The Ring of Kafrene was a strange place. It reminded Padmé of Yané's weaving—a loomlike framework of permanent buildings and broader avenues, churning out an ever-changing tapestry of small dwellings, narrow walkways, and their inhabitants. Newcomers, particularly those from rural areas, easily become lost amidst the shifting landscape if they ventured from the main thoroughfares. Padmé, however, long familiar with navigating by city towers in Theed and Coruscant, could find her way about with little trouble.

Today, as she moved through the crowded streets, she saw too many flashes of white gleaming amongst the populace. There were always a few stormtroopers, but now there were more than usual, or perhaps the patrols were more frequent. Had the Empire somehow found out about her exchanges with Ad'ika, or had Ad'ika's movements been tracked for some reason? Padmé herself was in the clear, unless there was a mole on Yavin, which was unlikely. Or… surely, Vader hadn't managed to cobble together anything she had said into an accurate tool to locate her? She had never mentioned anything to imply she was active in the field. If anything, that slip about Bail should have suggested her to be functioning in an administrative capacity. Ad'ika hadn't run afoul of the Empire, and there was simply no way, even with the Force, that the Sith apprentice could correctly guess all the information required to conclude that Rebels were operating on Kafrene. The heightened security must be due to some other cause. Perhaps strife with the miners, or a smuggling ring, or even a suspected Jedi presence.

Still, Padmé made her way even more carefully than usual, particularly mindful of her posture—slouching felt unnatural, but it blended in better here than a confident stride. Her path was more circuitous than usual, to lose any tails she might pick up. It also allowed her to make further observations of the stormtroopers' behavior. They were definitely not just making regular patrols at a higher frequency. Their pattern was different: they were combing the sectors, clearly searching for someone.

Another group of soldiers turned into the street, and Padmé felt the blood drain from her face, for at the head of that group strode none other than Vader himself. She forced herself to continue moving, slowly, keeping pace with the rest of the crowd, although she allowed herself to look back now and again to monitor the Sith's movements. Imperious gesture, and a few troopers split off from the group. Inclined head as one of the stormtroopers gestured in the direction of a docking area. Padmé felt in her pocket for her navicomp's memory chip. She had remembered to take it out of the device, hadn't she? Yes. Even if they found her ship, the base on Yavin was safe. No slicer could recover data from an absent chip.

Watching as Vader gave orders to his men, Padmé felt strangely like one does when one travels far from home, and half the people appear, at a distance, to be old friends. There was something so familiar—discordantly, uncomfortably familiar—in the Sith's attitude. It brought to mind blasterfire and the voices of the vod'e, the babble of reporters, fear and hope rising in equal measure as she stole a moment to watch the HoloNews, not to catch up on the latest developments, but only for a glimpse of Anakin, to assure herself that he had made it through another day. That stance, those gestures, were so like…. Replace Vader's dark armor with Jedi robes, give the stormtroopers blue markings, and it could almost be a scene pulled from the past. Or what the present could have been. Padmé's lips pressed into a stern line. In another world, she might have had a partner in this fight against the Empire. As it was…. She shook her head bitterly. As it was, she had only the memory of betrayal, both of herself and of all she valued.

And now the Sith was looking over his men's heads to the people beyond, as if searching for something, or someone. Wonderful. Uneasily, Padmé pulled her hood a little farther forward and let herself be swept along in the herd. Just behave the same way as everyone else, and you won't stand out. Hastening away from the area was an invitation to pursuit. It was safer to travel amongst the throng, where everyone else's nervousness would mask her own.

Thus far, the Kafrene operation was progressing satisfactorily. Sivron's ship had recently entered realspace and was expected to land within the hour. Vader turned to address one of his men.

"CC-1119, have any ships been identified which might indicate the arrival of Sivron's contact?"

"Possibly, Lord Vader. CT-6922 just reported a ship docked in Aurek sector—" CC-1119 pointed in the general direction, "which was missing its navicomp data chip. He says it's a bit small for a smuggler's vessel. Could belong to the rebel."

"Indeed. Increase troopers in the surrounding sectors. If the rebel evades capture at the rendezvous with Sivron, she will be apprehended when she attempts to return to her…."

