Diplomatic Immunity

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Miles arrived back in the Idris 's infirmary feet first. He was carried by two of the men from Vorpatril's strike force, which had been hastily converted to, mostly, a medical relief team, and as such cleared by the quaddies. His porters almost fell down the unsightly hole Roic had left in the floor. Miles seized back personal control of his locomotion long enough to stand up, under his own power, and lean rather unsteadily against the wall by the door to the bio-isolation ward. Roic followed, carefully holding the ba's remote trigger in a biotainer bag. Corbeau, stiff-faced and pale, brought up the rear dressed in a loose medical tunic and drawstring pants, and shepherded by a medtech with the ba's hypospray in another biotainer sack.

Captain Clogston came out through the buzzing blue barriers and looked over his new influx of patients and assistants. “Right,” he announced, glowering at the gap in the deck. “This ship is so damned befouled, I'm declaring the whole thing a Level Three Biocontamination Zone. So we may as well spread out and get comfortable, boys.”

The techs made a human chain to pass the analyzing equipment quickly to the outer chamber. Miles snared the chance for a few brief, urgent words with the two men with medical markings on their suits who stood apart from the rest—the Prince Xav 's military interrogation officers. Not really in disguise, merely discreet—and, Miles had to allow, they were medically trained.

The second ward was declared a temporary holding cell for their prisoner, the ba, who followed in the procession, bound to a float pallet. Miles scowled as the pallet drifted past, towed on its control lead by a watchful, muscular sergeant. The ba was strapped down tightly, but its head and eyes rolled oddly, and its saliva-flecked lips writhed.

Above almost anything else, it was essential to keep the ba in Barrayaran hands. Finding where the ba had hidden its filthy bio-bomb on Graf Station was the first priority. The haut race had some genetically engineered immunity to the most common interrogation drugs and their derivatives; if fast-penta didn't work on this one, it would give the quaddies very little in the way of interrogation procedures to fall back upon that would pass Adjudicator Leutwyn's approval. In this emergency, military rules seemed more appropriate than civilian ones. In other words, if they'll just leave us alone we'll pull out the ba's fingernails for them.

Miles caught Clogston by the elbow. “How is Bel Thorne doing?” he demanded.

The fleet surgeon shook his head. “Not well, my Lord Auditor. We thought at first the herm was improving, as the filters cut in—it seemed to return to consciousness. But then it became restless. Moaning and trying to talk. Out of its head, I think. It keeps crying for Admiral Vorpatril.”

Vorpatril? Why? Wait– “Did Bel say Vorpatril?” Miles asked sharply. “Or just, the Admiral ?”

Clogston shrugged. “Vorpatril's the only admiral around right now, although I suppose the portmaster could be hallucinating altogether. I hate to sedate anyone so physiologically distressed, especially when they've just fought their way out of a drug fog. But if that herm doesn't calm down, we'll have to.”

Miles frowned and hurried into the isolation ward. Clogston followed. Miles pulled off his helmet, fished his wrist com back out of it, and clutched the vital link safely in his hand. A tech was making up the hastily cleared second bunk, readying it for the infected Lord Auditor, presumably.

Bel now lay on the first bunk, dried off and dressed in a pale green Barrayaran military-issue patient tunic, which seemed at first heartening progress. But the herm was gray-faced, lips purple-blue, eyelids fluttering. An IV pump, not dependent upon potentially erratic ship's gravity, infused yellow fluid rapidly into Bel's right arm. The left arm was strapped to a board; plastic tubing filled with blood ran from under a bandage and into a hybrid appliance bound around with quantities of plastic tape. A second tube ran back again, its dark surface moist with condensation.

“ 'S balla,” Bel moaned. “ 'S balla.”

The fleet surgeon's lips pursed in medical displeasure behind his faceplate. He edged forward to glance at a monitor. “Blood pressure's way up, too. I think it's time to knock the poor bugger back out.”

“Wait.” Miles elbowed to the edge of Bel's bunk to put himself in Bel's line of sight, staring down at the herm in wild hope. Bel's head jerked. The eyelids flickered up; the eyes widened. The blue lips tried to move again. Bel licked them, took a long inhalation, and tried once more. “Adm'ral! Portent. 'S basti'd hid it in the balla. Tol' me. Sadist'c basti'd.”

“Still going on about Admiral Vorpatril,” Clogston muttered in dismay.

