So- I did not mean for this fic to get as dark as it did. But it did, so I'm UPPING THE RATING OF THIS FIC! But I'm not sorry and I'm so glad I made this lol.
Trigger warning- graphic descriptions of sexual assault/sexually charged situations.
The ward for the criminally insane was incredibly quiet.
The only real sound was the intermittent hum of the flickering fluorescent lights overhead and the thrumming of his own heartbeat.
There was only a single hallway that wound around the corner in only one direction- Ed remembered what the nurses had said- the hallway ran in a square spiral- winding further in- to only provide one entrance and exit.
It was strange, seeing only white walls with no doors- but as they stepped forward, Ed realized the doors- doors with metal bars, like the door of a jail cell- were built into the walls to allow the staff to see into the inmates cells.
As they walked past the first cell, Ed paused, hearing a noise...
There was a man with his knees to his chest in the furthest corner of the cell, partially nude and facing the wall, sobbing.
"Keep moving, Fullmetal." Roy ordered.
Ed stepped forward, though it took much more effort than he'd care to admit to tear his eyes off the sad sight.
As they kept striding down the hallway, a hand shot out between the bars and grabbed for Ed. He yelped, ducking to the side only to come face to face with a wide-eyed, rabid man.
"The military's here! The military's here!" the man was shouting, and he laughed, unbuckling his trousers and pulling out his member and pointing it at them.
Ed had frozen up, and Roy grabbed him by the arm and yanked him out of the way and further down the hall as the man tried to urinate on them, laughing and jeering and shouting.
A series of loud bangs echoed off the next cell in the hall, but they didn't see anyone else, and other than the screaming man still shouting behind them and the quiet weeping at the start of the hall, it was still silent.
"I said to keep moving, Fullmetal." Roy said tersely.
"Sorry. It's hard not to get distracted." Ed admitted, looking at his feet. He'd seen chimeras in better states than these sorry people.
"The sooner we get to the wounded the sooner we can get out of here." Roy said briskly.
At the end of the hall, there was only one place to go- to the left, and they turned, trying to ignore the stench of urine and the unnatural silence.
"Help! Help me! I can't find my mom, please!" A man who couldn't have been older than twenty was weeping, reaching out to them.
"Keep your eyes forward, kid." Roy ordered, and Ed forced himself to look at his shoes as he walked by.
"Please! Don't leave me here!"
Ed's hands clenched into fists, shoulders tensed, but he kept walking.
The next man in his cage simply stared at him, and someone else flung feces at them, making them take off at a jog to get away...
They'd reached the end of this hallway, too, and once again, they could only go left. Or through the emergency exit.
Ed paused.
The lights in the hallway flickered and went out.
Roy swore. "The escapees must've gotten to the fuse box. Let's hurry."
He turned, starting down the hall.
Ed jogged after him, but stopped- he felt unnaturally cold...
The lights flashed on one final time before returning to darkness, and he glanced behind him to see the silhouette of a nurse standing at the end of the hallway he'd just come from.
"No! Come back here!"
Ed jolted, grabbing Mustang's forearm and spinning the man back around.
"Did you see that!?"
"See what?" Roy looked baffled.
"There was a nurse back there, by the emergency exit! She just shouted for help! Come on!"
Ed jogged back the way they'd come, struggling with the emergency exit, which was chained shut from the outside.
"Ed... are you sure about this?" Roy asked.
Ed snarled, reverting his automail blade back to his hand and clapping, glaring at Mustang.
"I know what I saw." He pressed his hands to the door, dissolving the chain, and they both stumbled into the concrete stairwell.
The emergency lights here still worked, and they flickered dimly, leaving them in an eerie half-darkness.
"This is a dead-end. The door at the fourth floor is locked too." Mustang looked over the metal banister at the landing below.
"She was here! I swear!"
Ed stepped forward, scanning the ground critically. The hairs on his flesh arm were standing up... he looked down at a lump in the darkness at the bottom of the stairs.
"There's someone down there!" he pointed.
"Shit." Mustang bit out a curse, realizing he was right, and they both hurried down the stairs to the next landing, finding a bloodied and unconscious security guard with an alarming amount of blood on his face.
"He's in bad shape, but he'd still alive. He's lucky he managed to lock himself in here before he passed out." Roy was already tearing a strip of fabric off his coat, wrapping it around the man's headwound.
