barrayarmods: (Default)
For Barrayar mods ([personal profile] barrayarmods) wrote in [community profile] forbarrayar2016-12-19 09:43 pm

[ january i log: barrayar ]

Who: Everyone
What: Arrival on Barrayar and what follows
When: January 2nd - January 17th
Where: Barrayaran guerrilla camp
Warnings: None (at the moment)


welcome to barrayar.
It's the dark of night when you come to in the foothills. Snow on the ground, chill winter wind whistling. 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 nine 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.

They're dressed in weather-worn green uniforms, bearing swords and bows, and they surround you immediately, poised to attack. But they quickly realize you're not their enemy, the ones they call Cetagandans. They're just as confused as you are, but rather than hanging around to puzzle it out, they start shepherding you toward their camp in the mountains while it's still dark. There's a war on, they say, and you unlucky bastards have just been dropped right smack in the middle of it.

the guerrilla camp
It's a few hours' hike through the mountains to get to their hidden camp, set up in a clearing framed by dense, hard forestry and backed against a rock face. Daylight is finally dawning when you make it there. You and your fellow sudden arrivals are ushered to an empty tent on the far end of the camp, just big enough to fit all ten of you. You can't help but notice they've posted guards all around it. You aren't under arrest – they just don't know what else to do with you.

You are able to glean, from hearsay and what the soldiers are willing to share with you, that you are on a planet called Barrayar, and this is their home, and ten years ago they were attacked without warning by the Cetagandan Empire. They've been holed up in the mountains fighting against their invaders ever since, outgunned and outmanned, but scoring little victories where they can. They don't tell you much more than that. Some dialect of Russian seems to be one of the predominant languages of the camp, but for the most part they all speak English too, if with an accent. They're gruff and wary, and if you look a little less – or more – than human, they'll eye you with suspicion, maybe even make obscure hex signs at you that seem intended to ward off evil or disease. But they aren't hostile to you, not unless you start something with them.

the outsiders' tent
It's not in the greatest shape, but if you look around the camp, the rest aren't much better off. It's cramped, but you've at least been provided with bedrolls and heavy wool blankets to ward off the frozen chill, and if you're in need of clothing, they'll provide it, although it probably hasn't been washed in…a while. The soldiers bring you food at mealtimes -- not very good food, mostly tough meat and groats, and they keep you your own campfire, just to keep you warm. They've also hastily dug you your own latrine area at the edge of the perimeter, just behind the treeline. No private bathroom stalls in this outfit, unfortunately. The entire camp seems tense and wary, and the soldiers are alert, but they don't talk much. You could try sneaking past them, but you probably won't get far.

Well, at least you've got each other for company: the outsiders on Barrayar.
littlemissfutility: (87)

[personal profile] littlemissfutility 2017-01-11 04:30 am (UTC)(link)
Byerly's picked the right story to get her attention, at least. There's enough to it that she's not entirely sure where to begin--with his cousin, with the noblemen he mentions, with the technology they have here if they can do something like changing a person's sex that easily.

They also have space travel, according to him--like, real space travel. You're probably not supposed to be surprised about the last one. But it still seems impressive to her, the way he mentions it as off-handedly as if his cousin stopped by the store for a gallon of milk.

She thinks maybe he's trying to be nice, the way he tells her she's going to be all right, but the words are such a departure from everything else that she's not entirely sure what to do with them. After a moment, she shrugs. All right is relative, and they're still stuck out here in the middle of nowhere. Even if they weren't, her relative safety is another thing she's pretty sure she's not in the mood to discuss with him.

"Don't you have countesses here?" is what she finally asks, sidestepping all her other questions and vague concerns for the moment.
shri: (» my blood is a flood)

[personal profile] shri 2017-01-11 11:59 am (UTC)(link)
[ She goes as stiff for the word as if a line of soldiers danced along her spine. Taught, sharp - did he say?

