asgardgenesis | [VIDEO] backdated, shortly after NPC post

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[VIDEO] backdated, shortly after NPC post

» WHO: All
» WHEN: The morning following Tyr and Laufey's announcement on 7/17
» TYPE: Live broadcast

[ It takes some tinkering and awkwardness at first, along with a series of huffs and grumbles you thankfully miss... but when the feed does appear, enjoy a perplexed Daenerys looking at the screen (as well as a reflection of herself, Jon, and Robb). They are wearing modern clothes: button-down shirts for the men, a blazer for Robb, and a royal blue halter-like dress for Dany. ]

Well met, Wanderers. [ … she is speaking to you all, she hopes. ] My name is Daenerys Targaryen. This is Jon Snow and Robb Stark.

[ The feed will jerk as she attempts to angle the screen to both men, respectively. It's not at all elegant, and is, in fact, an eyesore to watch. Which is why seconds later she gives up on it and leaves the strange screen in place in front of her. (Robb gets up as if to try and help her, but his attempts are just as bad as hers. Eventually, he gives it up as a bad job too. Jon, who had inclined his head when Daenerys attempted to introduce him, merely watches now with a skeptical expression: it's going to take a while for them all to get the hang of this.) ]

In our world, war is commonplace. We have armies and generals, as well as a means to communicate when there is an attack on a city or castle. Here, that doesn't seem to be the case. [ Which is strange to her. For all her wariness of these self-proclaimed gods, the smallfolk of Asgard appear to be happy. ] It's why we've approached the gods about a means of gathering. The chaos which followed the dragon's appearance makes us believe that a type of war council is necessary for this realm.

[As Jon begins to speak, he seems a little bit uneasy, slightly awkward, but as his words spin out and gather momentum, he becomes visibly more comfortable with the idea of addressing everyone. It doesn't come as naturally to him as it seems to come to Daenerys.]

When the people of a realm don't work together to face a threat, the end is calamity -- death and hunger and suffering, for those who fought and for those who could not fight. When we know what our strengths are, we know how best to defend against what may come. And when we know what to do, we can be ready to do it, even when we face something that seems impossible to overcome. This is our realm now, all of us. Today, we can put our strengths together. We can begin to make those plans. Maybe we won't ever need them, it's true, but if we do, we won't be caught unawares again.

I know that you may not know us. Each of us has been a king or a queen; not one of us was born with that title. None of us means to try to rule anyone else here, none of us expects to be the loudest voice on any council, but we all have experience with planning for war, and with several kinds of threat.

Daenerys rides a dragon at home, and has taken cities in the East and freed thousands upon thousands of slaves there. I have been Lord Commander of the Night's Watch and King in the North: I've spent long years scouting and defending and preparing for great attacks on my homeland, fighting Wildlings first, and then making an alliance with them to fight the Army of the Dead. My brother Robb was King in the North before me; he was a successful general several times over in campaigns in the southron lands. He knows tactics, battle strategy, better than almost anyone you'll ever meet.

We have all fought for the lives and safety and freedom of our fellow men. We want to continue to do that here and now. We want you to join us, if you will.

[ Jon looks over at Robb, and Robb picks the thread up: ] Understand, we are not asking to go to war. This council is only meant to make certain that we are not caught so off our guard as we were when the dragon attacked. In order to do that, we’re going to organize the council into different groups: preparations, battle and response. We Wanderers come from different worlds, and in times of crisis our different strengths come out. We need to combine our strengths and work together if we are to effectively respond to whatever threats may come next.

( OOC #1: if you want to address a specific cast member, please indicate that in the subject of your comment--otherwise we’ll read it as fair game for any of us to attack C:

OOC #2: We made a spiffy ooc post detailing the war council, as well as sign ups for it. Check it out HERE. )

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More will fall if we lose to the Night King.

[ A compromise, of sorts, to cease that line of discussion--seeing as she's entered both wars. ]

I wouldn't know. [ She did know, once, when Viserys threatened to carve Rhaego out of her belly. That, however, was family against family... not family against others. ] Though I suppose on a personal level, no, it's not. Things change when one becomes a ruler... or a leader of any kind.

[ Family would be weakness then, in the Dothraki's eyes. The slaves she freed called her mhysa. Wasn't she mother to them all, then? ]

[He appreciates the save there, Dany, even if they're jumping from one depressing topic to another.]

That's probably why I never wanted to be a ruler. I can't imagine putting the lives of so many before my own.

But if my brother has chosen to stand beside you, I'd take it you have no issues in those regards. I hear you liberated Slaver's Bay before heading west.

[ Jumping from generalized loss to more personal losses... probably not the best 'save.' ]

May I ask why you became a knight?

