This is where the stable set comes in. To get into the stable set you need to have first gone through a number of relocations in the node age process. The stable set has a simple ‘first-seen’ ranking order since node age no longer applies. The first-seen seven nodes in the stable set are the elders and those that arrived later are adults, again ranked on first-seen.
If C is an elder and it gets booted, the highest ranking adult is promoted to take its place and C has to start again as an infant.