ornamental flower show

[middlingalong]

Destang isn't too thrilled with Ivan, but since his lack of thrill takes the form of sending Ivan to a flower show to be out of the commodore's hair rather than, say, confining him to quarters like poor Galeni, Ivan isn't going to rock the boat. He leaves the half-commlink with Galeni in case Miles suddenly has an emergency and goes off as directed to meet the lady he's escorting.

He finds her at the University of London's Horticulture Hall, shepherds her around, makes comments of limited sophistication but genuine enthusiasm regarding the pretty flowers, and excuses himself a couple hours into the affair for a bathroom break.

Comments

[thisvorlunatic]

He checks his chrono. Twelve minutes remaining until 0207.

"We don't have time for this—if you can't handle it, be me! Come on, Miles, where's your cousin?"

Mark, on the ground, shudders. And scrambles to his feet and opens the hatch in the wall. "This way," he says, Miles-voiced, bounding away into the corridor. Miles follows.

[alicornucopia]

Galeni chases after them too, on the grounds that Ivan is probably heavier than both of them put together and might be stunned wherever he's put. He shuts the door behind them.

[thisvorlunatic]

They pelt along the line of pumping stations, some lit and gurgling, some dark and silent. The latter outweigh the former, but the proportion is shifting as the tide rises. Mark stops at one unlit station, indistinguishable from the rest, and points. "In there."

"Shit," breathes Miles, his head filling with visions of horror. The pumping chambers are uniformly the size of a large closet, and filled with water when in use, air elsewise. Their watertight access hatches must be almost totally soundproof. No sound at all except, eventually, the rush of rising water...

"I know," says Mark, tight-voiced with some unidentified mixture of emotions, and he taps at the controls for the hatch and then hauls on the locking bar. The door yields to applied pressure and swings inward. Miles rushes forward with handlight and rappelling harness.

[middlingalong]

There is a wordless yelp in the dark.

[thisvorlunatic]

Miles flashes his handlight and locates Ivan's face, secures the grappler, and tosses down the harness. "Here. Come on, come up," he says, over the quiet beeping of some safety alarm probably meant to warn him that the hatch shouldn't be open so close to pumping time.

[middlingalong]

Ivan manages to sufficiently entangle himself and the harness to support his weight.

[thisvorlunatic]

Miles touches the control. The spool spools, lifting Ivan up. Mark and Miles cooperate with unsettling ease, helping Ivan up over the lip of the hatch - it's like having four hands, but conscious control over only two of them. Miles detaches the harness from Ivan while Mark closes the hatch on the now-empty chamber.

[middlingalong]

Ivan's hands are a disaster; it looks like he's been continuously clawing and pounding at the wall for hours. His breath sounds hoarse like his throat is equally torn up from shouting when he catches his breath. At the first opportunity he sits and puts his face on his knees, panting.

[thisvorlunatic]

"I hope you'll forgive me for being happy to see you," says Miles. "Just this once."

[unmarred]

Mark hangs back unhappily.

[middlingalong]

"I can still tell," mutters Ivan, "you're differently happy. Ugh. Think I'll take up claustrophobia in my spare time."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Whatever floats your boat," says Miles. "In the meantime, we should probably get out of here. Can you walk?"

[middlingalong]

"Yeah. I think. Just don't present me with a balance beam. I'm about fifteen percent adrenaline right now..."

[spacetobreathe]

"Sir," says Elli from the comm. "Cetagandans are coming at you from the direction of tower seven. I went ahead and called your wife and as luck would have it she's nearby, on her way, where do you want me to direct her specifically?"

[thisvorlunatic]

Miles gestures to Mark, who steps up and says in Naismith's voice, "We're on the lowest-level corridor about a third of the way from Six to Seven. If she comes down the Tower Six lift tube and heads for Seven from the bottom, she'll meet us on the way."

"The question," says Miles, mostly to himself, "is how best to apply her to the situation... send her in anyway. Tell her to keep an eye out for suspicious characters and turn back without protest if somebody flashes a weapon. We still don't know where the hell that Barrayaran assassination team is, besides 'threateningly close'."

[spacetobreathe]

"Uh - yes, sir," says Elli, sounding confused by something about how the voices are carrying over the commlink the same in timbre while differently located, but not making a fuss about it as long as he isn't arguing with himself.

[thisvorlunatic]

"Great." He lowers his wrist but doesn't key off transmission just yet.