[ She's not naive enough to believe all those knighted are good men. Ser Barristan was a rare breed, and while Jorah made mistakes, he's proven himself time and time again. But... that's her extent, really, with knights.

Save for Jaime, that is, and all she knows of him is what her brother's told her. What she's seen of him, as well, limited as it may be. ]

It's called the Bay of Dragons, now. [ Fond memories of flying with all three of her dragons. ] They only needed a chance. Someone to support them as they took their lives back into their own hands.

Mostly the adventure, the action... making my name a part of history, all that.

[And being able to follow his sister to King's Landing without rousing too many suspicions...]

Plus it kept me out of my father's hair. You can only live so much with a man such as him breathing down your neck.

[ ~~God damn you are so disappointing Kingslayer.~~ ]

And what of now?

[~~You sound just like Father, you know that?~~]

Now? Well... [He muses for a moment, tapping his side with his hand.] Now, I have an army of the dead marching towards my home, and only one hand to stop them with. I need to protect the things I care for.

[ ~~Blame that big dick energy.~~ ]

One hand accompanied by eunuchs, savages, and wild beasts — all following a foreign invader. [ She considers him, hating him for having a reason which is completely reasonable. Nothing about that answer makes him unlikable. ] My brother used to speak of how Westerosi knights would piss their pants if they ever were forced into battle with the khalasar.

Funny, my only memories of Viserys are when he was pissing in his pants, so I suppose the feeling is mutual.

[gotem.]

Not that he's entirely wrong, the knights aren't what they used to be, the Queensguard especially. Lucky that armor doesn't rust so easily.

[ She bows her head briefly, sucking in her bottom lip so as not to outwardly smirk at his remark. ]

He was frequently wrong. Wrong about the way to lead and treat people. [ Part of why he's dead. ] Do you remember him screaming very much?

[ That didn't start for her until they were a bit older. ]

Were you there when ser Barristan was... relieved of his duties?

No more than any babe. King Aerys had demanded the Kingsguard watch him around the clock, but he never spoke to us much. I think the armor and swords may have scared him.

[He was far too young for Jaime to ever remember him as more than the second son of King Aerys. That man, for all his terrible flaws, fiercely protected his family.]

...Sadly, Your Grace, I was not present when ser Barristan left the Kingsguard. I was leading the siege of Riverrun at the time. I had only received word that he had been removed, and that I had received the title of Lord Commander in his place.

Why would the Kingsguard be tasked with watching the king's son so frequently?

[ He's caught her interest. The way she watches him — sharp, attentive, eager, almost — betrays her. This is what happens when she's handed even scraps of stories about her family.

And it extends to talk of those she views as family if not in blood, but by choice. ]

That's a convenient title to receive... [ Convenient for the Lannisters, certainly. Did the title end up being the reason he lost his hand? ] Sadly, though? Would you have done something if you were there?

It had been seventeen years since Prince Rhaegar was born, and not a single child had survived childbirth since. Then there was Viserys. The maesters said that he was... [He shrugs] smaller than he should be, but he would live. After that, your father's paranoia took over.

[But he's caught on to Daenerys's interest for certain. These are undoubtedly questions the woman has kept with her for most of her life. Something to keep in his back pocket, for sure, but it also lent some humanity to the Mother of Dragons. Right now he wasn't the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard talking with some usurper queen. He's just an old knight regaling in stories to a young woman who wanted to hear them. It's... kind of nice, really?]

Convenience is one way of putting it. With King Joffrey recently crowned and my father joining his side as Hand, they needed someone leading the Kinsguard they knew that they could trust. Who better than family?

[Never mind the fact that most of the family actually loathed each other, but Tywin felt he had enough control over all of them to keep them playing nice. He was mostly correct.]

Though I'll admit, even if I were mad enough to speak up for the man, there's little I would have been able to do but throw down my own sword beside him. [Something a younger, dumber, more emotional Jaime may have done.]

But casting aside my knighthood would have meant casting aside my family, and that's not something I'm willing to give up.

So then you were around my mother, as well, whilst guarding Viserys. Were you tasked with guarding her during all her other pregnancies? [ What did she look like? How did she behave? Did she laugh, despite being mindful of her duties to her king and husband? Was she wild, or somber? She bites back her questions. Fingers her mother's ring. ] You must have been bored.

[ Once again, it becomes surreal speaking to the Kingslayer. In some ways, he speaks the same way ser Barristan did when he told her stories of her family. It makes her miss her knight all the more. Makes her wish this place could bring him here. If these gods could resurrect the dead, like Robb and Ygritte, why not bring Barristan Selmy back? He deserved to walk the lands of a realm that weren't constantly in conflict. ]

No, if you'd done that, you'd have found yourself cast adrift, likely wandering Essos as my two knights had. [ She leans back in her seat, tilting her head just slightly as she studies him on the screen. ] You wouldn't have liked me when I was younger.

