text: [Themes: Science Fiction, gender-neutral protagonist, robots, nonhuman protagonist]
  
  > look at your surroundings
  The first floor landing forms a mezzanine here, overlooking the lobby below. It's a sort of waiting room, placed right outside the Central Administrator's office, which is through the double doors to the west. A corridor leads east, and a grand staircase leads down. Like the rest of the building, the mezzanine is deserted, but if anyone was waiting here, they would be able to sit on the sofa and read the papers on the coffee table. Or they might look at the rather Administratively-themed artwork on the walls.
  
  There's a plaque bearing the word 'Stability' on the north wall.
  
  On the coffee table are a memo and a newspaper.
  
  > examine the window
  Even at night, you'd expect to see something. The driveway and surrounding parkland, lit by street lights and moonlight. It never gets completely dark. But today, there's nothing at all. Just total blackness, as if there is a smooth black wall just beyond the window.
  
  > Go west
  The doors are locked. In this building, office doors are usually keyed to the identity of the person who works there, so these doors will only open for the Central Administrator, unless he is already in the office. It seems that he is out.
  
  > examine the plaque
  It's one of three such plaques: the others are placed along the corridor to the east. Each briefly describes one of the three values of the Administration: Stability, Liberty, and Responsibility. Exams are highly likely to involve essays on interactions between the three, but it never hurts to revise a little more, so you read the description below the word:
  
  'Administrators have a duty to ensure that their government is stable, reliable and predictable, so that the freedoms and benefits enjoyed by subjects are unchanged from day to day, untouched by the chaos of civil disorder and economic turmoil. Policies with the potential to cause unrest, upheaval and conflict are considered dangerous, and Administrators are required to test all policies rigorously in simulation before deployment. As Pratchett wrote,
  
  'People believe they want justice and wise government but, in fact, what they really want is an assurance that tomorrow will be very much like today.'
  
  > Look
  (the plaque)
  It's one of three such plaques: the others are placed along the corridor to the east. Each briefly describes one of the three values of the Administration: Stability, Liberty, and Responsibility. Exams are highly likely to involve essays on interactions between the three, but it never hurts to revise a little more, so you read the description below the word:
  
  'Administrators have a duty to ensure that their government is stable, reliable and predictable, so that the freedoms and benefits enjoyed by subjects are unchanged from day to day, untouched by the chaos of civil disorder and economic turmoil. Policies with the potential to cause unrest, upheaval and conflict are considered dangerous, and Administrators are required to test all policies rigorously in simulation before deployment. As Pratchett wrote,
  
  'People believe they want justice and wise government but, in fact, what they really want is an assurance that tomorrow will be very much like today.'
  
  > sit on the sofa
  But you have an exam to pass!
  
  > Exits
  Exits lead:
  east to the Corridor.
  down to the Lobby.
  
  > look at Burke
  The painting hangs on the eastern wall. It is an enormous portrait of Edmund Burke, the 18th century writer and politician. The Central Administrator is said to be a fan.
  
  > eat the sofa
  (first taking the sofa)
  That's hardly portable.
  
  > Go east
  The corridor turns a corner here, continuing to the north and west. The Security Administrator's office is through a door to the east, and to the south, a short staircase leads downwards to a darkened room.
  
  There's a plaque bearing the word 'Liberty' on the north wall.
  
  > Exits
  Exits lead:
  north to the Museum of Pre-Administration Government.
  east to the Security Administrator's Office.
  south to the Observation Gallery.
  west to the Mezzanine.
  
  > go south
  You are in a cavernous room built on the same vast scale as a concert hall. It cannot possibly fit within the buildings of the Administration Centre - the normal rules of geometry have clearly been bent here. You are standing in an observation gallery far above the floor, which is filled with concentric circles of workstation desks. All face the centre of the room, where another circular desk is placed on a raised platform. Above all of this, a huge three-dimensional globe hangs in empty space. The dim lighting in the room comes mainly from the planet, which glows with an internal light. To the north, stairs lead up to the landing.
  
  A display monitor hangs above the gallery. There's a message on the monitor.
  
  You saw this room on your first visit to the Administration Centre, all those years ago. It was even more awe-inspiring then: the room seemed even more gigantic, and at that time, it was full of people, all busily at work on the floor below. It felt like standing at the centre of the world. You knew this was the place you wanted to be.
  
  > Examine monitor
  The display is an enormous high-resolution flat-screen monitor, suspended from the gallery ceiling. It shows a message: green text on black background.
  
  'Dear candidate 28436,
  
  You must be wondering where everyone has gone. Let me explain.
  
  A serious situation has developed, and I have been forced to take emergency steps to isolate the Administration Centre - and ourselves - from the outside world. This isolation prevents my communicating with you normally, and at present I can only do so via this screen. I will explain more in due course.
  
  In the meantime, I need you to obtain the emergency access card.
  It's in the museum north of here. It allows you to enter the Maintenance Room, which is northwest of the Lobby. Then POKE 702522351. Afterwards, please return here for further instructions.
  
  Yours,
  Central Administrator.'
  
  > look at the globe
  The 3D representation of Earth hangs in the centre of the room, suspended in empty space. It's a three-dimensional political map, highlighting countries and major cities, and it's tilted so that much of your view is filled with the European continent, where the countries of the First Settlement are shaded green. Across the Mediterranean Sea, much of Africa is shaded pink. The exception is the North African country of Assadia, which appears in yellow to indicate a major crisis.
  
  > examine the Assadia
  Assadia is a North African country run by a vicious gangster named Mugaffi. The yellow colour indicates that a major crisis is happening there.
  
  > Examine africa
  That part of the world is independent from the Administration.
  
