View Flat HTML
View Metadata
Search Post
Time goes by. Linya, who already quietly turned nineteen, turns twenty. She collects an accelerated master's degree in neuroscience and starts corresponding with various people on the subject.
Pens spread out; the next time Miles sees Elli he gets a white standard-model pen she bought him on Escobar. She has one too; it's silver. She loves it and thanks him for recommending it to her. (She has bought a whole boxful to unload at a markup on the next planet or station she comes to that doesn't have them yet, but doesn't explicitly mention this in case he objects to her cutting into Lady Vorkosigan's margins.)
Miles also has one actual courier mission in there, just escorting a diplomatic pouch from Pol back home, to pad his service record for the less-cleared eye.
There is a visit to a clinic to collect and mystically join gametes, and Linya collects the resulting assembly in data format for editing. She does the grey eyes first and estimates that if she doesn't particularly hurry she'll have a Little Aral What-the-Heck-Should-His-Middle-Name-Be all ready to put in a replicator in two or three years, though she can accelerate that considerably if something comes up urgently requiring the presence of Little Aral sooner rather than later.
And then Miles gets sent off again and is gone for a very long time.
+ Show First Post
isthisart
"I am, actually, a superior of yours, Lieutenant Vorkosigan," observes Galeni.
thisvorlunatic
...whoops.
"Of course, sir," says Miles, trying to tamp down his reflexive singsong chirp into a grave neutrality. "What are my orders?"
"Of course, sir," says Miles, trying to tamp down his reflexive singsong chirp into a grave neutrality. "What are my orders?"
"While we all await clarification," Galeni sighs, "I suppose I'll have to add you to my staff. Third assistant military attaché."
thisvorlunatic
"Perfect, thank you, sir. Admiral Naismith could use a break from existing at the moment. The Cetagandans put a price on his head after he embarrassed them at Dagoola. I've had two close calls since."
"...Are you joking?"
thisvorlunatic
"I don't find four dead and sixteen wounded soldiers under my command amusing in the slightest," says Miles.
"In that case, you are also confined to the Embassy compound."
thisvorlunatic
Right. Miles sighs. "Yes, sir. As long as I can make Commander Quinn my go-between to the Dendarii."
"Which you require because...?"
thisvorlunatic
"Because they're my people, sir. Look, all I really need before Admiral Naismith departs into the woodwork is to pay some bills. I can wrap up this mission as soon as I deliver the money they're expecting."
"Assistance with all due speed," muses Galeni. "Right. And how much do they require?"
"Lieutenant. That is more than ten times the operating budget of this entire embassy for a year. And even more dramatically beyond the means of this department!"
thisvorlunatic
"I have spreadsheets," Miles says weakly. "Operating expenses for more than six months - five thousand personnel in eleven ships - food, fuel, repairs, clothing, medical expenses, ammunition, equipment losses, not to mention the all-important payroll. I know it's a lot, sir, but they need it."
"I don't doubt it. But the funds don't exist here. Sector Security Headquarters is going to have to handle this one. I will arrange to drop your problems in their somewhat roomier laps as soon as possible. Excuse me for a minute, Lieutenant." And he gets up and leaves Miles and Elli alone in the room.
spacetobreathe
"So what's a Komarran's magical powers that stop you in your tracks on your way to - Naismithing people?" wonders Elli in a low voice.
thisvorlunatic
"Um," says Miles. "Short version?"
He tries to assemble the shortest possible version in his head, to be sure he won't still be explaining the delicate parts when Galeni comes back.
"Once upon a time, going on thirty years ago now, Barrayar annexed the planet of Komarr for a number of very excellent reasons. You may recall that my father headed the conquest, thereby making his reputation both at home and abroad. You may or may not also recall that the latter reputation was a dramatically bloody one, after the Solstice Massacre when people got it into their heads that he'd ordered all those people killed. The Komarr occupation got messy. And then came the Komarr Revolt, which got messier still. And now time has passed and things have calmed down, and my father is at the forefront of the movement to integrate Komarr fully into the Empire. I believe his exact words on the subject are, 'Between justice and genocide there is, in the long run, no middle ground'. And of course the major avenue for advancement in the Barrayaran Empire is through the Imperial Military Service. Komarrans have been allowed in for the past eight years."
He shrugs.
"So of course any Komarran in the Service is constantly working under the shadow of their planetary origins, proving their loyalty in the same unending futile way I prove my—well, you get the picture. And as a corollary, given who my father is, if any Komarran is unlucky enough to be nearby on a day when I happen to turn up unusually dead, that Komarran is dog meat. No one will believe they didn't do it for revenge. And it won't just be that Komarran who goes down for it; it would activate buried tensions with the approximate effectiveness of a plasma bolt hitting a large wasp's nest."
Miles pauses to contemplate this mental image, then moves hastily on.