Ed blinked, looking around. "Yeah- but where's the nurse? I know I saw her..."
He tried the door to the fourth floor, but it was locked. There was a locked metal gate preventing them from going further downstairs into the hospital. Mustang was right- this place was a dead end...
"Where the hell did she go?"
He felt something wet drip down his face. "Shit." he muttered. His nose was bleeding. Not again... not now...
He looked down at the unconscious guard Mustang was still trying to patch up, wiping his bloody nose on his sleeve and doing his best to hide it in the darkness.
There was no explanation for the disappearing nurse, unless...
Maybe the janitor wasn't the only person who's died in this hospital.
Either way, he didn't have time to muse about it.
"Fullmetal? What are you doing over there?"
Ed had drifted over to the far corner, trying to hide his nosebleed, which wasn't nearly as bad as some others he'd had, from Mustang. And in the dim light, it looked like it was working.
"Nothing. Just... looking around." he said simply.
"Right." Roy looked down at the injured guard- he'd done the best he could at wrapping the man's head wound, but judging by the way the man's arm was hanging limply, the man had other injuries that needed to be attended to.
"Would you be able to carry him?" Roy asked, looking over at Ed dubiously. The man was only about five foot six and had a solid but light build.
Ed paused "Yeah. Why?"
"We should split up. You get him out of the ward and then come back and find me- I'll keep searching and neutralizing any danger I come across."
Ed blinked. "You want us to split up? That's a bad idea."
Roy sighed. "It's the best option. We know the ward is clear behind us- but we don't want to stop searching. We've only got a short amount of time here. We don't know how serious this man's head injury is, though... you can get him out and come find me. first we have to get him upstairs..." Roy grabbed the man beneath the shoulders, setting the man's injured arm on his midsection to try and protect it and nodding to Ed.
"Grab his ankles, would you?"
With the both of them, it took only three minutes to get the man back upstairs, and Roy set him down on the upper landing, peering out at the hallway of the psych ward and nodding. "Remember the code phrase to get the nurse to unlock the door?"
Ed paused for a moment- he'd forgotten about that. "Cold December?" he asked hesitantly.
Roy nodded. "Good. Get moving."
Ed had slung the man over his automail shoulder- he had to move slowly with the injured man on him, but it wasn't a horrible strain. They headed off in perpendicular directions- Ed back the way they'd gotten into the ward and Roy heading deeper in.
Ed's trek was slow and arduous, but rather uneventful. He was used the the man screaming profanities and the random banging from the first cell, and he managed to get back to the entrance to the ward within ten minutes.
He rapped on the door with his flesh hand, shifting his weight and trying to lessen the load of the injured man slung over his shoulder.
"It's a Cold December." he said quickly.
There was the sound of a key in the lock, and the door opened, allowing him to duck out and deposit the injured man into a gaggle of nurses assembled.
"Good work!"
He nodded, turning back to the door. "Open it up- I have to go help my commanding officer."
The nurse hesitated. "Backup is on the way. I'm sure he'd be fine without you, honey, you're just a kid..."
Ed growled. "I am a MAJOR, and I am telling you to open the door." his eyes flashed with authority and skill beyond his years, and the nurse hurried to obey- he strode into the ward like he owned the place, trying not to let the sound of the door- the only way out of the locked ward- shutting and locking behind him.
The man in the second cell was still hurling profanities, and he didn't even notice someone at the cell adjacent to him until the hand clasped around his ankle and he fell.
He yelped, turning to see the elderly overweight man who'd been sobbing in the corner on all fours at the bars of his cell, both hands latched onto Ed's ankle and dragging him towards his cell, laughing maniacally.
"Fuck- get off! Ed kicked out with his flesh leg- it took a minute for him to remind himself the man was still behind bars, he was still relatively safe- three good kicks and the man had released him completely, clutching his brutalized fingers and whimpering.
Ed scrambled to his feet and took off at a jog, just wanting to get away.
When he was sure he was far enough away, he leaned against the wall, taking a deep breath and trying to still his racing heart.
He looked back over his shoulder, feeling a pang of regret hit him when he could still hear the man's whimpering drifting down the hall. He'd broken a few of the man's fingers, maybe he shouldn't have hit him so hard...
