Chapter Text
Sunbeams relentlessly make themselves known through the tattered cotton on Yuma's shoulders as they rush their way down the crowded walkway of their bustling university, the pheromones around Yuma and Nicholas weaving themselves through their tops like the fragments of dandelion weeds in the barely there breeze. The beta can hardly see past the older guiding him through the scent laden traffic, his left fist never loosening the grip it has on Nicholas' t-shirt the entire way to the clothing center. Sweat is cloying to Yuma's reddened flesh like another layer of skin by the time they reach an unfamiliar looking set of steps, and they're both panting by the time they've traveled up to the faded door's opening.
"Remind me why I couldn't have just bought you another outfit?" The omega halfheartedly implores, the telltale rattle of a wheeze in his exhale making his voice sound even deeper. Yuma's pressing the middle of his spine against the railing as he blindly wipes a droplet of dew away, his squinting eyes running themselves over the stitched holes in his sneakers as he shakes his bangs out of his skewed viewpoint.
"Because I don't want to feel like I owe you another thing I can't pay you back for, and I've heard that this place is a goldmine of lost goods," Yuma replies offhandedly, trying to ignore the taste of salt dripping down onto the tip of his tongue from his cupid's bow. "A mutual scholarship student said that he found half of his closet here in just one visit, and that none of the clothing had holes in it. Might as well take what the rich no longer want, than to ask one for more money."
His comment earns him an unamused look, that softens as soon as Yuma's endearingly crooked smile comes into view. It's clearly sarcastic, but Nicholas accepts it as one that's real. "Technically, me buying you an outfit isn't me giving you money or you asking for it, but whatever," he rebuts, ruffling the younger's hair and using the excuse of holding the door open for him as a form of immediate apology. Yuma looks up at him in disbelief through frizzed and disarrayed strands, yet he still rushes his way inside as artificial and cool air greets him through the door's widened opening. They both get relief as the overhead lights soften as they enter, and as the sweat on their skin begins to evaporate. "I can always just ask one of my packmate's if they have any clothing they might want to get rid of, if you want to stop over."
Yuma shakes his head, and bites the inside of his cheek until it stings. The beta knows he has nothing but good intentions, but stepping foot into the older's pack house means giving further hope to the omega that he'd consider joining them permanently, and he doesn't want to disappoint him once again. Yuma's had enough close run-in's with them at the canteen to know how eager they all are to meet him at once, with Nicholas and his mate Euijoo being the cause behind it all. Euijoo had nearly squeezed all the oxygen out of him in a welcoming hug, when the omega somehow snuck his alpha into Yuma's dorm room without him noticing last month. Yuma blames his dulled senses for it. And his RA Nicholas, who forcibly pulled him under his wing, as soon as he landed eyes on him at orientation, not that the beta minds all that much.
"I think I'll stay over here, where I won't be affectionately attacked." Yuma playfully declines, ignoring the soft twinge in his chest at the small frown he knows Nicholas is trying to hide. The beta doesn't object when he's brought into a hug, and he hides his grimace as his feet are brought off of the ground, his lips tugging upward as they brush the older's shoulder. Yuma wraps an arm around him temporarily, and he's still dangling off of him when footsteps audibly come to life at the other end of the hall. Nicholas squeezes him once more, and then lets him go.
"Fine, but I'll get you to accept one way or another," the omega relents, more like gently threatens. Nicholas instructs him on where to go, even if there are only three rooms on the entire floor their side is on. Yuma still listens intently, and he reiterates the older's words diligently, nipping at the others fingers as they come up to pinch at his cheeks in a goodbye. "I'll try to stop by later to see what you found, since you and the younger we're trying to welcome in are roomed on the same floor."
Yuma gently waves him off with the hand that isn't rubbing at his stinging cheeks, and he watches as the other saunters off, before Nicholas' tall figure descends and disappears down the earlier staircase. The stopper that had partially held the door open for them must've fallen out of place, because as he turns around and hears a metallic clink, the hallway is almost fully darkened. The beta quickens his footsteps, and he's near the end of the wing when the smell of pressed linen reaches his irritated nose. A breath he doesn't realize he's held in lowers his chest as he wraps a hand around the cool doorknob, and his eyes widen as he takes his first few steps inside.
