TBAS: "I'm afraid now is the time for concessions. We have no other choice."

B1: "Once again, you do not seem to understand the purpose of our pact. You will gain nothing in the long run if you keep feeding the Populists. Their ideology is dead in the water."

TBAS: "You do not understand your place, my friend. I remember nowhere in our contract where it said I had to listen to your advice."

B1: "This is foolishness!"

TBAS: "This is politics. Things don't work like they do in the Hells, devil. This democracy notion is new to all of us. We can work it to our advantage, but only if we play our cards right."

B1: "Throwing the Royal Treasury in a pit would be worth more than working with the Populists ever will, Taqi. I can't believe that you had the entire Sultanate in the palm of your hands and you threw it away. For a woman, too. I expected better of you."

(The sound of a cocking pistol is heard.)

TBAS: "Insult my wife's intelligence again and I will go to the Hells and kill you myself."

(Beat.)

(The sound of a pistol being put into half-cock and thrown onto a table is heard.)

-Dictation of a conversation between Taqi Basliel-Assi-Suleimani and myself on the 7th of Harvest, 33 F.A.