thisavrou_log | [ catch-all for miles, post-death ]

[ catch-all for miles, post-death ]

Who: Miles Vorkosigan and YOU
When: 11/27 thru...whenever
Where: the Vor cabin, the bar, the Personnel Office, wherever
What: Miles has recently recovered from a nasty bout of being dead after a week. so that's fun.
Warnings: talk about death, probably some other heavy emotional shit

Recovering from death is sort of like recovering from a cold, Miles has found, aside from the more obvious gaping differences. It leaves one feeling at least as drained as a nasty virus, weak and shaky, and in both cases you come out of it with a hell of a case of the chills. Then there are the obvious psychological differences between death and a cold, which Miles does not particularly feel like meditating on, but the distraction of company is too overwhelming for the first couple of days, and so he stays withdrawn to his cabin, trying not to replay the last few hours of his life -- his last life -- over and over in his head.

Cryoamnesia is a fairly common occurrence with cryorevival patients; many of them never fully recover their memories, especially around their deaths, Miles has heard. Not enough time to store it in long-term memory, or something. He wishes he were so fortunate. No, he can remember every excruciating moment of it in perfect detail, to the curious numbness of his lower body to the thick taste of blood in his mouth and the chest-clouding panic that had overtaken him in the face of death. That's almost harder to stomach than any measure of physical pain. It was frigging humiliating, that's what.

The first couple of days after his return he keeps to the cabin he shares with Ivan and Gregor. He doesn't exactly know who knows he's back yet, or even who knew he died in the first place, and he's not keen to ask. His week-long absence had to have been missed by at least some, and Gregor and Ivan probably had something to do with that. Miles is still a little wan and sickly-looking from his recent revival, and aching, too; not where the glass had perforated along his stomach, he has suspiciously few scars from that, but curiously enough his legs, and -- the rest of him. It's that damned osteo-inflammatory horseshit again, he's sure. But at least, for the first time in two months, nothing's actually broken and he is somehow whole again.

By the 27th, he finally starts to emerge from his cabin and make his way back to his duties at the bar and in the Personnel Office, where he'll be taking interviews and reviewing submissions to the official ~~complaints~~ suggestions box on his office door.

[ feel free to tag in with whatever or hit me up if you want a particular starter. miles was dead/in cryo between 11/18 - 11/25, and is only really returning to work on 11/27. ]

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Miles, hunched over his desk reviewing personnel files and the contents of the suggestion box, hears the knock on the door and raises a hand to wave whoever it is inside, looking up only belatedly. "Come in, have a -- Elizabeth," he finishes, blinking, his mouth forming a little O of surprise. He hasn't seen her since before his...death, he realizes. Perhaps he should have made some effort to reach out, she looks -- well, she looks worried, those beautiful features pressed into lines of concern. Miles is suddenly keenly aware of how he looks -- less than a week out of cryo, and he looks better, but he's still a little gray-faced around the edges, paler and thinner than when she'd last seen him. Miles absently touches his hand to his throat -- a motion that's nearly become a nervous tic, a physical manifestation of the preoccupation with what he'd seen on Caducus Primary -- and then, self-consciously, he tugs the collar of his uniform up. He swallows, offering her a wan smile that, despite his best efforts, looks a hell of a lot twitchier than his usual manic grin.

"You're not here to complain about your job, I hope." A relatively weak attempt at humor, all things considered. Miles clears his throat and gestures to the chairs in front of his desk. "Please, sit. So, uh, what can I help you with, Elizabeth?"

She doesn't need a seat, or to complain about her job. She does, however, need to move completely past the offered chair and Miles' desk to awkwardly bend down and hug him where he sits.

"Your books are overdue," she says, her voice relieved and upset and tight all at once. She wouldn't believe it until she'd seen it, and now she has-- so now it's real.

Whatever Miles was expecting, it wasn't this display of emotion -- certainly not the hug. He blinks in surprise as Elizabeth's arms come around him, pulling him in close, and when he draws in a startled breath, he breathes in the scent of her hair. Oh. Well. So much for trying to quash that crush, then. He returns the hug near-automatically, arms around her waist, but he has the sense not to pull her in any closer. Miles feels a little surge of emotion of his own -- he and Elizabeth are friends, yes, and they share a secret, which is a particular bond of its own kind -- but somehow he hadn't imagined she would take his death so hard. He kicks himself for it, feeling his chest go a little tight on reflex of guilt and sympathy.

