Author's Note: This was written and theoretically takes place sometime between the end of Mirror Dance and Diplomatic Immunity (which I have yet to get my hands upon to read). Criticism is greatly appreciated. Any Out-Of-Characterness I blame on my interpretation of Bel's manner of thinking, try as I might to be accurate, mistakes are of course my wont.
I never could cling to normalcy. That option, you understand, was torn from me at…birth? Well, coming out of an uterine replicator is hardly a birth, except by recent standards. Can you imagine the horror of early man if they were presented with the thought of a machine giving life to a kicking, screaming…child?
They might scoff. They might laugh. They might just destroy the replicator and child both, after all, is it not human nature to scorn what they do not understand? And, in turn, destroy it?
Maybe that's why I sought something different for myself than this stabilized existence on Beta. Beta Colony, for all its glamour and carefully sterilized sex, is boring and for all its differences and complexity, it's still vastly routine. Maybe that's why I turned to the stars—to a bigger and brighter future.
And do you know what I found out there, enraptured as I was within the cold embrace of Lady Eternity?
I found Miles Naismith.
That, right there, paved the way to an exalted euphoria. Being around that damned hyperactive little…man, made me giddy. In a completely non-sensible way. Hah, I'd laugh to hear some of those Betan therapists even try to explain the effect that Miles has on people. They'd fall over themselves talking, and somewhere along the line, words would lose their significance. Miles Naismith can't be put into words; they're too confining a definition for him.
Hell, the whole universe was too small for Miles. If he keeps this up, he'll need to expand it. Find a new wormhole nexus, something like that. Cetaganda, Barrayar, Beta Colony, Athos, Escobar, Jackson's Whole, all of them, too small for Miles.
It was painful to be around him sometimes, especially when he was in the typical 'Naismithian' mood. He…takes you over. He fills you up to the point of where you're not sure what's up and what's down, and you know it's not because the anti-grav's given out.
He's universal.
Maybe that's why I followed him. Maybe that's why I wanted his approval. Maybe that's why I let that disgusting little parody of Miles, my Miles; lead me into house Baraphutra to free those clones.
I wanted it, in an ironic sense, to be my gift to him. Instead…well, heh, I kind of got him killed, didn't I? All of them, Commander Quinn included, blamed Mark. Oh yes, yes, let's blame little Mark-the-clone, because he's so willing to blame himself.
No one ever stopped to think, 'Bel knew that it was Mark and not Miles, why didn't he put a stop to the mission?' Well, except Miles himself. Glorious, glorious Miles Naismith…he who sees nothing and notices everything.
But the others…
Of course, they can argue that I was saving my own skin, literally and figuratively. They'll say that I was afraid of being spaced (If I ever catch anyone saying this within my hearing distance, I'll friggin' well space them) or afraid of…what? What IS there to be afraid of? Mark couldn't very well kick one of his progenitor's ship captains out the nearest airlock; it'd be quite an unforgivable…ahem! thing to do.
But, it would have been just as well. At least I wouldn't be grounded now. At least I wouldn't be stuck on Beta, in the little colony of hermaphrodites here. The word 'boring' seems too generous a term for it, it's downright stagnant.
It's like…well, consider it thus. It's like the Dendarii Mercenaries without Miles. Like it was under Oser. Oser didn't have that charisma. He had lots of people that were loyal to him, and lots of people that feared him, but none that were loyal just because of who he was.
I know so many people that would walk through fire and ice for Miles Naismith without batting an eyelid. And likely with an idiotic smile. I know I would.
But...on my behalf, maybe it's a little bit of insanity, not just heady Naismith-Worship. I'd do anything at least once, just so I could say 'Hah! I did it and you didn't!'
Although, in truth, I really don't think I'd want to…er…well, die. I mean, I watched Miles die, and even though he's quite the little miracle worker in All Things Strategic, he couldn't rise from the dead with a snap of his ghostly fingers, as much as it would have amused (Scared?) the hell out of me.
But not even Miles can be remotely classified as God. Not even the genetic engineers that designed me to be this way could be classified as that same omnipotent being. I mean, the engineers took future lives into their hands, but Miles only asks for the 'here and now'. I'd willingly give him all my 'here and nows', just because…
Because what? Because he's different? Because he's unique? Because he's Miles?
No, that's…I think, an insult to him. There's more to him than being 'Just Miles', just as there's more to me than being 'Just Bel'. I mean, if names were everyone's defining form, wouldn't personality dictate they be just a little longer? It'd be like… 'Bel-can-occasionally-be-a-royal-jackass-subordinate-Thorne', wouldn't it?
Or, in any case, something like that.
"Damnit, Bel, are you going to move the piece or not?!"
I glanced downwards at the keypad, my fingers hovering over the grid of the holographic knight.
I snickered at the look of outrage on the Quaddie's face. "Hey, we Betans have time enough to hang around. It won't kill you to wait for me."
