trade my soul for a wish

[from_scratch]

This is a successor to "call me maybe", which is getting crowded.

Cam is dipping a grilled cheese sandwich into a bowl of tomato soup when he feels the summons. He goes ahead and grabs it. Doesn't even drop the sandwich.


with Mark (kappa)

with Adanya (Aestrix)

with Sable (kappa)

with Ari (andaisq)

with Metella (kappa)

with Miles (kappa)

with Isabella (Eva)

with Steel (Rockeye)

with Daphne (Maggie)

with Edie (Maggie)

Comments

[unmarred]

"It's not bad. I liked London. Anyway. Jackson's Whole has an interesting founding story, maybe even more interesting than Barrayar's; it was settled by a group of loosely cooperative criminal syndicates who wanted a base of operations outside the jurisdiction of any existing legal system. After a few centuries, they developed something resembling a legal system of their own, but it's not much more sophisticated than 'whoever has the money makes the rules'. They do honour their deals almost all the time, but you can't rely on notions of common decency or interplanetary law there. Neither one has much sway."

[from_scratch]

"Interesting..."

[unmarred]

"So. Six hundred years after Barrayar lost touch with the rest of the galaxy, it was rediscovered at the end of a five-jump route from Komarr." He indicates that connection. "It was nnnot the happiest reunion. For one thing, just as the Barrayarans were starting to get used to their new situation, the Cetagandans decided to conquer them."

[from_scratch]

"The joys of human nature."

[unmarred]

"Right?" he agrees, grinning. "So they came in through Rho Ceta," he points out this route, "bribing the Komarrans with trade-related promises, I think. And of course it worked; all the Barrayarans had was swords and horses and primitive projectile weapons and the Cetagandans had atomics. But it didn't work nearly as well as they hoped. Through a combination of galactic aid, genius commanders, and raw bloody stubbornness, the Barrayarans threw them out after twenty years of occupation. And immediately conquered Komarr, because what else are you going to fucking do?"

[from_scratch]

"Naturally."

[unmarred]

"Family history time: my brother's father, Aral Vorkosigan, planned and commanded the invasion of Komarr. It was a beautiful job, to start with. The Komarrans started at a major disadvantage, because their planet doesn't have breathable atmosphere; they all live in sealed arcologies. So, credibly threaten to crack the domes, and they fold like a bad hand of cards. It was almost that simple, except, of course, politics. One of the Barrayarans decided that a bloodless conquest didn't sit well with him, and he rounded up and murdered two hundred high-ranking Komarrans. When Aral found out, he killed the man in a rage, unfortunately making it difficult for outside parties to verify whether or not he'd been acting on secret orders, and Aral's name was permanently smeared, particularly on Komarr itself. I'm personally pretty sure he had nothing to do with it, because he's not a shortsighted bloodthirsty fucking idiot."

[from_scratch]

"But the court of public opinion had another view on the subject?"

[unmarred]

"Yeah." He shrugs. "Anyway. Time passed. Barrayar discovered Sergyar, and the connection to Escobar through it, and decided to try this conquering thing again. I strongly suspect Aral wanted no part of that, although I don't have direct confirmation; what I do know is that he met his future wife on Sergyar, when she was part of a Betan Astronomical Survey expedition that happened to find the planet while the Barrayarans were setting up there. He took her prisoner. No one's quite sure how they ended up engaged. I'll ask, if I ever meet them. The invasion plans proceeded, Barrayar poured a fleet through Sergyar, and the Escobarans wiped the floor with them thanks to a timely delivery of cutting-edge Betan shielding technology that reflects plasma blasts instead of absorbing them. Sergyar got its name from the Barrayaran Crown Prince who died in that battle."

[from_scratch]

Notetaking, notetaking.

[unmarred]

"My favourite part of that whole episode is the Betan newsvid I dug up where Cordelia - my brother's mother - comes home from the war, looking like utter hell, and it's very, very obvious that nobody told her she'd be making a speech with the President of Beta Colony the second she stepped off the shuttle, and she has a minor breakdown and rips off the medal they give her and flings it into the gathered crowd, and when the President's bodyguards try to restrain her she ends up accidentally kicking him somewhere one is normally discouraged from kicking one's President."

[from_scratch]

"A very dramatic failure on the part of whoever was supposed to be handling her."

[unmarred]

"No kidding. Not long afterward, she left the planet pursued by unexplained criminal charges; reading between the lines a little, I think they tried to lock her up - well, put her in therapy, that's what Beta Colony does - and she took exception, made a moderately violent escape, and fled to Barrayar. The 'fled to Barrayar' part at least is established fact; she married Aral, settled in, and then the dying Emperor made Aral regent to his five-year-old grandson and promptly died. Aral held things together pretty amazingly well, considering what he had to work with." He smiles, then shakes his head.