"Ah," he says, and clears his throat. He gives her a smile a little less twitchy than before. "I don't suppose I can get an extension? Extenuating circumstances, eh?" Miles blinks in puzzlement again, then, somehow belatedly only just noticing the obvious change in Elizabeth. "You cut your hair?"

One of Elizabeth's failings is she's too quick to act on her immediate emotions. She cares in an instant, she hates if given one reason to, she runs toward fatal situations and has few self-preservation instincts when someone she cares about is in the middle of crossfire. She'd learned that the hard way, after she'd let her anger get the best of her. But clearly the lesson hadn't been applied just yet.

She laughs wetly. "I'm the head librarian, I could grant extensions until my hair turns white." She backs away when he mentions her hair, her hand instinctively going to the shorter ends. "I did... Ivan came to see me after... after it happened." She shrugs a shoulder. "He and Gregor said hair was traditional so..."

That takes a moment to permeate, and Miles looks almost stunned, his cheeks flushing faintly. "Not that much," he says, taken aback -- and, very privately, touched and a little flattered. He knows she has no personal knowledge of Barrayaran customs, that she must not have done it all just for him, but the magnitude of the gesture, however unintentional, is arresting. "Just a lock of hair, usually, but -- "

He catches himself and clears his throat, trying to will the flush from his cheeks, but really, it just gives his face a little much-needed color. His expression softens. "Thank you," he finally says, quietly, although he looks strangely self-conscious. Well, it's a fundamentally bizarre and awkward thing to hear about one's own death offerings after the fact. "It...means very much to me." He realizes, belatedly, that his arms are just hanging awkwardly now that she's drawn away, and he quickly drops them back to his chair. She's still stunningly gorgeous -- as if a mere haircut could change that.

"Yes um... I was a little embarrassed when he didn't mention it and Greg made the announcement. I thought Greg must've pinned me for insane for giving him half of my head."

She still looks a little embarrassed for not asking more about the custom before lopping off her hair, but she wouldn't take it back now. Elizabeth still smiles sheepishly at Miles and fidgets with her hands. "I wanted to. I know... I know we haven't known each other for long, but I'd be a liar if I said that before what happened on the planet I wasn't afraid someone would come asking after what we talked about in the library. Old habits die hard.

"But I guess something about realizing you'd... that you actually hadn't told anybody--" She doesn't want to say that her secret had died with him, it's too odd. "That meant very much to me, too."

"Ah...no. Not insane, I think. Just...very sincere," Miles says, still looking faintly embarrassed. He clears his throat and shrugs, though, trying to reclaim some of his composure. Elizabeth looks like she's embarrassed, too. He doesn't want to give her any more reason to feel so.

"Don't ever let anyone tell you a little paranoia isn't good for you. Given what you know, I'd say it's healthy," Miles observes blandly, but then his face turns quite serious, unexpectedly sincere. "I gave you my word as Vorkosigan, Elizabeth. I intend to carry your secret to my grave -- twice, even." His expression breaks on a manic grin, a little grim and twitchy around the edges.

"Let's hope it stays 'twice'," she says with a little uncomfortable laugh. "You... you were dead though, weren't you? How did they, ah... reverse it?" Obviously it was no small feat-- Miles looks literally like he's been to hell and back.

Miles gives her a wan smile. "I'm not sure they really did," he says, rubbing his jaw, and then his hand goes to his throat, the strange new tic he's picked up since he saw his reflection down on Caducus Primary, the thin white scars he'd seen on his future self's neck. Cryo prep scars. He'd expected to see them after he woke up from cryo here, it would've been a massive relief, but his throat is bare of any new scars. It's...extremely troubling, to say the least. Absently, Miles tugs up the collar of his uniform.

"My old, um...body was destroyed along with the planet," he explains, shifting uncomfortably in his station chair. Talking about himself like a walking corpse is still kind of jarring. "As far as I understand it, a new body was produced by the Ingress and placed in cryo. I don't really know if that counts as a reversal, but it certainly was a revival." He pauses, looking suddenly much more tired. The memory of his painful death is still uncomfortably fresh in his mind. "But, yes. I was dead."

