[ february i log ]

[barrayarmods]

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


Quick links:
Barrayar: Barrayaran camp / Missions
Cetaganda: Cetagandan 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.

barrayar
The cold snap hits the guerrilla camp hard, especially with a handful of new people to care for. On the 1st, a few people from Riverfall Village come to the camp, Village Speaker Yakiv Gura among them, who seems to have a rapport with Piotr. They bring extra supplies with them, such as clothing, heavy wool blankets and bedrolls, as well as extra firewood to help fend off the cold. The new outsiders are accommodated the best they can -- they're all provided bedrolls and any extra clothing they (probably) need -- but the Barrayarans don't have an extra tent to spare, so that means all twelve outsiders are force to share a tent that ordinarily sleeps ten. On the plus side, it should provide some warmth. The cold is

A young boy comes in tow of the villagers; Speaker Gura tells Piotr that the boy turned up a week ago and insisted on helping them with the supply haul, despite his small size. He's clearly Barrayaran, and looks as though he might have been living on hisown for a while. He doesn't speak mcuh, and when asked his name, will only give it as Negri -- first or last, no one's sure, but the boy doesn't seem easily fazed. Piotr tells the villagers he has no room in his camp for lost children, but somehow the day after the villagers leave, Negri turns up in camp again. He's curious, but quiet and unobtrusive, wherever he is in camp. He's a very good listener…even when you might not want him to be.



On the 3rd, the Barrayarans and outsiders awake to discover that the part of the cave where they've kept the majority of their food supply has collapsed, either blocking their access to the cache or destroying it entirely. It's impossible to tell. The villagers can't spare much more than they already have been -- certainly not enough to feed the hundred and fifty-odd soldiers in the camp -- so while they try to find out a way to recoup their food supply, they have no choice but to slaughter their own horses for food. Food will be heavily rationed, but fairly -- the outsiders receive no less than the rest. The prisoners, on the other hand, get nothing. There probably isn't enough wild game in the area to sustain the camp, but Piotr sends out hunting parties, and when they get wind of a Cetagandan supply drop on its way, they organize a raid on the supply lines.

camp
With temperatures well below freezing, no food, and excruciatingly little in the way of advantage against the Cetagandans after their last infiltration attempt, morale is beginning to drop. Piotr and Olivia remain bastions of perseverance as always, but Sonia is beginning to buckle and wilt as the days go on. The soldiers do their best to entertain themselves and keep morale up, but all they've got are maple mead, and old card and dice games. They could use some new forms of entertainment. Maybe a snowball fight might get the blood moving -- assuming you can stand the wind chill. Thankfully, there's no shortage of warm clothes and wool scarves.

The cave isn't big enough to simply move all of camp inside, but the sickbay and mess tents are moved where it's a little warmer and out of the harsh wind. It's generally crowded with off-duty soldiers despite the food shortage, because no one wants to be out in the cold right now. Things get a little better after the mostly successful raids, but food is still heavily rationed.



missions
The hunting parties are only moderately successful; there isn't much wild game out there right now, and while the soldiers fare alright, the outsiders' hunting party fails miserably. The raiding parties yield a little more in the way of relief, enough now that they don't have to keep eating horse meat, but Pearl was captured by enemy forces in the chaos.

Maine helps Piotr with a very successful final interrogation of ghem-Miko, the Cetagandan scientist taken prisoner last month. He reveals that the Cetagandans have been studying the locations where exotics appeared, as it seems to be linked to wormhole technology, and that the Cetagandans are planning on building a device to control it. They have the technology, they're almost sure, but it's a puzzle they haven't solved yet. Ghem-Miko doesn't live long past his interrogation -- public execution by decapitation is his sentence, and when it's done, a few soldiers carry off his body and severed head.

Piotr's interrogation of Duv Galeni goes about as well but, blessedly, less fatally. It becomes known that Duv is from Komarr, the planet that sold Barrayar out to the Cetagandans, and that Duv Galeni is really David Galen, a relative of a few Counselors in the head of Komarran government. However, he's able to successfully convince Piotr that he isn't allied with the Cetagandans, and after a few days of agony, Duv is granted parole at Piotr's discretion.

On the evening of the 15th, Maine, Beth and Byerly inadvertently catch Vorhalas in the act of trying to sabotage what little of their food supply they've been able to recoup. He tries both fight and flight, but the three outsiders are able to take him down and drag him to Piotr's doorstep. It quickly becomes apparent that Vorhalas was responsible for the cave-in earlier in the month. Piotr is both furious and victorious; he now has a lead on the traitor conspiracy among his men, and his esteem of Beth, Maine and Byerly has gone up considerably for their part. Vorhalas is up next in the interrogation chair, and this one won't be pretty.

