Chapter Text
Chapter I,
A Confused Songbird
It had been disappointing. There was no other word he could think of to better describe the season finale of Season 5 of Game of Thrones. He sat back in his chair and sighed, he had such high hopes for the show, and Hardhome had been such a good episode, but now he was done. Instead of choosing to dwell on it though, he looked outside and saw that it had become bright, he scrambled to find his phone and realised with horror that he had ten minutes before his alarm to get up for work would go off. He couldn’t call into work sick, so instead he would have to do his warehouse shift tired. He showered, got dressed, had breakfast and made his way to the bus stop to get to work.
***
His shift was nearly over, and for that fact he was eternally grateful. He didn’t normally drink coffee but he had poured several cups of it into himself to stay awake, and now all he had to do was push one last cage of boxes down the length of the warehouse and he would be home free. If he had been more awake, he might have heard the shouts of dismay from his left. If he had been more alert he might have noticed the sound of tires squealing as they took off across the floor of the warehouse, unguided by a driver. Either way he became acutely aware of the runaway forklift as a fork on the vehicle embedded itself through the side of his torso.
He had enough time and air left to let out what he thought was “oh fuck” but instead was merely the sound of air caught in his gurgling mouth as blood filled it. Things started to go dark then, and the shock began to wear off to give way to the searing pain in his chest.
***
He didn’t claim to be a master philosopher, or theologian, so he was very certain he didn’t really have any idea of what was supposed to happen after someone died. However, he most assuredly didn’t think that it would be what was before him. He stood in a room surrounded by maps, books and littered with papers and coffee cups. On the wall there were pictures, but he couldn’t make them out, and next to the pictures was a collection of lanyards hanging to a piece of rope from a hook. He realized with a start that they were convention lanyards, but before he could say anything a voice spoke up.
“So, you didn’t like the finale?”
He looked around and saw a figure sitting in front of a computer screen, something about the voice sounded very familiar to him, and when the figure turned around he recognized it instantly.
“You’re George R.R. Martin.”
“I am.”
“Where the hell am I?”
Martin gave him a look, and let out a low chuckle that didn’t sound reassuring at all.
“Right now, you are between.”
“Between what?”
“Just between. You died some two standard earth minutes ago, and instead of just disappearing into what comes next, your consciousness was grabbed by me. So again I ask you, you didn’t like the finale?”
He was confused as all hell, but right now he felt like answering was a good move.
“No I didn’t. It felt rushed, the Boltons continue to have ludicrous levels of plot-armour. Stannis’s character was butchered, the Dorne scenes continued to add nothing of value to the series and “For the Watch” was just dumb. The only upshot was a nice hint at Cleganebowl.”
Martin raised an eyebrow. “I see, and tell me, you have written a television series or book series?”
“Well no.”
“I didn’t think so. Normally we successful creative types around about now tell you that if you think what we did was bad, then you should go and make something yourself. However I take this a little bit more directly. Tell me, do you know what an ASB is?”
“Yeah it means Alien Space….Bat” his voice trailed off at Bat as a terrifying realisation hit him “You are one aren’t you?”
“Yes I am.”
“I’m about to be given the ISOT treatment aren’t I?”
“Yes you are.”
“It’s going to be to Westeros?”
“Yup.”
“Okay I have one question then.”
Martin looked at him for a moment and then nodded his head for him to ask his question.
“If you can control time and reality, is that why Winds of Winter keeps getting delayed?”
Everything went black again and the pain in his chest returned, it was extremely sore and seemed to move and change as what he thought of as his body moved and changed. He just knew he wasn’t going to like what came next.
***
The pain came back tenfold, whereas the shock had kept him from feeling it until the very end, now he could feel it in full force. However the wound was different, he couldn’t tell exactly how as his torso was still were the wound was, but it was different. He darted his eyes around to try and figure out where he was, but the room was dark and he couldn’t move. The pain was nearly unbearable, and before too long he found that everything was turning black again. It was during this occasion that he began to have some very disturbing dreams, in them he was a single small child standing against a massive wolf. The wolf had mauled him, mauled him until everything turned to flaming pain. From the flame he found himself staring forlornly at someone, a woman, but in a moment she was gone. From there a darkness spiralled around him, and all he saw were flashes of light as he fell further into a pit of darkness.
He didn’t know how long he had such a nightmare, but he awoke to an older man with a metal chain around his neck poking at his chest and changing the bandages. Before he could look to the wound the old man, a maester whose name he couldn’t remember, noticed he was awake and force fed him something to drink. The nightmares returned shortly, but before they did he had a single cohesive thought.
‘How could I remember his name if I never knew it before?’
And somewhere in his mind he saw a brief flash of the same man, but in a room surrounded by scrolls, inkpots and with the sound of ravens nearby. He somehow knew this man, but his name still escaped him.
***
He was awoken again by someone changing his bandages. This time however it was not the Maester, it was a young woman who seemed to sing softly to herself as she worked. Her voice was not great, but something about it sounded familiar to him. He opened his mouth to say something to her, but it was very dry, so instead he made only a noise. She noticed and turned to look at him, and he realised that something about the young woman was very familiar. She looked at him and her face was full of worry, but she didn’t say anything. He tried again and finally was able to say
“Water”
She looked at him, took a moment to process what he said and then moved across the room to where a pitcher was set up. She came back with a stone cup and held it up to his lips to drink from. He took as much of it as he could, and it tasted to him like the most delicious thing he ever had. He swirled it around his mouth a bit, savouring the flavour, and finally swallowed it.
“Thank you.”
That caused a look of surprise on the woman’s face, and then she broke out into a wide smile.
“I’m just glad to see you are feeling better. What that brute did to you is unforgivable, and even though she begged him not to finish you off the Maester wasn’t even sure you would survive. But I knew you would pull through, so I’ve stayed and made sure to nurse you back to health.
She then moved in to kiss him, and he recoiled from her. He could see on her face an emotional mix of shock and sadness suddenly break out, and he realized he would have to think fast to avoid hurting her feelings.
“Sorry, you just brushed off of my wound I’m afraid. Truth be told I am truly sorry but as much as I would like to kiss you I fear that the excitement it would cause might exacerbate my condition.”
There was a tense moment, but then she seemed to buy his excuse and appeared satisfied with his answer.
“Very well then. I shall tell Maester Vyman that you are feeling a little better and I will leave you to rest.” With that she turned to go and stopped in the doorway to look at him and smiled again.
“I’m so happy to see you are still alive Petyr” and she left the room.
‘Oh fuck’ was his only thought, and in the distance he could swear he heard a chuckle that again didn’t sound in anyway reassuring.