(AN: So the world went to hell in a hand-basket since I started working on that last chapter. I am still alive and well, just fighting the general disinterest in everything that's been with me since ever: it took my arch enemy releasing a garbage album just to get me motivated to do music again! I don't even want to play anything! So I decided to force myself to do a little writing instead.)

(This chapter is going to see the main story continue, now that we have a few caps in Nathan's pocket [or duffle bag])

A Cat-Like Bird

After paying Yefim the ten caps for the room, Nathan went there to hold the cold bottle to his face as his head swam. Dogmeat, who was nosing around outside during the fight, was now at his side, a surprised look on his face. Piper stayed with him for an hour, and brought him a Nuka-Cola to place on his face when the moonshine lost its chill.

"What do you did back there for Travis," she said. "That was...really something."

"No, I messed up," Nathan replied. "I could have done something else. Nora..."

"Who's Nora?"

Nathan was amazed that he had just spoken her name out-loud: in Piper's presence. What was strange about that? In theory, nothing. Yet there seemed to be something inside him that squirmed with discomfort at the thought of bringing up his dead wife around Piper right now. After all, they had only just recently met and for him, it was still too near: no matter how many years passed between her death and now, it all seemed like just two days ago.

"Nevermind," he said, shaking his head. Piper cocked an eyebrow, curious about what she had just been denied.

"If you say so, Blue," she replied. "I mean, I know you said you had a son, so..."

"I said never mind," he repeated. "It's...it's too personal to talk about right now."

"Geez, alright," she returned. "Still, I'm proud of you for what you did for Travis."

"Thanks," he sighed. "So, tomorrow when this Nick Valentine gets back and we start searching for my son; are you with me?"

"Sure thing, Blue. It'd be a cold day in hell before ol' Piper misses out on front row seats to the story of the century."

He smiled, and winced as he did. He then turned to Dogmeat, who licked his knee. Nathan smiled and took that as good as a yes. As the hour grew long, Piper said goodnight, with the promise to see him early tomorrow morning to visit Valentine's. Nathan fell asleep on the old, springy mattress to the sound of the jukebox from the bar playing Danny Kaye and the Andrews Sisters song "Civilization."

It was six o'clock in the morning when he finally woke up for good. The last night had been filled with dreams, most of them involving that moment in the Vault when everything changed. Nathan found Piper waiting for him at the bar of the Dugout Inn. There was something unsettling about this in Nathan's mind. Not in any case Piper's demeanor, or her sly grin, or her brown eyes, but how eagerly she sought him out. Maybe things were different here in the 23rd century, but back in his day women didn't seek out men so eagerly: at least, respectable women didn't. Into his mind came again the furtive glances of the people of Diamond City that they cast in Piper's direction.

She led him first to the Power Noodles stand for breakfast. While they walked, she told him that most of the food in cans or in sealed packages was irradiated, so cooked food was better overall. Nathan gave his caps to the Protectron server, whom Piper named as Takahashi but who said nothing more than "Nan-ni shimasko-ha?"; despite its limited vocabulary, it gave him and Piper their food. They ate quickly, for Nathan was more determined than ever to finish what he had started and find his son. He barely had time to enjoy his meal, his military instincts kicking in to minimize down-time spent before returning to Valentine's. Indeed, he had finished so soon that Piper was still in the midst of her noodles by the time he was done and, with Dogmeat in tow, went looking for the place they had stopped by yesterday. She hopped along after him, slurping noodles and keeping her eyes and ears peeled.

The door was open, and as soon as they passed in, the young woman looked up in worried eagerness at the newcomers. Her face fell when she saw them.

"I...I'm sorry," she said. "We're closed."

"What's wrong, Ellie?" Piper asked from over Nathan's shoulder.

"Nick's missing!" the woman Ellie exclaimed.

"Gone?" Nathan asked, his temper starting to rise. It was just like this irradiated hell of a world: first his wife was dead, now his son was kidnapped, and then after waiting an agonizing two days, the one who was supposed to help him find Shaun was also missing. "You're serious?"

"Dead serious, I'm afraid," Ellie cringed.

"Son of a bitch!" Nathan swore, and kicked the tin wall of the office shack.

"Hey, cool your jets, Blue," Piper soothed. "I know we're in a tough spot right now, but maybe we could go looking for him?"

