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When GUN had assigned Rouge's team to retrieve a 'powerful object with mysterious properties' from a cave, she knew there'd be a catch. She should've known the catch was Eggman-shaped.
"Omega, to your left!" she cried out as she caught sight of more glowing red pairs of eyes approaching. Omega swiveled around without question and let another barrage of gunfire loose.
With his attention on one part of the fork in the road, that left the way they came undefended—at least until Shadow took his place. He might not carry the same amount of ammunition with him as Omega did, but he treated the badniks no less viciously. Rouge joined him, spinning and darting and kicking in tandem with his attacks. Her bombs could've made short work of their enemies, but her bombs would also make this whole place collapse if she wasn't careful. No matter, this horde of common badniks was no match for their combined power—it wouldn't even have been a match for just one of them.
"INFERIOR ROBOTS ELIMINATED," Omega called out just as Rouge's heel smashed the face of the final badnik.
Shadow huffed next to her. "You'd think he would send something with more firepower."
"Don't jinx it," she shot back as she headed for the pathway that hadn't been swarming with enemies just moments ago.
Shadow had a point, though. If Eggman had expected anyone else to show up, he definitely would've sent more than just run of the mill crabmeats and motobugs and whatever else she'd just punched to pieces. Either that, or they were just here to stall her team. All the more reason to hurry and get this over with. (In truth, Rouge just hoped they were done here before the last grocery stores closed.)
When the tunnel finally opened into a bigger room, Rouge almost stopped in her tracks. In the middle of it, on a platform made of naturally formed rock, sat a giant gemstone. The dark green on its edges mixed perfectly with the lighter pink in its core as its colors were illuminated from deep within, throwing the whole cavern into dim light.
Tourmaline—elbaite, if she had to be precise—she'd bet. Perfect for her ever-growing collection of gems that nobody could ever reliably trace back to her.
Of course GUN had been vague about it. If they'd mentioned anything about a gem, Rouge would've come up with a plan to have it mysteriously disappear during their mission before the briefing was even over. Well, looked like she'd just have to let GUN have their fun with it first. It had been a while since her last proper heist, after all. She could use the challenge.
"Duck!" Shadow called, and Rouge hit the ground moments before gunfire rained into the cavern. She cursed.
Omega retorted with his own arsenal a second later, and stepped between Rouge and the approaching badniks. She got up, cursed again for good measure, and then slammed her heel into the first badnik that made it past Omega. More and more swarmed past him, flooding the cave like a nightmare wave and rapidly closing the distance between them and her gem.
More than ever, Rouge wished they fought under an open sky. She'd be able to blow things up to her heart's content and make proper use of her ability to fly. Instead, she was confined in a cave barely tall enough that Omega could stand at full height.
Whatever, she'd been in worse situations. She wouldn't let something as silly as an unfortunate location get in the way of her latest prize. With renowned vigor, she spun around, successfully forcing most of the badniks back. Shadow held his own on Omega's other side just as well, fighting Eggman's lowly lackeys off with ease. Badniks piled up everywhere—but especially in front of Omega—making it harder and harder for more to push past.
That lull in numbers was just what Rogue had been waiting for. She darted away from her position and towards the gem. A blur appeared right next to her, and if Rouge had been just a little more trigger happy, Shadow would've had to dislodge her heel from his stomach.
They reached the gem at the same time, hands already outstretched. Rouge looked over her shoulder just in time to see something big slam into Omega, sending him flying back right towards—
Rouge's first thought upon consciousness pouring back into her poor head was that at least she wouldn't need to get the number of the truck that had run her over because she already knew where he lived. Her second thought went to the lack of green-pink light illuminating her surroundings, leaving everything an almost black sludge. Her third thought went to the incessant feeling of something probing her brain like the world's most annoying alarm.
She shook her head to get rid of it.
Something was off. Something about her head was horribly, terribly off. Rouge reached up to feel it, praying her hand wouldn't come away bloody. It didn't. It didn't because whatever the hell she'd just touched hadn't been her head.
She needed to stay calm. She needed to stay calm and not panic so she could rip whoever was at fault for this a new one.
She sat up and the motion left her disoriented. Her perspective was all off. She couldn't make out too much, but she could still see where the ground was and her head was definitely too far up for her to just be sitting. For a moment, Rouge didn't comprehend what she saw as she looked down.
It was Omega. She was looking at Omega, except he sat where—
She raised her hand. Her metallic and clawed hand.
The fire alarm in her head got louder.
Rouge scanned the room for her teammates. Out of nowhere, bright red outlines filled her vision and she startled backwards. This was fine. She was fine. This was all—
Her body lay on the ground. Her body lay on the ground and it slowly moved. She barely stopped herself from shooting at it in reflex. There was even a helpful target marker in her vision.
"Omega?" she asked with a familiar voice that shouldn't have been hers. At least it really was his, and not the voice of another robot. At least she'd been able to speak.
Her body squinted her eyes at her. Her body struggled to sit up, and Rouge could see the moment realization dawned on Omega as her eyes grew almost comically wide.
"…Rouge?" her body asked.
"WHY AM I TRAPPED IN SHADOW'S MEATBAG BODY?" Shadow's voice boomed through the cave loud enough to set off another prodding alarm in Rouge's head and make her body cover her ears.
"Stop yelling, you…" her body hissed before cutting herself off.
That had to be Shadow. Omega had possessed Shadow's body, who had in turn possessed her body, while she had somehow been brought into Omega's. She desperately wished for a glass of wine or ten, but not even alcohol could save her now. Especially not while she was in a body that couldn't drink.
That was fine. Being a robot all of a sudden was fine.
"I DEMAND AN ANSWER, ROUGE," Omega continued, angrily pointing Shadow's finger at Rouge's body.
"I'm right here," she told him in a voice that still felt utterly wrong.
"LEAVE MY BODY AT ONCE!" he shot back, and Rouge distantly wondered if she'd heard Shadow scream this much before; his voice really didn't sound like it enjoyed being strained like this.
Without warning, her senses were obscured by various recordings overlaying one another. Countless visuals and audios played simultaneously and Rouge hit her fist against her useless head to stop it. It didn't work.
"STOP!" Omega-as-Shadow shrieked, his voice piercing enough to reach her through the sudden cacophony, "DO NOT DAMAGE MY BODY!"
