Chapter 5: I like Oreos and kitties, YES IN THAT ORDER!
"It's the most, wonderful time, of the year..." Hummed Reno to himself as he all but danced into room B3 of Shinra HQ, home to the General Affairs Auditing Department.
He was being entirely sincere. Today truly was the highlight of his year, or at least the highlight of his fiscal quarter.
Today was the day when the Shinra Electric Power Company General Affairs Auditing Department received feedback on its auditing!
"When the paperwork comes calling, and you've got every single reason to be of good cheer!" Reno continued to sing as he made a beeline for the "in" tray on Tseng's desk.
Reno didn't have a desk of his own in the room, but that didn't matter. He'd earned this particular pleasure the same way he earned everything else; being so good at it that eventually everyone simply stopped making a fuss.
He'd thrown himself into this particular task like a man with actual morals would collapse on a grenade in a maternity ward. He'd devoted countless hours of his life to it; checking spreadsheets, and even going so far as to actually review the company's current policy documents! He'd made sure that not a single fraudulent expense item managed to avoid his notice.
In short... he'd actually done his job.
Lots of people at Shinra thought that accounting and auditing were boring but necessary tasks that someone would inevitably have to take care of, and they were fine with that, provided that someone wasn't them.
Reno felt those people were incurably lazy.
When approached with the right attitude, accounting could be an adventure! Reno embraced the files on Tseng's desk like a long lost lover, and breathed deep; the smell of printer paper and dry ink somehow managing to come a close second to fermenting hops.
"It's the most, wonderful time, of the year..." Reno repeated to himself as he departed the meeting room, and headed for the elevator.
The Turk knew that he'd have to go up several dozen floors in order to get to the bottom of these documents!
A lesser man might have ignored paperwork that didn't directly effect their own job, but not Reno! No, never Reno!
Because right now, the sheets of paper he held in his hands made him the second most powerful man on the Planet.
Not even a department head could overrule President Shinra's findings on what was or was not an acceptable expense for the company, and Reno worked hard to make sure the President found plenty of things to object to!
"It's the hap-happiest season of all..." Reno crooned as the elevator carried him upwards.
Then there was a soft "ding", and a moment later his nostrils were assaulted by a powerful aroma of antiseptic.
This was the only part of Reno's auditing adventure that he didn't completely enjoy, which was why he did it first. The Shinra Science Department was home to things that even the Turks didn't like looking at or thinking about.
Reno approached this mission with much the same mindset as he would wetwork: you got in, you found the target, you took care of business, and you got out. Reno made a beeline for the main laboratory, squinting his eyes to try and induce a mild case of tunnel vision.
Once said squinted eyes had located his target, Reno unloaded on them without pity, empathy, hesitation or remorse.
"Department Head and Professor Simon Hojo of the Shinra Science Division, President Shinra has directed me to inform you that though this company is extremely diversified, we are at the end of the day running a power company, not a jewelry store. Therefore, the cost of your latest purchases; which for some reason you decided to make without waiting for approval first, will be deducted straight from your next paycheck, with an additional 10% fee for misappropriation of company finances." Reno announced with the air of a herald reading the charges at a beheading.
With due haste, abetted by an arcing electrical discharge, Reno departed the room. To remain behind a single second longer was to give Professor Hojo had a chance to unleash a torrent of polysyllabic rage at: him, President Shinra, the world in general for not recognizing his genius, and all of the above for trying to thwart the scientific breakthrough of the century, if not millennium!
That had been fun at first, but the longer it dragged on, the less funny it got. Somewhere around the point where he was insisting that Reno was a "chemically coddled child" the Turk began to suspect that Hojo might actually be so mad that he'd be willing to risk President Shinra's wrath in order to punish the bearer of bad news.
So, as enjoyable as it was to tweak the nose of someone who thought he was the smartest person on the Planet, Reno didn't stick around to bask in the afterglow of that particular victory.
Besides, he had so many other important appointments today; it would be rude to keep them waiting!
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"Department Head Scarlet of the Shinra Advanced Weapons Division, President Shinra has found some alarming figures in relation to the 'Sister Ray' we currently have installed in Junon. Given Shinra's current uncontested hegemony over the world, he wonders why exactly we're continuing to pay massive amounts of gil to maintain the combat readiness of a gigantic cannon that would be overkill even if used on a certain tourist trap.
