barrayar | I am junking up this beautiful community with this junk

[ What is that obscurity? Miles picks at it idly, not liking it much, but also trusting Gregor above and beyond anything else. Gregor's keeping something from him. All right, he probably has a good reason for it. File it away with everything else and move on.

Because the main point is a hell of a big one. Miles isn't precisely surprised to hear Mark is an assassin - of course he would be if he expected to show up and pretend to be Miles Vorkosigan - but his answer is immediate and clear, like the ringing of a bell. Gregor has to ask?

He's my brother regardless. Of course I want him. Fierce and bright, a smaller version of the pillar of fire usually reserved for Gregor. It fades a bit faster, though, shrouded by worry. What does he want? Because that, to Miles, is the most important thing. Vitally important. He's decided to protect and defend this little sibling of his to the ends of the nexus, but he also desperately understands the need to do it his own way. Miles always has, after all. He would chafe to be protected, belligerently demand back his dangers if necessary. ]

[Gregor had been expecting Miles to pick up on the fact that there's something else afoot here (of course Gregor doesn't actually have to ask; that's why he'd done all this), and he'd also expected him to go along with it anyway. But witnessing him do it sends a short burst of affection through him, quickly muffled as he focuses again. It's not about him, or even Miles. Not right now.

I'm glad you feel that way, because I've just taken him as a liege-sworn, and secured his oath not to attack anyone. Yes, unbreakable. So we're quite stuck with him. Gregor sounds remarkably cheerful about that, even smug.

It fades to seriousness as he gently shuffles his newest subject's presence forward, clearing the murky obscurity between the two of them and letting their feelings go both ways, just faintly, just in traces, but enough to feel each other undeniably.

You should ask him yourself.]

[ The clone (Mark Pierre?) isn't ready for that sudden push forward into the light. He feels the sudden urge to hiss, like an opossum prodded and displeased by rough treatment, or like some hideous toothy vampire shrinking back from the daybreak. He doesn't know whether he feels like a feral beast or like a grubby boy being shuffled forward for inspection. Here I am, big brother. Da. Whatever you are. He shoves down all those stupid thoughts and tries to be as blank and unreadable as possible when he opens himself up for Vorkosigan's inspection. Miles' inspection...

He's my brother. Of course I want him. He wants to laugh himself silly. Or be sick. Or cry. All this time, all that scrutiny, and they never even knew that Lord Vorkosigan was insane. All this time, hating him - and he still hates him, he thinks, he still hates Miles Vorkosigan - and still the man's love is kindled quicker than an electrical fire. Even knowing what the clone was made for. Even knowing what he was sent for.

He has the stupidest urge to suddenly hide behind Gregor. He's small enough. He can fit in the Emperor's shadow. But...even so, he reaches out, and he sends a hesitant, awkward, shaky Hello. ]

[ The response from Miles is nothing at all like an inspection. Surprise - a thin wail of betrayal, damn it Gregor - while simultaneously applauding the Emperor's verve and skill. That's one way to upend the situation. Miles would have preferred his inside-out game of layers inside layers, but this ... cuts to the heart, doesn't it. Miles Vorkosigan and his little brother, before each other, working things out.

Or. Well. They're face to face, at least; that's a start. Miles, in contrast to Gregor - surely in contrast to Mark as well - is loud and brilliant and impossible to ignore. Even going a bit dimmer and cautious here, he's a blinding force of nature before anything else. He has to remind himself not to trample this thing before it's even started. Bracing himself mentally against Gregor - a faint, tiny thread of jealousy, perhaps so small that only Gregor can sense it - he brings himself to bear on Mark. Hello, he says rather breezily. Welcome to the Barrayaran Telepathic Tightbeam Network. Did Gregor teach you how to shield? Surely he did - I'm told I'm rather loud. And fast, everything tumbling out in one manic flare of information. ]

[His inside-out game of layers was probably going to be the death of all involved, perhaps literally, so Gregor has no remorse about taking matters into his own hands.

He feels like a fly on the wall for this conversation, honestly, a little embarrassed to be intruding, as he had when Miles had had his touching exchange with Aral after the treason charge. But this can't happen without him facilitating it (they're not sworn to each other) and furthermore, Gregor can feel that urge in Mark (?) to hide behind him. That twinge of jealousy gets noted to be brought up later; he accepts Miles's weight and tries to blunt some of the force of personality that attempts to flow through. He doesn't mind it but he is well aware everyone else in existence finds Miles a lot to swallow all at once.

