thisavrou_log | [ closed ] let me pour you the drink of my people

The air's still chilly enough that Bel is wearing an extra layer or two, the Dendarii tunic hanging open over the black Moira uniform and the grey scarf arranged in a comfortable twist about head and neck. Regretfully, the mysterious Betan sarong had been stowed away for warmer weather. But after weeks focused purely on survival, it had been a genuine pleasure to shower and wear laundered clothing again.

Wanda's snowman is gone, but somebody's been at work in here. The bar is freshly clean, a warm smell lingering in the air. Bel swings up to one of the barstools, leaning over with a bright smile. "Well. You're a welcome sight. Come here often, Lord Miles?"

Miles, too, is feeling and looking a lot fresher than he has in weeks, now that the showers have finally all thawed, though he'd had some very real concerns about slipping and breaking something -- several somethings -- until things had really warmed up. He brightens with a grin at Bel as they lean over the bar, gray eyes glinting.

"A Vor lord does his duty as he is commanded," he intones solemnly, shoulders squared and chin jerking up. Fully Barrayaran, of course; he can't exactly break out the Betan accent in a setting as public as this, even if Bel's presence makes it a very real temptation. Miles' face breaks with another grin after a moment, unable to keep it straight for long. "Hello, Bel. Good to see you're still in one piece." He gives Bel a discreet once-over; they'd seemed fine when they'd chatted via MID the other night, but one never does know. He gestures at the bar behind him, at the keg on the floor out of sight. "Come here for your first maple mead tasting?"

They do have to keep their story straight in public, but Bel has no intention of keeping it narrow. Whatever the accent, Miles's warmth is infectious.

"And might I say the same for yourself?" Bel grins impudently and reaches out to tilt Miles's chin a fraction toward the light. Shaving had been in short supply during the cold snap too, though Bel is genetically immune to that problem. "I have indeed. A Dendarii officer is always open to broadening cultural horizons." A wry glance around. "Within reason. I suppose you have a history of the beverage -- is it rendered down from actual bark?"

(In short supply on Beta Colony for the last thousand years: trees.)

Miles' mouth opens in a laugh until Bel's fingers touch his chin -- one of those subtle little gestures Bel has a habit toward making him, so very Betan -- a small, sharp inward breath, a slight coloring of the cheeks on a faintly stunned face, but for once his Barrayaran reflexes fail him, and he doesn't flinch away immediately. Or it's just a very different reflex... He doesn't move for a beat, swallowing, and by the time he tilts his head away -- not a flinch -- Bel is already withdrawing their hand. Odd, that -- well, Miles reasons with himself rapidly, all that huddling for warmth with Bel must have desensitized him to so slight a touch, and... Miles abruptly steers his mind away from thinking about that evening a few weeks ago and coughs, suddenly glad for Bel's curiosity.

"Oh, nothing like that." Miles regains his balance quickly, he always does, and he fishes for a heavy-bottomed glass under the bar. "Tree sap, rather -- maple trees secrete a sap in the springtime that we tap and ferment into alcohol. They're an Earth-descended tree, actually, one of the more prominent ones in my district. In fact," he says with a prideful little grin as he ducks down to the keg, "they grow all along the Dendarii mountains. One of the things Vorkosigan's District is known for."

He straightens up and hops back up onto his stepstool, setting down a heavy glass of maple mead, its amber color brilliant in the lighting of the bar. He flashes Bel a brilliant smile as he pushes the glass across the bar. A Dendarii drink for a Dendarii mercenary. "Fitting, don't you think?"

Miles always flinched. It was one of Bel's first clues to his identity; never had a Betan been so body-shy, and he'd gotten more so after learning that Bel's admiration wasn't completely platonic. They'd settled into a half-jesting equilibrium, Betan freehandedness met with somewhat less Betan brush-offs, Miles refusing Bel's offer to help hone his reflexes, the only visible crack in his cover identity.

Miles draws a slight startled breath, color brightening his face at Bel's touch, and... doesn't flinch.

The accustomed patient irony falls away, Bel's lips parting slightly. It's already over, the hand on its way back before Miles's reaction had registered -- fingers tingling, closing after a moment as though over a secret.

This.... this is new. This will have to be explored. Carefully and infrequently, not to spook the Barrayaran lord back into his shell.... But it's the Barrayaran lord who didn't flinch, no Betan cover story involved. Who can, perhaps, let himself change, now that he and the Betan captain can be seen together as legitimate friends in their right identities.

His bustling hurry to draw the historic drink gives them both a chance to regroup. When he turns back, Bel is leaning casually on the bar, watching his movements with sharp-eyed interest, brows rising at the rich hues of the liquid in the glass.

"Tree secretions," Bel drawls. At least they'd known 'maple' was a tree rather than just another flavor name, right? "You live in the hills and you drink tree secretions for fun. They'd never believe this back home. Whoo--!" Swirling the heavy tumbler stirred up a heavy, sweet scent that went straight up one's nose. "You weren't kidding. Perhaps our name's more apt than it appears at first glance." With a mischievous smile, Bel cradles the glass in both hands. "You will join me, won't you?"

Miles is silently thankful that Bel lets that moment pass with no comment, his own chest a little tight with -- not anxiety, nothing so unpleasant -- his mind trails back to that same confused tangle he'd been trying to muddle through that night after the morgue. He thought at the time that his brains had just been sluggish from the cold, but even now, Miles finds himself spinning, wondering fitfully why this time, for the first time, he didn't flinch.

"I suppose it's only proper," Miles concedes, pulling a glass out to fill for himself -- but when he sets it on the bartop, it is substantially less full than Bel's. "Still on duty, of course," he says by way of explanation, grinning sharply.

"And you don't give the Dendarii -- the Barrayaran Dendarii -- nearly enough credit. There's a reason I -- " He catches himself, clears his throat with a quick jump in his pulse. "A reason your admiral named the fleet after that region. Some of the most tenacious bastards on all of Barrayar dwell up in those hills. Haven't I ever told you about the role Vorkosigan's District played in the first Cetagandan invasion?"

Of course he hasn't, he could never have told Bel before this, but as far as their cover friendship goes -- old stories must have passed between the odd couple of Barrayaran ImpSec and mercenary captain, surely. Miles swirls his own drink in his glass before he lifts it in a lazy, silent toast and brings it to his lips to take a small drink. Oh, yes, that's maple mead, alright -- burns all the way down. Miles doesn't even flinch, though, just smiling as the liquor scorches a path down his tongue and throat. Bel can hold their liquor much better than Miles, but Bel has no practice with maple mead. This will be interesting indeed.

"Be sure to let me know when you're off duty," Bel smirks.