A spike of pain shot through the anxious waste that defined the denizens of the street in the Force. It recalled pleading brown eyes, an emberlike Force presence, sweltering heat, breaking my heart… I can't follow—

It was there, it was real, so familiar that a wild question capered through his mind, wreaking havoc as it went. What if Sidious had been mistaken? Vader cast about in the Force, madly seeking the ember's gentle warmth, craving it. Her warmth. Her life. But there were only the dim, cool lights of the multitude surrounding him. He knew her presence as well as Kenobi's, or the Apprentice's, and it was not present on the Ring. The strange, feathery thing which had awoken within him retreated back into oblivion. His master was not susceptible to mistakes; he knew this. The ember had long lain cold in a distant crypt, no more than memory, or perhaps a whisper of what might have been.

The horde milled on through the streets—insignificant, every one of them. She was not among them.

The task at hand was to find the rebels. And when Vader found them—

[Luke. Bail. Luke.]

What was he to believe—the word of his master, or the incredulous cipher that lay half-translated before his very eyes? The galaxy balanced on the point of a pin, and the Force held its breath. Vader would have done likewise, had he possessed the ability.

He was half inclined to send his men to scour the crowds in the streets until every last individual had been cataloged. Skywalker might have done so, in his impetuosity. Vader was wiser. Ransacking the population would likely spook Sivron, and his master would be displeased if he allowed one of the insurgent agents to escape while chasing what turned out to be no more than a figment. [No mere figment, it couldn't be, not with what he had felt in the Force.]

Vader could be patient, even now. Let the rebels meet. They would be apprehended, and then….

"CC-1119."

"Yes, Lord Vader?"

"Lethal force against the rebels is absolutely prohibited until further notice. Convey this to the rest of the troops."

Padmé arrived a little late to the noisy cantina where she and Ad'ika had arranged to meet, but the girl wasn't there. She must also have become delayed trying to travel beneath the stormtroopers' notice. The minutes continued to pass, and still Ad'ika did not arrive. Padmé ordered a cup of caf, which tasted like it had been made with swamp water and brewed in a rusty bucket—cantinas weren't exactly known for their caf, after all. She hid a grimace, inwardly promising never to complain about the base's caf again, and sipped slowly at the awful stuff as she took a moment to collect her thoughts.

After spending most of the trip to Kafrene in formulating an appeal to a world whose support the Alliance was seeking, she still needed to analyze her notes on the most recent conversation with Vader. What had they even talked about? Ahsoka, Bail, Palpatine, Tarkin… Tarkin. Who had apparently tried to kill Vader's apprentice, but why would a Grand Moff try to kill a Sith acolyte? If Palpatine had learned of Vader's apprentice and desired their death, wouldn't he simply tell Vader to off them, or at least send an Inquisitor to do the deed? And if Palpatine hadn't found out, why would a Moff have any interest in killing a Sith acolyte? It would be bad politics; far better to keep the secret as leverage over Vader. And how had Tarkin even found out about the apprentice in the first place?

"Kriffing hells!" a young, Ryl-accented voice exclaimed, and Ad'ika flopped down at Padmé's table. "I think they know about me. There were so many of them! I thought some were following me, so I went where we went last time, and I'm pretty sure they surrounded the building. I had to sneak out through an old smugglers' tunnel, and I don't think they saw me, but—"

"Quickly, then." Padmé slid a datastick disguised as a credit across the table. "Taa's latest dealings."

"Thanks."

As Ad'ika pocketed the credit, the cantina doors opened to admit four stormtroopers. The ruckus of the patrons began to subside. Padmé rose and casually removed her cloak to drape it over the Twi'lek.

"Come along, sister mine," she said, half-grumbling. "Maybe next time you'll think twice before you decide to get the Kowakian rum."

Ad'ika moaned theatrically and drooped beneath the cloak.

They made it halfway to the door before one of the troopers stepped into their path.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"Home. My kid sister—"

Ad'ika giggled, then stumbled, swayed, and listed into Padmé broadside.

"I am not dragging you home if you knock us both down. Siblings."

Longsuffering, she looked up at the trooper, who (she thought) regarded her with suspicion. Please, let the makeup be a thorough enough disguise. Please, let the trooper be too young to remember Amidala's face clearly.

The young Twi'lek, who was definitely enjoying herself too much, mumbled a slurred complaint, of which Padmé only made out the word sick. Oh, she wouldn't.

