[ march i log: we need medicine ]

[barrayarmods]

Who: Everyone
What: New arrivals, desperate times, whispers down the hall.
When: March 1st - 18th
Where: Barrayaran camp / Cetagandan base
Warnings: TBD

Quick links:
Riverfall
Barrayar: Plague / Camp / Missions
Cetaganda: Plague / Base / Missions



welcome to barrayar.
It's the dark of night when you come to in the foothills. Snow on the ground, chill winter wind whistling -- in fact, it's dangerously cold, and all you have is the clothes on your back.. A steep mountain range towers just ahead, its peaks illuminated by the light of two moons. Whatever you last remember, it isn't how you got here, and you feel oddly jetlagged, slightly queasy.

And you're not alone. There are a few other people close by, all looking equally lost and confused. But before any of you have a chance to figure out what's going on, the soldiers arrive. There's a war on, they say, and you unlucky bastards have just been dropped right smack in the middle of it.

With March comes some relief. The first few days to a week are still bitterly, dangerously cold, but the weather starts to pick up gradually over the course of the next couple of months. It only gets barely above freezing, but after the last month, it might as well be a summer's day.

riverfall
The party last month definitely boosted morale, and certainly brought the outsiders closer to the villagers. They're noticeably friendlier toward the outsiders afterward, although they still give the exotics and their accompanying ghem soldiers the evil eye.

Given the village's covert assistance with the war effort and the fact that the Cetagandans found enough data to include the village in its regular patrols, Riverfall has become sort of a middle ground between the two sides. Coinciding visits don't happen every day, but they can provide opportunities for the two factions to secretly meet. Of course, this always carries a risk…best be sure not to be caught by either side's soldiers. Thanks to Negri, the Barrayarans roughly know the patrol schedule.

barrayar
Temperatures are still pretty low by the time March rolls around, and the first week is considerably cold, but it's steadily getting warmer as the month goes on. By the second week, it's just warm enough to start taking baths again -- and boy is there ever a queue.

On the 2nd, a small troop of soldiers arrives, led by Prince Xav Vorbarra, Olivia and Sonia's father, and Piotr's aide-de-camp Captain Ezar Vorbarra, a distant cousin of theirs. They bring with them a load of relief supplies fom Beta Colony, improving not only their food and medicine situation, but some to pass on back to the Riverfall villagers in return for their help. Anyone lurking around at night might see Ezar talking to Negri from time to time as well, and Sonia seems to be getting up to some kind of mischief where Ezar is concerned.

Prince Xav gives Piotr a very helpful tipoff -- there's a Betan biochemist waiting in the occupied district capital, Vorkosigan Vashnoi, to rendezvous with him on his way back off Barrayar. Xav can't stay long; he needs to find another way off-planet, and Doctor Micah Niadem has been laying low in Vorkosigan Vashnoi, but the risk of their presence being detected grows with every day. It may be easier and safer to smuggle them back to the camp than try to get them back off-planet for now -- and besides, their expertise in astrophysics might prove useful. But Xav hasn't yet been able to make contact through the soldiers occupying the city, so Piotr sends his own scouts.

Piotr, with Xav and Ezar as advisors, is trying to come to a decision about what to do about the Cetagandans' wormhole project. There's no telling what the Cetagandans really intend to do with the wormhole device, but disrupting or destroying their project would mean no way home for the outsiders, and…Piotr no longer feels that to be the most honorable option. That, and the idea of this technology in Cetagandan hands does them no favors. But their intelligence on the project is limited -- Byerly will prove to be a useful intelligent asset, certainly, but Piotr is looking for more informants. Any outsiders willing and able to make connections with any exotics sympathetic to the cause would certainly be appreciated by the General.

plague
Early in the month, some of the villagers begin to get sick -- it looks just like a particularly nasty cold at first. It quickly worsens and spreads to the camp, and by the 7th it is evident there is an outbreak of the Barrayaran flu, an influenza variant that has mutated over the last several centuries. Barrayarans have built up antibodies against most strains, but this is a particularly virulent strain, and with a population that has neither vaccines nor modern medicine, it can be fatal. The recent cold snap and limited food haven't exactly fortified anyone's immune systems, either, and in the first half of the month, about half the population of the village and camp come down with the flu at some point.

