Sorry about the wait.
1) It's hot as balls where I'm stationed right now.
2) This chapter was awkward for me to write since I pretty much had to stick to how canon went with the layout of the mine and the mission events.
Chapter Ten
The Normandy
Garrus whistled appreciatively upon laying eyes on the laser cannon apparatus. This baby looked awesome, even if the Alliance considered the thing a "second tier" weapon. He could just imagine the sensation of this thing spinning up its magnetic armatures for battle. And he wasn't the only one drooling over this particular example of Alliance technology. Tali was peppering the Chief Engineer…Adams, if he remembered correctly, with questions regarding the details of its operational theory.
"This ship is so small! How do you have enough power to run a free electron laser with this kind of output?"
"I can't tell you the specifics. Information about the core systems is classified. Needless to say that our ships have much more energetic drive systems than your Element Zero drives. What I can tell you is that our ship hulls are far sturdier than yours, and while we do use mass effect envelopes, we don't need them as much. We can get away with propelling larger loads and therefore there's less of a power draw on the core. Long story short, better hulls and a larger drive core means less energy spent on mass effect fields and more available for weapons."
Behind her mask, Tali's eyes glowed with excitement. Many a quarian nursed a slight resentment for the Council for abandoning them in the aftermath of the Morning War. The news that the turian military had been forcibly humbled before a newly discovered race had been met with small celebrations. The information that came after that had set the rank and file abuzz. Directed energy weapons for infantry? A non-reliance on Element Zero? Powered armor systems well beyond anything even the Salarians could develop? Any one of the rumored technologies possessed by the Alliance could easily allow the quarians to reclaim Rannoch from the geth.
But Tali had seen her father and his fellow admirals argue over whether or not to reach out to humanity. Their actions with regard to the Batarian Hegemony were most disquieting. Information provided by sympathetic supporters within the Citadel told them about the Alliance's usage of disassembler nanites, a weapon straight out of science fiction horror stories. There was also the highly-publicized execution of General Desolas, and the Torfan Example. If nothing else, the available information made it perfectly clear how ruthless and xenophobic the Alliance could be, which might not bode well for a crippled race such as theirs.
To get their hands on Alliance technology was widely seen as the "holiest of holies," one of the greatest potential gifts a quarian returning from pilgrimage could bring back to the fleet. But the dangers and near-impossibility of such a venture had stayed many an enterprising child. Tali had never in her wildest dreams imagined that she would have this chance, and she absolutely intended to make the most of it. If she could just pry the details of even one of their secrets out to send back to the fleet, it would be of immeasurable worth to her people.
"I would love the chance to look at your engines," the girl said almost dreamily.
"They are quite a piece of work," Adams agreed. "Unfortunately, that area is off limits. Alliance secrets. It's a real shame. I think that you're the only new visitor who would have a chance at understanding them, and I rarely get the chance to teach people as it is."
"You know," Garrus cut in, "if you don't mind me asking, why doesn't the Normandy have plasma cannons? This isn't a Militia ship. This is the actual Alliance Navy."
"Information control procedures. We had Nihlus Kryik embedded on the ship, so we switched out the weapons systems. People can look at the lasers all they want. We'll keep the better toys to ourselves."
If that isn't paranoia, I don't know what is, Garrus thought. Then again, they have a damn good reason to be careful. "Why aren't you going back to swap in your real armament? From what I saw of Saren's dreadnaught, you'll need all the firepower you can get on something this small."
Adams snorted. "One, because of security reasons. Two, even if we had our proper armament, it wouldn't do much to that thing. This laser is what we mount on our Militia cruisers, and it barely pierced the hull. The only real difference the plasma cannons would make is how fast we could shoot." Of course, that wasn't strictly true. The original fusion lances could definitely do some serious damage. But the Spectre didn't need to know that. "If we're going to destroy that thing, we'll call in one of our own dreadnoughts."
Before Garrus could speak again, his omnitool chimed. "The hell?" Is someone messaging me? How are they getting a signal to me when the Alliance doesn't have the Extranet? "Oh hi dad."
"Garrus, were you at Warehouse 223?"
"Uh, yes. So were Nihlus and the Alliance soldiers. Why do you ask?"
"Because you left a little package here. Kind of an explosive one, really. You mind telling us how to disarm it?"