“Not Admiral Vorpatril. Me,” breathed Miles. Did that witty mind still exist, in the bunker of its brain? Bel's eyes were open, shifting to try to focus on him, as if Miles's image wavered and blurred in the herm's sight.

Bel knew a portent. No. Bel was trying to say something important. Bel wrestled death for the possession of its own mouth to try to get the message out. Balla? Ballistic? Balalaika? No—ballet!

Miles said urgently, “The ba hid its bio-bomb at the ballet—in the Minchenko Auditorium? Is that what you're trying to say, Bel?”

The straining body sagged in relief. “Yeh. Yeh. Get 's word out. In the lights, I thin'.”

“Was there only one bomb? Or were there more? Did the ba say, could you tell?”

“Don' know. 'S homemade, I thin'. Check. Purch'ses . . .”

“Right, got it! Good work, Captain Thorne.” You always were the best, Bel . Miles turned half away and spoke forcefully into his wrist com, demanding to be patched through to Greenlaw, or Venn, or Watts, or somebody in authority on Graf Station.

A ragged female voice finally replied, “Yes?”

“Sealer Greenlaw? Are you there?”

Her voice steadied. “Yes, Lord Vorkosigan? Do you have something?”

“Maybe. Bel Thorne reports the ba said that it hid the bio-bomb somewhere in the Minchenko Auditorium. Possibly behind some lights.”

Her breath drew in. “Good. We'll concentrate our trained searchers in there.”

“Bel also thinks the bomb was something the ba rigged itself, recently. It may have made purchases on Graf Station in the persona of Ker Dubauer that could give you a clue as to how many it could have devised.”

“Ah! Right! I'll get Venn's people on it.”

“Note, Bel's in pretty bad shape. Also, the ba could have been lying. Get back to me when you know something.”

“Yes. Yes. Thank you.” Hastily, she cut her com. It occurred to Miles to wonder if she was locked down in protective bio-isolation right now too, as he was about to be, trying to shape the critical moment at a similar frustrating remove.

“Basti'd,” Bel muttered. “Paralyzed me. Put me in s' damn bod pod. Tol' me. Then zipped it up. Left me to die, 'magining . . . Knew . . . it knew about Nicol 'n me. Saw my vid cube. Where's m' vid cube?”

“Nicol is safe,” Miles assured Bel. Well, as much as any quaddie on Graf Station at the moment—if not safe, at least warned . Vid cube? Oh, the little imager full of Bel's hypothetical children. “Your vid cube is put away safely.” Miles had no idea if this last was true or not—the cube might be still in Bel's pocket, destroyed with the herm's contaminated clothes, or stolen by the ba. But the assertion gave Bel ease. The exhausted herm's eyes closed again, and its breathing steadied.

In a few hours, I'm going to look like that.

Then you'd better not waste any time now, eh?

With a vast distaste, Miles suffered a hovering tech to help him off with his pressure suit and underwear—to be taken away and incinerated, Miles supposed. “If you're tying me down here, I want a comconsole set up by my bunk immediately. No, you can't have that.” Miles fended off the tech, who was now trying to pry loose his com link, then paused to swallow. “And something for nausea. All right, put it around my right arm, then.”

Horizontal was scarcely better than vertical. Miles smoothed down his own pale green tunic and gave up his left arm to the surgeon, who personally attended to piercing his vein with some medical awl that felt the size of a drinking straw. On the other side a tech pressed a hypospray against his right shoulder—a potion that would kill the dizziness and the cramping in his stomach, he hoped. But he didn't yelp until the first spurt of filtered blood returned to his body. “Crap , that's cold. I hate cold.”

“Can't be helped, my Lord Auditor,” Clogston murmured soothingly. “We have to lower your body temperature at least three degrees. It will buy time.”

Miles hunched, uncomfortably reminded that they didn't have a fix for this yet. He stifled a gush of terror, escaping under pressure from the place he'd kept it locked for the past hours. Not for one second would he allow himself to believe that there was no cure to be had, that this bio-shit would drag him under and this time he wouldn't come back up . . . ”Where's Roic?” He raised his right wrist to his lips. “Roic?”

“I'm in the outer chamber, m'lord. I'm afraid to carry this triggering device through the bio-barrier till we're sure it's disarmed.”