"While Cordelia was pregnant with their first child, somebody lobbed a nasty gas grenade in their bedroom window, and as a result she had to transfer the kid to a uterine replicator and apply medical experts to the problem of his dissolving skeleton. That would be my brother Miles. His gestation was imperiled again when an attempted usurper kidnapped his replicator as part of a general drive for hostages. Cordelia took exception, mounted a rescue with a few loyal retainers, and came back with not only the replicator but also the pretender's head in a bag. Thus ended that short-lived civil war. They lead exciting lives, my family."

[from_scratch]

"It sounds it. Very narratively satisfying."

[unmarred]

"Yeah, that's a pattern. The stories I could tell you about Miles... anyway. Time went on. Aral remained Regent, and little Gregor remained Emperor. There was a revolt on Komarr in the late 2970s, when Miles was about six. One of the major revolutionaries was a man named David Galen, who'd lost a sister in the Solstice Massacre. The revolt was unsuccessful. Galen faked his own death - I'm not sure whether that part was planned in advance, or he just took advantage of a misperception - stole a tissue sample of Miles, available in abundance because of how often the kid was in the hospital for this or that problem related to his fucked-up bones, and took it to Jackson's Whole to create a clone."

Here Mark gives a little bow in his seat.

"I was aimed ultimately at a substitution plot; Galen made me study Miles's life, his correspondence, his mannerisms, everything. Even called me by his name. And put me through extensive surgery to correct my lack of Miles's fetal damage. The plan worked as far as that went; I'm a near-flawless physical copy of Miles, except I have normal bone density and not nearly so many old fractures, and I do a near-flawless impression of him. I even got as far as setting up the switch and impersonating him for a few days, when he showed up unexpectedly on Earth and Galen decided to activate me. But I liked Miles, I didn't want to steal his life and assassinate his family, and—"

He pauses momentarily.

"—mm, sorry, I need to backtrack a little. During the Time of Isolation, Barrayar had a serious problem with harmful mutations, and wasn't equipped to apply a more sophisticated solution than widespread infanticide. They haven't nearly had time to shake off the superstitions and social attitudes established in those days. Being visibly deformed or disabled or weird-looking on Barrayar is a good way to get spit on and beaten up in alleys. Even in the nicer and more forward-thinking parts of society, you get some friction. So I knew, when Galen told me he planned for me to become the next Emperor of Barrayar, he was setting me up. There's an argument to be made that Miles has a claim by blood, but if he actually tried to claim it, there would be riots and assassination attempts until somebody got him. Which is exactly what Galen was hoping for, of course. Throwing me to the wolves to keep them occupied ripping my carcass to bloody shreds while he organized another revolt on Komarr. That isn't nearly as figurative as it sounds, by the way; the last notable case of Barrayar getting rid of an emperor it objected to was the descriptively titled Dismemberment of Mad Emperor Yuri, within living memory. Aral was about eleven."

[from_scratch]

"What a storied history your relatives have."

[unmarred]

"You can say that again. Anyway. I was... constrained, by factors outside my control, but at the first available opportunity I shot Galen and left Miles in possession of his own life again. Miles is the one who named me Mark, when I took him aside for a personal conversation after capturing him. He was very insistent on calling me his brother. It's the legal default on Beta Colony to consider clones siblings; Barrayar has no precedent, because as far as I know I'm the first clone of a Barrayaran. And Barrayaran Imperial Security is watching me because I am technically a threat to the Imperium on multiple levels. Miles actually had to save me from Barrayaran assassination teams shortly after I killed Galen, although I gather he's gone to the top and pled my case since, because I haven't had to dodge any more assassins."

[from_scratch]

"How nice of him."

[unmarred]

"I'm definitely grateful."

[from_scratch]

"And now you are wandering around evading and trolling your supervision."

[unmarred]

"Pretty much, yeah."

[from_scratch]

"Okay. I hope that works out for you, but I would like to start thinking about what I'm going to do with my time unbound in a mortal world, even if it's not the mortal world I'm accustomed to, and it probably doesn't look like wandering around aimlessly, periodically trolling people. I'd appreciate a native guide who knows I'm a demon and demonstrably doesn't care to go to the media about it, but can probably do without, if native-guiding me is incompatible with your wandering-troll plans."

[unmarred]

"I'm not married to the life of a wandering troll. Being your native guide seems likely to be interesting. Depends what sort of shit you plan on getting up to, I guess."

[from_scratch]

"Oh, I don't know yet... I've always wanted to terraform a planet, there a market for that?"

[unmarred]

"Plenty. Komarr, Barrayar, and Sergyar could all use help in that area, but of course you'd have to visit the Imperium to do that, and having me as your native guide would be a little complic—ooh." He breaks off mid-word and sits still for a few seconds, eyes lit with speculation.