Garrus grabbed his face. Whoops. "How do you know it's mine, dad?" he asked in an innocent tone that fooled absolutely no one.
"You wrote 'From Vakarian with hate, scumbags.' From one cop to another, Garrus, you want to avoid leaving evidence behind."
"It was supposed to explode…" he trailed off lamely.
"Then next time remember to push the damn trigger!"
*break*
Shepard jolted upright from her bed in her newly furnished (yet somewhat bare) quarters. Another flashback. Another haunting experience she'd longed to put behind herself. As she mashed her palms against her face, she focused on the one image that had been distinctly out of place. For some reason, the word "Reapers" echoed in her head. The alien images had joined her repressed memories while the word echoed in Saren's voice in the background.
Brushing it off as her anger towards the rogue turian for his actions, she slipped out of bed and donned her undersuit and hit the ship's intercom.
"Joker, what's our ETA?"
"We should hit Therum in about four hours ma'am. You want us to exit at the edge of the system in case those geth are already there?"
"Good idea. Make it happen."
"Aye aye, ma'am."
"Pressly, any leads from Captain Anderson yet?"
"No ma'am,"
"Alenko, run the Spectre and the quarian through weapons familiarization."
"You're bringing her on the mission, ma'am? She's a civilian, and she's not a Citadel representative."
"I don't like it either, but she's the expert on the geth. I'll need to bring her and the Spectre with me. You and Williams will join the marines for ground action, so get everyone suited up and ready."
"Yes ma'am."
"Chief Adams?"
"Reporting, ma'am."
"I want a full ops check on our laser cannons and engines. Joker will probably be going hot on this one."
"Right away, ma'am."
Tartarus
"When I approved Cerberus, it was with the understanding that questionable actions would be taken to ensure humanity's future. I fail to see how the destruction of an entire planet assures our future, doctor,"
"I-I assure you that Adogene's destruction was not part of our agent's orders, sir!" Dr. Core stammered. "Agent Leng acted beyond his bounds. We will take steps to assure that it won't happen again."
"You'd better." And with that threatening undertone, General Summers's image cut out. Core whirled around to the sound of private chuckling.
"Well I hope you're bloody happy!" she snapped at Harper.
"Oh I assure you that I am quite infuriated with Agent Leng's actions. But that doesn't mean I can't find amusement in the general's heavy-handed manners."
"You could have fooled me," the doctor muttered. "Do you have any idea what will happen because of this?"
"In the short term, the main part of the Hegemony remnant has been eliminated. The rather public example of how a planet can be destroyed by overriding the programmed drive safeties should lead to a very strong crackdown on unauthorized travel. I would daresay that the Council will have something to say about this that will infuriate many of their people." Harper paused in thought. "The troubling part would be how nearly all of the Citadel races would suspect our involvement. The one thing in our favor is that no bodies can be found. The evidence was destroyed when the ship impacted the planet. They can blame us as much as they want, but without real proof…"
"Come on, Jack. You know that all people need is the impression of guilt to do stupid things to 'punish' others. This will come back to bite us."
"Then we can fabricate some. Disseminate rumors pinning full blame on the Hegemony remnant. There is little the Citadel races wouldn't put past them, after all. Attacking a planet of 'rebels and traitors' to incite a possible larger war between us and the Council is a plausible scenario for them, and it could satisfy the public's need for an agent provocateur to pin the blame on."
"That could work…" Core agreed reluctantly. "But we'll have to be damned careful about it."
"Consult with our brothers in Intelligence to come up with a plan for that. If nothing else, we need something to assure the Council. In the meantime, pull Kai Leng from the field for consultations. Perhaps someone with more subtlety in the near future."
Core dutifully typed herself a note before remembering something else. "Oh, we've concluded our 'autopsies' of the geth bodies from Eden Prime. Coupled with what that quarian Shepard went after on the Citadel had to tell us, we've managed to identify the networking communication equipment that these combat units are equipped with. Based on software reconstruction, we've identified the comm frequencies the geth use to share data between units. I'd say this is a very valuable piece of intelligence."
"And why would that be?" Harper queried.
"By scanning on these frequencies and pinging for responses from each unit, we could create a locator program that would allow our soldiers to pinpoint their location on the battlefield. They would be impossible for the geth to ambush."
"Could you employ those tactics from orbit?"