“Right, good thinking. One of those fellows out there should be the bomb disposal tech I requested. Find him and give it to him. Then ride herd on the interrogation for me, will you?”

“Yes, m'lord.”

“Captain Clogston.”

The doctor glanced down from where he fiddled with the jury-rigged blood filter. “My lord?”

“The moment you have a medtech—no, a doctor. The moment you have some qualified men free, send them to the cargo hold where the ba has the replicators. I want them to run samples, try to see if the ba has contaminated or poisoned them in any way. Then make sure the equipment's all running all right. It's very important that the haut infants all be kept alive and well.”

“Yes, Lord Vorkosigan.”

If the haut babies were inoculated with the same vile parasites presently rioting through his own body, might the replicators' temperature be turned down to chill them all, and slow the disease process? Or would such cold stress the infants, damage them . . . he was borrowing trouble, reasoning in advance of his data. A trained agent, conditioned to the correct disconnect between action and imagination, might have performed such an inoculation, cleaning up every bit of incriminating high-haut DNA before abandoning the scene. But this ba was an amateur. This ba had another sort of conditioning altogether. Yes, but that conditioning must have gone very wrong somehow, or this ba wouldn't have got this far . . .

Miles added as Clogston turned away, “And give me word on the condition of the pilot, Corbeau, as soon as you have it.” The retreating suited figure raised a hand in acknowledgment.

In a few minutes, Roic entered the ward; he had doffed the bulky powered work suit, and now wore more comfortable military-issue Level Three biotainer garb.

“How's it going over there?”

Roic ducked his head. “Not well, m'lord. T' ba has gone into some sort of strange mental state. Raving, but nothing to the point, and the intelligence fellows say its physiological state is all out of kilter as well. They're trying to stabilize it.”

“The ba must be kept alive!” Miles struggled half-up, a vision of having himself carried into the next chamber to take charge running through his head. “We have to get it back to Cetaganda. To prove Barrayar is innocent.”

He sank back and eyed the humming device filtering his blood hung by his left side. Pulling out parasites, yes, but also draining the energy the parasites had stolen from him to create themselves. Siphoning off the mental edge he desperately needed right now.

He remarshaled his scattering thoughts, and explained to Roic the news Bel had imparted. “Return to the interrogation room and give them the word on this development. See if they can get any cross-confirmation on the hiding place in the Minchenko Auditorium, and especially see if they can get anything that would suggest if there is more than one device. Or not.”

“Right.” Roic nodded. He glanced over Miles's growing array of medical attachments. “By the way, m'lord. Had you happened to mention your seizure disorder to the surgeon yet?”

“Not yet. There hasn't been time.”

“Right.” Roic's lips screwed up thoughtfully, in an editorial fashion that Miles chose to ignore. “I'll see to it then, shall I, m'lord?”

Miles hunched. “Yeah, yeah.”

Roic trod out of the ward on both his errands.

The remote comconsole arrived; a tech swung a tray across Miles's lap, laid the vid plate frame upon it, and helped him sit mostly up, with extra pillows at his back. He was starting to shiver again. All right, good, the device was Barrayaran military issue, not just scavenged from the Idris . He had a securable visual link again now. He entered codes.

Vorpatril's face was a moment or two coming up; riding herd on all this from the Prince Xav 's tactics room, the admiral no doubt had a few other demands on his attention at the moment. He appeared at last with a, “Yes , my lord!” His eyes searched the image of Miles on his vid display. He apparently was not reassured by the view. His jaw tightened in dismay. “Are you all—” he began, but edited this fatuity on the fly to, “How bad is it?”

“I can still talk. And while I can still talk, I need to record some orders. While we're waiting on the quaddies' search for the bio-bomb—are you following the latest on that?” Miles brought the admiral up to the moment on Bel's intelligence about the Minchenko Auditorium, and went on. “Meanwhile, I want you to select and prepare the fastest ship in your escort that has a sufficient capacity for the load it's going to be carrying. Which will be me, Portmaster Thorne, a medical team, our prisoner the ba and guards, Guppy the Jacksonian smuggler if I can pry him out of quaddie hands, and a thousand working uterine replicators. With qualified medical attendants.”

“And me,” put in Ekaterin's voice firmly from offsides. Her face leaned briefly into range of Vorpatril's vid pickup, and she frowned at him. She'd seen her husband looking like death on a plate more than once before, though; perhaps she wouldn't be as disturbed as the admiral clearly was. Having an Imperial Auditor get melted to steaming slime on his watch would be a notable black mark, not that Vorpatril's career wasn't in a shambles over this episode already.