The verbal slip is a surprise, but of course it must be hard to extemporize backwards. Practice, that's the only cure. "A little, but I could surely stand to hear it again, in honor of the occasion." Raising the glass, eyes gleaming, Bel admires the color for another moment before following Miles's example.

Sweet is the first impression, an almost overwhelming richness -- a draught to be sipped and savored, oh yes, or drained in deep hot swallows to kill pain receptors, brain cells, and probably one's liver. Intense enough to want to go down quickly, and when it did--

Bel managed to mute the cough into a harsh breath, head turned aside automatically with the sensation of breathing actual fire. And that had been a small, cautious sip.

"Ah...." The face flushed bright against the grey scarf, brown eyes glazed for a blink or two until they cleared into laughing admiration. "That's... that's a vile trick to pull on an unsuspecting Betan, Lord Miles. This stuff could put a Jacksonian on the ground. Maybe I should ask them to lay in a stock back home, eh?"

"I know." Miles grins unapologetically. Ah, Bel's fine, he knows it. It wouldn't be funny if they weren't. He leans forward with one elbow on the bar, lightly sipping at his own tumbler with an insufferably smug look on his face. Cruel, yes, but totally worth it just for the look on their face.

"Well," he starts expansively, once Bel has recovered, "I'm sure you've heard the basics. The Cetagandans struck just a scant couple of decades after the end of the Time of Isolation, besieged the entire planet... Some districts surrendered, some Vor collaborated, even -- most went to ground and found some line to hold, somewhere or the other. But Cetaganda hit Vorkosigan's District hard -- and the only line we could hold was the Dendarii. For twenty long years, my grandfather -- General Count Piotr Pierre Vorkosigan -- held the Dendarii mountains against the Cetagandans. Waged guerilla warfare like hell. And used some dirty tricks to do it, too."

There is a definite note of family pride in Miles' voice, layered in with those smug notes. He grins over the lip of his glass at Bel and takes another sip, managing to mostly swallow his cough. Ah, maple mead. Tastes like home.

It's definitely funny. Bel's making no effort to hide the answering grin; they both appreciate a good prank (and a terrible prank even more), but they'd very seldom pulled anything on each other back in the fleet. Bel very badly wants to kiss that look off Miles's face. Ah well. Can't have everything.

Instead, leaning on the bar with one arm under their breasts, Bel swirls the tumbler again, letting the scent color the air. Another sip, barely a taste this time to test the balance of sweetness and fire. Caution will be needed. Not my strong point sometimes....

"All's fair in love and war," they agree, that laughing light back in the brown eyes. "One of my old commanders used to train us on the Komarr Report as a tactical exercise; the invasion was mentioned as a prelude, but not in any detail. Matter of fact--" an extremely wry expression -- "a copy turned up in my mailbox the other week. So far I've left it there."

Miles is grinning right along with Bel -- their wicked humor is delightful, but their unbridled amusement is something else, and, he's noticing, the way they lean against the bar -- right up until a copy turned up in my mailbox, at which point he abruptly chokes on that sip of maple mead, coughing as it burns the back of his throat.

"What?" he splutters, his face draining of color. Miles all but drops his tumblr onto the bartop and pounds himself on the chest twice until he catches his breath, jerking his chin up to stare at Bel, and then he rocks back with a look of total dismay. "Not you too. Did everyone on this ship receive a frigging copy?"

"Hey--!" Bel reaches out, holding Miles in place as he pounds the coughs out of his chest, genuinely worried he'll fall off his seat. The cough is worrying, too. He's not going to get sick now that the ship's warming up, is he? You never knew, with Miles and his aversion to having anyone take care of him until he physically can't escape it.

"I don't know. Didn't ask on the network; I didn't want to draw attention to it if they did, but I thought I'd better tell you than... not." Bel's glance flicks uncomfortably to the side. Could've just sent a text. Probably should've.... "And there wasn't an opportunity till...." An unhappy shrug. "If you have one you want to get rid of, there's still room in there. Or we can throw it in with the monster."

Miles finally clears his throat on one last cough that ends in a groan, slumping forward to drop his elbows on the bar, raking his fingers through his hair. "That's just the thing -- I didn't get one," he grates. "Ivan and Gregor, Snake, hell, even Loki -- and now you -- who on this ship didn't get one? Oh, god." Miles drops his face into his hands and lets out a muffled groan of pure, one hundred percent daddy issues anguish. "Everyone on the whole damn ship is going to have read that book inside of two months, I swear."

Everyone?

"....what the hell. Nothing will ever make sense here...." Nudging the drinks out of the way, Bel leans further to pat Miles firmly on the shoulderblades, rubbing the back of his neck steadyingly before withdrawing.

The awful groan only adds to Bel's perplexity. While Miles might not want the attention, it's not a bad book -- quite a good one, honestly. There's a reason old Tung swore by it. It'll add weight to Miles's real-and-true cover identity, too, in case any other Dendarii show up and let something slip. Miles isn't even in it. Why the distress? Other than the pointed way he hadn't received a copy. A less-than-amusing trick on the part of.... whomever, that went without saying. But that bad?

"You could have Ivan say they were all misdelivered and should be turned in to him, and then we can borrow that plasma rifle and burn 'em?" Bel smiles halfheartedly, hands closing to prevent themself from reaching out again.

Bel is the physically affectionate sort, Betan to the bone -- but even so, those hands on the back of his neck are more contact than Bel usually dares to make. Miles' face reddens slightly again, and he does jerk a little this time -- but not nearly as much as he was expecting of himself, shivering slightly instead. Bel had rubbed his back under the blankets back there after the morgue, too, but that context had been different. Not that it hadn't set his mind spinning about it. Miles has been trying not to think too hard about it, but even he can recognize when he isn't flinching out of discomfort, but embarrassed surprise. He makes a quick recovery, though -- hoping to pass off that reaction as some byproduct of his outburst, he rubs at his face before he lifts it to look at Bel, not quite scowling, but looking disgruntled nonetheless.

"That'd just make half of them want to hold onto it, you know that. Besides, Snake and Loki have already read it." Miles chews anxiously on the side of his thumb for a moment, looking agitated, before he finally lets out his breath in a resigned growl and snatches his glass back off the bar. "Whatever. Out of my hands. It's not like everyone on the ship could have a copy. That'd be absurd."

It's nothing Bel didn't expect, just another reason to take care. And Miles is right; someone would be sure to get suspicious if a Vor asked for the books.

"Starting to think nothing's too absurd for this place." Bel leans on one hand and sighs, eyes lifting disconsolately as Miles picks up his glass. "Sorry for breaking the mood."

