dendarii | [IC] TEST POST

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test post

[IC] TEST POST

[ Miles Vorkosigan cuts an unusual figure even under the most extraordinary circumstances: tiny and somewhat hunchbacked, his curved spine obvious even beneath his custom-cut Imperial Security green military uniform. Unless you're bitty like him (and he's met few adults below his height of 4'8"), he likely comes up to your shoulder or a little lower.

There is, however, a manic energy to the man that makes him fill up more than his physical space. Sharp, penetrating gray eyes take in the world around him as great refreshing gulps of information. Depending on the situation, he may be taking in you as well. ]

A - Canon

[ In his case, you suddenly find yourself in an empty and rather old-fashioned looking house. Old-fashioned except for the high tech consoles installed in various areas, anyway, and if one looks out the window a relatively sci-fi-esque view can be seen interspersed with vaguely Russian architecture. Miles looks up, startled by your sudden appearance. ]

I'm sorry, have we met?

[ In other words, how the hell did you just waltz into the Vorkosoigan House without him being alerted by the guards? Visiting his father or mother, maybe? That's the only thing coming to mind. ]

B - Mask or Menace

[ Staring, Miles can deal with. It's depressingly normal and almost comforting, given the circumstances. But having people approach him like some kind of celebrity is damned unsettling. It feels like some awful combination of being both Lord Vorkosigan and Admiral Naismith at the same time ... which is technically true, but he's not enough at ease with himself to cross those wires just yet.

Speaking of which. He fixes a brilliant smile on his face as his confident swagger threatens to knock over anyone within a five meter radius of him. The space operatic Admiral Naismith persona in full force and practically spilling over. After all, when faced with a wall, Miles tends to charge right the hell on through. First obstacle to be defeated: finding out what the hell is going on and why his head is feeling strangely full all of a sudden.

He's about twenty or so, though with a face like his he could be anywhere between early twenties and early thirties. The tell-tale import barcode flickers at his wrist; he hasn't quite realized what that means for himself or anyone else. In a remarkably flat, pseudo-American accent: ]

You know, I think I've gotten myself lost. Any chance you're more familiar with this place?

[ Heropa is where he's come out first, but by now he could be in any of the Porter cities. ]

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Really? But we are on the north continent-- ah. How provincial of me, [he says with ready, self-mocking amusement.] We're not on Barrayar.

There's no reason we couldn't visit the beach just to look, anyway. I've seen pictures; the seaweed isn't even red. [A slight joke. Of course after terraforming Barrayar has Earth-like sea life, too, but it wasn't what anyone would call prevalent.]

No, we are very much not. The seaweed is even green, I hear ...

[ A tinge of unsettlement across their link; awe and homesickness both. Nothing will ever take the place of Barrayar, no matter how many times he's forced to badmouth it as Naismith. He tries to focus on the awe instead, to appreciate Earth rather than long for home. ]

Why not? Pack a lunch and go, right now. Pick up some wine.

[If anyone shares Miles's complicated love-hate for Barrayar, it's Gregor. He understands that mix of awe and homesickness, and echoes it back more gently, sympathy rather than feedback.

Gregor sits up a bit more, looking abruptly more lively.] Nothing stopping us, is there? We could pick up lunch on the way. You get the food, I get the wine.

[ It's soothing like that. Having someone who really, truly understands ... He's not sure what he'd do without Gregor, if he's being honest with himself. ]

You've got the idea now. Moderate freedom - not just serving coffee.

[ He summons up a nice mental image of a Russian-American place he's fond of nearby. Reasonably close to Barrayaran cuisine. does great take-out. ]

[It's a thought Gregor's had himself about Miles more than once. He really doesn't know what he'd do. Who they are in public is both so different from who they are in private, for entirely different reasons but nonetheless true.

'Moderate freedom'. What a concept.

At that image, Gregor brightens and gets to his feet straight away.] I'll get my shoes. D'you think they have blintzes?

I will certainly request them. Or find them.

[ He will charm them into doing it if he has to, so help him. The Emperor wants blintzes, so blintzes he shall receive. ]

Meet you at the porter to Heropa after?

Sure. Don't go crazy about it, Miles. I'll survive if they don't.

[Gregor is rather easy to please and rarely asks for anything, too conscientious of imposing himself on those who serve him. Rather to the disappointment of some of them... a fact he is unaware of.