“My courier ship will travel in convoy, carrying Lady Vorkosigan.” He cut across Ekaterin's beginning objection: “I may well need one spokesperson along who isn't in medical quarantine.”

She settled back with a dubious “Hm.”

“But I want to make damned sure we're not impeded by any hassles along the way, Admiral, so have your fleet department start working immediately on our passage clearances in all the local space polities we're going to have to cross. Speed. Speed is of the essence. I want to get away the moment we're sure the ba's devil-device has been cleared from Graf Station. At least with us carrying all these biohazards, no one is going to want to stop and board us for inspections.”

“To Komarr, my lord? Or Sergyar?”

“No. Calculate the shortest possible jump route directly to Rho Ceta.”

Vorpatril's head jerked back in startlement. “If the orders I received from Sector Five HQ mean what we think, you'll hardly get passage there . Reception by plasma fire and fusion shells the moment you pop out of the wormhole, would be what I'd expect.”

“Unpack , Miles,” Ekaterin's voice drifted in.

He grinned briefly at the familiar exasperation in her voice. “By the time we arrive there, I will have arranged our clearances with the Cetagandan Empire.” I hope . Or else they were all going to be in more trouble than Miles ever wanted to imagine. “Barrayar is bringing their kidnapped haut babies back to them. On the end of a long stick. I get to be the stick.”

“Ah,” said Vorpatril, his gray brows rising in speculation.

“Give a head's-up to my ImpSec courier pilot. I plan to start the moment we have everyone and everything transferred aboard. You can start on the everything part now.”

“Understood, my lord.” Vorpatril rose and vanished out of vid range. Ekaterin moved back in, and smiled at him.

“Well, we're making some progress at last,” Miles said to her, with what he hoped seemed good cheer, and not suppressed hysteria.

Her smile twisted up on one side. Her eyes were warm, though. “Some progress? What do you call an avalanche, I wonder?”

“No arctic metaphors, please. I'm cold enough. If the medicos get this . . . infestation under control en route, perhaps they'll clear me for visitors. We'll want the courier ship later, anyway.”

A medtech appeared, drew a blood sample from the outbound tube, added an IV pump to the array, raised the bed rails, then bent and began tying down the left arm board.

“Hey,” objected Miles. “How am I supposed to unravel all this mess with one hand tied behind my back?”

“Captain Clogston's orders, m'lord Auditor.” Firmly, the tech finished securing his arm. “Standard procedure for seizure risk.”

Miles gritted his teeth.

“Your seizure-stimulator is with the rest of your things aboard the Kestrel ,” Ekaterin observed dispassionately. “I'll find it and send it across as soon as I transfer back aboard.”

Prudently, Miles limited his response to, “Thank you. Check back with me before you dispatch it—there may be a few other things I'll need. Let me know when you're safely aboard.”

“Yes, love.” She touched her fingers to her lips and held them up, passing them through his image before her. He returned the gesture. His heart chilled a little as her image winked out. How long before they dared touch flesh to warm flesh again? What if it's never . . . ? Damn, but I'm cold.

The tech departed. Miles hunched down in his bed. He supposed it would be futile to ask for blankets. He imagined little tiny bio-bombs set to go off all through his body, sparking like a Midsummer fireworks display seen at a distance out over the river in Vorbarr Sultana, cascading to a grand, lethal finale. He imagined his flesh decomposing into corrosive ooze while he yet lived in it. He needed to think about something else.

Two empires, both alike in indignation, maneuvering for position, massing deadly force behind a dozen wormhole jumps, each jump a point of contact, conflict, catastrophe . . . that was no better.

A thousand almost-ripe haut fetuses, turning in their little chambers, unaware of the distance and dangers they had passed through, and the hazards still to come—how soon would they have to be decanted? The picture of a thousand squalling infants dropped upon a few harried Barrayaran military medicos was almost enough to make him smile, if only he wasn't so primed to start screaming.

Bel's breath, in the next bunk, was thick and labored.