He would appreciate it if within the next week you could present him with a report that justifies in greater detail why exactly we shouldn't just break the thing apart and sell it for scrap metal… especially the light of how General Sephiroth managed to bring the Wutain War to a decisive conclusion before the Sister Ray could be completed, thus it has yet to provide ANYTHING of value to our organization." Reno read out the announcement while keeping his eyes carefully locked on Scarlet's blue ones.
Reno was not normally the sort of man to pass on an eyeful of proffered female flesh, but Scarlet wanted men to look at her with an uncomfortable mix of desire and fear; refusing to take the bait was just another way of twisting the knife!
XXX XXX XXX
"Excellent work on your latest expense report Department Head Palmer of the Shinra Space Division! President Shinra could find no items you requested that were not clearly and obviously linked to your department's functions!" Reno announced while sticking his head to an office that was far far too large for the amount of work that was done in it.
In point of fact, a typical restroom stall might be somewhat oversized for the amount of work done in this office.
This was the auditing equivalent of kicking a man while he was down, but Reno didn't care.
Palmer made several times Reno's salary without having to risk his life against terrorists, maniacs, and maniacal terrorists. In fact, Palmer, made several time Reno's salary without doing anything at all, not even putting effort into hiding the fact that he wasn't working!
There was no Shinra Space Department, but for some reason- Reno suspected that he must have been golf buddies with President Shinra once upon a time- Palmer still hung around the office drinking his lard flavored tea and collecting paychecks.
Now, on one hand, Reno could appreciate anyone who had a good grift going; on the other hand though, all Palmer seemed to enjoy doing was complain about his lack of budget. In other words, asking for more work, even though he already had exactly the perfect amount of work- none- to deal with!
That was why Reno didn't mind subtly reminding him that it had been years since he'd last even filed an expense report. Delivering that subtle reminder with great exuberance to anyone who might be in earshot was just another example of Reno going the extra mile to see a job done right!
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"Department Head and General Heidegger of the Shinra Public Safety Division, I have some important news for you." Reno began, before taking a moment to examine exactly what sort of mood Heidegger was in.
Though Reno had no worries for his own personal safety at the moment, he was very much aware that saying the wrong thing might cause the bureaucratic cold war that currently existed between Public Safety Department and the Investigation Sector of the General Affairs Department to get real hot, real fast.
There had been a brief time when Heidegger had managed to weasel his way into being in a position where he could give Reno orders, and Reno had not cared for that; both on principle and because said orders were profoundly idiotic. That particular crisis had only ended up being resolved by the mutual agreement that the Turks would follow any orders Heidegger gave them, on the provision that Heidegger would never again actually give them any orders.
In the wake of saving the world from some eco-terrorist nut job, Tseng had gone from strength to strength; launching a brilliant inter-corporation hostile takeover by having the Investigation Sector of the General Affairs Department first muscle in on, then completely absorb Shinra's Auditing Department. Not only had this greatly increased the "soft power" that the Turks could be wield within the company, but it served as an unspoken threat. Any further encroachment on the freedom of the Turks to disregard orders not given to them by the President would be responded to with yet more aggressive mergers.
Nobody (least of all Tseng) wanted Tseng to hold bureaucratic power equivalent to the other major Department Heads, but the possibility was out there. If they had to, the Investigation Sector would continue to absorb other minor departments (per Tseng's "big board", the company's Shipping, Receiving, and Interoffice Parcel Delivery Department was scheduled to be the next innocent caught in the crossfire) until there was no way to run Shinra without playing nice with the Turks.
In short, there were times when Reno privately pondered if maybe, just maybe, despite being the most profitable corporation in all of human history, that the Shinra Electric Power Company was failing to "embrace its core competencies" (whatever the hell that meant). Such thoughts were typically prompted by reflection on how when he heard the phrase "the enemy"; Reno didn't think of Wutai and its ninjas, he didn't think of Avalanche and their tree-huggers, he thought of General Heidegger and the Public Safety Department who couldn't leave well enough alone and simply let the Turks do their job.
So after taking another moment to look General Heidegger straight in his eyes, Reno got to work.
"The President wished me to inform you that your request for additional mako allocation in order to create another 1,000 SOLDIERs will have to wait until you're able to prove that you can achieve some success against the company's enemies with the ones you already have." Reno announced calmly and dispassionately.
