Both Needed The Age Of The Inhuman OOC (Dystopia/Superhero/No-Smut) Still Recruiting

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Both Needed The Age Of The Inhuman OOC (Dystopia/Superhero/No-Smut) Still Recruiting

Cheshire Cat

Cheshire Cat

Queen of the Parliament of Cats
Local time
Today 7:01 AM
Messages
1,620
Age
34
Location
The Mysterious Land Of Somewhere!
EDIT: Please note, characters must have been human before the event. I am not currently accepting supernatural, magical, or extraterrestrial influences.

The din of a dozen whispered conversations filled the room, the discomforted sounds of shifting fabric and furniture, of stifled coughs and groans providing a beat. Smoke swirled slowly on a sea of tense breath, little regard given to the small, brass 'no smoking' plaques affixed to the conference table as tired-looking generals and officials tapped cigars and cigarettes into discarded white coffee mugs. The rule of 'smoke 'em if you've got 'em' overruled all objection.

One of the secret service agents flanking the door shifted wordlessly, taking hold of the leftmost double-door and pulling it aside. The sudden rush of clean air sent eddies through the smoke. A tall, lanky man of advanced years marched in, stern green eyes tucked behind thick, tortoise-shell bifocals. His salt-and-pepper hair was short-kempt, and his thick brow hung low on his stoic face. Moving to the head of the table, he turned his stare slowly around the room as all present rose to display rank and respect.

Setting down the large, red folder he'd had tucked under one arm, he slipped into the head seat, silhouetted by the large television screen behind him, the seal of the office of the president glowing dimly. "Ladies and gentlemen, joint chiefs of staff ..." he began, gesturing for everyone to be seated. He paused. He rarely paused ...

"I would be very grateful if someone could explain to me exactly what just happened." He tried to keep his voice flat, authoritative, but it rang with worry. The question hung in the air for long moments before anyone spoke. A woman, middle-aged, dressed in a grey suit, strawberry blonde hair pulled back into a tight bun, sat forward in her chair and cleared her throat. Grey-blue gaze shifted slowly around the table in acknowledgement as she spoke.

"Domestic agencies are coordinating efforts at the scene of the ... event, and on the digital investigation. Military intelligence is focused primarily on radar and satellite analysis, but are providing support for our agents on the ground, transportation, communication. So far they've ruled out foreign intervention, and ..." She paused, casting a sidelong glance down the table to a young man in a regal uniform, who immediately averted his stare to the corner.

"... Space Force has confirmed that ... nothing entered or exited the atmosphere at or around the confirmed time ... and they have concluded that his was not ... extra-planetary in ... nature." Her lips settled into a thin line as she gave a little nod. Everyone was still adjusting. "We still can't identify the visual anomaly, but military intelligence is working with Sat-Com to see if they have an angle for spectral data or more detailed aerial," She paused again, but held in the sigh that had crept up on her. "but we still can't say ... what exactly happened."

The man at the head of the table, the national security adviser, removed his glasses and closed them. Setting them on top of the red folder, he rubbed at his temples, eyes closed for a silent few seconds.

"So, it wasn't China, and it wasn't ... Aliens. Can you tell me what it was?" It was getting harder to hide his frustration.

A white-haired man with a youthful face sitting adjacent to his blonde superior pushed up his sleek, black-framed glasses, beginning in a calm, even tone.

"Initial analysis of samples from the site was inconclusive, labs at FBI and Military installations have independently confirmed absence of chemical or energy residue from any known explosive or weapon system, active or black book. Examination of the remains at the edge of the affected area show no signs of heat or concussive force, no residue from chemical dissolution, nor any kind of radioactive leftover, particulate or EM ... nothing out of the ordinary." There was a hint of defeat in his otherwise professorial tone as his last few words spilled out.

The national security advisor's brow furrowed, and he took a moment to scrape his lower lip across his teeth and phrase himself correctly. He almost felt the urge to smile as he repeated those words.

"Nothing out of the ordinary ..."

Pulling his phone from his breast pocket, he thumbed it to life and tapped at it a few times. Behind him, the screen flickered to life, and displayed a short clip of aerial footage displaying the massive, perfectly even, domed crater now standing where the majority of Colby, Kansas, had once stood.

