☆ the vorkosigan saga psl post, volume 3

[runawayballista]

welcome to hell

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gathers up

[mahalakshmi]

Which of course - she does. Pushing up against in instant reaction at strange, clean, metal walls. So different to the stone ornate walls of Jhansi. To the man standing beside where she feels: open, vulnerable. A desperate reach for a weapon that isn't there as she pushes away from him.

-- the pain that flashes over her face is instant, as is the turn away, to hide it. Here, the Admiral that had saved them. That she had done her best to bleed out all over his feet, it seemed, given the blur between the last words spoken to where they were now. "I see." It's grit out slow, painful, between her teeth before she allows herself to sink back into the bed. "Where is my sword?"

[forwardmomentum]

Miles can see her pride, can empathize with it, even, and but even so, he raises a warning hand as she pushes the med tech away. "I meant it. You were in surgery for a few hours there. I think my surgeon would be rather annoyed if you tore up all her hard work."

He can see this is hard for her. None of this could have been easy, not their escape, not the battle that had pursued them. He spreads his hands in front of him in an empty-handed gesture of good faith. "In my personal quarters. Not confiscated, don't worry -- but it didn't really have any place in sickbay, and I wanted to make sure it wouldn't get lost."

Not that he doesn't trust the majority of his crew to uphold a code of integrity, but there are always a few shits in the crowd who might make the wrong move.

[mahalakshmi]

She slides, between him and the physician, back again, her shoulders are tense still, where she tucks her arms in close to her. Holding fast but little by little, she lowers herself back, grit against the pain that comes with the movement.

Watching that physician carefully, like she's ready for worse when he comes close and it forces a sudden stiff noise of pain out of her when he does go to broach the wound. But when his hands go no further and she undoes her iron fingered grip on the sheets, little by little, small exhale and smaller inhale to try and let herself settle. After that, her eyes slide back to him, fixing him a sight more curious.

"You will return it to me, then?"

[forwardmomentum]

Miles's eyebrows twitch upward just slightly, and he breathes out a thin sigh of relief when she finally concedes to lying back down. He leans his hip against the low-slung sickbay cot.

"Of course. You didn't think I'd confiscate it, did you?" Miles offers her a flourishing -- if overdramatic -- bow, a bit of good humor creeping into his voice. Perhaps that would set her a little more at ease. She won't recover as quickly if she's that tense, that on edge all the time. "That would be plain theft, and though we may be mercenaries, I assure you, we are not scoundrels."

[mahalakshmi]

Her eyes stay on him, direct and sharp, watching his little flourishes, his playfulness. It does nothing to change the look on her face - fixed, but little by little, she does try to take at first no more than an easier breath.

"Then I want my crew's weapons returned to them as well, as soon as it is able to do so." Swords, knives and blunt cutting tools all. Archaic to the UIC, but what they had. Allowed because of arrogance and nothing else. If she has any pride, it was in how they had made them pay for that mistake. But even so -

"How are they? Did they all - ?" Survive, the empty hovering word, the grit in her teeth on it. They knew they might all die in the attempt of doing something, anything at all.

[forwardmomentum]

Miles gives her a nod, making sure not to promise anything specific. He wouldn't want to break his word, and as much as he's willing to believe in this woman's story, he has to look out for his own crew, too. But that doesn't mean they can't have a friendly chat. He straddles a chair backward next to her bed, resting his arms along the top.

"They're all alright," he assures her. "It was a little touch-and-go for a while, but my fleet surgeon assures me they'll all make a full recovery in time." He taps his fingers along the back of his chair, a restless fidget. "I was hoping you might tell me a little more about what happened to your crew. About what's happening in the Marathi system these days. Our intelligence is clearly underinformed."

[mahalakshmi]

She holds perfectly still - or too still, as the physician begins to see to her injuries tells her that isn't relaxing and she has to take a deeper, longer breath in the effort of just that. So as he speaks, she is distracted - right up until she isn't and all that nagging is undone as she snaps sharp all over again - completely ignoring the medics miserable little noise of frustration.

"You have all been deceived. The Marathi system is enslaved and exploited to the profit of the company that now rules it." She is over taken by it, completely, incensed beyond reason or relief. Fighting all over again, to try and sit up and this time the hand forces her back is more direct. Ignoring the madam, "My people and I escaped, fought our way out and commandeered a ship, to let the rest of the galaxy know so that we may plead for our home."