  > examine first Settlement
  The First Settlement countries were once the European Union - an unhappy federation in which very different countries with very different cultures were forced to fit together by those who favoured ideology over stability. The unstable and incompetent union stumbled from crisis to crisis until it eventually blundered into the one that finished it off for good. That was when the Administration took over.
  
  > look at the desks
  The Administrators do much of their work here. Each desk is assigned to some small region of the world, with physically adjacent regions occupying adjacent desks in this room. The workstations allow situations to be analysed, resources to be allocated, and Administration decisions to be sent to the outside world. The layout of the room makes it easy to coordinate with neighbours.
  
  > Exits
  Exits lead:
  north to the Museum of Pre-Administration Government.
  east to the Security Administrator's Office.
  south to the Observation Gallery.
  west to the Mezzanine.
  
  > Go north
  This is the Administration Centre's museum. It's a vast hall, stretching far away to the north and east. It is currently closed and in darkness. A red rope blocks passage to the north and east. Light is coming from the corridor to the south and faintly from a blank video screen just beyond the rope. Exhibition displays fill the room, most too far away into the dark to be readable.
  
  There's a plaque bearing the word 'Responsibility' on the west wall.
  
  You can see a glass case containing an access card.
  
  You remember your first visit to the Administration Centre. The tour spent hours in the museum. Most of your classmates took little interest in it and were quickly bored. But you found it fascinating. Here in the centre of it all, literally within the corridors of power! What excitement, what possibility!
  
  > look at the screen
  The video screen is blank but producing a faint light. You notice a sticky label on the side.
  
  > examine the label
  There's a message on the label: 'Keeps breaking. 732595713 to reset.'
  
  > take the screen
  It's on the other side of the rope.
  
  > examine the plaque
  It's one of three such plaques: the others are to the south. Each briefly describes one of the three values of the Administration: Stability, Liberty, and Responsibility. Exams are highly likely to involve essays on interactions between the three, but it never hurts to revise a little more, so you read the description below the word:
  
  'Administrators have a duty to nurture personal responsibility, as this is necessary to build a strong, lawful and liberal society. It is held that each adult person has free will and is responsible for his or her actions. As Burke wrote,
  
  'Society cannot exist unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere, and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without.'
  
  > read the liberty
  [In Final Exam, 'READ' is synonymous with 'EXAMINE'.]
  It's one of three such plaques: the others are to the north and west. Each briefly describes one of the three values of the Administration: Stability, Liberty, and Responsibility. Exams are highly likely to involve essays on interactions between the three, but it never hurts to revise a little more, so you read the description below the word:
  
  'Administrators have a duty to uphold freedom of speech, thought and conscience, along with processes to prevent injustice such as jury trial. No person may be punished for holding opinions, however disagreeable these opinions may be. As Queen Elizabeth I famously said,
  
  > go to the north
  There's a plaque bearing the word 'Responsibility' on the west wall.
  
  You can see a glass case containing an access card.
  
  > look at the case
  The glass case bears a sign: 'In case of emergency, break glass. Penalty for improper use.'
  
  > examine the card
  A plastic card much like a credit card. It is made of white plastic and bears the text: 'EMERGENCY MAINTENANCE ACCESS'.
  
  > Break glass
  The glass shatters.
  
  > take the card
  Taken.
  
  > Go east
  This is the office of the Security Administrator. There is no sign of the Administrator or any other staff. The door leads west to the corridor. The office is furnished by a desk, sofa, a bookshelf, and a mural on the northern wall.
  
  > look at the mural
  The mural shows a dystopian cityscape of ugly skyscrapers and foul motorways. Miserable crowds mill around in the polluted, smoggy streets. The picture is intensely detailed, so you can even guess at what some of the people are doing, though none of them seem happy: miserable commuters, miserable criminals, miserable homeless people. Skyscrapers tower above them, adorned with the logos of credit cards and banks, and bearing the flags of failed governments. A tiny caption reads 'Where We Came From'.
  
  > look at the desk
  A very solid-looking wooden desk, bare and clean, as if it's just been delivered by an upmarket furniture shop. You feel like something is missing from the desk, but you can't remember what it is.
  
  > look at the sofa
  A large and comfortable leather sofa.
  
  > search the sofa
  [In Final Exam, 'SEARCH' is synonymous with 'EXAMINE'.]
  A large and comfortable leather sofa.
  
  > examine the bookshelf
  The bookshelves seem to have been emptied recently. Marks in the dust show where books have been removed. There is a book on the top shelf.
  
  > Examine book
  ('Notopia')
  The book is 'Notopia', by Perry Simm. Some of the book is a biography of the Central Administrator. But mostly, the book concerns how the Administration rose to power. The title refers to the Administration's approach to government, rejecting ideology and Utopian idealism, and focusing instead on stability and rational pragmatism. The result, according to the back cover, is 'the sort of society in which people would actually like to live'.
  
  > check what you're carrying
  You are carrying:
  an access card
  'Notopia'
  some thermal paper
  an identity badge
  
  > put Notopia on the bookshelf
  You put 'Notopia' on the bookshelves.
  
  > Examine book
  Which do you mean, 'Notopia' or 'Idiots' Guide to Writing Malware and Viruses'?
  
  > Idiot
  It's one of the well known Idiots' Guide series of computer books. It has a friendly yellow cover, on which a cartoon man offers to tell you how to 'Crack computers, flood networks and steal information'. The book contains several hundred pages of instructions for finding and exploiting security holes in computers. While this book may be filled with all sorts of interesting information, none of it's going to come up on your exam.
  
  > check your inventory
  You are carrying:
  'Idiots' Guide to Writing Malware and Viruses'
  an access card
  some thermal paper
  an identity badge
  
  > look under sofa
  [In Final Exam, 'LOOK UNDER' is synonymous with 'EXAMINE'.]
  A large and comfortable leather sofa.