Speed. For every reason, speed. Had he set in motion everyone and everything that he could? He ran down checklists in his aching head, lost his place, tried again. How long had it been since he'd slept? The minutes crawled by with tortuous slowness. He imagined them as snails, hundreds of little snails with Cetagandan clan markings coloring their shells, going past in procession, leaving slime-trails of lethal biocontamination . . . a crawling infant, little Helen Natalia, cooing and reaching for one of the pretty, poisonous creatures, and he was all tied up and pierced with tubes and couldn't get across the room fast enough to stop her . . .

A bleep from his lap link, thank God, snapped him awake before he could find out where that nightmare was going. He was still pierced with tubes, though. What time was it? He was losing track altogether. His usual mantra—I can sleep when I'm dead —seemed a little too apropos.

An image formed over the vid plate. “Sealer Greenlaw!” Good news, bad news? Good . Her lined face was radiant with relief.

“We found it,” she said. “It's been contained.”

Miles blew out his breath in a long exhalation. “Yes. Excellent. Where?”

“In Minchenko Auditorium, just as the portmaster said. Attached to the wall in a stage light cell. It did seem to have been put together hastily, but it was deadly clever for all of that. Simple and clever. It was scarcely more than a little sealed plastic balloon, filled with some sort of nutrient solution, my people tell me. And a tiny charge, and the electronic trigger for it. The ba had stuck it to the wall with ordinary packing tape, and sprayed it with a little flat black paint. No one would notice it in the ordinary course of events, not even if they had been working on the lights, unless they put a hand right on it.”

“Homemade, then. On the spot?”

“It would seem so. The electronics, which were off-the-shelf items—and the tape, for that matter—are all quaddie-make. They match with the purchases recorded to Dubauer's credit chit the evening after the attack in the hostel lobby. All the parts are accounted for. There seems to have been only the one device.” She ran her upper hands through her silver hair, massaging her scalp wearily, and squeezed shut eyes bounded beneath by little dark half-moons of shadow.

“That . . . fits with the timetable as I see it,” said Miles. “Right up until Guppy popped up with his rivet gun, the ba evidently thought it had gotten away clean with its stolen cargo. And with Solian's death. Everything calm and perfect. Its plan was to pass through Quaddiespace quietly, without leaving a trace. It would not have had any reason before then to rig such a device. But from that botched murder attempt on, it was running scared, having to improvise rapidly. Curious bit of foresight, though. It can't have planned to be trapped on the Idris the way it was, surely.”

She shook her head. “It planned something. The explosive charge had two leads to its trigger. One was a receiver for the signal device the ba had in its pocket. The other was a simple sound sensor. Set to a fairly high decibel level. That of an auditorium full of applause, for example.”

Miles's teeth snapped shut. Oh, yes. “Thus masking the pop of the charge, and blowing out contaminant to the maximum number of people at once.” The vision was instant, and horrifying.

“So we think. People come in from other stations all over Quaddiespace to see performances of the Minchenko Ballet. The contagion could have spread back out with them through half the system before it became apparent.”

“Is it the same—no, it can't be what the ba gave to me and Bel. Can it? Was it lethal, or merely something debilitating, or what?”

“The sample is in the hands of our medical people now. We should know soon.”

“So the ba set up its bio-bomb . . . after it knew real Cetagandan agents would be following, after it knew it would be compelled to abandon the utterly incriminating replicators and their contents . . . I'll bet it put the bomb together and slapped it out there in a hurry.” Maybe it was revenge. Revenge upon the quaddies for all the forced delays that had so wrecked the ba's perfect plan . . . ? By Bel's report, the ba was not above such motivations; the Cetagandan had displayed a cruel humor, and a taste for bifurcating strategies. If the ba hadn't run into the troubles on the Idris , would it have retrieved the device, or would it simply have quietly left the bomb behind to go off on its own? Well, if Miles's own men couldn't get the whole story out of their prisoner, he damned well knew some people who could.

“Good,” he breathed. “We can go now.”

Greenlaw's weary eyes opened. “What?”

“I mean—with your permission, Madame Sealer.” He adjusted his vid pickup to a wider angle, to take in his sinister medical setting. Too late to adjust the color balance toward a more sickly green. Also, possibly, redundant. Greenlaw's mouth turned down in dismay, looking at him.

“Admiral Vorpatril has received an extremely alarming military communiqu? from home . . .” Swiftly, Miles explained his deduction about the connection of suddenly increased tensions between Barrayar and its dangerous Cetagandan neighbor to the recent events on Graf Station. He talked carefully around the tactical use of trade fleet escorts as rapid-deployment forces, although he doubted the sealer missed the implications.