Then with all but military precision he strode out of the room.
He even waited patiently for the elevator doors to completely close before flipping off Heidegger with both hands.
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There was one stop left, the Urban Development Department. Of all the ones he was visiting today, it had the smallest budget, and was led by a man with the nerves of a long tailed cat in a preschool full of rocking chairs.
In short, it was the perfect place to round out Reno's little bad news cruise.
"Mr. Tuesti, I'm here with feedback from President Shinra on your recent expense report!" Reno announced and was sorely tempted to use his phone to blast Toccata and Fugue in D minor throughout the entire office just to drive the point home.
Reeve Tuesti looked up from his work with the strained expression and sleepless eyes of a man who'd seen too much and didn't drink enough to let him routinely forget it.
"Yes?" Reeve answered, a slight quiver in his voice.
"President Shinra has decided to approve your most recent expense request of a five hundred million gil for the purposes of building a robot cat. He also gave a thumbs up to the billion gil for a gigantic robot moogle for said robot cat to ride around on, with both of these expenditures being for the purpose of 'improving office morale'.
In fact, I am pleased to report that they are already working; morale has shown a remarkable uptick in the General Affairs Auditing Department ever since we received your expense report!" Reno declared, and then was out of the room before Reeve had a chance to respond.
Holding the paperwork close to his chest, Reno smiled so wide it hurt.
He did a perfect job of completely spotting each and every single possible flaw in every department head's paperwork…. and then he'd hide Reeve's properly marked expense reports underneath his suit. At the end of the day, he'd take it home, push aside a locked filing cabinet he kept filled to the brim with interoffice birthday party announcements, pry up his floorboards, retrieve an ever-fuller briefcase from its hidden storage compartment, disengage the anti-tampering device rigged to incinerate the contents, and deposit the report for posterity.
What actually wound up on President Shinra's desk was the bureaucratic equivalent of an otherwise blank sheet of paper saying that there was nothing at all wrong with Urban Development's latest request. This inevitably lead to President Shinra (who was far too busy running the world to read his own company's policies or paperwork) approving whatever Reeve wanted.
Reno didn't do it for reasons as mundane as Reeve having been able to buy his favor with a couple bottles of (admittedly exceptional) liquor. Nor was he doing it to get an easy mark into a situation where they were hopelessly indebted to him. No, Reno did it because he was performing an experiment, the likes of which even Professor Hojo's twisted mind might not have contrived.
Reeve was the one idiotically honest man in a position of power at the Shinra Electric Power Company. So what happened when he discovered that the company was no longer paying attention to how he chose to spend his money?
As of today the answer seemed to be "he builds a robot cat" (and gigantic robot moogle for the cat to ride, but you couldn't have the moogle without the cat; that would just be silly) but Reno was sure that Reeve could push his skills at scamming an organization he obviously hated from the bottom of his heart far further. He had high hopes that one day Reeve would be committing feats of financial malfeasance that even Reno himself could never have conceived of!
This, this was just phase one of the process, and it wasn't like robotic cats grew on trees. It made Reno's eyes fill with tears to think that his protege was coming along so quickly!
XXX XXX XXX
"Good morning, Tifa!" Jessie Rasberry chirped as she breezed into Seventh Heaven.
The only other female member of Avalanche took a look around the bar and promptly noticed one major change since she'd last visited.
"Tifa, who is the new waiter? Is he your friend? He is just your friend, right? Are you guys close?" Jessie chattered at Tifa, sneaking frequent glances at the silver-haired youth.
Tifa rolled her eyes, having expected more or less exactly this situation. Jessie was a genius with technology, but definitely had her quirks.
"Jessie, you looked sort of funny walking in here; do you think you might have a pebble in one of your shoes?" Tifa threw Jessie a meaningful look.
Although all of Sector Seven had good reasons to dislike Shinra, that didn't instantly translate to all of them supporting Avalanche. It didn't even mean that those who did support Avalanche on a theoretical level would refuse to sell them out if Shinra offered a big enough bounty.
That was why Barret had established a series of codewords that the group members could use while talking to each other in public.
"Pebble" was the codeword for "do not discuss Avalanche business, someone in this room is not a member". Barret had plans to fully initiate Sephiroth and his brother into the group by going on a mission with Sephiroth tonight; but until they proved trustworthy he wanted to keep the two from learning anything more about his cell.
