The Vor Game

Miles spoke now for both Metzov's benefit and the grubs. 'It's possible—barely—that Service Security wouldn't investigate the deaths of Lieutenant Bonn and his men, if you diddled the record, claimed some accident. I guarantee Imperial Security will investigate mine.'

Metzov grinned strangely. 'Suppose no witnesses survive to complain?'

Metzov's sergeant looked as rigid as his master. Miles thought of Ahn, drunken Ahn, silent Ahn. What had Ahn seen, once long ago, when crazy things were happening on Komarr? What kind of surviving witness had he been? A guilty one, perhaps? 'S-s-sorry, sir, but I see at least ten witnesses, behind those nerve disrupters.' Silver parabolas—they looked enormous, like serving dishes, from this new angle. The change in point of view was amazingly clarifying. No ambiguities now.

Miles continued, 'Or do you propose to execute your firing squad and then shoot yourself? Imperial Security will fast-penta everyone in sight. You can't silence me. Living or dead, through my mouth or yours—or theirs—I will testify.' Shivers racked Miles's body. Astonishing, the effect of just that little bit of east wind, at this temperature. He fought to keep the shakes out of his voice, lest cold be mistaken for fear.

'Small consolation, if you—ah—permit yourself to freeze, I'd say, Ensign.' Metzov's heavy sarcasm grated on Miles's nerves. The man still thought he was winning. Insane.

Miles's bare feet felt strangely warm now. His eyelashes were crunchy with ice. He was catching up fast to the others, in terms of freezing to death, no doubt because of his smaller mass. His body was turning a blotchy purple-blue.

The snow-blanketed base was so silent. He could almost hear the individual snow grains skitter across the sheet ice. He could hear the vibrating bones of each man around him, pick out the hollow frightened breathing of the grubs. Time stretched.

He could threaten Metzov, break up his complacency with dark hints about Komarr, the truth will out. . . . He could call on his father's rank and position. He could . . . dammit, Metzov must realize he was overextended, no matter how mad he was. His discipline Parade bluff hadn't worked and now he was stuck with it, stonily defending his authority unto death. He can be a funny kind of dangerous, if you really threaten him. … It was hard, to see through the sadism to the underlying fear. But it had to be there, underneath. Pushing wasn't working. Metzov was practically petrified with resistance. What about pulling . . . ?

'But consider, sir,' Miles's words stuttered out persuasively, 'the advantages to yourself of stopping now. You now have clear evidence of a mutinous, er, conspiracy. You can arrest us all, throw us in the stockade. It's a better revenge, 'cause you get it all and lose nothing. I lose my career, get a dishonorable discharge or maybe prison—do you think I wouldn't rather die? Service Security punishes the rest of us for you. You get it all.'

Miles's words had hooked him; Miles could see it, in the red glow fading from the narrowed eyes, in the slight bending of that stiff, stiff neck. Miles had only to let the line out, refrain from jerking on it and renewing Metzov's fighting frenzy, wait. . . .

Metzov stepped nearer, bulking in the half-light, haloed by his freezing breath. His voice dropped, pitched to Miles's ear alone. 'A typical soft Vorkosigan answer. Your father was soft on Komarran scum. Cost us lives. A court-martial for the Admiral's little boy—that might bring down that holier-than-thou buggerer, eh?'

Miles swallowed icy spit. Those who do not know their history, his thought careened, are doomed to keep stepping in it. Alas, so were those who did, it seemed. 'Thermo the damned fetaine spill,' he whispered hoarsely, 'and see.'

'You're all under arrest,' Metzov bellowed out suddenly, his shoulders hunching. 'Get dressed.'

The others looked stunned with relief then. After a last uncertain glance at the nerve disrupters, they dove for their clothes, donning them with frantic cold-clumsy hands. But Miles had seen it complete in Metzov's eyes sixty seconds earlier. It reminded him of that definition of his father's. A weapon is a device for making your enemy change his mind. The mind was the first and final battleground, the stuff in between was just noise.

