Boston

Boston has a problem with its dead.

Specifically, it has more of them than it admits.

The Office of the Second Census has spent centuries counting death through hospitals, churches, courts, cemeteries and governments.

Then another jurisdiction appears.

Lindall.

It counts through witnesses.

Widows. Nurses. Children. Friends. Anyone who remembers somebody the city does not.

This is administratively horrifying.

Soon seven hundred and nine death notices arrive, all signed by the deceased. One belongs to a man who is still alive and mildly annoyed that the Office has called before breakfast.

Then the count gets larger.

Much larger.

Boston has spent centuries putting inconvenient people somewhere else.

Unfortunately, somewhere else has kept excellent records.

The Office eventually encounters the most dangerous possible thing in bureaucracy:

another office with jurisdiction.

It has a complaint.

From Boston.

Boston has been waiting a very long time to be heard.

Included free: a complete Reality Services story, where the municipal problems are less dead but not necessarily easier.