Time: 10:30 AM. Monday. First Week of the Semester.
Location: East Bloc – Revolutionary Club Headquarters, Meeting Room.
The energy of the meeting room has drained completely.
Gone are the chaotic debates over fog machines, edible pamphlets, and unauthorized rooftop broadcasts. What remains is not stillness but stagnation. The kind that settles in the bones. The kind that makes failure feel less like collapse and more like slow erosion. Even if only momentary, it feels bitter and unfinished.
Above them, the ceiling bulbs buzz in protest. Their inconsistent light carves long shadows across the table, over stacks of unfiled incident reports and water-warped posters left too long beneath a leaky pipe.
Only Mariya's keyboard still moves—its rhythmic clatter more like static than progress.
And for once, none of them speak.
It is the kind of silence that makes people stare at windows that no longer open. The kind that pulls attention to the cracks in the walls and the chips in the paint. Fault lines that have always been there are now impossible to ignore.
Then, Chairwoman Svetlana finally breaks the silence.
Without ceremony, she reaches into the inside of her coat and draws out a single folded sheet of paper.
There is no announcement. No raised voice. No gesture meant to provoke.
Simply a motion, it is measured, slow, and final, like a movement one makes only after reading bad news ten times over… and finding it no less true.
She places the sheet above their meeting table.
"We have received notice."
Mariya's fingers freeze. Her eyes, usually tethered to her screen, snap upward. The others follow, slower, like machinery booting under doubt.
Svetlana unfolds the notice and reads aloud in a voice stripped of theatrics.
Notice of Performance Review and Disbandment Consideration
Issued by: General Student Body Council – Office of Club Oversight
Zero new member recruitment last semester. Repeated minor and major club violations—primarily involving incidents related to unauthorized propaganda installations, unlicensed mural detonations, misuse of cafeteria flame-retardant foam, and three separate confrontations with maintenance personnel. Declining cross-club engagement. Failure to fulfill re-registration criteria.
Classified Status: Obsolete.
The words hang in the air like a verdict.
Her steel-grey eyes shift at her most volatile member, Irina, who then responds with a half-shrug and a smile that completely lacks remorse.
"I was aiming for the clouds."
Natasha's gaze remains steady. Her voice cuts flat through the tension.
"You hit a janitorial drone."
"It rolled at me with intent," Irina defends herself.
"You declared it a class traitor," Natasha says, eyes narrowing.
"I stand by that," Irina answers, completely unrepentant.
Svetlana sits down in her chair. For the first time that morning, her expression darkens.
"They are not shutting us down because we are dangerous," she says quietly. "They are shutting us down because no one thinks we are necessary anymore."
A long pause follows. Then, quietly, Mariya folds her arms. Her voice starts uncertain but solidifies with each word.
"They're right."
Svetlana turns sharply.
"The East Bloc already runs without us. Maybe… maybe it has for a while."
She exhales—small, but enough to tremble the papers in her hands.
"We've become a footnote," she whispers. "No one fear us. No one mock us. We are just… forgotten."
"It isn't only the clubroom at risk," the strategist continues. "It feels like losing a framework. A language we built. A place that proved we mattered."
Her gaze falls to the floor.
Irina's smile fades.
"And when we vanish… they'll not even remember what they erased."
Mariya's voice lowers, steady but thin.
Svetlana's jaw tightens.
The Revolutionary Club, known for its defiance, loyalty, and conviction. The posters, the pamphlets, the slogans etched into hallway walls—everything they had built—came to this: a quiet and cold bureaucratic erasure. Destruction not by violence, not by scandal, but through irrelevance. Just another club the system no longer bothers to notice.
Natasha looks around the room. Even Irina, for once, says nothing. And in that silence, the weight of what they are truly losing settles in.
The silence continues to linger; it is heavy and unspoken—until Natasha finally decides to break it.
"I met with President Dagny Hammer this morning."
Everyone turns their heads towards their Vice Chairwoman.
"I was already notified before the notice reached us. The outcome was already decided. Logged and processed."
She flips her notepad. It bears fresh creases as though it had been held tightly.
"She does not want this," the Vice Chairwoman continues. "But the system did. The Council follows the algorithm. This was not personal. It was procedural."
No one interrupts.
"The President decided to give us time," Natasha says. "Not because she had to. She believed justice includes the chance to respond."
Irina raises an eyebrow. "You negotiated?"
"I only presented facts. She listened."
The Vice Chairwoman lets that hang.
"We reached an agreement," she says at last. "We must perform at the upcoming Cultural Festival. If we demonstrate value—publicly and visibly—then the disbandment notice will be lifted."
She pauses, letting the words settle like a verdict.
"The festival is six weeks away."
Svetlana says nothing.
Irina exhales loudly. "So that's it. We're back to fighting for relevance."
"We never stopped," Mariya says quietly.
Natasha stares across the table. "If we fail to demonstrate purpose, the system will erase us. Not with malice but with cold efficiency."
Svetlana lowers herself slowly into her chair. Her coat sags slightly as she sits.
"It wants us gone."
"It wants us forgotten," Natasha corrects. "That is more permanent… and it never cared for anyone."
No one disagrees. There is nothing left to say that has not already been said with silence.