Her sculpted face twisted into a wry grin and one of her four hands snaked in the direction of a coffee bulb, which she quickly downed. "I swear, you're moving slower every damn day. Like you need a battery recharge or something." The Naismith way. Pure adrenaline rush. There's no adrenaline around here…unless you plan on throwing that bulb at my head when you're done.
I grinned lopsidedly and swiped my fingers across the grid, moving the holographic little knight aggressively forwards. Miranda hissed at my move and made hers almost immediately, returning the grace of having to play to me. She absently reached out to tap the clock that kept track of the time it took us to move.
How…archaic.
We're playing chess.
Miles, I assume, is good at chess.
"Bel!" Miranda's low alto brought me forcibly off the little trail of remembrance I had just about fallen back into. "Are you gonna play, or are you just gonna sit there and rot?" Do I have an option?
"Well I can't think with you screeching at me," I said indignantly, tracing my finger across the board to my nearby rook. I moved it sideways three spaces and sat back, lacing my fingers beneath my chin.
"Well I can't win with you taking so long!" She moved again, decisively smug. My grin inflated into a fully-fledged beam. She was gonna loose! It had been so long since I'd won against the four-armed woman that I actually couldn't remember the last time I'd done it. But then, I had never actually been concentrating on a game before.
A mark of just how bored I was with the downside I was. I needed action. Oh glorious, blessed action! What kind of ass-kissing I'd do for a nice mercenary mission—damn me and my 'must try everything once' attitude~! It's damn near gotten me killed so many times now, I swear…
"Bel." Miranda said sharply, tapping the tabletop with a long, wicked looking nail. "Stop it. Play or I'll…" she smiled playfully, suggestively. "Do something you might or might not enjoy."
I leaned over the table, mirroring her playful visage. "Well, tell me what it is and I'll decide whether or not I want to take my time."
"You…! Damn near insufferable."
I smiled sweetly, moving my queen in for a decisive and vicious attack. "Don't hate me 'cause I'm beautiful, Miranda, hate me because I'm gonna kick your ass." Her head flew up, nostrils flaring. She didn't think I was serious, did she? Did I appear to be that far gone? I hadn't succumbed to talking to myself yet, had I?
"Oh, by the way, checkmate."
She snorted and glanced down; expecting to defy or countermand my declaration, but her defenses fell, groundlessly, from her deliciously full lips.
"Oh wow…" she breathed, drawing one of her hands to her neckline. "That's the first time you've ever actually beaten me, Bel!"
I pretended to buff my nails on the shoulder of my shirt. "Fear my almighty intellect." I said, half-jokingly. She snorted and really did chuck the coffee bulb at me. However, all the years I spent in the military had conditioned me quite effectively, and I caught the little white-and-green container in mid-air. We shared a private smile.
Miranda leaned back in her chair, heaving a sigh. "Oh, Bel. You're wound like up like a spring." As though inspired, she fair bounced out of her chair and scuttled towards me, smirking. She latched onto my shoulders and spun my swivel-chair (oh it's just like my captain's chair…just like it…) around once. "Want a massage?" She said suggestively, leaning down so that her breath tickled my ear.
"Full body?" I purred back, tilting my head from side to side as though to ease the tension she'd easy anyways.
"Of course."
But she wasn't Miles Naismith. She couldn't show me the stars. She could only take me to the roof of her flat and let me admire them from afar. But…reaching out, I couldn't touch them…I couldn't grasp them…
___
I groaned in pleasure, waking up, inhaling the sweet, engineered perfume of her blue hair. She smiled at me, having already been awake and, presumably, watching me sleep. When had I ever been so lax as to let people watch me sleep?
I yawned and flung an arm over my face to cover my, presumably, bad morning breath. "Sleep well?" I mumbled around my fuzzy tongue.
"Oh, you'd better believe it," Miranda purred, tracing her fingers across my left breast. I stretched, cat-like and curled up beside her.
"Another game of chess?" She asked lazily, yawning in a ladylike manner, complete with the abrupt widening and closing of her eyes.
Oh by all the Gods. Love Miranda, we've been friends for years, separated by my brief military career, reunited by the end of the same, but she's so…argh, boring! Nothing like being in the line of plasma-arc fire, or even stunner fire. I'd kill for a game of stunner-tag right now, I really would. Cat and mouse, the pumping of the adrenaline rush…the exhilaration…
Miles could get my adrenaline up just by being in the same room as me. It was his megalomania that got me pumping, the probability of his incredibly genius plans one day failing. I always knew, always that he was just human, but sometimes it was so nice just to forget…
Forget that the solotoxin-damaged, hunchbacked, 4'9 little man was just like everyone else, in a generic sense at least. But he isn't. It's hard to explain why he isn't.
Even Mark, his own clone-brother, is so vastly different…
Miles is a universe unto himself, and we're all just satellites, orbiting him but truly unneeded in the grand scheme of things.
…Why can't I be like that?
Because I'm Bel Thorne, not Miles Naismith Vorkosigan.
Oh…what I wouldn't give…