Voice Testing Post

[use_everything]

Canon

A.

[You may find yourself facing large, heavy gates. Behind the bars, you can easily see the enormous, austere residence spread both tall and wide against a backdrop of a lake, stables and a small, private cemetery. The unbridled horse grazing, unhitched beside a carriage, by a liveried servant is in direct opposition to an obviously futuristic lightflier not far from it.

Even the guard that narrows to nervous attention holds both a sword and a strange, small device.]

And you are?

[The voice comes from behind.

Aral, for his part, neither looks, nor feels the part of the lord. Having taken the long way, treacherous and unmonitored paths and foothills back to the residence, he smells of sap, a chemical tinge of smoke and the exertion it took to get back. His green dress uniform had survived in all but the pressed edges, looking as if he'd intended the slight look of disarray and set jaw.

He lifts a hand, stilling the guard from comment on him, and focuses all of his attention on this newcomer.]

B.

[The Counts and Minsters poured out of the building first. The debates of the evening being traded in words so sharp that they might as well have been blows. Aral followed much more sedately, having taken a bit of time to brief his intelligence officer and leave orders for the evening.

It's by chance he stumbled across a stranger, enough out of place to inspire both caution and curiosity in equal measures.]

You seem lost.

Mask or Menace

C.

[It helped to liken the city to a space station. It had the bustle of a large hub.. the rowdy clash and wild fusion of fashions and cultures that defied any easy identification of a trend or perhaps some anthropological hint as to the people - and species... intelligent and alien, the very thought sent his mind into fits of fantasy and planning at once. It was like water, as far as he could tell. Formless, impossible to grip, but could fill the air around you and sweep one far away should he let it. There were colors and layers fitting the ghem Cetagandan... lack of modesty known to the Betans... the maliable gathering of anything adorned by a Jacksonian mindset...

And yet, nothing that fit anything else.

There was only one way to begin. Diplomatically.]

Might I ask a question?

OTHER

[Pick your poison, or let me know and I'll cater a starter to you.]

Comments

[dendarii]

Goodness, no. At least - not the way you're picturing, I think?

[ Something is setting inside him as he converses casually like this. It feels natural. ]

You were very firm, but very Betan too.

[keep_nothing]

[ Another laugh, pulling back from leaning over him, her hair briefly trailing over his face. Her own mind is starting to ease, the companionable conversation helping too, as well as Miles' casual words. She can't quite find it in herself to let go of him though, her arms still loose and gentle on his casts. ]

I bet that was a learning curve for your father then as well.

[dendarii]

[ That's okay by him. It's nice, being held by his mother. ]

Oh, for sure. I remember his reaction to you walking Gregor through a presentation on safe sex. You had slides ...

[keep_nothing]

[ She blinks in honest confusion. ]

Barrayar doesn't have its own presentation? Oh, but I guess it would go against those Rules ...

[dendarii]

[ Miles returns the exact expression, blink for blink. ]

Rules? What Rules?

[keep_nothing]

Oh, I had tried to write down all the unspoken rules about the double standard of sexual behavior in Barrayar once. I got to about forty of them, but I gave up when I realized every single rule had a different variant depending on the present company, sometimes several variants.

[ She says it so casually that someone who might have been half listening to them wouldn't pick up on the actual subject; she could have been commenting on the weather for all they knew. ]

[dendarii]

[ Oh god. He shouldn't have even touched on the subject of sex, however obliquely. Clearly he's gotten more than he bargained for. ]

Mother! Really --

[keep_nothing]

[ She laughs, her amusement at his reaction apparent even if they didn't have the link. ]

That can't have been the first time you've heard that! Clearly I didn't raise you as Betan enough.

[dendarii]

Not - not like -

[ He's so mortified. ]

I've heard you reference numbers with Da, and he gets this look, and --

[keep_nothing]

[ She laughs outright, mirth bubbling up through the link. ]

Does he still laugh at number Nine?

[dendarii]

... Every time ...