Miles shakes his head and waves it all away with a dismissive hand, taking a drink from his glass -- a rather larger sip than he'd hazarded to take before. He sucks in a gasping breath with a little shudder to chase the burn and rubs at his chin before he straightens up, gaze settling back on Bel. The last thing he wants is for Bel's mood to tank along with his. He's supposed to be trying to unwind for once, dammit.

"No, no. My fault for getting so worked up over it. It really isn't a big deal." That nearly slips out in his Betan accent without thinking, and Miles clears his throat. It isn't even true, either -- it is a big deal, at least to him -- but he doesn't even really want to dwell on it right now. Certainly not with Bel. He manages to pull together a smile -- a real one, not too forced -- and absently swirls what's left of the maple mead in his glass. His eyes flick down to Bel's glass briefly.

"Besides, we have to get on with your initiation rite," he goes on, that half-smile cocking into a menacingly brilliant grin. "It's the final step in inaugurating you as one of the Dendarii Inner Circle, of course." He nods at Bel's glass, then glances back up at their face, gray eyes glinting slightly. "Unless you don't think you can finish that."

"Well, if it ever is a big deal, I'm here." Bel's mouth crooks upward a little. That it never had been a big deal in the fleet, even before Tung had stopped teaching it in the wake of Vervain, was a testament to Miles's self-control. Had this been lurking under the surface the whole time? It's a temptation to reach for his hand, but Bel manages not to. Barrayarans and their senseless touch taboos....

The change in Miles's grin is arresting, though, familiar and exhilarating.

And the words still make Bel's heart jump. For that long-awaited confirmation, the glazed window finally an open door -- not just now, lost and under siege, but truly and for good -- what they've gone through here is altogether worth it.

"There's one way to find out!" Gaze fixed on Miles, Bel takes a long drink, eyes closing to concentrate on the blend of flavors, letting it slip down slowly to make it last. The level's dropped a good inch when the glass hits the wood again, and Bel lets out a searing breath and slaps the bar, cheeks flaming, reckless eyes alight.

"It's inspiring, I'll give you that!" The cheerful alto is hoarse, and Bel swallows once or twice to kill the burn. A futile effort, probably. "Now how did your mountain-dwelling ancestors hold the line?"

Miles lets out a laugh of wicked delight, thumping his fist once on the bartop when Bel sets their glass down. Oh, yes, a drink or three with Bel is always a good way to lighten the mood, he's sure, and he could use the levity after this whole damn month. It's been one thing after another.

"Very good, Captain Thorne," he says approvingly, his accent wavering a little in temptation, but it's quickly corrected. It is impressive -- even day-drinking Ivan swears the stuff is vile -- and there's a little sheen of pride on his grin, as if Bel has met with flying colors some unspoken standard -- not for them, but for Miles. "My grandfather's soldiers thought so too, back in the day. Of course, it took more than maple mead to get them through that war. Say what you will about hillfolk, but they're tough as hell." There's a genuine fondness in Miles' voice. They're his hillfolk, dammit. "Some dirty tricks, too. You don't win a slanted war like that by playing it by the book. Although even Prince Xav had some objections to my grandfather's methods." Miles pauses, takes a sip. "He used to have his soldiers slip infant corpses into Cetagandan camps. Just to prove they could -- after all, could've been a bomb. Spooked the hell out of the Cetagandans."

Making Miles proud would have warmed Bel all over anyway, and the maple mead just helps things along. The shockingly cloying sweetness took getting used to, but it's definitely an experience, and the shine it's bringing to Miles's face is particularly appealing.

It's a strange, split feeling, listening to Miles talking about his Dendarii without meaning the fleet. The fierce smile is backlit with the little Admiral's possessive pride in his people, the deep commitment and genuine care for which they all returned equally fierce loyalty. Who are these dirt-bound people to him, to earn such protectiveness and love?

It's a bitter tale, the kind remembered through the ferociously defiant lens of hard-won survival. Bel winces at the account; that definitely hadn't been mentioned in the Komarr prelude. "Probably shouldn't ask where the babies came from," they murmur, tipping the glass in salute to the terrible economics of total war. "Where did they hide? Why couldn't the Cetas burn them out?"

"Products of Cetagandan rape," Miles says tonelessly -- this isn't something he's proud to recount, just a fact of war, something they'd done to survive. Personally, he is very against infanticide. He shrugs, swirling his glass idly and sips at it again. He hadn't poured himself all that much, but the stuff is as fierce as hillfolk -- he can already feel the burn spreading slowly from his belly. "Oh, they tried. But my grandfather and his men, they just kept moving camp. The Cetas didn't know where they'd hit from, or when -- and they couldn't figure out where the hell to hit, and the Dendarii isn't exactly a small region. Besides, they wanted Barrayar for a satrapy. They wanted to capture the planet, not annihilate it."

He tips the rest of his glass back, swallowing it down with a fiery sigh. He's on duty, right, shouldn't be drinking -- but it's late, and the bar isn't full, and Bel's good bar company. He'll be closing up in an hour or so anyway.

"The Dendarii Mountains are full of caves and hollows -- a series of impressively deep canyons -- a good place to hide an army, if you broke it into pieces. General Vorkosigan certainly knew how to run a guerilla operation." He tilts his empty glass in his hand in consideration and grins again. "Ivan and I used to take turns piloting a lightflyer through the Dendarii Gorge, when we were kids. It's one hell of a course."

It would be something like that. And on women with no access to uterine replicators, by an empire who considered themselves so highly evolved as to view other strains of humanity as a lesser species.... Bel grimaces, and takes another slow sip. All's fair.....

"Effective." The mead's a puzzle, simultaneously too much for the enlightened palette and inviting another taste to confirm you'd really just done that to yourself. "Ha, going underground, like we did. But only to pop back up. You wouldn't be held by outsiders, no matter what it took." No calm surrender, like Komarr; no bended knee, no quarter. But then, accounts of Komarr tended to differ. The Barrayaran Dendarii had fought for land they barely still held, fought an enemy better equipped in all ways and died in uncounted numbers, for nothing more than the chance to own themselves. To be themselves, ground into the soil of their mountains, but unbowed, sovereign, unalloyed. A terrible, breathtaking beauty.....

"Why am I not surprised?" Of course they'd flown ravines when they were kids. It was hard to imagine anything Miles wouldn't have done. "What was the course like? Hairpins? Loops?"

"The works." Miles smiles, running a thumb along the rim of his glass, but he doesn't refill it. Half a tumbler of maple mead is plenty to send him at least into tipsy territory -- something he wouldn't have dared do any earlier in the shift, or if it was anyone but Bel. Well, Ivan, maybe. Anyway, if he drank at Bel's pace he'd hurtle straight into the whole face going numb stage, and that'd just be embarrassing. "We'd take turns flying the course with risks of gradually increasing stupidity, daring the other to be sick right there in the lightflyer. Eventually we started disabling the safeguards and emergency protocols, just to up the ante... Ivan finally called it off when I flew us through the gorge at night, lights off, with my eyes closed." His grin goes wicked. "Something about not playing fair and totally insane and oh my god, Miles, what is wrong with you."

