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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

The look that Byerly turns on Ivan is an unusual brand of strung-out - at least an unusual brand of strung-out for By. The taut intensity in his face is, for once, not of chemical origin: he's not amphetamine-paranoid, nor hungover, nor in the upswing of a craving for something with an edge. (Though he could do with something, anything, that isn't more of that blasted maple mead or their foul ales...) No: this is stress, pure and simple.

The source of that stress? A rolled-up carpet at his feet. A rolled-up carpet of suspicious thickness.

"Oh, Ivan, you're here," Byerly sings out with some (rather weak) imitation of good cheer. "Help me with this, would you?"

Ivan has very rarely seen Byerly in any honest state of distress. The closest he could come would be when he thought everything had gone pear shaped as hell with Dono, and this matches it, only there's less foaming and visible fretting. Which isn't reassuring in the slightest. Ivan blinks at the request, and and then looks down at the bundle at his feet.

There are things that Ivan generally avoids. Overbearing women who don't want to sleep with him, angry husbands, young Vor women seeking commitment, his mother, and dead bodies. He's relatively sure the first four aren't applicable here, which just leaves the last one. And that last one, Ivan is proud to say, he's avoid for most of his life, despite a career in the Service thanks to his highly valued position of manning a desk. He is not going to let Byerly Vorrutyer ruin a perfectly good streak.

"Absolutely not," he says, not caring if he's jumping to conclusions and it's just a regular carpet Byerly is keeping in the snow, with weird bumps that could, if you squinted, be something other than an object of roughly human proportions. "Where did you even get that?" Wait, no. "Nevermind, forget I asked."

Edited 2016-11-24 19:00 (UTC)

Byerly gives a slightly demented wave of his hand and replies, "Would you believe that I made it? And here I've been accused of not having any creativity. Imagine if Grandmere Vorrutyer could see me now."

This is, it should be noted, By's very first kill. He'd really anticipated that he'd be rather good at killing someone - after all, he's been into and out of so many scrapes, and he's caused so much mischief, and he's even put people into a position before where they themselves would be killed. Not often, but it's happened. But as it turns out - no. Not really. He's not actually all that good at it at all. Really at all. It doesn't help that it happened the way it did - a grapple for a knife, and a stabbing, with enough blood that his gloves are wrapped up in that carpet with the body because they'll never be all right again. He rubs his bare hands, now, then shoves them back into his pockets.

Be smart, By. "I'm going to say," he says, "for your benefit, and my benefit, that that is just a rug. Help me get rid of this rug, Ivan."

"Didn't your Grandmere Vorrutyer marry one of Pierre 'le Sanguinaire''s kids? I think she'd be happy for you. Like calls to like, you know." What that says about him, Ivan won't examine too closely. Instead he's just going to avoid looking at the rug that is Just a Rug, settling on a point above Byerly's shoulder. He should never have gotten up this morning, he should have told Byerly 'no' when he first asked, he should have never have ended up here in the first place.

Fine, he'll play a long for a bit. "Alright. What do you plan on doing with this rug, By?" Surely he has some sort of plan. A ditch to throw it down. Something that isn't going to call attention to two men struggling carrying a rug through the snow in the middle of a war zone.

Good God, he wants a drink.

What was he planning on doing with it? What was he planning on doing with it...Yeah. Okay. God, what he wouldn't do for a glass of wine...

"If we can get it back to the Barrayaran camp without being seen, we'll be hailed as heroes," he responds, trying to sound very positive and cheerful. "Imagine - being moved to a warmer tent. Wine, women and song for us both. Or at least wine and song. Or at least song. Dreadful back-country stuff, I'm sure, but I will look forward to it drowning out that horrible snoring." Ivan's horrible snoring, but perhaps it wouldn't do to taunt dear Lord Ivan at this point in time. "Just need to evade some Cetagandan patrols - no trouble, I'm sure, for someone like you..." A hesitation, and then he offers, "Or we could find a cliff to pitch it off of."

