Drabble // Vorkosigan // Flight
For :: silensy
Title :: Flight
Setting :: Vorkosigan Universe
Characters :: Ivan, Miles, Aral
Words :: 526
Birthday Drabble Count :: 16/42
His wife was going to kill him, Aral decided. It wasn't that she'd dislike the idea, he thought - just that she'd resent not having thought of it herself, or at the very least, not having been invited for the ride. But, it had been very much a sudden impulse, he comforted himself, and surely she'd understand...
Twin shrieks of glee interrupted that morose train of thoughts, the brief moment of amused gloom very quickly fading away at the sight of the two boys bunched up in the front seat in a melee of wriggling, flailing arms and pointing fingertips.
"Didja see that, Ivan!? That was the palace!" Miles, face pressed to the glass, waved a recently cast released arm a touch too enthusiastically for his father's peace of mind, but interrupting the boy now would serve no purpose at all.
"I saw! It was eenie!" The word was spoken with clearly enunciated, boyish glee, Ivan's face only half-smooshed against the window, granting Miles a better viewing vantage than his. This fact was noticed in the following moment, the smaller boy immediately - and very effectively - elbow gouging his cousin to a better shared vantage point. "Stop squirming away Ivan, it's not like you're afraid of heights! Or are you?" The mocking taunt was small boy speak for 'stop going easy on me, I'm not broken today' between the two, a pattern those around them had noticed early on and pretended to never notice, for fear of embarrassing the children. Or so the adults kept telling themselves, as did Aral, even as he looked away briefly, blinking away overly bright eyes.
It had been so close. Had the boys been in the office but a few seconds earlier, had reached the window just as the bomb went off...
With a sharply indrawn breath, Lord Aral Vorkosigan tilted the flyer to the side, and started accelerating, taking the boys through another trip over the city, each manoeuvre accompanied by hollering and shouts of approval, their countenances finally showing the delight all children should show, rather than the stolid forging along which had been etched on their features since the attempted on Miles' life. For however long this might last, any subsequent trouble could be endured.
Bothari followed out of sight, he knew, in a flyer of his own. And a faint ghostly echo on his radar brought a small, grim smile to Aral's face.
Cordelia, it would seem, followed as well, stalking behind them all with unwavering fierceness, ready to bring down any who might offer the ghost of a threat to them while they were in the skies, just as she did at any other time.
Perhaps he would not be in as much trouble as he had thought he might be, after all, he realized. Mind set at ease, Aral glanced at the surveillance monitors on the flyer's board one last time, then set his attention entirely to the flight itself, intent on providing the boys with a flyer tour they would never forget.
They were safe, all of them, so long as they looked out for each other.
It was the surest, truest thing Aral knew.
Title :: Flight
Setting :: Vorkosigan Universe
Characters :: Ivan, Miles, Aral
Words :: 526
Birthday Drabble Count :: 16/42
His wife was going to kill him, Aral decided. It wasn't that she'd dislike the idea, he thought - just that she'd resent not having thought of it herself, or at the very least, not having been invited for the ride. But, it had been very much a sudden impulse, he comforted himself, and surely she'd understand...
Twin shrieks of glee interrupted that morose train of thoughts, the brief moment of amused gloom very quickly fading away at the sight of the two boys bunched up in the front seat in a melee of wriggling, flailing arms and pointing fingertips.
"Didja see that, Ivan!? That was the palace!" Miles, face pressed to the glass, waved a recently cast released arm a touch too enthusiastically for his father's peace of mind, but interrupting the boy now would serve no purpose at all.
"I saw! It was eenie!" The word was spoken with clearly enunciated, boyish glee, Ivan's face only half-smooshed against the window, granting Miles a better viewing vantage than his. This fact was noticed in the following moment, the smaller boy immediately - and very effectively - elbow gouging his cousin to a better shared vantage point. "Stop squirming away Ivan, it's not like you're afraid of heights! Or are you?" The mocking taunt was small boy speak for 'stop going easy on me, I'm not broken today' between the two, a pattern those around them had noticed early on and pretended to never notice, for fear of embarrassing the children. Or so the adults kept telling themselves, as did Aral, even as he looked away briefly, blinking away overly bright eyes.
It had been so close. Had the boys been in the office but a few seconds earlier, had reached the window just as the bomb went off...
With a sharply indrawn breath, Lord Aral Vorkosigan tilted the flyer to the side, and started accelerating, taking the boys through another trip over the city, each manoeuvre accompanied by hollering and shouts of approval, their countenances finally showing the delight all children should show, rather than the stolid forging along which had been etched on their features since the attempted on Miles' life. For however long this might last, any subsequent trouble could be endured.
Bothari followed out of sight, he knew, in a flyer of his own. And a faint ghostly echo on his radar brought a small, grim smile to Aral's face.
Cordelia, it would seem, followed as well, stalking behind them all with unwavering fierceness, ready to bring down any who might offer the ghost of a threat to them while they were in the skies, just as she did at any other time.
Perhaps he would not be in as much trouble as he had thought he might be, after all, he realized. Mind set at ease, Aral glanced at the surveillance monitors on the flyer's board one last time, then set his attention entirely to the flight itself, intent on providing the boys with a flyer tour they would never forget.
They were safe, all of them, so long as they looked out for each other.
It was the surest, truest thing Aral knew.