FIC: Static on a Broken Wire
( originally published november 15, 2011 )
Game of Thrones / ASOIAF [AU]; Ashara Dayne (Eddard Stark); 771 words
She reappeared just as she had vanished: in a wave of swirling, churning rumour and restless whispering. Those who'd seen Ashara Dayne called her reborn, remade; they called her untouched and unchanged and unaged. Or they called her haggard--a mere shadow of the beauty she'd been.
The nameless mouths, they spouted tale after tale, weaving stories into intricate patterns; sometimes she was a victim, sometimes a villain, yet always she was unnatural and the names spy and cyborg followed her like the shadow of a vulture across desert sands.
you remember it a time it wasnt so long ago you think and you used to be a girl then young you used to be then back then back in that time that distant past you were young and you were and you knew you knew you knew who you were and what why things these things all of them they had meaning and they fit together and they made and they werent just things werent just stuff wasnt just stuck together like this in this way in this mess running together and running around and and and zeros and ones its all just zeros and ones Are you alive? he asks the question so easily words slipping from his lips mouth and what a stupid idiotic kind of question because of course youre alive youre here right here right in front of him him standing there and you standing here and you think you may not be a girl not anymore but you cant have changed so much because he hasnt changed at all except his face is older and carved with cracks and lines you dont recall and his hair his beard not quite a beard its greying at the edges and its ragged around the corners but those arent changes arent real changes because he still stands the same and still speaks the same and still smells the same and his words his words are still soft but rough still measured out carefully like hes worried maybe if he uses too many at once hell one day run out and his words theyre still abrupt they snap through the air crash through the air his words like waves against rock violent and some things never change because his voice was always soft but the words hurt they hurt they but his eyes his eyes dont look the same they used to shine you remember from back then back when you where a girl his eyes they were cold they were they were grey but they were alive so alive and they would dance like a winter wind they would sing songs like gales and gleam and you would you remember back then you would look in his eyes in his cold grey eyes and you would see the jagged peaks of mountains far far away and he would say home and you would laugh you knew then you used to know how to laugh and you would laugh because his voice was soft it was it was soft and it didnt crash didnt shatter but sighed and drifted and you would laugh and imagine precipices he called home but his eyes now his eyes now they just look dead and you say, Are you? and you see in his eyes in his cold grey eyes his eyes that dont sparkle not anymore not like they did like before like you remember from back then back when you were a girl and you you see you see in his eyes a thing like a shadow a shade a flicker of darkness and you think what it wants to say is sadness you remember sadness oh yes you remember well sorrow your sweet friend you live with her she fills you up some days you think shell eat you up burn you up but she is cold so cold and she makes you feel old so old and everything is nothing its all just zeros and ones all just zeros and ones and nothing means anything and nothing means dead and are you alive no he asked that are you are you of course you are because here you are arent you and you look back in his eyes at the shadow spread across his eyes the shadow that wants to be melancholy wants to be sadness but what youre reading printed across the darkness across the grey rolling grey like storm clouds darkness is danger danger storm is coming wolves are coming howling howling holwing howling like a gale he was a wolf you remember tear you up they called him rip you up quiet wolf teeth and claws they called him He says, Of course I am. cold like winter like wind like jagged peaks and frozen frozen frozen and you remember now what they said then you remember what they said the word they said it was ice and you say, How can you be, with ice in your veins? and you say, Isn’t it cold? Don’t you feel cold? but he says nothing at all and its all just zeros and ones just zeroes and ones
(end) |