He ducks out to get shoes and coat both, suspecting the beach is likely to be windy, and meets Miles downstairs to head out.]

[ That is exactly why Miles is getting you blintzes, Gregor. Because you never do ask for anything.

In the end he gets a nice picnic put together, all wrapped in a to-go box, with Miles promising to stop back later to put together a sales pitch for their new menu item. Gladly carries it the whole way through the porter, to the beach, right up until setup. Surely Gregor has his hands full of wine, anyway. He can't help that swell of awe when they get to the sand and the ocean stretches out before them, green seaweed and all. ]

An excellent idea, Gregor...

I do have them occasionally.

[He's totally oblivious to the idea that other people might want to do things for him, just for him. But he is looking forward to eating blintzes, even though they undoubtedly won't be quite the same as the ones from home. It'll be close enough. A bit of Barrayar on a blindingly Earth-like beach.

Gregor can't explain it, but something about staring out at the vast expanse of sand and water hits home to him that they're on Earth in a way that had only been intellectually true to him before. He'd walked slowly down the dune, eyes fixated, and had to tear them away to help spread out the blanket-- pilfered from the couch in their living room-- to sit on.

There's a brown paper bag with two wine bottles in it, and two plastic stemless wine glasses, settled between them, yet unopened.]

Strange to think that this water was the site of the original evolution of humanity. Millions of years ago, of course, but... Hard not to get a little philosophical.

[ Miles settles himself down on the blanket with an appreciative look at the wine bottles. The basket goes down between them as well, with Miles already reaching over to grab a pirozhki out of the basket. Something to munch on while they talk. It's windy, but not unpleasantly so, he decides; just nice, with the smell of salt permeating the air. He breathes deep. ]

In a sense, we've actually come home?

[Ah, pirozhki. He hasn't had one of those in... well, at least a month, but it seems much longer. Gregor takes one himself, picking at it at least as much as he's eating it. There's a paper napkin taken from the bag that he holds it in, properly.

Some etiquette manners are harder to discard than others.]

Maybe. Or at least... We're never as far as we think we are. You're the one that said that escaping being Vor would be like escaping your own shadow. Maybe we're always closer than we think.

[It seems poignant in the context of all that homesickness.]

[ Miles isn't even bothering with that. He's adjusting a little better to casual life in general, jeans and all. The Naismith persona is a help rather than a hinderance in that regard. It's almost ... fun, some days.

Though speaking of not escaping. His smile goes kind of soft at that. ]

And here we haven't even gotten into the wine yet, Gregor.

[He laughs faintly.] Sorry. Have to get it out now-- I forbid anything too serious once we break it open. Imperial decree.

[It's a mark of how comfortable he is with Miles that he tosses out jokes like that, or laughs at all.]

You have my - er. Non-binding promise.

[ It's so good to see Gregor laugh like this. Real warmth on his side of the link. ]

[A shy reflection of that back, Gregor not looking at him but the sincere gratitude for his presence-- his existence, really, the whole of it-- leaking through without him consciously tamping down on it.]

Probably smart. Good thing we're used to watching our language on that one already.

Yes, indeed. It's really just a supernatural formalization of what we were doing anyway.

[ He's not terribly worried about it anyway. Wouldn't be anyway, but - ah, this is a good feedback loop. Gregor being happy making Miles happy making Gregor happy again. Clearly, this calls for the wine. He's mildly curious what being tipsy will do to their link. Once the last bite of his pirozhki has disappeared into his mouth, he leans over to corkscrew a bottle open. ]

The Porter doesn't want me to forget who I am, either, [Gregor says dourly, though it's hard to think he's complaining too much when he's still caught in that pleasant feedback loop, same as Miles. It feels like drinking hot chocolate on a cold day, maybe. It's hard to quantify.

Certainly it's never something he's felt before, at all, and it melts away even Gregor's innate awkwardness at having his privacy invaded until all that's left to do is relax and dig out the stemless glasses and hold them both out for pouring. He leaves the half-eaten pirozhki balanced on his lap in the napkin.]

Think we'll find someone else to bring into this? There'd be a lot to explain.

[And he's maybe a little reluctant, a trifle protective, of having what he sees as a safe connection with Miles alone. Just the two of them. Someone else might complicate it; he has no idea how it'd work with a third involved.]

[ LIke sitting in the sunshine at the Surleau, with Fat Ninny coming over to eat sugar out of his hand. Warm memories swirling to the surface, brought out by the radiance being shared between them. It's good. Could be addicting. Miles chases the thought from his head before it can properly form, though, not wanting to ruin it.