His assets: Ivan, barely on his feet. Mark, looking about to slip into another panic attack or whatever that was at any moment. Galeni, looking - tense, let's go with tense. And Miles himself.

The problem: Cetagandan assassins blocking one escape route, Barrayaran assassins known to be nearby but not to be anywhere in particular, potentially blocking any other.

"Let's try getting out Tower Six, just in case it's that simple," he decides. "Mark, whatever you're doing in your weird little brain, stop it. My weird little brain is much better suited to the scenario at hand. Stick with that."

Mark straightens and nods. "I'll go first," he volunteers, his Barrayaran Miles-accent complementing the Betan one Miles has fallen into out of habit after Elli's call.

Miles glances at Galeni, then Ivan, hoping that the suggestion will be clear and he won't have to resort to actually giving orders to someone who is more or less a commanding officer. Then, marching order established, he waits to bring up the rear on their march to the lift tube. While he's at it, he lifts two stunners out of Mark's collection, hands one to Galeni, and holsters his own back into its concealed slot. Mark accepts this redistribution without comment and heads off down the corridor.

[middlingalong]

Ivan accepts a little help from Galeni in proceeding along the corridor. Oh, look, a lift tube, antigravity will relieve him of the burden of supporting his own weight for a bit.

[isthisart]

Linya's coming down the other way. "Turn around," she hisses urgently.

[thisvorlunatic]

"Turning," agree Miles and Mark in unison, in their respective versions of Miles's voice. They look at each other. Mark adds, "That one's your husband," pointing down, as they both reverse course and start hauling themselves down the ladder. Miles asks, "What'd you see up there?"

[isthisart]

"Thank you. Plainclothes bunch of people who didn't care to interact with me. Barrayaran accents. I suspect if you were going to be happy to see them they'd be in uniform, yes? The Cetagandans I can probably call off for the time being as long as only one of you is around at the time."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Yes..." A plan is unfolding in Miles's brain. "Unfortunately I suspect it's going to have to be the wrong one, because if one of us is to hold rearguard against the Barrayarans it had better be the one who can produce the right skeleton on demand. Backed up by, er..." He looks at Ivan and Galeni. "...that part can't be helped, I guess."

Mark nods along. "Yes, I see it. Bull our way through the Cetagandans with our dignity dialed up to maximum power, then turn around and get you after we've cleared them off." He pauses, then adds, "The only way it could be better would be if we could show them me as Vorkosigan and you as Naismith at the same time. Your cover—"

Miles grins, but shakes his head, as his boots hit the floor at the bottom of the lift tube and he starts along the corridor. "I know, but we can't. They'd be too tempted to shoot me. The Cetagandans are extremely peeved with Admiral Naismith just now."

[isthisart]

"Right." Linya takes point. "So where is the real Miles going to hide while Mark delivers my relayed message to confused ghem?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"Ah..." Miles glances at the pumping chambers they pass.

"...really?" says Mark, following his look.

"It might not come to that. I hope it doesn't come to that. But it'd make a damn fine cloak of invisibility. Or we could go out the door we came in, but—"

Mark shakes his head. "The water's already covered it by now. I memorized the key points of the tide schedule."

"I suspected that might have happened, yes. So. Mark and Linya go ahead while the rest of us wait at the midpoint of this upcoming bend in the corridor. If we hear or otherwise sense any hint of Barrayarans coming the other way, Ivan and/or Galeni can attempt to persuade them to turn around while I cower out of sight and if necessary nip into a disabled pumping chamber for safe-ish concealment. Sound like a plan?"

Mark shrugs and moves up to walk behind Linya, separated by a respectful distance of a few feet or so.

[isthisart]

"Would there be a point to suggesting that you be careful?" wonders Linya. "Anyway. Mark, you don't have to repeat what they say back to me, there is no conceit that I cannot hear them per se..."

She doesn't break stride. On in the direction of the Cetagandans.

She doesn't even have to step into the lift tube to find them. There's one scouting in this direction. He stops, double-takes at Linya, and then averts his eyes. She stands with absolute hauteur and emotionlessness.

"Ah," says Linya. "How convenient that it has taken so little time to find them; this place has limited appeal as a tourist attraction even when the crowds are thin. Miles, would you like to tell this gentleman for me that you are not acceptable collateral damage in their attempts on the life of your clone, unless Fletchir has decided to take back with his left hand what he gave me with his right?"