The sensory overload didn't stop as suddenly as it started, but rather faded away as various clips finished playing. She'd expected a headache to be blooming behind her eyes, but it didn't. That definitely should've been enough to give her one, but Omega seemed to—quite literally—be built different.
"How do you live like this?" she asked, silently praying her brain wouldn't throw another sensory bomb at her.
Before Omega had the chance to reply, Rouge's own voice joined the conversation again: "What happened?"
At least the answer to that had to be fairly obvious. "The gemstone," Rouge supplied in Omega's mechanical voice.
Her two teammates stared at her.
"What?" she asked, "Chaos Emeralds, Warp Topaz, Phantom Ruby, the list goes on. What's one more magical gem?"
One more magical gem that had placed her in Omega's body.
At least that answered the question about robot sapience, she thought a little hysterically.
"It's gone," Shadow stated, making her voice sound strangely distant, "Eggman has it now."
"I WILL FIND HIM AND ELIMINATE HIM," Omega said, and if he hadn't been in a different body Rouge was fairly sure he would've up and marched away.
"We should just go back to GUN for now," Rouge said and hated every word of it, "the badniks are long gone and we have no idea to which base they went."
Shadow's body scowled at her, and if he hadn't been screaming until now she wouldn't have been able to tell anything was wrong. Her body, meanwhile, stood up on shaky legs. Shadow threw out her arms for balance and Rouge really hoped he wouldn't fall over.
"She's right," Shadow said once he looked somewhat steady.
"Of course I am," Rouge replied, "let's go."
She said, like she didn't still have to get up herself. She got Omega's legs under herself and pushed up. It went smoothly. At least whatever Shadow had struggled with, she didn't seem to have the same problem. Still, her new perspective threw her off just a little. Rouge was no stranger to seeing the world from higher up, but that didn't make seeing everything from up here while standing any less disorienting. Omega had always been tall in her mind, but she hadn't realized how different his perspective truly was.
Omega in Shadow's body had gotten up and now looked around as well, seemingly coming to the flip-side of her realization.
The tunnel they'd come from didn't seem to have collapsed, thankfully, so Rouge headed back down that way. Omega followed her easily enough, but Shadow still seemed… unsteady. She slowed down to let him catch up with them. Logically, she knew that with Omega's body, she'd be faster than before—Omega always had been even when he didn't mean to just because his steps were bigger—but even accounting for that Shadow moved slower than usual.
When he placed one of her hands on the cave wall to steady himself, Rouge made a decision. She let him catch up to her at the front, then fixed Omega's best stare on him and asked: "You okay?"
"Yes," came the expectedly short answer. Shadow didn't like to be asked that, and normally Rouge respected that enough to at least wait until no one else was around, but if her body had gotten a concussion, she'd very much like to know about it as soon as possible.
"You sure?" she prodded, leveling her gaze at the hand he used to keep himself upright, "no dizziness or anything?"
He sighed, almost managing to sound as tormented as she sometimes liked to act when she was fed up with something. His eyes traveled to the ground and he said, dramatically: "Your heels are killing me."
An aborted sound of noise escaped from Omega's voicebox as Rouge bit back a relieved laugh. "Don't break my ankles, okay?"
"I'm trying," he leveled a glare at her.
Rouge supposed she could show him a bit of mercy. "I've got other shoes at our place," she told him.
"Great," he shot back, "just need to get there first."
By the time they made it back to the GUN headquarters—the sun was just beginning to set, so maybe Rouge could still get that grocery run done—they'd decided to keep the side effects of this particular gemstone hidden, at least for now. GUN would jump on the chance to further prod Shadow and Omega under the guise of observing the way the gem had affected them, and none of them were all too keen on that.
Rouge was fairly sure she could pull off a decent enough Omega impression. She was also dead certain that Omega could not pull off a Shadow impression. She'd always assumed his volume had just been built in like that, but she had no problems making his body 'speak' with an indoor voice while so far their new 'Shadow' had been yelling his every word.
Shadow's impression of her would be passable, she hoped.
He marched in front of them now, ready to storm into whatever meeting they were supposed to debrief in, and all Rouge could do was silently pray that he'd be able to keep his stride up until he found a chair to hold onto. He barged into the room like he ran the place. So far, so good.
Someone was already waiting for them, and if Omega's visuals would stop shoving random things at her for two seconds, Rouge might even be able to tell who it was. All she could make out was a human-shaped silhouette and-
Oh. The sensory noise that she'd been trying to ignore actually supplied her with information. Her brain—somewhat helpfully—opened a file about the guy she was looking at. It contained some basic information and various clips that Omega must've saved. Most were of that guy embarrassing himself in some way.
She focused back on her visual input and was greeted with some additional information. Apparently the guy had an elevated heartbeat.
"We failed," Shadow stated, trying and failing to sound like he wasn't already fed up with this conversation.
"Straight to the point for once, Rouge," the guy replied and Rouge didn't even need to be a robot at the moment to see their chance of getting out undetected dwindle towards zero.
"There were explosions," she quickly interjected, "many explosions. Too many for silly little meatbags to handle."
Something about that earned her a glare from Omega, but that only made it more believable.
"Yes," Shadow agreed, thankfully picking up on her flailing attempt to save their butts, "I have a horrible headache."
The debriefing continued like that. Shadow acted like her in a way that even the most generous person could only grade with a d minus, she tried to sound as into explosions as possible and Omega's frown deepened with each new sentence she said. At least that guy didn't seem to catch on to any potential weirdness.
They left the building soon enough, and Rouge couldn't remember the last time she'd been this relieved to be away from GUN's watching eye.
"I DO NOT SOUND LIKE THAT," Omega accused her once they were further away.
Rouge could stand here and argue with her teammates, or she could get going and buy groceries so they wouldn't have to live off takeout for the weekend again.
"And I don't sound like whatever Shadow was doing, but we still made it out," she retorted, "Come on, we've got one more stop."
Her team obviously wasn't happy about that, but they still followed her like obedient little ducklings waddling after the big bad killer robot. She still wasn't quite over how much smaller everyone looked from Omega's perspective.
It was only once they reached the nearest grocery store that Rouge realized she technically didn't need to worry about food right now. She just needed to find Omega's charger and plug herself in. Still, her body needed nutrients no matter what, and Shadow didn't need to eat nearly as much as she did—something about being the ultimate lifeform and running on Chaos Energy—so she knew he would forget about it.