He is very, very glad to have Gregor here. Despite how much he worries about his safety. ]

It's possible. I suppose it would be better to know the first moment another Barrayaran shows up. Gives us a moment to calibrate our covers.

[ But there's an equally protective curl from Miles too. The thought of having even, say, Ivan caught up in this? Ugh. Perish the thought. Miles leans over to pour them both something. ]

[Gregor doesn't feel quite ready to share his own specific memories-- somehow they seem too revealing to him, how closely he's guarded them as something precious to hold against himself, when really all they are are short snippets of time that he'd felt welcome and cared for by the Vorkosigans, by Droushie; the exceedingly fuzzy memories he has of his mother, stroking his hair; seeing Miles here for the first time, that sense of you've found me again; are you always going to find me?-- no, Gregor would be embarrassed to share those. Baby steps.

He basks in Miles's instead, like a cat, blissfully free of any such concerns for his safety. No one even wants to assassinate him here. He does worry for Miles hurtling himself headlong into obstacles, but he's already wrestled his promise to let him help out of him.]

Yes, I'd thought of that. I'll make things expedient if necessary with an order. I know you don't want the Admiral to meet Lord Vorkosigan. I... would like to think that with enough shielding practice, we could sustain this with just us. Keep someone else out as we liked.

[It's too much to address directly that they're both protective of this; it might not survive the light of day, the sea breeze, or so it seems to Gregor. Good thing they can understand each other without discussing it. Truly, for all his reluctance to have his privacy broken into at first, Gregor's come to appreciate this connection immensely.]

[ Hmm. That lights a small fire in Miles, the thought of getting to keep this if he can only get their shielding perfected. With that as the prize, Miles will make it happen. Whether Gregor wants it or not. ]

I like that rather better. You ought to have some outlet, you know. Unless there's someone else you'd rather have it with.

[ He assumes - a bit sadly - that isn't the case. Really, he would be happy for Gregor if there were a more appropriate choice, if also secretly upset. ]

[Gregor definitely wants it. Don't worry, Miles, you'll always be special to Gregor. He has a huge leg up on anyone else meeting him here and starting over anew-- and it has nothing to do with knowing he's the emperor already, and knowing how much that swallows him up at times.

No, it's purely that he knows Gregor, that he's gotten him to feel comfortable around him. To trust him implicitly. That takes a very long time to build up, with Gregor. The product of years for the two of them.]

I can't imagine, [he says with a skeptical huff of laughter. Some of his honest bafflement at feeling this close with someone else anywhere near quickly filters through. Miles's mother comes closest, but the character of their relationship is entirely different-- maternal.

He accepts his wine and sips at it, relaxing back onto one elbow on the blanket.] You ought to have some outlet, too. As we discussed earlier. It's a mutual outlet.

[ Miles' mother is lovely and wonderful but ...yes. Very different. Miles can't help but relax, slightly, at the confirmation. He's still so used to trapping his friends into continuing to be friends with him. Or just being with him since childhood, though he's starting to have fewer and fewer of those too ... Ah. Better chase that thought down with a swallow of wine. ]

Don't worry. I don't intend to try going back on that.

[Perhaps it's because Gregor is by virtue of who he is unable to be recruited for schemes, but he's never found Miles as overwhelming and difficult to take in large doses as everyone else. He finds it comforting, actually, to be so thoroughly distracted from what's going on in his own head...]

Good. I don't have any objection to taking on another liege-sworn if they wanted to, but I do wonder if they would understand it. They wouldn't be Barrayaran. Maybe we shouldn't ask them to be sworn in the same way.

[Gregor isn't sure if he's making sense, but this is something he's thought about during his time here.]

[ Faint puzzlement from Miles at that. He ... thinks he understood what Gregor said just now, but he doesn't quite grasp the implications immediately. Or what Gregor is implying. ]

Are you talking about swearing someone else to one of us? Someone from here?

[ Not that Miles has any room to talk whatsoever. He's the more likely of the two to do it in the first place. ]

It seems inevitable to me that you will recruit someone eventually, [he points out logically, gesturing with his wine glass.]

And it might arise that someone from here wants to swear to one of us, yes. I've been thinking about that. It's a very... unique situation. [To say the least.] We have no idea how long we'll be here.

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timeskip?

Timeskip!

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