Edited 2015-12-08 13:56 (UTC)

...that does sound incredibly unnerving. It sounds like the chambers Ryan had been producing for use in case he or his relatives met an untimely fate. And produced by the Ingress? That piece of information makes her eyebrows come together in confusion.

"I hope it's not just... spitting out alternates of us that are just sitting in storage somewhere," she says, looking a little ill at the thought. Well, that was impossible on her end-- she'd completely collapsed. There's only one of her now.

"I'm starting to wonder if there's anything the Ingress can't do," she says with a worried little chuckle.

Miles goes a shade paler. The notion that the Ingress might be producing clones of some kind hadn't really occurred to him, and it makes his belly go cold. His mind turns over the notion frantically, his mouth going slightly dry. No, it can't be. He'd know if he was a clone. All those memories, and... Miles touches one hand to the other, feeling the brittle finger bones that had been broken just a few months ago.

"No," he decides, shaking his head. "No, I don't think we could be clones of any kind. Clones just don't work that way, it takes -- hell, it takes a brain transplant to give a clone any memories of its progenitor, and that's a dirty business." Done often on Jackson's Whole, along with a host of other ethically dubious industries. Miles gestures at the short length of his body, his mouth twisting into a self-conscious frown. "And then there's my body. My particular condition arose out of a dozen random factors -- the nature of the soltoxin attack, the array of experimental treatments used just to carry me to term -- I can't see how that could possibly be created through the cloning process. And my bones still snap like twigs, I assure you."

He smiles thinly, but then it slips off his face as he rubs his jaw in somber thought. "Considering what we know of the nature of the Ingress, I think maybe... What if the Ingress wasn't producing clones, but reaching into alternate timelines? Lose one, grab one from another -- although that does't explain the memories. I don't know."

Elizabeth looks a little horrified by the process Miles is describing. What kind of world created humans and then tried to perform brain transplants into them? That's just insane-- anyone could live forever in that case, with their brain slowly deteriorating until they were insane.

...but that was a fridge nightmare for another day.

"Y... yes, that's what I meant. Alternates from our timelines. Which would make sense, but... after my collapse, there weren't any more of me."

Which probably means that if she were to die on the Moira, that would actually be the end of her.

"Oh." Miles flushes slightly, realizing he's gone on that whole embarrassing tangent unsolicited and that he's somehow totally missed her point. At least he hadn't done anything so stupid as to have brought up his clone brother. He clears his throat, rubbing at his neck.

"Well, it still wouldn't explain the memories. Of this ship, I mean. No reason an alternate timeline Miles would remember any of this, right?" Miles rubs absently at his throat and laughs awkwardly. "I don't recommend dying, in that case. Or at all. Best if you can avoid it."

"Not unless the Ingress pulled us from the very moment we were about to die-- then we were somehow saved by the medical technology here," Elizabeth admits slowly, a hand to her cheek. "But in that case, why not invest in some teleportation technology? It would probably be less unpredictable..."

Speaking of the Ingress being unpredictable... "Miles... I'm starting to think that the Ingress and the technology I'm familiar with are completely different. I never managed to completely destabilize an entire planet before. The energy it produces is far more volatile and potentially more powerful than I was ever capable of."

Miles frowns. "Well, it is a lot bigger than you are -- and a machine. I don't think we can even begin to estimate its complexity. I don't know that we can rule out some kind of relationship straight out..." He lets a sigh whoosh out of him and rubs at his chin, looking deep in thought. "But no. I wouldn't say it's exactly the same, either."

He glances down at himself -- at his belly, where all the glass had pierced -- and looks back up at her with a totally bleak smile. "It'd have taken some very advanced medicine and even more advanced skill to put me back together after -- that. And I hardly have any scars."

And Eggsy -- poor Eggsy -- he'd come back missing a hand...

"...right, true..." Elizabeth nervously touches her forehead, rubbing it slightly and frowning as though deep in thought. It's very disturbing for her to be losing what she thought was a clear understanding of the Ingress, and what she could become capable of if they pitched some part of her into it.