“My plan is to get myself, the ba, the replicators, and as much evidence as I can amass of the ba's crimes back to Rho Ceta, to present to the Cetagandan government, to clear Barrayar of whatever accusation of collusion is driving this crisis. As fast as possible. Before some hothead—on either side—does something that, to put it bluntly, makes Admiral Vorpatril's late actions on Graf Station look like a model of restraint and wisdom.”

That won a snort from her; he forged on. “While the ba and Russo Gupta both committed crimes on Graf, they committed crimes in the Cetagandan and Barrayaran empires first. I submit we have clear prior claim. And worse—their mere continued presence on Graf Station is dangerous, because, I promise you, sooner or later their furious Cetagandan victims will be following them up. I think you've had enough of a taste of their medicine to make the prospect of a swarm of real Cetagandan agents descending upon you unwelcome indeed. Cede us both criminals, and any retribution will chase after us instead.”

“Hm,” she said. “And your impounded trade fleet? Your fines?”

“Let . . . on my authority, I am willing to transfer of ownership of the Idris to Graf Station, in lieu of all fines and expenses.” He added prudently, “As is.”

Her eyes sprang wide. She said indignantly, “The ship's contaminated .”

“Yes. So we can't take it anywhere anyway. Cleaning it up could be a nice little training exercise for your biocontrol people.” He decided not to mention the holes. “Even with that expense, you'll come out ahead. I'm afraid the passengers' insurance will have to eat the value of any of their cargo that can't be cleared. But I'm really hopeful that most of it will not need to be quarantined. And you can let the rest of the fleet go.”

“And your men in our detention cells?”

“You let one of them out. Are you sorry? Can you not allow Lieutenant Corbeau's courage to redeem his comrades? That has to be one of the bravest acts I've ever witnessed, him walking naked and knowing into horror to save Graf Station.”

“That . . . yes. That was remarkable,” she conceded. “By any people's standards.” She regarded him thoughtfully. “You went in after the ba too.”

“Mine doesn't count,” Miles said automatically. “I was already . . .” he cut the word, dead. He was not, dammit, dead yet. “I was already infected.”

Her brows rose in bemused curiosity. “And if you hadn't been, what would you have done?”

“Well . . . it was the tactical moment. I have a kind of gift for timing, you see.”

“And for doubletalk.”

“That, too. But the ba was just my job.”

“Has anyone ever told you that you are quite mad?”

“Now and then,” he admitted. Despite everything, a slow smile turned his lips. “Not so much since I was appointed an Imperial Auditor, though. Useful, that.”

She snorted, very softly. Softening? Miles trotted out the next barrage. “My plea is humanitarian, too. It is my belief—my hope—that the Cetagandan haut ladies will have some treatment up their capacious sleeves for their own product. I propose to take Portmaster Thorne with us—at our expense—to share the cure that I now so desperately seek for myself. It's only justice. The herm was, in a sense, in my service when it took this harm. In my work gang, if you like.”

“Huh. You Barrayarans do look after your own, at least. One of your few saving graces.”

Miles opened his hands in an equally ambiguous acknowledgment of this mixed compliment. “Thorne and I both now labor under a deadline that waits on no committee debate, I'm afraid, and no one's permission. The present palliative,” he gestured awkwardly at the blood filter, “buys a little time. As of this moment, no one knows if it will buy enough.”

She rubbed her brow, as if it ached. “Yes, certainly . . . certainly you must . . . oh, hell.” She took a breath. “All right. Take your prisoners and your evidence and the whole damned lot—and Thorne—and go.”

“And Vorpatril's men in detention?”

“Them, too. Take them all away. Your ships can all go, bar the Idris .” Her nose wrinkled in distaste. “But we will discuss the residue of your fines and expenses further, after the ship is evaluated by our inspectors. Later. Your government can send someone for the task. Not you, by preference.”

“Thank you, Madame Sealer,” Miles sang in relief. He cut the com, and collapsed back on his pillows. The ward seemed to be spinning around his head, very slowly, in short jerks. It wasn't, he decided after a moment, a problem with the room.

* * *

Captain Clogston, who had been waiting by the door for the Auditor to complete this high-level negotiation, advanced to glower at his cobbled-together blood filter some more. He then transferred his glower to Miles. “Seizure disorder, eh? I'm glad someone told me.”

