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Barrayar ⚔ Cetaganda ⚔ The Invasion

Have you read the FAQ?

The Village ⚔ The Barrayaran Camp ⚔ The Cetagandan Base ⚔ The Fight

You've been on Barrayar for a while now, and you're finally starting to adjust. Or maybe you're not. Maybe this is all still too much for you – the attacks, the constant raids, living in the middle of a war zone by no choice of your own. But if you want to live long enough to make it back home one day, you might as well do what you can to help the war effort. Besides, where else are you going to go?

The fierce Barrayaran winter rages even to the southern end of the continent, and it's been none too kind to Vorkosigan's District. Temperatures at sea level are well below freezing, and up in the mountains, it's even colder. Several inches of snow already blanket most of the mountains all the way down to the Cetagandan base, and the storm that's just started up is only bringing more down. Visibility is low in the flurries, wind swirling snow everywhere, and God help you if you get lost on your own out in the storm. Nights are cold, these days.

A recent attack on the Cetagandan base has left half their facilities damaged and in disarray. Raid parties snuck in by night, planting bombs in previously scouted locations for maximum effect. Damage to the base's water treatment plant and organic grow labs have considerably impacted the Cetagandans' food and water supply, and in the chaos caused by the explosions, the Barrayaran guerrillas raided their medbay and made off with a considerable bounty of medical supplies. One man's bane is another man's boon, and while the Cetagandans have reserve supplies to sustain them for now, some of the damage is extensive and the repairs will take time. But in the meantime, the Barrayarans have scored a precious victory as well as equally precious resources.

the village
The Riverfall villagers are used to the harsh winters of the Dendarii mountains, and though they don't have much themselves, they are happy to offer what they can in terms of cold-weather clothing and extra blankets to those allied with the guerrillas. Despite the cold, the hill children are going wild in the snow, and they may try to lure you into their play by sneakily pelting you with snowballs.

Cetagandan allies, however, may not be met so warmly, and at the first sight of ghem soldiers, any children out playing in the snow will be immediately ushered into their homes. Unaccompanied outsiders from the Cetagandan base might have an easier time talking to the hillfolk, but any attempt at digging information about the guerrillas out of them will get you stonewalled fast. A sneaky hill child or two may steal away from their home to approach one of the "bad guy" outsiders to sate their curiosity.

the barrayaran camp
Morale is higher than it has been in a while after their recent victory, and the guerrillas are in high spirits. And do they ever love their spirits – as night falls, most of the Barrayarans gathered around the campfires are enjoying the deceptively named, dangerously alcoholic moonshine they call maple mead. It might start out sweet, but it burns all the way down, and a few glasses of that stuff will tank even the heaviest Barrayaran soldier.

But the storm rages on despite their celebration, and preparations must be made. Clearing as much snow off the tents as possible will help ensure that no tents collapse overnight, the horses need to be tended to, and the officers are always running training drills. Food is in real supply now, but the guerrillas need help foraging and hunting nonetheless. And when night falls, you'll have to find a way to keep yourself warm – it's a good thing there are a cozy ten of you to a tent.

the cetagandan base
The Cetagandans outnumber their guerrilla enemies almost seventy-to-one, so their base has not been completely devastated, but it hardly looks to be the work of a few raiding parties. Nothing is beyond repair, but the water treatment plant has been taken offline, which means that all water is now locally sourced and must be treated by hand with purification tablets. No one in the base will starve, but fresh food is mostly unavailable until they get the grow labs back online, which means that meals are mostly comprised of ration bars and MREs. Morale isn't exactly at an all-time low, but none of the ghem officers seem to be in a good mood.

They won't hesitate to put you to work, either. They need all the engineers and laborers they can get for the grow labs and the treatment plant, and the medbay's inventory needs to be thoroughly audited before they can send a request for more supplies. But if you need a break, it's not too hard to slip away for a little quiet downtime. Some of the lower-ranked ghem ladies might let you participate in some more artistic activities, or maybe some of the enlisted soldiers who are a little more used to you by now might invite you into one of their Cetagandan games of strategy. Or, since the treatment plant only affected potable water, you could appreciate your comfortable surroundings and take a nice hot soak in the bathroom while everyone else is working.

the fight
PVP
You're in the midst of a skirmish with the other side -- maybe you signed up for the battle, maybe you just got caught up in the fight -- but at least it's easy to tell who's on what side. Only one side is wielding swords, and the other guns.

But then you come across someone who doesn't look like they're either -- not one of the rugged Barrayarans or the face-painted Cetagandans, but an outsider, an exotic like you. They must be. So do you fight?

