ateratooc | TD006

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test drive

TD006

Test Drive 006

WELCOME TO ATERAT

Here is our Fifth Test Drive Meme! There are a lot of areas of the city to explore, so please have a look around! In case you need a little help getting started, I've included a few prompts below, or feel free to start your own! Exploration and player initiative are the names of the game here!

Helpful Links to Get Started

Arrival & General Information | Setting & Bestiary | Locales & Businesses | Residences & Housing Info | Rules & FAQ (ask questions here!)

I. Crash Into Me

Not exactly, but close enough. You have just arrived and received a strange satchel from a tiny, strange little man and are left more or less to your own devices (more information on what to expect upon arrival can be found here)! Follow directions to the north and check out the housing, or maybe have a look around the Historium and try to get some information from that giant glowing ball, see what you can waste your meager starter coin on in the Market District, or maybe just meet the neighbors.

II. What Goes Bump in the Night

It looks like Aterat proper has a spirit problem. Maybe you're seeing specters, hearing disembodied voices, your windows rattle when there's no breeze outside. Maybe there are cold spots in your place of business (or your apartment, which is so much worse). Either way, you're 100% convinced you're haunted. Hopefully, someone else believes you, or maybe you're used to feeling crazy.

III. When the Carnival Came to Town?

Take a look at the prompts from our latest event and go to town (or the carnival).

IV. Try the Network

The Tell-Phone allows for text, video, and audio transmissions to everyone else who has one. Give it a whirl!

V. Wildcard

The above prompts are all options, and there's much more to the setting than what they provide. Do your best (or your worst)!

Navigation

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Ghost watches her approach, as he does with everyone who approaches his master, but he must have decided that she's not a threat, because he stays seated near Jon. He had heard the people around him in the market, so he's not surprised to discover that there's someone behind him. What surprises him more is hearing someone address him, and with that name specifically. Someone who not only knows Ned but is confusing him with the other man is not only from Westeros, but from the North itself. Which brings back a sort of homesickness in his chest, a homesickness for the North more than for all of Westeros itself. The North was home to him in a way that he hasn't found anywhere else, although this place has come close.

He gives the horse's muzzle one final pat to send it on its way. "Ned was my..."

Then he turns, the action exposing not only the knife at his belt but also the hybrid sigil embroidered on his chest, and he stops. She's obviously a Stark; he can see that from her face. A face that looks like his, in fact. And she's a Stark who knew Ned. Could she be...? The sudden surprise of looking into eyes that mirror his own set him off balance, and the end of his sentence is much less confident than the start of it.

"...father."

Everything in Lyanna grinds to a halt as she comes face-to-face with the stranger she'd mistaken for her brother. Because it almost feels like she's looking into a mirror. He's not Ned, that's suddenly clear, but there's no mistaking that the man is a Stark. Much as the Targaryens had a distinct look about them, so did the wolves of the North: long face, dark hair, dark eyes.

It takes her a moment to speak, caught off-guard not just by the man's resemblance to her family and his overall familiarity, but also by what he says. "You can't mean Eddard," she finally manages to say, taking a cautious step forward with the briefest of glances at Ghost, "of House Stark? Son of Lord Rickard?" Then she laughs, despite still not quite shaking whatever it is she's feeling. Ned has a son this man's age? "I'd believe it if it were Robert, but Ned..."

She squints at Jon. Must be another Ned. A cousin... though she's sure that's not it. The strange feeling continues to gnaw at her. How does she know this man?

He doesn't know for sure, without outright asking, if she is who he suspects she is, since he had never known what she looked like beyond the statue in the underground crypt at Winterfell, and his own appearance. He doesn't want to assume, because if he's wrong it's just awkward and disappointing for both of them. But she knows Robert Baratheon well enough to call him by his given name...

"Eddard Stark, lord Winterfell," he confirms, because if she doesn't know that yet, she'll need to be told soon anyway. "He raised me as if I were his own son."

Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell. The words pierce her heart like a lance, and she shivers at the coldness that it brings. Ned would be Lord of Winterfell now, wouldn't he? Since their father and Brandon were dead.

Sorrow clouds her face in remembrance, her guilt returning. If she hadn't been so foolish...

Then the stranger says something outright preposterous: that he'd been raised as though he was Ned's own son. Lyanna eyes, eyes that might as well be the same as his, once more narrow. "How is that possible? You are a man grown, and Ned—"

She's no stranger to magic, not anymore. How else could she have been in her deathbed one moment, and here in the next? Ned having a grown son could simply imply a different world, perhaps a different time, though she's yet to fully grasp either of those concepts. But that's not what she struggles with, however; it's the possibility that he might be who she's beginning to suspect he is.