Jessie put her acting skills to good use, and only someone who knew her as well as Tifa did could have hoped to spot the glint of comprehension that briefly flickered across her face.
It just was too bad that Tifa didn't also have a codeword to tell Kadaj "she's a little boy crazy but a good friend, don't break her heart or I'll break your nose".
"I'll make sure to check them later. So, who is he?"
"I'm Kadaj." The 'he' in question all too happily introduced himself.
"Kadaj doesn't have anyplace else to go, so I'm going to look after him for a while."
"Anything I can do to help you feel more at home?" Jessie eagerly offered.
Luckily, Tifa had already come up with a plan for exactly this situation. There was something Kadaj could do to help Avalanche without even realizing it, and it would keep him from being underfoot when Marlene got back from school.
Barret had been VERY clear on how he didn't want either Sephiroth or Kadaj to meet Marlene until they'd proved their devotion to the cause.
"Jessie, weren't you just telling me that you had the next batch of water filters ready to move, but were worried that some of our customers might try to give us the run around? Just take Kadaj with you.
Kadaj, do you think can do that thing your big brother does with his eyes that scares people?"
"I can sure try!"
Judging by his current look of wide eyed eager to please exuberance, Tifa did not expect great things from Kadaj's career as a street tough. On the other hand, he wasn't actually going to be shaking down people for money, only making sure that Jessie was paid what she was owed.
"Just so I know, why are these water filters important?" Kadaj added after a moment of reflection.
"People who live below the Plate need water just like everyone else, but they've got no way to complain if Shinra cuts corners by supplying them with stuff that is barely potable." Jessie explained, eager to discuss her inventions.
"That's not very nice of them." Kadaj interjected.
It was an obvious and effortless quip to make... but he sounded oddly sincere.
"So that's why I've been working on making better water filters. If Shinra won't bother to properly filtrate the stuff they sell us, then we'll just have to do it ourselves. My new filters can all but completely eliminate the rotten egg smell that most of the water comes with, countless different types of particulate contamination and also come with a built in cooling device. I'm actually really proud of that part, because Shinra seems to think it's perfectly fine to have water come out the tap at around halfway to boiling."
"Smart." Kadaj agreed.
"All right, you two; have fun, play nice." Tifa instructed, hoping that they were able to handle this mundane errand.
If they somehow wound up having trouble with something as simple as this, it'd bode ill for Barret's plans to integrate Sephiroth and Kadaj fully into Avalanche; Planet knew they needed the muscle.
XXX XXX XXX
"Firion, this is Kadaj, Kadaj, this is Firion; he runs the local items store."
Firion took one look at Jessie, then at Kadaj, and seemed to pout slightly.
"Aw, and here I'd hoped Tifa would be the one bringing me my replacement." He chuckled to himself.
"You and every other guy in Sector Seven between the age of thirteen and dead. Sorry, you're going to have to settle for little old me today." Jessie chuckled right back.
"So, who exactly is Mr. Kadaj?"
"I'm in charge of collecting money for Jessie and looking after it!" Kadaj beamed.
One water filter installation later, Kadaj and Jessie exited the item shop with some additional gil in Kadaj's pockets. This was an easy job when everyone was so friendly!
XXX XXX XXX
Ms. Marle who apparently owned a small collection of sleeping rooms was also quite nice, and so Jessie didn't need Kadaj's help to deal with her. No, all she had to do was live up to her end of the bargain and focus on installing the new filtration system.
That let Kadaj free to just stand around and… well stand around.
Then the knocking started.
It was very loud, almost as if somehow the knocking was coming from inside Kadaj's head instead of simply being relayed to it by his ears.
So far as he could tell, the knocking was coming from the rightmost door on the second floor of Marle's establishment. The longer Kadaj waited and did nothing the louder the knocking got.
He couldn't understand why someone would keep continuously knocking on their own door, shouldn't they just be able to open it? Whatever was going on, Kadaj refused to simply let his ears continue to be assaulted by that hideous knocking.
So he raced up to the door that the knocking was coming from and opened it.
A man collapsed at Kadaj's feat.
He wore a black cloak that covered most of his body, but one section near his left shoulder had been torn, revealing that someone had tattooed the number 49 on said shoulder.