At least Shadow was actually decent at cooking, though she didn't dare count on that right now, with him being in a different body and all. The change for him might be smaller than for her and Omega, but she still wasn't sure how well his hand-eye coordination would hold up. Best to just get some pasta, bread and various things to put on those.
In the pasta aisle, Rouge realized something that really should've been obvious. Omega was strong. Strong enough that she pierced the plastic packaging of the pasta she'd picked up and crunched most of it together. She cast a quick glance around, then put the damaged packaging back.
The only person to have noticed her thankfully seemed to be Shadow. He took pity on her and wordlessly picked up a different package and tossed it into their basket.
Dutifully, he did the same thing with their bread, except that a very familiar figure slid up to them before he could put it down.
"Heya Rouge," Sonic greeted her body, "Fancy meeting you here."
Shadow's grip on the bread tightened, turning a perfectly serviceable loaf of bread into a squished mess. "Leave," he threatened, Rouge's voice dropping lower than she'd let it in ages.
Sonic eyes widened in surprise and Rouge would've enjoyed seeing him get caught off-guard if Shadow wasn't presently ruining her reputation. His expression shifted to something more like amazed curiosity quickly enough, and he asked: "Shadow?"
The glare he received was answer enough, and a grin spread across his face. Rouge wasn't surprised in the slightest. Sonic had a ton of people fooled with his carefree, happy-go-lucky attitude, but Rouge knew his mind was sharp. Knowing him, he was already running through all the possible ways this could've happened.
"Yeah," she said and would've given him a sheepish grin if Omega had a mouth, "we've got a bit of a situation going on."
"No kidding," he replied, looking elated at their predicament, "so our good pal Shadow here is actually Omega, I assume?"
"CORRECT," Omega helpfully confirmed, loud enough that Sonic winced at the sudden volume.
He snapped back to an expression that Shadow had once referred to as punchable a moment later. "Let me guess," he said in a voice that meant he wasn't doing a whole lot of guessing, but rather a whole lot of confirming, "messed with something you shouldn't have?"
There he was. He definitely knew more than he was telling them.
"Yes," Shadow confirmed because he was no fun, "now leave."
Sonic sighed dramatically, and turned away. "Guess I won't ask Tails if he knows anything about reversing this," he sighed.
Rouge wasn't in the habit of betting unless she knew the outcome, but even she would bet that Sonic had been after the gemstone just as GUN and Eggman had been. She needed to do something about that as soon as this fiasco was over, she couldn't be the last one to learn about a new gem entering the playing field.
For now, all she could do was concede.
"Actually," she said, knowing fully well that if Sonic had wanted to leave he would've done so by now, "I'm sure asking him wouldn't hurt."
He turned back to face her, pretending to think it over. "Oh, but I dunno, he's awfully busy at the moment."
Awfully busy constructing some gizmo that would have the gem at its center, maybe.
"I'm sure he'd still be happy to help some friends out a bit," she replied, "He's kind like that, isn't he?"
Sonic gave her a grin, one that seemed genuine this time. "I'll give him a call, see what he can do," he said and turned around for real, "See ya!"
With that, he left as suddenly as he appeared. Shadow glared after him.
"You seemed even less thrilled to see him than usual," Rouge remarked, half to poke him for fun, half to figure out if something had escaped her notice until now.
He punished her with a glare aimed at her now and gestured at what she could only assume meant 'this whole situation'.
She did her best to roll what passed as Omega's eyes and continued down the aisle. It was like just after they met all over again. In the time since then, Shadow had warmed up to her a lot, dropping the 'I'm angry and I hate you' act that he only put on to protect himself around her more and more. Now, his walls were raised as high as they'd ever been.
Then again, she was stressed about this whole mess too. She wouldn't have asked Sonic of all people for help so plainly otherwise. When all this was over and Shadow still acted all spiky and guarded she'd call him out on it, but for now she'd just leave it be.
Hearing their apartment door click shut behind them brought Rouge relief so immediate that she sat down. They always turned a few heads when out and about—plenty of people knew of the ultimate lifeform and Team Dark as a whole, and those who didn't still noticed the giant robot hulking through the streets—but today it felt much worse. She doubted strangers that didn't actually know any of them would be able to tell anything was wrong, and even if they could it wouldn't even matter, but Rouge had still felt more watched than in a long time.
Rouge wouldn't just wait around until Sonic called—knowing her luck, that could take days—but they'd all need at least a little break before jumping back into the next misadventure, even if that just included searching the Eggnet and various GUN databases for any clues to the new whereabouts of that gem.
Another look at her teammates confirmed that they desperately needed some time off. Omega had been tense the whole way here, but even now he didn't relax an inch. She's chalked it up to the whole switch, then the presence of GUN and then the presence of civilians, but even in their home he still seemed on edge.
Shadow currently struggled his way out of her boots, not looking much better. Once he got out, he tossed the boots to the side, and any other day Rouge would've reprimanded him for treating her things like that. Today, she let it pass. When he went to sit on the couch, however, she spoke up: "Do yourself a favor and change, okay?"
He turned back to look at her, confusion written all over her face. "What?" he asked, narrowing his eyes.
"I know that suit, and I also know there's more comfortable clothes in my room," Rouge told him with endless patience.
He still hesitated. "And you are sure you're-"
"Shadow," she interrupted him, "Get into something comfortable and stop torturing yourself."
For a moment, Rouge thought he'd protest, but with a long-suffering sigh he turned and left for his room, before remembering and turning towards hers instead.
Meanwhile, Omega had found his way towards the couch and sat down, holding one of their pillows and staring at it with marvel written all over Shadow's usually so unexpressive face. Rouge pushed off the ground and joined him, sitting down next to the couch like he often did.
Omega cast a quick glance towards her, then turned his attention back to the pillow.
"THIS IS UNUSUAL," he told her, and if he hadn't screamed the words she would've said he'd told her in secrecy.
She'd noticed it too. The way Omega experienced the world couldn't be more different from what she'd known until a few hours ago. She'd taken the ability to feel things for granted, and now she found herself sorely lacking. It shouldn't have surprised her that Omega had been built without any sensors for touch, but she still hadn't expected it. Her perception of the world felt off-kilter, and evidently it was much the same for Omega.
"Sense of touch is pretty neat, huh?" she told him, and wondered what it had to be like to feel something as soft as a pillow for the first time in your life.
"IT IS UNUSUAL," Omega repeated, hands still clutching the pillow tightly, "THIS IS A LOT OF INPUT."