The unabridged event writeup is here.

cetaganda
The recent supply drop not only provides resources for the base and for distribution to their other outposts, but also brings fresh species for transplant into the gardens at the Grow Labs. The arrival of a handful of new exotics gives rise to a fresh wave of buzzing curiosity around the base. All of the new exotics are given thorough physicals, just as the first wave were, and provided with fatigues and anything else they might need. They make an even dozen now, their bunk at capacity. The Cetagandans are beginning to become accustomed to having the exotics on base, some of them even forward enough with their curiosity to be friendly. Darkstalker now has a small following of ghem lady scientists who regularly feature him as a subject in their art.

New arrivals will be processed as the first were -- once everyone has been whisked out of the extreme cold, everyone is subject to a thorough physical, including a number of scans that may or may not seem totally arcane to you. Other than a blood sample, nothing they're doing is at all invasive. Lady Diya d'Zefyst, while not a physician, is present at all physicals. She is easily notable not only for her striking, almost ethereal beauty as is typical of the haut, but, as the only haut on base, she is easily distinguishable by her lack of facepaint.

While the exotics still have freedom of movement around the base, the recent extreme temperatures have their hosts diplomatically suggesting they travel as much as possible, they are provided cold weather wear, as the mess hall and medbay are in separate buildings from the barracks. Weather warning aside, they encourage the exotics to take advantage of the non-restricted recreational facilities -- exercise rooms, art rooms, the lush gardens in the Grow Labs -- and will satisfy any reasonable curiosities.

base
In an effort to make the exotics feel more at home, the Cetagandans decide to put on the sort of function they might for visiting diplomats, full of art of all sorts, to show that they're just as willing to share their culture with the exotics as they're asking the exotics to share with them. The function is hosted on the evening of the 7th in an annex to the Grow Labs apparently meant for this express purpose, as it shows off the most beautiful and elegant of the Grow Labs' specimens, and acts as a live arboretum in and of itself, and quite vibrantly beautiful.



If there's one thing the Cetagandans are good at (besides art, and language, and genetics) it's throwing a good party. Functions like this are always an opportunity for Cetagandans to try and socially one-up one another; everyone is in their most fashionable dress in the latest fashions they manage to keep off-planet, or at least a dress uniform, wearing fanciful scents and vibrant facepaint they might not otherwise on the job. For the artistically inclined ghem (read: a lot of them), this is the chance to show off their artistic endeavors as well -- large sculptures of unusual and improbable materials, walkable installations meant to engage every sense, and of course the living art engineered by the ghem ladies, ranging from relatively simple and tame pieces such as koi fish patterned with clan insignia or black roses and blue orchids, to complex combinations of non-human DNA to create some genetic sculpture. There is, of course, food and drink -- in the usual flagrant Cetagandan style, although the hors d'oeuvres and drinks are even more ecletic than the usual mess hall fare. It seems as though the Cetagandan passion for genetic art extends even into the culinary realm.

At the center of the party is a particular kind of art installation called a discernment garden. Housed in a beautiful, improbably architectural tent, the discernment garden consists of a series of rooms, each meant to test the refinement of the senses -- not unlike a varietal wine tasting. Each room is dedicated to a single sense, inviting participants to judge a collection of samples and suss out the differences, or match tastes and smells and textures to labels; the end of the garden presents its visitors with a final art piece incorporating all five senses, as a final test of one's refinement. Some of the ghem might (a bit wryly) confess that this is actually more of an education tool used for Cetagandan children, but this is meant as a gesture of good will toward the exotics.



missions
On the evenings of the 6th and the 8th, some of the exotics do a little sneaking around, and not for the first time. York lends Kaidan his access badge to the R&D Lab on the 6th and Kaidan, along with Sans and Symmetra, stumble onto a whole lot of wormhole data and schematics to construct a device capable of controlling the phenomena of the exotics' appearance. On the 8th, Deanna and Natasha sneak around to the tactical buildings and overhear some marital discord between Zahal and Diya, and a troubling glimpse at their diverging plans.

On the evening of the 13th, Jasper, York and Daryl are all in the medbay when a biocontainment breach sends it into automatic lockdown, trapping them inside. They overhear Diya arguing with one of her subordinates over unauthorized use of ba genetic material, whatever that is.

