forbarrayar | [ may ii log: we're a broken people living under loaded gun ]

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!event

[ may ii log: we're a broken people living under loaded gun ]

Who: Everyone
What: Victory quickly curdles when the Cetagandans go nuclear -- literally.
When: May 18th - 31st
Where: the Barrayaran camp, the Cetagandan base, Riverfall Village
Warnings: TBD

Quick links:
Barrayar / Cetaganda

barrayar
The jubilant atmosphere in the Barrayaran camp doesn't die out, but it does shift back into the sense of intense focus on their next task, their exhilarating victory driving them forward. The attitudes toward the outsiders are gradually lightening -- the fact that two of them rescued Princess Sonia has gone a long way toward fostering good will. While Prince Yuri and Colonel Vorvolk are still staunch their position of mistrust, Dorca is now openly showing support for Piotr's decision, tipping the balance of politics among the top brass -- which always has a trickle-down effect. But it's a slow spread, and while some of the other soldiers have turned entirely grateful to the outsiders for their part in the attack, for most of them they're only just starting to tone down the hostility. But the shift in atmosphere, however gradual, is clear: the outsiders are starting to fall back into favor with the soldiers.

Vorvolk himself still remains unconvinced, and in the downtime between briefings, can be seen frequently in conference with Piotr, and they don't often look to be in agreement. The fact that the body of Falco Vorkalloner, one of the more vocal anti-outsider dissidents, was found dead shortly before the attack only throws things into hotter contest: although as far Lakshmi and Sisko, the ones to discover the body, reported to him, it appeared to be an accidental death. Colonel Vorvolk remains suspicious considering the timing, but a funeral for Vorkalloner complete with death offerings is held on the 19th. If one is positioned correctly in certain circles, too, one may overhear more talk about the increasingly tense succession politics – talk, say, about finding Yuri a new wife so he can produce another heir. Yuri, perhaps surprisingly, seems reluctant, and harshly bites off the subject every time it comes up.

Lapis has requested a note be delivered to Sonia through the villagers, and Sonia rushes to show it to Piotr. While the gene therapy trials weren't news – and subsequently dire conclusions could be drawn from it – any deals with Jackson's Whole are news, and dangerous at that. If the Cetagandans release the outsiders' gene complexes to the Jacksonians, they might as well be releasing them into the wild: there'll be no hope of permanently recovering them. Piotr is going to want the his handlers to pass on this information to their informants so that they can keep an eye out for any new developments or ways to sabotage the deal.

Scouts are sent to Vorkosigan Vashnoi to further coordinate their efforts with the civilian underground resistance in the city and move on to the next step in their plans to retaking the city. The attack on the base had been meant to force Zahal to withdraw some of his troops from the city, and it works – except that according to Barrayaran intelligence, by May 21st he has recalled the entire occupying force from Vorkosigan Vashnoi.

At approximately three o'clock in the morning on May 22nd, the night sky goes ablaze with a sudden flash of light. The sound of the explosion doesn't follow for another minute, but even at night, the mushroom cloud is clearly visible from the mountains. And even at night, given the vantage point, it's clear that this means only one thing: the Cetagandans have just bombed Vorkosigan Vashnoi.

There's nothing left of the city -- the Cetagandans went nuclear on it, obliterating the city and all its inhabitants and leaving nothing but an irradiated crater behind. Morale in the camp takes a sharp U-turn after the total destruction of the district's capital. Not only were they on the verge of successfully retaking the city, it's the capital of the district, and a symbol of hope for many of the soldiers, especially those from the district -- or it was, anyway. Now there's nothing left of it. Everything they've been working toward for the last few months, everything they've struggled toward -- simply gone.

The soldiers all react in different ways. Most of them are furious, angry like a wounded beast, despairing but only more determined to eliminate the Cetagandan threat to them. Many of them weep openly in grief or despair -- lost family and friends, a lost home -- and some are simply stunned into numbness at so dramatic an escalation. The Barrayarans are badly thrown, and they need to regroup before Cetagandan strikes again.

The unabridged mission results can be found here.

cetaganda
Thanks to the Barrayarans' extremely effective sabotage, there's no hope of getting the main or backup power generator back in operating oder until their next supply drop arrives with reinforcements -- still weeks away. Most of the base is without power, which also means no running water, no refrigeration, and no way of recharging their weapons' power packs. As much is being done by daylight as possible, including pre-preparing meals -- still a mix of MREs and fresh food, but especially the latter, as they have no way of keeping it from spoiling, but when they run out of fresh food from the Grow Labs, the base's denizens are stuck with MREs and rather unpalatable ration bars. Thankfully, the water treatment plant has a considerable buffer, so while they may not have running water, they do at least have some manually retrievable potable water for the time being. Hey folks, if you ever wondered what it's like for the Barrayarans roughin' it up out there in the mountains, here is a tiny fraction of what that's like.

