♖ 001.

[summerschild]

Who: Bran Stark and YOU
Broadcast: Fleetwide
Action: The HS Marsiva Hospitality Deck
When: 6/13

[On the Hospitality Deck, there's a little lump of dirt and fur on the floor next to one of the cots, twisted up in the white sheets. Bran had woken up in a fit of panic, scrabbling for the damp floor of the Queenscrown holdfast, and then-]

Is anyone there? Hello?

[A bump on his head aches from the tumble. He doesn't understand what he's seeing in front of him, through the clear glass of the bowing windows. It makes him dizzy, and he rubs at his nose with one grubby hand. His fur cape is still muddy from the thunderstorm, making him look a bit like an abandoned puppy.]

I need some help!

[He tries to use the cot to pull himself back up, but with a click the wheel unlocks, and sends the bed teetering towards anyone coming across the floor. Oops...]

Comments

[poetontheinside]

[That's a pretty lordly voice coming out of such a small boy. Ray grins a little wider, feeling at least slightly better about the situation.]

Good. They catch you up yet, give you the whole space spiel?

[summerschild]

[He doesn't quite understand Ray's use of words, but he gets the gist, and nods.]

I've been told where I am, and what I was brought here for.

[Not that he's at all happy about it. There's a childish grouchiness in his voice.]

[poetontheinside]

's gonna take some gettin' used to, but it can be pretty cool, too.

[summerschild]

"Cool"?

[It's a bit cold in the Hospitality Deck, but otherwise Ray's evaluation seems pretty irrelevant.]

[poetontheinside]

[By now Ray has developed a foolproof method of dealing with people who don't seem to get his colloquialisms, because they're from some kind of different world: treat them like Canadians. Talk a little fancier, don't make too many jokes taken from movies, that kinda stuff.]

Yeah-- nice, interesting.

[summerschild]

Oh. I haven't heard it used to mean that before.

[He ponders on this for a moment.]

What if something is interesting, but not nice? I don't think this ship is quite... cool.

[poetontheinside]

[He grins when Bran picks up on the lingo, encouraging.]

You're gonna be on a way cooler ship later on, you're gonna have your own bed and crewmates and everything.

[summerschild]

[After months of sleeping on the cold ground, that sounds very inviting.]

How long will it be until then?

[poetontheinside]

No more'n a couple days. Think you can hold out 'til then?

[summerschild]

I think so.

[He puts on a brave face.]

Thank you for your kindness.

[poetontheinside]

No worries, kid. You ever need anything else, just lemme know. My name's Ray.

[summerschild]

Ray?

[It's not a name he's heard before, and he puzzles over it for a second.]

What ship are you on?

[poetontheinside]

's short for Raymond. Let you in on a little secret-- my name's actually Stanley, but I hate it. So I use my middle name.

I'm on the Windrose.

[summerschild]

My name is short as well, for Brandon. I don't mind it, though I'm not sure it fits me.

[poetontheinside]

How's that?

[summerschild]

I was named for the first King in the North, Bran the Builder.

[poetontheinside]

Hey, you're still young, right? You don't know what's gonna suit you later in life. Me, when I was your age, I had no idea what I was gonna turn out doing.

[summerschild]

I'm nine.

[Said as if he's arguing his youth. Nine is so grown up, dude.]

And...

["And I might not have much of a future because everything's gone to hell?"]

You're right. I don't know.

[poetontheinside]

And I'm thirty-nine, and I'm tellin' you you got a lot more to look forward to. [Maybe.]

[summerschild]

What sort of things?

[A childish question, but said a bit too seriously.]

[poetontheinside]

Finding out what you like doin' the most. Getting to know what you like about other girls or boys. [Ray.]

[summerschild]

[His cheeks go a little pink at the last bit, and he tries not to think about a (much) older frog-hunter he's been traveling with.]

I don't have very many choices.

[poetontheinside]

How's that? [A city kid through and through, choices were never something he lacked. Opportunities, sure, but never choices.]

[summerschild]

I have a responsibility to my family, and to the North.

[poetontheinside]

The North, huh? [What is it with people and their loyalty to things in the North? The North is cold, and windy, and lonely, and it sucks. Most of the time, anyway.]

Sounds like you got a lot on your plate already.