"It split that planet in half though. And we have something that can do that on this ship right now." She sighs, agitated by the memory. She's never seen that level of destruction before, and Elizabeth would be lying if she said she felt no connection to the death of the planet and her own previous abilities. "What can I say? I don't like that I seem to know even less about the Ingress than I thought. I could at least feel safe around something that I used to be, but..."

She shakes her head and covers her mouth, trying to hold her nerves in. "I'm afraid of something because I don't know what it's capable of." That makes her no better than Comstock, probably.

"The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown," Miles recites, straining that bleak smile to its limits, and raps his fingers on his desk. "A quote from an old Earth writer, I believe. I think he was onto something. Fear of the unknown is perfectly rational -- it's what you do with it that counts. Personally, I don't care for the idea of turning away and hiding from something just because I don't understand it. But if you let that fear motivate you to conquer that unknown, on the other hand..."

His smile grows a little less strained, though subdued. "Right now it seems like there are far more questions than answers, but I refuse to believe this is beyond our grasp. We need to keep looking. There are answers to be had -- we just don't have them yet." He chews absently on the side of his thumb. "I've built up something of a rapport with Captain Thán, I'll see if I can squeeze anything out of him. Cagey as hell, but once in a while he'll spill something relevant. Assuming I can get him to talk to me again."

"Lovecraft." It had stuck with her, honestly. Everything that concerned humans being afraid of things and working to contain them instead of understand them stuck with her for extremely personal reasons.

Miles is, of course, right. As much as she's afraid of her comfortable life being literally ripped in two, if they don't work to understand the Ingress it could come back to bite them later. She might even feel more secure knowing a little more than absolute speculation.

"Cagey?" Elizabeth frowns, looking quizzically at Miles. Cagey? Captain Thán? The kind man who brings her boxes of books and shares her love and care for them? "He's been very forthcoming to me-- did you do something to make him dislike you?"

"I haven't -- no," Miles says, surprised. He gives Elizabeth a quizzical look, mouth twisting. "I mean, we had, uh, a little spat right before -- " I died " -- everything went to hell on Caducus Primary. It seems he does not appreciate criticisms on his command style."

Miles smiles tightly. However Thán is around Elizabeth, it's no tthe same treatment he's been getting. But then again, he doubts Elizabeth has been pursuing the same topics of conversation with Thán. "He's only cagey when you start sniffing around the curtain they're hiding behind. Tell me, is he very forthcoming when you ask him about the Ingress? Or about himself?"

Edited 2015-12-26 06:45 (UTC)

"Ah, well..." Elizabeth fidgets with her hands for a moment, just to steel herself and remember Miles' promise to keep these things to himself. "It's a strain when you're responsible for the lives of dozens of people and you really don't know what direction you're supposed to be traveling in-- if that's indeed what's happening with him. I should know, the one time I couldn't see where I was going, what door I'd opened and why, I nearly lost my mind over it.

"I did ask him about the Ingress, and when he said he didn't know enough about it to discuss its inner-workings I believed him," Elizabeth says with conviction. "I've been lied to in creative and consistent ways before, I didn't think he was lying to me when he said that. As for talking to him about himself..." She fidgets again with her pinky and shifts on her feet. "That's not really my place to discuss with him, is it?"

You can ask Thán about what he likes to do on weekends all you like, Miles-- Elizabeth feels that if she started asking those kinds of questions, there would be a certain unavoidable undertone.

"Believe me, Elizabeth, I know what it's like to be responsible for those under your command, and in much greater numbers than this." The assertion slips out before he can stop himself, and Miles quickly closes his mouth, swallowing. Right, because an ImpSec lieutenant's ever been in charge of an entire fleet. Idiot.

He makes a smooth transition from that, though, hardly skipping a beat, and shakes his haed. "I never said I thought he was lying, just playing it very close to the chest. He's very selective about what he tells us, and at any rate, my concern is with the quality of their command. And if you can't get anything from him on a professional level, learning something about his person might give you some other kinds of insights."

Spoken like a true covert ops agent. Miles shrugs, though, and lets out a sigh, leaning back in his chair. "But I'm not going to push too hard. That doesn't get you anywhere either."

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[ catch-all for miles, post-death ]

Re: 29th - Personnel Office

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