On the night of the 20th, Diya is discovered dead. According to Sei, she was attacked and killed by Natasha -- for what exact reason, Sei cannot claim to know, but this clearly marks Natasha as a dangerous entity. Natasha flees the base that night in a hijacked groundcar, leaving no one to fast-penta and no witness but Sei and Ba Talim, and -- even though it would be an affront to suggest it -- haut and ba are immune to fast-penta. An elaborate but solemn funeral is held for Diya on the 21st. It's about what you've probably come to expect of Cetagandan functions, but the mood is distinctly different. There is still a lot of poetry reading. When not in uniform, Zahal now dresses in mourning colors.

The one building that does still have power is the building containing the medbay and gene labs, powered by the secondary backup generator that clearly exists for that express purpose: if all else fails, protect the interests of the Star Crèche. However, even with the base's population reduced, there are still thousands of people who need power, and Zahal is in a heated argument with the haut over redirecting power from the secondary backup generator to other vital base functions. The secondary backup generator does not possess the capacity to power the entire base, but some of its power could definitely be rerouted to select other areas. By May 21st, the barracks and mess have limited power -- just barely enough to get running water and the most basic of kitchen functions running. A little bit of power is rerouted to one of the undamaged research buildings for continued research on the Star Gate Project, since it's of nearly as much interest as the genetics research.

By May 21st, Zahal has recalled the entire occupying force from Vorkosigan Vashnoi. This means a couple thousand soldiers have now returned to the base, but they're still badly undermanned. Reinforcements are slated to arrive along with a supply drop at the start of next month, but until then, it's time to make do. Some of the repairs can at least be started manually, so any off-duty soldiers and willing and able bodies will be asked to lend a hand to start fixing up some of the base now that it's more cleaned up.

At approximately three o'clock in the morning on May 22nd, the night sky goes ablaze with a sudden flash of light. The sound of the explosion doesn't follow for another minute, but even at night, the mushroom cloud is clearly visible from the upper perimeter of the base. And even if you don't have the vantage point to see it for yourself, it doesn't take long for word to get around: the Cetagandans have just bombed Vorkosigan Vashnoi.

Apparently Zahal was able to pull together enough resources to drop a nuclear bomb on the city, utterly destroying it and everyone in it. Judging by the surprise of the rank and file, this was not a long-planned maneuver, but a direct response to the Barrayarans' attack. It isn't the sort of measure they're supposed to resort to so quickly -- the city itself is a valuable resource, and it gave them leverage -- but Zahal is furious.

Between Diya's sudden death and the bombing, the atmosphere around the base is suddenly tense and uneasy. While the Cetagandans have hardly felt threatened by the exotics, after Natasha's supposed recent actions, there's a growing mistrust. The victory might go to the Cetagandans, but it doesn't really feel like it.

The unabridged mission results can be found here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ He takes just a moment to pause, here. Just a moment to lay his hand on Lakshmi's arm. ]

Thank you.

[ She stares at him a hard moment when he does. Her mouth set, her shoulders stiff and God knows what Miles has them running from. It's words and a destruction that she will not understand, and yet perfectly know the feeling of, when it comes.

She takes him by the arm, yanks him hard. Her hand coming around him up to the back of his head. Pulls him into hard to catch her mouth to his. A thick heavy breath in, teeth to his lip, catching. Her fingers drawing through his hair as she kisses him the once and full and quick before she lets him go.

After all, what good was be careful, when she knew neither of them would be. ]

I'll meet you out there.

[ Ah. He just melts against her for a moment, eyes fluttering closed as he drinks in the feeling of her for a moment. Like a man parched of thirst in a desert, knowing he must go on but not knowing when he might see another oasis. He slides his own hand along her waist to rest there a moment.

And then, the moment ends. He pulls back, refocuses on his preparations. ]

Good. In a few minutes then.

[ The hour grows late, and 3 AM is too soon... ]

[ Whatever warmth she can cut out in the face of so much, it's reserved for him, in this and for now, when she smiles at him briefly before she steps away. Finishing up her own preparations.

And then, she's there, astride her horse, reigns in her hand. Ready and waiting, a stiff nod to him, whatever else follows, follows, she has her instructions, she has never made a fuss in times like these. ]

[ Once everyone's ready, Miles signals for them to move forward -

Only for that deadly flash of light to fill the sky. Miles draws up short, staring at the brilliant flare of light, mouth falling open with horror. ]

No ...

