dissonance

[isthisart]

Dr. Cheung's at a funeral all day, so Linya decides to go up to London and see if Miles is out of his Mood.

Security has decided to be deeply unhelpful today. She is currently showing them various forms of ID and repeating in a slow, patient voice that she has been here before, there is not more than one of her, and she promises she is not there to assassinate her husband or whatever fool thing has them skittish today. Perhaps she shouldn't drop in while the captain's missing; it seems to make them worse. But she got in before while he was missing...

Comments

[middlingalong]

Ivan snorts. "Right, but at some point in there you had to figure out what she liked and do it right on the first try. Meanwhile I thought Sylveth liked me but apparently not enough to suffer her weirdly political friends' opinions about Barrayaran culture. Do I seem like a patriarchal misogynist to you, Miles? Me personally, I mean."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Not especially, no."

[middlingalong]

"I don't think so either, but. I'd say it was easier back home but it's not like I've got a long-term girlfriend waiting for me there, is it, or there'd've been no Sylveth in the first place. How is Linyabel anyway?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"Elsewhere. Buttering up her neuroscientist, at last word. He sure takes a lot of buttering."

[middlingalong]

"Does he get breadcrumbs too?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"Cannibalism is frowned upon in most jurisdictions, Ivan, even if you bake them first."

[middlingalong]

Ivan giggles. "What's she even going to do with him if she hauls him to Komarr?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"Neuro...science? I honestly wasn't completely clear. But besides the holo-pens I think her main research interest is life extension, so he's probably related to that."

[middlingalong]

"Isn't she probably going to live to be two hundred anyway?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"Yes, but I'm not."

[middlingalong]

"Aww. Awww! See, that's sweet."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Well, it's not literally because she is married to a mere heirloom human, I just happen to be a particularly relevant example. She wants life extension for everyone."

[middlingalong]

"Via neuroscience. Sounds sort of creepy to me, to be honest."

[thisvorlunatic]

"It's not like she proposes to grow everyone Jacksonian body transplants. Is neuroscience just creepy by itself, without any attached details?"

[middlingalong]

"I don't suppose that, I don't know, those scans they do to see if you've cracked, are particularly creepy by themselves? But the kind that could make you live longer maybe."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Well, let's see... what about better research into the effects of cryopreservation on brains, preventing the glitching you sometimes get on revivals? That's life-extending, sort of, in some circumstances, and I don't think it's that creepy."

[middlingalong]

"Is that what Cheung does?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"I told you, I'm not sure."

[middlingalong]

"Maybe I'll ask her. Sometime when I've got half an hour to kill waiting for her to be done answering me."

[thisvorlunatic]

"She's not that long-winded, is she? Or is my time perception skewed on the subject?"

[middlingalong]

"Your time perception is absolutely untrustworthy. She'd let me go but only after rolling her eyes, probably - you go on about her without seeming to notice as the sun rises and sets six times comically in the background -"

[thisvorlunatic]

He cracks up at that.

[middlingalong]

"But at least you're happy -"

The door to their workroom opens. There are some local police.

"We have," one of them says, "a detention order for Miles Vorkosigan. Please come with us, sir."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Yeah? Do you have it signed by the Emperor of Barrayar?" says 'Miles Vorkosigan', rather pointedly.

[alicornucopia]

"We don't need it to be," says the police officer. "All the detention order means is that you can't leave London. You are free to not leave London here, but then you can't answer the subopena and let the municipal bench find whether there is sufficient evidence to charge you."