RECON
Maybe you're not on the front lines, but there's plenty more to winning the war than just fighting. You're partnered with another outsider on recon; the ground is cold, and you try not to let your shoes crunch too loudly on snow as you scout, scanning for patrols or supply lines.

Or maybe you're with the Cetagandans, hiking it thorugh the mountains with one of your fellow exotics in an attempt to locate the enemy camp. Except it's damned cold, and there's hidden ice everywhere, and everything is starting to really look the same.

--

Feel free to write prompts for your character on either side -- you don't have to choose just one for the TDM! Just label it clearly so folks know. GO WILD, MY FRIENDS

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"With Gregor and Ivan there?" Miles snaps right back, but he doesn't have the energy to argue that point to the ground right now, and it really isn't the point of this story, it's true. Yeah, he'd been having Dagoola flashbacks before he even set foot on the planet, and the nightmares after -- losing Sergeant Beatrice in a sea of shattered glass, falling down in her place -- he never really did shake them. It hasn't even been a year since that happened. Miles grips his mead tighter and wonders which will break first: his fingers or the cup.

He barks out a raw, near-hysterical laugh at that, surprising even himself. He hasn't even begun to touch on resurgence yet. That'll be a trip. It's a moment before he catches his breath, hand pressed to his forehead. They're edging ever closer to Miles's least favorite part of this story, slowly circling the drain.

"Yeah," he says, finally, and he tries his damnedest to make it sound flippant, "maybe that's because I got the shish kebab treatment with falling glass instead of having my chest blown open." God, it's nauseating to talk about. He buries his face in his cup and mumbles, "Think I'd have preferred the needler fire. At least that was quick."

Especially with Gregor and Ivan there, Miles wants to argue, but - he hadn't actually been on that ship. In that situation, at that age, surely he would have chosen the same, wouldn't he? It doesn't matter.

The brokenness of that laugh would be distracting enough even if he had wanted to pursue the topic. It sends a chill straight through his body, practically freezing his blood. Once again he tries to picture the scene: surrounded by falling glass on all side, having been impaled by some of it but not neatly enough to at least grant a quick death. Now his other self's earlier question makes sense. For all that Miles' recovery has been agony, he was at least granted that small mercy. He hardly remembers the needler impact at all.

He still clutches instinctively at his own scars, feeling for the spiderweb beneath his shirt. No points for guessing where his younger self's scars are.

"Were you alone?" is the only thing he can think to ask after all that. "Clark?"

"Yeah," Miles says quietly, shutting his eyes. "Clark was there. Got there too late to do anything about it, though."

God, he hates talking about this. He'd almost forgotten how much the memory still stings, the sheer indignity of it, and somehow it's harder telling his own self about it. Like some final admittance of -- of what, defeat? He hadn't really cheated death, after all, not like his older self had with his cryorevival. He imagines the other Miles must've felt his throat go just as tight, recounting the ugliest details of what's happened to him. Miles figures he owes his older self the same courtesy.

"I was already bleeding out. It doesn't happen as fast as you'd think with a stomach wound." Wound. That's a cute way to put it. Miles puts down his cup, almost dropping it onto the table. "Thought he'd showed up to save me, all heroic horseshit. Kept insisting it was already too late to save me, the prick. He could fly and toss around an aircar like it was nothing, and he couldn't even..."

He trails off, trying to swallow the thickness down his throat, but he can't so he just shuts his eyes again instead. Wrong move. Light gleaming on glass flickers at the edge of his dark vision. "He stayed with me. I remember that -- all of it." Every aching, agonizing detail. Clark's last words to him -- his own last words. God. He draws in a shallower breath.

"I think -- I think if I'd asked him to, he'd have put me out of my mercy right there. But I couldn't -- I wouldn't. I'd take every agonizing fucking moment I could get. I didn't -- I didn't want to die." He presses his hands to his face, remembering the sheer, overwhelming panic of his own impending death, breaking down into tears when its inescapability finally overcame him. His next words are muffled by his hands. "I was terrified."

Not exactly the way he'd hoped he'd face death.

Better to go quick in that case. Yes. Miles absolutely agrees. He would have fought just as desperately for each painful second he could still draw in breath, much like they've been fighting for their lives from the moment they'd been born. And when the inevitable finally sank in ... Miles hadn't had to deal with that with his death, but he had stared it in the face as Naismith had died. The same impulse, translated sideways. God. It hurts just to contemplate, these literal and figurative deaths for both of them.

