*voiceover*
"In the social justice system, the people are represented by two separate but equally important groups. The Proctors who investigate ill manners and the District Professors who correct those who are rude. These are their stories."
*DUN, DUN*
The heavy-set woman exited the Starbucks, an orange mocha frappucino in one hand, a jelly donut in the other. She walked down the street, eating the donut and waiting for her coffee to cool down. A crowd of young people came out of a bar further up, and started walking towards her. They were laughing and not paying attention.
The heavy-set woman tried to walk to one side, but the group filled the width of the sidewalk. It looked like she might make it through, but at the last minute, one of the youths, an attractive girl of no more than 21, bumped into the heavy-set woman, causing the coffee to spill down the front of her blouse.
The laughter stopped at once, as did the heavy-set woman, and all eyes turned to the attractive young girl. The Jiminies all swirled about, forming a rough circle around both women, two feet above them. A frown flitted across the young woman's face, but was changed to a smile almost instantly. She said in a sweet voice, "I am sooo sorry! Totally my fault! Can I give you something for the dry cleaning?"
The heavy-set woman seemed somehow disconcerted, as if some tone had been detected that didn't seem quite as sincere as could have been hoped. Even a couple in the young woman's group looked at her sharply, as if wondering if she was really sorry.
The heavy-set woman said simply, "It's okay, it was an accident, thank you for the offer." And started to move on. But then as the group turned away, the young woman muttered to her friends, in a poor attempt at a stage whisper, "Thank heavens, that bill would have broke my budget!"
Instantly the young woman's Jiminy pulsed red blue, red blue, as did the Jiminies of two in the group who had started to chuckle, but stopped at the lights and sirens of their own Jiminies. Instantly the heavy-set woman's Jiminy and the remainder of the Jiminies also pulsed red blue, red blue, while each said in unison, "Remain in place, remain in place."
The young woman, named Madison, started to speak, but at once everyone shushed her. The heavy-set woman was quietly crying, and some of the young woman's friends were going up to her to give her pats on the back and murmured apologies.
Soon enough two men on electric bikes glided to a stop in front of the group, each wearing the blue kilt and blouse of the Proctors. Lenny, a 20 year veteran of the force looked through each person there, and you could almost see him figuring out the situation before he could get any official report.
Rey, his junior by some years, was at once cocking his head to the side, listening as his own Jiminy, who had been updated on arrival, privately related the incident and it's own evaluation to him. Open and shut, sounded like. Still, was anything ever open and shut in the city's elite Passive-Aggression Department?
By now, Lenny had also been briefed, and at Rey's inquiring look quipped, "Guess she should have had the vanilla skinny chai!"
*cue theme music*
Into the general hubbub that marked the usual sound level of New York City's Passive-Aggression Department walked Lenny and Rey. A phone rang in the background, no doubt one of the five or six calls a day that came in from those who didn't trust the judgment of their Jiminies, who had there been anything real to call in about, would have already summoned the Proctors.
Between them was Madison, looking nervous and scared as they escorted her to the Interview Room. Sitting her down, her first words were, "I know my rights, I want a Therapist!" Rey looked blank, but Lenny immediately gave a world-wise grin and said, "Ya hear that, Rey? Less than a minute and she already wants to Therapy Up! What, your conscience not being your guide? Because if it was, you'd hardly need emotional care, would you?"
Madison looked defiant. Lenny continued, "Look, lady, here's how this is going to go down. We got you cold on a flat out Personal Insult in the 2nd degree. And that's only as we haven't got the full diagnostics back from Central AI on why your own Jiminy didn't have you avoid her in the first place. If it shows it did warn you, then it's 1st degree!"
"Yeah", jumped in Rey. "For 1st degree, you got to register for your life, since Weightism is a hate crime. You try finding any fun occupation to while away your time after that, eh? Last person convicted, he had to spend the rest of his life living off of Basic Income, cuz no one let him participate in any personal or community growth project ever again!"
Lenny looked contemptuously at Madison. He sneered, "Maybe that's what she's looking for, Rey. An excuse to veg for the next 60 years, VRing her life away. Now look, honey, right now, we're your only two friends. You tell us how it went down, maybe we can put in a word for you with the Professors. They listen to us. But if you want to wait on your Therapist, we can write this up as how it looks, and let me tell you, it looks bad."