"Yeah, no kidding," she agreed, distantly remembering those files that had overwhelmed her at first. They might be useful, but she'd found this way of perceiving the world lacking. It didn't feel right. And Omega was stuck like this all the time. He was stuck perceiving only a fraction of life. Maybe that was a little dramatic, but he still lacked senses she'd taken for granted. He'd never even tasted anything before.
That could be changed.
"Is there any sort of food you wanna try while you've got the chance?" She asked, "We didn't buy anything special, but-"
"NO," he interrupted her.
Rouge stopped, surprised. "What?"
"I DO NOT WANT TO CONSUME FOOD," was his simple answer.
"Seriously?" Rouge found that hard to believe, "This will probably be your only chance to-"
"YES," he cut her off again, "I DO NOT CARE FOR YOUR SUPERFLUOUS SENSATIONS."
Rouge definitely would've tried as many things as possible, but it was his loss, not hers. Shadow would be fine without food for a while, so she didn't push. "Suit yourself," she told him.
"I WILL," came his reply.
He turned to look at her again, then went back to staring at the pillow—or rather, his hands, now that she paid closer attention. "MODULATING SHADOW'S STRENGTH IS STRANGE," he offered, "I AM NOT USED TO RECEIVING SENSORY INPUT."
"And I'm not used to not having that," she continued, remembering how easily the pasta had given way.
All this time, she'd assumed Omega was simply careless whenever he broke the TV remote or pierced another pillow. She'd been wrong about that. A few broken items here and there weren't a sign of carelessness, at least not for him, but rather a sign of his care. If he truly hadn't cared about damaging things, they'd be replacing something daily and not weekly. She'd never even paid attention to how many things he touched that stayed intact, only to the ones that broke. And she'd held every single one over him like a crime.
"I shouldn't have been so hard on you for breaking things," she told him as she stared elsewhere, despite knowing her expression wouldn't be readable anyway, "I had no idea how difficult this is."
He stayed silent. When they talked and he didn't reply, the silence was usually filled by his fans straining under the sudden effort it took to keep his systems cool. Now, the silence was just filled by slow breathing. "I DO NOT WISH TO DAMAGE OUR PROPERTY," he said eventually.
"I know that," she agreed, "I just didn't realize how hard it is for you."
This time, he really didn't reply anything, but Rouge really didn't mind. She wasn't one for heavy conversations, especially not when she wasn't even in her own damn body.
Speaking of, Shadow chose that moment to reappear in the living room and Rouge stared at him.
She'd expected him to choose pants.
After everything that happened today, that thought almost made her crack up, and she was so unbelievably glad to be in Omega's expressionless body all of a sudden. Rouge knew where she kept which clothes, so she knew that the long, dark grey skirt Shadow had picked was at the very bottom of her drawer. He'd rummaged past various pairs of sweatpants to get to it. He'd made an active choice to wear it. She liked antagonizing her teammates, but if she'd laughed or looked at him funny, he wouldn't take it well.
He looked quite good, actually. The dark skirt went well with the lighter knitted sweater he'd picked, even if Rouge personally wouldn't have paired those two shades of grey together. Shadow didn't really strike her as someone who'd enjoy wearing bright pinks or purples, though.
"Good choice," she told him, and he gave a curt nod before joining Omega on the couch.
"So, what's the plan?" he asked, wiggling a little to get more comfortable.
If it wouldn't have likely ended with a destroyed floor, Rouge would've let herself dramatically fall backwards. "Great question," she told him instead.
None of their options looked great. They could wait for Sonic to get back to them, but who knew how long that would take. They could also wait for GUN to get back to them—they might've failed, but they were still the team most suited to the task of retrieving the gemstone from Eggman—but if they went through GUN, planning for the infiltration would take days, at least. Likely longer.
Her access to GUN's servers had recently been cut off during some scheduled security update, and while she'd be able to get in again, that would also take a while. The Eggnet was the other place to look, but usually Omega took on that task. Rouge didn't have the fainted clue has to how he did it, let alone how to replicate his steps. Even with him guiding her—which would already be a hassle—she didn't want to risk tripping any alarms. Omega would be able to deal with that on the fly, but she most certainly wouldn't.
"We wait," she settled on.
"That's it?" Shadow asked, surprised. His brow furrowed as he thought through the possible scenarios himself, until he reached something like resigned acceptance. "Great."
"Let's just try to do what we usually would," Rouge tried, as if her 'usual' didn't include an involved self-care routine. Omega wouldn't even fit in their bathtub. Even worse than that, her 'usual' included regular injections. Rouge didn't have any problems jabbing herself with a needle once per week to get some more estrogen into her body, but she'd doubted that would be the case for Shadow too.
He couldn't stand anything even remotely medical and unless she'd seriously missed something, he'd also never given himself an injection before. Omega lacked the knowledge to help with it too—the only thing he ever administered to others were bullets right through the chassis—and trapped in Omega's body, Rouge wouldn't be of any help either.
She really hoped this whole situation would get solved before they had to figure out a solution to this.
With nothing else to do to kill time, they'd decided on watching TV. After their usual squabble over what to watch—Rouge won this round by legitimate means and not by guilt tripping Shadow after he'd made popcorn that only he would be able to enjoy—they settled down quickly enough.
Omega's identification and information overlay thing mercifully stayed mostly quiet. Mostly. It triggered at the appearance of a few actors who'd been marked with flags that either related to her or Shadow. How she knew that, she had no idea and she definitely wouldn't ask Omega about what she assumed to be quite private. Still, knowing that he'd marked actresses that also appeared in her favorite movies was surprisingly touching.
Her thoughts were interrupted by her phone ringing, and Rouge automatically tried to reach for it before remembering she didn't actually have it on her person at the moment. Shadow fished it out the pocket of his pants instead, glared at the caller ID, and picked up.
"Hi Rouge," Sonic's voice whispered, and Shadow quickly put him on speaker, "So, I've got good news, bad news, and good news again."
"Shoot," Rouge demanded, desperate to do something that wasn't just sitting around and waiting.
"Good news: Tails is pretty sure he can get your little team back to normal. Bad news: he's gonna need the gemstone for it," Rouge had expected as much, but she still didn't like hearing that, "But good news! We already located it for ya."