It isn't a large room, maybe thirty feet all the way to the back and twenty to the side, but there are packed rows, organized by size and color, and the relief Yuma feels makes his chest ache. The last thing he wanted to do was ask Nicholas to help him out once again or accept one of his eager offers, or even worse, be forced to call home. There's a small desk to the immediate right, a black folded table with plastic store bags and a binder filled with the names of the other less fortunate. Yuma can't see anyone else in the room with him, but he can hear distant footsteps, so he follows after them, his fingertips dancing themselves over the passing clothing items as he goes.
A girl around his age, a beta with long red hair that reaches just past her shoulders, turns around as he sheepishly calls out to her, and his own shoulders lower to relax as she excitedly greets him back. He can barely catch up to her in conversation as she raises both arms to direct him either way, her head nodding to the side to let him know where she'll end up being at the end of her enthusiastic rant. Yuma just nods along and coerces himself to smile, even as he doesn't know where things start and end, and he's left to stand in the middle of the rows of clothing as she nearly prances off with hoodies dangling off of all ten of her fingers.
The beta sucks in a deep breath and then he begins, the few words he had caught onto letting him know that for his first visit, he's allowed to take five shirts, two hoodies, and three pairs of pants. One pair of shoes if he can find his size, with the small amount of them neatly aligned on a triple stack of nailed in shelves near the room's entrance. Yuma's eyes dance along every strand of fabric as he slowly makes his way down each item and row and rack, and by the time he's near the back of the center, his left forearm is bent inward to hold onto two shirts and matching pairs of pants. There's a large basket by a door he hadn't noticed before, with unfolded t-shirts nearly exploding from it, and as he closes in on it with his shoes squeaking against the floor, his gaze latches onto a jersey with their university's colors on it.
Brows furrowing in question of who'd let go of something like that during their summer season, Yuma lifts it with his free hand to inspect it, and as he presses his fingertips into the thin and worn fabric, something tells him to take it. There are dozens of shirts in better condition, the ones in his inner elbow proof of it, yet the beta feels the instinct to keep it close. Brushing away his subconscious worry of why that might be, Yuma tucks it in with the others, and by the time he's got a pair of shoes he'd luckily found resting against his chest, on top of a pile of nearly brand new clothing he lucked out with, the thought is no longer crossing his mind.
He's in luck, as the redhead is already sat at the foldable table as his arms begin to ache, and as she opens up a store bag for him to tumble his items inside of, he asks if she needs to count them out. She waves him off with a grin, grabbing a second bag for his sneakers and pants when he can no longer make room for them in the first. "You don't seem like the type to take too much without asking."
He raises an eyebrow at the comment, but just thanks her after signing his name in the almost full binder, and after showing proof of him being a student with his identification card. Yuma politely bows his farewell, and he's clumsily elbowing the door of the clothing center back open with full hands, before stumbling out into the hall. A few familiar looking students brush past him with shy smiles before entering behind him, and as he readies himself to go back out into the overwhelming heat, he mentally thanks whoever is above and the higher ups for making it possible that he was able to find a way around having to call back home, to have to ask his already struggling family for even more.
The beta winces as soon as the bright sunlight greets him once again, and as he rushes his way through and around the still impeding and growing amount of students on the walkway, he glances down at the jersey once again, tucked deeply in the very first bag and purposefully protected from the sun.
・ ・ ・ ・ ・
Yuma's eyes force themselves to reopen as his morning alarm blares loudly, right by his eardrum, the source of the loud sound resting just by the precipice of his unmade and messily slept in bed. The beta blindly slaps his sheet and pillows for his cell phone, and as soon as he has it in his hand, he's hurriedly sliding his thumb against the cold screen, before he can wake up his roommate, still asleep on the other side of the room.
The alarm eventually relents under his rapid fingertip, and Yuma sighs in relief, before furrowing his brows at the heat that's already emanating itself in through his window's curtained sheet. His body's joints cracks in multiple places as he forces himself to sit up, and as his somehow still damp, dark pieces of strands of hair make their way into his viewpoint without permission, he already wants the day to end. Pressing his fingers and palms into his mattress, that he already knows are still imprinted on the sides with the shape of his pencil and still streaked with pen, he uses them as leverage to lift himself out of bed, and Yuma fights back a shiver as his bare feet make contact with the cool to the touch, wooden floor.