A body was flung at the metal bars to his right, and Ed was staring into the burning eyes of a madman as he clawed at the bars and growled.
"You'll burn for that, you filthy fucking military dog!"
It was the man who'd tried to piss on him earlier. Ed turned and plunged deeper into the ward, not even bothering to look back.
He was pretty sure he was safe, now- he was at the first corner, where the hallway turned left. It was dark enough he couldn't see who was behind the bars in this cell, but he heard a moan from within, somewhere in the darkness...
"Someone... Please... kill me." a pitiful voice called.
I have to get out of here. he turned, looking back at the door to the ward. He could turn back- say the code phrase, get out of here and never have to come back.
He crushed the thought like it was a spent cigarettes.
No. I need to find Mustang. I can't leave him here alone.
He took a deep breath and turned the corner, and kept walking.
It was getting easier to tune out the sobbing and screaming as he wound his way down the hall, and soon he'd reached where he and Mustang had parted ways by the emergency exit. He took another left turn and continued down the hallway- the silence made him apprehensive. He kept walking, trying to ignore the utter silence and darkness of the ward...
"Holy shit. They really did make a kid a state alchemist."
Ed turned, looking in the door of a cell to see a man with long black hair and sliver eyes, hands placed in a wooden stockade.
It was the most coherent thing he'd heard from any of the inmates since he got here, and he stepped closer to the bars of the cell, blinking.
"Can you really transmute without a circle?" the man asked from where he sat cross-legged at the back of the cell.
Ed nodded.
"Did you see a man in blue walk by here?" he asked- he was wondering how far ahead of him Mustang had gotten.
"Oh- you mean Roy Mustang." the man said with a smirk. "Maybe I did, maybe I didn't. Maybe I heard him screaming his lungs out before he even got here." the man said, giving Ed an idle shrug.
Ed's blood ran cold. He glanced behind him, at the emergency exit- had Mustang been overwhelmed and dragged into the concrete stairwell? Were they taking him apart right now?
"This isn't a game! I want answers, dammit! Wait... how the hell do you know Mustang's name?" Ed was caught off guard.
The man stood- he was lanky, with stringy black hair and calculating eyes, a thin face. "Mustang and I used to work together." the man gave him a smile that was quite unnerving.
Ed growled. "I don't have time for this shit! Which way did Mustang go- did he walk passed here or not?"
"I'll tell you if you do something for me. Equivalent exchange." the man said simply, giving him a smile that made him wary.
Ed frowned. "I'm not letting you out, if that's what you're asking."
"No, no. Nothing like that. I just want to see alchemy without a transmutation circle. It's quite a rare thing." the man was eying him carefully, and he stepped closer to the bars separating him.
Ed frowned, stepping back. He didn't like this. He didn't like this guy. But he needed to know if Mustang was further ahead or had gotten dragged off into the stairwell, and he sighed.
"Fine."
Roy sighed, continuing on the dismal path. He'd been shouted at, spit on, and cursed out as he walked past cell doors. But aside from some blood smeared on the walls, he was no closer to finding anyone. He was getting unnerved by the silence- he idly hoped that Fullmetal was making better progress than he was. And that the kid hadn't run into any trouble.
He made another left turn, trying to shake off his own anxiety, and stopped dead.
There were two bodies laying in the hallway.
A nurse was unconscious, splayed out on the floor, with a good chunk of flesh missing from her cheek.
Right beside her, a fat man had a large amount of blood smeared on his face. They were both out cold.
This must be the cannibal, then. he thought to himself, stepping forward. They were both unconscious, and he was left with a decision to make- keep moving forward and look for the last nurse and remaining inmate, or take one of the injured back with him- whether it be the nurse or the inmate.
He wasn't sure. And he really, really didn't want to leave the inmate free to wake up at any time.
He rolled the man over onto his back, withdrawing his handcuffs and cuffing the man. He snapped one cuff to the man's wrist and secured the other cuff to a metal radiator pipe, moving the unconscious nurse a safe distance away.
There was just one nurse unaccounted for now, and one inmate. He steeled himself, pulling at his gloves out of nervous habit, and kept moving forward.
As soon as he was around the corner and out of sight, the man handcuffed to the radiator sat up and smiled, lapping at the blood on his face. It wasn't his.
