Cupid Parliament
The Cupid Parliament was the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids' governing body, stepping in after the Creator retired from public life.
Nature
The Cupid Parliament's membership was made up of the Prefects of the many departments of the Cupid Intelligence Institute, and overseen by the Copper-Colored Council of Elders, made up of the ten oldest Mark I Clockwork Cherubs including the Cupid Prime himself. (PROSE: The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids) Other members included various “Cupids of Interest”, such as the head operatives of the Scarlet Wings and Blue Feather task-forces. On the other hand, by special exception, Foreman-964 and Conspiracy-1263 were banned from participating in Parliamentary debates despite their status as Prefects due to how unproductive they were in conversation, even by the Parliament's standards. (PROSE: Magic Trick)
The Parliament was infamous for getting drawn into lengthy, circular debates about trivial matters. (PROSE: The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids) They held council in the Cupid Parliament building. (PROSE: The Cupid Suggestion Box)
History
Early history
Around the late 1970s-early 1980s, the Cupid Parliament took a long time to approve young Philatel-426's plans for a Department of Postal Services. While waiting for them to report on the proposal, Philatel finished going through mandatory training and joined the Department of Journalism. The eventually did so.
Later, after Mailbag-431 died, the document declaring him officially dead was signed by “the Parliament” as well as by other authorities such as the Supreme Quaestor and the Cupid Prime. (PROSE: A Copper-Colored Christmas Carol)
In 1994, the Cupid Parliament decided, after some debate, that the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids should maintain neutrality with the Mob of the Maroon Magpie. (PROSE: The Mob of the Maroon Magpie)
A “few years” before 2019, the Cupid Parliament were sent a two-way communicator distress signal by Amity-965, who had been taken prisoner in the Discordia Dimension. They dispatched a battalion of Fog Ships led by Amadeo-378 to the rescue. (PROSE: The Drove of the Demesmaekerite-Dyed Discordias)
2019
In 2019, the Parliament made the emergency decision of exiling the Sisters of Juliet to Dimension 1579. (PROSE: Of Romeos and Juliets)
At some point prior to Pessimist-242 and Larrikin-1029's adventure in the Workshop of Madame Tarsa, (PROSE: The Cupid Suggestion Box) the Copper-Colored Council of Elders put up the Cupid Suggestion Box. Among other things, (PROSE: The Cupid Suggestion Box) Pessimist's Fog Ship put in a request with the Parliament for them to officially grant vacation time to the increasing number of non-Clockwork Cherub members of the Crew, such as the sentient Fog Ship itself. (PROSE: The Toymaker's Labyrinth, The Cupid Suggestion Box) They agreed to put it to a vote in the Parliament, (PROSE: The Cupid Suggestion Box) and later rubber-stamped a more bounded version of the original proposal, which seemed to broadly satisfy the targets. (PROSE: Conspiracy-1263 Publicly Accuses the Gang of the Green Gorillas) They also got a threatening note from a nonexistent Cupid who signed Wicked-6666, as well as a number of highly frivolous requests, with Foreman-964's insistence on sending them messages asking them to take his side in his feud with Philatel-426 ultimately causing them to put guards around the Suggestion Box to prevent him or the equally spamming-prone Acquaintanceship-982 from accessing it. On what would ultimately become the Suggestion Box's last day in operation, Larrikin-1029 also accidentally broke one of the windows of the Cupid Parliament building, leaving an apologetic note in the Suggestion Box. After a few more inane suggestions, the Elders agreed to stop operating the Suggestion Box altogether. (PROSE: The Cupid Suggestion Box) Subsequently, queries to the Parliament were sent through the Cupid Post Office, apparently in sufficient numbers that a specific crate for them, of equal size to “Misc. Letters”, was introduced. (COMIC: A Message from Philatel)
When they received an S.O.S. from Morningstar 1 Base on Colony World #2, the Cupid Parliament debated what to do at some length until they decided to do what they usually did, namely send in the Department of Problem-Solving. (PROSE: The Resurrection of the Wellsians) After the Problem-Solvers returned with news that the Wellsians had returned, the Parliament made an official statement to the Crew, claiming that it was “nothing to worry about”. (PROSE: The Wellsians)
Increasingly frustrated by their rebuffing of his suggestions, Conquest-932 founded the Triangular Society with the aim of overthrowing the Parliament as well as the Cupid Prime. (COMIC: A Slight Misunderstanding)
On the day of the Rabbit Invasion, the Parliament had been engaged for nine days in a protracted debate about whose responsibility it was to replace the ink in the typewriter of Stenographer-123 (who typed down the Parliamentary logs) when it ran out, the main contenders being the Department of Discipline and the Department of Documentation. Despite being banned from the Parliament, Foreman-964 had snuck in, hiding under his desk for most of the debates before revealing himself. Just as it was about to descend into sheer fisticuffs, the argument finally ended when the destruction of the typewriter in question by the magic rabbits rendered it moot. For the first time ever, one of Acquaintanceship-982's suggestions was listened to as he moved that they all run for it. (PROSE: Magic Trick) Subsequently, though they all returned to the Homeworld save for the Cupid Prime — who extended his holiday in Florida by some length —, the Parliament refused to reconvene in the Parliament building for some time. (PROSE: The Cupid Parliament Destroyed?)