Her hands still in her hair, curling into it - she has no blades, she has nothing but the strength the Blackwater gives her and a lifetime of fighting to her last breath again and again. She must trust in that - she is Jhansi ki Rani and -

Who is he? Which one is he?
]

Did you say Camelot?

[ her attention is sharp, utter, straight through. The air has gone out of the tent and no, it's not some teasing disbelief. Not laughing and saying it's not real.

Oh, she knows those stories, knows them better than both and has paid the price for their ideals. So had half the damn world it felt like. A fight that aches down her limbs in a need to strike almost as instinct for the bearest mention. A curling in thought again for what she's lost by being here - whom she had to wait to come back to her, and now couldn't.
]

Who are you?
vorrutyer: (world-weary (and smug))

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-11 02:20 pm (UTC)(link)
Ah, good. That's a slightly safer topic. And he's abruptly grateful she doesn't even touch his phenomenally awkward you'll-be-all-right - he is by nature, after all, quite smooth, quite suave, and he stays so by neatly sidestepping conversations where he is not-suave and not-smooth. Trying to provide comfort is - well. No one is suave when trying to comfort someone. But the rights of the poor women on this benighted world of his? Yes, there was ample room for irony there.

"Oh, yes, dozens," he answers easily, then flips up a hand - "All of whom got there by marrying a Count, and their duties consist of ruling his household, not his District. It's a fool who writes off the power of our women, but voting rights rest with the men. Hence Dono's clever workaround. They say that women are just too foolish and short-sighted to rule appropriately. So emotional, they cluck, completely blinded by their emotions. The more charitable ones simply say that a woman's upbringing doesn't develop the skills needed for good governance - though it must be noted that Dono, who had a woman's upbringing, is easily the best of them." And that's hardly even family loyalty speaking - even his opponents have come to rather admire the energetic, charismatic new Count.

"Your clothes hint to me that you're from a rather...egalitarian world. You can usually tell that a planet's all right to their women when it's all right for those women to wear trousers." He gives a little sigh. "This planet's sexism is such a pity - trousers are far more flattering to the backside than skirts."
littlemissfutility: (Default)

[personal profile] littlemissfutility 2017-01-11 03:55 pm (UTC)(link)
He's doing pretty well up until he brings up backsides and she has to wonder if he's been taking advantage of the fact that she's wearing jeans. Gross--but what's the alternative? It's too cold to pull off the coat and tie it around her waist. So she tries to pretend she didn't hear that part.

Besides, she's appalled enough at his explanation that she's kind of busy gaping at him. "You can go to other planets."

They have space ships, but women can't vote. It seems insane to her--though it occurs to her after a moment that people with bows and arrows, at least, probably don't have space ships. And plenty of places before the turn didn't let women do anything, let alone voting. They just weren't anywhere near Georgia.

It's enough to make her forget the fact that he'd wobbled over words about being okay, just a minute or two ago. "The strongest people I know are women."
prorenataa: (B&W Serious)

[personal profile] prorenataa 2017-01-11 04:12 pm (UTC)(link)
"Something like that," Adrien confirmed, though it was his turn to arch an eyebrow when she made that exclamation. "You're Russian?"
prorenataa: (you are giving me a fucking headache)

[personal profile] prorenataa 2017-01-11 04:15 pm (UTC)(link)
While he completely understood the words coming out of Miles' mouth, Adrien still looked dubious about their intention. It just was hard to reconcile that line of reasoning with his own; even with the wider view his recent life experiences had afforded him.

"It's not just to plunder local resources and build up their own coffers?"

Because that was usually the motive behind one group trying to invade or secure the domain of another. A struggle as old as time and space itself.
vorrutyer: (drugged out)

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-11 04:24 pm (UTC)(link)
"You can go to other planets," he agrees, "which, not coincidentally, many many women choose to do. It's less a population drain than a population collapse. Which, honestly, we have coming. Women get educated off-world and choose to stay very, very far away - which has led some of the more hideously idiotic old men to propose not letting women be educated off-world. Can you imagine? Hah. They'd revolt. Counts stabbed to death in their beds by their own granddaughters. A bloody, hideous coup. Fools."