His footsteps can be considered a long withstanding stumble as he makes his way to the bathroom, and as he washes his face and brushes his teeth with his eyes still nearly fully closed, the beta absentmindedly thinks of what he should wear for breakfast and his morning class. Rinsing his mouth free of the fluoride and white foam, he wipes his mouth dry with the back of his hand, and as he's walking back into their shared bedroom, Yuma feels envy for the very first time, as his roommate continues to rest freely.
Yuma tiredly grumbles under his breath, his lips raising as a snore makes its way into the air, and he travels over to his makeshift closet to ruffle through his sparse clothing, before pausing to look near his dresser, where the bags still reside. Yuma blinks in a lazy repetitive motion and pattern, and then he's grinning to himself and eagerly making his way over to them. He bends down after reaching for the shoes, and his fingers are meticulous as they undo the shoestrings, so he can replace them with his own. They're multicolored, tie-dyed, a small project he and Nicholas had worked on together during a group meeting at orientation, and although his older shoes are ruined, his shoestrings still look brand new.
They're looped in and tucked by the time the sun is fully risen in the sky, and as Yuma stands back up to ruffle through the clothing he had been gifted, his nose catches on to a faint scent lingering on the edge of the bag, before it strengthens near the bottom of it. Hesitant with reaching for the jersey that caught his attention yesterday afternoon, the beta takes everything else out of the bag, and then he's bending over to let his nose hover. The first inhalation Yuma breathes in has his pupils dilating, although it's still faint by all standards, due to his senses being weaker and more neutral. Lingering notes of honey and sandalwood caress his sinuses as he peers into the bag, and despite not wanting to spread the scent, Yuma carefully extracts the top from the bag anyway.
The worn fabric feels like silk underneath his fingertips, and Yuma subconsciously rubs the material against his skin, until the embedded scent wafts from his palms like a perfumed deodorant. He's careful as he unfolds it, the university's colors of navy blue, gold and white still shining brightly, even as the number on the front and back of it is partially ripped off. It looks as if someone had taken their fingernails to it to attempt to pick it off, and then got tired and lazily tried to discard of it. Yuma still holds onto it likes it's treasured, and he stares at it momentarily, before glancing at the other shirts he had chosen. They're almost perfectly new, pressed and cleaned to the point where they're fully neutralized and wiped of their former owner's scent, yet Yuma doesn't feel the same urge to wear them like he does with the jersey. He wonders what sport the original owner had played, or if they still do, and then his eyes begin to wander, before pausing right at their entryway.
A small handful of free tickets to their soccer team's game tonight are thumb tacked to the wall right beside their front door, and as Yuma contemplates making time to go, having had already been urged to and welcomed by Nicholas and Euijoo, Yuma decidedly tugs the fabric over his head. It's a few sizes too big, the jersey's lower hemming brushing mid thigh and the short sleeves coming down to end right beneath his elbows, but it still feels like a perfect fit. Honey and sandalwood create a thin, protective barrier around him as his white sleep shirt covers what the partial mesh material can't from underneath, and Yuma rushes through the rest of his morning routine after he notices the current time on his and his roommate's digital clock.
He's springing into one of his new pairs of pants and hurriedly tying his shoes, and then he's using his fingers to comb his bangs into place, before quietly opening the front door. Bending down to grab his backpack and then securely transferring it to rest on his left shoulder, the beta makes sure to be as quiet as he can as he snags one of the tickets free from the holder, and as he closes the door behind him. Yuma immediately misses the chilled air from their conditioner as soon as he gets outside, yet he still pushes himself forward, already knowing that he's only got a handful of minutes to eat breakfast, before he's got to run to an entire other building for his morning class.
Yuma's bag slaps noisily against the base of his spine as he runs, sweat already collecting itself at the nape of his neck, and as he gets closer to the canteen, he's grateful that he's worn the jersey and short sleeve, rather than his usual hoodie or sweatshirt. The beta gets a short moment of relief as he reaches the line near the entrance of the cafeteria, and then he's freezing in place as a dozen pairs of eyes shift to stare at him. Yuma immediately begins to feel underdressed and exposed, his forearms that are reddened from the sun beginning to match his cheeks at the unwanted attention being given to him, and he goes to wrap his arms around his middle, before the people in front of him are being directed inside.
