recruitment arrived. Two-stars and genii hopped over the forbidding adamant walls of the fortress in a maneuver they would never later replicate unless CoH got its own sports minigame collection. Three-stars too, if less often. Four-stars? Sure. Everyone wanted another Inorrea Villeria, right? The old, non-summer one that you already fully Fortified with three dupes? No? You should have said so earlier! A column of seven colors flashed between earth and sky on the horizon, a figure overleapt the walls, and a sudden, convenient wind whipped away his concealing cloak. A long, embroidered green coat held closed by ornate buttons! Fuzz all over his mostly human-esque form! R Tanpendan, the first playable chiropt, landed in Freegate.

“Hurray! But also boo!” Whether to be joyful at the advent of a new comrade or chagrined at the lack of a real show as the players threw away absurd numbers of Imperia Records was no question worth asking. Why pick one? The assembled spectators stood for and against everything all at once, as is the right of crowds.

The gacha reserved its own right of caprice to give players what they wanted the most, what they would prefer not to have if it lowered their chances at something else, and some off-rateup officer better than their target UR, thereby troubling them with the frustration of knowing it would be unjustified to complain but really, really wanting to. Those options all sounded neat. Another R Tanpendan slid out of the gacha's fun tunnel into the game.

The dark and rumbling clouds crept in on big, smelly feet, far unlike those rumored to be the key selling point of Vanna Jad Albrulin. Guests from abroad laughed and cooed as the famed showers of Commandment of Hero fell upon them, many for the first time.

“Wow, the players must be sooooo mad right now!” Agnes of South Cabbage squealed. “We don't have anything like this at home!”

“What? Players?”

“Oh, you!”

SRs opened their umbrellas while the URs waited for their UTASes or Rs clad in slickers to do that for them. The indignity of being seen to care about getting wet eclipsed the discomfort of in fact getting wet, much as the versatility of Eclipses eclipsed the stronger bonuses of the more specialized officers in the traditional elements. Noted Storm Medic R Tanpendan, for example, or Storm Harasser Vanna Jad Albrulin, who popped over the walls right then.

“Hurray! But it would have been more fun if you'd waited for another few hundred Imperia Records!” The crowd yelled out its complex and nuanced feelings while Vanna kicked the air a few times as a reward for the lucky player who managed to recruit her after an irksomely reasonable number of attempts. The blue skies returned, dark blue by then, and the rains dried up like the tears of the foot-lovers in Commandment of Hero's playerbase who had suffered the oppression of boots, shoes, and sandals for so many years.

With every spotlight, some players wanted to push it further, to get enough copies of the new officers for full Fortification and get those team-wide damage bonuses that the rarest of Rares enjoyed by then but only the commonest of Ultra Rares. Since those sorts of whales always skipped their way through their recruits, the session soon ended.

“Done! Charge!” Team New Blood dashed forward as a body at Smidgen's urging to take possession of the newest new bloods before opposition arose. Those eager beavers skumaned and ursited their way through the crowd of officers just standing from their chairs all the way up to Vanna and Tanpendan, seized the two, and began to drag them straight to their clubhouse.

Cadmos interposed himself, a glint shining in his heroic eye. “Wait! We haven't congratulated them yet.”

“Thanks for reminding us. Congratulations!” The whole gang from Wruden Calx to Aurebecktoemnire, listed here in reverse alphabetical order as a tribute to their rebellious spirit, paused to shout that before stampeding right over Cadmos.

“Back up, back up,” Diora admonished her buddies. They heeded her words and backed up over Cadmos, then forward, and then back again.

“That's enough.” Lurdden Casguir stood, his smithy-forged muscles bulging under his tight shirt and his unbreakable tongs in his hand. “No, keep running over Cadmos if you like. That act demonstrates a willingness to behave within the bounds of custom. So then, why do you behave wrongly in other regards? I watched the reveals of the spinoff characters, saw the formation of factions around them, and never witnessed any such iniquity as I do here today. When those announcements were full new and best able to incite the passions of officers, even at that time, no recruiter conceived of this idea that membership might be compelled. As proof of that, think on this: no one in your team asked me to join, though I was the most recent recruit before the spinoff announcement.”

“Hey, yeah, why is that?”

“Well, you see, Diora, I thought he was old.”

“Because he looks older than most of us?”

“Yep.”

“Those wrinkles and lines. He's what, late thirties?”

“Something like that.”

“Refleang, are we stupid?”

“We might be.”

“If you committed no crime then or even considered it, what should we say now, when though the temptation is less, you blush not to submit to it? I can only conjecture some illness, some fevered madness has worked its way into your bodies tired by your exertions in the admirable cause of aiding your friend, and that even as your limbs do wrong, your mind screams at them to allow room for freedom and conscience, unheeded. But I bid you to heed those screams, for they have reason in them, and justice.”

Team New Blood slowed down and stamped in place, its members thoughtful. At last, Ozric Orn Pallad spoke. “Now that I reflect, one of these two looks like he came out of a S**** t** H******* game, and not the respectable ones where you run right and jump. I'm afraid I've developed an allergy to weird bat-people.” He released his grip on R Tanpendan's ankle. The others followed the same course and dropped their burdens to the rain-muddied earth.

“Now that we've all calmed down, I'd better get up and welcome our new arrivaaagh!” Though the New Bloods helped up the other officers they dumped, not that they felt remorse over it, they judged that Cadmos was old enough to get up on his own while a bunch of officers stepped on him.