Ivan spends three seconds imagining suddenly being thrust into the center of attention in a camp full of terrifying relatives, and doesn't have to waste any more time thinking about it. "Cliff. It's the Dendarii, there's plenty around." A beat, as he gently nudges the Just a Rug with a foot, scowling at it. "They don't have enough decent wine to make it worth it."

Also the fact that they'd be lucky if the managed to get it past the Cetagandans undiscovered. And, wait, hang on. "How'd you manage to get this here?"

"The rug came from that house right there." A wave of his hand indicates a half-burned izba - a casualty in warfare, it seems. Stripped of foodstuffs and livestock and weapons, but not of furniture. To his great benefit. Distantly, By wonders if the inhabitants are dead, fled - or gone to join the guerillas in the mountains. "As for anything that might have gotten stuck in the rug when I rolled it up...It walked here. Of its own volition. Possibly interested in a bit of a dalliance, which - "

A little shudder, quite unlike his usual foppish joking shows of putative disgust -

"Went a bit wrong."

For a moment, Ivan is struck with the uncommon and slightly uncomfortable feeling of being sorry for Byerly Vorrutyer. To go from his usual flirtatious flippancy to murder must have been, well. Ivan's never killed someone, not really. And he's not looking to start. "Most people use 'bit wrong' for things like miscommunication or accidentally upsetting someone's husband," Ivan points out, although he moves to the other end of the rug and gestures for By to follow his lead.

"The sooner we get rid of this..." body "rug, the better."

By, for once, doesn't argue. He goes to the other end of the rug instead. His teeth are chattering - distantly, he wonders if it's cold, or shock? God, I hope it's cold. I'm not going to let Idiot Ivan Vorpatril see me swooning like some maiden over a dead body. He's seen plenty of dead bodies, hasn't he. Granted, they were nearly all handsomely dressed in House livery or fine gowns to be laid out to rest with enormous dignity. No bodies he'd ever made himself...

"Why, Ivan, I'd almost think from that comment you had experience with upset husbands," Byerly coos. Right, keep focused - focused in on Ivan's misadventures. That's far from the grim task ahead of them. As he grabs and hoists, he says - "I always assumed you were too quick to get caught. There was a story going around Vorbarr Sultana, you know - what was it, six years ago - about you jumping buck-naked from Yvette Vorkalloner's window and running down six city blocks wearing nothing but a strategically-placed stunner holster. They say you ran fast."

The fact that Byerly doesn't argue but goes straight for the bring up rumors and gossip tactic means he's trying to deflect. Ivan scowls -- he'd have done the same in By's place, which is probably why he's so annoyed at being the butt of Byerly's amusement once again. Well that and it gets damned old after a whole.

Ivan grits his teeth as he hoists up his own end, scowling at the other man. "Don't always believe what people say, By." He was wearing her bathrobe, alright. "Anyway, getting caught is part of the deal when they're using you to make their husbands or boyfriends puff up and get all jealous." A scoff then, as he lets By lead the way towards whatever convenient cliff he's found. "Like I want to marry them."

"Ooh," By puffs from under his end of the burden - none of his ImpSec qualifications ever involved training him for physical fitness, and so his physical type tends to run to lean - or, well, nonexistent. Ivan, damn him and his broad chest and his gorgeously squared shoulders, doesn't have much trouble hoisting up one-half of a Cetagandan. Ex-Cetagandan. Ex not for reasons of defection, as had been By's initial hope...

"You sound a little grumpy." It's a stupid conversation to have over their grim burden, perhaps, but it's better than discussing said grim burden. "Don't tell me you're getting tired of that sort of treatment? I thought that being thoroughly physically exploited and abused by voluptuous housewives was your favorite pastime."

Why are they arguing about this over a dead body? Why is it even a topic of conversation? The last thing Ivan wants to be doing is having a conversation about his love life in the middle of a war that had been over for nearly eighty years while he's carrying a dead Cetagandan with Byerly Vorrutyer to chuck off a cliff. There is no way he's going to admit to getting lonely to By, of all people.

"Mine and theirs, but their husbands tend to have a problem with it. Can't imagine why." He says with a shrug. "It's not like your reputation is any better." It's just a different sort of reputation. Ivan's lands solidly within the acceptable bounds of Vor Lord behavior, even if it's frowned upon. Byerly's tends to, well. Skirt around it, a little. Never to the extent of having a body end up at his feet, though. That part is new. "This won't help that, by the way."

