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

Yes this is beautiful? ?

Capture. Don't kill.

You can do this, Miles, had been Ser Galen's last words to him before he'd gone silent. He'd looked so excited. You didn't often see Ser Galen looking happy, and even when he was happy it was often very hard to tell. He didn't smile, really. He went wider around the eyes, and his face got more energetic. Focused, really. And during those last words, he'd looked focused, energetic. The sort of face the clone saw on good days. Hopefully, if all of this worked, he would make a long series of good days for Ser Galen.

Or maybe he'd fail so spectacularly that the whole thing came crashing down and Galen burned with it. Hah.

The clone learned how to ride. Of course he did. Part of the training. The old playmate gets access, too, unusual access. There were some adventures that happened between these two, the Emperor and Lord Vorkosigan. Nothing spoken of, but there were oblique references. A level of trust. Maybe. Something of the sort. And so when the clone pushes for a ride out in the country, get away from the court, just spend some time talking perhaps about something that might interest the Emperor (and the Emperor seems to think that it's perhaps something involving a love life which twists in the clone's guts in a way he can't identify), there is assent. Arrangements are made. Guards are sent out with them, of course, but guards will be taken care of.

Ten miles outside the city, a rendezvous will happen. The clone leads them in that direction. And he looks over at the Emperor and says, with just the right blend of respect and familiarity, "It's good to come back to this. I've started missing it when I'm away."

He'd thrown up his breakfast this morning in terror. He's already hungry again.

Truthfully, Gregor was relieved to have a moment to just go on a brief retreat with Miles. He's waved off the guards to follow behind them at a far enough distance to keep them in sight, but not overhear their conversation. It's always relaxing to him to spend apolitical time with one of his very few unconditionally trusted confidantes, and Miles is the only one of those even somewhat close in age. Gregor has other agemates as friends, but none he can say what he's really thinking to 100% of the time without consequence.

As a result, he's quite relaxed. He's used to letting Miles lead him places and it's always a relief to be the one not in charge for once. Of course, sometimes he does assume that role even with Miles, but it's a bare minimum of the time, and he never has to apply more than a deft hand to make himself understood. Miles is not someone who responds well to heavy-handedness and Gregor has always liked that about him, admired it even. So he sits astride his horse, night-black and sable as it is with silver stitching on all the tack, with the complete unconcern for his body language that only comes from spending time with Miles.

"Really?" he muses, a subtle note of dry teasing in his voice. "Here I'm never sure you're going to come back. It's much more exciting than riding through the countryside with me. You get to really do something."

Edited 2016-01-23 17:56 (UTC)

"You certainly do things too, don't you," he answers, glancing over at the Emperor. He has...a presence. The clone wasn't really expecting that presence. Even now, when he's just talking like he would to a friend - no, when he is talking to a friend, because he's talking to Miles, not knowing that it's the death of his whole corrupt system and planet sitting uneasily astride his own horse, that it's Komarran vengeance...Even just talking to a friend, he still has an unconscious air of command and dignity. It...makes the clone just a bit envious, truth be told. How can you get so powerful that power actually hangs about you like a cloak?

You need to learn. Ser Galen wants you as Emperor. He doesn't expect you to stand at the top of the Imperium for long, but you will. You'll surprise them all. When you take Gregor's place, you'll be far more than he anticipated - more than any of them anticipated...

"Are you happy with how things have been going? Since I've been here last. It's been a long time since we've talked." Tell me, emperor, what needs to be done...

It's not strange to be asked that from Miles, and Gregor doesn't mind it from this avenue; being asked as a friend has a very different character than being asked as even a political ally. And Miles spends so much time off-planet, he doesn't blame him for wanting a quick and dirty update on the political situation, too. He's less involved but Gregor knows he still cares.

"Happy is a strong word, but, mm, pleased maybe. I'm continuing the progress on the Caravanserai that your father started," by which he means restoring it from a pit of iniquity to its current state as a shopping district, "and I've been making headway on pushing through your brilliant idea of having district peasants get a teacher's education and then return to their towns to educate the rest.

"So yes, I'm doing things as you put it, but it's all behind a desk. I'm sure you've seen more action this month than I did my whole year in service."

That's a leading statement, Gregor inviting him to tell some tale from his last excursion. Gregor is one of the vanishingly few people he can tell the whole unabridged story to, above security clearances as he is.

That is...dangerously leading. Ser Galen only just learned of Vorkosigan's double identity three months before...and the clone can't help but feel a hard curl of contempt at the bumbling incompetence that would have led to the Komarran resistance missing that. It's a large galaxy, yes, but how many four-and-a-half-foot megalomaniacs are there strolling around? Especially given the little kernels of Vorkosigan that exist in Naismith. But the short time that they've known about Naismith has meant that the clone has had less time to learn about Naismith. He doesn't know how Vorkosigan talks about those adventures. If he talks about them. Whether he gives plain reports or boasts. Whether he chatters. Whether he talks about the grim realities of war.