"Nothing out of the ordinary?" He was too confused to be angry. The white haired man shrank back into his seat as his superior sat forward again. Elbows on the table, hands actively splayed in a silent plea for consideration of their side, she spoke again.

"Sir, witness reports are all over the place, and we're still combing through footage but most of what we have immediate access too is from CCTV footage that's too close or too far away and too low quality to tell us anything. Survivors at the site of the event, the ones on the interstate and in what's left of the city, reported a sudden, blinding light, and a low rumble, and then nothing. literally nothing ... Edna Dillinger opened her eyes to find her husband and half of her bookstore ... just ... gone. Markus Banlow drove his civic off the cleanly cut edge of the interstate and into the crater ..." She stopped. She was starting to ramble. Taking a moment to wet her lips and calm her heart, she straightened her blazer and re-positioned in her chair.

"Every method we use to gather intel, every mechanism, is telling us that at 10:48:05AM Central, 98% of the geographical area of downtown Colby, Kansas, and 4000 or more of its residents, along with a significant portion of Interstate 70, all just ... stopped existing."

The silence in the room was deafening.

The national security adviser leaned forward in his chair, resting his elbows on the dark stained table as he wiped his hands down his face. Maybe this was a nightmare and he would wake up if he just rubbed the sleep from his eyes. The grave sight of the situation room remained as his hands fell away. "... So ... what am I supposed to tell the President? ... Nothing happened? Is he supposed to tell the CNN, the American people, not to worry, that a whole lot of nothing happened to Colby?" His glare could have melted butter, even if it wasn't entirely a glare for the Director it was aimed at.

She slipped back into her seat, chin lowered. The white haired man spoke up again "We're working on it sir. We've deployed every resource available to us, but it's going to take time."

"Besides, we don't need answers." interrupted a bold, brash voice from the far end of the table. Crew cut brown hair, dark eyes, a squared jaw, a light frown on his lips despite his best efforts. "To be frank, sir. What we need right now is an explanation, even an inaccurate one. Right now, social media and Fox news are doing more damage to the collective calm than the initial att-" he caught himself. "Event. We need to keep the public from getting whipped into a panic over this. We need ... to return people ... to a state of calm."

He peered around at the others for any hint of agreement. He found a few nodding faces.

"Colby is gone, we can't undo that ... b-" the chime of a cellphone cut him off, twenty-some-aught scowls searching the room for the source of the sound. The director of national intelligence pulled her phone from her coat and peered down at it, indifferent to the glares burning into her. Her brow furrowed, and she leaned over to the director of the central intelligence agency. They both stared for long moments, vexed.

The national security advisor slammed a balled fist down on the table, drawing all but two pairs of eyes. "Mme Director! What is so important?" He demanded. The director turned her stare on him, lips hanging agape. Hesitantly, unable to sum up what she'd seen in words, she tapped at her phone screen, taking over the visual apparatus behind the national security advisor. Flickering again, it now showed what looked like CCTV footage of a crowded hallway lined with lockers. A small box in the corner read 'ColbyHS023.'

In scene, students were filing this way and that, presumably between classes, a few pulling into their lockers, a few lingering in small groups. From off-screen, a tall, muscled young man in a tank top, a jersey tied around his waist, storms up to a much shorter young man changing out books from his locker. Without pausing, the taller student shoves the shorter, sending him sprawling to the floor. The surrounding students freeze and stare. Some flee, but most watch. The taller student can be seen speaking aggressively, but there is no audio. He spits. The crowd is obscuring the fallen boy for the most part, but he can be seen sitting up, pulling his knees to his chest, his head rocking. The bully laughs. A lot of kids laugh. The boy lowers his head, begins to shake, presumably sobbing ... begins to glow. There is a wave of shock that moves through the crowd, but it's too late for anyone as a sudden flare of light cuts the camera feed, causing the clip to restart.

The silence is again deafening. The clip plays again, and again. No one speaks. Glances are exchanged. Is this a joke? Some kind of fabrication.

"i-it's ... directly from the ... the school district security server. Our field agents recovered it a ... a few minutes ago." The director stammered.

Silence.

The phone on the table rings, startling everyone. The national security adviser hesitates before reaching out to pick up the receiver.