“Yes, well, we wouldn't want you to mistake it for an exotic new Cetagandan symptom. It's pretty routine. If it happens, don't panic. I come up on my own in about five minutes. Usually gives me a sort of hangover, afterwards, not that I'd be able to tell the difference at the moment. Never mind. What can you tell me about Lieutenant Corbeau?”

“We checked the ba's hypospray. It was filled with water.”

“Ah! Good! I thought so.” Miles smiled in wolfish satisfaction. “Can you pronounce him clear of bio-horrors, then?”

“Given that he's been running around this plague-ship bare-ass naked, not until we're sure we have identified all possible hazards that the ba might have released. But nothing came up on the first blood and tissue samples we took.”

A hopeful—Miles tried not to think, overly optimistic —sign. “Can you send the lieutenant in to me? Is it safe? I want to talk to him.”

“We now believe that what you and the herm have isn't virulently contagious through ordinary contact. Once we're sure the ship's clear of anything else, we'll all be able to get out of these suits, which will be a relief. Although the parasites might transfer sexually—we'll have to study that.”

“I don't like Corbeau that much. Send him in, then.”

Clogston gave Miles an odd look, and moved off. Miles wasn't sure if the captain had missed the feeble joke, or merely considered it too feeble to merit a response. But that transfer sexually theory kicked off a whole new cascade of unpleasant, unwelcome speculation in Miles's mind. What if the medicos found they could keep him alive indefinitely, but not get rid of the damned things? Would he never be able to touch any more of Ekaterin than her holovid image for the rest of his life . . . ? It also suggested a new set of questions to put to Guppy about his recent travels—well, the quaddie doctors were competent, and receiving copies of the Barrayarans' medical downloads; their epidemiologists were doubtless already on it.

Corbeau pushed through the bio-barriers. He was now somewhat desultorily arrayed in a disposable mask and gloves, in addition to the medical tunic and some patient slippers. Miles sat up, pushed away his tray, and unobtrusively twitched open his own tunic, letting the paling spiderweb of old needle-grenade scars silently suggest whatever they might to Corbeau.

“You asked for me, my Lord Auditor?” Corbeau ducked his head in a nervous jerk.

“Yes.” Miles scratched his nose thoughtfully with his one free hand. “Well, hero. That was a very good career move you just made.”

Corbeau hunched a little, mulishly. “I didn't do it for my career. Or for Barrayar. I did it for Graf Station, and the quaddies, and Garnet Five.”

“And glad I am of it. Nevertheless, people will doubtless be wanting to pin gold stars on you. Cooperate with me, and I won't make you receive them in the costume you were wearing when you earned them.”

Corbeau gave him a baffled, wary look.

What was the matter with all his jokes today, anyway? Flat, flatter, flattest. Maybe he was violating some sort of unwritten Auditor protocol, and messing up everyone else's lines.

The lieutenant said, in a notably uninviting voice, “What do you want me to do? My lord.”

“More urgent concerns—to put it mildly—are going to compel me to leave Quaddiespace before my assigned diplomatic mission is quite complete. Nevertheless, with the true cause and course of our recent disasters here finally dragged out into the light, what follows should be easier.” Besides, there's nothing like the threat of imminent death to force one to delegate. “It is very plain that Barrayar is overdue to have a full-time diplomatic consulate officer assigned to the Union of Free Habitats. A bright young man who . . .” is shacked up with a quaddie girl , no, married to , wait, that wasn't what they called it here, is partners with , yes, very likely, but it hadn't happened yet. Although Corbeau was thrice a fool if he didn't grab this opportunity to fix things with Garnet Five for good and all. “Likes quaddies,” Miles continued smoothly, “and has earned both their respect and gratitude by his personal valor, and has no objection to a long assignment away from home—two years, was it? Yes, two years. Such a young man might be particularly well placed to argue effectively for Barrayar's interests in Quaddiespace. In my personal opinion.”

Miles couldn't tell if Corbeau's mouth was open, behind his medical mask. His eyes had grown rather wide.

“I can't imagine,” said Miles, “that Admiral Vorpatril would have any objection to releasing you to this detached duty. Or at any rate, to not having to deal with you in his command structure after all these . . . complex events. Not that I'd planned to give him a Betan vote in my Auditorial decrees, mind you.”

