A Harry Potter Quest: He who was not

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Present Date: Late Winter 5104 BC, Hills of Blood (Night)
Current Weapon: Elm wood bow, Unicorn hair core

One hour.

In the end that was the extend of the time the heavens had given your brother and liege to work with. One hour to prepare the defense against the largest army to have ever existed.

Since the beginning of times - when the sky had risen from the ashes of old and the ashes had formed to clouds, when the hot sparks of fire burned themselves to stars in the night - a more monumental task had not been given to a mortal.

Where others would fail, your brother persevered. In one hour, he had discarded the careful planning; a month of pondering yielded to an hour of action, as he devised something new that was supposed to hold your people alive and gift you one more day in the realms of the living.

Antes ordered Valentino to initiate an early advance of your reserves to the back of your frontlines, collapsing any idea of controlled wear-down through interchanging reserves. It was Isaac who took the burden onto his soul instead to prepare the children and elderly, who had been hiding inside the village to arm themselves and who would order them to follow you into battle as soon as possible.

You and Antes used the time to go over the formation tactics. Six years of constant warfare had given you many ideas, but few solutions for the problem at hand. How did you defend against a much stronger and larger force with the few resources you had at hand?

"They will not hesitate," Antes had said, as you discussed the rational of your final plan.

"If Isaac's words are to be trusted, then they've been marching and swallowing up any forces in their way for a long time. If there haven't been any survivors to tell the tale … it is sound to believe that they march hard and conquer swiftly." His eyes roamed over the map, where you had laid out your formation. A white stone represented twenty men, a black one a hundred. Never before had you seen so many stones on this very familiar map.

"We will need to use that to our advantage."

And so, you had discarded your early tactics and started weaving a new one out of the threads that made up your army. In the end you decided on a strategy that Isaac had come up winters ago. It had allowed your brother to hold an entire hill with a much smaller force for hours, while the rest of you had circled around the enemy.

Never before had you so dearly wished for more time.

But the heavens did not concede to your wished. The hour passed by quickly and you found yourself riding atop your mere at your dedicated place. You were riding in front of the most left flank of your army, trying to spot gaps in your designated troops; but everything looked in order and it seemed as if the men were still highly focused.

Behind you the intensity of the drums grew in volume as the enemy drew closer.

Men and women looked up at you as you passed them, your eyes finding familiar faces among them. You smiled when you could, nodded when you couldn't. For years these people had been yours to defend. But soon enough many of them would join the realm of the dead. Would you be amongst them?

The formation you had gone for was a simple one and something Isaac had come up with at the spur of the moment. His genius showed itself in those moments of peril, when you could not see a way out.

The underlying idea was to line up the soldiers in ranks of close order. The warriors in front would lock their shields together, and the ranks behind them would project their spears out over the first rank of shields. Had you planned for using this tactic in advance, you would have downed all trees in the land if necessary and build large enough shields to cover most of their bodies. Instead you had to use what you had at hand; many of the shields only covered the upper body – if even that. They were designed to let the warriors be agile and to move quickly, because by now they were not an inexperienced bunch anymore. Among them were the finest warriors in the realms of men, but this battle today, was not going to be a fight where you dared to open your rows like that. Today individual prowess would mean nothing. Your troops would fight as a single unit instead.

The presented shield wall would stop and hold the enemy, while the first line of defense was equipped with short swords to cut at the bodies in front of their shields, the rows behind them would use their mass and spears to engage the enemy. If a warrior fell in combat, the one behind him would take up his sword and shield and continue the defense. It was a tactic that put all the pressure on the first line. If a single man broke in fear, an entire section of the wall was endangered.

Isaac had created this tactic years back to allow most of your troops to fall back and encircle the enemy. The tight formation would make a frontal assault against it difficult and costly. It also allowed a higher proportion of the soldiers to be actively engaged in combat at a given time, because it didn't need too much depth. A few rows could hold against an entire army for some time, because multiple rows were joining their might, rather than relying just on those in the front line. It was simple, easy to explain and brilliantly effective.

Against any other army, this should have been enough.