The tumbler's level has dropped by more than half, and there's a very pleasant flush across Bel's sharp cheekbones, the soft hair framed by the grey scarf. The bar is deserted, no doubt due to the lingering chill, and there's no reason for restraint. That look of admiring delight would be there anyway, of course. It's something Bel might have done themself, given sufficient reason (or provocation). Disabling a vehicle's safeguards just isn't physically possible back on Beta.....

Bel's laughing outright by the end of the tale, slapping the table again. "Was he sick? Who had to clean it up afterwards? God, I'd pay to see that run." And now the glass is almost empty. Hmm, how did that happen?

Miles grins, watching Bel drink. He knew they'd be able to handle maple mead -- but it's still entertaining to watch the amber liquid disappear from the glass, that laughing face growing warm as the drink settles in. Actually, it's a nice look on Bel, that flush to their face oddly fetching, the looser version of their usual cocky grin. Sort of rewarding. Without his really noticing, Miles' smile grew a little softer with fondness.

He chuckles a little when Bel's glass suddenly appears empty, and fetches it to refill it before Bel can think to ask. He doesn't answer until he's slid it across the bar back to Bel.

"Not until we landed, thankfully -- right there in the grass. And then he looked at me and told me we were never doing that again. So closed the book on that particular adventure." Miles props his elbows on the bar, his eyes warm and going distant with memory. He laughs, suddenly. "I wonder if I could still do it."

Edited 2016-01-03 14:08 (UTC)

Bel's shoulders shake with suppressed mirth, head leaning on one hand, eyes shining at the image. Grass, there's another thing Beta Colony has to grow in specially built habitats, when there's a use for it at all. And Miles is... that's not an expression often seen on Admiral Naismith's face, with the pace of mercenary life seldom allowing room to rest and breathe. At least until he slips down again behind the bar. Is it easier for him in his Vor-lord skin? Or just the first time in Bel's experience that he's had the space to be himself?

(Not that Bel hadn't tried. But they both had other skins to wear back in the fleet. People counting on them. People watching, always. And maybe drinks in the captain's cabin was too intimate a setting, as comfortable a refuge as its occupant had made it.)

The top of Miles's head bobs about on the other side of the barrier as he deals with the empty glass. Bel watches, unknowingly matching that fond smile of his, until he climbs back up to his seat. Loose-limbed with that lazy confidence, for once not running out of time or mind, laughter on his lips, eyes alight. Their knuckles nearly brush as the tumbler glides into Bel's hand.

Glancing sharply from the glowing mead back to Miles, Bel does grin that cocky grin. A hazing, is it? One final test for the new initiate? Though too long in coming, it's one test Bel is glad as hell to confront. And the mead is just as startling as the first time it went down -- one could get used to this, yes, this is easy. Even the fire comes up sweet.

Bel doesn't cough, though it's a near thing. Instead, setting the glass down again to wait a bit before draining it further, the mercenary leans back and laughs along with the bartender-admiral-lord. "Why haven't I ever finagled you into racing Anderson on a sim drop?"

Ah, and what a fine hazing it's turning out to be. Bel's just as vibrant drunk as they are sober, but differently so -- even more unbridled, unchecked, because for all their usually well-timed restraint, it's Bel's spirit that's always endeared them to Miles. He's always liked Bel, even if not in the way Bel would have liked --

His mind abruptly veers away from that line of thought, too, shifting his attention back to just the brilliant warmth on Bel's face, the way their eyes positively shine at the recounting of Miles' stupid adolescent adventures. Only Bel would give him that look of awed approval, that giddy delight. Elena would frown despite the remembered smile in her eyes; Elli would roll her eyes and tell him he's a lunatic while trying not to laugh; and Tung -- god, he misses Tung already -- would probably be torn between cursing in surprise and disbelief and slapping his knee in an outburst of laughter. Only Bel would give him that absolutely captivated look. There's a growing warmth in his chest Miles can't totally chalk up to the mead.

"You're getting better," he says with a smirk and an approving nod at Bel's glass when they manage not to cough or choke. He watches Bel lean their lithe body back on the stool with a grin -- something in his stomach flutters -- and then he lets out a laugh, gray eyes lighting up.

"That's because you've never heard this story till now," he says, only a touch smugly, and shakes his head, still grinning. "It wouldn't be a fair fight, anyway. Piloting a lightflyer through an obstacle course is one thing, but I couldn't hold a candle to Anderson. A good commander," he says, slipping back into his Betan accent in a fit of poor judgment in the empty bar, "plays to his strengths, rather than willingly allow his subordinates to humiliate him in a contest of skill he could not possibly win."

Edited 2016-01-04 23:18 (UTC)

"Tactical judo, personnel edition," Bel laughs. It's a luxury to be unchecked, simply enjoying someone's company instead of staying alert for upcoming action or counting sentences until someone tosses another Betan stereotype at them. Miles, even with a head full of flawless Betan in-jokes, had always been safe. And only he would tell such a story with such reminiscent joy, watching his audience to see not whether they approved but whether they could keep up. Wanting them to keep up. Making it matter.

"That's why we all love you, you know." The room's empty, no reason to keep up the cover, and it's surprisingly easy to say. "You like to watch."

....and surprisingly easy to suggest something completely different, apparently; Bel's head drops to their arm, muffling the cackle. Sorry, Miles.... "As much as you like to participate--" it comes out in a fit of giggles, accompanied by an unrepentant grin, half hidden behind the grey tunic sleeve. Miles will get it. He's not full of maple mead. "It shows, after a good mission or when we find someone like Anderson or Taura. You like it when we're good. That can... mean a lot."

Bel's no lightweight, but the mead is definitely making its mark, the heat tingling down to their toes. A third glass and things are likely to really get fuzzy. Obviously, the thing to do right now is take another pull at this one. And then ask for another story, while the door was open.

"How did you find us? Back then. What brought you there with your Inner Circle? I always wanted to know."

It's a treat to see Bel so unchecked -- there are times when his gung-ho captain fails to check their hot-headed side, fierce and righteous, but this is something entirely different. He grins and props his chin on one hand, idly turning his empty glass in his hand as he watches Bel. That's why we all love you, you know. The words make Miles' stomach do a sudden jump. It's not like he doesn't know he has the respect of his fleet, but to hear it put so fondly -- and there rings a more personal note in Bel's voice. And the bar might be empty, but to be so lax with security... But Admiral Naismith is like a siren song in his mind, a beacon of freedom to some unspoken bonds that have held him down since he arrived.