"Hello Mr. President ...yes, the joint chiefs, and the department of national intelligence ... No sir ... well, yes sir, but ... I ... I have something you need to see ... for yourself. Yes sir ... right away sir."

Nodding to the secret service agents at the far end of the room, the national security adviser hung up the phone and stood, slipping his glasses back on as he picked up the red folder from the table. Turning to the director of national intelligence, he plucked her phone from her hand and offered a flat smile.

"I'm ... going to need to borrow this. Don't circulate this, or any other footage you recover ..." He paused, considering, pondering, then leaned in, speaking clearly, but quietly. "And find out ... what happened at Colby High School."
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James Ferrier, born August 23, 2014 ... the first recorded Inhuman. It only took a few days for them to put together what happened that day, December 15th, 2030. A bully, Carson Meadows, shoved a longtime victim, James, to the ground. There were psychological reasons for Carson's selection of James, but that's for another time. James likely suffered a panic attack, which caused him to begin hyperventilating and crying. His file shows he was still adjusting to a prescription for anxiety. Something in him snapped ... and unfortunately it was the first impulse in his brain to reach ... whatever controlled his powers. Data collected from cell towers in the area show a burst of broad-spectrum radiation that disrupted calls on certain frequencies during the event, and electrical devices nearby were fried, suggesting that the field seen in footage was some kind of ... sub-atomic event ... the physical manifestation of James wishing he didn't exist anymore.

He got his wish, and he took almost the entirety of his hometown with him into oblivion. The nature of his powers are still a mystery, but this is how the Inhuman race was born. Not with a coo, a gentle, beautiful blooming, but with an explosion, and a blood curdling scream.

The legislation was enacted almost overnight. The Bureau of Inhuman Affairs formed using resources from other intelligence agencies, it's Human Conservation Officers carrying more authority than any ground-level law-enforcement personnel in US history, overtaking traditional police in many cities by sheer presence. Inhumans are required to report themselves upon self-discovery, and punished severely if found to be living in secret, regardless of power or potency. Inhumans in almost every country must wear some form of identifying mark, and there is a zero-tolerance policy on power use. Bigotry and intolerance are at inquisition levels, and hate groups have an empathetic ear with the public. IT'S ONLY BEEN A YEAR SINCE JAMES but the legal and cultural climate has given rise to the super-villain, with violence between inhuman street-gangs or particularly powerful individual criminals and HCOs or military forces becoming a weekly occurrence in most major cities.

There are ... gestures made in popular culture. Attempts at acceptance, to diffuse the tension, to make inhumans feel like a part of society instead of unwelcome interlopers. Things people can point at and say "No, it's okay, SVU just had an Inhuman detective on" ... nevermind that there are no Inhuman detectives, except those who might be living in secret or ignorance. There is a UN-backed, internationally membered crime-fighting team, but they have been formed for six months and have done nothing but ribbon cutting. There are, however, no independent superheroes. The few vigilantes to grace the recommended tab of popular awareness have been violent psychopaths out for blood, quickly making themselves into pariah, if not outright villains.

Something has to change. Somehow we need to find a way of accepting Inhumanity while safeguarding Humanity, because if we can't, we default to the natural option. The option that has played out time and time again throughout the history of this planet ...

... whenever a superior species enters the picture ...

Section 1) An Inhuman is defined herein as any person living within the united states in possession of powers not normally associated with the human condition.

Any inhuman, upon discovery of their abilities, must report themselves in full and immediately to the local offices of the Bureau of Inhuman Affairs (henceforth to be referred to as the BIA). At the time of reporting, The Inhuman will present him or herself for detention until such time as a power assessment has been completed by a licensed assessment officer. Based on the judgment of the BIA, the individual may face such provisional requirements as;
- The wearing of a monitoring device
- Living in a supervised group-home environment
- Detention in a state facility
- Referral for termination

Section 2) BIA Human Conservation Officers may, at any time, question any person or persons with regard to their status as a Human or Inhuman individual, and engage in a field power assessment. Persons failing to report their status as an inhuman who go on to present signs of power-use are subject to immediate incarceration, assessment, and judgment by the BIA.
While the government here-signed accepts its responsibility to provide for and uphold the rights and safety of every person residing legally within its political borders, and to observe basic human rights for all persons found to be on her soil or under her influence, the status of Inhumans as a legitimate and inherent danger to public safety provides adequate consideration to remove from them their legal person-hood. Should an Inhuman present with powers potentially dangerous enough to generate significant public panic, or public harm, the tribunal and/or officiating body, may, without consideration to the right to life and liberty, enact lifelong incarceration, or immediate termination of the individual.