He leaned forward, sinking his teeth into the meaty part of his hand, just below the thumb. Warm blood filled his mouth, and he smiled- it wasn't quite as sweet when it was his own blood, but he needed a few less fingers to slip these cuffs off.
"Fine- I'll do a transmutation for you." Ed clapped his hands together, turning his automail arm into his signature blade and then reverting it again.
"There. Now tell me which way Mustang went."
But the man was as close to the bars as he could get, now, and he was looking amazed. "Man- you really are a prodigy, kid. The papers were right."
"Tell me what I need to know!"
"Easy, take it easy, kid!" The man held both stockade-bound hands up in a pacifying gesture, and Ed could see the two transmutation circles tattooed on either palm. He took another step back.
"I'm impressed with you. So I've decided I'll tell you everything you want to know and more. Starting with how I know your boss, Roy Mustang. Roy Mustang- the Flame Alchemist. The lord of the purge of Ishval. The incinerator of Ishvalans. I was the butcher, and I did my fair share of killing in the war- but Mustang- he was a demon." the man's white teeth flashed in the darkness, and he smiled.
"The name's Kimblee, by the way. The Crimson Alchemist. Not to toot my own horn or anything, but my kill count was pretty high. But Mustang- Mustang's was the highest. You wouldn't know it now, but Mustang... the man is a natural born killer. When they wanted something done quick, the brass would send him out- in one night, he'd level villages, towns... he took out the city of Eskal in only three days."
Ed had been backing up unconsciously, and his back hit the opposite wall, but Kimblee kept talking.
"You know how he did it? How he got results? Anyone in his way, he just-" Kimblee snapped the fingers of one restrained hand- "turned them to ash. It'd take less than a minute. Sometimes, they didn't even have time to scream." Kimblee grinned. "It didn't matter who, either. Men- women- children. Hell, one time we went out together and we both destroyed a hospital- and Mustang, man, he burned the whole place to the ground. The screaming only lasted three minutes. All those lives, snuffed out, just like that." Kimblee snapped his fingers again, smiling. "I mean, what could they do- they were a hospital, it's not like they could run.".
"Shut up." Ed muttered. His hands were shaking.
"What's wrong? Mustang never told you what he did to get to the rank of Colonel by twenty eight, huh? He left out his sadism when he had you sign your military contract?" Kimblee looked at him sadly. "That's a shame. You remind me of Mustang, you know- with your ambition."
He was finding it hard to breathe, but Kimblee just kept talking.
"You know, normally, I absolutely hate suck ups- but Mustang- his drive, it was frightening enough to make me respect him. All the brass had to do was tug the leash and he'd annihilate entire families. And you know what the craziest part is? The sick bastard enjoyed it."
"You're wrong!"
"Man, I wish I was, but that guy is a monster, kid." Kimblee looked at him, silver eyes serious. "I remember once, we were ordered to take out a small village together. Night operation, covert. We got in- and he lets it start to burn slow. He's drawing it out, enjoying it. And once it's lit up, he disappears for awhile. I found him in one of the huts at the edge of the village. He's banging this Ishvalan woman- got her thrown out on the bed, just fucking her raw!"
"Stop talking!" Ed was nauseas and shaking.
Kimblee shook his head. "I can't. You need to know the truth, kid. So he's raping this girl, and her kids are in the corner of the room, and they're crying- the older one is holding the younger one, and they're both scared shitless and crying, and this woman- I mean, he's decimating her, she's torn up down below- and this lady, all the amestrian she can string together is that he can do what he wants, just let her children go."
"So you know what he does?"
Ed didn't want to know. He didn't want to hear this!
How could Mustang- the man who'd pulled him from his backwoods town, gave him hope, been like a father to him- have done such terrible things?
"You're wrong. There's some mistake. There would be official records of this!"
Kimblee nodded. "Yeah. There would be. But he finishes, buttons up his pants, turns to me, and says- 'you want a turn?'. And I turned him down, because there wasn't any fun in it- I didn't want his sloppy seconds. And I wouldn't have enjoyed it-" something in Kimblee's eyes sparked. "not with the kids crying in the corner. So we both walk out and I'm about to ask him what he's gonna tell the brass to keep this quiet, he's a Major, afterall- and he just snaps his fingers. Doesn't even look back. There can't be records when the only witnesses are ash."