By the amusement in his voice, he doesn't actually have all that much pity for this particular vision. He tends to agree with the girl: women, in his experience, have always been far more worthwhile than men. Far more formidable. In a Countess Cordelia-esque way, blasting through enemies, yes - but there's also always been the likes of Alys Vorpatril, with her cool polite words and her razor wit and her ability to wield courtesy like a whip. What a woman.

"We've a curious history on this planet, though. We lost access to the rest of the Nexus for seven hundred years. Hence the bows and arrows in place of more Galactic stunners and plasma arcs. And hence the sexism."
Edited 2017-01-11 16:24 (UTC)
littlemissfutility: (27)

[personal profile] littlemissfutility 2017-01-11 06:21 pm (UTC)(link)
Well, of course they do. Who would want to stay on a planet where you don't have a say in anything? (Somebody who loves their homeland, even if they don't love some of the people in charge. She knows the answer on a visceral level; all she has to think of is her own home, whatever's left of it now, and it's as obvious as the desire to leave.) (If they were from here, she thinks Maggie would have gone to college someplace else and then come back and given everyone here hell.)

"It's like you got stuck in the dark ages." And they never left. Maybe that's a matter of pride for them--she recognizes something in the way the hill people carry themselves, albeit distantly. The kind of people Daryl and Merle Dixon probably grew up around, stubborn, proud hicks you knew instinctively not to call "hicks" to their faces.

She fixes her gaze on Byerly, considering where he fits. Silly and drunk and rich, even less to do with hillfolk than Beth had with the real rednecks at home, and only a little less out of place on this slope than she is. "Is that why you left?"
vorrutyer: (confused)

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-11 09:12 pm (UTC)(link)
"Left?" By's eyebrows quirk with curiosity and surprise. "I didn't leave. Barrayar is still my - " Home? Prison? Personal albatross, hanging about his neck, weighing him down? "Well." He gives a little sigh and a wave of his hand. "Place of residence. Vorbarr Sultana is still Barrayar - though it's a bit less benighted than the rest of the planet."

He sighs again. Would he leave if he could? No, he thinks. He's too...tied to his duties. He loathes this place, loathes the people sometimes - loathes his lifestyle, loathes his friends - loathes his family, God knows - but he lives to serve. His patriotism (a curious thing to have in combination with his hatred of his planet), and his desire to make things different for the people kicked around by the paranoid and powerful, ties him down here. Ah, if he dies here, he hopes he's done enough for the people he cares about...

"And the whole rest of the planet is less benighted than this place. This is the poorest district of this entire world. The rest of the place is less like this, I promise."
littlemissfutility: (48)

[personal profile] littlemissfutility 2017-01-11 10:27 pm (UTC)(link)
That's comforting enough, the idea that even if this is the shittiest hike she's been on since the last time she ended up hiking thrive the forest, it's not the only thing they have before them. At least he can say there are less empty parts to the planet; what they see right now is what they'd get if they were on Earth, no matter where they headed.

"Okay," she corrects herself. "Not left. But you've seen the world. Or the...the galaxy, or whatever."

He's been places completely different from where he's from, even if that's where he came back to. She's envious, in a distant sort of way. (It might not be justifiable, now that she's on another planet, but she always daydreamed about going to faraway places on Earth.)
dendarii: (solpadeine114)

[personal profile] dendarii 2017-01-11 10:40 pm (UTC)(link)
"Some of that too, I'm sure." But Cetaganda already has enough worlds already. It's not a press for resources, as far as he knows; just greed.
vorrutyer: (drugged out)

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-11 10:57 pm (UTC)(link)
"Oh, I was just following the party," he says breezily. Or following his duty. Or both, at times - his duty, after all, tends to be reporting on parties and the sedition that might or might not happen there. Still, it's interesting how she focuses on that, isn't it? He turns his gaze on her speculatively a moment, trying to evaluate her expression. Yes, he supposes it would be impossibly exciting to someone who didn't even know of the possibility of interstellar travel until recently, wouldn't it?

