Returning to the arena the next day, you try without success to find dAnkan. Instead, you find the construction work momentarily paused, as all the elfs are congregated in small groups. Approaching one group, you easily see that they are reading the latest issue of Waryon News, where the sensationalistic headline reads “The North Pole labor SCANDAL and how it reached new heights.” Looking around you see a lot of elfs nodding along while reading.
“Psst, it’s easy to go to the control room,” says an inconspicuous trash can with a feathered voice.
“I guess it is. So what?” you ask the trashcan. When you don’t get a response, you instead decide to do what the trashcan told you and jog over there. On your way over you spot elfs in various stages of revolutionary preparation, together with a weird number of World War 2 era posters like “Don’t love the squander bug when you go shopping” and “Only you can prevent item fires!” haphazardly taped to the walls, together with some old aerospace dictionaries.
After you ascend the final staircase you turn a corner just in time to see a large plant move into position. A silent moment passes before the plant awkwardly beckons you over. “There are ears everywhere. We must speak in code until we have fixed this, but once we’ve done that the weird uncle newspaper shouldn’t be a problem any longer,” the anxious voice of the trashcan whispers.
“Fine, sure, but what code is it?” you wonder annoyed, but the plant does not answer. Losing your patience, you lift up the plant only to find a hastily melted tunnel and a dropped queue card with the phonetic spellings of the name of the Norwegian competitors.
Continuing on, you finally reach control room Sierra-Delta-Echo: the hub for the arena. Currently deserted, this is where the arena manager Winston Churchill (some relation) will oversee the games. On the big whiteboard, between building plans and notes about doping regulations, you see dAnkan’s unique handwriting: “Say the codeword into the mike quickly.” You look over at the intercom microphone which looks old enough to maybe have been used by Winston Churchill (the other one); it probably can’t even record modern words. Well, time to think through your entire day to figure out what your boss wants you to say.