You turned your horse with only the force of your knees, guiding her around one of the many Abatis on the top of the hill; a structure Antes had come up with to secure as much of the eastern border as possible. While the hill had given you a natural measure of defense, it had been crucial to reduce casualties amongst your people in the prolonged years of war. For this you had set up the Abatis, which were fields of fortification near the highest level of the steep hill, consisting of an obstacle formed by sharpened branches of trees laid in a row, with the sharpened tops directed outwards, towards the enemy. They were as wide as five men and you had been able to build a-hundred-and-fifty over the years. In the last moon cycle another fifty had followed, now reaching from one end of your troops to the other.

While the fortification wouldn't stop the enemy from circling around the individual structures, they would at least slow them down and break their formation. Today, you would need any advantage you could get.

Something moved above you, throwing you off your thoughts.

Looking up, you saw a burning arrow faintly illuminate the sky, coming from the right flank. This was Isaac's sign that his flank was ready. A few heartbeats later, you shot out the same signal, your burning arrow following the path of the first one, crossing a third of the distance to the incoming enemy before it burned out on the ground.

An arrow from the center right followed from Antes and then a moment later from the center left. Valentino was also ready.

The rhythmic drums of the enemy made it feel as if all realms, living and dead, were marching against you. The ground quivered. The darkness of the night had been expelled by their fires. Endless rows of enemies were approaching. Their troops, small and large creatures of grotesque nature, reached all the way back to the horizon.

Their numbers would do them no good. No more than a few thousand could climb the hill side by side and then … once they ascended in smaller numbers, they would learn to break against you.

Today, it was easy to lie to yourself.

Your wolf senses extended behind you, while still looking at the approaching enemy. By now they had again halved the distance to the foot of the hill – soon they would start climbing upwards.

As you let your mind roam, you felt for the minds of the men behind you. There was some courage still. They front rows were experienced and strong, the bravery of past days having retained a hold on their minds from years and years of war. But you also felt fear and doubt among their minds. Just like you, many did not see a path to victory tonight. You would need a miracle to survive to sunrise.

The ground started shaking more violently, the screams of the enemy turned from unintelligible sounds to voices that you could actually discern from each other as they came closer. The rhythm of the drums was taking over your thoughts, drowning out your own heartbeat.

When you heard your brothers voice then, even you were startled. The booming voice of Valentino had often been loud enough to drown out the deafening noises of war. Today, as if his magic was more potent the more hopeless a situation was, his voice resounded over the entirety of your side of the hill. Even as far as you stood from him at this moment, you could hear his every word and felt the strength his voice gave you.

"When our fathers stood against the realms of the wild they had no such resources as we have now," Valentino shouted. Your horse turned to allow you to look behind you. Heads were rising and turning all around – even back in the eighth row they were able to hear Valentino.

"They were born as one of many … and in the end among many siblings, only few survived. My father was born the tenth sibling. Still, I call no one my uncle or aunt. Just like mine, your fathers grew up in pain and hunger and still, we know that they abandoned even what few they had, and then … be it by wisdom and strength rather than by good fortune, they drove back nature and made our land what it is today."

Courage seeped into your breast as you made for a turn again. The enemy had now reached the foot of the hill. Time was up.

Instead of stepping back, behind the safety of your fortifications and the first line of your troops, you raised your right hand instead. The other hand stayed on the neck of your mere, keeping her calm with your touch and magic.

"We, today, must live up to the standard they set: we must resist our enemies in any and every way, and try to leave for those who come after us a land that is as great as the heavens allow." Valentino's magic drowned out the fear you had been feeling just moments prior, gifting you clarity and focus. The enemy was picking up speed. The first creatures had crossed a third of the distance up, reaching inhumane speeds.

Now they were close enough for you to make out their faces. What you had thought of as beasts before, were much more human now, even if none of them looked right. Even in a cold winter night, they were almost completely naked. Their skin was pale and white, making them look like running corpses, but you saw life emanating from their eyes. Their expression was one of hate and excruciating pain. A Basques without her brother's mind magic forcing her to bravery and strength, would have lost courage at what she was seeing in their faces. Where you had fought against humans dozens of times in the past, these creatures looked like beasts today. Glyphs, you had never seen before, were carved into their skins, most still bloody, some infected, others burned into their flesh.

While many of the attackers still looked human to you, a significant part of them were different; either taller and wider than should be possible, or smaller and faster. Those that were making up the first wave where mostly the smaller ones, who had broken free of the rows behind them and had crossed two thirds of the distance to your fortifications already.