Lieutenant Yaski had taken the opportunity afforded by Miles's attention-arresting nude arrival on center stage to quietly disappear into the Admin building and make several frantic calls. As a result the trainee's commander, the base surgeon, and Metzov's second-in-command arrived, primed to persuade or perhaps sedate and confine Metzov. But by that time Miles, Bonn, and the techs were already dressed and being marched, stumbling, toward the stockade bunker under the argus-eyes of the nerve disrupters.

'Am I s-supposed to th-thank you for this?' Bonn asked Miles through chattering teeth. Their hands and feet swung like paralyzed lumps; he leaned on Miles, Miles hung on him, hobbling down the road together.

'We got what we wanted, eh? He's going to plasma the fetaine on-site before the wind shifts in the morning. Nobody dies. Nobody gets their nuts curdled. We win. I think.' Miles emitted a deathly cackle through numb lips.

'I never thought,' wheezed Bonn, 'that I'd ever meet anybody crazier than Metzov.'

'I didn't do anything you didn't,' protested Miles. 'Except I made it work. Sort of. It'll all look different in the morning, anyway.'

'Yeah. Worse,' Bonn predicted glumly.

Miles jerked up out of an uneasy doze on his cell cot when the door hissed open. They were bringing Bonn back.

Miles rubbed his unshaven face. 'What time is it out there, Lieutenant?'

'Dawn.' Bonn looked as pale, stubbled, and criminally low as Miles felt. He eased himself down on his cot with a pained grunt.

'What's happening?'

'Service Security's all over the place. They flew in a captain from the mainland, just arrived, who seems to be in charge. Metzov's been filling his ear, I think. They're just taking depositions, so far.'

'They get the fetaine taken care of?'

'Yep.' Bonn vented a grim snicker. 'They just had me out to check it, and sign the job off. The bunker made a neat little oven, all right.'

'Ensign Vorkosigan, you're wanted,' said the security guard who'd delivered Bonn. 'Come with me now.'

Miles creaked to his feet and limped toward the cell door. 'See you later, Lieutenant.'

'Right. If you spot anybody out there with breakfast, why don't you use your political influence to send 'em my way, eh?'

Miles grinned bleakly. 'I'll try.'

Miles followed the guard up the stockade's short corridor. Lazkowski Base's stockade was not exactly what one would call a high-security facility, being scarcely more than a living quarters bunker with doors that only locked from the outside and no windows. The weather usually made a better guard than any force screen, not to mention the 500-kilometer-wide icewater moat surrounding the island.

The Base security office was busy this morning. Two grim strangers stood waiting by the door, a lieutenant and a big sergeant with the Horus-eye insignia of Imperial Security on their sleek uniforms. Imperial Security, not Service Security. Miles's very own Security, who had guarded his family all his father's political life. Miles regarded them with possessive delight.

The Base security clerk looked harried, his desk console lit up and blinking. 'Ensign Vorkosigan, sir, I need your palm print on this.' 'All right. What am I signing?' 'Just the travel orders, sir.' 'What? Ah . . .' Miles paused, holding up his plastic-mitted hands. 'Which one?'

'The right, I guess would do, sir.'

With difficulty, Miles peeled off the right mitten with his awkward left. His hand glistened with the medical gel that was supposed to be healing the frostbite. His hand was swollen, red-blotched and mangled-looking, but the stuff must be working. All his fingers now wriggled. It took three tries, pressing down on the ID pad, before the computer recognized him.

'Now yours, sir,' the clerk nodded to the Imperial Security lieutenant. The ImpSec man laid his hand on the pad and the computer bleeped approval. He lifted it and glanced dubiously at the sticky sheen, looked around futilely for some towel, and wiped it surreptitiously on his trouser seam just behind his stunner holster. The clerk dabbed nervously at the pad with his uniform sleeve, and touched his intercom.

'Am I glad to see you fellows,' Miles told the ImpSec officer. 'Wish you'd been here last night.'

The lieutenant did not smile in return. 'I'm just a courier, Ensign. I'm not supposed to discuss your