"Where's the brilliant ploy this time," he mumbles to himself. "The last minute bolt out of the blue we always had before." Born of his own brilliance, or a well-timed opportunity, or just sheer damned luck. The longer one holds out, the greater the chances of seizing just that opportunity. But there comes a point when they just can't exert their will on the outside world and expect it to change. That moment - that horrible event horizon of despair - they both know it intimately now.

His head is swimming. He has to do something to combat this horrifying sense of powerlessness rising up to choke him. It makes him want to just stride out that door and start organizing guerillas, or laying down everything he knows about the future for his grandfather, or - or something. Something grand. Something idiotic. Anything. He does get up to pace now, even though the floor sways dangerously under his feet.

"You came back, didn't you?" he says, turning back sharply. Grant him some relief from this awful topic or he really will just give up and go mad. "You said you were there a year."

Miles lets out a hoarse, hollow laugh. Bolt out of the blue -- that was Clark, wasn't it? Supposed to be, anyway. But after a point, after he and Clark had had it out with each other over Miles's admittedly childishly resentful behavior after his revival, he didn't have it in him to hold it against Clark anymore. He didn't want to. Himself, on the other hand...

"Oh, yes," he says, although there's little about his tone or his sudden, deeply ironic smile that's actually comforting. The warmth of the maple mead is really settling in, now, tingling at his fingertips. "Not the way you did, though. Clark eventually helped subdue Bruce, put him in some cage specially engineered by the other crew -- but that was it for Caducus Primary. Between the core shattering and its on-planet Ingress being destroyed, it all just...imploded in on itself." He drums his fingertips on his lap, staring at his mostly-empty cup. "My body went with it."

But that doesn't make any sense. Miles stops twitching long enough to stare back at his younger self in disbelief. "Then what the hell did you revive from?" he asks, his own tone clipped and sharp. Something tells him he is not going to like this answer.

Miles's bland smile stretches serenely across his face, if tightly, far enough into maple mead now that he doesn't meet his older self's tone with more of the same. A sort of relief, actually, the kind he's been craving, and all the more so for having to trudge through those grueling memories. You're not done yet, boy, a voice in his mind reminds him, and Miles reaches for his cup again.

"Resurgence," he says, like that word would mean anything to the other Miles, but he goes on. "Cryo wasn't for revival, it was for recovery. It's the Ingress. Spits people back out after they've died. Most of the time," he adds after a thought. Once in a while, somebody stayed dead. No rhyme or rhythm to it. "And it doesn't spit you back out whole, either. Those synthetics we got in our legs, the first ones..."

He very nearly raps on his cast but stops himself just shy, aborting it into a vague gesture instead. "Gone. Replaced with old brittle bone. How d'you think this happened?" Falling out of a vent shaft, actually, but that's another story. "A few memories, too. I chalked it up to cryoamnesia at first, but it turns out the Ingress is just greedy."

Miles sucks in a sharp breath. He's not sure which is most horrifying: being spat out of a machine after death, having that machine revert a portion of his body, or having a few memories missing just because of some kind of machine glitch. At least his own cryorevival has actual scientific explanation for it, and reasons behind every side effect he'd suffered. This just seems random.

He starts pacing again, his expression pale with muted horror. "Like we needed to be any more brittle," he says with a bit of a snarl. Not directed at his alternate, oh no. It's the only piece of this madness he can look at directly. The other two ... It makes him wonder if he really is this man's future after all. That somehow this Ingress machine could have put him back with precisely zero memories of being on the Moira to begin with. He needs - well, he's had too many drinks already. He needs to do something stupid.

Breathe, dammit. He forces himself to return to the chair and tap on the back of it rather than continue circling the room. "Well? Does it get any worse from there?" he says. "Might as well get it all out at once."

Miles is envious of the pacing, but thankful for the heavy blanket of maple mead that keeps him from getting up to do something stupid. Yeah, something stupid, that's always the cure for this kind of existential misery, isn't it? He can't help another laugh, this one escaping as an all-too-familiar giggle. One-way ticket to hysterics for two, please. Maybe the maple mead isn't helping as much as he thought.

"Where do I start?" He sets the cup down in his lap and starts ticking off on his fingers. "The ship froze over from some power failure, I got trapped in the morgue for three days and damn near froze to death, some horrific monster that'd apparently been holed up in some secret room got loose and terrorized the entire ship, we made berth at a planet whose primary export was matchmaking -- the place was like an unholy union of Jackson's Whole and Cetaganda, I swear -- " At least he can, for now, gloss over the parts about the dates and his hideously embarrassing sexual panic. " -- Some of the new arrivals start murdering each other, I manage to have the stunning and astronomically unlikely misfortune of falling for the same girl as Ivan -- and I haven't even gotten to the complete and utter breakdown of my entire sense of identity."