[ She has never seen light like that. She has never known something so bright, so utter, so destructive. It feels like watching a story her father had told her about the divine fire that Sita set inside of herself when her husband had been insulted. It was more than fire. More than light. To know death, like that, destroyed in a way she cannot even begin to fathom.

Nor does she care too, not right now. This isn't her home. These aren't her people to mourn. Not her way.

She doesn't go to him, right then, there's no point. Maybe someone else will be better at the immediate shock. Because what even is there to say? There isn't a term for it. There isn't a single thing to begin. So she finds him, later, much later. A day past, when it's quiet again, late at night and she goes to see whatever kind of drunk he quite probably is. She would be, if she were in his place - or not. She hadn't had the time when she had been.

But she hadn't been alone, either. Moves into campfire light, to find him. ]

[ He is exceptionally drunk by then. Having been forced to return all the supplies he'd borrowed, after letting Wash walk him away from the immediate danger, after spending a day staring at the glow on the horizon, mourning the lives of his people. And cursing himself. Cursing himself for being here, cursing himself for being unable to do anything ...

And now, he sits at the fire, eyes dull. He has a knife in one hand. The same he'd stabbed Tarn with, the same he keeps on him on all times. He's alternately taking swigs of mead - and cutting off small bits of his hair, tossing each lock into the fire one at a time. ]

[ her poor wretched fool. Her worn blade. What a sight he was, like that. Those sad miserable eyes she hadn't been able to walk away from since the first even if all of this, was one long lesson in getting attached. She steps forward when he goes to take off another lock of hair. Stopping him, that self-destruction that stings in her throat.

Idiotic, but she knows most surely he won't hurt her, not on purpose, closing her fingers around the blade rather than his hand to stop him. Feeling the blade bite into her palm and not blinking for it. ]

Stop this.

[ Indeed, he jolts to a stop when she clasps her hand around his knife. Looking up at her rather wildly. ]

--Lakshmi? Let go, please.

[ she doesn't relinquish the blade, feeling it bite into her skin when he jolts in surprise. Instead she leans forward to push it further from him.
If she's bleeding, she hasn't the want to care. ]

You will cut and cut and cut, and it will still not have the relief you seek to this feeling.

[ He doesn't move, but neither does he let go. Dammit, he needs to mourn. ]

It's still something. The least I can do is honor the dead.

[ she grits her teeth, biting back something harsher for that misery. At one point or another she's going to have start using the word vor in exchange for stubborn fool. ]

And to cut yourself to ribbons is the measure of respect they deserve?

[ He blinks slowly at her. Somewhat puzzled by her reaction. ]

Yes. I ought to shave my head and dump all of my hair in. This will have to do.

[ She cannot stand it, she cannot stand the self-destruction. Him, her husband, Galahad, Byerly, Tesla. She can trust them all, but except in their miseries. They are fools and she is devoted to him and to them and she won't let him sit here all night doing that. ]

You don't have enough hair for that many dead.

[ She lets her fingers dig in harder to that blade until the blood does start to run. Between her fingers and over his where he holds it. Swallows, blinking slowly in that edge of pain. ]

Don't take away what I so fondly wish to have between my fingers, my love.

[ Hell. He can't bear to hurt her, even in this. So he finally lets go of the blade. Lets her take it, if she likes. ]

I can spare some for the dead. They have nothing at all now.

[ It's cruel to use it, but she is ever good at taking what she has and wielding it. She doesn't have that kind of sympathy left.

When he stops, relinquishes it, she flips the blade over in her hands, contemplating it for a minute and no - she is being selfish, rocking her weight back onto her heels to give him some space and turning back to the fire. Her hands reaching up to her long braid, heavy down her back, and grips it tightly in the same bloody fingers. ]

Keep the rest for the woman you call yours, she is selfish. [ I need you more. Sits in the space under her tongue. ] But can spare some herself, I think.

[ But nor did she want him alone in thinking she did not understand, that he was alone in this, that he could not share - I have not done as a widow should, she had told Vishnubhatta. She had not cut all of her hair off, dressed in white, taken her husband's ashes to the Ganges. Hadn't gone quietly into mourning and emptiness. Hadn't stepped away from public life. There was too much for her to do that, and just like that, she never did it. Like not knowing how to take to a task that one had not been taught, nor did she know how to mourn and stared blank into the fire for a minute longer. Like a language she could not speak. Or a poem she knew the ending of but not the first line.