Nathan took a deep breath and mastered himself. He then turned back to Ellie. "Sorry, miss. Can you help us find him?"

"Uh, I don't know," she replied. "Last time I saw Nick, he went to the old Park Street Station, tracking some girl who'd been kidnapped by Skinny Malone's gang. I hear there's an old Vault down there they use for a base. I told him not to go; said he was walking into a trap! But he just smiled, said he'd be back by today, and walked out the door: like he always does." She sighed.

"And who's Skinny Malone?"

"Some cat out of Goodneighbor," said Ellie. "And all I know is that means he's in the well-pressed suits and machine guns school of thuggery." Piper laughed in the middle of a bite-full of noodles, and they slurped out of her mouth in a strange coughing noise. Nathan turned around to her and Piper, in her embarrassment, held her hand up to cover her mouth; her eyes were almost double their normal size. Nathan smiled, his mood improving at her comical appearance; Piper blushed at being in that state, and wished that she was a hundred miles away from here. But that smile, that damned smile...

"Park Street Station..." mused Nathan, turning back to the secretary. "That's northeast of here, right? About two miles?"

"Yes, that's right," Ellie nodded, a hopeful look in her eyes. "Nick should be easy to spot: he's always wearing that old hat and trench coat get-up. Please, hurry!"

With that, Nathan turned to Piper, who had composed herself and had put down her noodles and taken up her pencil and paper, muttering something about Skinny Malone and what his 'angle' could be in the great disappearance of Nick Valentine. Nathan cleared his throat and she looked up at him.

"So we heading out?" she asked.

"Are you sure you wanna go with me?" Nathan asked.

"I said I'd watch your back, didn't I?" she replied. "Besides, if you're heading northeast, you'll need back-up. Folks say it gets dangerous the farther away from Old Boston you go, but the city's just as bad; you'll need more than just a dog." At this, Dogmeat, who was waiting patiently behind them both, whined and looked up at her with wide, sorrowful eyes. "Aww, don't look at me that way, boy. You're good, the best around here; but unless those paws can shoot a gun, he's gonna need me too." Dogmeat rubbed his nuzzle against Nathan's leg.

"Nora used to say the pen is mightier than the sword," Nathan commented.

"I like that!" Piper replied with a keen grin.

"But we can't be facing the Commonwealth with just pencil and paper," Nathan replied.

"Of course not," Piper said, and pulled back her red jacket just enough to reveal the N99 10mm pistol in her belt. Closing her jacket, she popped her pencil and paper back into the confines of her jacket, took out a stick of gum which she tossed into her mouth and began to chew. She then turned to Nathan, a grin on her face, and said:

"You ready, Blue?"

The walk from Diamond City to Park Street Station was only a forty minute walk. Compared to the road from Sanctuary Hills, it was nothing. At his right hand walked Piper, her 10mm in her hand as she kept her eyes peeled, looking this way and that for anyone who might pose a threat to them; and at Nathan's left hand walked Dogmeat, his tongue wagging as he panted happily. As for Nathan himself, he had Danse's Righteous Authority in his hands while he kept his eyes to the roads, keeping watch for any that might assail them while trying to recall what he knew of the streets of Boston of old.

These memories were of little use to him, for the city had changed over the course of two hundred years. Buildings many stories high had collapsed into tangled ruins of brick, sand, and steel, their offal spilling out in wide swaths into the streets. Old fusion cars sat abandoned in the streets, some of them so rusted that all indication of their original color had been lost. Street signs and billboards had been torn apart, or painted with crude graffiti; the most vulgar ones came from the raiders or Gunner mercenaries, while the more blunt and horrifying ones were from other sources.

"It might be a good idea to avoid the overpasses," Piper had said. "That's Gunner territory, and you do not wanna be messing with them."

The path which Nathan had chosen for them took them down followed Boylston Street. The freeway passed on eastward, while their road continued northeast. It was his plan to follow this for most of the journey, then cut across the Boston Commons to the Park Street Station on the northeastern corner thereof. A straightforward plan, and so far there seemed to be no resistance. But the eerie silence and deathlike calm was more than enough to set both of them on edge.

"It feels like we're walking into a trap," Piper commented. Dogmeat made no sound.

