“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.