"Only when the geth are present in sufficient numbers. They would have to boost power to their communications or have established units in orbit for us to track from."
"Send your findings to Anderson, and have him forward them to the Normandy. I have no doubt that Shepard will be able to test out your theory."
"You say that like you have no faith in my research," Eva chided.
"Call it conservatism. Initial theories usually have flaws, doctor."
"Killjoy."
The Normandy
When Shepard arrived on the bridge in full gear, Lieutenant Pressly ran up to her.
"Ma'am, message from the captain. Our people have extrapolated the geth comm frequencies."
Shepard raised an eyebrow as she read the full message. "Get the quarian up here."
"Yes ma'am."
A few minutes later, Garrus and Tali stepped off the elevator. "What gives, commander?" The Spectre asked.
"Tali, do you think you can use these frequencies to locate the geth on the planet if they're down there?"
Tali blinked behind her mask before reading the message. "I suppose I could. But why?"
"We're trying to search a planet, and we're just one ship. That's a lot of area to cover and we don't have time to waste. If there are geth on the planet and they're after the asari, we can just follow their trail. Also, this is a volcanic planet according to the Council. That'll make our search somewhat easier, but I still don't want to have to drive a badly-made APC around half the planet looking for a blue archaeologist."
"You sound like you're hoping the geth are actually there," Garrus noted.
"Like I said, we could just follow their trail and make our search much easier. We find the largest concentration, blast them from orbit, secure an LZ, and we go in after her."
"Orbital bombardment? And they say I cause collateral damage."
"It's a laser, Vakarian," Shepard justified. "It's not going to cause an impact crater. It'll just melt or explode what it hits."
"Commander, we'll hit Therum in about ten minutes."
"Thanks Joker." Shepard returned her gaze to the two in front of her. "Get down to the bay and board the Skyranger. If you see the lieutenant commander, tell him to move his ass. We'll be going in hot."
"You know, technically I don't take orders from you," Garrus threw out as he and Tali moved toward the elevator.
Shepard rolled her eyes before turning to Pressly. "You're in charge while we're gone. Once we drop, do whatever it takes to deal with any geth in orbit. When you're clear, have Joker give the rear guard some orbital strike support."
"Got it ma'am. Good luck."
Therum
As it turned out, there was an orbital presence around the planet. The geth cruiser was caught quite off guard when the Normandy materialized right behind its engines and forcibly depowered them with a precision strike through the hull.
The loss of engine power did not prevent the ship from launching its fighter contingent in pursuit of the Alliance prowler however, and Joker spent an agonizing twenty minutes ducking and dodging around the geth ship to avoid enemy attack before Tali finished her work.
"Any day now would be nice! It's kind of hard to deal with enemy fighters when you're driving something ten times bigger than they are!"
"And it's kind of hard for me to focus on hacking into the geth network while you're trying to make me throw up in my suit, bosh'tet!" Tali swore as the Normandy performed another maneuver that the manufacturers would have told anyone was physically impossible in space.
"Oh sorry, I figured you'd like surviving better than a smash landing on the planet down below!"
"Knock it off you two," Shepard growled, from her seat at the very rear of the Skyranger. "Save it for the enemy."
Joker nearly flinched as a pulse cannon shot from a geth fighter blazed past the cockpit. "Alright, that's it!" In an impressive display of piloting, Joker flipped the ship backwards while maintaining its previous velocity and allowed the firing computer to go fully automatic as he slewed the prow about. Six of the fourteen geth fighters were picked off before they abruptly split in several directions to minimize the chance of being hit.
"Got it!" Tali exclaimed. "I have the triangulation data!"
"Send it to me," Pressly ordered.
As Tali complied, Joker took the ship for another wormhole jump behind the cruiser and fired again, this time spearing the cruiser's critically active mass effect core. With the sudden failure of containment, the core blew out, unleashing a massive burst of Dark Energy within the hull as the drives capacitors discharged into the swirling mass of Element Zero. A wave of repulsive force tore apart the internal superstructure and the bulkheads, blasting the cruiser into two halves and crushing any geth still aboard.
With the loss of the cruiser, the geth fighters became much less coordinated, and five more minutes of action eliminated the rest, leaving the Normandy in sole control of the orbital space.