Miles' face reddens slightly at that extended innuendo -- Bel always has had a wicked sense of humor, but to see ti come out in its purest form is something else -- but even so, he snorts out a laugh, unable to help himself. And then Bel drifts right back into that fond territory, luring Miles with them, and he breathes out a sigh through his nose as his smile turns slightly smug. "Of course I like it when you're good," he says, his Betan accent failing to slip back into the warm gutturals of Barrayar. Admiral Naismith's voice tastes familiar in his mouth, more tempting than anything else. "It wouldn't exactly reflect well on me if you weren't, eh?" He pauses, smile warming, almost diffidently. "It means I've done something right."

He lets out a laugh at Bel's request, leaning back. "You really want to know?" His grin widens, his fingers tapping on the bar. "I was on vacation, visiting my grandmother on Beta Colony. I'd just failed -- wait, what?" Miles frowns and blinks on a delay, looking at Bel quizzically. "Who's Taura?" It's the maple mead that spares him the immediate sense of dread about the holes in his memory, leaving him merely confused.

Miles had started it, letting his accent slip like that. Or had Bel started it, by mentioning Anderson? But Miles wouldn't have kept it up if he suspected bugs in the area, or if any of the weird aliens aboard could hear through walls.... It seems important, somehow, to explain how the fleet feels about him. Even the ones who aren't in love..... The other kind of love would still be there, with or without the personal attraction. There's no greater or lesser about it. Miles would lay down his life for any of them, and they'd do the same without a second thought.

But it's so much better to have this instead. To live and laugh together without fear, the rush of a combat drop a small thing beside this glorious freefall.

The glass is empty again, and Bel just about manages to avoid suggesting other things Miles could do right if he set his mind to them. His fond tone warms them all the way through, a tingling blanket of delight over the mead's pulsing heat. Bel's leaning forward again, chin on hand, the grey scarf slanting askew over one brow.

"I've wanted to know ever since I figured out who you weren't. Ha, no--" Bel laughs, wagging a chiding finger. "You wouldn't know her, 'Lord Miles,' since we so very seldom run into one another. A recent acquisition, but I guarantee you'd approve. But please go on?"

The maple mead might be warming his system through, but it's Admiral Naismith Miles is getting drunk on right now, only fueled by that impossibly fond look on Bel's face. More than fond, even, and Miles feels his belly do another flip that has nothing to do with the fleet. His face is still faintly flushed with color, just as much that trace of embarrassment as it is maple mead and something else -- something Miles has been struggling to get a grasp on, but he keeps shying away when he gets close, or it keeps slipping away from him, fumbling. But that captivated look on Bel's face is something else, pure and intense, totally honest. Independent of the come-ons, the little flirtations Bel always manage to slip through the cracks, the ones that trigger those Barrayaran reflexes. This seems to find its way in easy. Miles leans forward to take hold of Bel's glass to refill it -- just one more couldn't hurt, and this is nice -- this is good, this unprecedented honesty of character. Miles doesn't know what it says about him that he finds that honesty so much more easily in Naismith right now, and that Lord Miles strikes a strange note in him.

The temptation to skip over that hiccup is very much there -- he almost gives in to it -- but as he refills Bel's glass and turns to set it back on the bar before them, he can't ignore it. Oh, he'd so much rather tell the story Bel's asking for, but Miles can't shake that slow dawning dread. "What acquistion?" He frowns, discomfited. "When?"

The bright eyes and flushed cheeks are a good look on Miles. Bel's gaze softens, breath stilling as Miles leans in for the empty glass, something strangely open in his expression, a searching fascination, the pride and approval intoxicating at this short range. They really have to do this more often before they go home.

Letting him duck behind the counter again, even for a moment, is a wrench. Bel leans further, trying to see over the barrier. But there's a perfectly simple solution for this new problem: by the time Miles turns away from the keg, Bel's legs are swinging over the bar, the sharp face peering downward to check the distance before letting themself drop -- with a noticeable sway on the landing -- to the deck beside Miles's tall chair. "There we go. Plenty of room for two back here." Innovation! Aren't you proud, Admiral?

Miles is still caught on Taura, for some reason -- well, for some reason other than the rumors that occasionally went around the fleet. Bel would have suspected simple jealousy of the young sergeant's rapid rise, but for certain knowledge that something had happened on the way out from Jackson's Whole. Getting to know Taura, the simple earnest sweetness beyond the terrifying fanged exterior, had erased any lingering jealousy for the Admiral's instant devotion to her. She, more than most, deserved to grab any happiness she could, and hold on with both hands ~~preferably after filing down the claws~~. But it's bothering Miles, for some reason. Why would it bother him?

"Green Squad Taura." The lightheaded mood falters. "A couple of years ago now. She just made Sergeant -- you haven't seen her recently because she stayed with the other half of the fleet when we came for you on Dagoola IV." Including Ariel; leaving the ship under someone else's command, however temporary, hadn't been fun, but the Admiral had needed an adjunct he could trust. "Miles, is something the matter?"

It's probably just the maple mead blunting his usual edge, but Bel genuinely startles Miles when they vault unexpectedly over the bar to land next to one of the stepstools Miles usually stands on just to be able to see over the bar, let alone tend it. In fact, it's a pretty neat landing even with the swaying. The fact that Bel didn't break anything is a bonus. He half-jerks back in surprise, but a stuttering breath of a laugh escapes him anyway. Bel's unmitigated drunken chipper is almost helplessly endearing. Maybe they don't need that third glass of maple mead. Well, it's already been poured; no sense in letting it go to waste.

But that moment flickers out again almost immediately. Green Squad Taura? Green Squad? Unless there've been some personnel changes no one notified him about, there's no Sergeant Taura on Green Squad. Miles feels that knot of dread tighten in his chest, the bottom dropping out of his stomach. No freefall here -- this is all gravity, inescapable. Has he just discovered another hole in his memory? He searches what's there frantically, comes up empty for anything with the name Taura. Just like he came up empty trying to remember what happened on Kyril Island, who his CO had been back there. He has to know, has to fill in the cracks with secondhand knowledge if nothing else.

Miles looks at Bel, at that bright, soft-focused light in their eyes, warm and close and most definitely drunk, and decides this isn't the time. He can't spring this on Bel now, not like this -- a bad time to drop bad news, especially news that makes Miles inclined to panic, and besides that -- he's reluctant to spoil this good mood. He doesn't know exaclty how they came about this odd place of honesty except by way of maple mead, and he finds himself surprisingly reluctant to let go of it just yet.