Madison glared a moment, then her shoulders drooped and it seemed the fight went out of her. She said, "My Jiminy never gave me any warning about our trajectories intersecting. And it doesn't seem like hers did either. As to the comment, I don't know why I made it."
Rey, filling the silence that fell, asked insinuatingly, "So maybe you and her had history, right? I mean, maybe she had took a position at a local charity that you had wanted one time, or maybe she had got away with some remark that to you sounded snippy, yeah? And here was an opportunity to get back a little, yeah? I mean, if that's how it went down, we can understand that. But you have to be straight with us."
"I didn't know her, okay?!", Madison suddenly yelled, as her up to now dormant Jiminy, programmed not to interfere within the confines of a Proctor's Station, went red blue, red blue, and Lenny and Rey's own Jiminies, programmed with a far greater latitude and indulgence of verbal abuse then the general public's were, flew up and back to make sure to have a good vid shot of the possible violence to come.
But Lenny and Rey were interrupted then by a sharp two knocks on the "mirror" behind them. They both got up. Lenny said, "Tell you what, we'll get you a Soothie, and you can think about what we said." And with that they exited to see what their Lieutenant had.
Their Lieutenant, Anita, was standing grimly next to Claire. Claire was a junior Professor, young and attractive, the way Professor McCoy always picked them. She said to Anita, "Personal Insult 1? But we do have the Central AI report back, and it says that Madison received no warning from her Jiminy. Nor did the victim's Jiminy give any warning. I think we're looking for a jammer, and if that's true, this city is going to be in an uproar!"
Lenny shook his head. He said, "Yeah, I get that, but I'm telling you, this woman isn't being truthful. She's holding something back. Like maybe she knows of whoever is jamming Jiminies. We need some time in there with her, before any Therapist comes in."
Claire, a stickler for procedure but mindful of the need to get leads on this case fast, said, "You've got some time, but in an hour, the temporary gag on her Jiminy will be lifted, that's out of my hands. And while her Jiminy won't know what you've said up till then, it will quick enough broadcast her vitals and the tenor of the room to Central AI. A Therapist will be dispatched within minutes. Can you work with that?"
"Sure, sure", said Lenny, already turning to re-enter the Interview Room. "Let's go, Rey. Before the Prof here changes her mind!"
Madison looked up. "My Therapist here yet?" Rey went over to the corner of the room behind her and to her right, while Lenny just gave a quick grimace and set a Soothie down in front of her. He set his own coffee down as he sat across from her. He motioned to her Soothie. "Never could get into those - never needed them. You think it's going to help your nerves? Tell you what, you share what's really going on, and I bet you'll never need another Soothie in your life."
She glared at him, picked up the calmative drink and drank deeply. A wash of pleasure seemed to hit her and her body relaxed. Unbeknownst to her, a euphoric and an amity enhancer were also present in her drink, added courtesy of Lenny. Not entirely kosher, but it'd wash out before any Therapist thought to do any med work up on her.
A glance at Rey, a slightly lifted eyebrow, and Rey picked up on the cue and gave his Good Proctor spiel. "Listen, you seem like a nice girl. Hard to believe you could be messing about with jamming Jiminies. But you need to help us. You want the bad old days back? You're too young to remember, but my granddad used to tell me all about it. People walking about, unattended, hitting and kicking and stealing from others. You even know what 'stealing' or 'kicking' is? 'Course not, nice girl like you. But you've been to the VRs. Sometimes, even life was lost."
Madison's eyes started to get moist, as her artificially enhanced empathy let her picture the Dark Ages of man's past, where anyone could do anything, so long as no one was watching, and lie about it later. Lenny took the set up now and said, "Okay, so you've got a conscience, maybe. But if you're really wanting to help us, sign this waiver of your rights so we can get going on this investigation."
A tear spilled down one cheek, and she nodded, and signed off on the papers that Lenny almost magically had appear in front of her. At once, an Interview Room Jiminy came out of it's cove and attached to the back of Madison's neck. Outside the Interview Room, Claire was shaking her head in wonder. "How do they do that so fast?" she asked Anita, who just chuckled and went back to her office.
