driftfleet | Bobby B

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Bobby B - One

Who: Robert Baratheon
Broadcast: Fleetwide video.
Action: The Marsiva
When: Soon.

[The camera catches view of a man who is as thick as he is tall standing in front of the massive windows that separate the safety of the Marsiva from the inhospitable void of space on the other side of it. For many, this would be a breathtaking view of the cosmos. The King saw it only as a nuisance. Dressed in rich silk and velvet with a antlered crown on his head, Robert Baratheon was no man to be toyed with and he was eager to be free, even if he could not fully comprehend what he was seeing. He had never been a learned man and the concept of space itself was so far beyond his sphere of experience. He saw nothing but a night sky and though he could not see the ground, that only posed a problem to be solved later.

Later meaning after he had broken through the glass with a chair that he had caused significant damage to by beating it repeatedly against the window. With each thrust he roared in something between fury and excitement.]

That's right! Try and cage me, you bastards! Do you think this metal prison can hold me? Come now! Have at me!

[Yet for all his bravado and effort, the window did not even crack. Besides that, he was not so fit as he was in his youth. Winded and exhausted, he eventually righted the dented chair so he could sit on it instead. Only then did he turn his attention back to the communicator. He could not say why or how, but he understood that it was meant for communicating. He twisted in his hands a few times before deciding to play the fool and speak into it.]

...well? Does this damned bloody thing work or not?

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[ it isn't that sansa's not scared. rather, she's absolutely terrified. the man she sees on the communicator is an absolute brute and a force of nature. but (she reminds herself in a stiff inner voice) he's a brute that's been her father's dearest friend long before turmoil had set into her family's bones.

so she doesn't shrink back from the sight of him, although she's awash with many feelings. pity, chief among them. and vestigial reverence from all the childhood stories she still carries with her in her heart. ]

Your grace. [ he's not the king; tommen is king. and yet she doesn't know what else to call him. as she continues, her voice is small. somehow, she doubts he'll remember her no matter what the colour of her hair. no matter who her father was. ] I can assure you it works well enough.

[ and so has recorded all of his folly so far. ]

Edited 2015-11-26 23:25 (UTC)

[Hair color was not so much to keep him from recalling the look of Sansa Stark, but a small video on an incomprehensible device made any kind of recognition too difficult by far. Less when Robert was far too distracted by the strange shapes in the night sky to even give the curious video his full attention.]

I see that well enough, girl. [His tone is sharp, save for the tired breathing that is following his violent workout.] What manner of devilry is all this?

A prison, your grace.

[ the sentiment in her voice is skinny -- narrow, and threadbare. she doesn't dare betray too much emotion even in the abstract presence of a westerosi king. ] Of sorts. At least, some describe it as one.

I said as much, didn't I? [Tell me more than what I know already. Some softspoken girl is the last thing he needs just now. He has a kingdom to return to and a grand hunt to attend. His courtesy fails him, much as it ever does.]

And who attends this prison? Your master?

[ she bites her tongue. she knows he'd said it; otherwise, she'd not have used the same word. always the bird, chirping and repeating. sansa sucks in a slow breath. ]

They are called the Atroma, although they do not attend us.

[ and they are not my master. ]

I've heard of no Atroma. [Robert had not done much reading in his lifetime. If truth be told, the things that he had read in the entirety of his life could likely be enclosed in the space of a dozen pages. But he had still learned his heraldry and knew of every noble house of any significant in the Seven Kingdoms. None were called Atroma, but when it came to those across the Narrow Sea, well...]

What are they? Pentoshi? Braavosi? The sotted bastards. If it's a war they want, by the gods I'll give them one.

[ she breathes a little easier. gods, is she relieved he doesn't seem to recognize her? perhaps -- likely so. sansa tucks a lengthy piece of dark-dyed hair behind her ear. ]

None and neither. I'm afraid we're very far away from anything we've known, your grace.

[ how bizarrely thrilling it is to know more than a king knows. ]

And how far is that, girl? You'll give me an honest answer. Is it Ghiscar? Asshai by the Shadow?