She turns to the horse and starts to pet it, if only to have something to do to calm her nerves. Could she really dare to hope the impossible? Have the gods taken pity on her and granted her not just a second chance at life, but a glimpse of the man her son would become? Or was she really still back in the mountains of Dorne, slowly dying, her life — and the future — flashing in front of her eyes?

His face brightens. How he ended up here isn't something he understands, but after his time in the Sphere, he's at least familiar with the idea of traveling between different realms, and even of those realms having different qualities from each other. (He's still amazed by electricity and showers; heat and light without needing to light a fire? Bathing without having to heat pans of water? To him, those are magic.) He can identify her point of confusion, and explain it in a way that might help them sort all of this out.

"This place, it not only takes people from different realms and brings them here. It also takes people from the same realm but different times and brings them here. There could be years between any two people from the same world."

She starts to shake her head halfway through his explanation. Different realms she understands, though it's still quite hard to grasp just how large the world actually is. But there's so much more than Westeros and the world she knows, and that she's come to accept. He tells her more, though: same realm but different... times? In his context it seems to make sense, since Ned would've been very young to have a son as old as he is. Unless Ned had taken in a child as his ward while he was fostered in the Vale. One of Robert's bastards? But no, this man looks distinctly like a Stark, and their father would've known.

Perhaps she should just believe what he's saying, as preposterous as it sounds. Her mind will just keep going around in circles otherwise.

"You speak of matters of myth and legend," she finally says, and she's unable to keep the incredulity out of her voice. Some old magic, perhaps? Like dragons, and the Others? "You mean to tell me that you and I..."

She trails off as her gaze turns to his strange sigil again. "You are a Northman, perhaps even a Stark," she points out, giving his achingly familiar face another glance, "yet the symbols you wear are strange." It's as if Houses Stark and Targaryen had united—

She stubbornly ignores the part of her that wants to believe in the impossible. Maybe, after everything, she just doesn't want to be disappointed.

Myth and legend. He knows something about those. He has come face-to-face with the wights, not to mention dragons, and there very well may be a prophecy about him. Ice and fire. Wolves and dragons. Starks and Targaryens.

"My name is Jon Snow." So he's a Stark, at least by blood, if not legally. He has another name, of course, one that his mother had given him, but he still has a hard time thinking of himself by that name. Besides, this is the one that clarifies him as a Stark.

He glances down at the sigil on his chest, as though he's forgotten that he's wearing it. "Sansa did that." Not that she'll know who Sansa is, but he can explain that easily enough. "My sister. Cousin. More sister than anything else. I thought she was my sister as I thought Ned Stark was my father." He's rambling, but at least he's clarified a bit more. "It's a combination of both of my Houses. The one I was born to and the one I was raised in." Since most people have only one House, that of their father.

Edited (forgot some info) 2022-07-28 12:52 (UTC)

Jon Snow. A bastard's name. A Northern bastard's name. Jon's right, at least, that it clarifies his standing among the Starks. Though his resemblance to Ned was incredible, Lyanna thinks, for someone who wasn't blood related to him.

Unless...

He continues to ramble. She doesn't hear any of it, not really, her face having gone a little paler than when their conversation had started. She glances around and, finding a couple of crates stacked together beside the horse, she lowers herself onto the top of them. The horse tries to nuzzle against the side of her head and she absent-mindedly lets it, reaching up with a hand to pet it.

Then he explains the meaning of his sigil, and that one she catches. She lifts her head to look at him again, at the heart-stirring familiarity she finds there. He'd been raised among the wolves, yet he'd been born to dragons. What else could it possibly mean? It's all adding up in some weird, unbelievable way, a gift from the gods that she feels she doesn't deserve.

Promise me, Ned, her own dying voice echoes in her head, and she remembers looking at her son for the first time and feeling almost the exact same thing as she's feeling now, gazing at this Jon Snow.

"Oh, Jon..." Does this boy even know the truth? She doesn't presume to know. The truth would've been a dangerous thing, given his friendship with Robert and the man's obsession with her. "What has Ned told you? About..." She swallows. "About his sister, Lyanna?"

He died before he was able to tell me anything. The thought run s through his head but goes unsaid. He doesn't want to dwell on that right now though, and he guesses that she probably wouldn't either, if she knew about it. He's sure that Ned would have kept his promise to talk about Jon's mother the next time they saw each other; they just hadn't seen each other again.

And then in the Sphere, when they were out of Westeros but in the same place, they had talked about Jon's mother.