He shoves that growing feeling of dread aside and the slightly nauseated look on his face with it, forcing a smile and wrenching it into place. A little easier, unexpectedly, with Bel this close, though it comes with that tightening of his chest he's always taken as some other kind of discomfited panic. Mistook, maybe. Miles' gaze strays to Bel's glass. Maybe he ought to help Bel with that last drink.

"Nothing. It's alright. Just the maple mead." His grin widens slightly, far more convincingly, a touch sardonic. "Now you know yet another well-guarded Dendarii secret -- that the Admiral is a terrible featherweight." There, ply Bel away from any worry with a little levity, or so he hopes. He leans his side against the bar, hand out to Bel's shoulder to keep them from swaying any farther. "Besides, don't you want to hear how I got from my grandmother's flat on Beta Colony all the way to a war zone in Tau Verde?"

"That," says Bel, leaning both elbows back against the bar with a mostly-convincing air of supercilious solemnity, "is not a secret." At least not to someone who's worked so many receptions alongside him as Bel has. Poor Miles, facing the Jacksonian barons without more than a drop in him.....

They're just about at a height, with Miles sitting on the barstool. Bel knows too many of Miles's moods for any amount of drink to distract from his bewilderment. Dammit, something's wrong, but... he's closing it off, saving it for later. Bel can't help but be glad. Falling-over-drunk is not the ideal state to deal with whatever put that look on his face.

Later. Good.

The solemn air drops almost immediately, crowded out by a thankful smile, the touch of irony softened by happiness as Miles's hand finds Bel's shoulder. Moving the glass from between them, Bel tucks an arm around Miles's back in turn, a comradely gesture, squeezing a little and then letting the hand fall back to the board. That's okay, right? Right here for you, Miles. Whatever it is, we'll work it out.

"Oh, yes." A small sip of the mead burns away the effort involved in moving. "In that rattletrap of a -- Arde's RG, with the Necklin rods. I tried to look your family up, you know, just out of curiosity, but just my luck, too many Betan Naismiths. How did it happen?"

Miles swallows slightly when Bel's hand slips around his back, but he doesn't flinch this time, oddly enough -- and Bel's withdrawn their hand just as quickly anyway. A little breath of relief escapes him when Bel permits themself to be distracted, and he tucks that uncomfortable revelation away for now, to ask Bel again when they're both more sober. His eyes glint with genuine delight at getting to repeat this story to Bel -- no half-truths, no lies of omission or otherwise, just a tale between friends. Friends, that's right. Miles might be the Admiral back home, and even a little here, if only between Bel and Miles, but functionally Naismith doesn't exist here. Just a bartender and interrogation officer, sharing old stories. Ha, sounds like the start of a bad joke.

"What, you never thought to look up Captain Cordelia Naismith?" Miles' grin flashes. "Yeah, we made it all the way from Beta to Tau Verde in that RG, if you can imagine it. But the story actually has its origins on Barrayar. Would you believe it all started when I broke both my legs jumping off a wall?"

Miles isn't sure how, but by the end of that story they're both sitting on the deck behind the bar, Bel's scarf wound around both their shoulders, the glass empty on the floor beside them. Miles is pretty sure he helped with that. "And that's how I avoided being executed for treason," he concludes with a lazy flourish of one hand. He's still speaking in the flat, irreverent tones of Admiral Naismith, got stuck on it somewhere along the telling. He struggles with himself momentarily over it, knowing he's edging into dangerous territory. But maybe a little Naismith is what he needs right now. "Saved only by my own wits and Ivan's insatiable seventeen-year-old sex drive. I guess I shouldn't give him such a hard time for it, saved my ass back there. I really put Gregor in a bad spot, though."

He heaves a sigh, more contented and nostalgic than anything, leaning against Bel's shoulder, and then he starts to straighten up, plucking at the scarf wrapped around them both and glancing at his MID. "Closing time," he announces, picking up the glass and reaching to put it on the lowest shelf at hand. He'll clean up tomorrow, before Jacky's next shift. He nudges Bel gently. "Come on, let's get you back to your cabin. I'm afraid I don't trust you to make it back on your own right now, Captain Thorne."

Edited 2016-01-10 20:40 (UTC)

For the most part, Bel had listened in avid fascination, gasping or cheering or laughing at the appropriate parts. The only temptation to interrupt was Cordelia's name; Bel's eyes had glinted at that, but Miles was on a roll and the opportunity passed. The part where Miles had stormed through the Ariel waxing so beautifully sarcastic about everything he found prompted a couple of asides (and/or peals of laughter). What a day that had been. Awful, exhausting, exhilarating.

The scarf had been to ward off the cold; it was important to stay warm, especially with the alcohol killing all pain. For some completely incomprehensible reason Miles hadn't wanted to cuddle up on Bel's lap and share body heat again (they both even have all their clothes on! Barrayarans, seriously), but Bel had insisted on the scarf and managed to get away with wrapping one arm snugly around him. He'd relaxed so beautifully, even if he'd kept up the Betan accent through the wrapup of his precipitous flight back to Barrayar and the subsequent incredibly Barrayaran proceedings.

"Seventeen," Bel marvels, cheek pressed once again on Miles's short dark hair. He fits so nicely this way. "I almost knew, rejuv'nation treatmen' my ass, but I thought... nineteen, twenty. Your age, I was still on Beta." Three glasses are definitely the limit, and then only if Miles is around to help. (Which he should be, always, based on the results of this experiment.) "Be proud, Miles. You had us all taken in. I was r'ly hoping you'd be real." Shifting slightly to look down at Miles, Bel winds up mumbling into his hair, an unintended but pleasant consequence. "Took a while, but you made it real."

The story is a more thorough introduction to Miles Vorkosigan than Bel had ever hoped for. Chaos, heartbreak, cultural extremes, but the same frantic mind and struggling body, the lightning tactician trained in a more bitter school than a Betan would have credited. Bel's mind is still whirling with it; there'll be questions later, after what decades of drinking experience foretells will be a killer hangover. They should both get some liquids in them. Non-alcoholic liquids.

"I c'n -- no, I can't--" Grinning suddenly, Bel becomes a complete deadweight. "Why did we invent gravity? Oh, do help me home, Miles, I don't think I have any more feet--" The helpless pretense collapses in a fit of giggles, Bel not quite following it to the ground as Miles tries to move. "'s okay, I really can." And Bel does manage to stand, albeit a little uncertainly. Wow, Miles is all the way down there now.

Edited 2016-01-10 20:46 (UTC)

They're being awfully cozy like this, but Miles supposes that after that night after the morgue, after Bel spent all night curled around Miles just to keep him warm when he'd spent three days starved of food, water, and warmth, those boundaries have been irrevocably changed for the both of them. Bel's breath is warm in his hair, and he shivers slightly, the skin at the back of his neck tingling, his chest warming.

