“You,” Baron Bharaputra blinked, like a lizard, “are a curiosity. We not manufacture you. Where did you come from?”

“Does it matter?”

“It might.”

“Then it is information for sale or trade, not for free.” That was old Jacksonian etiquette; the Baron nodded, unoffended. They were entering the realm of Deal, if not yet a deal between equals. Good.

The Baron did not immediately pursue Miles’s family history, though. “So what is it you want from me, Admiral?”

“I wish to help you. I can, if given a free hand, extract my people from that unfortunate dilemma downside with a minimum of further damage to Bharaputran persons or property. Quiet and clean. I would even consider paying reasonable costs of physical damages thus far incurred.”

“I do not require your help, Admiral.”

“You do if you wish to keep your costs down.”

Vasa Luigi’s eyes narrowed, considering this. “Is that a threat?”

Miles shrugged. “Quite the reverse. Both our costs can be very low—or both our costs can be very high. I would prefer low.”

The Baron’s eyes flicked right, at some thing or person out of range he vid pick-up. “Excuse me a moment, Admiral.” His face was laced with a holding-pattern.

Quinn drifted over. “Think we’ll be able to save any of those poor clones?”

He ran his hands through his hair. “Hell, Elli, I’m still trying to Green Squad out! I doubt it.”

“That’s a shame. We’ve come all this way.”

“Look, I have crusades a lot closer to home than Jackson’s Whole, if you want ’em. A hell of a lot more than fifty kids are killed each year in the Barrayaran backcountry for suspected mutation, for starters. I can’t afford to get … quixotic like Mark. I don’t know where he picked up those ideas, it couldn’t have been from the Bharaputrans. Or the Komarrans.”

Quinn’s brows rose; she opened her mouth, then shut it as if on some second thought, and smiled dryly. But then she said, “It’s Mark I was thinking about. You keep saying you want to get him to trust you.”

“Make him a gift of the clones? I wish I could. Right after I finish strangling him with my bare hands, which will be right after I finish hanging Bel Thorne. Mark is Mark, he owes me nothing, but Bel should have known better.” His teeth clenched, aching. Her words shook him with galloping visions. Both ships, with every clone aboard, jumping triumphantly from Jacksonian local space … thumbing their noses at the bad Bharaputrans … Mark stammering gratitude, admiring … bring them all home to Mother … madness. Not possible. If he’d planned it all himself, from beginning to end, maybe. His plans certainly would not have included a midnight frontal assault with no back-up. The vid plate sparkled again, and he waved Quinn out of range. Vasa Luigi reappeared.

“Admiral Naismith,” he nodded. “I have decided to allow you to order your mutinous crew to surrender to my security forces.”

“I would not wish to put your security to any further trouble, Baron. They’ve been up all night, after all. Tired, and jumpy. I’ll collect all my people myself.”

“That will not be possible. But I will guarantee their lives. The individual fines for their criminal acts will be determined later.”

Ransoms. He swallowed rage. “This … is a possibility. But the fines must be determined in advance.”

“You are hardly in a position to add conditions, Admiral.”

“I only wish to avoid misunderstandings, Baron.”

Vasa Luigi pursed his lips. “Very well. The troopers, ten thousand Betan dollars each. Officers, twenty-five thousand. Your hermaphrodite captain, fifty thousand, unless you wish us to dispose of it ourselves—no? I do not see that you have any use for your, ah, fellow clone, so we’ll retain custody of him. In return, I shall waive property damage charges.” The Baron nodded in satisfaction at his own generosity.

Upwards of a quarter of a million. Miles cringed inwardly. Well, it could be done. “But I am not without interest in the clone. What … price do you put on his head?”

“What possible interest?” Vasa Luigi inquired, surprised.

Miles shrugged. “I’d think it was obvious. My profession is full of hazards. I am the only survivor of my clone-clutch. The one I call Mark was as much a surprise to me as I was to him, I think; neither of us knew there was a second cloning project. Where else would I find such a perfect, ah, organ-donor, and on such short notice?”

Vasa Luigi opened his hands. “We might arrange to keep him safe )r you.”

“If I needed him at all, I’d need him urgently. In the circumstances, I’d fear a sudden rise in the market price. Besides, accidents happen. Look at the accident that happened to poor Baron Fell’s clone, in your keeping.”

The temperature seemed to drop twenty degrees, and Miles cursed is tongue. That episode was apparently still classified information in these parts, or at least some kind of hot button. The Baron studied him, if not with more respect, then with increased suspicion. “If you wish another clone made for transplant purposes, Admiral, you’ve come to the right place. But this clone is not for sale.”

“This clone does not belong to you,” Miles snapped out, too quickly. No—steady on. Keep it cool, keep his real thoughts buried deep, maintain that smarmy surface persona that could actually cut a deal with Baron Bharaputra without vomiting. Cool. “Besides, there’s that ten-year lead time. It’s not some long-anticipated death from old age that concerns me. It’s the abrupt surprise sort.” After a pause, and with a heroic effort, he choked out, “You need not waive the property damage charges, of course.”

“I need not do anything at all, Admiral,” the Baron pointed out. Coolly.

Don’t bet on it, you Jacksonian bastard. “Why do you want this particular clone, Baron? Considering how readily you could make yourself another.”

“Not that readily. His medical records reveal he was quite a challenge.” Vasa Luigi tapped the side of his aquiline nose with one forefinger, and smiled without much humor.

“Do you plan punishment? A warning to other malefactors?”

“He will doubtless regard it so.”

So, there was a plan for Mark, or at least an idea that smelled of some profit. “Nothing in the direction of our Barrayaran progenitor, I trust. That plot is long dead. They know about us both.”

“I admit, his Barrayaran connections interest me. Your Barrayaran connections interest me too. It is obvious from the name that you took for yourself that you’ve long known where you came from. Just what is your relationship with Barrayar, Admiral?”

“Queasy,” he admitted. “They tolerate me, I do them a favor now and then. For a price. Beyond that, mutual avoidance. Barrayaran Imperial Security has a longer arm even than House Bharaputra. You don’t want to attract their negative attention, I assure you.”

Vasa Luigi’s brows rose, politely skeptical. “A progenitor and two clones … three identical brothers. And all so short. Among you, I suppose you make a whole man.”

Not to the point; the Baron was casting for something, information, presumably. “Three, but hardly identical,” said Miles. “The original Lord Vorkosigan is a dull stick, I am assured. The limitations of Mark’s capacities, he has just demonstrated, I fear. I was the improved model. My creators planned higher things for me, but they did their job too well, and I began planning for myself. A trick neither of my poor siblings seems to have mastered.”

“I wish I could talk with your creators.”

“I wish you could too. They are deceased.”

The Baron favored him with a chill smile. “You’re a cocky little fellow, aren’t you?”

Miles stretched his lips in return, and said nothing.

The Baron sat back, tenting his fingers. “My offer stands. The clone is not for sale. But every thirty minutes, the fines will double. I advise you to close your deal quickly, Admiral. You will not get a better.”