But otherwise... he finds himself reluctant to interfere with this meeting in any way, the first honest one, and sits back quietly.]

[ The clone wants to crumble into pieces right then and there. Miles is no bigger than he is physically, but his mental presence is - enormous. Thundering. Manic, no surprise there, all the psych profiles had identified Vorkosigan as a manic-depressive, a thing that had never been easy for the clone to copy when all he wanted to do was shrink down into nothing and stay silent...And already he's being identified as Mark. The name just given to him without question when he hasn't even decided if he likes it or wants it. Already chattering at him like they're old friends, catching up after a long absence. Hey old chum, did you hear, did you know, welcome home... As though he even knows where home is.

The effect is both dazzling and painful. Like a light being shone directly into someone's eyes when they've adjusted to the dark. And so the clone does the only rational thing, driven by one part a desire to demonstrate, one part defiance, and one part a need for a moment to regroup: he shuts off the connection, firmly and completely, a door being closed firmly. But not slamming shut. It's not desperate, but deliberate. ]

[ Oops.

Good fucking job Miles, you ruined it. The rejection kind of stings, in fact, like an indirect hit on a very old wound. (Nothing like the jagged raw edges he gets from other kinds, but - instantly sore.) But at the same time he kind of deserved it, didn't he? So much for just trying to run over the situation and sort out the details later.

He sighs in frustration for a moment, mostly directed inward. Less noisy, dammit, less overbearing ... He hates making himself any smaller, mentally OR physically, but he tries to tone himself down. For his brother's sake. (It's so strange having to do that compared with the utter freedom he has with Gregor, just for starters.)

It takes all of his somewhat drained reserve of patience to just wait for a moment, to stare at his brother's door and just be there when it reopens again. If it reopens again.

(And in the meantime, another private wail to Gregor: I really am too loud.) ]

[No, well, yes, probably, but he seems to just do that, Gregor explains to him, apparently sanguine about this turn of affairs if a little regretful. He did it with me, too, so it's not just you. He's very confused, and you're who he was supposed to be. I'd lock you out, too.

Hell, it was probably terrifying; he'd felt that well of fear as deep as Miles's self-image issues, but Gregor isn't going to pass secrets in any direction. He tries to give Miles some of his patience laced with the now familiar current of his acceptance.

And try not to press him on being a Vorkosigan, or even named Mark. It's... a lot for now. One thing at a time, okay?]

[ It does, of course, reopen again. It takes an undoubtedly agonizing minute, but it does reopen. And the clone's mental presence comes out again - still wary, but better. Not shrinking, not looking for a place to hide. Those few moments had let him come to terms with the things he'd overheard from Miles' mind, and had let him adjust. He'd refound his footing. A bit. He's as balanced as he ever is.

So, firmly unbalanced. Great.

This time, he takes firm control of the conversation. He pushes back by asserting himself the only way he knows how. He makes an offering of a part of his identity - but attaches to it worth, too. Here. I can offer you things. I'm not a stray you're taking in. I'm a warrior in my own right. You want intelligence on the plot, don't you? We know you work for ImpSec. Obviously. Gregor didn't care so much, but you'll want this intel. ]

[ I didn't call him Mark, is Miles' peevish reply. (But he had begun referring to his brother as Mark - he tamps down on the urge immediately, running brother through with virulent intensity instead.) And you didn't lock me out. We mutually had to take a step back, that's all. He clings to that for a moment, to soothe his own sore issues.

When M - his brother reappears, he's quiet. Receptive. Nearly gentle. His flames tamped down to a candle, bright and cheerful.

He wants to do the ImpSec angle? Okay, sure. He's curious anyway, interest brightening him. How did all this come about? Tell me then. What were you trying to do? ]

[ Brother isn't perfect, but it's better. It's still an identity pushed on him, but it's one that's a bit less...firm. He feels as though he has a little more control. Brother is the way that Miles sees him, but it's not the way that he has to see himself. Mark is something that sticks to him. It's a thing he has to call himself. He's not ready to give up quite that much control yet.