"Of course I'm real," Miles says, and maybe it's just the maple mead but in that moment he hears himself speak in two voices, one Barrayaran, the other Betan. He grins a little lopsided. "Anything you can reach out and touch is real."

Is that, then, why he feels so off balance lately, so incomplete? He can't reach inside himself and touch, can't feel where one ends and the other begins, it's why he keeps them so separate. But the thought evaporates like so much steam when Bel half-collapses against him, giggling hysterically, and it pulls a laugh from Miles, too, before he can help himself. Miles helps Bel keep their balance as they get to their feet, one hand under Bel's arm, the other at the small of their back to brace them. He rises with them, managing not to stumble -- but then, he's not nearly as drunk as Bel is. He's still laughing as he straightens his back as much as he can, Bel's drunk but honest cheer highly infectious, and he throws an arm around Bel's back, too short to pull their arm over his shoulders. Wouldn't do much good, having to stoop down to lean on the person trying to give you a hand.

"You'll have feet again in the morning," Miles promises them with a grin, only a little wicked, deeply self-satisfied. This had started out as a friendly hazing ritual, just to see what'd happen -- it'd been worth it just for the look on Bel's face at their first taste of maple mead -- but by the end of it, he's no longer sure what he expected to get out of it. Just that he doesn't really regret it. He's a little drunk too, just enough for it to warm him from the inside and leave him more relaxed than he has been in weeks, but only a little. "You can pass out with great satisfaction once we get back to Nomo Deck, but until then, you'll just have to march, soldier."

"Damned good thing too." Bel sways a bit, leaning against Miles, managing well enough by gripping his shoulder; that's good, that's plenty of balance, with his arm about their waist like that. "Got you now. You're def'nitely real."

If only that had ever worked to hold Miles in place.

His laugh vibrates through Bel's side; the night's test has surely been passed. For whatever it's worth. Bel can't wait to look back on this with all faculties turned on again. "First m'boots, now m'feet. Sometimes you're th' only thing that makes sense on this ship. Ha, you 'n Greg. He'll always make sense." Feet are a bit more cooperative than mouth, fortunately; so far the one hasn't managed to end up inside the other, at least, and Bel's stride grows steadier, spine instinctively straighter, at the Admiral's word. March, soldier. Can do. Miles will give the word; until then, Bel can march forever.

Floating on that thought, it seems only moments before the door to Bel's cabin is opening. Didn't that only open to a fingerprint? Oh, apparently we have fingers, that explains it. There's a confused impression that Miles is still there, helping them into the room. Bel sways for a moment, looking up at their bunk. The top one, of course. That usually isn't a problem. Looks like it's the couch tonight, Miles. Sorry.

(Had they just said that out loud?)

That hand is warm on his shoulder, Bel's slender fingers curled around his shoulder as though there's no barrier of fabric between them. Distantly, Miles wonders when Bel's touch became something to lean into instead of flinch away from. He quickly snags a bottle of water from the back of the bar as he steers Bel back out of it, tucking it under his free arm.

"Gregor's the sensible sort," Miles agrees amiably, the smile hanging on his face with no effort at all. He lets Bel lean on him, guiding them at a gentle pace toward the lift. "It's why we keep him around."

When they reach Bel's cabin, Miles follows their gaze to the top bunk. Ah. No, that's the wrong route to take. A farcical image comes to mind of Miles attempting to help a considerably tanked Bel onto a top bunk with his meager height, ending in an undignified heap on the floor. "Couch it is," Miles says in response to Bel's unwittingly vocalized thought, steering Bel in that direction and seating them firmly on one side so they can lean against its arm. There. That way if Bel topples over, there's not very far for them to go. Miles climbs halfway up to Bel's bunk, surprisingly catlike even while tipsy, and snatches a pillow and the blanket before he climbs back down.

"Can you get your boots off?" he asks, very practically, as he tucks the pillow against the arm of the couch. The tone of his voice and the slight rise of his eyebrows implies he expects to get a no.

Yes, Miles's reflexes are coming along nicely. That's a good thing, right? It'll help his cover back home. Should've let me coach you back then, Miles. Nobody'll ever catch you out on your body language again.... "I like the top," says Bel distinctly, managing not to flop over sideways, "b'cause you have the best view. But down here's nice too." Yes, that certainly is a nice view of Miles climbing the ladder to Bel's bunk. And bringing down blankets and a pillow? They don't deserve him, they really don't.

A brief struggle with the Moira-issued boots confirm that no, that's not going to work. By the time Miles descends, though, Bel has shucked the Dendarii tunic and folded it over the back of the couch. The Moira uniform jacket is still distressingly tight up top, but there's the grey trousers and the black trousers too. Clothes. So complex. Words, too. Bel shrugs, waving a hand in a gesture that's supposed to mean something, probably. It's okay. Miles will help.

Well, at least the heat on the ship isn't malfunctioning in the other direction, everything swelteringly hot, so that Miles doesn't have to strip Bel down to briefs and bra -- not that he hasn't seen Bel in undress before. He gives Bel a placid raise of his eyebrows and shakes out the blanket, though his soft-focused eyes are amused. Tonight has been unexpectedly...what, exactly? Enjoyable? Honest? Comfortable? Miles huffs out a soft laugh, folding the blanket next to Bel.

"Down here's probably for the best," he says, dropping to a crouch to unfasten Bel's boots so they can kick them off. "I don't need to worry about you rolling out of bed and hitting the floor like a sack of bricks." Giving one boot a good tug, he looks back up at Bel with look of softer curiosity, tilting his head. He nods in the vague direction of Bel's torso. "You couldn't exchange that for a women's top? I mean -- it just seems like that'd be more comfortable."

Bel glances down at the top, as if surprised it's still there, and looks away as the question works through. "People assume." Body language changes when a crewperson is faced with a girlish bosom instead of an ambiguously fastened tunic. Responses change. Assumptions change. Bel's job on board is already almost a nullity. Too much of the galaxy reads "woman" as the same thing; it's only been for a few years that Bel's relaxed enough to read as feminine occasionally on shipboard, where they're well known, and the Dendarii uniform is specifically tailored for the effect they want; and this is a new ship. And honestly? Bel wants the questions. Questions mean someone cares about getting it right.

Shrugging, Bel looks back down at Miles in gentle appreciation for his help, leaving the issue for... whenever. This has been too good a night to let galactic gender prejudice mar it.

One of the boots hits the floor as Bel struggles with the neckline, finally unfastening it enough for a plain undertunic (along with the aforementioned bosom) to show underneath, arms working out of the sleeves. It's an awkward procedure, especially with warmth rising to their cheeks that has nothing to do with the mead. Miles is so good. Always caring, always helping, always looking out for them. Some Vor woman's going to be really lucky, someday. Maybe a certain Fleet woman already is, if there's anything to the rumors. Sorry, Quinnie. Wasn't my idea. I'll bring him back safe, I promise....