As if to make things worse, the sky above them started to grow dark. Gray-green clouds floated up from the southwest, threatening to blanket the city of Boston in another storm of gamma radiation. It was now glowering over them, shutting off the light of the sun and filling the ruin of that proud American city with the sickly pallor of death.

"Are we almost there, Blue?" Piper asked. "We're gonna have a lot less hair and a lot more limbs if we stay out in this storm." She laughed. "I'm amazed you can find your way in this mess."

"I know my way around," Nathan replied. "I still recognize some sights, but..." He sighed. "...so much has changed. It's so strange, seeing names and streets I used to know like the back of my hand, now completely unrecognizable."

"I like that one," Piper smirked. "I'm gonna make a note of it. Hopefully in someplace safe from all this radiation!"

"If you find us a place to hunker down in," Nathan said. "Lead the way."

True to form, the buildings around them had collapsed roofs and offered no great protection. But they were now come to the edge of the Boston Commons, and Nathan's mind was on getting to the other side. Before him he could see the trees of the Commons: brown, bare, stunted skeletons with spindly naked fingers scratching the pallid green sky. Yet as he was looking about, he could hear deep heavy footsteps causing the ground to tremble; for a moment he thought of the creature that had attacked Quincy. Piper, on the other hand, wasn't looking very brave at the moment.

"Blue, we gotta get outta here," she said. "Under cover quick!"

"Why?" he asked. "What is it?"

"I think Swan's out and about," she said. "It doesn't make any sense, though. He never leaves his pond during the day."

"Who's Swan?"

"Trust me, you don't wanna know. Let's get under cover before he sees us!"

Despite Piper's warning, Nathan was still determined to get across the Commons to Park Street Station. Keeping to the buildings and not venturing out towards the dead trees of the park, he and Piper followed Boylston Street along the southern borders of the Boston Commons. Suddenly there was a loud clash of thunder and a metallic tang in the air: the storm had broken over Boston. Now Piper was determined to get under cover as quickly as possible; to avoid the storm as much as to avoid Swan. But they were nearing the intersection of Boylston and Tremont Street, which led up the eastern side of the Commons, and none of the buildings on their right were in any suitable condition.

Then Nathan saw a glimpse, momentarily, of something walking in the forest. It was a great thing, in shape roughly similar to the mutants he had seen fighting Diamond City security when he first arrived: but it was much bigger. The hulls of several broken boats were lashed onto its shoulders and left arm, and in its right arm it bore a great anchor as a weapon. It was many times larger than the beast he had seen in Quincy, and he wondered if even Paladin Danse and his power armor could avail against this monstrosity: certainly he couldn't as he was now.

"You know what, you're right," he told her. "Let's find cover."

They took stock of their surroundings. The buildings along the eastern side of Tremont were in better condition than those on the southern side, but they were too close to this monster for Nathan's liking. He wanted to get away from it, and be someplace where it could not find them. To that end, rather than turning north, he turned south and saw a large block of buildings on the eastern side of Tremont Street that were in good condition. Towards this structure Nathan, Piper, and Dogmeat now ran as fast as their legs could carry then, keeping their heads down in fear of the beast.

But as they came near the building, another sound began to fill the air: the sound of gunfire coming from a building that looked to be a dilapidated theater. As they approached it, Piper and Nathan drew their weapons as they walked around to the side of the theater towards the entrance. This opened southward, and had in red letters gratified across the walls the phrase: THE COMBAT ZONE. At this, Piper squealed and came to a halt.

"Bad idea, Blue," she said. "I hear that place is crawling with raiders."

"You said we need to get under cover, right?" Nathan asked. "Well, here's as good a place as any. We can sneak in under the cover of their guns."

"But they're raiders, Blue! They'll kill, rape, and rob you as soon as look at you!"

"Would you rather take your chances out here in the storm with Swan? Besides, we have Dogmeat."

Piper grumbled. "Alright, but it's your ass if we get shot. Lead the way."

Through the doors they went, and found themselves inside the theater. Flashes, loud bangs of guns going off, and hoots and hollers were echoing from the main stage, just beyond a pair of double-doors ridden with bullet holes. To the right was a locked room with a barred window and a sign hanging beside its door, with the words "Rule Breakers" written thereon. Nathan and Piper looked there and saw two kneeling down with burlap sacks over their heads. They passed by, but kept their guns in their hands. Straight on were the double-doors, with words drawn in chalk above and to the sides: and on one side was a board with the words "Tommy's Rules" written on the top, with three short and to-the-point rules written beneath the title. Carefully they passed through the doors, entering the seats of the main hall.