When the first of the monsters stepped over an imaginary line, you let your right-hand drop. Finally, you turned your horse around to fall back, as volley after volley of arrows were shot out downwards against the enemy.

Your line of defense was two-thousand men wide and eight rows deep. While those at the front had enough spears, those behind the eighth row, shooting out the arrows, didn't have enough bows. Only a hundred of them stretched out over the entirety of your defenses.

"Today, we will slaughter them to the last man," Valentino shouted.

Their first line finally reached your fortifications, when you had fallen back to a more secure position behind your last row. The enemy was forced to split up into smaller groups and poured into your defenses: "Hold the line! I command you to hold the line! Shields up!"

The first impact happened simultaneously across the hill as thousands of creatures crashed against your men.

"Shields! I said shields, damnit!" You screamed as you rode behind the eighth row, trying to look for breaches in your troops. And as if the heavens had consented to one single miracle, your men held the line. You screamed: "Spears! Nail them down! Stop them!" Your voice was but a fraction of what your brother commanded, but it seemed to be enough. The first row slowed the onslaught of mass and your second row started pushing against the first, raining down their spears on the enemy. First blood was yours.

"First row, shield the man to your left! Hold the line!"

You rode back to the center of your troops, the fourth to eighth line making space for your horse. Every warrior on the first row was half guarding himself and half defending the man to his left with their shields. The shields pushed against each other, strengthening their defenses. Even so, it was clear that the equipment hadn't been made with this tactic in mind; two of your first line were taken out by a group of small human shaped monsters. If whatever the enemy did, transformed their people into these creatures, then those you saw before you had to be almost near the completion of what they were trying to create. They were short and pale, so thin that their bones popped out of their white skins. Most were carrying short blades, some used their immensely long fingers and claws to cut the men down. They had dome-shaped heads with long, crooked noses, pointed ears and completely hairless bodies. Whatever these creatures had been before, the glyphs on their skins had turned them into monsters.

Before anyone could react another two of your men fell right next to the first pair and suddenly a breach was created in your frontline.

"Take the shields of the fallen!" You shouted as you raised your bow and shot out a rapid set of arrows to win the men some time. "Up with the shields! Up with the spears! Fight! I command you to fight!"

A moment later, without the need of calling her, Lobo pushed herself by your side and through the rows of defense. When the Small-Creatures jumped in to the breach, she was already there. The blood you tasted through her, pushed you deeper into battle trance. "Kill them! Attack! Attack! Close the line!"

The enemy didn't back down, even when facing the monster that Lobo had become, but with so much attention and pushback from your side, you were able to close the breach and regain your old posture in the end.

"Shields up! Spears!"

The Small-Creatures fell by the dozens, then by the hundreds to your second row's spears and your first row's shields and swords. Every time a shield-bearer died, the warrior behind him took his shield and sword from the ground, closing the line of defense with a fresh body. You were still holding the upper hill, causing any fallen soldier or dead monster to roll down, slowing the following attackers down. Lobo, still fighting near the front, sent you a picture of what was about to happen moments before it became reality.

"First row, Shields! Second row, push! Second wave incoming!" This time, your voice felt louder, only later would you realize that Lobo had started imitating your brothers magic, pushing your words into the minds of your troops.

The change happened so fast, that your troops weren't able to keep up. While the early attackers had been fast and agile, the men following those were larger and stronger. Most of them looked still human, but those that didn't had grown to extreme proportions, towering over the largest of your own men by a wide margin. As one, they smashed into your first line … annihilating your flanks position.

"Hold! Regain ground!" You shouted, but as soon as the first row broke, the second and third line started falling back. In as much as a few moments, room had been created that hadn't been available to your enemy before. It took you only a moment to see that the change of momentum had happened on all segments of the hill. Your army was breaking apart.

"Warriors! Retake the shields," your screams reached their ear, but it didn't reach their hearts. Soon you had lost the upper hill, as your troops started retreating while fighting, the courage reverted to fear and doubt. The enemy - Human, Small-Creature and Large-Creature alike – pushed forwards, slaughtering many of your first row, killing as many as you had of their first wave.

'Legends' your father had once said, 'are created only when facing peril, a mortal cannot possibly combat.' You remembered him and his strong hand on your head, as he taught you and Valentino a lesson, that would become very dear to your brothers' heart. 'Once you face such a peril, rejoice, my children. For you are about to become a Myth of old.'