And bad news, knowing them, they'd like to keep it afterwards. In any other situation, Rouge would've at least thought about a way to keep the gemstone to herself, but even more than another addition to her collection, she wanted her body back. If the trade-off would be losing a pretty gem to Sonic, she'd take it. She wouldn't like it, but she'd take it.
"Sounds great," she told him, thankful that Omega's voice made it impossible to tell that she felt like she just bit into a lemon.
"Sweet, I'll send you the coordinates," Sonic's cheery voice told her and hung up. A moment later, her phone buzzed with an incoming message and Shadow got up.
"Let's go," he gestured for them to follow as he headed towards the door.
For a moment, Rouge considered telling him to stop. She might not have worn those clothes in ages, but she still didn't want them to potentially get damaged during what would surely turn into another fight. She wore the same outfit to most of their missions for the simple reason that she ultimately didn't care if it got damaged or not because she could easily get another one. Then again, she had urged Shadow to wear something different in the first place and she had no idea how high his tolerance for distractions like that would be today. Better not to risk him getting all agitated with her when their solution to this was within reach.
She followed him, and Omega didn't wait around either.
Even stuck in each other's bodies, Team Dark moved fast. It didn't take long for them to come within reach of the secret base Sonic had so helpfully marked for them on a map. It didn't look particularly well-guarded, and even if it did, they'd broken into places with much higher security.
Some other time, a stealthy approach might've been the better choice, but Rouge could feel the impatience in the air and knew that infiltration would turn into an all-out assault quickly enough. Might as well cut round it.
"I say we rush in, grab the gemstone and disappear before they know what hit 'em," Rouge suggested to quick approval from her team.
"I WILL ELIMINATE ANYTHING STANDING IN OUR WAY," Omega proclaimed, and any other day Rouge would've backed him up.
"You can't go in guns blazing this time," she told him, "You'll have to fight like Shadow does just this once."
"And Shadow," she turned to him, "You'll have to fight like me. No teleporting, lots of flying and kicking, and most importantly searching for that gemstone, got it?"
Neither of them looked thrilled about it, and Rouge wasn't either. Omega played an important role in all their missions—namely first, second, and third line of defense—but she doubted she'd be suited to it. Her strengths lay in dashing behind enemy lines and scouting the base for whatever they needed. She didn't doubt that she could do Omega's job, just as she didn't doubt the others could do whatever they needed to today, but they certainly wouldn't be playing their preferred parts in this.
"Let's just get it over with," Shadow said and strode towards the base, Omega and Rouge following closely behind.
It didn't take long for a patrolling Egg-pawn to spot them, but by then it was already too late. Rouge had raised Omega's arms and unleashed a barrage of missiles heading straight for the closest wall, right towards a spot that her visual overlay had helpfully highlighted as the best point to attack.
The familiar sound of an explosion rattled her body as dust rose from where the wall once had stood. She advanced through the hole, arms pointed forwards. Her targeting locked onto enemy movement and she fired, raining down a tsunami of bullets. Behind her, Shadow and Omega joined the fray.
She'd fired guns before. The aptly named GUN issued weapons to virtually every officer, and even she hadn't been an exception. She simply didn't use it a lot, for a variety of reasons. This was different, though. It didn't feel like shooting her gun. It didn't feel like anything she'd ever done before. She plowed through waves of enemies like they were nothing, robotic carcasses falling wherever she wanted. Suddenly, Omega felt powerful in a way she hadn't conceptualized before. Seeing him fight was impressive enough, but knowing how much further he could push if he wanted made her appreciate his strength like never before.
With a quick glance to the side, she confirmed that Shadow held his own too. He didn't look as confident as he usually did, and didn't use any of the moves Rouge would've, but he still took down whatever Egg-pawns made it past her quickly enough. Omega meanwhile had resorted to throwing enemies at one another. That was one way to kill two birds—or rather, badniks—with one stone, Rouge supposed.
They advanced through the rooms easily enough. It wasn't a cake walk and Rouge wouldn't be foolish enough to ever think that of a fight, but at least Eggman didn't seem to have any heavy hitters stationed at this base—then again, she'd also thought that until something had knocked Omega backwards and gotten them into this whole mess to begin with. She wouldn't get lulled into thinking they were safe until they'd grabbed that gemstone and made a run for it.
A warning popped into her senses—not quite visual, not quite audible—and she startled. She ran the risk of overheating her systems if she continued like this, apparently. Omega had complained about this before, but Rouge hadn't really understood his frustration until right now. She didn't quite stop firing, but slowed down enough to give the cooling system the chance to catch up.
She kept a closer look on her teammates, but they still held their own.
They pushed forwards, driving the remaining badniks further and further back even with her reduced fire. Once the warning dissipated, she went back to it full force, but the resistance kept dwindling. They'd taken out most of the forces by now and the remaining badniks could no longer rely on numbers to keep them busy.
Omega liked to finish them with all he had, shooting projectiles and missiles into the remaining forces until all movement ceased. One day this would land them all in a big heap of trouble—reinforcements just needed to arrive at the wrong moment, or Eggman would show up, or a million other things where the extra firepower would've been useful—but so far it hadn't. Still, Rouge wouldn't risk it. She'd just—
Bright red warnings and targets flashed across her vision and shrill alarms drained out any other sound and if Rouge would've needed air, it surely would've gotten stuck in her lungs. She fired off more aimless shots towards the remaining enemies, desperately scanning the room for whatever had—
Shadow, on the ground. No, Omega, in Shadow's body, on the ground.
She suppressed the urge to run over to him and instead stood her ground. Wouldn't help him if the last few badniks overran them because Rouge didn't deal with them quickly enough. With newfound fury, she rained bullets upon them, ignoring whatever warnings her body suddenly threw at her.
Only once the last badnik stopped moving did she turn back to her teammates.
Instead of being by Omega's side, Shadow stood where she'd last seen him, unmoving. Rouge cursed to drive away the frustration and helplessness slowly seeping in. One of the reasons she didn't use her gun was… this. Shadow couldn't stand the sound. Omega's arsenal was different enough not to bother him, but this sort of reaction was exactly why her and Shadow's—and that one really had brought a tough couple of days to get through with it—guns lay in a locked drawer in her desk in some small, rarely-used office at headquarters; as far away as possible from the one place Shadow felt safe at. Anything to avoid another mission where he suddenly froze.
Of course, shooting one of his teammates had the same effect.