Lenny waited a few seconds, to give the Interview Jiminy a chance to access all of Madison's bio-systems. Then he said, "Tell me what you know." Madison, well freed of any inhibitions to lie by the special Soothie and the direct stimulus of the Jiminy on her neck said, "His name is Michael Dobson, and he runs that Titillation Trap on W. 57th - " but at this, and to Rey's consternation, Lenny leapt up and was heading out the door.
*DUN, DUN*
Lenny glided to a stop in front of the Titillation Trap, a modest comedic club, with Rey only a few seconds behind him. They'd discussed it on the way over, including Michael Dobson's previous run in with the PA Department for suspected Jiminy jamming a couple of years ago. He'd been let off, then evidence suggestive of him having known the person who had ultimately been charged with the jamming had come to light.
But double jeopardy had attached, one of the few procedural safeguards to have been retained when the Ancient Bill of Rights of had been revamped in 2098. He could not be put on trial a second time for that offense. Though he was looking good to be put on trial for a new offense, Lenny and Rey thought.
He saw them come in at once. "Aww, c'mon, guys! All my jokes are approved, we run a clean club here, nothing to get a Jiminy chirping!" Yet they did have a reputation for heading right up to the line, as evidenced by a sassy and sexy woman on stage doing a Henny imitation, Henny Youngman being one of the few comedians to have survived the Cultural Revolution of the 2090s.
"Take my Jiminy - puh-lease!" she said, to a ba-dum ting by the drummer. "I take my Jiminy everywhere I go - as who doesn't? One time my Jiminy warned me that where I was going was trouble, and I said, 'oh good, I thought I was lost!'! But seriously, did you hear about the guy who turned his Jiminy off? Of course you didn't - because no one can turn their Jiminy off!"
Edgy stuff. But Central AI had long since determined that if there was no outlet here or there, then the pressure would reach breaking point and you'd have a spontaneous riot of rudeness. Hence such establishments. Hence the yearly Carnival, where animal meat could be ate, hard words spoke, feelings hurt, insults hurled. But only for that 24 hour period.
And still recorded for examination so future offenses could be predicted or past offenses revealed.
Still, for some, Carnival and the barely tolerated Titillation Traps weren't enough. Some roving underground clubs, inevitably called "Speakeasies", operated here and there now and then. They jammed Jiminies, let the folks have some laughs at the expense of various ethnic groups and authority figures, then let them claim a "malfunction".
Such were shut down by Vice routinely, but always popped back up.
Lenny already was waving Dobson to the exit door. "You need to come with us. Clear up a few things.", and Dobson went peaceably along. Everyone did, in an era where surveillance was universal and there was no where you could go that your Jiminy - or the Jiminies of others - would not report on your location.
*DUN, DUN*
Claire entered Professor McCoy's office, to find him dressed in jeans and a blue button down shirt. For reasons of his own personal quirks, Jack loved to dress as if he were some kind of workingman. Not that there were any such things as workingmen, outside of historical VRs, but the Mannekins who had replaced such all wore that, for reasons of tradition.
"Can I have a moment of your time, sir?", she deferentially asked, and he grinned and nodded, motioning to a seat near his desk. And failing to remove his feet from his own desk, he said, "Why so formal? Things can't be that bad, can they? I hear Lenny already picked up our old friend Dobson."
"He did", she said, "But it may go deeper than Dobson. I don't think this is just about some naughty jokes or even a bit of pratfall mischief. I think we might be facing a situation of an actual pre-Reform style crime." Jack took his feet off the desk and leaned forward. No grinning now. But no complete acceptance of what she said, either.
"Claire, I understand you're still relatively new, and want to see some grand incident unfold that you can be a part of stopping, but honestly, for any kind of real incident, like causing physical pain or depriving someone of property, that just cannot be any more. Even if someone like Dobson can jam some Jiminies in a given range, the very fact of the blank spot alerts Central AI at once. The classic example is the man who immediately after the Reform tried the first jammer, remember what happened?"
Claire nodded dutifully. "He could be spotted by the 6 meter in diameter circle of blankness that left his house, moved toward the jewelry store, then returned. But he was stupid - others might not be."
Jack nodded and said, "Glad you weren't asleep in the Intro to the Reform class! But the truth is, no matter how smart someone is, the Reform is infallible. Every bit of the nation is viewed by camera, and the Central AI can detect any kind of physical or financial harm. It can detect most emotional harm, too, but wisely our Reformers chose to leave the larger cases of emotional harm to human judgment, or we'd be out of work!"