"I grew up hearing the same thing about her that everyone else did. The story that Robert Baratheon told." The story that had gotten the Stark men involved in the rebellion in the first place. "I also know that that is not the way that things happened." Then he takes a shot. If she is who he suspects she is (and why would she be asking about Lyanna otherwise?) then she'll know what he means. "I know that she had a child."

"Who else knows?" comes Lyanna's knee-jerk reaction. Because ultimately, it doesn't matter what happens to her. She's already dead, only in this strange world on borrowed time. But her son... Robert would certainly want him dead, perhaps even countless others. He's not safe, though she'd hoped with Ned he would be.

It's only after that little outburst that it really sinks into her. How, in his own way, Jon had answered her unspoken questions. A boy Ned had raised as his own, with a bastard's name and a Stark's face. In fact, she wouldn't have suspected Jon to be a Targaryen heir of any sort, if she didn't feel the way she felt about him, a certain... connection. He'd been hidden in plain sight, surrounded by wolves; a part of her is relieved that for once at least she'd chosen right, entrusting the child to Ned.

Her gaze still not leaving his face, she slowly stands back up and takes a tentative step closer. She doesn't know what gives, but something in her then does, and her shoulders shake as she stifles a sob. "Forgive me," she whispers, her voice nearly inaudible in the bustle of the market. "Forgive me, Aegon."

He's about to answer her question, to assure her that no one knows, that he hadn't even known and the secret was about him, when she calls him by that name. The name that only a few know, even now. The name that his mother had given him. And if she knows it, that means only one thing.

His mother. He is talking to his mother right now. The one thing he had ever wanted -- a mother -- standing right here in front of him. He wants to put his arms around her, like his siblings had all done with Lady Stark, but he's afraid that actually touching her will break the moment. He couldn't handle the disappointment.

He reaches a hand out and tentatively places it on her shoulder. It's the most contact he'll allow himself to chance right now. Just in case. "Forgive you? For what?"

It really is him. He wouldn't have answered to the name if he wasn't Aegon, would he? Lyanna's caution disappears then — overcome by emotion than anything else — and she cups the sides of Jon's face, tearfully gazing into his eyes.

"My little prince," she whispers, almost reverently. All of her cares fade away; the crowd, the fact that he's nearly a head taller, and perhaps much older, than her in their current state. All she sees is her boy, now a man grown. "I'm sorry I could not be there for you. I had hoped to give you the world..." For what mother did not?

He's still not used to the idea of being a prince, even if according to the laws he is one. He had been one his entire life, in fact, though he didn't know it. It explains a great deal of things as well. Which he's not going to dwell on right now; he's had time to consider them already.

He raises no objections to his mother -- his mother! -- calling him such. It's what he was expected to be, after all, and he's just enjoying the fact that he finally has a mother. He wouldn't exist without her. She can call him whatever she wants.

"You don't need to apologize for that...mother." For the first time in his life he tries that word in reference to himself, to an actual person with an identity instead of just someone who must have existed because he does, and the feeling is so overwhelming that he can't stop the tears from welling up in his eyes.

He's not the only one who's overwhelmed. She'd only held him briefly after he'd been born, too weak to tell him everything she'd wanted him to know about her and her father or to even sing him a lullaby. And while she's happy and thankful to the gods that he's alive and had grown into a fine young man, it's also a reminder of all the years and experiences she'd missed.

It's such a potent mix of emotions — happiness, sorrow, longing, grief, gratitude, disbelief — that she's unable to hold back her tears any longer. She draws her hands back only so she could wrap her arms around him, cradling him the best she can despite being the smaller and shorter. "Oh, my son." Is she crying? Laughing? Perhaps both. "You were only a wee babe when I held you last."

Edited 2022-07-29 17:00 (UTC)

This is what it's like to be held by a mother. As a baby, his only affection would have come from a wet nurse, which is hardly the same thing. He wraps his arms around her in return, so that she will know what it's like to be held by a son. He doesn't even care what other people in the market might think about a grown man hugging someone like this. He deserves this.

"So much has happened since then. Perhaps one day I will have told it all."

"I only care that you are alive and well." That Robert hadn't gotten his filthy hands on him and he'd grown into the man he is now. Although just how well had his life been, when he'd been raised a bastard? She's not quite gotten a grip on her tears, but she pulls back a little and looks up at him worriedly. "Ned has been kind, has he not?" Those around him, she's not sure.

She finally draws back so she can wipe her tears with her hands. People have started to stare, some lingering long enough as they pass, but she barely notices them. "I still cannot believe..." She hadn't expected a second chance at life, let alone the chance to see her son all grown. "You must tell me more." Realizing that sounded like a demand, like when she'd pester her brothers for something, she hastily added, "When you are ready, of course. Perhaps over a meal?" How is it to be a mother? Especially of a grown boy?