"So this poor bastard Galeni—a Komarran in the Service, a Komarran officer no less, with a post that handles Security of all things. Just about as trusted as a Komarran officer gets. And here I am with my top-secret army to illustrate the vast gap between that and the degree of trust that can be placed in the rest of us. And if he has any relatives or friends who died in any Barrayar-related event, or fought in the Komarr Revolt..." Miles spreads his hands helplessly. "The Great Man's son in fucking deed. He's got every reason to hate me, but he has to guard me like he's Koschei the Deathless and I'm the egg of his soul, and I have to shut up and let him."
He tries to assemble the shortest possible version in his head, to be sure he won't still be explaining the delicate parts when Galeni comes back.
"Once upon a time, going on thirty years ago now, Barrayar annexed the planet of Komarr for a number of very excellent reasons. You may recall that my father headed the conquest, thereby making his reputation both at home and abroad. You may or may not also recall that the latter reputation was a dramatically bloody one, after the Solstice Massacre when people got it into their heads that he'd ordered all those people killed. The Komarr occupation got messy. And then came the Komarr Revolt, which got messier still. And now time has passed and things have calmed down, and my father is at the forefront of the movement to integrate Komarr fully into the Empire. I believe his exact words on the subject are, 'Between justice and genocide there is, in the long run, no middle ground'. And of course the major avenue for advancement in the Barrayaran Empire is through the Imperial Military Service. Komarrans have been allowed in for the past eight years."
He shrugs.
"So of course any Komarran in the Service is constantly working under the shadow of their planetary origins, proving their loyalty in the same unending futile way I prove my—well, you get the picture. And as a corollary, given who my father is, if any Komarran is unlucky enough to be nearby on a day when I happen to turn up unusually dead, that Komarran is dog meat. No one will believe they didn't do it for revenge. And it won't just be that Komarran who goes down for it; it would activate buried tensions with the approximate effectiveness of a plasma bolt hitting a large wasp's nest."
Miles pauses to contemplate this mental image, then moves hastily on.
"So this poor bastard Galeni—a Komarran in the Service, a Komarran officer no less, with a post that handles Security of all things. Just about as trusted as a Komarran officer gets. And here I am with my top-secret army to illustrate the vast gap between that and the degree of trust that can be placed in the rest of us. And if he has any relatives or friends who died in any Barrayar-related event, or fought in the Komarr Revolt..." Miles spreads his hands helplessly. "The Great Man's son in fucking deed. He's got every reason to hate me, but he has to guard me like he's Koschei the Deathless and I'm the egg of his soul, and I have to shut up and let him."
spacetobreathe
"The what of his soul?" asks Elli, making an attempt to clean out one of her ears.
thisvorlunatic
"Egg. Um. Old folk legend, about a man—" a wizard in the original Earth versions, if he recalls correctly; a mutant in the variations that developed on Barrayar during the Time of Isolation "—who kept his heart or his soul or his death, take your pick, in an egg inside an unlikely layering of creatures with the outermost trapped in a box and buried under a tree, so that he could not be killed or harmed while the egg was safe. But if anybody managed to dig up the box and chase down the succession of animals and kill each one as it springs from its predecessor until they got to the egg, well, as soon as it was smashed he'd keel over on the spot."
middlingalong
And with that, the doors open, and in comes Galeni, trailing yet another lieutenant.
"- yeah, unmistakeable," he's saying. "Brilliant, absolutely, but - hi, Miles, what are you doing here?"
"- yeah, unmistakeable," he's saying. "Brilliant, absolutely, but - hi, Miles, what are you doing here?"
thisvorlunatic
...Miles puts his face in his hands and mutters very quietly, "How, God, have I sinned against You, that You would give me Ivan, here?"
With no heavenly signs forthcoming, he drops his hands and turns to face Ivan with a wry smile. "I could ask you the same question," he says at normal volume.
With no heavenly signs forthcoming, he drops his hands and turns to face Ivan with a wry smile. "I could ask you the same question," he says at normal volume.
middlingalong
"I'm second assistant military attaché. I think they assigned me here to get cultured. Earth, you know."
"Oh, is that why," says Galeni, almost inaudible.
"Anyway, how goes the life of Admiral Naismith? Getting away with it, are you?" Ivan inquires brightly.
"Oh, is that why," says Galeni, almost inaudible.
"Anyway, how goes the life of Admiral Naismith? Getting away with it, are you?" Ivan inquires brightly.
thisvorlunatic
"Just about. The Dendarii are parked in orbit right now," says Miles, because otherwise Ivan might not notice that Miles is currently in his grey-and-white Dendarii uniform and draw the appropriate conclusion.
middlingalong
"Does everyone but me know about this business -? Vorpatril, I know your Security clearance is no higher than mine!"
Ivan shrugs. "Previous encounter, all in the family." He smiles in a friendly sort of way at Elli.
"Damned Vor power network," mutters Galeni.
Ivan shrugs. "Previous encounter, all in the family." He smiles in a friendly sort of way at Elli.
"Damned Vor power network," mutters Galeni.