"Shadow," she called, and thank Gaia, his head snapped around to look at her—with wide eyes and a chest rising too quickly to mean anything good, but that he could deal with. As long as she didn't have to pull him out of old, half-remembered memories, she could deal with this.
"He's in your body; you've been shot before," she told him, as slow as she could as Omega's systems kept tossing alerts at her, "He'll be just fine."
Omega should've chimed in now. He should've expressed frustration at some badnik getting the better of him, or maybe frustration at being stuck in a body that couldn't even tank one measly little bullet, but he didn't.
He wasn't dead. Whatever panicky system monitored his heart rate and breathing and too many other damn things for her to focus on would've informed her of that. He wasn't dead, because Rouge could still see the rise and fall of his chest. He wasn't dead, because when she crouched down to look at him, all she could see was a spot of wet fur that was already starting to dry, no more blood seeping out of the wound. He wasn't dead because Shadow's body couldn't die.
"Omega," she said, and his pupils flickered towards her.
Rouge should've said something. She should've reassured him, or chewed him out for getting hurt in the first place, or panicked over the injury, or something. Instead she just stared. Omega had never once looked so vulnerable before. He'd never before been so quiet.
"Stay with him," she told Shadow instead. They should be in the clear now, but she wouldn't risk it. "I'll grab that damned gem."
Shadow gave her a nod—he still didn't look great, but at least he seemed present enough to deal with whatever badniks they might've missed earlier—and Rouge got up and left. That horrible gemstone sat in the next room, its pink and green gleam taunting her from behind a class cage. She had half a mind to smash it before remembering that touching the gem had gotten them into this mess in the first place. The glass box sat on a podium, and maybe there was a smarter way of doing this, but Rouge was exhausted and fed up so she simply gripped the podium and ripped it out of the ground.
When she returned to her teammates, Shadow already had Omega slung over his shoulder. He didn't say anything. Rouge didn't say anything either. She raised her free hand, shot a few final missiles towards the wall, and then they marched out of there.
Some part of Rouge would've liked to have headed to their apartment first to regroup, but the larger part of her was done with this, plain and simple. She wanted her body back. She wanted a scalding hot shower and then her bed. The fastest way to get that would be to head to Tails' workshop directly, so that's what they did. Omega didn't have any objections, and Shadow's grunt at her question could be interpreted as literally anything, so she took the liberty of deciding he'd sided with her.
The big garage door to the workshop stood open, so Rouge stepped right up inside, Shadow following closely behind. Sonic was doing something on his phone, but looked up as soon as he heard them approach, and Tails looked up from whatever he was tinkering with too.
That horrible blue menace at least had the decency to look surprised at their state, and attempted to say something before Shadow cut him off.
"Not one word out of your mouth," he hissed. Rouge couldn't remember the last time he'd sounded so pissed. Then again, she doubted she'd sound much better right now.
"Okay, so, uhm," Tails started, eyes flickering between them, "Sorry, but is he alright?"
"We're all just peachy," Shadow spat out as he gently let Omega down. He stayed upright without help, and looked more alert than earlier. Rouge would take that.
"Right," Tails said, clearly doubtful, then clapped his hands, "Right! Swapping you back shouldn't be too hard. Luckily I already know what we're dealing with, we'll just need to…"
Rouge drowned out whatever technobabble followed. If she better understood how to get Omega's body to give her whatever information he'd had stored, she might've been able to follow him, but that whole headache wouldn't be worth it. Tails was a smart kid, and if Omega trusted him enough to let him perform repairs on his body, Rouge would also trust him with this.
Thankfully, it didn't take him too long to walk them through whatever steps he was doing. Soon enough, he had all three of them hooked up to a machine that looked too polished to have been constructed within a few hours. Then, using tongs that better not have been used for their last barbecue, he took the gemstone and placed it into his contraption. With more explanations that went over her head, he flipped a switch and—
Darkness receded from Rouge's vision quicker than last time. She glanced around the workshop, finally at a normal height again. Shadow and Omega stood next to her, looking like they came out of a daze too. Her gaze quickly traveled downward, and sure enough, Rouge was greeted by her very own beautiful, perfect body. Before relief could hit her, exhaustion did just that. Her beautiful, perfect body ached all over and wanted to do nothing more than collapse on the spot.
The next few minutes passed in a blur. Shadow and Omega had evidently been put back into the right bodies too, Sonic talked way too much and coerced her into giving up the gemstone—not that she cared anymore, that piece of trash had caused her more than enough trouble—and Tails cast more and more concerned looks at Omega the longer he kept quiet.
They said their goodbyes soon enough, and finally headed back home.
Rouge had barely shut their door behind her when Shadow already took off towards the bathroom. She wanted to do nothing more than drag him back and claim the bathtub for the next few hours, but she heroically held herself back. Shadow was much quicker than her when it came to bathroom usage. Plus, she just had the usual dust and soreness to wash off, he still had blood crusting up his quills.
While she waited, she might as well shove some food into her mouth.
She turned to head towards the kitchen, but Omega blocked her path. Rouge looked up at him, surprised—and annoyed too. His day had sucked, but so had hers, and she wasn't in the mood for one of their arguments.
"You are no longer— YOU ARE NO LONGER ALLOWED TO JOIN ME ON MISSIONS," Omega told her anyway.
"Excuse me?" She shot back, too tired to hide her appalled shock.
"YOU ARE NO LONGER PERMITTED ON MISSIONS," he oh-so-helpfully repeated himself.
"Do we need to go back to Tails?," she asked, tone maybe more biting than she should've used, "Did you finally knock some load-bearing screw loose?"
"DO NOT DERAIL!" he screeched at her, "YOU CAN NO LONGER GO ON MISSIONS."
She would've loved to know what had suddenly gotten into him. She also would've loved a nice, relaxing bath or at the very least some snack to stop her stomach from twisting, but of course she couldn't get what she wanted.
"I heard you the first ten times," she shot back, "Can't this please wait until tomorrow?"
"NEGATIVE!" he shouted, stomping his foot hard enough that Rouge felt her poor, tired bones shake, "NEGATIVE! NEGATIVE!"
The last damned thing she needed right now was a tamper tantrum from this oversized—
She cut herself off. Omega wasn't the only one about to explode. They'd all been forced through the wringer today. He might be more explosive than her or Shadow, but Rouge still understood where all his sudden irritation came from.
Instead of yelling back like she wanted, Rouge pinched her face—her face, at least she was in her own body again. At least she had that familiarity back. "Why?" she asked.