And as if he had remembered that one moment in your childhood, Valentino spoke again. His voice drowning out all sounds of war: "On the left a Sea encloses you, without you possessing even a single ship for escape." His voice was so loud that you could not hear the screams around you anymore. His magic overshadowed yours, as it burned brighter inside you as you had ever felt anything in your life.

"There is a river to your right, taking you the possibility to cross it and run. Behind you, your fathers and mothers … your sons and daughters … prepare to throw their everything into this fight."

You looked for the troops to your right, trying to find Valentino, only to find him where his first row should have stood. They had broken and fallen back just like your left flank, but he was at the front, fighting on his own. His horse lay dead and broken behind him, as he swept through the enemy, his sword glowing as bright as the sun, moving faster than you had ever seen him move before.

"My brothers and sisters, trust the man to your left and the woman to your right; for today there is only the way forward."

Courage overcame you again. You grabbed the spear that was mounted to the side of your mere and rode forward, into the enemy. Your spear hit flesh, your mouth filled with blood as Lobo moved by your side.

"Warriors, where you have first met the enemy on the frontline, there you most go back! Today, you must conquer or die! And the same desperate need which has imposed you to fall back, which imposed you to survive … you will take and march forward! Today we will be victorious and take the lives even from the immortal gods and these creatures of the underworld!"

You fought on your own. There was a monster as tall as your horse before you, he fell by your spear and magic. Then a smaller creature jumped you, tried to drag you down; your dagger cut his throat. A man to the right, then a woman and a woman again died to your fury as you covered the runes on their skin with blood.

Soon, you did not need to desperately hold on against the mass of enemies anymore. Instead your horse was walking forward, step by step. Only then did you realize that there were warriors by your side. They picked up their shields, they took on swords and spears of the fallen and they joined you, pushing against the enemy to your left and right. Step after step, did you push them back together, leaving a trail of corpses behind. You climbed over both, creature and human, naked corpses with carved skins and those of your side without.

Your troops pushed back again and again and were able to buy an advance at walking pace with a steep price in blood. Soon you were able to get back to the top of the hill and finally started pushing down again, as the enemy broke against your shields.

"Shields!" You screamed, now amidst the second row, using your reach to strike from there. "Push them behind the fortification!"

You made to stab one of the large creatures with your spear, when you saw him flinch back as if in pain. Then another creature flinched, this time a bit down the hill. Only when the third stone hit someone before you, did you realize what was happening; the children and elderly had finally arrived in full forces. They were ordered to build slings and gather stones to throw them from behind the last row. Now, they numbered almost seven thousand fresh forces.

With additional support in your back, you were able to further advance at nearly a walking pace, maintaining formation throughout. The opposing side starting to collide.

As they were pushed back farther, their lines thinned out. The wooden fortifications were still standing, splitting them up as they passed between them. Your advance held together solely by the valor of the men in the front line, whilst those in the rear maintained forward pressure on the front ranks. The struggle had become a pushing match between men and beast, and driven to new heights by the magic of your brother, men were winning this duel.

As your warriors advanced, the pushing match pressed both sides so close together that your shield-bearers were able to maim their first lines with quick stabbings of their short swords. The pressure from behind kept the enemy from stepping back as their own rows kept pushing forward as well, stopping them from withdrawing or retreating. This tactic, your brother Isaac had invented, resulted in the highest number of causalities you had ever seen. By now, thousands of corpses were blocking their march upwards. In matters of losses, both sides were on equal footing. Still, it was not enough. You needed to win with the warriors that made up your first few rows. With every row that followed, the men and women were more inexperienced and fragile. This right now was the strongest force you could bring to the battle. You needed to make it count.

"Spears-…" you began to shout, only to halt when a pressure went through the front rows. None of the warriors around you seemed to notice. Then, as if a single body, the formation of the enemy changed in less than a breath.

There had been no command, no signal, no change in drum rhythm, but as one, the creatures changed directions. Stopping their senseless frontal assault, that was causing them too many losses, they suddenly pushed diagonally, coming from your right and pushing you backwards to the left.

"Hold the line," you heard Valentino shout, as he realized what was happening, but it was too late. Almost in unison, your front row fell apart a second time.