The Moira uniform finally slips over Bel's head, to be folded with somewhat less care and shoved toward the other end of the couch. The undershirt, riding up over the right hip, lets a smooth line of skin show, scored with an electrical pattern of thin black lines curving around from Bel's back and disappearing under their waistband, like an unfinished tattoo.

Edited (.....oops past tense in the wrong place!) 2016-01-11 02:10 (UTC)

Ah. Of course. Miles knows well the cost that comes with the assumptions of others -- how it can be when you know you can't control what they see, but only how they see it. He should have known that had something to do with it, that it couldn't possibly just be neglect or ignorance on Bel''s part. Bel's too smart for that, far too aware. Miles suddenly feels a flicker of shame for having asked.

He doesn't say anything in response to that except a hum of acknowledgment, one he thinks will speak louder than words to Bel. He tugs off Bel's other boot and sets it aside with the other, glancing back up at Bel as he braces one hand against the couch next to Bel to pull himself up -- just as the hem of Bel's undershirt hitches up, just enough to show the strange black scarring underneath.

Miles has seen it before, on Clark's arm, Hiro's face. He knows what it looks like. He goes still where he is, before he can haul himself up, and his hand goes to Bel's hip before he can stop himself, his stomach doing a little flip as his fingers close over it. Acting without thinking -- maple mead, surely. His hand seizes, but he doesn't withdraw it, even after he looks back up at Bel, the easy grin replaced with a look of open concern.

"Bel," Miles says slowly, "what happened?"

He knows what happened. He knows what must have happened. What he wants to know is why Bel didn't tell him, because he totally doesn't have double standards or anything.

Bel's just about done in, and that hum of quiet understanding, comforting and caring and nonjudgmental, is almost too much. Flopping over into the thoughtfully provided pillow, the mercenary stretches from spine to fingertips, wishing -- and then there's a hand right there, warm-cool-warm over the scarred skin--

Betan to the bone, Bel lays still and peaceful for a moment, no flinch or twitch in evidence: just a long sigh into the pillow. It would be so nice just to let the touch remain; only the knowledge that it's Miles's hand gets them to move at all. That the hand stays brings the heat back to Bel's cheeks as they hitch up on one elbow, hair mussed, a hand moving automatically to rest gently over his smaller one.

The look on his face almost prods them out of the sleepy alcoholic haze. There's something there that will have to be dealt with later, when they're both awake and sober. Bel's only coherent enough to motion vaguely in the direction of the corridor. Miles knew what had been out there; he'd helped lock it up. "Thing? Got me early on. Din' even see it." They'd seen it later, of course, stalking the halls in vain with other monster-hunters. Ugly beast. And to think it had once been someone like them.... But Miles looks so worried, and he needn't be -- Bel hadn't been the only victim; plenty of people bore the mark. They'd all woken up in the infirmary. Aside from the scar, there was no harm done.

Shifting, hoping irrationally that Miles's hand would just stay where it was for a while, Bel reached up to curl reassuring fingers around Miles's jaw. "'s okay. 's gone now. Miles...?" The association was muddled, but the question itself was simple enough, something Bel had wondered for a while but had never found the right time to ask. "You'n Elli, 'd you get together back 'n Earth?"

Maybe it'd be easier if Bel were embarrassed at that touch, if they'd react the way Miles would expect himself to. But that long sigh, some twist of want and resignation, sinks into him, and his gaze shifts back to his hand on Bel's hip. Suddenly their skin seems to burn into his fingers. But Bel's laconic answer draws a frown from him.

"So why didn't you tell -- " That sentence ends on a sharp inward breath as Bel's fingers curl around his jaw, that warm, sleepy look still on their face, and color rises in his face again, unbidden. Miles' hand hovers.

The question comes so out of left field that Miles is nearly coldcocked, tensing as his expression shifts into a look of utter bewilderment before the question really catches up to him. "What?" He blinks in slightly sluggish noncomprehension at Bel. "Why do you ask?"

....oh, Miles wants to be told things like this? After the whole thing with the morgue?

Drunk or not, Bel recognizes irony when it's standing right there with its hand on their hip, looking so very, very shellshocked. What happened to all that maple mead you had, Miles? No, Bel's not embarrassed at all.

Smiling sweetly, Bel asks, "'s it a secret?"

Edited 2016-01-11 04:37 (UTC)

Miles blinks again, flushes a little darker, looking something like some odd chimera of sheepish and deer in the headlights. It's the maple mead that's slowing him down, making him act without thinking, on -- not instinct. Something else. He can't seem to shake it. He hovers there still, mouth open, throat working, but still on a second's delay.

"I -- yes. Sort of. In theory," Miles finally admits lamely. There's a difference between keeping the professional and personal separate -- which they have, dammit -- and keeping a very good secret. Naismith had to get sloppy somewhere along the line eventually, he thinks glumly. After a beat of hesitation, he starts to pull his hand away, wincing. "How obvious?"

...good God, Admiral, stop being adorable.

And there it was. Elli'd finally made it -- honestly, after watching the two of them on the Triumph, Bel had been expecting this.

"Sorta~" Bel grins. "Good f'r you."

It's another thing to talk about after the hangover wears off. The Admiral's Betan, but Miles is not, but Elli's dating Naismith, unless they've decided otherwise....? Too many questions to answer tonight. But Bel's always Betan, so maybe it isn't a total surprise when they lean in against the other side of Miles's neck, lips at the edge of his jaw. Not quite a nuzzle, not quite a kiss.

"G'night, Miles." It's a husky murmur against his skin, and Bel's sinking back to the couch almost at once, sleepily reaching for the blanket; it's that or fall asleep on Miles's neck, which would be lovely but impractical. "Thanks.... f' all. This."

Edited 2016-01-11 17:53 (UTC)

Bel's lips graze over his skin, their breath warm, and Miles goes entirely red, flinching only slightly and largely out of surprise, this time. He watches Bel fall back against the couch and exhales slowly. Maple mead, right. That's what's responsible for the odd warmth in his chest and the strange prickling of his skin. Certainly it's responsible for the relatively calm response to all of it. Miles gently tugs the blanket along with Bel's grip to drape it a little more neatly over them.

"Don't mention it," Miles says softly, tucking the bottle of water next to them. "Just try to get some liquids in you and get yourself some sleep." He smiles crookedly. "Promise I won't com you too early."

He's inflicted enough friendly cruelty on Bel for a while. Pausing to make sure Bel's tucked warmly enough in, Miles hits the lights and escapes silently into the corridor.

[ closed ] let me pour you the drink of my people

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