"Ned always treated me well. I got the same education as the rest of his children." It slips out, even though he's not really one of Ned's children. He still thinks of them as his siblings, and Ned as his father. He'd been treated as one of Ned's children by most of the household, by Ned's orders. Except for Lady Stark. She had made it clear that she saw him as imposition.

"Yes. We will have a meal. But first, you must meet Ghost." He indicates the direwolf standing nearby.

Lyanna can tell there's more to the story, but for now, that's good enough for her. They can speak more freely once they are in private and not standing around in the market where everyone and anyone can just listen in. There's so much she still wants to know anyway. What is Jon like? What does he like? Does he have someone special? He seems to be older than her, as strange as that is. Then again, what about this place and everything that's happened to her since her arrival hasn't been strange?

Speaking of strange things... there's her son's white-furred, red-eyed pet. No, not a pet; now that she knows Jon is a Stark, his companion can't possibly be an ordinary wolf. He's not an ordinary boy, after all — or so she, as his mother, wants to believe. "A direwolf," she says almost reverently, moving to crouch in front of Ghost but giving the creature enough space to approach at his own choosing. She holds out her hand for him to take a sniff of, though. "They have not been sighted south of the Wall for centuries."

There are certainly places that are more comfortable than here for having that conversation, and more private, and they'll find one. Perhaps even the apartment he shares with Inesa. But one thing at a time. They have time to get to know each other. They don't have to cover everything now.

Ghost approaches and sniffs the outstretched hand, then sits down in front of her to allow her to do more. She smells like someone he can trust.

"Westeros is changing." Jon wonders how much he should tell her right now, or if it's better to wait until he has time to explain more. The truth about the wights is hard to take, after all. He hadn't wanted to believe it, and he's seen it happen right in front of him. Other things are easier to explain, however. "Dragons are back, too."

Whatever fear Lyanna has in the face of being so close to a direwolf immediately disappears once Ghost sniffs her hand and sits down. "Good boy," she coos, shifting to her knees so she could take a closer look at the creature and shower him with more affection. It's fascinating, really, for she's only heard stories about direwolves. Stories are wonderful, but the real thing is even more so.

But apparently that's not all there is to it. That Westeros is changing is no surprise; she's figured whatever she'd started would have repercussions for generations to come. Yet that's not the sort of change her son's telling her about, so when Jon mentions dragons, she lifts her head to gaze at him, frowning.

"Dragons." She chews the inside of her cheek. Perhaps he'd meant it metaphorically. She glances at his strange mixed sigil, many of Rhaegar's words coming to mind. "House Targaryen has reclaimed the Throne? You are king?"

He had supposed that that was what she wanted for him, if it had been at all possible. He knows what Sansa had told him about how it ends, but he doesn't want to go through that explanation now. Especially when there are things about it that he can't explain because they haven't happened for him yet. At least he can explain what is happening in Westeros, now that he seems to have gotten caught up in the middle of it.

He bites his lip. "There's a war over the throne. When Robert died, his son took the throne, but Ned had found evidence that Robert's children weren't really his children. So his brothers both made a claim on the throne, and Cersei insisted that they were his children, so they defended their possession of the throne, and then Robert's brothers both died, and his children, so now it's down to Cersei, who refuses to give up the throne and the power that comes with it, and Daenarys, who was born in exile after the queen fled King's Landing." So there is a chance for House Targaryen, when it comes down to it. "The dragons are hers. In Westeros, I don't yet know the truth of my parentage."

Lyanna gives Ghost one last ruffle, then she stands, frowning at Jon in confusion. Not because she couldn't follow his talk of the war and the apparent succession problem, but his last words: In Westeros, I don't yet know the truth of my parentage. How does he know, then? It's all so strange.

Then again, she's alive and speaking to her son, now a man grown. That's a whole lot stranger.

"Dragons and direwolves... and you and I, here." Strange times, indeed. "I do not claim to understand what's going on, but I am glad." She cuts herself off, having caught her voice tremble again, and she shakes her head. "I suppose we need both a meal and a drink." She eyes him doubtfully. "That is, if you are old enough to partake."

"I don't understand all of it either," although undoubtedly he understands more than she does, having been in this place longer, and another one before that. "I'll try and explain what I do know. Over both a meal and a drink." He's old enough, whether he looks it or not. "There's a place that will allow Ghost inside. We can go there."

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TD006

he's just glad he finally gets to have one

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at least his mom won't be telling him that he knows nothing hahaha

good, cause that would be weird

she's younger than him but already thinks "this boy" hahaha

he tries his best, he really does

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