Svetlana's eyes narrow. "They are giving us six weeks to become... palatable."
"To prove we still matter," Natasha says.
"No. They want a performance," the Chairwoman replies, her voice low and sharp. "A sanitized showcase. Booths. Smiles. Recruitment flyers screened by the Office of Tone Moderation."
Then she turns to face Natasha. "And you accepted this?"
"I accepted time," Natasha answers defiantly. "Diplomacy does not secure outcomes. It creates space to act before collapse becomes inevitable."
The room holds two visions in fragile orbit, Svetlana's defiant doctrine and Natasha's controlled concession, circling the same truth from opposite sides.
"So they do not want to crush us," Svetlana says bitterly. "They want to process us."
Natasha meets the Chairwoman's gaze. "Exactly. And as much as you may disagree about their decision making, we need a way to make them notice us. Something—anything—that shows we are still here. That we deserve to survive. At least."
"The President told me that we need to submit a performance proposal this Friday, before the week ends. The events board will review it to determine if we may proceed. Only then can we participate in the festival."
She lets that sink in.
"Failure to submit means we are forfeiting, and that would be a critical blow to our survival."
No one moves. The weight of compromise lingers just long enough to feel like surrender—yet this is not the time for hesitation. They need a plan. Time marches forward, indifferent, and they must act now.
Then—
Irina raises her hand. She stays expressive, but there is a hesitation now. Her fingers drum nervously on the table—too fast, too loud.
"I propose: papier-mâché effigies of every GSBC secretary to be dramatically liberated during our club presentation."
"No," Svetlana says flatly.
"Okay, okay—puppets and fireworks."
"No."
"A cannon that launches glitter-leaflets scented with revolutionary oils—"
"No."
"I'm just brainstorming! You know—visionary thinking!" The words come faster now, more brittle. Her breath carries the faint edge of frustration.
"No," Svetlana glares at her. "You are thinking like a clown."
Mariya drags her hands down her face. "Ugh… we're doomed."
A chair scrapes softly.
No one notices, but Liliya Ivanova stands and walks. She does not speak. She only adjusts her white gloves, smooths the hem of her coat, and moves past the table like a shadow in formalwear. Her steps are soundless, but the room responds to her presence like a temperature drop.
Svetlana turns. "Ivanova—"
"I will bring one," the enforcer replies.
Natasha's tone sharpens. "You intend to do what, exactly?"
"The notice told us that we have not yet received a new member since the last semester," Liliya replies without turning, "if it only takes one new member, then I will bring them."
There is no emphasis. No request. Just certainty.
Mariya speaks, her voice tight and uneven.
"U-Um… I-I mean, h-how would you even do that? The student body… they already think we're unhinged, or—o-or dangerous, or… or sometimes both."
Liliya offers no rebuttal.
Natasha stays seated, but her gaze sharpens with quiet suspicion. She knows exactly what Liliya is capable of. The enforcer always delivers results—but they always come at a cost. She wants to intervene. She wants to stop whatever underhanded tactic is forming behind those crimson eyes. But she hesitates.
"Do you intend to stop me, Vice Chairwoman?"
Liliya speaks first. Her tone is soft, almost polite, but it lands like a blade.
All eyes turn to Natasha.
"No force. No surveillance. No intimidation," she says firmly. "That is the line."
"There will not be any," Liliya replies, calm as a clock.
But Natasha's gaze does not waver. The club needs movement—anything to break the deadlock—and if it means risking a path she cannot fully control, then she will bear that risk.
Svetlana's hands curl slightly. She rises from her chair—but she does not stop her enforcer because she cannot; she needs a result.
"Ivanova," she says carefully, "I do not condone coercion."
Liliya pauses at the doorway.
"I know."
She turns her head one last time to Natasha. Her voice does not rise—it never needs to.
"Time is not a gift. It is a currency. I intend to spend it wisely."
She opens the door. Light from the corridor spills in, catching the suspended dust like a constellation of memory.
"That is all I needed."
She steps out. The door clicks shut.
The silence that follows is not empty. It is heavy—dense with the weight of what none of them can bring themselves to say. That someone should stop her.
"This is not exactly what I had in mind…" Irina finally mutters—then smiles. "But I kinda like it."
Mariya exhales, shallow and rapid, as if Liliya's words alone threaten to trigger a panic attack.
"Uh… if she goes too far, that is it. We'll—uh—we'll be finished. No one even… even trusts us to begin with."
Natasha raises her teacup and takes a slow sip. At least the warmth offers some illusion of control.
"I know," she replies. But even she hears the uncertainty in her own words.
Her voice remains steady. It always does when things begin to tilt.
Svetlana sinks back into her seat—slowly, as if gravity itself has shifted. Her fingers hover above the disbandment notice. She does not touch it.
"We need a miracle."
"No," Natasha says quietly, "what we need is time, and I have already bought it. She will make use of it."
Mariya continues staring at her laptop. She has not typed a single word since the notice was dropped.
"And if she… um, if she fails?"
Natasha grasps her teacup firmly. The warmth steadies her gloved hands.
"Then we end the same way we started—ignored, underestimated, and still standing."
No one speaks. On the far wall, a faded poster flaps once in the draft—
Loyalty Is Not Optional.
Then, silence again. The kind that knows it will return.