Yuma's shoulders round as a quiet murmur follows him inside the double doors, and by the time he's only a few steps away from the breakfast line, he feels like he wants to jump out of his own skin. He feels overly exposed, every inch of his uncovered skin feeling like it's crawling, and Yuma's about to turn around, when a large hand is encircling itself around his wrist.
"Yuma, what the hell are you wearing?" Nicholas rushes out, looking down at him in disbelief, his eyes rounding with how wide they're being held open. Yuma goes to open his mouth to respond, before he's taking in the looks and expressions of everyone else in the nearby vicinity. Lips lowering themselves in a frown, the beta gently tugs his arm free, and then he's wrapping it around his midsection and shrinking into himself.
"A jersey?" He asks, confused as to why it seems to be a such a big deal. The earlier comfort he had felt from it, from the scent, is now gone, and Yuma just wants to get rid of it. Wants to rip it off, until it's in the hands of the original owner, or whoever the hell got rid of it. "I don't see what the big deal is, Nicho. It was donated."
Nicholas sputters, and then he's looking over his shoulder, and gently beckoning the younger out of line. "That's the jersey of our central defensive midfielder, that's been missing from his locker for the last few weeks. And now it looks like you were the one who stole it." His words comes out in a harsh, panicked whisper, yet the hand on his back is gentle, and Yuma sucks in an anxious breath as he's guided back in the direction of the doors he'd just entered in from.
Yuma grasps along the lower hemming of the top in panic, and as he goes to tug it upward to yank it over his head, a faint scent, similar to the one covering him, is pushing its way forward, right over to them. He can hear Nicholas call out to someone with a curse, but before he can look over to see who he's speaking to, a rough hand is grasping along a rushed handful of the jersey, and then he's being yanked forward.
Yuma's feet almost get lifted with the strength behind the one singular movement, and as he locks eyes with the upset alpha in front of him, the beta feels nothing but fear and confusion. He braces himself for a punch, a rude shove, a yell in his face, yet all he gets is a frustrated demand. "Who the hell are you, and why the fuck are you wearing my jersey?"
Yuma steadies himself with the tips of his shoes still in contact with the ground beneath them, and he shudders around a breath, before holding onto the hand keeping him upright. It tenses underneath his. "I got it from the clothing center on campus," he stammers, his stomach muscles tensing in discomfort. The alpha's grip on his jersey slackens, yet he doesn't fully let him go. "I swear, I didn't know it was yours, or that it was stolen. I don't even know who you are."
The alpha's look of frustration quickly turns into one of offense, and before either one of them can say anything else, Nicholas and another unknown alpha are separating them and shoving the jersey's owner away. "Maki, knock it off. This is Yuma, the beta Joo and I have been talking about." Nicholas tries to explain, yet his words and voice sound warped and echoed as Yuma attempts to calm himself down. The combination of the heat, the lack of food, the whispers and the angry alpha is making him feel sick, and Yuma feels like ground beneath him is going to fall apart if he tries to take another step.
Yuma focuses in on his breathing, on the tops of his new shoes, on the partially charred scent of lychee coming from where Nicholas is stood, the beta's nose uncomfortably twitching with how strong it is. The only thing grounding him is the omega's palm on the middle of his back, underneath the weight of his bag. The beta's eyesight clears itself up after he stops shuddering for air, his hearing coming back to as the raised voices lower themselves, and as the overwhelming scents begin to soften. Yuma is still hyper focused on the whispers coming from all angles, but he's able to look up at Nicholas after the older repetitively insists for him to.
"I'm so sorry, Yu. I should have come over when I said I would," the omega trails off, his softened scent still tangled in distress, and Yuma only notices Euijoo when he moves in his peripheral, to send a glare to the alpha Yuma assumes is Maki. He no longer looks upset, just sheepish, large hand rubbing the back of his neck as he gets reprimanded by someone unknown. Yuma can't focus in, but he does notice that the packmate's he's been trying to avoid now surround him, and the beta feels defeat as Nicholas gently rubs his back in a circular motion. "Maybe none of this would have happened."
Euijoo shakes his head, before raising a gentle hand to graze his mate's scent gland. "You didn't know any better, and Maki rarely ever acts out," Nicholas relaxes under his touch, his scent turning more powdered instead or burnt with the delicate caress. "He's just on edge because of the game, but that still isn't an excuse. Yuma, I am so sorry. This isn't the way I wanted you to meet everyone."