Although the virus isn't spreading much more quickly than your average flu, it's still a nasty infection, and the symptoms are difficult to effectively treat without proper equipment of facilities. Some of the relief supplies brought by Prince Xav include surgical masks and gloves for the people working triage to protect them from the airborne illness as much as possible. The supplies also include some analgesics and synergine, but hardly enough to go around. Fevers, aches and chills, coughing, vomiting -- they treat them with what they have once they run out of relief supplies. And for the most part, those with the flu manage to pull through and recover -- but if the flu turns to pneumonia, there's almost nothing they can do at that point. Thanks to the tireless efforts of villagers, soldiers, and some outsiders, the first half of the month sees only a 10% mortality rate between the village and the camp, resulting in only 23 influenza-related deaths.

Sonia is among the first to get sick, but she sweats it out in five days or so and manages a full recovery. Olivia, on the other hand, falls much more seriously ill. Piotr takes great care not to get sick; the camp is already incapacitated as it is.

camp
Camp morale is still buckling under the weight of crisis after crisis, but the arrival of Prince Xav and the improving weather have done a lot to lighten the mood. Xav and Ezar coordiate to distribute the relief supplies even as the flu ravages the camp and village, never a dull moment . Olivia and Sonia haven't seen their father Xav in over two years, and it's a long-overdue family reunion. Piotr welcomes the return of his friend and aide-de-camp Ezar, and Sonia seems to be getting into some kind of mischief with her cousin. And in a quiet moment here and there, Ezar can be seen talking to Negri.

By the morning of the 1st, Byerly Vorrutyer will have abruptly disappeared from camp.

Piotr is trying to keep military operations running as much as he can while half the camp tends to the sick or fall sick themselves. They'd found the traitors, yes, but Piotr's anger is far from satisfied. The food shortage had derailed their power supply strategy, and it's only further pushed back by this current crisis, so large operations are off the table. But Piotr has never underestimated the value of psychological warfare in this war. He has a few conveniently available corpses for hacking up and planting in the Cetagandan base just to shake things up a little, and anyone who can lift a sword without coughing is qualified. Xav does not approve.

missions
The medical assistance provided by the outsiders doesn't go unappreciated, nor without effect. Not every day is a success, but they manage to keep the mortality rate relatively low.

The infiltration missions to plant the severed body parts mostly go according to plan, although Lakshmi and Nash run afoul of some guards. Between the outsiders and other Barrayaran squads, they manage to plant several body parts, and in doing so, inadvertently spread the Barrayaran flu to the Cetagandans.

The outsiders scouting out Vorkosigan Vashnoi manage to stay undetected by Cetagandan soldiers, although they run into exotics on the other side. They manage to get some information about Micah's location, but very little…thankfully, Byerly passes on to Miles much more specific information the exotics were able to obtain.

Here are the unabridged mission results.

cetaganda
The snow piled up around the base starts to gradually melt over the course of the month as temperatures rise. The new wave of exotics are processed and very gently prodded like every group has been, but they've been treated with the same level of civility. The Cetagandans are generally exceedingly polite, but they are becoming a little less patient with the exotics after the recent bouts of violence and escapism.

Despite the Barrayaran flu sweeping the base, military operations must carry on. Zahal might have lost his informants in the Barrayaran camp, but he knows they've been struggling, and wants to implement some more aggressive tactics to hit them while they're down -- and more than that, the dead body parts of his own soldiers scattered around the base have had their intended effect, rattling and aggravating the ghem-General -- even more so when they realize that this was the means by which the plague spread to the base. Whatever organized strategy Zahal starts to pull together is immediately disrupted by the rapid spread of the virus through the base. With Cetagandan soldiers dropping like flies, military operations all but come to a halt on the base.

However, Cetagandan intelligence gets wind of a Barrayar-allied astrophysicist from Beta Colony, a planet renowned for its cutting-edge technological advances, particularly in the field of wormhole science; they may be able to solve some of the pieces of the puzzle. The Betan scientist is apparently hiding out in Vorkosigan Vashnoi, the capital city of the city. The virus has spread there too; Barrayarans and Cetagandans alike are facing the outbreak, although the native population seems to be faring a bit better. The Cetagandans need help bringing medical supplies, so while they're at it, the ghem-General dispatches a few teams to try and sniff out the scientist's location. Meanwhile, in the R&D labs, some of the exotics who have been promoted to lab assistant are helping the Cetagandans to make some advancements, and they're finally let in on some more details about the project.

