[ january i log: cetaganda ]

[barrayarmods]

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


welcome to barrayar.
It's the dark of night when you come to beyond the foothills. Snow on the ground, chill winter wind whistling. A steep mountain range towers overhead, its peaks illuminated by the light of two moons, and the foothills behind you ascend quickly into rocky mountain faces. 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 fitted with what look like futuristic tactical vests and armed with some kind of energy weapons that look deadlier than not. They surround you at gunpoint, dealing orders in intelligible English, but with some obscure, unplaceable accent, and their faces are colored with vivid paint. It quickly becomes apparent, however, that you are not the people they at first assumed -- something about Barrayarans, the barbarians in the mountains. The one who seems to be in charge steps away to murmur into what looks like a wristwatch-like communicator. After a minute or two of inaudible conversation, the officer steps back in. He orders his men to escort you all back to their base. As long as you cooperate, that's all that will happen.


the base
You are taken back to a military base of considerable scale and some serious fortification. There are two rounds of guard checks to go through, both taking what must be a lot longer than usual, and it's cold out. You are ushered past the guard checks into what looks like a barracks building, but relegated to a bunk on one end. They seem to have cleared the immediate area, with guards posted at the door, but there's audible activity beyond the short hallway in front of the door. They make it clear you are not under arrest, that you are merely being detained until they have ascertained the situation -- the word quarantine is used, but it doesn't seem to be of a medical sort. Either way, the only people who come to the bunk are those cleared by the guards, and they all seem much more interested than hostile.

They answer your questions with the very basic facts: the people who hold custody of you are the military service of the Cetagandan Empire, and the planet you are on is their Ninth Satrapy, and they're currently at odds with some of the native population. They won't say it outright, but it's clear they have no clue how you came to be here or why, but it's clearly of great interest to them. For the most part, the Cetagandan soldiers are civil, if at times distant and aloof, but if you look a little less -- or more -- than human, they'll eye you with visible curiosity, perhaps even some kind of appreciation.

At daylight, a few women in lab coats and the same face-paint as the soldiers come to the room to escort you across the base to the nearby medbay, two or three at a time. The medbay is an intimidatingly sterile and state-of-the-art facility, all gleaming chrome and polished glass and crisp holo displays. You are taken in one at a time for a physical examination -- they have to make sure you haven't brought any foreign contagions into their base, after all -- but the military physician isn't the only base personnel in the exam room. You hear the word exotic tossed around a few times until they realized they're talking about you. They call you the exotics.


the exotics room
For a military bunk, it's in surprisingly tasteful design. The room sleeps a dozen soldiers, so you even have a little bit of room to yourself, and while the furnishings are relatively spartan, they're hardly uncomfortable. If you're in need of clothing, the soldiers will bring you base fatigues – no rank insignia, of course, but the make of the textile is surprisingly fine.

You're served food at mealtimes, a combination of shelf-stable meal rations and what seems to be fresh food, all prepared with unusual artistry for a military base. There's a sophistication to the preparation that seems more like it belongs in a four-star restaurant than a military base. If you have any special medical needs, they'll do their best to attend to them -- and their medicine seems impressively advanced.

Soldiers and scientists alike come to the room every so often to ask you questions, more like interviews than interrogations, but behind the civility there's a burning intellectual curiosity. They seem intent on knowing as much as you'll tell them, and then some.

The nearest bathroom is at the end of the hall, and while they seem to have cleared the area of all other personnel, showers and baths are scheduled, and any trips to the restroom are chaperoned. The guards, while not hostile, are certainly not interested in letting you escape. You could try sneaking past them, but you probably won't get far.

Well, at least you've got each other for company: the exotics on the Ninth Satrapy.

Comments

[pigsfeet]

Daryl folds his arms over his chest, leans back against the pristine wall. He knows it doesn't feel like a kindness, but it's the best he can do for this kid.

"Ain't gonna have you worrying over something you can't fix," he says. "Won't believe me anyhow."

[infailtration]

York stares at Daryl, sizing him up, his good eye dead serious. "We're randomly on a planet in what's gotta be a different galaxy. I bet I'd believe you."

[pigsfeet]

Well, that's a cogent point. Still, Daryl doesn't want the kid to wet himself over a mess nobody can clean up. Then again, if he stays quiet, he'll just worry over whatever his fevered mind can cook up at midnight thirty.

"Sickness," he says, and that's a kind word for it. "Like rabies, I guess." It's a kind word for it. Something just seems wrong about scaring the kid.

[infailtration]

That was along the lines of one of York's ideas, a plague. He tries to imagine a whole city full of people with something like rabies, and it's terrifying. They'd be violent, not just sick. He takes in Daryl's toughened demeanor again and thinks he might understand where it comes from now. The poor guy probably had friends, loved ones, lost to it. If it spread far enough, it'd be chaos.

"That sounds horrible. Were you immune, or do you have to catch it through fluids too?"

[pigsfeet]

Explaining the full extent of it will just, again, make the kid scared. Given a kernel of the truth, Daryl thinks he'll take whatever Daryl offers and be happy with it.

"Ain't been bit," he says.

[infailtration]

"Bit?" He raises an eyebrow, having never heard of a rabies bite from a human. "What, they're like zombies?"

[pigsfeet]

Daryl shrugs. Your guess is as good as his, kid. "The hell's a zombie?"

