fermata

[isthisart]

Linya sees Dr. Cheung onto a ship other than the Ariel, which agrees to tote him to Komarr very, very slowly, knocking him out for each jump and having someone look after him when he comes around green in the gills. It's not going to be a fun trip for him, but it's better than trying to collaborate with a multi-week conversational turnaround time. It's pricey - the ship has nonperishable cargo with no deadline at its destination and already employs a medtech, but still - but she thinks it's worth it.

Her business on Earth concluded, she examines the list of tourist attractions she didn't get around to, determines that none of them are worth sticking around for, and gets on a much faster vessel and goes all the way home. The first thing she does when there is go looking for whichever of the Count or Countess is easiest to find.

Comments

[isthisart]

"Your memory's fine." Pet pet. "You have probably been outrageously bored in here, haven't you? I don't even see a setup to pipe in music, what an inhospitably designed hospital."

[thisvorlunatic]

"It's ImpMil, Linya. It's not supposed to be hospitable."

[isthisart]

"What a fine excuse for leaving you with no functioning arms and nothing to do. I forgive those responsible completely and at once."

[thisvorlunatic]

Miles snickers. (Ow.)

[isthisart]

Forehead-kiss. "I think Quinn may have saturated me with all the war stories I wish to hear this week. But I successfully coaxed Dr. Cheung to Komarr, and he arrived the other day and is recuperating and cursing my name for talking him into it and celebrating the nice workspace I rented him. And pens are now available without custom order in three more colors. And I'm going to take physics courses and a little math when the next term starts. And I have to keep stopping myself from re-offering to show you simulations of Aral Adri because he's going to be exquisitely cute."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Which three colours?"

[isthisart]

"The viridian and burgundy and brown were the most popular custom offers. And my agent's working on getting them available on Beta Colony now."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Congratulations."

[isthisart]

"Thanks." Pet pet. "Any idea how long it will take the doctors to let you go?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"Soon, I hope. I've been promised recuperation at Vorkosigan Surleau, and now hand-feeding."

[isthisart]

"I can hardly expect you to manage it telekinetically, now, can I?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"I'm sure given sufficient time to come up with a creative solution, I could manage to feed myself semi-independently."

[isthisart]

"With your feet, perhaps. Or by diving face-first into bowls of things. I believe I will spare you self-inflicted creative indignity."

[thisvorlunatic]

He giggles, then winces. "Ow."

[isthisart]

"Shall I entertain you less - entertainingly? I could sing."

[thisvorlunatic]

"I like it when you sing."

[isthisart]

Forehead-kiss.

And singing.




And, when he is released to recuperate at Vorkosigan Surleau, hand-feeding.

[thisvorlunatic]

Hand-feeding!

[isthisart]

It's rather cute, although not so cute that she doesn't want to multitask, so he's getting mostly finger foods that she doesn't have to pay close attention to balancing utensils while she does pen work with the other hand.

When he has had his fill of grapes and toast and little cheese cubes and nibbles of ham and maple candies: "I have sufficiently recovered from Quinn's elaborate attempts to dismay me," she says, "if you want to tell me any more of the things I am now allowed to hear."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Well," he says, "there's always the story of how Admiral Naismith got started, that's worth a laugh..."

[isthisart]

"It has occurred to me to wonder. A version of the persona whose design were - carefully overseen - would probably have a different name for himself and his mercenaries both."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Yeah. Well, I was seventeen, and on a visit to Beta Colony, shortly after my grandfather passed away. It all started... let me see... with Arde Mayhew's RG freighter, right. Arde's a pilot. He had a debt problem. They were going to repossess his ship, or something, and he'd rigged himself a deadman switch of some kind so that if anyone attempted to separate him from the ship, he and it would both be reduced to a rain of highly inconvenient glowing debris scattered across Beta Colony's high-traffic orbits and approach vectors. I stumbled on this scene and managed to convince someone in charge that it would be a good idea to send me up there to negotiate with him, or at least that it would be worth trying. I can't remember why I decided to do this; probably it just occurred to me that I could and I went from there. Anyway, up I went, and there he was drinking this amazing green goop - ethanol plus a stimulant, tastes like it was made from mint and the fires of hell, I haven't had any since but I still remember the flavour quite distinctly - and under the influence of this substance I concocted a plan to weasel Arde out of his situation by swearing him to me as an Armsman. And then convincing his creditors to accept my recently inherited lands - you know, Vorkosigan Vashnoi - as collateral when I bought out his debt, figuring to make a few cargo runs with the ship and come up with the balance of the price that way. Happily, nobody knew enough Barrayaran history to bother checking the radioactivity plats. Unhappily, I had vastly overestimated how fast it would be possible to raise cash by making simple cargo runs with a junky old freighter."

[isthisart]

"Oh dear. And then where did the rest of the fleet and its crew come in?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"The RG isn't actually a member of the fleet as such, but I'll get there. Right, so the only cargo I could find that would make us our money fast enough was a rather suspicious-looking delivery of 'farming equipment' to the other side of a wormhole blockade. I deduced that it was probably the blockaded side looking to get a shipment of Betan weapons past the blockaders, managed to convince the customer that I was a mercenary of unspecified rank detached from my outfit and looking to pass the time by smuggling his cargo - you'll find I spend a significant fraction of this story managing to convince people of things - and got it all loaded into the RG behind some state-of-the-art Betan mass detector jammers, which had only barely hit the market at the time. Then we headed for the Tau Verde system to deliver it. Which, of course, necessitated first getting past the blockade."

[isthisart]

"And did you convince the blockaders of things?"