"According to the data," Pressly continued, "the geth are spread out, but moving mainly into one area. Looks like they found the asari, commander."
"Launch the Skyranger and start firing at them," Shepard ordered.
The bay door opened as the Normandy oriented itself toward the planet, and then the Skyranger activated its boosters and shot downward. Everyone aboard held their breath as they descended. "We're at fifty thousand, ma'am," the pilot called out.
"Fast drop it!" Shepard replied. Every human quickly adopted a brace position, which Garrus and Tali quickly copied.
Every geth in the target area had been informed of the space battle and was aiming at the incoming dropship. The pilot snarled as he began to encounter anti-air fire while closing in. Then a violet beam flashed by the craft and struck a rocky outcropping where a several large guns were mounted. The surface exploded as the beam delivered its energy into the rocky area in the center, which then superheated the air directly above and created an area of insanely high atmospheric pressure. The sudden differential resulted in an expanding wave of superheated plasmified air that shredded the turrets and a rather large four-legged mobile geth unit along with its attending entourage of forces. What was left was consumed by a lava flow as the outcropping collapsed.
As the defensive positions fell to precision fire from the Normandy, the incoming hail dropped to nothing as the geth abandoned their established positions to seek some form of cover from the rain of laser fire. Uninhibited, the pilot finally reached ground level at the central area, something that looked like a mining outpost.
Tali squeezed her eyes shut to fight off the nausea in her stomach as the dropship abruptly decelerated. Then she felt the ship's ramp slam down on the ground outside and heard several loud bangs as large metal plates detached from the ship and planted themselves on the ground.
"Move move move!" Shepard called as she unbuckled herself and sprinted down the ramp. The rest of the team followed behind her, As Garrus and Tali made their way off, the ramp folded back up and the dropship lifted into an overwatch position. Meanwhile, Alenko and Williams directed the marine contingent to spread out into defensive positions.
"Better get on with it ma'am," Alenko said, nodding towards a hole dug into the rock behind them. "We'll keep the exit clear for you."
Shepard returned the nod and gestured for Garrus and Tali to follow her into the tunnel. "Did the Council tell you anything about this dig site?" she asked the Spectre.
"You know as much as I do," Garrus admitted.
"There are some geth units up ahead," Tali called as they approached the end of the tunnel. "A few of them are on the catwalk. The rest are farther away."
"Garrus, stay here and cover me. Tali, make sure no one comes behind us. I know the team is guarding that end, but it doesn't hurt to be safe."
"Wait, you're going out there on your own?!"
"I got you, commander," Garrus replied, motioning for Tali to calm down.
The geth were unprepared for the armored blur that raced across the catwalk faster than any living being was supposed to. The three snipers covering the catwalk didn't even attempt to take their shots before Shepard shredded one of the units advancing towards her with a heavy laser and shoved her fist through a second. One sniper suddenly sprouted a hole in its chest cavity and dropped, followed by another. Meanwhile, Shepard ducked and weaved around the remaining two closer enemies before eviscerating them in a hail of red. The final sniper took the opportunity to fire, only to experience the computerized equivalent of confusion as the human reacted inexplicably fast, dodging the shot. Before the geth could fire another, it too joined its brethren in destruction.
"Clear!" Shepard called over the radio and motioned for Garrus and Tali to regroup. As they closed up, Shepard noted with amusement that the quarian appeared to be staring at her in complete awe. "Close your jaw and let's move."
Garrus chuckled as Tali jerked in mild embarrassment. "And that's why I didn't argue with her."
The catwalk sloped downward and ended before a large kinetic barrier. "Where the hell is this even coming from?" the commander muttered as she examined it.
"No way to shut it off from here," Garrus pointed out. "We'll have to go around."
"Over here!" Tali called, indicating a freight elevator platform nearby. The three stepped onto it before Garrus pressed the control and sent it downward. When they stepped off, they were greeted with the sight of a pile of medical supplies.
"No need to worry about first aid, I guess," Garrus chuckled.
"Says you," Tali muttered.
They moved along to another elevator platform, which smoked ominously. Garrus eyed it dubiously. "Do we have to take this down?"
"I don't have to," Shepard answered. "But you two probably wouldn't take the drop very well, and it's better not to split up while we're down here. You see another way down?"