The old Orpheum Theater had seen better days. The balcony had collapsed, and the current occupants had erected their own out of pieces of trash: wood, metal, and other things of low quality. Nathan's engineering eyes saw the shoddy work, even in the dim light of the theater, and tutted to himself, forgetting their peril. It mattered not, for the occupants were still busy firing their weapons in glee. Nathan then turned towards the stage to see what was the cause of all the ruckus.

The stage was ringed with a high fence; within the fence two were battling it out. The one was large, a brutish man with many scars, and the other a slender, pale-skinned woman; she was also bruised and bleeding. Outside was a portly man in a fedora speaking into a microphone stand, giving commentary on the two occupants sparring. A morbid curiosity more than anything else drove Nathan to watch the fight: maybe it was the American spirit, that which always rooted for the underdog, which drove him to watch the woman fighting against someone nearly twice her size. The man was armed with several pieces of sharp scrap metal which were lashed to his left arm, while the woman had a baseball bat. He seemed to be getting her on the 'ropes', so to speak, though there were no ropes. Throwing his size against her, he made her give ground or receive crushing blows from his fists. Sometimes she'd evade the blows, and sometimes she'd take them defiantly, yet she wasn't knocked out even after two heavy blows to the head and chest; she was tougher than she looked. Another blow came and she swung her bat, cracking the knuckles of her opponent.

It was all over after that. She swung to the legs and broke his knee-caps, driving her opponent to his knees. Then with such fury as Nathan had never seen, she threw blow after blow upon him until a bell was rung and the voice of the announcer was heard.

"...and there she is, the undefeated champion of the Combat Zone! Ladies and gentlemen, let's hear it for the one, the only, Cait!" Cheers and gunfire rose up from the crowd. "We'll be right back for the next match. Have a drink, place some bets, take a load off, and no fighting in the auditorium."

"Fuck you, Tommy!" one of the people in the crowd shouted.

"Get this joker outta my theater," the man called Tommy said in the microphone. From out of seemingly nowhere, two large men walked into the audience and made off with the offender. Suddenly Nathan realized that they were in trouble, for the two bouncers were bringing the man here.

"Who the hell are you?" one of them asked, noticing the newcomers.

"Uh, nobody, really!" Piper said, trying to act natural. "Just here to...uh, enjoy the show?"

"Ice the dick," one of the bouncers said. "The little bitch can stay. Bet we could make her squawk."

"Tommy would want him for the ring," the other one said. "Let's cuff 'em and send 'em off to...hey, stop movin' or I'll break yer arm!" The raider in their care was struggling to get free, now that their attention was turned.

"Intruders!" he shouted out as loud as he could.

"Time to start shooting!" Nathan said.

With Righteous Authority, Nathan strafed leftward and sent lines of crimson laser fire into the crowd. They were taken at once in surprise by the blinding flash of the laser blasts, after their eyes were adjusted to the dark theater. Piper got under cover and fired off rounds with her 10mm. The bouncer that had threatened her fell with a bullet in his head, while the other one was now fighting with the raider he had tried to cart off. Nathan managed to fire off a few kills before the crowd became aware that they were under attack and so reached for their weapons. Tommy cowered away from his microphone stand and, fumbling with a key, locked himself inside the cage with the fighting woman, his hands over his head.

The Orpheum Theater indeed became a combat zone, with bullets flying this way and that, punctuated by the blasts of Nathan's laser rifle. But the mean balcony of junk wood that the raiders made served Nathan and Piper as their only defense. For though the bullets of the raiders tore the wood apart, it provided them more cover than nothing; and one by one, the raiders were dropping like flies. Dogmeat clung to Nathan's back, spooked by the gunfire, but ready to attack anyone who tried to take him from behind. Slowly the gunfire started to become less and less intense, and then it was just the throb of the laser capacitor and Piper's 10mm. Then a voice spoke up, thin and fearful: it was the voice of the announcer, the man named Tommy.

"Don't shoot, whoever you are!" he said. "We don't want no trouble...at least, not anymore." There was some indistinct muttering, and then he spoke again. "The hell with that, I'm too pretty to go out like this!"