[ Mostly because she'd probably have murdered him for having the gall to approach her as ser Barristan had. ]

Is that why you allowed Tyrion leave from King's Landing and arranged for the meeting in the Dragonpit?

[Bored. That was a word for it. Despite living in interesting times with interesting people, it's true that a knight's life boiled down to long stretches of boredom interspersed with brief moments of life-threatening insanity. One made you long for the other, really.]

I imagine you'd have wanted my head the moment you'd lay eyes on me. [Was that not true anymore? When they first met in this world, had she arrived flanked by soldiers, would she have taken his life?]

I allowed [and he stresses he word, because there's so much more story to it than that] my brother to leave King's Landing to avoid being executed by my father. I didn't know where Varys would take him. Not exactly. I knew he would never be safe in Westeros, but aside from that... [He shakes his head.]

[ She hides her disappointment well when the conversation shifts away from her family. A smirk always would do the trick. ]

I'm not a savage, ser, and I don't enjoy chopping heads off. [ Her Dothraki, on the other hand... ] Depending on how we met, you might've been welcomed — until ser Jorah told me who you were. Viserys was dead by the time ser Barristan found us. You'd have been spared from him, at least.

[ She shakes her head, neither confirming nor denying that she'd have him beheaded. The circumstances are different with the dead looming. And while there are still so many questions she needs answers for, she neither knows Jaime Lannister well enough to have a sense of whether he's lying, nor does she think she ever will know him well enough to ever know.

He does have her attention, though, when they speak of Tyrion. The way he stressed the word, the things he doesn't say on the network before both she and two Starks. ]

Family will always make things far more complicated than we expect. And sometimes that loyalty will bring us things we would otherwise have avoided.

[Don't take it personally, Dany. Jaime doesn't let anyone close to him, unless their name happens to be Lannister. Even then it's a tossup.]

With all due respect, Your Grace, revenge can make reasonable people do unreasonable things. But if you brother was as ruthless as you're making him out to be, then I'll thank you for sparing us of him. I'd like to say I'd spared you of my brother as well, though in fairness he's more irritating than he is dangerous.

[Even as he tries is best to insult his brother, the smirk on his face betrays him.]

[ Her eyes go distant and cold. Impossible to help, and though he does make fun of his own brother, it's the insinuation which drains her dry of any lightheartedness. ]

Is that what you think. That I murdered my brother? [ There's a tilt to her lips, but it's wrong. Not a happy smile. ] It was my husband. Do you know why? Did ser Jorah's letters to Varys give the reason before the Usurper sent someone to poison me?

[ Her brother was an idiot and a fool, but she could say it of him. Not any of these men, here. ]

[Oh Jaime, now you've done it.]

He said that the two of you were divided. He was resentful of you, that the Dothraki made you a queen and not a whore.

[Ser Jorah was a bit more of a poetic man than he is, but it was a poignant observation.]

Last I remember, he had tried to steal from you and run off. He was stopped, then he was killed. I don't recall the specifics as to how.

[ That does sound like how Jorah would phrase it. Hadn't he said that once? ]

I'm not their queen. I'm their khaleesi — and they are all my bloodriders.

[ Not three, but the entire horde. Let him realize that. Let him know that the Dothraki who rode upon he and his men did so for her. She shakes her head, still carrying a look of displeasure; however, it's not as sharp as moments ago. ]

He tried to steal my dragon eggs and ser Jorah stopped him. The night he received his crown of gold was when he drunkenly threatened to carve out the unborn child from my belly. [ Her gaze never strays as he tells him this. She's watching for any sign of discomfort. And she doesn't flinch in knowing both Jon and Robb hear this tale as well. Not all of them were fortunate to have family who cared for one another in a softer way. ] He said he intended to 'take me back,' because he sold me to Khal Drogo. Like a broodmare.

You never told me that.

I imagined it was enough to know I'd been sold and raped.

[That kind of cruelty isn’t unusual, though. It had happened to Sansa; it happens to women all over the world. Maybe a little less among the Free Folk, but they had been known to steal brides from south of the Wall... still, a man who took a free woman truly against her will was like as not to find himself without his balls one day, and sooner rather than later.

But what Viserys had threatened: that’s a breed apart, more on the lines of what he’d heard Ramsay Bolton had done to his stepmother and her newborn son.]

Whether or not I know of it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Your brother should have been protecting you.

[And if she was really determined that he not hear of it, she wouldn’t be telling Jaime Lannister while Jon stands three feet away.]

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[private]

[private] cw: rape

permaprivate, content warnings still apply

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