[ There's a wall of NO happening inside his head. The mental equivalent of sticking his fingers in his ears. ]

[keep_nothing]

[ In fact she had just been thinking about the mechanics of Rule Nine so Miles timed that extraordinarily well. But it catches her attention, that shift in the link, her amusement pausing briefly. ]

Oh ... What was that?

[dendarii]

Telepathic shielding. Which you really ought to know how to do, even if you don't care to use it. Gregor and I both can.

[keep_nothing]

I feel that's almost cheating.

[ But she takes pity on him, finally unwrapping her arms from him and folding back down to the couch, sitting much closer than she had been. ]

[dendarii]

[ Good. That's more normal; more comfortable. ]

It's necessary. You don't want to be keyed into me when I'm injured, for example.

[ He focuses, necessarily, on that pain rather than immediately start running through all the numbered instances he remembers. (Because that's exactly where his mind wants to go next.) The sensation is dim at first, then thick and hot and leaden. A sense of pressure on his bones that will never go away. ]

[keep_nothing]

[ She gasps out loud, the wholly different feeling from his earlier amusement and exasperation, then nothing, then this—her mind flinches from it. ]

[dendarii]

[ Oh. Oh shit. He hadn't meant that to leak over - and now that he's thinking about it actively, it's impossible to push it back to the back of his mind again, where it usually rests. ]

Sorry - sorry, hang on --

[ Awkwardly, he starts to build his shields back up. ]

[keep_nothing]

[ She reaches out to take his hand, physically stopping him since she has no idea how to do it telepathically, but she's trying that too. The jostle to his arm adds another layer to the pain too, eliciting another wince.

But she stubbornly holds on to that pain, holding it close. A memory rises unbidden: the mewling sound Miles had made when his tiny humerus had snapped, only minutes out from the replicator. She couldn't help him then, her touch too heavy for his delicate body, she could only hand him over to the doctors. She wants to help now. Her voice is breathy with the remembered and recent helplessness. ]

Is that ... is that how you feel all the time?

[dendarii]

[ If she presses very carefully, she can feel it give underneath her. She could spool it way from Miles, take it into herself over the link...

Miles himself has to stop closing as her own memory filters back to him. God, that - he obviously doesn't remember anything being that young, though having to go from his parents' care to the doctors is a familiar one. He'd railed against it as a child, the unfairness of it. In his darkest moments thought his parents were trying to push him away - obviously not true. ]

Not - as bad. It's background noise, I don't notice it. It's all right, Mother.

[keep_nothing]

How could that be all right ...

[ She pulls it to her now, as surely as she would have wanted to pull Miles to her breast those times, to quell his child rage—she pulls his pain to herself now too, barely conscious of it. ]

[dendarii]

[ And Miles, once again, feels the distinctive drain of his pain lessening, before fading away entirely. Given as they're on the topic he realizes what's happening midstream - tries to raise a shield, can't seem to cut off that vital part of himself. Dammit - dammit! His very real relief is tempered by rising alarm. ]

-- Not you too!

[keep_nothing]

[ She still has no idea she's doing it, assuming the pain she feels is still Miles'. She's startled by his outburst and alarm but it doesn't interrupt the drain. ]

What?

[dendarii]

[ It's all gone now - she can feel his blissful lightness too, damn it all, damn it all to hell - the relief is too strong for him to choke it back no matter how hard he tries. ]

You can't just - you've taken my bone aches away, Mother.

[keep_nothing]

Taken—?

[ So this is what her son will feel like for the rest of his life ... there's a roiling concoction of emotion with it, guilt at forcing her son to have to deal with her stubbornness, her refusal to let him die, joy at knowing he lives despite his pain— ]

[dendarii]

Mother!

[ Miles says, breaking into her train of thought. He gets it, his parents have a world of emotional baggage going on here. It's - a little heartbreaking to demand it back, all things considered. But this is his body, dammit. And he can carry his own burden. ]

Give it back. I'm fine.