the better space adventure

[vorbarra]

[ Gregor has long since progressed from afraid to bored and straight on through sullen. Just how long were they going to keep him here? Gregor is not accustomed to being kept anywhere he doesn't want to be, and maybe he's led a constrained life but it hasn't been a literal prison. And okay, so it's a little high-handed of him to be entitled about this, but he thinks he's entitled to know his future.

Yet no one answers his polite or his frustrated attempts to ask for answers. No one does anything apart from bring him food while looking harried and eye him dourly before leaving. He's started to get gross. He needs a shower, badly. He's washed his face and hair in the sink in his cell multiple times but it's just not the same and he's not used to these conditions.

Also, the boredom really is driving him insane. He's taken to composing sonnets in his head. He hates sonnets. He hates all that rigid structure in poetry, it's asinine and archaic. That's how bored he is, how craving stimulation and challenge.

When the door open, he startles upright, eyes wide. This is off schedule; he's already been fed today. ]

Comments

[vorbarra]

Because I'm not going back. I told you that. They don't need me.

[dendarii]

Just because one is true doesn't mean that the other is.

[vorbarra]

They don't. Your father is ludicrously competent and my mother can have another heir whenever she likes. We've had uterine replicators as commonplace for years.

[dendarii]

So why haven't they?

[vorbarra]

Because I was there. I told you, attempting to supplant me would be an act of war. If I'm gone it's just necessary.

[dendarii]

They could still have given you a sibling. At any time. I doubt they're going to just make one to fill the gap.

[vorbarra]

No, they really couldn't have. And you don't understand-- they'd have to. There has to be an heir who is a Vorbarra. It doesn't matter if it's me.

[dendarii]

So they clone you or something. They could have done that too.

[vorbarra]

A clone is never going to be accepted on Barrayar, [ he says in exasperation. ] Certainly not as the emperor.

[dendarii]

Why the hell not? Twins would be.

[vorbarra]

[ He folds his arms. ]

They're barely accepting that the next crown prince is going to be born from a replicator instead of a body birth, and you think you can shuffle in a clone?

[dendarii]

I met one. My clone. Well, the other Miles'. Lord Mark Vorkosigan.

[vorbarra]

You have a clone?

--No. Stop. Stop telling me about this insane other dimension. It doesn't matter; we're not there. We have to deal with the reality we have.

[dendarii]

I'm just saying. For context. Surely they could make a clone work if they truly wanted to.

They want you, Gregor.