The unabridged event writeup is here.

Comments

[littlemissfutility]

"At least an animal wasn't grown in a lab." Cuts of meat quivering on white plastic shelves, little electrodes attached to each piece--that's what she's picturing. It's unnatural, it's creepy, and there must be better ways to make farming efficient. "Since when do chickens have hopes and dreams, anyway?"

[vorrutyer]

He shrugs with one shoulder, leaning back slightly. "I assume all living things do, in one way or another," he says. "Even if it's just to lay an egg that hatches into another chicken." But all that runs the risk of sounding far too soft, and so he continues on, "Are you that unnerved by labs? You certainly must never encounter the Cetagandans in person, then."

[littlemissfutility]

"Not by labs. By meat grown in them." Beth shakes her head. Byerly, she suspects, hasn't spent a lot of time around animals raised for food. It's hard to see them slaughtered, but it's nearly as hard to imagine that most of those animals have any real idea of what they want out of life. Instinct isn't the same as thought. "I'd rather eat horse."

[vorrutyer]

He tilts his head just a little bit to the side, a curious - and slightly confused - smile playing over his lips. "But it hurts the horses to be slaughtered," he says, smoothing his moustache down just a touch. Heaven preserve him - he's actually arguing for the Galactic position. They'll strip him of his Vor title any moment now. "I'm not some soft squeamish fool, to be sure, but there's very little pleasure in thinking of that pain. I cannot help but think it's better to avoid it entirely."

[littlemissfutility]

"It sucks," she agrees, her mouth twisting down a little. It took time for her to come to terms with the knowledge that every chicken in the yard, every cow in the field, was probably going to end up on her plate. And if not her plate, somebody else's. "But it's real, not some kind of Frankenstein meat. And if you do it the right way, it doesn't hurt them."

[vorrutyer]

"Frankenstein meat?" The other eyebrow raises up a bit, and he sits back with a small, half-amused snort. "My word. You should have been born Vor yourself." He shakes his head; for once, his mockery is - well. Genuine. It seems to come from some genuine feeling, rather than just from some some desire to provoke. "Just because something proceeds from technology doesn't make it corrupt or perverted, you know. There's quite a lot technological that's been quite a blessing. Uterine replicators, for one. Stunners."

[littlemissfutility]

"So tell me about those." Because she doubts--quite strongly--that cloned meat is ever going to meet with favour from anyone in her family, herself included. And while he's kind of being an ass, you should have been born Vor seems like a compliment on this planet. It's the kind of "kind of being an ass" that doesn't stop a conversation.

[vorrutyer]

"What, uterine replicators and stunners?" He clears his throat, and tugs at his cuff. This is not precisely how he wanted this conversation to go. "Well. The stunner is exactly what you can imagine - a nonlethal weapon. A distance weapon, more precisely. No need for all this ghastly cutting and bleeding and dying of infection when you're using stunners. A stunner fight is far more civilized.

"As for uterine replicators - " He gives a little wave of his hand. "It's a mechanical incubator for infants. It makes it so that women no longer need to undergo the pain and danger of pregnancy and childbirth. Which, if you ask most of the women on this planet, is a marvelous thing. Strangely, if you ask the men, it's an abomination that results in freaks of nature. It's almost like they want to keep their control over the women. So curious."

[littlemissfutility]

Okay, so stunners are science fiction laser guns. That's easy enough, and she guesses it makes the count's earlier explanations about weapons--how they could be tracked by the Cetagandans if they used anything other than blades--make a little more sense. (Of course, if they just used guns with bullets, they wouldn't have that problem.)

Uterine replicators, she's more interested in, and it shows in her face--a mix of interest and perhaps a little longing. "We could've used those at home. The uterine replicators, they sound..." She shrugs. It's hard to imagine hating technology like that, but when things are good, it's easier to pretend you don't need it. "Good."

[vorrutyer]

"They are." Oh, true, he's not supposed to advocate for such things so openly; old Vor like the Vorrutyers are supposed to keep to the old ways, reject all this technological wickedness and all of that. And it generally suits his image to come across as careless and devoid of empathy. Idiot fops aren't supposed to care about preserving the lives of women; idiot fops are just supposed to care about getting into their pants. But this is something he cares about quite a lot, not least because -

"Particularly since children born via replicator can be gene-cleaned." He gives a small smile and glances off to the side. "You can remove all those predilections towards disease, inherited insanity, all of that. Better for mother and child both."