“I . . . I don't know anything about diplomacy. I was trained as a pilot.”

“If you went through military jump pilot training, you have already shown that you can study hard, learn fast, and make confident, rapid decisions affecting other people's lives. Objection overruled. You will, of course, have a consulate budget to hire expert staff to assist you in specialized problems, in law, in the economics of port fees, in trade matters, whatever. But you'll be expected to learn enough as you go to judge whether their advice is good for the Imperium. And if, at the end of two years, you do decide to muster out and stay here, the experience would give you a major boost into Quaddiespace private-sector employment. If there's any problem with all this from your point of view—or from Garnet Five's, very level-headed woman, by the way, don't let her get away—it's not apparent to me.”

“I'll”—Corbeau swallowed—”think about it. My lord.”

“Excellent.” And not readily stampeded, either, good. “Do so.” Miles smiled and waved dismissal; warily, Corbeau withdrew. As soon as he was out of earshot, Miles murmured a code into his wrist com.

“Ekaterin, love? Where are you?”

“In my cabin on the Prince Xav . The nice young yeoman is getting ready to help carry my things to the shuttle. Yes, thank you, that too . . .”

“Right. I've just about cracked us loose from Quaddiespace. Greenlaw was reasonable, or at least, too exhausted to argue any more.”

“She has all my sympathy. I don't think I have a functional nerve left, right now.”

“Don't need your nerves, just your usual grace. The moment you can get to a comconsole, call up Garnet Five. I want to appoint that heroic young idiot Corbeau to be Barrayaran consul here, and make him clean up all this mess I have to leave in my wake. It's only fair; he certainly helped create it. Gregordid specifically ask that I assure that Barrayaran ships could dock here again someday. The boy is wobbling, however. So pitch it to Garnet Five, and make sure that she makes sure Corbeau says yes.”

“Oh! What a splendid idea, love. They would make a good team, I think.”

“Yep. Her for beauty, and um . . . her for brains.”

“And him for courage, surely. I think it might work out. I must think what to send them for a wedding present, to convey my personal thanks.”

“Partnering present? I don't know, ask Nicol. Oh. Speaking of Nicol.” Miles glanced aside at the sheeted figure in the next bunk. Crucial message delivered, Thorne had fallen back into what Miles hoped was sleep and not incipient coma. “I'm thinking that Bel really ought to have someone to ride along and take care of it. Or of things for it. Some kind of support trooper, anyway. I expect the Star Cr?che will have a fix for their own weapon—they'd have to, lab accidents, after all.” If we get there in time . “But this looks like something that's going to involve a certain amount of really unpleasant convalescence. I'm not exactly looking forward to it myself.” But consider the alternative . . . ”Ask her if she's willing. She could ride in the Kestrel with you, be some company, anyway.” And if neither he nor Bel got out of this alive, mutual support.

“Certainly. I'll call her from here.”

“Call me again when you're safe aboard the Kestrel , love.” Often and often .

“Of course.” Her voice hesitated. “Love you. Get some rest. You sound like you need it. Your voice has that down-in-a-well sound it gets when . . . There will be time.” Determination flashed through her own audible fatigue.

“I wouldn't dare die. There's this fierce Vor lady who threatened she'd kill me if I did.” He grinned weakly and cut the com.

* * *

He drowsed for a time in dizzy exhaustion, fighting the sleep that tried to overtake him, because he couldn't be sure it wasn't the ba's hell-disease gaining on him, and he might not wake up. He marked a subtle change in the sounds and voices that penetrated from the outer chamber, as the medical team switched over to evacuation-mode. In time, a tech came and took Bel away on a float pallet. In a little more time, the pallet was returned, and Clogston himself and another medtech shifted the Imperial Auditor and all his growing array of life-support trappings aboard.

One of the intelligence officers reported to Miles, during a brief delay in the outer chamber.

“We finally found the remains of Lieutenant Solian, my Lord Auditor. What there was of them. A few kilograms of . . . well. Inside a bod pod, folded up and put back in its wall locker in the corridor just outside the cargo hold where the replicators were.”

“Right. Thank you. Bring it along. As is. For evidence, and for . . . the man died doing his job. Barrayar owes him . . . debt of honor. Military burial. Pension, family . . . figure it all out later . . .”

His pallet rose again, and the corridor ceilings of the Idris flowed past his blurred gaze for the last time.