Nathan slowly rose up from cover, Righteous Authority still in his hands. He could see the two figures in the cage; the woman was standing tall, seemingly unafraid, while the man Tommy was out of sight.

"Clear!" Nathan called out. The firefight had taken him back to his days fighting the Chinese at Anchorage; he had to remind himself that Piper wasn't a soldier and wouldn't know how to answer such calls. "You can come out now."

The two of them made their way slowly out of the bullet-ridden makeshift balcony, with Dogmeat following on behind them, and, passing through the dead bodies, came to the stage. Tommy, seeing that he wasn't going to be targeted by the newcomers, rose up from his place and walked over to the gate which he had closed in his fear. It was then that Nathan had a better look at him under the still-glowing stage-lights. To say that Tommy was human was a great exaggeration: he had ceased to be that several hundred years ago. He looked like he had been skinned alive, and the hideous muscles and raw flesh had been rotted and wrinkled; his nose and eyebrows were gone, and his pupils were so dilated that they looked to be wholly black eyes. Beneath his fedora he wore a wig of brown hair that sat at a rakish angle on his bald head.

It was the first time Nathan had seen a non-feral ghoul in the flesh. He was glad that there was a line of fencing between him and Tommy: he reminded him too much of the things he had seen at the Cambridge Police Station. Even his movements, fluid and dexterous, and his language, thick Bostonian accent, seemed a mockery of humanity coming from him. Particularly he stood out in stark contrast to the woman inside the cage with him.

She was obviously human, given her pale skin - albeit bruised and blooded - and flaming red hair that clung in bedraggled locks on her sweat-drenched forehead: not to mention her green eyes. But there was something icy about her, a coldness that intrigued Nathan. Not at all like the warmth of Nora or the child-like mischievousness of Piper. Her face and her mood were unreadable, save when she spoke: her accent was twinged with the brogue of the Irish.

"Is it over?" he asked then. "Thank God. That could have been a hell of a lot worse!"

"I dunno," the fighter said. "Seemed quite the performance from where I was standin'."

"Are you fucking hi...oh wait, stupid question, of course you are!" Tommy berated, speaking to the fighter beside him.

"I still won the fight, didn't I?" she returned, ignoring the strangers for the moment.

"You're gettin' sloppy, strung out on that crap," said Tommy. He then heaved a heavy sigh as his eyes fell on the body of one of the dead raiders. "I guess we don't gotta worry about that now, do we? This jackass just put us outta business!" He turned his black beady eyes towards Nathan, who liked him even less than before.

"I don't know if I should kiss your ass for not shootin' me," he said to Nathan. "Or have my little bird here feed you your own entrails."

"I'm not your fucking bird, Tommy! Didn't I tell you to quit callin' me that?"

"What is this place?" Nathan asked.

Tommy spared them a brief explanation. The Combat Zone was a fighting arena that used to serve the folks of Boston; a rest-stop and entertainment on the long road through the streets of the Boston Commonwealth. Cait, the woman who was with him, was an undisputed champion of the ring: one hundred straight wins. Two years ago, raiders took over the place and it became their hostage and serviced them and them alone. Despite all the trouble their new clientele put them through, Tommy was still surly about their deaths.

"They may not have been the, uh, friendliest idiots 'round here," he said. "But keeping them entertained kept the lights on."

"T'hell with 'em!" Cait dismissed. "More'll come. Just let me rest up and I'll be good to go."

"Rest up, huh?" Tommy asked. "What, so you can slam more of that crap into your arms? Fuck that noi..." He then paused, a look of realization in his dark eyes; he pointed towards Nathan with one of his gangrenous fingers. "You know what, this was a blessin' in disguise. Hey pal: you caught that last bout. Whaddya think of Cait's work?"

"Well, she can hold her own in a fight," Nathan said. "She's got talent."

"More than hold me own," said Cait; but her sour expression changed to a wiry smile. She then gave Tommy a shove. "Least somebody knows good skill when they see it."

"It ain't your fightin' skills I'm concerned with!" he retorted, pushing her away, then turned back to Nathan. "Look here, pal. Thanks to you, I got no audience; no audience means no caps. And no caps means Cait's a liability. So why don't ye do me a favor and take over her contract?"

"What?" Nathan and Piper asked one after the other.

"What the hell, Tommy?" Cait asked.