So the clone evades the implicit question as best he can.

"Desk work is still work," he says, and then gives a good convincing grin to the Emperor. "You just get less of a chance to stretch your legs doing it, that's all."

Now this is an odd response. The grin is all Miles, but Gregor is used to reading him, Miles no less relaxed around Gregor as Gregor is around him.

He nudges his horse over a fallen branch and casts his companion a sidelong, speculative glance. An obvious deflection around a chance to brag to a rare audience about his exploits reads as concerning, not about his identity but just about what must've happened.

"It's woefully unglamorous work, is what it is. Not that what you do isn't unglamorous at times. Did something happen, last mission? I know you don't put everything in your reports to Simon."

He doesn't know that for a fact straight from him, but he just assumes.

He doesn't want a continuation of that line of questioning. The nausea from this morning suddenly returns with a vengeance - sick acid sloshing horribly in his stomach, burning his throat. He wonders if he can kill the Emperor before the guards stun him. Or nerve-disrupt him. No, stun - they'd never risk deadly weapons around their liege. His life is worth so much - they'd die before they'd let anything happen to him.

What do you have to do, to get that sort of loyalty? What do you have to do to not be expendable? Start by being born an original, instead of a copy, I suppose...

"Have you read the report? From my last mission." Please no. Because I have no idea what the details are. Don't catch me in a lie.

But there's really only one possible answer to his question, with Gregor's wistful envy for his second life.

"Of course. It's all fascinating to me. Plus I've met a few of your Dendarii, remember? I admit I scan the casualty report to see if anyone whose name I remember is on it... Elena, for one."

That's a morbid comment but the pure truth, and Gregor tries to ease into the discussion, gentle Miles into revealing whatever it is that's bothering him. He thinks it might be easier for him to come at it sideways, assuring him that he doesn't need any of the story repeated if he doesn't wish to go into it. Just straight to the bit that he needs to get off his chest.

Fuck.

"Of course I'd let you know if anything happened to Elena." Probably...No, of course Elena Bothari-Jasek, the Barrayaran-born girl who had some connection to Vorkosigan. One of the many, many clues linking the Dendarii to the Vorkosigans, one of the many clues that the Komarrans didn't pick up on. The clone is finding it...harder, feeling contempt for them as his own fear grows.

"But really, everything that happened was there in the report. That was one where I really did include everything. Is your horse limping?"

Pay attention to anything else, get distracted...

He was a bit concerned and curious earlier, but now he's progressing straight into actively worried, Gregor frowning at him directly, eyebrows knitting. Distracting Gregor from the point is fairly futile. He'd be a supremely ineffective emperor if he were that simple to manipulate, and he's made damned sure he isn't, these days.

"Miles, that was particularly ham-handed of you. Is there some reason you don't want to tell me? You can just say so. You know I'm not going to demand it of you." He says that with a sort of duh tone in there, as if the thought of Gregor using his rank to compel answers is ludicrous and they both know it.

"I thought you might like a chance to vent, since I know you won't speak to your mother. I don't think you ever put everything that happened in the report. That's why Simon keeps sending them back with a million corrections."

He'd thought that would work. Barrayarans are obsessed with their horses. Why didn't that work? Okay. So - what if he just does say, I don't want to tell you? The Emperor says I won't demand it of you... But that's obviously a lie, right? Or not a lie - it's a trap. "Miles" says he doesn't want to cooperate, and that means anger. Cold command. The Emperor's demand that the impostor be held fast and clapped in chains to be drawn and quartered later at his leisure. Or worse. Barrayarans don't execute their enemies kindly - the only ones they treat worse are their own. And which one am I...?

"It just wasn't the spectacular success I wanted," he responds, which is neutral enough. How could the Emperor call him out on that? "Too many dead." Does Vorkosigan beat himself up? He must. He has to. "They're interesting reads, though, aren't they? Even with details edited out."

This is both the right note and... not quite right. Miles always does want spectacular successes, and he is haunted by those that are killed under his command (who isn't; Gregor knows that keenly himself) but at the same time...

It's very cavalier. Miles is only cavalier when he's hiding something, or focused on some other goal and subsequently impatient, or... speaking to someone he doesn't know.

"Yes, interesting." But that's all he says for some time, Gregor keeping his gaze focused ahead now, thinking carefully. He's often found that staying quiet invites others to incriminate themselves-- not that he thinks of incriminating Miles, but if there's anyone prone to filling silence, it's him. Normally he makes it look deceptively easy in a way Gregor wishes he could emulate. When he can't, that's another sign to worry.

I am junking up this beautiful community with this junk

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject