Mark Pierre Vorkosigan / "Peter Kane" (
jacksonian) wrote in
barrayar2016-01-22 09:49 pm
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I am junking up this beautiful community with this junk
All the other starters are so beautiful but instead I'm coming in and ruining everything with this useless post with this sad sack
Comment to this post and I will write you something
Comment to this post and I will write you something
no subject
[ Magic? Healing magic? Did he just hear Aral Vorkosigan talking about magic and his love of magic? It's - there's...something...wrong with that. Isn't there? Is he insane after all? The clone lowers his face to his cereal to avoid meeting the man's eyes, suddenly reluctant to face any madness there. ]
So what did they have you doing today?
no subject
Hm.
[He lets it go.]
Very little. Orientation went quickly enough.
[There's a note of amusement in his voice.] You never did say what they had you working with.
no subject
[ Shit. What? What should he say? God, what's he doing...Aral Vorkosigan wasn't surprised to see his son. He knows Miles is here. And whether The Other Miles is Naismith pretending to be Vorkosigan or really Vorkosigan, Aral will believe that one over him, because that one is...smoother. Better. Better. The lies he's telling right now will get compounded later on. What if he just killed him? He could kill him. That would make things so much easier. Murder would be so much simpler than this small talk... ]
Money.
[ He blurts that out. Why? Why does he settle on that... ]
I'm working on investments.
no subject
[He puts his chin in his palm, elbow on the back of the chair. Aral's sharp eyes search his son's face. It seemed strange to be back to this, and nothing he particularly wanted to foster.]
Relax. This isn't the interrogation.
[They already did that.]
no subject
I'll take it. ]
Yeah. Sorry.
[ And another excuse that Aral is providing for him. The clone remembers Galen's descriptions - that Aral dotes on his son. That it'll blind him until it's too late. It looks like that's...very true. So, a little braver, he lies: ]
They want analysis of the prospects of biotech firms. Firms in the biotech industry. Which ones are likely to turn a profit.
[ "And I recommended that they invest in cloning. That's a real growth industry." ]
no subject
Hm. That might be useful position in this world.
[He gives him some shrewd regard.]
That is the blood and bones of a country like this one.
no subject
Money, you mean.
[ Somehow, this is suddenly a little less scary. Money. He knows money. And it's not talking about how-are-you. And it's...not talking as Miles, either. These are his own thoughts, but they sound enough like what Miles would say that they're safe. ]
That's the impression I've gotten, too. Profit is linked to success here - though not as brutally as in Jackson's Whole. Since you're also expected to give back.
no subject
Fortunately, not that far gone, agreed. Though it seems to have been enough of an ideological shift for this country's enemies to define themselves as such. From the propaganda one might think this country holds all possible advantages.
[The look is curious, sharp, challenging, the same studying test as he often gave his son growing up. There's a prompt here, an expectation.]
no subject
It seems like that's a necessary part of their self-image. And a method of control, too. On Jackson's Whole, they say that if you're smart enough and ruthless enough you'll succeed - but here, they say that if you work hard enough, you'll succeed. That means if you're not successful, you're not working hard enough. You're lazy. It probably suppresses class conflict.
no subject
To some degrees, as long as the economy prospers in general, there's not as much of an issue as it would seem to beg.
Hm. Still, I imagine you've had some dealings with the Jacksonians, at this point.
[Studies aside, with the Fleet, it would be almost inconceivable not to.]
no subject
I've had some, of course, yeah. [ Does Aral know about Naismith? Yeah, of course he does. ] I can't say I've enjoyed them much. [ Which is a true answer for both the clone and for the man he's pretending, inexplicably, to be. ]