milliways_bar | (no subject)

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Belar's real proud of those mountains, now that the snow's finally settled in and everything's in shape for maximum winter-time use. Time to go see if he can't rustle up some interest in 'em, as long as they're out there waiting for people, hey? At least, once he's done with his obligations.

The sign on his table tonight reads:

ANSWERING PRAYERS - BACK IN 15 MINUTES

WILL TAKE QUESTIONS ABOUT SNOWBOARDING, SKIING, BOBSLED, LUGE, OR OTHER SNOW-BASED SPORT LESSONS AFTER THAT

NO, SERIOUSLY, THERE'S MOUNTAINS OUTSIDE, GO LOOK

That, he figures, should do the trick.

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"It's a very important subject," River informs her paper without looking up.

"Diversification is vital." Half a beat, and then she glances at him with a quick and conspiratorial smile. "Got to be competitive. It's 2520 -- marketplace is a jungle."

"Traditional metaphor," she adds to the air over his left shoulder. "There's a dearth of tigers."

Belar nods. "I never did get on all that well with the big cats," he says, twisting briefly for a look over his shoulder before turning back in her direction. "Oh, the stock market. Okay. Yeah, see, I ask because my brother Nedra? He trades commodities on the Street. Told me I'm not ever allowed to show my face anywhere within a hundred miles of the place. It's, uh, it's amazing how soon the bears show up after that, you know? Metaphorically speaking."

Or not, but, you know, he's trying to get a feel for the conversation here.

River brightens.

"Family connections are often vital," she agrees. "Within an avoidance of apparent nepotism. We'll have to call it standard networking practice."

And then she rolls her eyes, an amiable duh. "Real bears," she informs him, "would piddle in the carpets. Very bad for business."

"Well, see, that's kind of the point. Nedra says they use bears as a metaphor for the market going into the toilet, you know? Bears widdling on the carpet makes total sense now. I wouldn't ever have gotten it on my own- I'm not what you'd call a big financial mind." He grins. "Thanks, miss... I'm sorry, I don't think I got your name?"

River is always happy to explain other people's metaphors!

Or call them stupid and nonsensical. One of the two.

"Tam," she says, and offers a hand with a smile that seems faintly polished, for all that it's genuine. "River. Ordinarily in the English formulation."

He nods, and leans over to shake the hand. "Belar," he says. "I don't normally use a family name, but for people who need one, I use Ulsson. It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Tam, a real..."

The swift, light swiping of a finger of awareness over the surface of the other person's mind, and only the surface, is almost reflexive by now.

"... pleasure. Oh, for the love of Dad..."

River's face tightens slightly.

"Patronymic," she agrees politely. "In the traditional usage."

"The solo format is a distinctive tool for remembrance. Risks impress the clients -- it's a constellation of potential factors." The polished smile is back.

"Actually, it's more that it's never been necessary to give a last name," says Belar. "Except for the past couple of decades. Years. Whatever- I've been on vacation a while, you know how that kind of thing just makes time slip right on by..."

Passive mode, now. He felt that soybean grease, all right. He's not going to actively touch on her mind any more; he doesn't need to. He just needs to work his way through the influences he picked up on and see if there's any chance at all of picking it apart. Technically, that kind of thing counts as a miracle, and he really isn't sure if he can do one of those for somebody who isn't one of his Alorns.

But hey, what is life for if it hasn't got challenges, huh?

"Oh yes," River agrees.

"Getaways are healthy to combat stress -- quantities of data correlate. Active version of meditation."

Then, seriously, "Overdoing it can minimize your readiness to leverage opportunities. Better watch out. There are booby traps in the break room."

"And I am nothing if not active," says Belar. "Sitting around on the beach? Not my style. Give me a surfboard and a good cold wave coming in off the Pacific and I am as happy as a clam, I can tell you. Of course, there's nothing like actually getting out in the real world either- out where the real action happens... Ever been on a serious wilderness expedition, Miss Tam? I don't mean a corporate retreat. Those're just canned, preset experiences somebody put together to keep the cubicle peons happy. I mean real wilderness. Ever seen it?"

"Seen the sky," River says, and smiles a little down at her soy bubble tea.

"Out in the black." She glances up at him. "The definition of wilderness is contextual. Need to ensure proximity of standard mobile facilities." With a quick half-laugh, "Only way to insist on adequate civilized conveniences."

Beat.

"No surfboards."

"Me, I'm gonna have to go with helicopters being the nearest mobile facility," says Belar. "I mean- I like having easy access to the ski lodge when that's what I'm doing, but honestly? That's just fun and games. For a real challenge you need to get way out there. I'm talking planetside, myself, mostly because that's what I'm used to. Not a big space traveler, you know?"

"Antiquated technology," River says sagely, and just a little pityingly.

We know what's preferable, her tone implies, but what can you do?

"Need to keep in touch. Make it tidy -- call it a vacation but we limit interference with the job."

Hm. He felt the strings holding the greasy together vibrate that time, like something might've been actively touched on her end. That's interesting.