He gives his older self a terrifying grin, teeth bared at the mere memory. Be proud of your younger self, older Miles, because at least some of this wasn't actually his fault.

Edited 2016-11-27 18:22 (UTC)

It would be impressive if it didn't also make Miles want to throw himself off the nearest bridge. Freezing to death in the morgue, god. He shivers just thinking about it; Kyril Island and cryorevival have not improved his opinion of cold temperatures in the slightest. And fucking monsters, and -

He gives up. He just utterly gives up. He makes a strained noise and settles himself back down in his chair, holding on hand up to stop his double from going on. "I get it," he says, before anything worse can come tumbling out. It's a damned sad day when complete and utter breakdown of my entire sense of identity is the thing he's least concerned about. He's going through that now, so some horrible part of him takes a deep schadenfreude out of knowing his younger self did the same. "This place was insane. Places. Whole damn universe." He gestures vaguely. "God, tell me you at least dated someone fun in all that. Give me some good news."

Miles has his mouth open to expound on that whole identity crisis -- because really, considering the place his older self is in, he probably ought to hear about it -- but then he stops Miles, and Miles vents out a sigh instead.

"It defies mere notion of sanity. I had a murderous ten-year-old break my arm with a hand weight." Ah, good times with Chara. Terrifying little shit. At least Miles had gotten to throw them in the pool after.

But yes, onto better and brighter things. Miles's grin turns more genuine, if a little glazed. That is a better topic, if a little painful in its own way. He misses them all as fiercely as he misses Elli and Taura. "Oh, yes. Lovely girl named Lara. Very sweet. Explorer adventurer type, at least as fucked up as I am. Nothing like bonding over hallucinations." It's said with wry fondness, though, because...Lara really was sweet. Not as commanding as the women he usually goes for, he surprised himself, but underneath all that she was unbelievably fierce. It was hard not to like her. "And there were...others."

He coughs delicately, dropping his gaze to his lap as he twists his lips in contemplation. He's not sure how he ought to approach this one, or if his older self has had the same kind of sexual awakening Miles'd had on the Moira. That had really been a very...unique set of circumstances.

That's exactly why Miles doesn't want to hear it. He's not done wallowing in his own misery yet, dammit, and he doesn't want to take any more advice from his younger self. He'll have to be tricked back into that subject later. For now he winces at the mention of Clara - really? a ten year old? - and refocuses on the answer to the question he'd asked.

"Bonding over medical condition is a lovely pastime," he says, thinking of Rowan Durona himself. Not that Rowan herself had had any, but - details. He sighs softly, letting himself resettle again. "Who else then? Hopefully not all at the same time," he says with the slight lilt of a joke. Romance can't possibly be a minefield, right? What could his younger self possibly spring on him if they stay on this topic?

Edited 2016-11-27 19:06 (UTC)

Come on, Miles. This is you. This is younger you. Be realistic here.

Miles gives him a crooked grin that is none too reassuring. Good God. How, exactly, do you spring an unexpected sexual awakening on your future self? Or -- older self, anyway. The other Miles has given no indication he's had the same sort of experience, but then, they haven't exactly touched on the topic until now.

"Uhh." Not a reassuring start, either. He doesn't quite wince, but the smile he bares at his older self looks more like a preemptive apology than anything else. "Remember that matchmaking planet I told you? Emiri, it was called. Well, uh -- we were all sort of...forced to participate in their program. As part of the terms of our docking."

Man, next to his death, this might be the second most humiliating experience on the Moira to recount. Maybe he can gloss over some of the worst of it.

Excuse you, Miles was dating Taura and Elli (plus Rowan) at the same time for a while, sort of. He's allowed to joke.

But that expression is concerning. Miles is looking back at his younger self with concern. How the hell is this going to be surprising? Does he really want to find out?

"All right," he says, cautiously. "How did that go?"

Edited 2016-11-27 20:17 (UTC)

You really do want to find out, Miles. You really do. Probably.

Miles coughs again, turning his cup in his hands. "Well, I was, ah. Matched with Bel."

Miles just stares at his double disbelieving. "Bel," he repeats, a bit dumbly. "God. Poor bastard. I hope you let them down easy."

Oh, boy. Miles is now fairly certain that he's alone in the new sexual awakening boat. He doesn't quite cringe, though he does open his mouth to say something and then promptly close it, along with his hand.

"Well," he starts carefully, "we'd both already agreed the whole system was horseshit. That you can't give someone their designated soulmate through a bunch of quiz questions, so we had a good laugh about it after the fact. I think they were keeping their expectations low." Bless them and their patience. They'd have waited forever and then some, he's sure. "So we used our, ah, date for recon, seeing as we'd gotten more than a whiff or two of something really seedy going on."