As it turned out, she would. A nasty retching sound issued from the cloak, and a moment later, the trooper was forced to take evasive action. As he jerked out of the way, Ad'ika darted forward. Padmé followed suit, pulling a small blaster from her pocket. She dropped the trooper with a stun bolt before he had time to raise his own weapon, and by the time his three comrades made sense of the situation, both rebels were out the door and sprinting down the street.

"I don't—want—to do that—again," Ad'ika gasped. But Padmé thought she could hear a grin in the girl's voice, and once again, she found herself dreading the twins' teenage years.

Pounding footsteps sounded behind, and a stun bolt nearly clipped Padmé on the shoulder.

"In there!" She pushed Ad'ika toward a grove of fuel drums at the side of the street. They plunged in and wove between the tall metal barrels. The troopers pursued, but their bulk slowed them considerably, and they lost sight of their quarry. Padmé and Ad'ika ducked to crouch under an abandoned speeder propped at the back of the grove.

"Is there something you haven't told me? Have you run into any trouble with the Imperials?" Padmé hissed.

"No!" Ad'ika whispered indignantly. "There's just the checkpoint over Ryloth, but they've always let me through. I looked for a tracker and everything the first time it happened."

"The first time?"

"Yeah."

"Did you check any time after that?"

"No…?"

Padmé resisted the urge to give a very Kenobi-esque sigh.

"I didn't think it was necessary, because they let me back in and everything! They never stopped me… and…" Ad'ika's eyes widened. "I guess that was because they wanted to find out who I was meeting, didn't they."

She looked aghast as Padmé nodded, feeling no less appalled by her own blunder. Vader must have searched every world she had mentioned during their exchanges.

"I'm sorry—I didn't realise—I kriffed the whole thing up—"

"I think it was a joint effort," Padmé murmured. "I doubt they would have figured out my contact was from Ryloth if I hadn't… anyway, the most important thing now is to get off the Ring."

Ad'ika raised her chin. "It's my fault, Revenant. Let me lead them away from you."

"It's not even half your fault, and they will take you in for interrogation. If they don't just kill you outright."

"They'll have to catch me first. I'm small, and I'm quick. I can fit into places stormtroopers can't follow."

"They'll just be waiting for you on the other side."

A distant voice drifted into their refuge.

"Lord Vader. We located the rebels but lost them in sector Cherek-2. When last seen, they were heading toward Besh-3."

"Search—neighboring—halt all—corresponding docks—" Vader's reply was difficult to hear—it must have been a commlink, thank the stars—but Padmé made out enough to understand the gist of it.

"That's it," she told Ad'ika. "I will handle this. You will get out of here."

"No, let me lead them off. I'm just some nobody trying to do her bit for the galaxy. But you—you're important. The galaxy needs you more than it needs me."

"You are a child," Padmé said, falling into a quieter version of her mom voice, "and you do not belong in armed conflict. End of discussion, do you understand?"

Ad'ika nodded meekly.

"Thank you. Now, I'll draw the search after me. Wait until you hear a commotion, wait five minutes more, and then leave, but be careful. And give me your headdress," she added.

"Why?" Ad'ika asked, as she removed the headdress and placed it into Padmé's outstretched hand, along with the borrowed cloak.

"If I drop it before I catch the troopers' attention, then hopefully it will look like you headed the same direction as me. Go the opposite direction from the way you see me leave, and it should be less likely that they will find you. One more thing—will you be able to get to your ship?"

"I—no, it's in one of the closed sectors!"

"So is mine. We'll have to improvise. Meet me in sector Krill-4, by the junkyard near the docking area. If you move fast, you should be able to make it there before the stormtroopers."

"How?"

Padmé pulled her saber from beneath her tunic.

"Are you a Jedi?" Ad'ika whispered in awe.

"No. But I have friends who are, and one of them showed me a trick to turn a lightsaber into a bomb."

She opened the saber's casing and brushed a finger over the crystal inside, hesitating. Obi-Wan always says your lightsaber is your life. A part of her didn't want to give up this last piece of Anakin's life. Damn it! She shouldn't feel that way anymore. She carried this weapon in case she ever needed to use it, and now was certainly that time.

A couple seconds was all it took to invert the emitter and reassemble the hilt.

"I didn't know they could do that!"

