Mirror Dance

“He was doubtless about to.” Bothari-Jesek sighed. “I don’t think we need to waste time rationing blame. There’s going to be plenty to go around.”

Thorne winced, as did Framingham, Qui

“It’s only been,” Qui

“So what do we do?” Lieutenant Kimura asked dryly. “Mount mother drop mission?”

Qui

“In the meantime,” Bothari-Jesek said, “Fell Station is calling us, pretty urgently. We have to start dealing. I presume this will involve our hostage.” A short nod of thanks in Kimura’s direction acknowledged the only wholly successful part of the drop mission, and Kimura nodded back. “Does anyone here know what the Admiral intended to do with Baron Bharaputra?”

A circle of negative headshakes. “Don’t you know, Qui

“No. There wasn’t time to chat. I’m not even sure if the Admiral seriously expected your kidnapping expedition to succeed, Kimura, or whether it was only for the diversionary value. That would be more like his strategizing, not to let the whole mission turn on one unknown outcome. I expect he pla

“In that case,” said Bothari-Jesek, “I don’t think we should let on to House Bharaputra just how valuable a package we left downside.”

Bothari-Jesek, Thorne, Qui

“I’ve thought of that too,” said Qui

“No,” he whispered. “No!” His scream emerged as a croak. “You can’t be serious. You can’t make me be him, I don’t want to be him any more, God! No!” He was shaking, shivering, his stomach turning and knotting. I’m cold.

Qui

Qui

Thorne nodded, as if this were entirely expected. “Am I under arrest?”

Qui

Thorne’s face went very bleak indeed. “Yes, ma’am,” it said woodenly.

Qui

Except for Qui

Miles’s women. Elena-the-childhood-sweetheart, now Captain Bothari-Jesek, Mark had studied back when the Komarrans had tutored him to play Lord Vorkosigan. Yet she was not quite what he had expected. Qui

Bothari-Jesek was the taller by a head, with long aristocratic features, and was more cool and reserved, an effect augmented by her clean officer’s undress grays. Qui

Elena Bothari-Jesek was watching him with a sort of appalled fascination. “So like him. Yet not him. Why are you shivering?”

“I’m cold,” muttered Mark.

“ You’re cold!” Qui

Bothari-Jesek rose and walked around to his end of the table. Willow-wood woman. She touched his forehead, which was clammy; he flinched almost explosively. She bent and stared into his eyes. “Quin–back off. He’s in psychological shock.”

“He doesn’t deserve my consideration!” Qui

“He’s still in shock, regardless. If you want results, you have to take it into account.”

“Hell.” Qui

“Qui

“Oh, he’s really dead all right. Very really frozen dead. And he’s going to stay that way forever if we don’t get him back!” The blood all over her fatigues, caked in the grooves of her hands, smeared across her face, was finally turning brown.

Bothari-Jesek took a breath. “Let’s focus on the business to hand. The immediate question is, can Mark fool Baron Fell? Fell met the real Miles once.”

“That’s one of the reasons I didn’t put Bel Thorne under close arrest. Bel was there, and can advise, I hope.”

Yes. And that’s the curious thing …” She hitched a hip over the tabletop, and let one long booted leg swing. “Shock or no shock, Mark hasn’t blown Miles’s deep-cover. The name Vorkosigan hasn’t passed lips, has it?”

“No,” Qui

Bothari-Jesek twisted up her mouth, and studied him. “Why not?” She asked suddenly.

He crouched down a little further in his station chair, trying to ape the impact of her stare. “I don’t know,” he muttered. She tried implacably for more, and he mustered in an only slightly louder mumble, “Habit, I guess.” Mostly Ser Galen’s habit of beating the shit of him whenever he’d screwed up, back in the bad old days. “When I do the part, I do the part. Miles would never have slipped that one, so I don’t either.”

“Who are you when you’re not doing the part?” Bothari-Jesek’s gaze was narrowed, calculating.

“I … hardly know.” He swallowed, and tried again for more volume in his voice. “What’s going to happen to my—to the clones?”

As Qui

“I want them to go free. To be set free somewhere safe, where House Bharaputra can’t kidnap them back.”

“A strange altruism. I can’t help wondering, why? Why this whole mission in the first place? What did you hope to gain?”

His mouth opened, but no sound came out. He couldn’t answer. He was still clammy, weak and shaking. His head ached blackly, as though draining of blood. He shook his head.

“Peh!” snorted Qui

“Qui