I'm over the moon

[lucetimods]

Who: All draftees
What: Arriving on The Liberator and preparing for battle
When: Today, from 9AM to 3PM
Where: SPAAAACE
Summary: The draftees are in space! On a ship! IN SPACE! SPACE!
Rating: SPACE

SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE!!

But no really. The draftees are in space. The mod post about it is here, so familiarize yourself with the details. This log is for general interactions, where you can tag around as your characters familiarize themselves with the ship, look out the windows, try on their space suits, and run simulations for the Tyr-Fighters. (Among other things.)

Specialist Davis can be encountered and will have a thread available on the log to talk to him on.

Comments

[herotypical]

"...Technically?"

[vor]

He sets his spoon down. "As you've guessed, I'm...high-profile, back on Barrayar." He knows he's surely dropped the name of the planet before. Whether she puts together his family name and the planet's name is a matter of chance more than intelligence, as memory retains so little of what is heard. "I went on patrols, sometimes. No real risk. Just...pretending I was doing real service while everyone else pretended I wasn't making their jobs harder just by being there."

[herotypical]

Perhaps the family name and the planet name did not connect so easily for her, but other elements did.

"Let me get this straight. High-profile. Fake-real military service. Security forces. Assassination attempts. A laughable amount of names...you're not from some sorta government, are you?

Elected or...or..." Bingo. Her eyes widen.

"Huh."

[vor]

He says nothing, only watches her to see what she'll say. She's clearly guessed something, or thinks she has.

[herotypical]

"You're not elected, are you?"

[vor]

He shakes his head.

[herotypical]

"Chosen? In, like, a voluntold kinda way. As well."

[vor]

This could go on forever.

"Just born to the right people. Or the wrong ones."

[herotypical]

"...You don't get to choose your family."

Emptyish. She'd said it to Drusilla before taking her head off.

[vor]

"No." He sips at a spoonful of tomato soup. It's not actually bad. At all.

[herotypical]

"So. What does that make you? King? Prince? Sultan?"

[vor]

He puts the spoon back in the bowl. "Emperor of three planets."

[herotypical]

"...Three?!"

Excuse her while she looks shocked.

[vor]

"Barrayar, Sergyar, and Komarr." His shoulders slump, burdened with the weight of all three of those entities.

[herotypical]

"You're not evil, are you? 'Cause my home has a long tradition of writing a great many tales about evil planetary emperors."

[vor]

"I've only technically been in power for five years. Give me time."

[herotypical]

She raised her standard issue mug.

"Here's to hopefully not turning to the dark side."

[vor]

He swallows and looks...well, not-amused. But he lifts his own cup and sips.

"Cetaganda's the kind of thing you're thinking about."

He doesn't touch his food again.

[herotypical]

"Is it? Why?"

[vor]

"Expansionism. Elitism. They've tried to annex us three times."

[herotypical]

"Recently?"

Her tone was light but -- hmm -- there was curiousity in her eyes.

[vor]

"Over the last hundred years or so. Most recently was during my lifetime. We...had to perform our only planetary conquest because Komarr took a bribe from the Cetagandans to give them access to their wormholes so they could get to us the second time."

[herotypical]

"Is that so? And what happened? After you...conquested them?"

Conquered. It wasn't that she didn't know the word, but that she wilfully didn't use it.

[vor]

A shrug. "It's been a process. Some of them think we're all barbarians and monsters, some believe in assimilation as much as I do. We've been...I've been trying to treat them like citizens. The trick is always to see the Council of Counts vote the same way I feel, if they don't feel the same way I feel. I inherited Komarr the moment my grandfather died, the same as I inherited Barrayar, so both are equally my responsibility."

His shoulders slump further.

[herotypical]

"It...can't be easy. Leading never is. But I can't even imagine leading a whole planet, let alone three."