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Ivan is asleep when it happens, but the captain knocking on his door gets him up quick enough. "What? Where's the fire?" Ivan asks. This was supposed to be a quiet posting. Well, the posting on Earth was supposed to be quiet too, cultural, etcetera, but Xerxes is supposed to be downright boring. Ivan is not supposed to be awakened from his eight hours unexpectedly.
"Murder, not a fire. You're cousin to Lord Mark Vorkosigan, aren't you?" says the captain.
Ivan has to think for a second. "...Yes?"
"Security vid picked him up within radius of a murder. This is the first we knew of him being on the planet, but the locals want us to bring him in so they don't have to it themselves and risk mishandling a Vor lord. Seemed worth consulting you on him - the file on him's really something."
Ivan blinks. "You need to arrest Mark."
"Yes."
"...Sir. Uh, give me a while to try doing it myself. He's... I'm not positive I can succeed but I am pretty sure I can survive trying, and unless he's in a cooperative mood I'm very uncertain anybody else can say the same thing."
"He may have just killed a man."
"I'm aware. He likes me. He doesn't know you from a hole in the ground, or anybody else within fetching distance, sir. Give me his last location and a few hours? Please?"
"By yourself?"
"He wouldn't know anybody you could send with me from a hole in the ground."
The captain chews his lip. "None of your shenanigans, all right?"
"Sir, I'm not the shenanigans one, it's just contagious when m'co- my other cousin's around. I'll see if I can find him, if I find him I'll try to bring him back."
The captain eventually acquiesces. And that is why Ivan is tromping around downtown, debating whether or not to call "Mark? Mark?" like he's looking for a lost dog.
Ivan has to arrest Mark
middlingalong
middlingalong
"Your usefulness isn't in question. When you decide to be useful you accomplish it very handily, just -" Ivan waves a hand, lacking a necessary word.
unmarred
"Just, I have a very patchy sense of what people are going to think of the things I do?" he suggests.
unmarred
"I might leave the planet. I might stay nearby and just not look for you unless I hear someone's kidnapped you again."
unmarred
"I know. It might very well not happen again for years, or for the rest of your life. I still—" He breaks off, shaking his head.
middlingalong
"What in the hell did I do to deserve a deranged ghost for a devoted guardian angel?" Ivan mutters. It's probably a rhetorical question.
middlingalong
"I don't have nearly enough past crimes to account for it." He sighs. "Would it make you feel better about my safety in comparison to nothing whatever if we got lunch a couple times a week, or - something that doesn't involve ghosting around after me all the time?"
middlingalong
"Okay. And you like everything, if I remember right. Soup place in the east village on the main drag, I can't remember the name but the sign's blue? Two days from now?"
middlingalong
Ivan produces about a third of a salute sort of gesture, and turns on his heel and heads embassyward.
unmarred
Mark, naturally, ghosts away.
Two days later, around lunchtime, he can be found loitering openly in front of the soup place.
Two days later, around lunchtime, he can be found loitering openly in front of the soup place.
middlingalong
"How've you been?" Ivan pushes open the door and holds up two fingers at the hostess, who finds them a little booth.