plague
A few days into the month, some of the soldiers start to show cold-like symptoms -- and then the outbreak of Barrayaran influenza spreads rapidly throughout the base. Unlike the Barrayarans, the Cetagandans have no antibodies for this strain, and even their advanced immune systems cannot defend them against a totally new pathogen. They are infected even more quickly than the Barrayarans and their symptoms escalate rapidly as well, resulting in an alarming mortality rate. Cetagandan soldiers are falling sick left and right. Triage starts in the medbay, but they have to quarantine off another wing of the building just to make room for the rapidly growing population of infected ghem. The airborne virus is spreading through the base at an alarming speed -- save for Byerly, no one on base has ever been exposed to it. The symptoms are severe and while the Cetagandans have plenty of equipment, they have neither an antiviral nor a vaccine for the Barrayaran flu. High fever, vomiting, dehydration, respiratory and sinus problems run rampant, and though they have plenty in the way of synergine and analgesics, the Barrayaran flu quickly leads to pneumonia in most Cetagandan patients, and with their immune systems so completely unprepared, most patients with pneumonia die within 24 to 48 hours. The triage assistants are, at least, provided with surgical masks and gloves and antibacterial gel by the bucket load to protect them from the airborne illness as much as possible. By mid-month, nearly two thirds of the base has been infected.

The medical staff scrambles to put up a quarantine while also working on a vaccine for the uninfected population on the base. Byerly, being the only person on base who has ever been exposed to the Barrayaran flu, offers a blood sample -- potentially containing antibodies to this strain. Some of the Cetagandans' testing methods are a little ethically questionable, but they're trying to work fast. They're able to develop a working vaccine with a projected effectiveness of 70%.

Toward the middle of the month, Amai catches the flu and is laid low for about a week. Diya and Zahal take great care not to catch it -- Diya seems particularly absent lately.

base
Paranoia of infection hovers over the entire base, but some of the Cetagandans are concerned with another upcoming event: the arrival of the Handmaiden of the Star Crèche. What the Handmaiden of the Star Crèche actually is or does seems to be rather vague to the exotics -- she seems to play some role in genetic politics -- but it's known that she's haut, like Diya. The Cetagandans are scrambling to prepare for her arrival with considerable worry about resolving the flu epidemic before she touches down. The Cetagandans are about as close to cultural panic as they get right now. Diya received personal notice from the Handmaiden of the Star Crèche herself.

Starting on the 1st, Byerly Vorrutyer joins the exotic ranks as an undercover agent, looking not only for information but to potentially recruit exotics sympathetic to the Barrayaran cause.

Meanwhile in the labs, the Cetagandans have been letting the exotics get a little more hands-on with their research. Natasha, York and Symmetra have risen a bit in the ranks and are brought in on more specific projects. The ghem ladies are, surprisingly, now looking for volunteers to work in the gene labs too -- personnel shortage, of course.

missions
Even though a few of their own fall prey to the illness, the exotics' medical assistance does wind up being quite helpful, particularly with development of the vaccine. Meanwhile, eavesdroppers are doing their usual business and digging deep in places they shouldn't -- particularly where Amai and Diya are concerned.

The exotics that accompany the Cetagandans to Vorkosigan Vashnoi manage to stay undetected by Barrayaran soldiers, although they run into exotics on the other side. They are able to get some very detailed information about Micah's location, which Byerly passes back to the Barrayarans via Miles.

Here are the unabridged mission results.

Note: Negri and Zahal are available for threads by request only. Please hit up Madi or Ammay respectively for you want threads with either of those NPCs. You can also request a thread with Village Speaker Yakiv Gura if you want, in which case hit up Madi.

Comments

[vorrutyer]

[ An encrypted note left at their dead drop had, a few days prior, given Miles preliminary intel - about the base, the guard positions, the exotics that might be flipped with just a little bit of work. It had also told Miles that he'd be in Vorkosigan Vashnoi. That there was a very interesting someone in the city, and he'd be going after them, but that he'd break away to sit on a bench placed in front of the Kosigan Bridge between 1500 and 1600. Meet him if possible. Risk nothing if not.

Well, turns out there aren't any benches in front of the Kosigan Bridge. Go figure. So he's left instead leaning insouciantly against a stone plinth supporting a snarling stylized lion, watching the ice fishermen squatting on the river. ]

[dendarii]

[ All good intel, which Miles of course relays back to Piotr. But the meeting in Vorkosigan Vashnoi is what really intrigues him. Under the guise of splitting up to gather better intel, Miles sneaks off to the bridge at the appointed time. He sidles up to Byerly casually, looking out across the river. No need to fake the awe in his voice. ]

Amazing, isn't it?

[vorrutyer]

[ By lifts his eyebrow in acknowledgment of Miles' presence and voice without looking over. ]

I'd actually wondered as I was walking the city. Does it feel familiar? Is there some genetic memory built in there that makes you know this place?