"They aren't really supposed to, but needs must, and it'll work in a pinch. If troopers report an explosion caused by a lightsaber, that should draw Vader to the immediate area to deal with the Jedi. Your route to Krill-4 should be clear for a good bit of time while he concentrates troopers on the sectors surrounding the blast area."

"But how'll you get out with more troopers around? How are you going to meet up with me?"

"I'll blend in with the crowd. I've had a lot of practice doing that."

The tips of Ad'ika's lekku twitched nervously, but she nodded. "Okay. Krill-4 it is. Good luck, Revenant."

"May the Force be with you, Ad'ika. I will see you soon."

Padmé listened carefully but heard no telltale bootsteps from without. The stormtroopers must have moved off to continue their search. The coast thus (relatively) clear, she ducked out from beneath the speeder and wended her way through the fuel drums. Emerging into the market area once more, she let her back round slightly and her gait take on a shuffling quality, until she became just another member of the crowd, one more soul stretching to get by, with nothing about her to draw the eye.

A flash of white in the next row of vendors' stalls attracted her notice. Troopers, two of them. She hadn't gone far enough yet. If she set off an explosion here, their search perimeter might well include Ad'ika's hiding spot. Plus, she didn't want to risk injuring civilians or damaging their property if she could help it. Perhaps, though, if she let the troopers see her now and give chase, she could lead them away, and draw others after her, thus leaving fewer in position to apprehend Ad'ika during her flight to Krill sector.

Padmé slipped between the market stalls, but this time when she stepped out into the street, she shuffled a little too much, drew her hood a little too far over her face, became a little too interested in a selection of secondhand hyperdrives, checked her tail with a slightly exaggerated motion. Let just the slightest bit of alarm show on her face as her eyes fixed on the troopers.

And, turning away, listened with satisfaction as she heard a shout ring out behind her.

"Hey! You there, brown cloak!"

The marketplace went silent as half its occupants froze, hands in their pockets and varying degrees of guilt on their countenances. The second trooper made a disgusted sound at his comrade.

"What are you, a kriffin' clanker?"

Padmé took advantage of their brief distraction to dart down a nearby cross street.

"There she goes!"

"After her!"

A crash sounded from the thoroughfare, followed by a peddler's anguished cry. "My meiloorun!"

Though she felt a twinge of conscience, Padmé didn't look back. She kept on running, weaving through crowds, gasping out a breathless apology once or twice as she collided with another pedestrian. The japor snippet, having worked its way loose of her collar, now swung wildly about. She tried to tuck it back in, but it was a difficult task in the middle of a sprint, and eventually she gave up.

The stormtroopers on her tail were slowly gaining, but no more had joined them. That would have to change. Padmé whipped around a building, dropping into a crouch as she spun to peer around the corner. The crowd thinned before the approaching soldiers. Padmé took out her blaster and turned off the stun setting as she carefully took aim. She didn't want them stunned, nor dead. They needed to be able to inform their fellows which way she had run. Leaning out from the side of the building, she fired a shot at the front trooper's right knee. Thanks to a quirk of Imperial engineering, the right knee was less protected than the left when bent, and Padmé was a good enough shot to take advantage of the flaw. The man fell with a pained shout, and his compatriot followed moments later.

Padmé rose and leaned against the building as she caught her breath, reorienting herself as she planned her next move. Before long, the telltale clack of armor sounded in the distance. Dropping Ad'ika's headdress, she took off again, and thanked the stars for the endurance she had built through exhausting hours spent in saber sparring with the Force users and hand-to-hand with the vod'e.

Dodging blasterfire and stun bolts from time to time, she led the chase into progressively more ramshackle districts, where she doubled back now and again to survey her following. There were more troopers, to be sure, but not enough to ensure Ad'ika's safety en route to Krill sector, so she began to look for a good place set off the bomb. Somewhere unpopulated, with nooks where she could evade the troopers.

This—this might do. A deserted refinery for raw ores mined from the Ring's asteroids, now a disintegrating jungle of durasteel and duracrete, haphazardly adorned with industrial refuse. The troopers were closing in behind her, but Padmé was strangely unafraid as she scanned the area for a niche to hide in. It wasn't supposed to be this exhilarating to run for one's life. Apparently, she was still making up for those six years of tranquility on Tatooine.