So he comments, "It's not expensive, though. Travel like that. If you get out of here, you can pursue it yourself. Could be...fun."
littlemissfutility: (55)

[personal profile] littlemissfutility 2017-01-11 11:12 pm (UTC)(link)
Beth doesn't really notice him looking at her--at the moment, she's stepping carefully over a large stone in the path, determined not to make herself colder by stumbling into the snow. When she glances back at him, he looks the same as he has throughout the conversation. Specifically, right now he looks like the kind of person who thinks everyone should try the things he likes, because he likes them.

"Maybe," she agrees, after a moment or so. She'd like that, truthfully--seeing real cities again, with consistent electricity and running water, and maybe law enforcement, and of course, food that's never been canned--but it can't be her first priority. It's low on her to-do list, well below entries like find out what happened to Earth and go back and find everyone...but he doesn't need to know that. "What's your favorite place you've been?"
dendarii: (cunning plan)

[personal profile] dendarii 2017-01-12 12:54 am (UTC)(link)
I don't care. Do I have to care?
vorrutyer: (annoyed and/or stressed)

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-12 01:01 am (UTC)(link)
Yes. Are you even a Vorkosigan, or have you been a bastard all along?
dendarii: (TW_S1_E3_0348)

[personal profile] dendarii 2017-01-12 01:04 am (UTC)(link)
Fuck you, Byerly. Let me sulk for one day.
vorrutyer: (I'm honestly having a time telling)

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-12 01:09 am (UTC)(link)
Twenty-seven hours - [ You know, one day to a Barrayaran - ] is enough to change the course of empires. You really want to sit out a day? Or maybe two, maybe you need two. Or three? Or a week?
vorrutyer: (looking off to the side)

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-12 01:10 am (UTC)(link)
"I'll tell you my second-favorite place, how about that?" His first-favorite place is, of course, the Orb of Unearthly Delights. The Orb is, admittedly, probably the favorite place of about a third of the Nexus, a paradise of enthusiastically consensual sensual experiences - and a place that Beth would be welcomed to, given the Betans' liberality about what constitutes adulthood. For Byerly's part...Well. He has a Barrayaran sense of the line between childhood and adulthood - it was set at twentyish as soon as he reached his majority and has been creeping higher and higher every year as he gets older - and this girl isn't there yet. So, no, he's not going to encourage her to go to the Orb.

"The Spacefaring Museum on Beta Colony. I know that probably sounds dreadfully dull, a museum for heaven's sake, but it's actually quite fascinating. Tracing the development of the technologies through the centuries. If you can endure something educational, that's the place to spend your time." He considers, then allows, "That or Crater Lakes on Escobar."
dendarii: (cunning plan)

[personal profile] dendarii 2017-01-12 01:12 am (UTC)(link)
That sounds fantastic if it means you get out of my hair.
vorrutyer: (shaaaahhhhts)

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-12 01:13 am (UTC)(link)
Or maybe I'll cut your throat right now. It might earn me some points with the soldiers here.
dendarii: (solpadeine111)

[personal profile] dendarii 2017-01-12 01:19 am (UTC)(link)
[ With absolute certainty: ]

You won't.
vorrutyer: (haughty (and smug))

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-12 01:21 am (UTC)(link)
Give me a knife and come outside with me if you really believe that.
dendarii: (eidetics 160)

[personal profile] dendarii 2017-01-12 01:23 am (UTC)(link)
[ A dangerous glint flares in his eyes at that. He has no weapons, of course, but ... he spies a guard he can easily palm one off of. ]

I'll meet you there.
vorrutyer: (annoyed and/or stressed)

[personal profile] vorrutyer 2017-01-12 01:25 am (UTC)(link)
[ ...Ah. ]

Yes, and where are you getting the knife from?
dendarii: (eidetics 135)

[personal profile] dendarii 2017-01-12 01:26 am (UTC)(link)
A guard, of course.

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