It helps to have something to talk about that doesn't involve emotions. Because it doesn't have to involve emotions. His report on this matter can stick exclusively to the facts and nothing more. And - it's useful.

And maybe it'll be horrific enough to kill Miles Vorkosigan's love here and now. Throat-cut like an infant fallen prey to Barrayaran prejudices.

Destabilization of Barrayar in order to enable another Komarran rebellion. This one successful. I was to eliminate you and return to Barrayar after your death, after which I would eliminate your father and the Emperor. When I took the throne, I'd withdraw all Barrayaran troops from Komarr. Freedom for their planet. I can give details on the conspirators in the plot. Bases they kept, sources of their funding. I wasn't supposed to know those last details, they weren't supposed to be my business, but I managed to find them out. The last is asserted with a little fierce wave of pride. ]

[ It's all Miles can do not to laugh. First because that touch of pride should not be messed with, he feels, and secondly because it's really not funny, except in a blackly humorous way. He and his family would die. Gregor would die. And finally his little brother would die too, as the Barrayaran Imperium would eat him alive before tearing itself apart too. It's a terrible scenario. Hideous.

And yet - Miles can only feel morbid fascination working it out. The wheels in his head turn visibly as he lays out the problem, working it through to its conclusion.

You realize that would kill all of us, Komarr included? Even assuming you were able to get on the throne - my god. You'd be torn apart in a matter of days. And then, to make it less like he's doubting his brother (because really, he isn't), he adds: I'd be torn apart in a matter of days if I tried. Chaos to screen another move by the Komarrans, at best. The only thing anyone in the line of the succession really wants is for Gregor to live forever. Or, failing that, have approximately ten children. ]

[There's a strong burst of dark amusement, the sort of gallows humor that leads one to telling jokes to their own hanging, overshadowed only by Gregor's own sallow incredulity. Not that they'd have a plan like this, but just at the thought that it could work.

All I do is field queries about when I'm reproducing, he agrees, sounding dry as the desert. As for Miles... God. I wish it worked that way. He's almost been executed once already because someone came up with some shady evidence that he was trying to stage a try for the throne. One whiff of it and you'd be dead and no one'd check your bones, or care. Otherwise I'd have foisted this snake pit off on Ivan years ago.

I also note there was no provision for Cetaganda in this plan-- or was there? It's the actual Emperor's sense of inevitable implications, that inexorable push toward politics. There's a sense of a million variables shuffling themselves in the back of his brain that Gregor has to stifle.]

[ Allies. That was the original plan. To bottleneck the wormhole so that none of the impending civil war would spill over to Komarr. There's a grimness in his full awareness that a civil war would ensue. That was part of the plan, after all. Destabilize the planet. Tear it to pieces. Revenge against an entire world for the blood they'd shed on Komarr, in Solstice. The clone thinks suddenly of that bubble of memory Gregor had shared with him, the people who'd died to put him on the throne, and thinks of the flash of hazy memory of the normal people, the people in the country, in the Dendarii Mountains, and feels deeply uncomfortable.

To suppress that, he focuses on the other half: But that was the plan. That doesn't mean that's how it was going to go. There's nothing to say that I couldn't outlast you, he thinks fiercely at his progenitor. Maybe you'd get torn apart. That doesn't mean I would.

And then he turns his attention briefly to the Emperor. The feeling he extends to him is wordless, but...sincere. He didn't really want the throne. Doesn't. But if he was going to be sat down hard on that camp stool, then he was going to do a good job of it. Everyone assumed - and still assumes - that he'd get eaten alive. But he's smarter than any of them give credit for. ]

[ That's not quite what I meant. Miles, glad for the cue from Gregor, is happy to pick up the thread. Cetaganda would pounce instantly. The revolution would be short-lived at best. As for whether his brother would be a better emperor than Miles, well ... He doesn't particularly doubt that. Miles is fairly certain that small, flightless birds would make better Emperors than Miles Vorkosigan would. He's loyal, utterly, but too prone to havering off on crazy capers at this point in in his life. And the Naismith thing ...

