It was second-nature to doubt himself by now, but he was always certain about one thing: he was a shitty leader. Couldn't even keep people in his pathetic little group without having to beg for them to not abandon him. But many of them left without saying a word. How was he supposed to keep members around if they kept ditching at the drop of a hat? The logical solution was to bribe them, associating participation with reward in their brain. As if they were a pack of Pavlov's dogs. After hatching a plan with Morgan, he tried to collect himself enough before announcing to his peers in vain.

    His limping gait lacked the weekly jitters of a meeting as he dragged himself to the statue, yet he still forced a fatigued smile onto his snout -- although his crooked smile looked like a grimace of pain more than anything. Something had broken in him, yet nothing too uncommon fortunately. Just a slight hiccup in the stubborn consciousness keeping him in existence. The overwhelmed feline remained tensed even as he gave up on yelling for the clan's attention and let out a sharp choppy whistle to round them up before numbly staring up at the brown sky rumbling overhead. Maybe it was a light monsoon in the distance, maybe it was a hurricane clambering its way over to wipe out the filth of the swamp once and for all; Beck wasn't in the mindset to care. Once he tore his sights from the weather to check if everyone was present, he straightened out his spine to begin his expected rambling, speaking disjointedly while he gnawed on his pallid lip, "Meeting welcomes, right? Right. New folks... Axle, yep, with the muzzle, Dorian -- he's fancy, very fancy. Elliot's got a cool cape. Also Courier, Courier -- two eagles, Serqet 'n' Was. And last minute addition, Flux." His broken speech didn't seem to bother him much, as he started to babble out his promotions with an aloof expression, "Arrow -- arrows hurt -- Arrow can be a chaser now, and so can Stockin', and Aya. Nayru? Nayru is gone, maybe dead; we gotta have more medics, nurses, whatever. Asked Abathur and new gal Mirabella if they wanted to be nurses, and they said yes. Iota and Malphas, ya better start catchin' 'em up with trainin'. Thanks to the usuals, Fen, Iota, Malphas, Vigenere, and Zimavich -- y'all get shout outs." A wild look burned within his filmy stare as his stubby tail thumped against the statue's base and he raspily mumbled, "Freyja is demoted, haven't seen her for weeks."

    Was that it? Huh, weekly meetings were certainly shorter than the biweekly schedule he had settled into before. Still locked in his partially-lucid daze, Beck abruptly scrambled to his feet, teeth bared as a snarl between a sneer and a threat. "Oh! If anybody sees that Meta-bastard, I want you to scar him up real good, maybe gut him, then get him outta Tanglewood. He's exiled! Exiled!" the commander giddily shrieked out, falling back into a fit of deranged giggles that quickly became tearful laughter. Slouching back against the statue's base as his teeth gritted and his shallow chest heaved to recover the air he just expended, Beck rubbed at his eyes with both muddy paws, sniffing to his deputy in defeat, "Just give 'em the stupid food already, Morgan." Hopefully, the Pavlovian reward was enough to make them forget about his public relapse into his early days of the afterlife, otherwise Morgan would have made everyone ice cream for nothing.

tl;dr: big welcome to the joiners this week! [member=1501]AXLE[/member] [member=1524]DORIAN[/member] [member=1491]elliot.[/member] [member=1465]COURIER[/member] [member=1407]SERQET[/member] [member=1413]Was[/member] and [member=1602]FLUX[/member] !
[member=1350]ARROW ![/member] [member=1430]STOCKING[/member] and [member=1444]aya[/member] are promoted to chasers
nayru was dropped, so to make up for the loss, [member=1431]ABATHUR .[/member] and [member=509]mirabella[/member] have stepped up as nurses alongside iota and malphas
shoutouts to [member=234]FENRISULFR G.[/member] [member=253]iota[/member] [member=37]MALPHAS[/member] [member=601]VIGENERE CIPHER.[/member] and @ZIMAVICH.
[member=863]Freyja[/member] is demoted to a regular rogue
[member=1255]THE META[/member] is exiled for sabotaging the alliance with the ascendants
IMPORTANT OOC ANNOUNCEMENT