Turning a corner, she saw a narrow space between two pieces of corrugated metal sheeting. If she could fit through, and then shift the metal so no gap showed, the troopers would have no reason to think she was within. As she squeezed between the metal sheets, wincing as her clothes snagged here and there, she saw a crack of light down what appeared to be a narrow path between two buildings, or maybe rubble stacks—yes, if she could distract the troopers and keep them in the refinery, and then follow that light to the end of the tunnel, she might be able to escape.

Taking out her lightsaber, she flicked the ignition switch on and hurled the improvised bomb out of her shelter, toward a couple of fuel drums. The area was mostly full of metal and duracrete, such that a fire resulting from the explosion would run out of fuel once anything in the drums had burned away. Not waiting to see the result of her handiwork, she heaved the metal sheeting closed just as the clack of armor began to sound outside.

The lightsaber and fuel drums exploded with an impressive bang that Padmé's shelter only somewhat muffled. Shouting ensued outside, and she continued to squeeze through the crevice toward the spot of gloomy light. Protruding bits of detritus scratched at her as she wiggled through the cramped space, but her struggles were well rewarded when she reached the gap. Peering out, she found that it gave onto an abandoned alley, populated only by litter and dust. No one had passed this way for a very long time. Hopefully that meant it was forgotten, its entrances hidden, and she could travel it in relative safety.

To Padmé's relief, Ad'ika was waiting for her in the Krill-4 junkyard, and there was a scarcity of stormtroopers in the area. The only ones in sight were those guarding a flock of Imperial ships in the docking area, which gave Padmé an idea. She didn't want to steal a civilian's ship unless absolutely necessary, which meant the only other option was to somehow steal an Imperial vessel. Options were limited. There were several Lambda shuttles, as well as one notorious, familiar starfighter. As Padmé studied her options, a plan began to unfurl into full, glorious, ridiculous bloom. If she could only pull it off, it might actually be the best way to ensure their escape from Kafrene.

Vader's TIE Advanced was fast and agile, and the Sith was a wicked pilot. Artoo had barely managed to escape, and Padmé had nowhere near the droid's abilities or experience. Escape in a Lambda and leave the TIE where Vader could possibly use it to chase her down before she hit hyperspace? Oh, no. If she was going to steal a ship, Padmé was going to steal the ship that would grant her the greatest chance at success. The TIE would confer a distinct advantage. Plus, she needed to make sure it wasn't available for its owner to use in pursing her.

Watching the guards, she singled out her mark: a rather bored-looking trooper, standing guard over the TIE. Guarding Vader's ship was probably not as prestigious a task as it seemed, for who would dare steal or tamper with a Sith Lord's property?

Of course, they had not reckoned on the existence of a very determined Padmé Amidala.

She scavenged through the junkyard and came up with a curved metal bar that might have been some kind of structural support, as well as a piece of pipe, which she used wire to attach across the diameter of the curved bar.

"What are you doing?" Ad'ika inquired.

"This resembles an Inquisitor—that is, a Jedi-hunter's lightsaber. If I can act the part, it should be enough to convince that guard to let me take a ship. Will you trade boots with me, and let me use your coat?"

Ad'ika nodded and removed her black boots and coat. Both fit rather snugly on Padmé, but they would suffice long enough to see her and the girl into a ship, if all went as planned. She twisted her hair into a tight bun and contoured her face into a severer shape with a subtle touch of grime from the junkyard, darkening her eyes with more of the same. Garbed in black, with the "saber" hanging openly at her waist, she made a passable Inquisitor.

"If I didn't know you, I'd be terrified," Ad'ika said, approvingly.

"Thank you. Now, I'm an Inquisitor, and you're a Force-sensitive Rebel spy. I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to manhandle you a bit. I'll try not to be too rough, but it needs to look convincing."

Ad'ika merely nodded, unfazed. "Fighting back will help, yes?"

"As long as you can make it look real."

"Oh, I can make it look real." She bared her teeth in a feral grin. "Do you mind if I draw blood?"

"I'd prefer you didn't, but if it comes down to it, a little blood is preferable to being arrested by the Empire." It wouldn't be the first time Padmé had been bitten, although Leia had never actually drawn blood.