[infailtration]

"You know, the dead rise and attack people for food. Romero movies. Resident Evil, Left for Dead, World War Z." He lists off a few pop culture references that the other man must have heard of before.

[pigsfeet]

A cold anger grows in the pit of Daryl's stomach. What kind of sicko watches movies about that for fun? He thinks of the dead he knew and the dead he didn't, crawling over each other on the pavement, rotting flesh and broken, jutting bones, exposed teeth and cracked skulls...

These were people, once, she'd said, killing them shouldn't be fun.

"Nah," Daryl says, "ain't no movies."

[infailtration]

Wait. He's serious. York can see the rage coming over Daryl when he explains, and it's shocking. A zombie plague? That's never been his cup of tea but he knows as much as anyone would and if it's like rabies... York supposes it's possible. Like a lot of things written about in fiction have come to pass. But if that was happening on Earth he's certain he would have heard about it.

"It's actually happening? I don't--" And this guy is living through it. How did it start? How far has it spread? York has a million questions. He settles for: "How was it not quarantined right away?"

[pigsfeet]

"I told you," Daryl says, restraining himself from flying off the handle. He can feel the temptation rising up in him, and it'd be so easy to raise his voice and yell. But he's got bigger things to worry about than this kid acting like the shit that killed nearly everybody he's ever known is some easy to handle issue. "It don't matter."

[infailtration]

Maybe if they had no idea how serious it was, or could become... or maybe if the rules were different. He doesn't know. He can't pretend to know, or to come up with solutions to something that's obviously devastated this man. He can also see Daryl's anger growing and thinks it's probably best to change the subject.

"...I'm sorry." He offers a hand. "I'm York."

[pigsfeet]

The anger cools, even if it doesn't go away. It's no longer burning in his veins, and most of it's directed at this place, and the people in it. What a load of horseshit all this is.

"Daryl," he grumbles. "Sure. You got a smoke on you, or that's missing too?

Anything to change the goddamn subject.

[infailtration]

"Everything's missing, I including what I was wearing last." He gestures to himself, in the Cetagandan fatigues. "We could ask them if they smoke here."

If this guy would trust cigarettes from aliens. York's pretty sure he wouldn't.

[pigsfeet]

He wouldn't, but he'd like one anyway. It'd tell him something. This no information thing they're doing is wearing real goddamn thin.

But anything to burn off some of this nervous, angry energy is good in his book. He goes over to the window into the lab, starts banging on it with a closed fist. "Hey! Hey, you! Got any smokes!"

[infailtration]

York watches him for a moment, then turns to the guard that escorted them here and is lingering near the end of the line. Do they smoke? Cigarettes? Tobacco? Nicotine? The man doesn't seem to understand the substance he's asking for. Hm. He goes back to his spot on line and waits for Daryl to return -- or not as the case may be.

[pigsfeet]

The techs mostly ignore him, and Daryl does his best to raise a fuss. He's not interested in smokes, not really, he's interested in seeing what he can get out of these assholes. The answer, so far, is not much. Eventually, York is called in for his physical, and Daryl watches him go, grimacing all the while. After all, he's next.

[infailtration]

York goes in to his examination without complaint -- he makes a bit of a fuss when they start scanning the implant but the Lady comes over and calms him down. He lets them go about the rest of their tests without complaint, but sees and hears Daryl putting up a fuss and consequentially getting sedated. He winces for the other man, who gets carried out before he's done -- the techs are interested in the pretty wires in his head.

When he does get back to the exotics room, Daryl's been carefully placed on his cot but still isn't moving. Whatever they gave him, they gave him enough to make sure he could be brought back without causing trouble.

He comes over to Daryl with a cup of water when he sees the man stir. "How are you feeling?"

[pigsfeet]

Daryl is only able to move slowly, in increments. First, his hands, then his feet, then his arms and legs. When he can sit up, he feels groggy and uncoordinated. It's a shitty feeling, like a hangover with perfect clarity. At least he doesn't have any regrets.

He doesn't want to drink the water this place pumps up, but he hasn't got a choice. He takes it, and considers York for a moment. He's caring, polite, that's... probably gonna get him dead in a week. Damn shame.

He drinks. "Great," he says with grumbling sarcasm. "Guessing your doctor's visit went a whole lot better."

[infailtration]

"It was alright... they didn't hurt me, just took a lot of scans of my head." But then, he didn't fight past wanting to see the scans. Getting knocked out was not on his agenda. "They said they'd show me so I can see what's wrong but I don't trust them."

[pigsfeet]

Daryl looks over his water with a bitter expression. "Now you don't trust 'em."

[infailtration]

"To keep us alive, sure, for now. To let me see their equipment, no. That's when they threatened to knock me out too."

[pigsfeet]

That's a better consideration than Daryl expected from this kid. Maybe he's smarter than he looks. But far be it from Daryl to actually mutter out a compliment. Instead: "So what's wrong with your head?"

[infailtration]

"They didn't say, but I have a feeling it's going to be complicated. Worst case? My implant deactivated." He seems very grim about this, like it's going to fuck him up beyond belief.

[pigsfeet]

Daryl raises a brow. He's barely moving, sitting there and staring at York through his hair. "Then what?" It's not like he knows what an implant is, or what it does, beyond, presumably, get implanted somewhere.