"Now", Jack continued, "How could any jamming of the Jiminies let a person get away with say, a 'punch' in the nose? You know, like if you moved your hand very fast towards someone's face, and didn't stop. You ever see one?" Claire nodded, "I saw one in VR, it was terrible. It made blood appear. I threw up." "Ahh, yes", McCoy said, "I think I saw that one, and if it's the one I'm thinking of, that was a banned one! I had no idea you had such a misspent youth!" and he grinned again.
"But", Claire said, "Doesn't that prove my point? We do get away with banned movies, Titillation Traps, Speakeasies, and this Jamming. How? And where will someone like Dobson, or those behind him, take this?"
"Claire, the Reform leaves some room for wiggling. I shouldn't tell you this, but there are what we call 'Blue Fairies' that can't be jammed. They aren't even detectable, as they don't come on unless someone is jamming the Jiminies. Remember that case last year, the guy who actually slapped his wife?" "Yeah", Claire said, "He figured that a local jam within his house would leave it a 'he said/she said'."
"He should have known better", Jack said, "The Jiminies deliberately let a person get or build a jammer, just to learn who wants such, and who helps with such. So when he acted to engage it, that told the tale of who did what to whom. But the deeper secret, as many know of that obvious one, is that there are almost as many Blue Fairies as Jiminies. They're built into every home and office, every public place, and they lay dormant till they are cued to activate by the Jiminies going down. As soon as an area has no Jiminies active, the nearest Blue Fairies come on. So not only did we know that man slapped his wife by inference, we actually had a complete vid of it. Not that we told him."
"Then why don't we end all this stuff, all these deviations, all the random jammings? You know there were 32 jammings last year?", Claire asked. Jack said calmly, "Besides that it would put us out of a job? Claire, people are people, so Central AI, and our own office, let a bit of steam out now and then. It lets people get in some harmless venting, it lets us see who the potential trouble makers are, and it keeps us on our toes. All good things. We tried a clamp down once, in a test city, and it didn't end well."
"Baltimore!", breathed Claire heavily. "It was Baltimore, wasn't it?"
"Yes", said Jack. "And that rudeness riot took five teams of ER Therapists to get things back in order. So relax, Dobson and his backers are already known, all that's left is for how we'll pretend we knew who they were without giving away the existence of Blue Fairies."
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*promotional message*
*video montage of Lenny and Rey bicycling around NYC, of Professor McCoy gesticulating in court, of a citizen looking angry in public*
*voiceover*
"Now in it's 32nd season, catch this award winning, top rated VR drama each Deci on Sixday! Ripped from the Interweb Updates, nothing keeps you more immersed in our times!"
*end promotional message*
*DUN, DUN*
"Therrrr-aaaa-pisttttt! Therapist! I, want, my, Therapist!", chanted Dobson, in as annoying a tone as he could manage, which was much more so than most people, since Dobson had had more practice. Lenny looked over at the Lieutenant and said, "Just give me five minutes with him, Luey! Just five minutes, and I'll give him enough 'analysis' for a lifetime!"
Anita looked at him sardonically and said, "You best watch that mouth of yours, Lenny. You get away with a lot of quasi-atavistic behavior, but at some point, you're just going to be begging for a full diagnostic eval for yourself." Rey hearing this, chuckled and said, "That's long overdue!" earning him a smile from Anita and a look of "Et tu?" from Lenny.
"McCoy says this is already a wrap, but I need you two to go over his 'special data' and figure out a way to back trail it till it looks like you remember how to do real police work!", Anita said. Lenny rolled his eyes, but Rey nodded and looked eager. Lenny noticed this and raised an eyebrow.
Answering him, Rey said, "I've already been going over it with Claire, and we found 'inevitability' that will pass any Prof's review. They were good, they had most of the stuff made for other semi-legit things, but one element can only be for a jammer. They did their best to have it produced in Jiminy free nations, all two that are left, but the factory in the People's Democratic Socialist Republic of Puerto Rico that made the third sub-Discernment infractor had no jammers going, as the rolling black out their People's Government scheduled had them powerless for four hours!"