The trooper guarding Lord Vader's TIE Advanced was roused from his boredom by the thud of boot heels nearby. He came sharply to attention at the sight of an intimidating woman before him. A round, double-ended lightsaber hung at her waist, symbol of the Inquisitorius, and a Twi'lek girl writhed in her vicelike grip.

"Stand aside, trooper," the woman barked. "I have orders from Lord Vader to take this Rebel brat back to Nur. Turns out, she's a baby Jedi."

"But this is Lord Vader's personal starfighter!" protested the trooper.

"It is," the Sister agreed, ominously. "Do you presume to question the orders of my master?"

Her brown eyes glared unblinkingly into his, as if she was reading the contents of his soul. People did say Lord Vader and his ilk could do that sort of thing. The trooper very bravely managed not to squirm in his boots. He stood his ground. Until the Sister raised her hand in an ominous gesture, whose meaning the man knew all too well. Serving in Lord Vader's personal troops tended to acquaint one with it. Was she already beginning to strangle him, or was he just imagining the slight pressure on his throat?

"No, Sister!" he gasped. "I would never presume—of course not!"

He stepped out of her way with a sharp salute. Unfortunately, he did not step quite far enough, and so received a stinging slap across the eye from one of the Jedi brat's flailing lekku as the woman dragged her past.

"That's for Ryloth!" she hissed at him.

"Trooper, a ladder!" ordered the Inquisitor.

He narrowed his eyes. "Can't you just, you know—the magic thing?"

"I'll 'magic thing' you, if you aren't careful. You think it sounds like a good idea to go jumping through the air with an armload of squirming Jedi brat? Ladder. Now."

Grumbling under his breath, the rather put-upon trooper went off to fetch a ladder. These Force users were more uppity than Core-born officers.

"No evidence of explosives," one of the stormtroopers mused, kicking at a piece of blackened debris. He turned to another trooper. "You were around back then. Did your Jedi ever cause explosions?"

The clone coughed. "Not with the Force alone."

"You found the remnants of a lightsaber." Vader said, before that particular line of conversation could go any further. "The weapon itself will function as an explosive, if misassembled."

The Apprentice had related a story, many years ago—

"There was this kid, he kind of reminded me of you, Skyguy, stubborn and proud, but smart. He put his lightsaber together wrong during the lesson, thankfully no injuries came of that, but then when the pirates boarded our ship, he thought to use it as a grenade." Her expression turned saucy. "I can't believe you've never pulled that trick!"

"Your lightsaber is your life, my very young Padawan," the Jedi said with mock gravity, in a horrendous imitation of a Coruscanti accent.

"Yeah, right. You two are the worst hypocrites I know. Well, anyway, I think it was a brilliant move, and Petro will be an excellent Jedi one day."

The slightest barb jabbed at Vader's psyche. It was… irritation, at the lack of foresight which had wasted an excellent potential Inquisitor. But that was beside the point. Someone clearly understood the workings of a lightsaber to the degree that they could disassemble the hilt and reverse the emitter such that it became a bomb. To possess such knowledge, that person must be either a Jedi or someone with ties to them. [She would have such ties.]

"Give me the lightsaber," he ordered.

One of the troopers offered up a pile of scorched metal bits, half-buried among which lay a kyber crystal. As Vader reached for the crystal, it wailed a piercing lament into the Force, unlike anything he had ever heard. But back of that dirge was an old song, once as familiar as her laugh or the Apprentice's saucy teasing.

It was the Jedi's crystal, and it frankly confirmed Kenobi's involvement somewhere in this. Before the lava tides of Mustafar quite overwhelmed his faculties, however, Vader heard something else in the crystal's song, something different—a faint, new harmony, sharp as glass, yet carrying all the warmth of an ember aglow. It was entrancing, at once strange and familiar, and it was her.

Was this, then, what he had felt earlier? Merely this remnant of her presence, somehow preserved in the Jedi's kyber crystal? But how had that presence come to be so deeply imprinted in the kyber? Had it somehow been imbued as her life faded into the Force? No, a kyber crystal took on the attributes of its user. And for a crystal to have shifted, even slightly, to match a Force-null user—that would have to take years.

The galaxy shook on its axis as one of the cornerstones of Vader's existence fissured. It did not crumble—not yet—but the feathered thing within him crept forth through the cracks, tentative as one emerging again after the passage of a fearsome gale. Though Vader had never known the fragile thing, he remembered its name.

Hope.