POST HERE IF INTERESTED. 4-5 players by application only



Now, the profile, or, as the french call it, "le grand betard" ...

Cheshire Cat said:
Profile Skeleton:
First Name: (Required)
Middle Name: (Optional)
Last Name: (Required)
Date of birth: (Current Date December 16th, 2031)
Birthplace: (where your character was born, geographically :3 )
Registration Status: (Did your character declare their inhumanity as soon as they realized they were inhuman?)
Power/s: (Be as specific as possible.)
Weakness/es: (You have them, what are they.)
Distinguishing Marks: (Your character's full appearance. A picture is nice, but a description is required.)
(Your character's boring, human past, and the potentially exciting events of 2031. Be as brief or as long-winded as you like, this won't be known to other characters unless your character tells them ... or you famous.)
Initiating Incident: (The circumstances surrounding your characters capture and incarceration by the BIA. This can be a scene, a summary, or whatever presentation you like, but should include how your character was found to be inhuman.

Code: 
[B]First Name:
Middle Name:
Last Name:
Date of birth:
Birthplace:
Registration Status:
Power/s:
Weakness/es:
Distinguishing Marks:[/B]
[spoiler="Background"]
[/spoiler]
[B]Initiating Incident:[/B]
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Hm, you are a nefarious one Cheshie and counted amongst the those I hold in the highest regard as literary colleges. This has caught my attention, and that's not something I say lightly. I look forward to seeing where you take this.
 
As tempted as I might be to carry on being a smartass, next time we write a story I'll adjust my formatting accordingly. :)
 
Laughingstokk said:
I'd interested. Would you prefer any questions be saved until the OOC so I don't clutter up this thread? Or I could PM you
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Ooh, hourray! Nono, this thread will be repurposed as the OOC once we open the RP. The Sanctum doesn't technically have an OOC space, so I figure this is as good a thread as any! Questions, characters-in-progress, you can post whatever you like in here! Posts just make me look popular U w U
 
Cooool. So I was actually about to write my own rp centered around different kinds of witchcraft and possible Eldritch beings but I saw yours first and I haven't done a superhero RP in just such a long time. That being on my brain when I saw yours, my imagination was sparked when you wrote "sub-atomic event ... the physical manifestation of James wishing he didn't exist anymore." So I hope running with that theme wouldn't offset what you had in mind too much.

My character's power would be the possession of a spell book which seems to be completely malleable to the character's will. It's the manifestation of the same force that gives everyone else their supernatural abilities filtered through his intent, sometimes consciously sometimes sub consciously. The book, while versatile, would be relatively low-impact in most of it's effects. Some effects I was thinking were:

Unlimited Page - No matter how much paper is taken out of the book, it never loses it's thickness nor contents. This is mind boggling to watch. Using this same spell, the pages of the book sent out can be controlled magically. They resist damage like steel, and cut just the same as well.

Hide Object: Small - Whatever can be fit within the eight-by-eleven inch book's pages can be enclosed within them seamlessly as if the thing did not exist. If there is a limit to this spell, Kobe has not found it. Currently stored within the pages of the book are a .44 Magnum snub nosed revolver, a camping knife with a jagged blade about four inches long, a compact grappling hook capable of holding up to two hundred and fifty pounds with a twenty meter rope, a cloth soaked with choreiform (replaced every once in a while), some high-test wire meant for making snares, glass cutters, a pair of leather gloves, and five MREs.

Ascend - A gust of wind seemingly from nowhere lifts Kobe straight in the air one story.

Explosion - Must be centered on something within ten feet of Kobe. The object will begin to inflate, glow red, and then explode with the same force as a hand grenade.