"YOU ARE A SQUISHY MEATBAG," came his reply.
"So?" she probed again, but he remained quiet. He'd called her variations of 'squishy meatbag' more times than she cared to count, this was useless. Whenever she wasn't fast enough for his tastes. Squishy meatbag. Whenever she didn't do something the way his clearly superior robotic brain wanted. Squishy meatbag. Whenever she got—
"Is this about you— Shadow— whatever— getting shot?"
"AFFIRMATIVE."
She should've known when he'd been so quiet afterwards. During that whole horrible little stunt, countless Egg-pawns had shot at her, and she hadn't felt a thing. Omega had never felt a thing before. Then, suddenly, he got shot and had to deal with all the fun organic stuff like pain and your body being an uncooperative piece of junk. That must've freaked him out big time.
"He's going to be fine, Omega," she told him, her angry subsiding already, "He's probably healed by now."
"I KNOW THAT," he replied, but Rouge wanted to believe he looked relieved anyway, "YOU ARE NOT THE ULTIMATE LIFEFORM."
With anyone else, she would've taken it as an insult. With Omega, she long since learned how to interpret him. He was right. She wasn't the ultimate lifeform. She couldn't get shot and just walk it off like it was nothing because she's been created with a healing factor that would knit her veins back together before she could even say 'blood loss'. If her body had gotten seriously injured instead of Shadow's, that little robbery would've gone even worse than it already had.
"I know," she told him, "Trust me, I know. That's why I'm letting you boys do all the hard work."
He glared at her. "THE DANGER YOU PUT YOURSELF IN EXCEEDS ACCEPTABLE PARAMETERS."
"It didn't before." She'd gone on countless missions with her team. She even had gotten injured before. She'd had a laser sear some of her flesh, she'd gotten a concussion from one of her bombs going off too early, she'd gotten a twisted ankle after being tossed across the room, she'd broken some ribs after taking a nasty punch to the chest, the list went on.
"THE PARAMETERS HAVE CHANGED," he replied, still dead-set on his little power trip.
"How so?" she asked again, resigning herself to playing twenty questions with him until she got him to admit to the root cause of this.
"PAIN IS NO LONGER ACCEPTABLE."
That was quicker than expected.
"Omega, it's fine. I've—"
"IT IS NOT FINE!" he interrupted her, fruitlessly gesturing around. "YOU ARE NO LONGER PERMITTED TO JOIN MISSIONS."
"I'm not going to stop joining my team on missio-"
"NEGATIVE!"
"You need me out there. We're a team. You can't-"
"NEGATIVE!"
"Omega!" she screamed back, "I'm the leader of this team. This is my call. I'm not staying home."
That should've been it. She'd said it with the same air of finality that ended all their arguments. And yet, she knew Omega well enough to understand that his silence wasn't just him sulking. It was him calculating how best to express his anger.
"YOU ARE NO LONGER PERMITTED TO—"
"No!" she cut him off. He'd repeated himself more than enough times. "I am—"
"YOU ARE NO LONGER PERMITTED TO RECEIVE INJURIES OR EXPERIENCE AVOIDABLE PAIN. YOU ARE NO LONGER PERMITTED TO JOIN MISSIONS."
He was worried about her. Her scalding words died within her throat. Omega wanted her to stay out of the line of danger because he was worried. If she had to guess, he hadn't understood pain as anything other than an unpleasant sensation, like an overheating processor or a sudden warning. And then she went and let him get shot. No wonder he'd turned so uncharacteristically quiet.
She sighed, long and deep and in a way that evaporated her building anger. "Getting injured is a risk I'm willing to take," she told him, much calmer than she'd been moments ago, "I've been aware of what it means since day one."
"INJURY IS NOT PERMITTED," Omega insisted, "YOUR RECOVERY IS SLOW AND TEDIOUS."
"Them's the breaks," she shrugged, "That's why I'm trying really hard not to get shot at."
"UNACCEPTABLE."
Putting her life on the line was nothing new to her. No risks, no rewards, as everyone always said. Even long before Team Dark had formed this had been her life. Risking her skin for heists nobody else dared to commit. She liked the thrill, the danger, the impossible odds she beat yet again and again. It was her life. It was all she'd ever known.
"I won't stop," she told him, already knowing this wouldn't get her anywhere. Once Omega had decided on something, he'd stick with it.
Omega stared at her, and she got the feeling that were she anyone else, he wouldn't still be having this argument. If he told other people his opinion at all, he wouldn't repeat himself, that was a blessing and a curse reserved for his teammates only. "YOU ARE A VALUABLE RESOURCE TO MY MISSION. YOU ARE ALSO AN UNPROTECTED MEATBAG AND EASY TO DAMAGE. YOU CANNOT BE ALLOWED NEAR DANGER ANY LONGER."
"…And if I wasn't unprotected?" she asked after a moment.
"ELABORATE."
"Armor," she simply stated. The suit she usually wore already offered more protection than normal clothes, but she'd refused to go further than that until now. She had an image to uphold, after all.
Omega visibly relaxed at that—a strange thing, and not something most people would notice. He might not have the classic sort of tension that could bleed out of his posture, but where before he'd leaned forward, looking ready to shoot the first thing that moved he now stepped back ever so slightly, lowering his arms.
"GUN ARMOR IS INADEQUATE," he said and if he shot down this idea entirely Rouge would actually just up and leave and find someone's couch to sleep on for the night, "BUT WE CAN EXPLORE OTHER AVENUES."
"Great," she stretched her sore arms above her head, wings flexing in tandem, "let's talk more about it tomorrow, alright?"
Omega really did have a point, after all. Risking her life was all fun and games, but if getting just that little bit of extra protection would stop her teammates from worrying this much, she'd take it.
"I WILL CONTACT TAILS IMMEDIATELY, BUT YOU CAN REST FOR NOW," he told her and—before she could protest the involvement of Sonic's little sidekick—headed to his room. She'd deal with that tomorrow. For now, she just wanted to finally get all this grime off her and then relax with some mediocre microwaved food until exhaustion pulled her under.
When she got to the bathroom, however, her other roommate had decided to sabotage her plans as well. The door was still closed, even though Shadow had been given more than enough time to shower by her little argument with Omega. That wasn't his usual style. Shadow liked his hygiene—maybe even more than Rouge did—but he didn't make an elaborate ritual out of it like what she so often did. His showers were usually done before the microwave had warmed up her food.