The Spectre shook his head and they boarded the platform. Mercifully, nothing untoward happened while they descended. The team ended up in an area littered with twisted metal. Shepard winced as their footsteps echoed through the area.
"I-is someone out there?" a woman's voice called.
"Commander Shepard of the Alliance," Shepard answered. "I'm here with a Council Spectre. You're Liara T'Soni?"
"Oh thank the goddess, you're not the geth!" As the team made their way around a corner, they could see a blue woman suspended in mid-air behind a barrier.
"Yo," Garrus waved. "Spectre Vakarian here. You mind coming with us? This place isn't exactly safe at the moment."
"I noticed," the nervous asari replied, "but I'm stuck in this field. When the geth attacked, I guess I touched something I shouldn't have."
"I'm detecting a power signature down below," Tali reported as she fiddled with her omnitool.
"And that looks like an elevator shaft back there," Shepard commented.
"It is," Liara confirmed. "I was making my way down when the geth attacked."
"Then we just need to find that elevator," Garrus finished.
"Watch out," the scientist warned. "A krogan and some geth came by a while ago."
At that moment, a rocket detonated against the barrier, throwing the team backwards, and eliciting a scream of terror from the asari behind it.
"Thanks for the warning!" Shepard snarled as she scrambled back up and faced the source, diving over the railing and dropping into a pit of geth.
Garrus braced his rifle against the rail, keyed a special ammunition selection, and fired. The shot exploded in mid-air, unleashing an EMP burst that covered the area. The geth platforms lacked the proper shielding to prevent their computer cores from being fried by externally induced current. Shepard stood in the center of the pit, feeling somewhat stupid for having literally jumped the gun.
"Can't let you take all the kills," Garrus called cheekily.
"Whatever…" Shepard muttered. She looked over the area and noticed a flickering computer that had miraculously survived the EMP burst. "Tali, can you get information off this thing?"
"If it wasn't fried in the blast," the quarian answered as she pushed past. "You could have warned me you were going to do that," she chided the Spectre. "It appears to contain map data for the caverns here. According to this, there's some sort of hallway underneath the ground. It appears to go straight toward the power source I detected."
"Well that tells us where to go," Garrus commented. "Now how do we dig through this?"
"With that." The other two turned to where Shepard was pointing. "I'm no expert on digging equipment, but that huge thing looks like a mining laser."
"Hope it's still useable," Tali opined.
"Only one way to find out. Let's move this thing."
As it turned out, the automated system was fried. Garrus and Tali manually adjusted the actuators with some clever jury-rigging on the circuit breaker box until the laser pointed at the floor in the direction of the underground hallway.
"Better stand back," Tali warned. "If I'm reading right, this thing has a yield in gigajoules."
The laser fired at the ground in a short burst, transmitting all its energy in the span of a nanosecond. The unsupported layer of rock covering the underground passage exploded downward, pelting the walls below with molten fragments and a few large chunks. The team waited for the dust to settle and the edges of the hole to stop glowing before making their way in.
"Looks like we got something," Garrus noted.
The cavern shook suddenly, and an ominous rumble echoed throughout the depths as the elevator carried them up to Liara's level.
"What the hell was that?" Shepard growled as she ran to the console and deactivated the field keeping the asari suspended.
"This area isn't really stable," the scientist replied as she slowly got to her feet. "I'd imagine that the geth attack isn't really helping in that respect."
Her words were punctuated by the sudden crash of several tons of rock crumpling the catwalk outside the barrier like cardboard.
"Yeah, I think we should be going," Garrus called from the elevator.
Shepard grabbed Liara around the waist, ignoring the squawk of surprise from the woman, and jumped on the elevator as it began to rise farther upward. "Alenko, we've got the doctor, and we're probably not coming back out the way we came. Get ready to pick us up topside."
"Where are you, ma'am? Your signal is hard to track at the moment."
"Don't know," the commander admitted. "I'll let you know once we're out."
The ground around them shook even more as the elevator reached the top. The roaring sound was the only warning that something was amiss before a barrage of gunfire rained down on them.
"Ah!" Liara screamed, covering her head and running to take cover behind a pillar.
"Krogan!" Garrus called as he pulled out his pistol and shot down a floating drone.
"I'm on it," Shepard snarled.