"Well, okay, I'll concede that there's something to be said for keeping in contact with home," he says. "I mean, let's be honest, have you ever read Into the Wild, by Jon Krakauer? That kid went out into the Alaska wilderness with one gun and a bag of rice. That's asking to get killed. You have to do these things right, you know? Take the same approach you would to something important back in the day-to-day. Take it seriously, life- because life is gonna take you seriously, you know what I"m saying?"

Let's see if that touched anything, hmm?

Something's shifted a little in River's face -- a tightness, a confusion.

"Ammunition," she says, and falters slightly.

Then, with a quick sip of bubble tea -- to gather herself, maybe, although the action looks half-conscious at best -- she rallies, and pastes on another faint smile. It doesn't work so well; River's not very good at faking emotion, and worse at suppressing it. "Pick and choose. Gotta focus our effiencies."

"You said it," says Belar. That was a serious vibration he felt there. Somewhere down those lines of influence, a fish is tugging on the hook. Now he's got to set that hook in its jaw.

"Too right, Miss Tam," he says, "too darn right. Because I'll tell you- I've been out there in the real world, and I've been to the halls of commerce, and I can tell you that if there's anything at all the two have in common, it's that you've absolutely, totally, completely gotta be there. It's not enough just to hang around and poke your finger into this pot or that. You can't do that kind of thing halfway. It's all here-"

He taps his temple with one forefinger.

"You can't let that get away from you, you know? You can't let something distract you, pull your attention off, make you imagine there's some, I don't know, some game of trading in things as empty as the wind that makes a difference. Because that's all finance is, you know? As empty as the wind after the storm's blown itself out. It's nothing but the faith people put in it. It's not seeing the sky, feeling the stars, being out there with the snow and the mud under your feet and the snow falling down on you. It's not being alive. If you're going to live, you can't let that game pull your attention away. Your mind's got to be in one or the other, and..."

He gauges the tension in that unwholesomely greasy influence, the look on River's face.

"... I think you know where yours ought to be, don't you, Miss Tam? You can do so much better than this. Come out. You know you want to. Come on out of it."

He holds out a hand to her, expression neutral, but eyes hopeful.

River's eyes are fixed on him, wide and just a little panicky, her breath coming too fast.

"I'm not," she says blankly, and sways slightly -- and then her hand does lift, but only to catch herself against the table, though there's no reason for her balance to be off. "I'm not," stronger and more strained, "the incorporated assumptions are fallacious," and her fingers tighten on the edge of the table as she closes her eyes with a low gasp.

The style of her clothes has changed subtly, and her long tumbling hair doesn't look half so tidy as it did a second ago.

Belar nods. "You know who you are," he says, and it's a question as much as it is a statement. "Let's hear it."

If he were the kind of god to exert his will on people, this would be ... well, rather different. Even the strongest-willed of his world's humans can't withstand a God's will without external help.

He's not that kind of God. He's waiting, and he's listening.

River's will is very strong, but her mind is fragile. There are fault lines; there's quicksand, and scars in every sense of the word.

"I don't want it," she whispers, eyes squeezed shut.

Not to Belar.

"The drawings overlap, lines blurred, trade the planets and misplace the priorities." She sucks in a shaking breath. Steadier, "I have a mission."

He nods again. "That you do," he says, very quietly, but his words are the sort that can't not be heard. "That you do, River. You know, and so do I."

Fish tend to break the line most often with the absolute last jump.

He's not about to jeopardize this.

"Ken it," River whispers, "very well," and opens red and teary eyes to stare at her hands.

There's nothing poised and professional about her now.

No, there is not. He'd know if there were.

For a moment, just a moment, there is a hand on her shoulder. He's been there for his people for twelve thousand years, whether in person or in spirit; he can be here for this, for her, for now.

The hand is not there any more, but that does not mean he is gone. When you are the Bear-God, all bears are open to you, even the strange small bears of River's world and River's future. So if there is, perhaps, a bear with the proportions of Ursus arctos but of a size that people would be willing to let into their homes, and if that bear were to poke his wet black nose against River's leg? That's not such an unheard-of thing either.

The bear's going to be here just as long as he needs to be. Whatever she does.

Genetic engineering's an advanced tool by the 26th century. Bears are a classic and charismatic animal, beloved in literature and history; they're also an inconvenient animal to have around, by and large.
Suddenly we're on Jiangyin and she's got a driving need to commune with the beast?
Which is why, round about the time they were terraforming the first planets of what's now the Rim, a few scientist set about breeding smaller and more docile forms of certain large animals from the frozen genetic samples the spaceships carried from the vaults of Earth-That-Was. Modern bears are small enough to be house-pets, and can be tamed to eat from a dish, and to come when called to be petted.
They weren't cows inside.
River drops out of her chair in an abrupt ungraceful tangle, abandoning soy and stock options on the table to curl into herself and turn her face against the fur of the miniature polar bear.
They were waiting to be, but they forgot.
He's a god, really. He looked like a man a minute ago. And even in River's world, no polar bear is tame enough for a complete stranger to cuddle.
Now they see the sky
It doesn't matter.
and they remember what they are.
She's not crying. She's only wrapping her arms around herself, and breathing, and remembering what, for an evening, she forgot.

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