Lenny, looking disgusted at this type of pretense said, "So we play like we had our spy eyes on that, and then alerted, followed it all the way up the line to Dobson? He's going to know that was unlikely!" Anita just shook her head and said, "Given what's coming to him for his crimes, that'll be the least of his worries. And it's not like the System is going to let itself be played, no matter how much he squawks. And who's he to squawk? You know the press and public won't care."
*DUN, DUN*
The Doctor, presiding over Michael Dobson's preliminary hearing, was wearing the traditional white lab coat. McCoy still sported his denim jeans, but had put a tweed jacket over his blue chambray. It had patches on it. Which meant he was barely within the dress code of the Profs who argued cases.
Dobson was sitting in a wheelchair next to his Prof, not a Public Prof, but Emil Skoda, who Dobson had hired himself. This Prof was dressed like a 19th century Austrian gentlemen, vest and all, even a pocket watch, and displaying, of all things, a little goatee and mustache! Actual facial hair, like cavemen! McCoy had come up against him before, though, and knew that behind the fake Germanic accent was a keen therapeutic mind.
So keen that he'd once worked on Jack's side of the street, before being lured away by conscience, he said, but more command of economic resources that was available for aiding such types, others said. He wasted no time waiting for the Doctor to speak, but instead piped up with, "Your honor, ve must object to dis rushing to der judgment, my client is a man in need of help, not to this punitive course that der Professor McCoy has proposed to my ovvis!"
McCoy looked outraged, but was cut off in his sputtering retort by the Doctor saying, "The press-jury has not been impaneled yet, so you can cut the phony accent now, and keep it cut later! There'll be no theatrics in my court!" McCoy looked happy at this and started to speak, but the Doctor held up a hand to silence him. "McCoy, I know your arguments already, both sides briefs were exemplary. I'm not remanding him to a Care Facility of his choice, but nor am I releasing him. I note that both sides are ready, and we're moving to trial right now!"
Looking about the empty room, Jack nodded to himself. In this era of zero crime, where everyone knew that any crime would be caught, gone were the throngs of people that cluttered vast court buildings in previous centuries. Now we don't just have one court house for all of New York City, but are down to just one court room! His reveries were broken by the press-jury coming in.
Twelve men and women of the press, good organizations and true, to view and broadcast this trial to the masses. Left-wingers in favor of Punishment Bands that the Jiminies could self-activate without a human ruling, and Right-wingers in favor of re-classifying any speech not in keeping with Neo-Christianity as "hate speech". And every flavor in between, up, down and all around. Including, Jack noted ruefully, an old college roommate of his who'd been in an anti-Jiminy group in his youth!
"Objection, Doctor!", Jack called out. The Doctor looked up, and the press-juror from Jack's early days stepped forward with a smile, knowing Jack's likely objection. He waited till Jack made his explanation about knowing a juror, then faced the Doctor and said, "Doctor, my viewers have as much right to hear and participate in this as any. And no, we aren't trying to ban Jiminies, just perhaps a bit of slowing down in how much they get to control our lives!"
The Doctor said to Jack, "He stays." and turning to the man said, "But save the speeches. Sit down. Let's get going."
As was usual with all cases, the Doctor started by stating to Michael Dobson and Professor Skoda, "Do you understand that you are, in fact and in law, guilty, based upon the evidence already reviewed by the Central AI and myself, and that we are only here to determine the best methods of healing you?"
Skoda nodded affirmatively. Dobson started in with, "Not guilty, your honor!" and the bailiff moved towards him. The Doctor waved the bailiff off. The Doctor took off his glasses, and briefly pinched his nose. He looked at Dobson and said, "I get it, I really do. You feel that the law itself is wrong, that you had some kind of 'right' to do as all the video shows that you did. You wish to argue that law, and why it should be repealed." Dobson was nodding.
"But", continued the Doctor, "We're not here for that. You have had, everyone has had, every opportunity to speak against our system, to write against our system, even to run for office so as to change our system. What you had no right to do was to simply violate our system. Yes, you found the law offensive. But it is a law that billions find to be liberating. We live in a world of total surveillance - and zero crime. No rapes. No murders. No thefts. Such few exceptions are cured at once, and new ones prevented by an ever increasing diagnostic skill at an ever decreasing age. We can catch any psychopathy by the age of two now, and cure it. In a generation, even your offenses will become a distant memory as advances continue. No one wants that interrupted. And if some few, like you, do want that, the rest of us do not care."