She lived ever long in actions, not words.

Her fingers lift, lining blade to braid and she begins to saw half a foot up from the end of it. The long strands begin to snap, one by one. Some grey, some dark, all of them thick and fall away loosely. Started now, must see it through, and she only stares into those flames as she begins to saw away her hair. ]

[ As she begins to cut, Miles' eyes go wide. A little horrified - he does love her long hair - but utterly grateful too. For her to do this for him ... He bows his head a bit, humbled by her gift. Tears flickering at the edge of his eyes, which he wipes away clumsily. ]

Thank you, my lady. The dead will be honored by a gift such as yours.

[ It is not quick work, dragging the blade, slippery with her own blood, back and forth over it, feeling the tension pull and then break as she works. When he speaks, gives his mouth, she opens her mouth to reply, to say something - don't perhaps, I do not know what else to do, I have never known, feels regrets and death and too much time, and the little comforts that are the only things worth living for, in the face of it. Don't look to me for more, I cannot say no to you.

Instead, she says nothing, her mouth closing again as she turns into the fire again, warm on her skin now that the weather didn't require so many layers. She swallows, readjusting her grip and nods instead without anything else to say, she turns back to the heat washing over her face. Doesn't look at him and in quiet soundless murmurs, she says prayers, her own - the ones she had told Tucker, and says now. Long unending mantras that she remembers, still, and never finds a voice to them often anymore. The meaning of them is solemn, remembered, do not matter so much to Gods, but to the soul. The only thing she dares take solace anymore.

And in that monotonic reverence, little by little, her hair is cut through. Thick as a rope, half as heavy, she holds it up to him for his hand to take. A lifetime there, and yes, it is fitting, but not because she is Queen. But for them, she does, what she could never do for her own. ] Go on, they are your people, not mine.

[ He will know his own words to say, with them. ]

[ He does so gently, turning the braid over in his hands for a moment. Inspecting the fine array of dark and gray hairs both, letting his fingers drift gently over the joined threads. But the gift is not for him. He cannot hold it too long.

Instead, he turns back to the fire. There really should be incense, and an offering bowl ... Surely there will be a real funerary offering in camp later on. But he can't wait. Not when the blood of his district is on his incompetent hands. Carefully, slowly, he arrays the braid in the hot ashes, until it catches fire from the sheer heat. The smell is unpleasant, as all burning hair is. But that is half the point of such an offering, isn't it? The acridity among all else. ]

I am sorry not to have served you better. [ He murmurs the words, lifting his gaze to the coil of smoke going up from her braid. ] There was much I could have done that I did not do. All I can offer you now is rest. What little solace there is in a quick death.

[ And then he repeats the same, first in Russian, then Greek and French. ]

[ She loses his words in the Russian and Greek, follows as much as she can in the French. Her eyes lowered after it, watching the end of her braid go up in smoke. Threading smoke and curling and crinkling with the heat, before it burned. That awful smell she's too familiar with - not just in butchery, but in living in the worst sort of conditions for years.

She stays seated until he's done before she unfolds herself to stand. Coming up to stand beside him. The back of her hand so brushing against his, but otherwise, she doesn't tug to him. Asked enough, for one night. ]

My people don't believe the soul is bound eternally to the flesh. Life is just clothes, to be discarded at the end of one life and donned in the next, and in birth... we find those dear to us, again.

[ After a moment, he grips her hand with his. Weakly at first, then more tightly. ]

I found it more to be a sunless sea. Our sparks are easily swallowed up.

[ She grips as tightly back, though her gaze stays forward. ]

I cannot believe that, can you?

[ Byerly had called her an optimistic. Spat it like an insult and perhaps he was right too. Because it was true, she was. Fatally so. Determinedly. Her whole body bound to a future she might never see but she would give it gladly for that cause. Until Satya, she had nothing else but faith for it either.

If he could not have that for himself, for his people. She will do it for him. ]

[ Sorry, Lakshmi. Normally he would drift more towards his mother's theist tendencies - at least enough to take solace in her words - but he has experienced otherwise. ]

I've seen it. There was nothing after I died. Absolutely nothing.

[ She thinks about it for a long while, could that be true? That there was nothing. No she, can't. Simple as that. Shakes her head. Never mind that it was strange to say he had died, and then come back. But what was she but something that should have died that persisted otherwise? ]

Then you had not finished this life.

... Mm. That may be so.

[ If there is such a thing as a soul, then perhaps it was frozen too. ]

[ may ii log: we're a broken people living under loaded gun ]

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