Tremors - Allows Kobe to track the vibrations of any movement within a twenty meter radius touching the ground (or building in which he resides.) This is a flood of information and thus only shows a brief image in his mind of the source and location.

Aqua Lung - Allows Kobe to breath under water for up to ten minutes.

an added caveat to his power would be that to create new spells he has to do some ritualistic meditation to manifest it effectively to be used. For aqua lung he practiced holding his breath as long as he could for months until he realized he no longer needed to. Hide object he placed his pistol in the book and opened and closed it for hours playing peekaboo until suddenly it stayed gone. So on and so forth. I'm also thinking they'd be a successful cat-burglar-for-hire/ex spy whom probably tried to hide their ability at first but got found out and because of their past were recruited into the team in exchange for not going to inhuman-prison.[/spoiler]
 
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I have... ideas. I'm going to mark this with an 'interested.'
 
I'm interested.

Alrighty, a sudden emergence of superpowers event suggests that Superpowers have a common source, although the setting strongly implies the knowledge of what that common source might be isn't any sort of common knowledge. I'd say that's a good thing to keep a mystery for the players. Gives a question to seek the answer for.

Powers are new and ill understood, even for the Inhumans, so practicing with your powers and discovering more uses/flexibility seems pretty reasonable. That said, 'feel' is important. Powers should probably be geared toward the overall feel and tone of the story the group wants to explore. As the opening vignette involves a kid accidentally nuking his hometown, the tone is going to be on the serious side. Do we want to play a group of Inhumans who're trying to convince the public to accept inhumanity? Are we Inhuman supremacists who're trying to bring down the oppressive government that're trying to murder us? Are we Inhumans who've been given a choice by a rogue element of BIA to either work with the rogue arm of the Agency or get terminated for the powers we have?

Our first super nuked his hometown, so powers can be powerful and scary, but it's probably best if the characters don't lean into that for their own design. If a single character can wipe out an army division, that actually really reduces the sort of obstacles and problems we can try to overcome. Think Angel Summoner vs BMX Bandit, for those of you who get the reference.

My first instinct for a character would likely be immediately shot in the head by the BIA if they learned about the power set. Namely, a Technopath who can mentally communicate with/control electronic devices. A national security nightmare. That said, I'm not really super invested in the character concept yet, as I like to start with the story and design the character to fit the story, rather than trying to mold a story to a character.
 
Baxter Peters said:
I'm interested.

Alrighty, a sudden emergence of superpowers event suggests that Superpowers have a common source, although the setting strongly implies the knowledge of what that common source might be isn't any sort of common knowledge. I'd say that's a good thing to keep a mystery for the players. Gives a question to seek the answer for.

Powers are new and ill understood, even for the Inhumans, so practicing with your powers and discovering more uses/flexibility seems pretty reasonable. That said, 'feel' is important. Powers should probably be geared toward the overall feel and tone of the story the group wants to explore. As the opening vignette involves a kid accidentally nuking his hometown, the tone is going to be on the serious side. Do we want to play a group of Inhumans who're trying to convince the public to accept inhumanity? Are we Inhuman supremacists who're trying to bring down the oppressive government that're trying to murder us? Are we Inhumans who've been given a choice by a rogue element of BIA to either work with the rogue arm of the Agency or get terminated for the powers we have?

Our first super nuked his hometown, so powers can be powerful and scary, but it's probably best if the characters don't lean into that for their own design. If a single character can wipe out an army division, that actually really reduces the sort of obstacles and problems we can try to overcome. Think Angel Summoner vs BMX Bandit, for those of you who get the reference.

My first instinct for a character would likely be immediately shot in the head by the BIA if they learned about the power set. Namely, a Technopath who can mentally communicate with/control electronic devices. A national security nightmare. That said, I'm not really super invested in the character concept yet, as I like to start with the story and design the character to fit the story, rather than trying to mold a story to a character.
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likewise I am prepared to scrap mine if it doesn't fit. It was inspired partially by Chrollo Lucilfer from Hunter x Hunter, and partially by the concept of giving a thief magic.
 