On Halloween 2019, the Cupid Parliament were gathered for their own portion of the Halloween celebrations when the Spirit Realm Gateway collapsed into a dimensional rift that let the Great Ghost's legion into the Homeworld. Conducting a “hasty” vote where they were standing, the Parliament told the Cupid Prime to use the Emergency Transport Button. (PROSE: The Ghosts and the Machine)
Many entries in the Book of Evil urged Cupids to report sightings of various villains to the Parliament if they occurred, including the Wellsians. An addendum stressed that this did not apply to villains who had been redeemed since being included in the Book, most especially Lord Thymon, whom people seemed to pointlessly report en masse owing to his having moved to the Cupid Homeworld permanently. (PROSE: The Book of Evil)
Some time in November 2019, Conquest's plans with the Triangular Society reached a crescendo when he successfully dynamited the Cupid Parliament building. In this, he was unexpectedly assisted by a random Parliament-member who'd caught him in the act, and made a snap decision to get some catharsis by helping along instead of trying to stop him. (COMIC: Professional Endorsement) No other members of Parliament were nearby, however, such that the attack caused no casualties: the Parliament had yet to resume regular sessions in the aftermath of the Rabbit Invasion. After the smoke cleared, the Council of Elders decided to commission Foreman-964's Department of Construction to build a new Parliament building, pleading with him that it not be a warehouse (something about which Foreman made no promises). (PROSE: The Cupid Parliament Destroyed?)
In December 2019, after the Department of Phenomena reported that the concept of Christmas was, as best they could tell, non-sentient and thus harmless, they finally lifted their ban on letting the concept penetrate the Homeworld, though they soon came to regret it due to the conceptual threat presented by Santa Claus; (PROSE: Father Christmas) this nevertheless Celebration-665 to adapt it into the nondenominational “Festival of Giving”. (PROSE: The Frost King's Treasure) The Parliament would formally authorise the celebration of Christmas in the Cupid Homeworld from 2020 onwards due to pressure from the Homeworld's non-Clockwork Cherub inhabitants, such as Lord Thymon and Sneernobiel — but tasked Pythagoras-858 with handling the actual setting up by himself. (PROSE: The Time of the Toymaker)
Also in December 2019, while debating whether to join Dandy-432 on his quest for the Frost King's treasure, Pessimist-242 motivated himself by telling himself that “if they killed Dandy, the Parliament would blame him for not picking up the pieces”. (PROSE: The Frost King's Treasure)
In a possible “bad future” shown to Philatel-426 on Christmas Eve 2019 by the Ghost of Christmas Yet-to-Come, Philatel died under mysterious circumstances, and the Parliament ordered an investigation, sending operatives to search his house. (PROSE: A Copper-Colored Christmas Carol)
In late December, Pessimist-242, Larrikin-1029, Juliet-178 and Diggy-292 witnessed the unexpected appearance of an unknown Void Ship whose occupant, Hector Fenwick, soon revealed that in his home universe, he was a writer who wrote stories about the Crew. After he made too much of a nuisance of himself, the Cupids made a joint decision to take him before the Cupid Parliament, who were now holding sessions in a “temporary Parliamentary Hall”.
There, Fenwick persisted in nagging and irritating the Cupids, even getting to the bottom of senior Parliamentary Cupid Patient-039's reserves of goodwill; in the end, the Parliament made a decision to have him trapped in a burlap sack and exiled back to his home universe, where his Void Ship had been set to self-destruct once he exited it. Just after this was implemented, Lord Thymon arrived in the temporary Parliamentary Hall with a stack of reports from the Department of Applied Contrafibulation; Larrikin, who was still in the building, showed Thymon a photo of Fenwick and asked the time-demon to disintegrate him should he ever return. The Parliamentary Cupids chastised Larrikin for the impractical violence of the solution, but could not disagree with the spirit in which the suggestion had been made. (PROSE: The Metafictional Meddler)