The krogan laughed even as the geth under his command began falling to deadly accurate precision fire or electrical arcs from the quarian. At least his quarry was putting up a fight. That would make it all the more fun when he tore them apart. The human woman would be first, he decided. He would see how well she would hold up against good old fashioned krogan brute force.
He mentally triggered his biotics and prepared to catapult himself towards the woman while enveloped in a mass effect envelope. But something seemed off as his feet left the floor. She was moving quite fast. In fact, as time slowed down for him, she still seemed to be moving at normal speed. She was bracing her back foot and readying a fist almost like-
Shepard roared as she lashed out with her arm, colliding with the massive armored krogan warrior traveling the opposite direction at nearly fifty kilometers an hour. Her enhanced strength meant that her gauntleted hand smashed through his chest armor, into his chest cavity, and exited his back by traveling through his spinal column, shattering the bone and severing the nerves. The forward momentum of the krogan forced her to pivot right, effectively swinging the body off her arm and sending the warrior sprawling across the floor. Shepard ignored the sudden concentration of fire in her direction and leapt into the air before smashing her fist into the dying warrior's head crest, piercing through it and making a mash of the krogan's brain matter.
"Commander!" Tali shouted a warning as a geth trooper launched a rocket at the woman as she stood up. The rocket exploded on impact. In that moment, horror coursed through the quarian at the sight. But then something charged out of the smoke cloud and forcibly disassembled the offending geth trooper with one immensely powerful punch. As the last geth fell to Garrus's pistol, Tali's mind replayed the entire scene. "Keelah…"
"By the goddess…" Liara whispered in awe as the commander shook off remnants of metal and flesh from her fist.
Garrus whistled appreciatively as he holstered his pistol and looked closely at the krogan's corpse. "Overkill and a taste for applied violence. What a woman."
Tali recovered enough to sniff dismissively at the Spectre. "Men."
The Normandy
As everyone disembarked from the Skyranger, Shepard could feel someone glaring at her. She looked across the bay and saw a familiar-looking krogan mercenary who looked somewhat annoyed.
"Uh, what's his problem?" Alenko wondered, noticing him as well.
Shepard rubbed her neck sheepishly. "I had a feeling I was forgetting something…" she answered lamely.
Codex: Alliance Intelligence
The parent organization of Cerberus, Intelligence proper focuses mainly on internal threats and security while Cerberus handles outside threats. The Alliance's paranoia results in Intelligence embedding liason officers within human corporations to ensure their operations in no way threaten the Alliance. Such heavy-handed methods have alienated many business leaders who are offended at the implication of being suspected of treason. This is one of the main reasons a number of humans have left Alliance territory, preferring to enjoy more freedom outside from prying eyes and influence.
Codex: Elerium
Within the entirety of the known galaxy, there exists only one facility for producing and refining the keystone element of the Alliance's technology. The station is currently guarded by the Ninth Fleet. Every shipment of Elerium from the station is escorted by the Alliance Navy to its destination, and each company that is authorized to receive a shipment is carefully vetted and monitored by the tireless Cydonians. For additional security, each company has a retinue of soldiers stationed to observe all usage of the element within the manufacturing processes of each contracting company. Elerium-derived products may only legally be sold to the Alliance military.
Unauthorized sale or usage of Elerium is considered treasonous. A number of highly-publicized incidents within the Alliance have heavily discouraged any unscrupulous individuals who have considered such actions. It's a testament to the Alliance's security measures that despite the twenty-six year standing bounty from the Citadel for Alliance technology, no Elerium has made its way out of Alliance territory into the hands of the Council races.
Poor Wrex. He missed out on the fun!
How's that for taking out a Krogan?
One thing that's bothered me about the geth is how no one addressed or exploited their obvious vulnerabilities. The geth are a networked AI and each unit functions as a node, allowing for inter-unit communications through wireless signals.
Yeah, this would make them hyper-efficient in coordination, but it's also a huge weakness. There's a reason that military operations emphasize EMCON (emissions control). If you can find it, you can hit it. And if you can hit it, you can kill it. Communications are a dead giveaway in the field, and a bunch of constantly communicating infantry makes it damn near impossible NOT to know where they are.
And yet NOBODY in Mass Effect ever takes advantage of this. Instead, they have you drive the Mako through the ass end of a planet and go through waves of enemies that you should by all logic be able to detect from their own communication systems.
*sigh* That's logic for you. BW style.
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