I'm also interested but I see that there's a few other people so if there is still room left for me I would love to be apart of this
 
*nods nods* I have my own ideas about what caused the emergence of superpowers, but in the end the story, and the direction people want to go in, is going to shape things a looooot. That's part of the reason I haven't mentioned anything about like ... who our characters are going to be, what they're going to be doing. We need a framework for very different people to be pushed together, but there are various ways of doing that ... which I will devote some brain power to, but otherwise yeah ... I wanted to present the world first and see what kinds of ideas we got rolling.

~~~

Now, >sighs< @Laughingstokk , I love characters like ... Zatanna, Hex, Archer (The Merlin), but I feel like introducing magic into this project is just going to cause a lot of havoc. You've presented a very reasonable way of cutting the canon of magic out of the character's power explanation, but I feel like it's ... kind of flattening out something that really CALLS for a lot of depth. James' power, and I'm sorry I got too flowery for clarity, was telekinesis. I never outright said that, and in trying to ... insinuate motivations for the character to cause a disaster by accident, I think I made it seem more like his powers were doing whatever his mind wanted, rather than what I had intended; That he had telekinesis, very powerful telekinesis, and that he wanted not to exist so firmly in that moment that his powers tore everything in the range of his powers down to like .... base atomic particles. But even then, I've tried to be vague ... maybe James and the town of Colby are still out there ... somewhere ... *makes spooky hands*

... I hope that wasn't too rambly. In short; kewl character but nay for this project.

~~~

For everyone else, yes, we have a fair bit of stated interest, but I encourage everyone to submit their ideas. The superhero genre has great breadth, and as we get closer to a shared understanding of the desired atmosphere, people are going to get less interested, it's just natural :P

Also, as for the plot, my initial intention was to rely on the idea of characters who have been incarcerated for a variety of reasons related to powers being offered a chance at freedom by 'volunteering' for a crime-fighting program in an attempt to counter the rise of super-crime. That could lead us into ... finding out that a portion of super-crime is actually a rebellion against the BIA and the HCOs, and the general treatment of mutants, or ... the lesser of two evils kind of plot progression where characters find themselves caught between cruel masters and truly evil foes ... we have a lot of cliche-ish options here ... but I encourage everyone to get comfortable with the idea of tropes and cliches ... we're talking superheroes here :P

But we could just as easily be a bunch of Inhumans living in secret who are drawn into a situation wherein their powers are revealed accidentally, play the 'we just want to live' angle. It's darker, grittier, more street-level, but it offers a lot of space to explore the characters' motivations and psychology.

Inhumans living in a supervised co-op facility who decide to form an illegal crime-fighting team and work together to protect one another from consequence while feeling out how to be superheroes and learning to cope with unexpected consequences ... that could be fun :P
 
Also, as for the plot, my initial intention was to rely on the idea of characters who have been incarcerated for a variety of reasons related to powers being offered a chance at freedom by 'volunteering' for a crime-fighting program in an attempt to counter the rise of super-crime.

Alrighty, so a scene popped in my head that I think would make for a good character foundation.

"So, do you know why you're here?"

"Sure." The inhuman shifted in their seat, the folding chair's cheap steel groaning in agony underneath as oversized chains rattled across the interrogation table. "I'm here because you people make a bunch of stupid fucking laws that allowed me to take the fall because some other idiot was scared and stupid."

"You were involved in a shooting."

"No, fuck you. I was shot at. I was shot at for doing my grocery shopping while inhuman."

"A woman died."

"A woman three aisles over died because some asshole decided to stand his ground and shoot me for threateningly holding my hands in the air and asking him to calm down. It wasn't even a ricochet. The jackass missed with 8 of his 14 shots, yet I'm the one in chains like a fucking animal. I'd been the good boy. I'd registered, I didn't fuss when I lost my job. I've never once raised a hand toward anyone since becoming this thing. And even that isn't good enough. I played by the rules and it didn't mean shit because some asshole in a Make America Human Again ball cap decided I needed to die before I killed someone with a cantaloupe. So forgive me for being grumpy."

"Sir, I'm going to need you to calm down."

"I'm going to need you to kiss my ass. I am calm. I could shred these chains like tissue paper and walk through the walls to get out of this place and there's not a thing in this state that could stop me. But despite that, I'm sitting here, still a good boy, listening to you patronize me with stupid questions. So maybe you and all the ignorant fucks like you should be the ones calming down."
 
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