"You were there! Why didn't you stop him, why didn't you say something!?" Ed demanded. He was near tears.
Kimblee frowned. "Because- the people who stand in his way burn, kid. They always do. Mustang isn't just the Flame Alchemist- the man is fire. His ambition, his drive, his goal- his lust for power, it demolishes EVERYTHING. I kept my head down and survived the war. You don't know how demented Mustang is, kid- one time, we had burned out a village, and this guy- he kept him alive. Only burned half of him. So this guy, he's just writhing around, half his face is melted, his fingers are all fused together, hair is burnt, he's halfway dead- and Mustang just watches the guy flailing around screaming. The guy is begging- he's just... he's screaming, he's looking at the charred corpses of his family, calling their names, and Mustang just watched... That blonde lady with the gun was the one who finally put an end to it all and shot the poor guy. But Mustang- he just let it go on- just watched. He enjoys it- he enjoys the power, kid.".
"I... I don't have time for this." Ed was trying to make his hands stop shaking. "Which way did Mustang go?" he demanded.
Kimblee nodded further down the hall. "He went that way. Didn't even say hello to me, even though we're war buddies and all."
Ed's head snapped up. Someone was walking down the dark hall towards him.
"Mustang? Is that you?"
There was silence.
"C-can you help me?" a shaky voice asked. "I'm a guard here..." It was a portly man, a head shorter than Mustang- and he was covered in blood. He looked pale. "I lost my thumb." the man held up his severed thumb. "That cannibal maniac took it..."
"Shit- here." Ed turned, tearing a piece of cloth form his shirt and holding it out to the man- when he dove forward, tackling Ed to the ground.
Ed shouted, Kimblee jumped in surprise, and it was only Ed throwing his flesh arm up to defend himself that prevented the man from sinking his teeth into Ed's face.
Instead, the man bit down on Ed's flesh arm, hard- warm blood flooded his mouth and he let out a pleased scream, bloody hands closing around Ed's neck as he choked the kid and sunk his teeth further into Ed's arm, shaking his head like a dog with a piece of meat...
"What the fuck!" Kimblee was shouting.
Ed reeled back and punched the man in the face with his automail fist, and the man's nose became a fountain of blood, his grip on Ed's neck loosening.
Ed reeled back and hit the man against, the he scrambled off Ed, managing to scratch his cheek with his nails as he stood.
"A child! A child! They've sent me a flesh lamb for sacrifice, the heavenly father will look upon me with favor when I offer him your heart!" the blood was dribbling down the man's chin as he babbled maniacally.
"A golden boy with sweet virgin blood!" the man lunged forward again.
Ed clapped both hands together, slamming them onto the ground on either side of where he was laying. The white tiles of the floor wound themselves around the man's legs, stopping just above the knees. More tiles came and fixed the man's hands, holding him up like a starfish, both hands and legs restrained.
The blue alchemic light faded, and Ed growled, getting to his feet.
"Not today, man. Not today." growled, wiping his bowl and looking unsettled and annoyed.
"Holy crap. Are you okay, kid?" Kimblee was looking from Ed's alchemic restrained to the blood dripping down the boy's arm.
"I'll live." Ed growled, but suddenly, he was standing ramrod straight, looking nervous. "That guy- he came from the direction Mustang was headed." he turned and took off running further into the hospital, deaf to Kimblee telling him to wait and the ravings of a cannibalistic madman.
Shit! Did he get Mustang!? images rose tot he forefront of his mind like the bile that was licking at the back of his throat, images of Mustang- face chewed off, throat torn out, face-down in a puddle of his own blood on the tile floor...
We never should have split up!
Despite all the atrocities he'd just been told Mustang was responsible for, he couldn't stop the way his heart was pounding at the thought of Mustang dying here, Mustang injured here...
He may be a monster. But he was nice to me, he stuck around! That has to count for something. I can't let him die here!
He'd found the last two.
But not like he'd wanted to.
the nurse was half-naked on the ground, begging, while the inmate was undressed, straddling her.
"Don't worry, pretty thing- you'll like it, I promise."
He's snapped his fingers before the man had had a chance to unbutton her skirt.
The man screamed as flames licked across his back, getting to his feet and looking around blindly, and he snapped his fingers again.
