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Oxygen comes from aquatic plant life in tanks, which grows, requiring something to eat the excess growth lest it overrun the tanks. Newts eat the plants and something must be done with the newts. Among other uses are fried newt legs, cream of newt soup, newt creole, newts 'n' chips, bucket of newts, newt nuggets, ad infinitum.

Everything is recycled, from water to the bodies of the stationers who've died (though bodies are broken down to the molecular level and fed to plants). Some organic materials are broken down to a lesser degree and fed to food products growing in vats. All meats (except newts) are vat-grown tissues with no (ugh!) live animals to be killed.

"How could I have died and gone to Hell without noticing the transition?" is the perfect opening line of "The Borders of Infinity," describing the Cetagandans' torture chamber for the Marilacan prisoners of war.

Rather than building walls, roofs, and floors and posting armed guards, the Cetagandans simply generate a force sphere, showing above ground as an opalescent force dome, perfectly circular, a half-kilometer wide.

With the force dome, the Cetagandans meet the treaty requirement in the cruelest way. So many square meters a person—make the dome just big enough. No solitary confinement—everyone is together with no privacy of any kind. No dark periods longer than 12 hours—no dark periods at all, just the same light, twenty-four hours a day forever. No beatings—with no guards in contact with the prisoners the guards can't beat the prisoners. No rapes by the guards—no contact with the guards handles that, but since the captors don't enforce any rules, if a prisoner rapes or beats another, too bad. No forced labor—no labor or work or occupation of any kind—nothing to do, forever.

Even the rule requiring access to medical personnel can work as torture if you confine the medically qualified prisoners with all the others, but don't give them any equipment or supplies.

Food is delivered when the Cetagandans bulge one side of the force dome. When the bulge disappears there is a small stack containing exactly one ration bar for every prisoner.

Arrayed against the Cetagandan technology is Miles, who starts out naked, and two spies among the Cetagandans, Elli and Elena, who have some means of burst-transmitting data to the Dendarii fleet.

Then, there's the final problem technology—the mechanics of the combat drop shuttle's ramp. With the recessed slot for the ramp inside the door, if the ramp gets damaged and jammed, the door can't close and that's not good for a combat shuttle taking off for space under combat conditions with pursuit.

As Miles arrives for his first visit to Earth, in Brothers in Arms, he can contemplate taking a submarine tour of "Lake Los Angeles" or visiting New York behind the famous dikes. London, his destination, has either settled or the ocean has risen—it is protected from the Thames and the ocean tides by a huge set of tall dikes.

While Miles is stuck in the Barrayaran embassy on Earth, he "gets" to attend ambassadorial receptions. One reception, with planetary representatives who speak no English, suffers because the keyed translator earbugs are misdelivered somewhere else in London, leaving them all just smiling and pantomiming. Alas, the replacements arrive before the interminable speeches.

Miles encounters body laser mapping and computer-controlled garment creation. An expensive store in the mall gives him a chance to buy a cultured "live" fur that seeks warmth and purrs. It's blended from the very finest assortment of Felis domesticus genes. It doesn't eat, shed, or need a litter box and is powered via an electromagnetic net at the cellular level, which passively gathers energy from the environment. If it seems to run down, the salesman points out, just put it in the microwave for a few minutes on the lowest setting, but "Cultured Furs cannot be responsible, however, for the results if the owner accidentally sets it on high." It makes an excellent blanket, spread, or throw rug.

In an assassination attempt to kill Admiral Naismith,