Yuma tries to smile to placate the familiar alpha, but it just comes off as a tremor. The beta's hunger is now gone, and as his second alarm goes off in his pocket to let him know that he's got to rush if he wants to make it to his scheduled class on time, Yuma mourns the fact that he'd even left his bed. "It's alright," he murmurs, his tone stilted and dry, even as his bottom lip fights off the urge to quiver. "I've got to head to class."
Nicholas opens his mouth to object, but he stops himself as he looks into the beta's shifting eyes. The omega's shoulders drop, his expression falling even further, and as his mate continues to scent him, his hand drops from Yuma's back. There's an awkward moment of silence, and then someone is stepping forward, to the point where Yuma can see them, and the grin he's being met with has it all slightly feeling better.
"I can walk with you, my class is right next to yours anyway." The beta interjects, his energy breaking through to crack at the tense environment his packmate made. He's slightly taller than Yuma, dark brown hair almost shaggy, with an energy to him that's so infectious, that even Yuma wants to smile. Yuma nods despite feeling unsteady and out of place, and he takes a step forward to near the other, before he realizes that he's still wearing the jersey. The top is ruffled upward, his white sleep shirt now fully wrinkled underneath and almost torn, yet he still wants the other's shirt off of him.
The beta is carefully lowering his bag to the floor and yanking the jersey off with haste, it now feeling foreign as he has it held in one hand. Yuma doesn't think that he can look at Maki long enough to give it to him himself, so he gently hands it over to Euijoo, who nods a quiet thanks, even though he looks like he's holding himself back from saying anything further. Lifting his bag once again, Yuma lowers his head in a quiet farewell, and then he's situating himself through the rest of the packmates, to start walking alongside the beta who offered to walk him to class.
It's a quiet affair, at least until they get back outside, and then the beta similar to him is amusedly going off. "I can't wait for Maki to get his ass chewed out and handed to him, he thinks because he's the youngest, he can get away with everything," Yuma blinks at his words, astounded, and then he slowly starts to grin, his nervousness at the situation lessening as they continue to get farther away from the canteen. "The name's Taki, by the way. Sorry you had to get assaulted before we could say hi, you know, and that you had to be covered in his funk."
Yuma quietly laughs before he can stop himself, his travel and way to class ingrained in his memory as they walk in tandem, bags nearly colliding with how close they're walking side by side. "He doesn't smell that bad, from what I could tell." He defends, and then pauses, shifting his head to the side to evade the curious look Taki's throwing his way.
"You could smell him that strongly, on a shirt he hasn't worn in that long?" The taller is asking in wonder, before humming to himself, his amused expression staying in place for the rest of the duration of their joined walk. "Interesting." Yuma purses his lips and stares ahead, feeling like he's playfully being put on edge and is out of the loop on something important. As soon as they make a left turn and they're just about to reach Yuma's class's entrance, Taki stops him with a gentle tap on the arm.
"Don't hold it against him, yeah?" Yuma sends him an incredulous look, and the other beta raises his hands up in surrender, his cheeky grin holding him back from looking serious. "Euijoo and Nicho are already going to nag him until his ears fall off, and I'm sure Fuma and Kei are going to exhaust him during practice," he trails off, a short laugh escaping him, and then his amusement is turning into something gentle, more genuine. "He really isn't that bad, and I don't want how he acted to get in the way of how you see the rest of us. I'd really like it if we could be friends."
Yuma softens involuntarily, and he loosens the grip he has on a strap of his backpack, before nodding slowly. Although he doesn't know Taki personally, Nicholas has done nothing but speak highly of him, and he was the only one who offered to get him out of an uncomfortable situation. "I think I'd like that too."
The beta's cheeks look as if they're about to split with his smile, and for the second time in a full day, he's being brought into a lung constricting hug. It doesn't matter that they're closer in height than he is with the omega, his feet still graze the air, and as he's finally let go of, his cheeks are being cupped. "I can't wait," Taki rejoices, and then he calms, before cocking his head to the side and speaking with absolute certainty. "See you at the game, make sure you cheer for me."
He's beaming and then turning to quickly walk away, leaving Yuma to stand there with wide eyes, wondering what the hell had just truly happened within the last twenty minutes, while also anticipating having to have just made a new friend.