[dendarii]

[ He looks forward as well, not quite glancing over at Byerly. ]

Well. I've seen pieces of it. From a distance anyway. Technically I'll own most of this in about seventy years.

[vorrutyer]

Hah.

[ His lips lift. ]

What an inheritance. Whose joke was that?

[dendarii]

Take one guess.

[vorrutyer]

I didn't take Piotr Vorkosigan as someone with a sense of humor.

[dendarii]

Humor, no. Cruel irony, absolutely.

[vorrutyer]

The one's as good as the other, in my books.

How is the old man? Has he favored you with a smile yet?

[dendarii]

[ A bit of a scowl. ]

If he had, I wouldn't be here. On account of having had a heart attack.

[vorrutyer]

Then thank God he's an ornery old bastard. You'll live a while yet.

[ He straightens up and sighs. ]

There's a bar down about three blocks. Has a sign with a leaping frog. Wait here for about three minutes, then meet me there. It's dark, it's warm, and we can have a drink.

[dendarii]

[ Ah, an even better prospect. He loves his rural district, but ... ]

Good on all counts. I'll see you there.

[vorrutyer]

[ By pushes off from the railing without another word and saunters off. He enters the bar, gets himself a glass of wine, and positions himself at a table in a shadowy corner. This place is full of nooks and crannies, hence his fondness for it - he and Miles will be out of the bartender's line of sight.

He sips the wine with some satisfaction. Even the bad stuff is still Vorkosigan district wine. Phenomenal. ]

[dendarii]

[ He waits three minutes as instructed. For all that Miles gives his COs grief, he is damned good at listening to his experts when he has reason to. And Byerly is the expert on this scenario.

He slips in a little later, spying Byerly in the corner and sliding over to him. There's something bizarre and amazing about being here, in Vorkosigan Vashnoi, having a goddamn drink. He'd think he was dreaming if he weren't already convinced of the reality of this place. ]

How's the wine?

[vorrutyer]

It's all right.

[ Because like hell he'll admit his fondness for the stuff. That'd go right to Miles' head. ]

Have a glass yourself. It's a considerable improvement over maple mead.

[dendarii]

[ It seems evident enough, anyway. He grins and pours himself a glass from the bottle as well. ]

Ah, but I've an especial fondness for mead. Even Vorkosigan wine isn't quite the same.

[vorrutyer]

[ A delicate snort. ]

I shouldn't be surprised. You are addicted to your own suffering.

[dendarii]

Better mead than most things.

[ He takes a long sip. ]

How goes life on the other side?

[vorrutyer]

Well, it is warmer.

[ His lips curve up with amusement. ]

Honestly, I'm tempted to stay forever. The buildings are heated. And you don't shit in the dark. Marvelous, truly.

[dendarii]

Real baths too, I'm sure.

[ He rubs idly at the stubble on his own cheek. ]

Our parties are better, though.

[vorrutyer]

I suppose so. Though real parties need drugs, which you have no access to. Which, incidentally, I'm pretending to be something of an addict. So tell me if there's anything I should lift out of the medbay. They seem to have a high tolerance for mischief like stealing.

[ Just in case he should be stealing any anti-seizure medication to use "recreationally." He takes a sip of wine, and then - without a change of expression - he asks: ]

How is life back there?

[dendarii]

[ Bless Byerly for being damn smart about this. Miles brightens visibly, and not just because of the wine. ]

Hmm, I could think of a few things. But I hear there's someone else who's a real expert. Knows his stuff. Ratchet, I think.

[ Talk to the doctor, basically; see if he can figure something out. As for the current state of affairs, well. He sobers a bit. ]

Sick all around. I've never seen so much vomit in my life.

[vorrutyer]

Ratchet. Duly noted. A friend of anyone's in particular?

[ But - ]

But yes, the flu has hit our camp quite hard. Hideous thing. [ A hesitation, then - ] This plague is...natural, correct?

[ Translation: Did the Betans who just showed up engineer this crap? ]

[dendarii]

York. [ He murmurs the name into his glass. ] They both helped Wash, apparently.

[ The same ones Miles asked By to take a message to earlier. So hopefully he's talked to them already.

As for the plague, well ... Miles makes a face. ]

Entirely normal. I had it as a kid. Similar strain.

[vorrutyer]

[ A small lift of his chin. ]

Yes, I did as well. The timing just seemed...Well. The famous Xav has arrived, no?