You tried to fight back, force your frontline to reform, but it was without any merit. The men were breaking again. The first time had costed you hundreds, if not thousands of warriors. You would not survive another such loss.

Were you a bit more like Isaac, you would have realized what was happening the moment you saw the shift in the direction of their momentum. If you had more of Antes in you, by now you would already be organizing a change in tactics on your side to minimize the damages. But you were neither of them, not as gifted intellectually, even if most of your magical prowess was of the mind arts.

In the end, you lost valuable time, as your forces were pushed upwards and back to the top of the hill; your men scrambling back to stay alive.

Your initial tactic had been an ingenious one. Each individual warrior carried his shield on his left arm, protecting not only himself but also the soldier to the left. This meant that they could bundle their strengths and have enough room to use their swords on the enemy.

Only now, that you were rethinking the basics of your tactics, were you able to realize what why their change in direction was so effective. The enemy had stopped the frontal assault and had begun a diagonal attack into your troops; like this a shield would tend to drift to the left, pushing and hindering the man that they would usually protect. As such your men were suddenly not only unprotected but were even hindering each other from using their swords freely – with a simple change in direction, they had destroyed your advance and your hope of surviving the night.

You fell back with your horse and rode up the hill to its top. Thousands were already dead on your side. Behind your rows there were hundreds of corpses, more were lined up between them and the fortifications and down the hill, the largest quantity of them were serving their last honoring deed, hindering those climbing the hill. While their men and beasts were stronger than yours, you until a moment ago had the advantage in tactics and grounds. Somehow you had lost that advantage in a matter of moments.

You turned your horse again, looking around frantically for a solution. A miracle … something to stop the incoming defeat that now seemed inevitable.

Breath in.

To your left and right, men and women were falling back again, losing all ground that you had regained with flesh and bone.

Breath out.

Time passed by slower and slower, as your magic pushed outwards to a level that you had never reached before

Breath in.

You felt your brother's touch on you. Valentino's magic was still holding the lines together, strengthening your men and allowing you to feel your magic in a way that had never been possible before.

Breath out.

There was other magic as well. You had never felt Isaac's magic, nor Antes' gift before. Right now, you did. It felt calming and soothing. Even if unknown to your senses, they felt familiar to your mind.

Breath in.

You remembered your father's strong hand on your head, as Valentino laughed next to you.

Breath out.

As time slowed, you felt something else in the air. Your eyes followed the pained expression of a woman, running past you. Her intestines were falling out of her body, as she clutched on to them. She was screaming something, but her words were slow and hard to follow. Blood squirted out between her fingers. You could follow its slow movement through the air.

Breath in.

All sound disappeared. Her movement stopped as well, as everything around you came to a halt. An arrow was shooting by, a foot from your face, frozen in space. You didn't mind it. There, to your front; one of the smaller creatures of the enemy, an ugly little beast, had thrown itself on a boy, no older than fifteen winters and was sinking its claws into that boy's neck as he tried to crawl back away from the monster.

You ignored the boy and focused on the Goblin instead. There was no question as to what its name was, as the glyph's magic spoke to you. Suddenly, a thousand chattering voices surrounded you. Some were Goblin, others Human, others Troll. The names came to you naturally as you gazed deeper into the glyphs. The connection between the tens of thousands of creatures was open to you and you followed it.

You were not on the Hill of Isaac anymore; both your body and the horse you were sitting one vanished as you appeared in the mind of the centerpiece.

He, who was called the Centerpiece, was a tall man, going by the feeling of his body and muscles, he had never felt hunger in his life before. Frozen in time, he was looking down at a woman. She was thin, her skin pale and dirty. Her mouth was open in the midst of a scream as she was being forced to kneel by two Goblins pushing her down. The man, whose eyes you were looking through, held a long knife in his hand. There was blood on the blade and all around the ground the woman was kneeling on. She was going to be sacrificed next as a corps was already being carried away to the left. To the right other captives were being dragged into the large circle you were currently in; a circle of repeating death.

While you did not know the magic, you understood the intent. Here, the Glyphs were holding the construct together. They were influencing body and mind of the enemy troops, thousands and thousands of minds connected and controlled by this. And this man - the Centerpiece - was giving the commands. You felt the surge of power running through his veins. His mind was far gone, no resemblance of anything human was left.