"Look, you'd be doin' me a favor," Tommy said. "I gotta get this place put back in order. If she goes with you, she can watch your back. Like you said, she can hold her own in a fight."

"And why are you trying to get rid of her?" Nathan asked.

"Yeah, Tommy," Cait chimed in. "Just why the hell are ye tryin' t' get ridda me?"

"You know perfectly well why, little bird," said Tommy, turning to Cait. "That junk's makin' you careless, and I ain't gonna be the one doin' color commentary when your pretty ass hits the floor." He turned back to Nathan and made his offer.

"What does Cait think about this?"

"Yeah, don't I get a say in this?" she asked, mirroring his thoughts.

"That ain't the way a contract works," said Tommy. "Besides, you really wanna stay here? No audience, no caps, no one else to talk to but me?"

"Jeez, point taken," Cait groaned. "But what the hell are ye gonna do without me here?"

"You don't need to worry about me no more. I'll get this place straightened up right." He turned back to Nathan. "I'll even sweeten the deal for ye, buddy. A hundred caps for your troubles: call it an exterminator's fee for gettin' rid of those raiders. So, what do ya say?"

Nathan turned to Piper, who gave him a noncommittal shrug. Dogmeat said nothing, but looked curiously at Cait; she frowned at him but made no other sound. It seemed that the final decision would be with him and him alone. While he certainly liked having more than one person with him, having so many women around was something...unusual for him. As a young man, he had had mostly male friends, and the 108th Infantry had been mostly men as well. Aside from his mother, a teacher or two from grade school, the neighbors at Sanctuary Hills and of course Nora, there hadn't been that many women in his life. That wasn't to say that he didn't want Cait traveling with them: she could certainly hold her own in a fight. Or perhaps it was the leather corset she wore, slightly more brown than the red of her hair.

"Alright, she can come with us," he said.

Tommy removed a key from his suit and unlocked the door of the cage. He then turned to Cait and gestured with his head that she should go out first. She looked crossly at him, but he remained resolute.

"Go on, get outta here," he said. "You ain't wanted here no more, little bird."

"Just like that?" she replied. "Sell me off like a slave? You're a real son of a bitch!"

"Now now, it ain't like that," Tommy replied. "If you was a slave, I'd be the one gettin' money for losin' ya."

Cait walked out of the cage and went to get her things, while Tommy followed her out of the cage and went to bring Nathan his caps. As they waited, Nathan and Piper searched the bodies of the slain raiders. Most of them bore the pipe weapons, whose weak .38 bullets wouldn't do them much good in a fire-fight. Some of them also bore melee weapons: baseball bats, pole cues, machetes wrapped in barbed wire, or simply tire irons. On one of them Nathan found something he became almost giddy over: a .45 combat rifle, like the ones used during the War. He knew all about these weapons, for he had often fixed his own and repaired those of the other soldiers of the 108th. It found a place in his dufflebag, alongside the few supplies he had brought with him from Sanctuary, ArcJet, and Diamond City.

Tommy arrived shortly with a bag of bottle-caps: the hundred fee he had promised. Shortly thereafter there came Cait out to meet them: her bare arms were covered in the same leather and junk armor that the raiders used, a bandolier full of shells was bound about her hips, and she had on her back a shotgun along with the bat she still held in her hands. She looked as savage as any one of the raiders Nathan had met in the small time he had been in the Commonwealth.

Dogmeat approached her, a friendly look in his brown eyes. She made a face at him and stepped back, but said no words. Piper grinned but also kept quiet.

"We ready to head out?" Cait asked Nathan.

(AN: So here we are, back again, folks! And we introduced our second Rose Leslie lookalike. I might have a full...ish team of companions in the Sole Survivor's entourage, with three notable exceptions [absolutely no Porter Gage; the other two might veer into spoiler territory]. Now that I've finished Servant of Darkness and have some time to go before I start planning The Fall of Angmar and something else [it's gonna be big], I have more time to dedicate to this story.)

(So it turns out that I made a mistake with Piper's eye-color twice over: when I introduced her I said that she had brown eyes, whereas the game says that she has "hazel green" eyes. As if to further the confusion, the one I had in mind for her [Krysten Ritter] also has eyes that are somewhere between blue-green and brown. Maybe I'll address this later on in the story, but it came up here particularly in the first part of the chapter.)