[littlemissfutility]

Her thoughts are of Lori, how Lori could have lived to see Judith instead of dying on a filthy floor in an abandoned prison. How, if Maggie and Glenn wanted to, they could have kids without worrying about Maggie surviving it. How she could, someday, if she met somebody who lived long enough to get close to. Technology like that would have changed their lives--if they had some way to make it work, back in the ruins of modern life.

Gene-cleaned brings her back to the reality that Byerly's used to, and she frowns again. On the face of it, it doesn't sound terrible--of course people want healthy babies, that's just common sense--but messing around with people's genes seems like a dangerous way to do it. "Why does all your technology end up being creepy?"

[vorrutyer]

"Creepy?" By lifts his eyebrow at her. "Perhaps your object isn't with our technology, but to technology generally." He gives a little gesture. "But consider this. Barrayaran history is littered with - bloodied by - madmen. Torturers and sadists, whose insanity came in no small part from mutations. Though you didn't hear that from me, mind - calling someone a mutant here is grounds for a duel. So which one is less creepy: a bit of engineering, or a ruler with an insane penchant for flaying his enemies?"

[littlemissfutility]

"They're both creepy," Beth says decisively. She's pretty sure that this is Nazi stuff, but with her luck, he'll probably seize on that if she says it, and she doesn't know enough about World War II to actually prove it to him. "You could have technology that doesn't screw up people's genes--or you could stop letting crazy people be in charge."

It seems obvious from the outside. Nobody has to have an emperor, insane or not.

[vorrutyer]

"And how do you propose we do that, with an inherited aristocracy? An inherited, inbred aristocracy?" he asks, now a little harsher with his mockery. "Total revolution, perhaps? Betan democracy? I know that most of my family would relish the prospect of a revolution, since it would make for a whole new set of criminals for them to exercise their creativity on, but I don't think anyone else would enjoy it."

He gives a small wave of his hand. "Barrayar is not a planet for hard revolutions," he says. "It has to be the soft ones. The Vor know how to deal with hard revolutions. But a mother deciding to cut here and tweak there, to quietly excise the madness from her child? They can't defend against that."

[littlemissfutility]

"You could," she answers, her own words growing a little more forceful. Arguing with him isn't nearly as grating when it's not about her. Still a little annoying, and she keeps her voice on the quieter end of things, since she doesn't want to end up with the whole tent shouting her down, but she'll do it. "Other people have."

And what's so wrong with democracy? she wants to add, but that's opening up a completely different conversation, one that--as with Nazis--she's not sure she'll be able to summon up all her half-remembered lessons from civics class to support her opinions. "Even if that was the only option, changing genes, how do you know all you're taking out are the crazy parts? It's not like you can compare the thing you made with the original baby."

[vorrutyer]

"Sequencing," he replies, with a slight narrowing of his eyes. Gene-sequencing has been a technology for centuries - not on benighted Barrayar, of course, but elsewhere in the galaxy. Did she not have it? "We know what genes do what, of course. Granted, Barrayar has presented the Galactics with some new and exciting sequences, thanks to our mutations, but still, you can isolate most of what's going on."

A hesitation, and then with a little gesture of his hand - "I'll grant that mental conditions are a little harder to isolate than, say, what causes one to have six fingers. For example, the sixth Countess Vorrutyer no doubt had issues with her genome that made her want to bathe in human blood, but also she probably wouldn't have gone quite so insane if she hadn't watched her family killed in front of her. I'll grant you that. But still, it's something. Anyway, please bring up the prospect of democracy in front of Piotr Vorkosigan, and please invite me along to watch. That would be a sight to see."

[littlemissfutility]

"Sequencing," she repeats, and it sounds like it's about right as a term. Map the human genome, sequence the genes in it--like, it's about as scifi as the laser guns, but it makes sense.

The way he turns the subject away from genetics seems like it'd benefit both of them, and she's willing to let the disagreement drop. She doesn't know much more about genetics than Dolly the sheep and those hereditary squares they drew in sophomore biology--and he's already hinted that this is a subject he might have a personal stake in. (Madness is such an old-fashioned word for it. I wonder who the sixth Countess Vorrutyer was to Byerly Vorrutyer.) Maybe she does, too, but it's always been easy not to want to bathe in human blood. So maybe not.

And instead they're back on democracy, and she gives him a dubious look. "He's a count. He was never going to like letting people vote."