"Reunion..." The man whispered.
Kadaj's head swam.
He wasn't standing in the streets of Midgar anymore… he wasn't standing anywhere.
He couldn't see any part of his body, he could only see a small parade of people dressed in threadbare black cloaks, trudging their way through some sort strange sort of white fluff. Whatever was going on, it didn't look pleasant in the slightest.
"Reunion… Reunion..." One of black figures groaned.
All of a sudden he was back in Midgar.
Kadaj still had no idea what the man was talking about. Kadaj honestly wasn't sure if the man himself knew what he was talking about.
Whatever was going on, there was no reason to just leave him laying around on the floor.
Kadaj gently picked up 49 and carried him back to his bed.
"Reunion." Panted 49 once more.
Kadaj's mind briefly drifted back to his first encounter with Sephiroth.
"You're right… after all is said and done, everyone deserves a reunion." Kadaj tried to reassure him.
To his amazement it worked.
49's body seemed to relax slightly when previously he'd been a strange mix of both incredibly tense and yet at the same time entirely limp.
"Re-un-ion..." Kadaj could still hear the words being whispered behind him as he closed the door and left 49 alone to sleep off whatever illness he was in the grips of.
XXX XXX XXX
As opposed to Firion and Marle, Leon; who ran the weapon shop, did not seem to be quite so nice.
"Hey, that last filter you sold me didn't do shit!" Leon shouted at Jessie.
In fact, though Kadaj hated to think the worst of people; he was starting to consider the possibility that Leon was rather mean.
"What? You really mean that? Look I promise my new version also comes with a built in olfactometer so that you can see what kind of a job it is doing!" Jessie protested.
"Save your excuses and get out."
Jessie sighed heavily and shook her head.
"If you don't want to buy a new one, that's your choice. That said, Tifa told me that you bought your last filtration device from us on credit. Since your store seems to be doing pretty good business, I'd like you to pay Kadaj the money you owe us." Jessie insisted, planting her hands on her hips.
"You think I've got something to fear from a punk ass bitch like him? I bet there's not even a real sword in that sheath." Leon scoffed.
Kadaj had just been standing there his hands at his at sides, waiting for Jessie to sort out matters of payment, but now he seemed to be directly involved in the conversation.
"Souba is a real sword." Kadaj insisted, as he drew the blade in question.
All of a sudden the weapon shop became much quieter.
"Do you see this?" Kadaj asked, using his right hand to point to the gap between Souba's blades.
"Yes, I see it!" Leon whimpered, sweat trickling down his brow.
"Kadaj, I don't think he's seeing what you think he's seeing..." Jessie suggested in a strangled voice.
Kadaj tilted his head to the side, wondering what was going on that he wasn't smart enough to figure out. Then he carefully tilted his weapon to the side so that Jessie could take a good look at Souba.
"He said that Souba wasn't a real sword; so I wanted to show him its materia slots." Kadaj explained awkwardly, adjusting his grip so that Jessie would be able to see them clearly.
Kadaj noticed that Jessie was squinting, but he wasn't surprised, lots of people had trouble seeing things that he could.
"Are those six empty materia slots, all linked?"
"Yeah, that's what the doctors told me. They never actually gave me any materia, though..." Kadaj admitted.
"This is soooo much more important than a two hundred gil tab. Biggs need to see this, now!" Jessie grabbed his arm and hauled him out of the room.
Kadaj didn't see why it couldn't wait until after he'd convinced Leon to pay Jessie the money he owed her, but since it was Jessie's money he supposed she should get to make that particular call.
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As it turned out Jessie's friend Biggs was actually hanging out in a room on the weapon shop's second floor. He was also accompanied by another man who Jessie introduced as Wedge.
Both Biggs and Wedge wore red headbands, which was probably part of the official uniform of the neighborhood watch they belonged to.
She'd also said something about how she hoped to "get the pebble rolling" by introducing Kadaj to the other two, which was struck Kadaj as a weird turn of phrase, but then every phrase was sorta weird the first time you heard it...
"I'm telling you, his sword has six linked materia slots!" Jessie insisted.
Once again, Kadaj didn't see what the big fuss was; it wasn't like he had six materia, let alone six materia in pairs that needed to be linked in order to be fully effective.