Not that Ivan is planning on telling anyone about it, which By also knows.

"Oh, I don't know," Byerly responds breezily. Or, well...With a faint strain in his voice that he hopes passes for breeziness. "I think you're not a true Vorrutyer until you have a body count. That's what my famous ancestor Le Sanguinaire thought, in any case. I suppose we do come from a softer time, though."

He gives a little jerk of his head a moment, an indication that he needs a rest. He stands, half slumped-over, catching his breath, and then straightens up and starts again.

"Anyway, I like my reputation. It serves me very well." Then, with a curl of his lips - "Nearly as well as yours serves you."

Byerly might be able to pass it off to most people, but Ivan has been working on seeing through Byerly's bullshit in order to avoid a headache for a while now. His frown eases into a moment of concern, that worrying sensation of being sorry for By coming back before he shakes it. Hell no, even though Ivan stops when Byerly gestures.

"Le Sanguinaire is still being is bloodthirsty self right about now, isn't he?" Good God, Ivan decides to add another distant relative -- well, probably, he's Vor -- on the list of people to avoid.

But it's the slight for reputation that has him scowling at Byerly. "You're lucky I don't just leave you here." He's tempted to, at any rate.

Byerly chooses to ignore the comment about leaving him here - honestly, Ivan is so distractible that as long as you don't dignify his comments with a response he'll forget them within the minute - and instead focuses on that bit about history. "I'll admit that I'm not quite certain," he says, "but I believe he is, yes. Quite elderly at this point. Perhaps a bit less handy with the sanguinating. But still there, and probably just as vicious. I shall have to drink a toast, later, to avoiding one's most unfortunate ancestors."

He hoists the rug a little higher, then comments, "I met yours earlier, by the way. Your ancestor. Charming girl. I can see where you get your lively good humor from." Byerly bats his eyelashes at Ivan's scowling face.

"Yes, can't have you end up in your own district, explaining to some long-distant relative who you are and what you're doing there." Ha ha ha. Although at least he's not in the Vorpatril's district, explaining Falco's dear relatives that just because he's Lord Vorpatril he's not an heir to the district. Ugh. Best stay away from that side of the family. Although By's remark about his grandmother takes him aback when coupled with the eyelashes.

Had he done anything beyond talk? Ivan doesn't want to know, even if he wants to know to avoid it from happening in the future. "Wouldn't know. Haven't talked to her, and if you're as smart as you'd like people to think you are, you're never going to talk to her again." That's pretty wide ranging, and a good cover-all isn't it? Ivan thinks so.

"Is that a threat?" Byerly asks, sweeping his eyelashes elegantly at Ivan. He knows full well it's not. Ivan's a fool at times, but not, truly, an idiot; the man will doubtless be aware of the risks and possible consequences of diddling with the space-time continuum. Or, more directly, diddling it. Still, that's not going to keep By from tormenting Ivan a bit - God, no.

"Are you protecting the girl's honor?" he asks with amusement, then holds up a finger - "Or - ah. Worried at doing a gene-scan and finding a few strains of Vorrutyer madness and decadence in there after all." Mildly, he goes on: "Honestly, I think a bit of that would just serve to liven up your stodgy personality."

Edited 2016-12-26 01:19 (UTC)

"My--" Ivan grits his teeth and reminds himself that if he ends up throwing By off the cliff with the Cetagandan remains, someone is probably going to notice he's missing. And then he's going to end up in front of General Count Vorkosigan wether Ivan wants to or not, and it'll go steadily downhill from there. Surely don't kill me, I'm your sister-in-law's grandson would stay his hand?

Probably not, Ivan thinks, Great Uncle Piotr has never really liked him.

He tries to come back around to the point -- because By did hit it on the nail. Partially. "I'm not having you for an accidental grandfather. And anyway, there's probably more than enough Vorrutyer in me anyway -- your family does get around."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

test drive meme

You're the best

i am, yeah

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jesus christ your new pb

such a trash monster

horrific