[vorrutyer]

"Just so," he says, spreading his hands at her to indicate that by that very comment of hers, he's won the match. "Democracy seems a lovely notion to me. Honestly. The Betans seem to do all right, and I honestly can't see how even the least-educated prole could do worse than most of my cousins and uncles and great-uncles and second cousins who have held Countships. But bring this notion to those sorts of people and, whoops, suddenly you find yourself having misplaced your head. So unless you want to be the one donating that little skull of yours to the Vorhartung Castle Museum of Oddities, better to accept that Countships are how it's going to go for the foreseeable future."

[littlemissfutility]

"My skull isn't that odd," she answers, maybe a little sullen. They'd probably want my blood. And that thought brings along a darker one, something she's tried not to think about ever since the prison fell: whether getting cut across the neck is close enough to the brain stem to do any good. She's pretty sure it isn't, but the thought of her father's head lingering in some kind of undeath in a bloodied field is too much to bear.

Arguing about democracy doesn't really matter right now. They're in the middle of nowhere, and if they're going to live, they have to have some kind of leader. Fine. Whatever. Spending a whole month here, never thinking about what happens if I die in someone else's war for more than a moment--that actually matters. And with serious, steely Rani captured, she's not sure who she can actually trust. Sonia's so cheerful that it's hard to think of asking her about death; the countess is a remote ally at best. Somehow, Byerly has become one of her better options for help if the worst happens.

She's silent, expression grave, with something of a measuring look. It's not the right place to ask this, and just because he's her best option doesn't mean he's a great one--but people have been killed and captured. She can't just let something happen. "Byerly? If I asked you to do something..."

[vorrutyer]

That...takes him by surprise. Beth is normally so wary and hostile - so resistant to being perceived as weak - that he doesn't quite know how to respond. His normal response to a request like that is glib and automatic, but of course milady, a mocking bow, a leer. It's usually a request that earns him an ugh, forget it from the other party, and thus By successfully avoids work or obligation of any sort. But coming from Beth, he's unprepared for it, and so instead of his normal off-putting response, he responds a little more honestly.

"Depends on what it is," he says, eyeing her. Not hostile, but cautious - and, for once, without any hint of nastiness.

[littlemissfutility]

She's halfway steeling herself for something sarcastic in reply, and part of her wishes he'd just be a jerk so she doesn't have to say it. It was so obvious at home--people die, people need to be stabbed before they become walkers--that it's something nobody ever needed to voice. It was what you did. But he's not a jerk, and she has to say it.

"If I die," she says, keeping her voice low and even--the last thing anybody needs is for her to freak out the soldiers in the mess, "somebody needs to stab me in the head."

Can you do that for me? is on her tongue, but it seems like a bad idea to say it like a favor she needs from him. Even if that's exactly what it is.

[vorrutyer]

Um. Byerly is genuinely, truly, thoroughly taken aback, positively speechless - which is a rare sight indeed; Beth ought to consider herself fortunate. His mouth opens, and then closes, and then finally he clears his throat.

"Stab you in the head," he repeats faintly, and then reaches up to pass his hand over his face. "Can I ask...why?"

[littlemissfutility]

You can't just ask somebody to stab you and refuse to explain.

She nods, her hands clasped together on the tabletop. It's another thing people don't really have to say--not these days. After two years, you know how walkers work, or you're dead. "If you die and nobody does anything about your brain, you become a walker. Doesn't matter if you were bitten or not."

At least they've already gone over those. Even if he was drunk then (or pretending to be drunk? who knows?), he has to remember the walkers. Remembering the headless corpse being carried away, she adds, "We should probably start stabbing everyone in the head, just in case."

[vorrutyer]

He feels a sudden sickening leap of panic in his throat at that last comment. His mouth is suddenly, abruptly very dry. Start stabbing everyone in the head - A little shakily, he takes in a breath, and faces the more immediate request first.

"I don't expect that you'll be dying any time soon," he says. "But - I'm sorry. What do you mean, we should stab everyone in the...head? Are you saying - there's some infection?"

[littlemissfutility]

"It only matters if you die," she says hastily, guessing what Byerly might think of this even if she can't quite see it in him. Crap. "It doesn't do anything if you're alive. But everyone at home has it. So...everyone here might, too."

She probably should have mentioned that in the first place. Her stomach drops at the thought of stiff-backed Count Vorkosigan getting wind of this from casual gossip. She'd really prefer if he didn't have reason to find out at all, but if he doesn't hear it from her, she's probably going to end up getting a sword to the neck herself. "Please don't say anything about it--if anyone asks, you didn't know. Okay?"