・ ・ ・ ・ ・
Yuma leaves his dorm room alone for the second time today, his roommate having had already left for the soccer game an hour earlier, to meet up with the teammates he knows personally to excite them for the game. The beta spent the first thirty minutes alone contemplating if he even truly wanted to go, since he was still feeling off about what had happened earlier at breakfast, and then the latter half hyping himself up enough to get ready.
It's eerily quiet on the floor of their dormitory, with the weekend now rolling around, meaning that the students who attend and still live nearby, have either gone home to see their families, or they all rushed to see the upcoming event themselves. With no longer having a jersey on hand, Yuma's left with his basic essentials of neutral colored clothing, and he does his best with finding something close to their soccer team's colors in his closet. The white short sleeve similar to the one he wore earlier isn't anything to look twice at, but the golden emblem on the left side of the chest and the purple in his shoelaces are better than nothing.
His footsteps echo against the hot pavement, now louder due to the walkway being deserted, but as he makes his way down to the fields by following the curving trail, faint cheers can be heard ahead. The sun is now almost set, an orange and yellow hue ricocheting off the leaves near his head, and as he looks forward, football field like light towers beam down and threaten to overtake the earth's natural lighting.
Yuma's only a few handfuls of yards away when the yells and cheers become almost overbearing, but in a way, the accumulation of sound is comforting. Instead of the whispers that were earlier targeted at him, they're instead aimed at something they can understand, rather than just ogle at.
The beta is tightly gripping onto the ticket as he slowly makes his way up to the entrance gate, a few other students ahead of him in line, and the beats being created and performed by the band is nearly matching the pounding in his chest. It's excitement mixed with nervousness, something he hasn't felt in years, and after his ticket is accounted for and his hand is stamped, he's eagerly making his way inside.
The levels and rows of seats seem to go on for days, boxed around and squaring the entire field, and with how close to the game it is, Yuma has to squint to see if he can even find a seat. There's one near where their team is meant to walk out of, just on the second level, and Yuma feels his hands begin to sweat as he starts walking over, the sound of everyone's cheers reverberating and rattling his eardrums, intense enough to make him feel dizzy. He's careful as he makes his way up, the metal walkway and staircase vibrating with other people's steps and with their enthusiastic cadence.
His seat is hot to the touch, enough to make his skin almost sting through his bottom clothing, and the sensation is grounding as he situates himself near a family, their faces painted on with numbers and war paint that matches the colors of their team's uniforms and university gradient. Just minutes later, the light fixtures overhead brighten even further, and the band comes together on the back right side of the field to start a rapid drumroll.
Some students in the middle of the stands raise in unison, their purple shirts with big gold lettering standing out to spell the name of their mascot, a strong raven and wolf, as the cheers get even louder, and the last names of their team's players begin to be chanted. Yuma rests his left side on the railing closest to him, and he looks down through the metal gating as he hears the doors to their locker room being shoved open. Loud laughter and screaming filter out before they're even seen, and when their soccer team finally makes their entrance, their own sounds are being muted out by their guest's screams.
It's something unlike Yuma has ever seen, the way everyone else on their side gets up and screams at the tops of their lungs, the way posters and collages are held up proudly and then eagerly waved, the way everyone's happiness turns into one. It makes Yuma smile, his stomach suck in with excited nerves, and just as their team is about to touch the field's ground, the beta catches the way Taki is looking around. A part of Yuma wants to pull back, slouch in his seat and hide behind the cheering family next to him, but instead, he leans forward and sticks his hand out from beneath the rail, and waves until he can be seen. The excited shout the taller beta lets out is muted, but Yuma can see the teammate next to him physically recoil and flinch, and just as he's about to laugh, Taki is rushing forward to shove at a packmate's shoulder. Instead of Nicholas, who he was expecting him to reach out to, it's Maki, and Yuma grips onto the railing as their eyes meet.
Instead of anger or distrust, the alpha's eyes are filled with interest, and a hint of regret. Before either one of them can do much else, their coach is yelling for them to move forward, and then they're herding towards the center line. Yuma slowly unfreezes, and as his side makes contact with the hot metal beside him and he prepares himself for the game that either holds them back or takes them to the finals, the beta realizes that Maki is wearing the jersey he'd just been given back this morning, that still has both of their scents strongly embedded inside of it.