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“THE GREATEST ESCAPE”
The Vicereine found the holovid hilarious. Miles, however, found time to pick at the details.
Brother Miles was depicted dressed in grey and blue striped pyjamas. He also wore a grey felt hat with a blue plume.
The visible hat seemed to piss Miles off even more than the sappier scenes, like the moment Colonel Guy Tremont died in Brother Miles' arms, with Tremont in his last dying breath extracting a promise from Miles to rescue the inhabitants of Dagoola IV Top Security Camp #3.
“The hat was a metaphor! It wasn't real! How hard is that to understand?”
- - -
“QUADDIE CLONE OF ADMIRAL NAISMITH!”
The headline ran across the Nexus in trashy tabloids everywhere.
A Betan newsie managed to get comments from Lord Mark (“What the hell? Shove off!”) and Lady Kareen (“Everyone knows there's only 3 clones – the Betan clone, Admiral Naismith; the Jacksonian clone, my husband; and the Barrayaran clone, Lord Vorkosigan, who Captain Vaagen created after the original, Piotr Miles, died in his replicator during Vordarian's Pretendership. Unless the Cetagandans really do have that psychic clone they keep denying.”)
Lord Auditor Miles Vorkosigan, Vorkosigan District and the Barrayaran Imperium had no comment.
Lady Ekaterin Vorkosigan confirmed to a Vor ladies periodical that 'our dear friends in the Union of Free Habitats, Nicol and Bel Thorne, recently had their second child, a son, whom they named after my husband'.
Cetaganda and Cetagandan officials said nothing. The existence of a young ba on Eta Ceta with startlingly similar features went entirely unmentioned.
- - -
“GENERAL VORKOSIGAN AND HIS HILLMAN HEROES!”
“Barrayar. A planet lost by civilisation for centuries. Rediscovered by the Betan Survey, the planet was soon invaded by the Cetagandan Empire. Barrayar's last line of defence... General Vorkosigan and his Hillman Heroes!”
The show was produced on Earth, in one of their Regency historicals kick. It was filmed in Canada – the mountains were greener than your average Dendarii peak, and the rocks were the wrong colour. Even the accents grated – the French used in the show was Quebecois and the dialect of Barrayaran French was wildly divergent, accented with Russian-inspired gutterals. Miles, who had spent a good portion of his childhood touring through the Dendarii Mountains with his grandfather and meeting Cetagandan War veterans, also suspected that in real life the officers hadn't actually worn full Imperial Dress red and blues constantly.
On the other hand, the episode featuring a full, Time of Isolation-style cavalry charge of Cetagandan hovertanks was undeniably awesome, despite being historically inaccurate, and Miles thought the Tom Sawyeresque “lost in the caves” worryingly authentic, based on his own childhood.
Despite all this, it was highly popular with the children of the Barrayaran Empire, and Miles liked to watch it with Nikki.
- - -
“MVK ENTERPRISES' SLAVE DEALS!”
“Mark, what is this?”
“The Escobarans are still pissed about the way I liberated Enrique and his butter bugs and the fact you won't extradite him back to Escobar to stand trial.”
“But accusations of gene slavery? Exactly why is the Escobaran media claiming you're trading in gene slaves with the Jacksonians?”
“...I might have hired some mercenaries to clear out House Bharaputra's slave creches again, and had to transfer the kids through Escobaran space as they were moved to orphanages where they could seek asylum.”
“Mercenaries? But Elli hates you. There's no way you could have hired the Dendarii to raid Jackon's Whole without me getting several messages complaining about having to work for my crazy clone brother again.”
“I didn't hire the Dendarii. I used Ventura Moon Mercenaries. I'm not Ivan, Miles.”
“And through Escobar... Mark, exactly which planet did you convince to offer asylum to your clones? I'm sure Beta would have issued yet another condemnation of gene slavery if you'd convinced them to take the clones in.....
“They're on Sergyar, aren't they?”
“Our mother did offer them asylum the moment I mentioned my plans to her.”
“So basically, Mark, all the accusations in this article are true, except you're actually freeing the slaves and the Vicereine of Sergyar is colluding with you to hide them from Jackson's Whole and help populate Sergyar.”
“...Basically.”
“Please tell me Gregor knows about this.”
“...”
“MARK!”
- - -
“THE RAPE OF THE ESCOBARAN WOMEN”
The cartoon came from Pol. It depicted a squad of Barrayaran soldiers in their undress greens, brutish caricatures for faces, carrying off 18 women. In the lead was a demonic Aral Vorkosigan, with a red-headed figure in Betan tan Survey fatigues thrown over his shoulder.
The image instantly became one of the most circulated pictures in the Komarr underground.
Escobar pleaded for privacy for 'the victims of Barrayaran war crimes' whilst pointing out that they had scrupulously abided by interstellar treaties for treatment of prisoners of war.
Beta officially condemned the cartoon for 'inciting Barrayaran reprisals' while completely coincidentally repeating their demands for the extradition of the mentally ill Barrayaran spy and Betan citizen, Cordelia Naismith. (“What sort of medical treatment could a backwards planet like Barrayar be giving her? The first time they got their hands on her, she was brainwashed!”)
An anonymous source sent letters to newsies in several systems mentioning that the products of said war crimes had been released into the custody of Admiral Vorkosigan by the Escobaran authorities 'and no one has ever heard what the Butcher of Komarr did with those poor innocent babies'.
Cetaganda had no public reaction, but several prominent ghem families quietly released statements confirming that General Count Piotr Vorkosigan had committed infanticide on half-ghem infants during the First Cetagandan War.
At the Barrayaran Imperial Residence, the Regent's family was at breakfast when Illyan arrived with the day's security reports. Drou and two of the Residence's nursemaids escorted the Emperor, Lord Miles and Elena Bothari, who was visiting for the weekend, off to the nursery after they had finished eating.
Cordelia muttered little sarcastic comments through the entirety of the briefing. Aral was stone-faced through most of it, his only comment “I didn't know Pol provided its cartoonists with a classical education.”