A flame of one hundred and thirty one degrees Fahrenheit is sufficient to inflict second degree burns. he reminded himself mentally, tweaking the temperature of his second attack. And if the flames so happened to hit the man's exposed genitals and burn him- well, that was an unfortunate accident. Maybe the man would think twice before trying to rape someone next time.
The man hit the floor, out cold and probably on the edges of shock, and Roy slapped cuffs on him and turned to the nurse, who was laying on the ground, in tears.
She whimpered when he moved closer to her, and he stepped back. "I'm Colonel Roy Mustang. I'm with the military, I'm not here to hurt you, I promise." he was shrugging off what was left of his blue coat, and he made sure to direct his eyes else ware as he awkwardly draped the coat over her exposed chest. "He won't be hurting anyone anymore. Can you walk?"
The nurse sniffed but nodded, pulling his coat close around her to cover her chest and shakily getting to her feet.
"W-what about the others?"
"There's another injured nurse and an unconscious inmate back a ways. We'll get her on the way out."
They started slowly down the hall, and the nurse's eyes darted around the room nervously.
"They only sent us one soldier?" she asked, disbelief heavy in her voice.
"No. They're sending more. I'm not alone, there's another alchemist with me." Roy assured her, and they continued their trek down the hall.
They turned tow corners before they ended up in the hallway with the bloodied nurse laying on the floor.
The battered nurse rushed forward. "She's stable. Just unconcious- a nasty knock on the head, and... her face... Oh, he got her." the nurse looked upset.
But Roy was far more interested in the puddle of blood and empty set of handcuffs dangling from the radiator. His eyes widened. "What the hell?" there was a thumb on the ground, the crazy bastard had chewed off his own thumb...
"He got out. We haven't seen him, so he... he went the other way. Fullmetal!"
"We can't leave her!" the nurse wearing his coat sounded flustered, looking down at her injured comrade.
"We'll come back for her- we have to move now, or that maniac might kill my subordinate!" the terror in Roy's voice must've convinced her, because she was on his heels and they took off at a sprint down the hallway.
"Fullmetal!"
"Mustang!" the voice echoed around the corner, and Roy nearly plowed right into the kid when they met in the next hallway, seizing the kid by the shoulders nervously.
"Fullmetal, one of the inmates- the cannibal, he's still out..."
"I know! I ran into him! I thought he overpowered you!" Ed chattered back hurriedly.
"No, he didn't- he got out of my handcuffs. I didn't realize it until I was walking back. Did you see him?" Roy asked Ed seriously.
Ed nodded, looking tired. "Yeah. I ran into him. He's not bothering anyone anymore."
"You're bleeding." the nurse stepped forward, and Mustang noticed the rather large gouge in Ed's flesh arm. It was bleeding a lot, making it look worse than it was- the blood had dripped all the way down Ed's forearm and dripped off his fingertips onto the floor below him, and Mustang had forgotten how to breathe for a moment.
"Shit... what the hell happened? Are you hurt anywhere else?" Mustang felt guilt fill him. His carelessness had meant Fullmetal got hurt.
"He bit me. I'll live." Ed said dryly. "How about you?"
The nurse was tearing a piece of cloth from Mustang's coat. "Hold that tight to your arm to slow the bleeding, sweetie." she said. Ed said nothing but obliged, turning back to Mustang. "What about the other inmate?" he asked seriously.
"Neutralized. We have an injured nurse who's going to need to be carried out..." Roy turned around, Ed at his side and the nurse at their heels as they headed back into the room, finding the unconscious nurse where Roy had left her earlier.
"How much blood have you lost?" Roy asked seriously as he knelt down beside the unconscious woman.
Ed shrugged. "I dunno. I can see straight and I can walk. I've had worse."
"Can you still do alchemy? If I'm carrying her, I'll be relying on you to use alchemy if we need it."
"I'm good to go." Ed promised.
Roy nodded, holding the unconscious woman bridal style, and they started back towards the entrance of the ward.
Aside from having to walk passed the alchemically restrained and screaming cannibal, they were home free, and It was only as the rest of the military showed up and started to flood the ward and Ed and Mustang were ushered into the backseat of Hawkeye's car that Ed glanced over at Mustang, who was talking to Hawkeye and Havoc and giving orders, and wondered- How the hell could someone like Mustang do all those terrible things? I was right not to trust him to begin with.
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