[The uttering of that last one gives him pause. What land could possibly be shadowed as the one he now looks at? There is not even the light of the Moon to illuminate the world and it seemed as though the stars were as much above him as they were below. He had only heard tales of Asshai, but somehow this alien setting seemed as though they might fit the descriptions.]

[ gently: ] We sail among the stars.

I asked for truth, not songs. Now, tell me again.

[ sansa stark no longer sings songs. but king robert wouldn't know that -- and so she swallows the cracked remnants of her pride. ] Ask anyone else, your grace. They'll tell you much the same.

[ she isn't even offended by this prospect. someone else, she concedes, will be far easier to believe than a silly girl like her. ]

The stars. If they say the same, what's that to me? Shit remains shit, no matter from which hole it spews. The stars are not the sea and I've seen no sails.

[Harsh, yes. But he's unapologetic. Robert is far too sober to deal with this kind of folly.]

[ odd, isn't it? how she'd thought along much the same lines -- albeit in gentler words. ]

Because we haven't any.

[ dull and to the point. she isn't even trying to be clever, merely informative. ]

Then it makes for a piss poor sail ship. [Nevermind the size of the vessel. King's Landing boasted many of the biggest and strongest galleons on the sea, but none could match the size of this building he had traversed. A building it remained, because he could not comprehend anything of this size being able to move.]

Who are you, girl?

[ her jaw words without words. alayne stone is such a simple answer. her heart thunders and clamors for her to give it far and above the truth. but (and this accounts for her initial silence) she reminds herself that not only is bran present in the fleet, but so is tyrion lannister. some lies are kind, but they're also foolish if they're made clumsily.

the young woman lifts her chin. ] Sansa, your grace. Of House Stark.

[ she wishes she sounded prouder. ]

[Her pride is nothing to him. Though her name does give him cause to give the video a second look. He squints his tired eyes and supposes she looks more or less the same. In truth, Robert rarely paid the girl much attention at court. She was only a child and though she was pretty enough, he hardly ever paid her much attention outside of that incident with the wolf.

But he could see it, now. Older, maybe. And the hair... He frowned at that.]

Sansa. Aye. Was your hair always that shade? [Her hair was dark enough she might well have passed for a Baratheon.]

[ she arrives at the sudden conclusion that her life will be made simpler so long as king robert has little cause to question much. explaining the colour of her hair -- and why it's changed -- will raise too many alternative concerns.

so, with a deftly achieved tone of embarrassment, she answers: ] A-always.

[ and stammers as if his inability to remember her causes her great social strife. ]

[Something strikes him as wrong about that, but maybe it was the other daughter that had the auburn hair - though he couldn't recall her name just then. Still, his throaty grunt comes with a simple acknowledgement. His concern is not with Sansa.]

Your father. Ned. I'd have words with him.

[She might be a highborn girl, but she could still be expected to go fetch her father if the king asked it. Surely Ned would be able to suss things out.]

You can't. [ but that sounds a little too much like giving commandments to a king. so, softer: ] He isn't here, your grace.

Not here? [He could strangle Ned if he did not love the man so much. Still, it couldn't be helped. At the very least, he might take comfort in the knowledge the kingdom still had a Hand to rule.]

And you are? Alone?

I have my brother.

[ she prays he won't ask which one. let him believe she is better cared for than she actually is -- because just now, she is in awe of robert baratheon but not yet prepared to put herself under his care. ]

Do you? He seemed a likely lad. I would speak to him, then.

[He scarcely recalled much of Robb, but he had made certain to give the boy some attention. He was the first born and seemed to have some sense, so much as a boy ever could.]

He's -- [ she pauses. her mind looks for quick answers, and finds so very little. ] I am certain he will answer you soon enough, your grace. New arrivals are hard to miss.

[ loud and destructive ones especially. ]

I'll expect him soon. His king commands it.

[That might just serve. With Eddard's eldest lad at his side, the two of them might just stand a chance of breaking free of this prison. They would take Sansa Stark along with them and make their way back to Westeros. A heroic return, that would be. The singers would love it.]

Certainly.

[ and what else does she have left to say? it isn't her place to tell him that he's no longer the king of anyone -- and not because he's here but because he's dead. and his sons have taken up that torch in his absence. but she'd seen what he'd done to that chair -- she doesn't fancy being the messenger for more bad news. ]