Because Rouge was a kind and considerate person, she knocked on the door instead of just barging in—even if her knocking didn't exactly sound friendly.
Shadow didn't reply.
Deep in her heart, Rouge knew that he hadn't just simply closed the door behind him as he left, but plausible deniability were two of her favorite words, so she pushed the handle down and the door inwards.
From his position on the floor, back against the bathtub and legs pressed against his chest, Shadow glared at her. His dark, beautiful eyes were filled with a sort of rage she hadn't seen since he'd been out for revenge for his murdered sister. "Leave," he hissed at her, sounding just like the dangerous weapon GUN liked to paint him as.
Rouge crossed her arms and leaned against the doorframe. "I'm not doing this again," she told him, unfazed by the danger signals he put up to protect himself.
"What?" Came his surprised answer, but Rouge continued before he could start arguing.
"We're skipping all the acts this time," she said, "You're going to tell me what's wrong, and then we can all go to sleep."
"That's your biggest concern?" he asked, appalled, and Rouge simply gave him an unimpressed stare.
"Fine, you want to know what's wrong?" he spat at her, mirroring her glare with something more venomous. He pushed himself off the ground, using the bathtub as a crutch to get up to full height, and if Rouge had been anyone else she would've feared an attack right about now. No matter that his injury clearly wasn't entirely healed yet, Shadow looked ready to go.
She'd pushed too far.
"What's wrong is that I—" he stumbled over his growled words, "I liked your body better."
His body went slack like that final word had cut his strings and Shadow sank down on the edge of the bathtub. His head nodded forwards and he stared at the ground, all the fight bleeding out of him like he'd been shot all over again.
Rouge could kick herself in the no longer present balls for this. She of all people should've put two and two together. Too late for that now, though, so she did the next best thing to salvage this situation and sat down next to him, not quite touching. His head tilted towards her momentarily, but that was all the acknowledgement Shadow gave her.
She'd thought plenty of times about what she'd tell her younger self, but none of those imagined conversations had ever involved this topic. She didn't know if there were any magical words that would've helped her back then; repression was one hell of a drug. For the first time since this all went down, she genuinely didn't know what to say.
"It's alright," she tried anyway.
Shadow huffed a bitter laugh. "Yeah, right."
"I get it," that got his attention alright and he lifted his head to look at her again, "Not with Omega, that was dreadful, but with my own body. I didn't realize how many things I disliked until they suddenly changed."
The desperate hope she'd seen a moment ago changed to a disappointed confusion. "Changed?"
"I wasn't born a woman," she said slowly, picking her words carefully enough that he wouldn't think she meant puberty, "I made myself one."
His looked her up and down. Her curves, her chest, all the mundane aspects she no longer paid close attention to that he likely had never allowed himself to think about wanting before. "That's possible?" he asked, surprised in a way that made it impossible to tell he'd been boiling over with emotions just moments before.
"Welcome to the future," she gave him a grin and he actually rolled his eyes at her.
He turned away again, looking at his own body now—his pristine body with no specks of blood. So he had managed to shower in and drown in dysphoria in what little time she'd given him.
"I don't know," he confessed to the white tiles below their feet, "It still didn't feel right. I just felt…"
"Great and awful at the same time?" Rouge offered.
"Exactly," he replied.
"You're figuring things out," just as Rouge was figuring out how to have this conversation, "That's going to take a while."
"I don't…" he trailed off again. When he continued, he spoke much quieter, "Some days I barely feel like a person at all. I don't know how to do this."
"You take it one small step at a time," she nudged his hand with her own, "I reached the point where I'm happy, and you'll do too."
He didn't pull away. Rouge counted that as a win.
"And if it doesn't work?" He hunched in on himself, "If what worked for you won't work for me?"
"Then that's okay. If you're a man"—he grimaced at that word—"or a woman, or somewhere in-between or outside of that, it's fine. I don't want you to be like me," Rouge liked being unique, she didn't need her friend to turn into a doppelgänger of her, "I want you to be like you. Whatever that means for you."
He didn't reply immediately.
This certainly wasn't how Rouge had imagined this evening to go, but she wouldn't complain about it. She'd noticed Shadow's discomfort with certain forms of address and comments before, but she hadn't thought about it further, hadn't thought about how she'd felt much the same back when she'd been younger. She didn't have anyone, back then. She'd be there for Shadow now, she swore that to herself.
"How would I even start?" he asked eventually, and Rouge had to bite back a sudden wave of emotion.
Everyone started differently. No two journeys were the same. That wasn't quite the right question though, was it? Rouge glanced at herself, at the clothes Shadow had picked out without anyone watching over him from the endlessness of her wardrobe. Skirt, tights, and knitted sweater.
Rouge got out of the sweater—still sporting a top underneath—and handed it over. Shadow looked at her confused.
"You already started, now you just need to continue," she wouldn't force him down the same path she'd walked, especially not when he'd already found his own without realizing at first.
He glanced at her, then at the fabric he now held, gently feeling the wool beneath his fingers. Rouge caught sight of something else too, a darkened stain that must've appeared when Shadow had carried Omega.
"…We should probably wash it first," she nodded towards Shadow's new sweater.
He huffed at the sudden tonal shift, smile appearing on his face and driving away the last remnants of his earlier pain. "We probably should."
With that, he got up. Rouge could still see the tension in his body, the way he favored his uninjured side, but he seemed lighter now. Like he'd been weight down by doubt and uncertainty that she'd managed to extinguish. Still, he hesitated, glancing between her and the sweater again. "Is this really alright?"
He wasn't just talking about taking her sweater, was he? "It's your life, you should live it in an identity that feels right."
She got a nod out of him, at least, but he still looked unsure.
"This is happening at your pace," she tried again, taking a stab in the dark at what still worried him, "I won't tell anyone else."
His shoulders sagged and the final furrow in his brow finally vanished. Bull's eye. Rouge still knew how to read him like nobody else could—maybe helped a little by the fact that she'd been plagued by the same worry about how others would react until she'd finally managed to cast it away.
He gave her a thankful nod and left the bathroom, the door gently falling shut behind him.
When Rouge left the room after a long overdue bath that finally managed to wash away all the stress of the past day, the scent of her favorite food filled the air. Living alone might've been the easier choice, but even between misadventures and arguments, she'd take Omega's hidden concern and Shadow's quiet vulnerability over solitude any day.