Vienna

Vienna has always taken hospitality seriously.

The Office of the Second Census eventually discovers that hospitality can take Vienna seriously in return.

A House appears with rooms, meals, guests, obligations and an extremely old understanding of what it means to welcome someone.

The dead arrive.

The forgotten arrive.

People who may never have properly left arrive.

The House keeps making places for them.

Then it offers the Director a place too.

Permanent duty. No more decisions. No more failures. A chair waiting forever.

She responds by picking up the chair and beating the door down with it.

This works better than several earlier procedures.

Briefly.

Then Vienna moves one inch away from the world.

Telephone calls arrive as applause. Traffic lights turn white. The Danube becomes uncertain about direction. Aircraft can see the runway but cannot quite reach it.

The Office would like everyone to remain calm.

Vienna would like to know who is hosting.

Included free: a complete Reality Services story, where buildings generally stay in the same reality but management makes no promises.