You felt another connection behind his, as if even he, who held the sword at the very center of this intricate structure, was captive to someone higher – but the connection was faint and far.

Instead of following the connection, you simply destroyed his mind.

Breath out.

You were back in your body as an arrow flew by your head, to hit a small Troll in the eye that had breached the last remnants of a first row. The woman by your side, fell to the ground, still trying to push her intestines back into her body. She was screaming in agony.

This time, you felt calm. Valentino's magic was not affecting you anymore, but there was no fear left inside your mind. Lobo was looking up at you attentively, as you reached for the minds of your brothers.

'Their control over the beasts, has been broken', you said, doing something that you had never been able to achieve before. You felt their thoughts resonating to your words. There was shock, some fear and … pride. 'They will break if we push again.'

Even if the magic of minds was a domain that Valentino had dabbled in, it fell to Isaac to first establish himself inside your connection. Soon he spoke as you did before.

'Make the men split up into lines of twenty-four. Let them create enough room between those units for one of the large creatures to walk through.'

He did not explain himself, did not tell you why; because he knew that you had shared enough battles together to understand instinctively.

"Men, take back position!" You screamed out at the same time as Valentino shouted: "Reform! Their attack has been broken! Form lines of two dozen and make space between the groups! Use spears and swords for all those that fall in between the groups!"

Your words came true. Soon enough the enemy stumbled back as if in pain. The Centerpiece of their magic had been killed moments prior. Whatever their blood-sacrifices had allowed, losing its master made it play havoc.

"He who gave you life, today demands you to return," you shouted as Valentino's magic interlocked with yours, enabling you to his gift as well. Your voice reached every man on the hill. Then the both of you started to speak as union. To your left and right men and women were regrouping. "If you feel the need to die on this day, remember the example of your fathers who conquered the realms of nature from beasts like this and whose names are inscribed in the Heavens."

Valentino's and your magic reached out, encompassing the entire battlefield. Men and women were regaining their strength a third time as they pushed forward, killing in their wake and then finally down the hill again. The spears came down, slaughtering the still sluggish enemy.

Antes and Isaac spoke with you as well at last: "We are amongst you at this time, in the midst and heat of the battle, to live or die with you all; to lay down, for our family, for our land, and for our people, our honor and our blood. You, with us will die in dignity as you slay the enemies and sink the world in blood!"

You were amongst the first line, even when after falling off your horse, did you keep fighting; you fought on the ground and crawled back upwards to push against the shields as well, as you killed beast after beast.

"They will die with us!"

The killing went on for so long that the hard ground below, turned into bloody mud. After hours of fighting, there were twenty thousand dead on each side. The hill was soon covered in mountains of corpses. Streams of blood turned the battleground into a river of flesh and mud. Only, when you had forgotten how many you had killed yourself, and how many there were still to kill, a ray of sunshine broke through the dark clouds in the horizon.

The sun was rising; you had survived one more night, against all adversaries and challenges. You were holding and winning. You could survive, make your land secure once again, raise children and crops alike and go back to cultivating the surrounding wild-lands.

Never came the moment for you to smile.

In the end, you were the first to see it. Your eyes fell on them as soon as they moved out. Only then, did you realize that you had never once, in this entire night, asked yourself why they weren't joining the fight.

'Once you face such a peril, rejoice, my children. For you are about to become a Myth of old,' your father had said.

"Then I will rejoice," you whispered, as the fight came to a halt in front of you. The ground moved once, making warrior and beast alike, look back down the hill.

The ground moved again, then again, and then … started shaking.

"For there has never been a greater peril," you said as you saw a hundred giants make their way up the hill.





Something is stirring your soul, making it see things that weren't there before.

[ ] Magic Sense I – You remember feeling the magic of your brothers. There was warmth and familiarity. Underneath your senses there had been something else, waiting to wake. It would allow you to feel that, what is always around and inside you. You have felt Sally-Ann's magic once before, because it was so vibrant and powerful. Now, you will start your journey to develop your ability to sense all magic.

[ ] Voice of things I – This is something that you can not explain, nor control. At times, you hear [sense] [feel] [taste] something that lays underneath the fabrics of reality. There is meaning hidden in it, but you do not know what it entails. Objects and beings alike can at times start this ability of yours and gift you insights that you would otherwise never have.




Six-hour Moratorium! As always, please take time to discuss the chapter and the vote first.