"Six slots? Linked? I've heard that four with only two of them linked is the standard weapon for third class SOLDIERs. Hell, the only other weapon I've heard of that supposedly has six linked slots is Masamune!" Biggs gasped.
"Masamune does have six slots; I know my brother's sword." Kadaj wasn't going to let anyone's insult his brother, even if only by implying he lied about what his weapon was capable of.
"Wait, say that again…?" Wedge suddenly protested.
"Masamune does have six slots; I know my brother's sword?" Kadaj repeated his words hesitantly, in case there had been something wrong with how he'd said it the first time.
"Okay, we're gonna break this down real slow. Can we start with letting me actually see your sword?" Biggs pleaded.
Kadaj just stood there for a few moments, the fingers of his left hands twitching uncertainly.
"I'm not supposed to give it to anyone. Well not anyone other than the doctors…." Kadaj admitted as he carefully thought the matter through.
"Just think of me as a sword doctor, I make weapons better."
Kadaj considered that for a moment, then drew Souba and handed it over, but he made sure not to look away or blink. Souba was important to him, especially now that he was out of the lab; there wouldn't be anyone to just hand him a new sword if he lost his current one.
Biggs began to inspect the sword more closely, especially the gap between its blades.
"It's like he said, six materia slots in three linked sets. Sephiroth's Masamune or Genesis' Rapier, that's the class of weapon we're talking about... Wherever the hell you got this thing; I'm amazed there aren't a squad of Turks bursting in through the windows to take it back." Biggs murmured.
"Can we please go back to the part where we were talking about Masamune, General Sephiroth's sword, and you mentioned your brother? Because that sure makes it sound like..." Wedge interrupted.
"General Sephiroth is my older brother. I'm gonna be a hero just like him!" Kadaj interrupted Wedge's interruption, happy to clear up the matter now that he actually understood where the confusion lay.
There was a very long protracted silence, making Kadaj wonder if he'd done something wrong again, like when he'd tried to show his materia slots to Leon.
"Sure… lets go with that. Kadaj, the neighborhood watch group could really use someone with a sword like this. I mean you know how to use it right?" Biggs offered.
"I've spent a lot of time training with it." Kadaj reassured him.
At least it certainly qualified as a lot of time if you measured it as a percentage of exactly how long Kadaj had been alive.
"Well then Jessie, why don't you take our new hero and go on a patrol through Scrap Boulevard with him? We've been getting reports about lots of monster activity there recently, but we've been too busy with… other things to properly investigate them." Biggs suggested.
That sounded like a great idea!
"Slaying monsters is one of my favorite parts of being a hero!"
Granted, his last "monster hunt" had concluded with exactly zero monsters killed, but he had found Sephiroth, so clearly he must have been doing something right! If he ended up failing to kill any monsters but finding another missing family member, well he'd consider that a successful mission any day of the week!
End Chapter
AN: First off, yes I am cheating with this chapter's song lyric. I would normally avoid paraphrasing or in any way altering my chapter title song lyrics, but if you know the original song lyric for this chapter you can probably understand why I altered it.
Toccata and Fugue in D minor is piece by Johann Sebastian Bach, you might recognize its opening bars from like every ominous pipe organ you've ever heard played in a horror movie, Phantom of the Opera to pick one example (not) at random.
I am aware that in Advent Children Souba/Kadaj's swords is depicted as having no materia slots in it, hence why he needs to insert a materia directly into his arm… however the heck that is supposed to work. That said, in Advent Children, Kadaj and his siblings weapons came from…. ? Oh yeah, Advent Children never established where any of Kadaj, Loz or Yazoo's weapons came from.
In this AU where Souba was made by Shinra and given to Kadaj expressly for the purpose of molding him to be Sephiroth-2.0, of course it is going to have the best materia slot configuration they can manage.
Also, in the remake materia are presented as being around the size of a baseball, they more or less completely fills the hand of a person holding one. This is all fine and reasonable when you're dealing with weapons like the Buster Sword or Masamune, but how could any of Tifa's gloves possibly have room for multiple materia?
So in the interest of creating a version of reality that hangs together a little better, I'm going to say that in this story your average materia is actually only the size of a D20, that is why there are room for six of them to be slotted in between Souba's two blades.
Anyway, this chapter marks the end of what has effectively been our "prologue", you can probably guess what Sephiroth and Barret will be doing together next chapter.