Highlander / Vorkosigan Saga: Potential Unfulfilled

[ffutures]

I think this is the fastest I've ever written a drabble - about ten minutes from start to finish, came out at 101 words before final editing. Highlander / Vorkosigan Saga crossover.

Spoilers for Barrayar



Potential Unfulfilled

Marcus L. Rowland

Count Vordarian didn't know he had the potential for immortality, of course. Under other circumstances Cordelia might have told him, trained him. But now her son was endangered - a son she could never have had before the invention of the uterine replicator.

There was little time for pity or remorse. As Bothari's blade came down, as his head rolled across the table, she felt the faint stirring of his quickening, snuffed before its time, and wished it could be otherwise. She whispered "there can be only one," put the head in her bag, and set off to end a war.

End

Notes: In the Highlander universe immortals can't normally have children. But it occurred to me that the uterine replicator might change that... That got me wondering why the first gift Cordelia bought on Barrayar was a sword, and the rest followed very easily.



Comments please before I post to archives.

Comments

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

[missmurchison.livejournal.com]

I see the change from Immortal canon, letting an Immortal have kids, was bothering some people, but that's just personal taste. Either you don't mind being flexible with canon law in fanfic or you do. I don't and I think a lot of other people don't either.

Cordelia would be an amazing Immortal.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Definitely, she'd be wonderful.

I don't think immortals can have kids naturally - but the technology of the Bujold universe can do a lot better than nature. If I was writing a longer story I think I'd have someone say that getting the embryo started was really tricky, and that her children (also her clones) are mortal.