Professor Skoda leaned over to whisper in his client's ear. Dobson looked angry, but nodded. Dobson looked at the Doctor and said, "Fine. Railroad me, then."
The Doctor said, "Having advised you of your guilt, we now stand ready to hear from each side concerning how best to cure this situation. Professor McCoy?"
"Doctor, the People feel that Dobson's crime, and the likely repetitive nature of it - ", Jack started out, only to be interrupted by Professor Skoda saying, "Objection, we're only here for one crime." The Doctor said, "Overruled. This isn't the 21st century where we pretend that we don't know something that everyone already knows." Skoda looked inclined to argue, but the Doctor said, "Forget it. Appeal it later if you care to be able to bill him more to no point."
Already those in the press-jury were adjusting their goggs, blinking in the appropriate filters for their audience, as the Doctor had dispensed with the usual convoluted politely obsequious speech prevalent today and spoke roughly - even curtly! Jiminies whirred, press-jurors blinked in filters and audiences across the globe leaned forward in rapt attention to the most violently exciting trial in decades!
"We ask", said Jack picking up where he'd left off, "That Mr. Dobson be taken to the nearest Healing Center and there given neurosurgery sufficient to prevent any possible recurrence. Not only in emotions and inclinations, but in the cognitive abilities that he has perverted to - "
At this point, Dobson was up out of his wheelchair, screaming, and all the Jiminies flashing red blue red blue as he roared out, over and over, "You'll not take my mind, you'll not take my mind!" A woman press-juror started to get up, then fainted. Other press-jurors tried to catch her, but several fell over with her on top of them. Others, getting frantic reports from their own Jiminies were scrambling away from those on the floor, being warned about possible - and unheard of - physically violent contact!
The bailiff was at Dobson's side in a flash, and the hypospray pushed into his arm immediately dropped Dobson heavily back into the wheelchair. The bailiff wiped the sweat off his brow. 15 years on the job, and this was the first time he'd ever had to draw his hypospray. Some bailiffs went their whole careers without having to do that. He shivered a bit in reaction. His Jiminy, noting that, put in a request for an occupational therapist to go over this with him later. And a time off request.
No one should have to go through such alone!
The Doctor hit a chime on his desk with a velvet covered miniature hammerette. When that failed to get everyone's attention, he said in a tone of voice louder than normal, "Enough! Please take your seats!", but the volume of his voice, being what in the old days was called a "raised" voice, was enough to make several press-jurors shiver the more. One looked like he might vomit.
Order was finally restored by the unprecedented emergency use of Pacification Spray that, at the Doctor's press of a button under his desk, had a gentle mist of calmatives and euphorics bathe all those in the room. McCoy and Skoda, and the Doctor, each removed a hypopen from their briefcases and injected the antidote in themselves. They'd need to be clear headed for the rest of the proceedings. The press-jury could just enjoy the dose, it would not effect substantially their transmission of this to their audiences.
Audiences that were now making up a larger percentage of mankind then had watched the first moon landing way back in the 20th century! Audiences that would almost inevitably vote for the solution of the prosecutor.
*DUN, DUN*
Jack and Anita were talking in the hall outside the courtroom. Behind them, a thoroughly pacified and sedated Dobson was being wheeled to the Healing Center for the correction that Jack had advocated. Dobson's Prof had made a valiant case, that the IQ reduction was more punitive then corrective, and punitive was forbade by the Constitution, but Jack had countered with the argument that society could afford to take no chances when it came to such an evil genius as Dobson. What if he found a way to circumvent the Jiminies again? Who else might be insulted?
Anita said, "You don't look like a man who just won the Trial of the Century, as they're calling it. What's wrong?" McCoy said, "You know what's wrong. With the Blue Fairies, we didn't truly need to reduce his IQ. I argued it for effect, I expected the Doctor to dismiss that part of it." Anita shook her head. "Jack, you and I have been at this for a long time. Some people just don't like to play nice, and Dobson was one of them. Maybe it was a punishment, maybe it was preventative correction, I just know that I'll sleep better knowing that my little girl - who isn't so little - won't be teased into an eating disorder on the playground!"
"Thanks, Anita. I guess I just needed a bit of perspective!"
*fade out, roll credits, theme music*
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