And this is only half of the story. He hasn't even started on the part with Clark. God, what a tangled mess. He's amazed either of them still put up with him after that.

All right, that's a decent plan. Miles can begrudgingly admit to that even as he's still distinctly uncomfortable with it. He knows how Bel feels about him; encouraging that past a little flirting seems terribly unfair to the captain. Unless he's intended to go through with it, which is - well, impossible. He's extremely straight. Right?

"Makes sense to me. Bel probably enjoyed that, even considering the situation." A pause; he drums his fingers on the chair arm thoughtfully. "So what was really going on?"

Ha. So straight. Ha ha ha.

"Well, nothing good, obviously. Some shady business about forced matches and their progeny and suppressing some kind of uprising, and Ivan and I had to hide a body -- anyway," he says, because they're straying far away from the point, and Miles feels like now that he's started on this path he needs to follow it through. "What was really going on -- "

God, this is messy. Miles rubs his face hard, trying to sort out his scattered brain, now murky with maple mead. "It's beside the point. I think I need to...back up a little." Again.

"Ivan," he sighs, and there is some relief in being able to put some of the blame on his idiot cousin, "shortly before we docked at Emiri, apparently felt the urgent need to post -- a personals ad on the ship network for me." Yeah, let that one sink in for a minute. It was every bit as mortifying and infuriating as you think. "A mutual friend of ours saw it and offered to set me up with someone he thought would be my type. Only he neglected to tell either of us it was a date. The whole 'we'll meet you for drinks downside, oh wait, everyone had to mysteriously cancel' kind of setup." He rolls his eyes, tipping his head back, and considers his words carefully. Then he just sighs. "It was with Clark."

Yeah, yeah, he knows they were just talking about Bel, but there was a lot going on at the time, okay.

There's a lot to react to in that. He manages a huff at the mention of having to hide a body with Ivan - because of course he did, that seems exactly par for the course - before he just stops dead at that last part. Okay, going on a date with Bel to expose a greater conspiracy is weird but at least makes some kind of sense. Ivan putting up a personal ad for him is depressingly normal. Going on a date with Clark? Miles just kind of stares at his younger self.

"Clark? The alien?" A pause. How does he phrase this delicately? He's half-Betan for god's sake; he's hardly opposed in general, it's just - it's him. "He ... er, he is male, right?"

Edited 2016-11-27 21:23 (UTC)

For once, Miles has the opportunity to give his older self a withering look. God, was he really this bad? Talk about uncomfortable mirror.

"Yes, he's male. Hence the he." He clears his throat, realizing he might not be the most embarrassed party in the room once this all comes out. "There was a lot going on at the time. Emiri was a disorienting place, and I was...learning some things. About myself." God. Why does he suddenly feel like he's talking to a teenager?

"Look, the second I realized it was a date, I panicked. I bolted. Left Clark standing there like an idiot." He rubs his forehead and draws in a breath. Here goes. "I did the same thing to Bel on our recon not-date. Right after I'd kissed them."

Well. Let's see how that goes.

Kissed Bel. Kissed Bel. And - bolted from both encounters, but given the way his younger self is staring at him, he doesn't think that was all. Learning things about myself. He can't possibly mean --

Miles abruptly grabs the bottle of mead. There isn't much left by now, but he is drinking all of it. Now.

Oh -- God. If his older self had occasion to be embarrassed, now the younger Miles sure as hell does, too. Is this what Bel and Clark had to deal with? Was it really that bad? Miles sets down his cup and tries to push himself to his feet to put a stop to this, but he's pretty drunk himself.

"Oh -- just stop, will -- " He makes a grab for the stick he's been using as a crutch and damn near trips, lurching forward.

Oh no. He's not letting his younger self get the rest of this bottle. If he's going to have this revelation sprung on him he's damn well going to drown it out with mead. He just holds out a hand to stop his other self from getting close. And also keep him from tripping over himself.

"You stop," he hisses between gulps. "You're the one springing this on me."

It's an unfortunately effective attempt, because Miles has to grab hold of his older self's arm just to keep himself balanced until he gets that stick properly braced, and damn he managed to put weight on his broken leg for just a second and it hurts like a son of a bitch. He hisses back, trying to swat the bottle out of his double's hand just on principle.

"I'm the one springing -- seriously?" Before he was embarrassed and a little exasperated, but now he's indignant and angry. "You're one to talk about springing! How is a -- a frigging sexual revelation worse than what you did? You destroyed everything we've ever worked for!"

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