“What an enthusiastic welcome.” R Tanpendan brushed mud off his formerly immaculate coat.

“It's not the custom, but we might as well take off flying with it.” Gradis P. Dorenz jumped into the un-umbrellaed area of the courtyard, splashing everyone within a three-mile radius, and raised his plump arms to strike a fork-like pose. “Who wants to challenge me? I'm the filthy wrestling champion!”

“There's been filthy wrestling going on without my knowledge? How awful!”

“Nope. That's why he can make himself champion if he wants. But can he keep it?” Georgia Anne Cooper said that and moved in to contest the title. Taiphan Ninx, for his part, blew the Rare whistle that only Rares can hear.

“Did Gary Whitecrest sell you that whistle? You've been had. There's no special R frequency,” Reginald informed him.

“That's a shame. As long as you're here though, I want you to knock the roof and railing off the secondary bandstand so we can convert it to a wrestling ring.”

“The problem is that I don't want to do that.”

“That is a problem. Because you have to do it.” That contest of wills ended in a contest of might between the immovable bandstand versus the irresistible Reginald's head as propelled by a UR. The bout between Gradis and Georgia was far more competitive than the other, for the bandstand shuddered with each blow of the ram. The other silvers absented themselves before their cranial material could be applied to the same task. They even fetched some posts, ropes, and turnbuckles from the secondary storage site to avoid censure later.

Far from that, Taiphan praised them. “Good work,” he said. “I was going to censure you later, but you avoided that with aplomb and dexterity.” They set up the ring exactly as adroitly. The moment they finished, Gradis tossed Georgia Anne Cooper into it much like some horse-related simile that went along with her cowgirl theming.

Straightaway the true contest began. Toughs not only from Commandment of Hero but other games as well such as bare-knuckle brawlers with mustaches but no shirts from Fields of Steam, technical wrestlers who knew every trick from Radiant Illusion Country, fashionable frequenters of the squared circle from Endless Disco, and more, converged on the area even from distant spaceports as word got around of a chance to unseat the champion, whoever that was.

The distraction, though some might call it the main event, allowed Cadmos the time he required to deliver the new officer orientation. Recruits came over the wall fully aware of their own skills, stats, and yearning for alts and event appearances, but they were necessarily ignorant of the customs and improvements developed outside the view of the developers. Would they have to bunk in the cramped little Barracks? Not at all, when long effort had furnished a Storm conservatory for the comfort of that element's officers. Wait for the players to issue them what weapons, armor, and amulets they would? Read the Gear Set Compendium (Revised), pick your favored bonuses, and collaborate with Vigilant Patrol buddies to fill up those slots. Cadmos also addressed items of less immediate relevance, such as inter-ludic travel, the pan-ludic assembly, the secondary storage site far from Freegate where they should feel free to stow weird stuff, and the doings that surrounded Commandment of Hero: Ersatz Struggle.

“And so heroes are forming cliques around the ones who get in? I meant officers.”

“That's right, Vanna. I'm not saying you have to get involved in that. Many haven't. But it is a good way to get to know people.”

R Tanpendan scratched his furry little chin. “Are you one of the fighters, Cadmos?”

“I am one, yes.”

“So not yours. What about that big guy who likes to wrestle? He's got style for miles.”

“That's Gradis P. Dorenz, usually Santa C. Dorenz, and he has been confirmed for the spinoff.”

“Think his crew would let me in?” Before Tanpendan received his answer, a great bulk descended on him with as much impact as when Tiboleus the Experimenter came out and made the game easy. “Oof!” the victim exclaimed in the finest CoH style.

“Sorry about that.” Gradis labored to regain his feet. “I'll throw one of those weasels out for you.” He glanced down. “Better make it two. I'm off!” He tromped back toward the ring to make good on his promise to the tragically mangled chiropt.

“What a guy!”

While the filthy battle transfixed foreigners, the locals began to recall their sacred traditions. Serdon Miloz and the other three lumans, as Cloton Zvolo resented being known, came over to greet the newcomers first so they could hurry up and put the primary bandstand to its intended purpose. The other officers subsequently ran past and slapped hands.

“Remember when we used to introduce ourselves at these functions? Uh oh. I'm becoming a reminiscing aunt.” Dr. Stezlinstein almost sighed, but decided her case was not yet so advanced as that.

“Nothing for it, Doctor. Numbers are always going up. We'd complain more if they didn't!”

King Ostros drifted over. “I know I do, Gralles. At least the number of bodies thrown out of the ring is increasing at present.” He pointed over at the squared circle, where the air traffic had become thicker than Fields of Steam's. Spectators had to dodge as much as watch, especially Lynissia, who haunted the outside of the ring like an unscrupulous manager, sign raised to take advantage of a lapse in the referee's vigilance. She just wanted to stay close to the action though. Imagine her doing anything wrong.

Vanna Jad Albrulin saw that and understood forthwith that Lynissia City was where she wanted to be. As soon as the congratulations ended, she inquired how she might go about joining the relevant organization.

“Team Plushy? I see Manyana right over there. She's jeering at wrestlers right now, but she's very approachable normally. I'll introduce you. Well, reintroduce you, but with words this time. Ha ha.”

“Even their name is perfectly calibrated,” Vanna marveled as she walked with Cadmos.