The Archhosion clicked the button on the remote once, twice, three times. He cleared his throat, glanced to his right, intoned, “Slide, please.”

A new slide flickered into place on the large screen above and behind him. In thin, dark-grey, elegant sans-serif letters the slide laid out the case that had come before the Oversight Board three days before and on which, despite several days of disputation, the Board had yet to come to a decision: “Incident 0912-HS-SEA-TD,” the slide’s title indicated. Beneath the title there was a picture of the controversial Facebook post, published three weeks before, in which a prominent member of Azerbaijan’s governing party had written that it was becoming increasingly clear to all that the country had a rat problem and opined that, as everyone knew, there was only one way to deal with rats. Below the post there was an English-language translation.

The Archhosion stood very erect at the obsidian lectern, his palms pressed flat to his sides. A tall, slim man, with hollow, acne-scarred cheeks and a gray gaze emptied, through rigorous training, of all predisposition, he was tonsured and clad in the flowing silver robes of the Pythian Order. He looked out impassively over the hall before him, where, cloaked in darkness and draped in their own black hooded robes, the twenty members of the Oversight Board sat in silent deliberation. The Board members were arrayed in a two-tiered semicircle and in the darkness of the hall they were little more than black shapes.

“Incident 0912-HS-SEA-TD is brought before its Excellency the Oversight Board,” the Archhosion intoned in a high, flat voice. “Has the Board reached a resolution?”

With slow dignity the Chair rose in her place at the center of the semi-circle. 

“The Oversight Board has not yet reached a resolution,” she said slowly, gravely, her voice resounding from the deep black space cloaked by her hood and echoing in the dark stone hall. “We must,” she added after a moment, “consult the Oracle.”

The Archhosion inclined his head in solemn acknowledgement. 

“The Oracle shall be consulted.”

He turned to his right and tilted his head gravely at the Hypohosioi attending in the wings. They went into motion at once, making the necessary preparations. High overhead in the center of the hall a bright spotlight flared on and beamed down a narrow band of very white light, revealing a circular opening in the stone floor, ten feet across and surrounded by a low parapet of black granite: the Kolos. Dust motes circled lazily in the beam of blinding white light above the Kolos. Silently the members of the Oversight Board rose in unison from their seats and assembled around the circular parapet. Despite the brightness of the spotlight, the blackness of the Kolos seemed without end.

When the members had taken their places around the Kolos, the Archhosion began intoning the Goiteia, drawing out each word in a high, droning chant:

“Myyyykiiitaaaaas. Voooooutyylooooou.”

As the Archhosion chanted the words of the Goliteia, the Board members progressed through the slow ritual of the Flyktaina, moving with exaggerated grace and maintaining near unison as they did so. First they reached with their right hands into the inner pockets of their black robes and, withdrawing small purple capsules, held these aloft over the Kolos.

“Saaaaapiooooo. Sfaaaaagiioooooo.”

The Board members raised their eyes to the ceiling, lifted the capsules above their heads, and dropped them into their open mouths.

“Myyyyyxaaaaa. Gleeiiiipsimoooo.”

Drawing back their hoods to reveal their smooth heads, tonsured in the manner of their order and branded on the top with a large rune in the shape of an arched infinity symbol, the scarred flesh standing out in angry red welts, the members leaned against the parapet over the empty space of the Kolos and vomited in unison down into it. Twenty robust flumes of dark fuchsia vomitus spouted down into the Kolos from all sides. A whooshing retching sound, like that of a crude valve unleashing a torrent of thick liquid, filled the hall and echoed from its black granite walls. Still inclining, the members retched once, twice more, the vomit spraying out into space, and then straightened up, saliva and vomit dripping down their chins.

“Skoouuuuliiiikiiaaaaa. Zyymaaaaarikaaaa.”

A low whirring sound started up below the floor of the hall. From the interior space of the Kolos a circular platform rose smoothly into view and stopped at floor level. The platform was covered in a white taffeta cloth that was splattered heavily with the members’ vivid purple vomit. In the middle of the platform, also covered in streaks of vomit, stood a two-headed calf. It had a tawny coat and stood with lowered heads on shaky legs, quivering. Its two heads were each three-quarters formed and met at the middle in a single, two-pupiled eye that was filmed over with a milky cataract. The other two eyes looked down at the platform myopically. 

“Ptooooomaaa. Katavroooooochtiizoooo.”

Moving slowly, solemnly, the Chair pulled a thin telescoped rod, the Souvli, from her robes, drew it out to its full length, and extended it toward the calf. 

“Katsaaaaaariiidaaaaaa. Saaaaantouuiiiiiits.”

The tip of the Souvli made contact with the calf’s neck and shocked it with a brief buzzing sound. The calf jumped and moaned and began meandering about the Kolos shakily, dragging its hooves. It had weak mastery over its limbs and it fell often, sliding about in the vomit and struggling on the wet surface. When it had ceased moving, seeking to rest, the Chair shocked it again with the Souvli. Again the calf twitched and moaned and stumbled in another ragged circle around the Kolos. 

“Apoooovrasmaaaaaa. Pooootoooooo.”

The Chair shocked the calf several more times, forcing it to lurch forlornly around the circular platform. At last it fell to its wobbly knees and lowered its heads onto the vomit-covered cloth and was not troubled again.

Now it was the Chair who, having compressed the Souvli to a small rod and replaced it in her robes, spoke to the others:

“Anoisies.”

“Anoisies,” the other members responded. They inclined once more over the Kolos, scrutinizing the scattered, random hoof marks that the calf had left in its meandering course through the pooled vomit and that formed a vivid arabesque of complex figurations. For several minutes they took in the sacred marks silently and then, one by one, straightened up to indicate that they had taken in the Oracle’s prophecy. When the final member had done so, the Chair raised her head and, turning gravely to face the Archhosion, intoned:

“We have consulted the Oracle. The post shall not be removed.”