Unfortunately, he's not sure his brother would escape those handicaps either. No, you're right, he admits. But I doubt your captors planned for much more than chaos. Expected less. And then: Play me all you like, but mind that you don't get terribly burned in the process. ]

[Komarran dissidents never seem to realize that in order for Cetaganda to stage an invasion of Barrayar, they have to have Komarr first, Gregor puts in grimly. It wouldn't go well for Komarr.

A pause, before he says more softly, directly to his new subject, I've no doubt you'd attempt to rule well. But it has nothing to do with smarts. The Imperium is-- well. You're not so different from me, I think; imagine it this way.

Gregor flashes an image of the Council of Counts in full session, filled to the brim with people, and he's sitting on the camp stool in the direct middle on a dais, looking out at all the rest. Every single eye is fixed on him, and he cannot show any weakness, cannot twitch, cannot put one syllable out of order or he will create a crack others can exploit against him.

It's that, all the time.]

[ Your captors. The clone is uneasy with that description. He pushes down his thoughts about it. Instead he focuses on Gregor. And he admits, grudgingly - I didn't say that I wanted it. Just that I wouldn't die as easily as that. I've survived a lot.

But that brushes too closely to things charged with emotion. And emotion is something he doesn't want to bleed over. So instead, he continues on. Chaos is all they really needed. Then the Komarrans would rise up. They've been so mistreated for so many years, and they're already on the brink of it... Though that's rhetoric that's lost its teeth since the clone has been allowed access to news sources. There's not even a hint of that. But even if they didn't, I think Ser Galen would be content with just seeing Barrayar hurt. And Aral Vorkosigan. ]

[ Galen, Galen ... the name rings a bell rather clearly, although he can't picture the man. His father would surely know instantly, and look both grave and ill at the same time.

<I think you are right. It would hurt my father very keenly - destroy him, multiple times over. If he was permitted to live to see it.

He chills, faintly, to consider it in that light. ]

[Ah. A corresponding note of bleak satisfaction. This motive makes much more sense.

Indeed, Gregor is chilled to imagine that happening to Aral, too, enough so to take the familiar depressed sting out of being reminded that a large subsection of his people are unhappy with his rule.

Galen was a major figure in the Komarran Revolt that took place when I was nine. I'm not surprised you don't remember it, Miles. Your father had to deal with it directly.]

[ A note of confirmation, carefully neutral.

His sister, Rebecca Galen, was killed on Aral Vorkosigan's orders.

Better that than touching the worry and love for the Butcher radiating off the both of them. ]

[ Ah. That's the name he was looking for; instant recognition there.

And then, an abrupt swirl of uncertainty. His instinctive response to that, of course, is to repeat that his father ordered no such thing, that it was a subordinate, his father would never do that for so many reasons - but they're trying not to sour this thing before it starts, dammit. Miles won't let the issue be him. Stubbornness to make this work overtakes stubbornness to his father's honor, temporarily.

Well, mostly. He's here, you know. And the undercurrent of warning: don't you dare say that to his face. ]

[Here in my head, too, Gregor reluctantly admits, in the interests of honesty. I'm holding the link closed, don't worry.

Would you... prefer to deal with that later? You've some gross misconceptions about him but I thought you might have had enough of my talking at you for one night.

Wry self-awareness in that.]

[ The fear returns, boiling out from where it was just dormant. Never defeated, just sleeping. He is terrified at the prospect. The stories about his progenitor were bad; the stories about the Emperor were, too. They're nothing compared to the stories of Aral Vorkosigan.

He'd kill me. ]

[ Ha. Considering how close Aral was to killing Miles ... No, no. He's already tried. You should be quite safe. All sardonic, all self-deprecating - Miles getting to enjoy breaking a few bones by falling down the hole he'd dug for himself. But that probably isn't comforting, he realizes, so he follows it up with: He'll listen to Gregor and me. We'll just warn him. ]

[Gregor instantly sends a wordless chiding at Miles for playing into his brother's fears.

Don't be ridiculous, Aral Vorkosigan would sooner fall on his sword than turn a hand against his own son. He's no stomach for it. Half the genius of you as an assassin is even if he knew who you were, he'd be hard-pressed to fight you.

But yes, we will talk to him, so if the character testimony doesn't assure you, let that do it. Anyway, you should really speak to Lady Vorkosigan first. There's no such complications there, are there? She's so Betan.]

I am junking up this beautiful community with this junk

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