Brave New World

A/N ~ I decided it was a good idea to rewatch all my Walking Dead box sets. This happened. Also, fans of The Adventures of Super Jock and Awkward Girl, fear not, this won't interfere as that's pretty much already written up. For people who aren't fans of that work – 1. Why not? And 2. All my fanfiction is uploaded rather sporadically, as I have limited internet access these days. Also, new readers… welcome aboard *Ramsay Bolton face*

Summary ~ Distraught mother Catelyn Stark charges military-trained girl next door Brienne Evenfall with finding and preserving her daughter Sansa, vanished with her abusive boyfriend days ago. Two minutes later, Catelyn's heart stops beating. With unsteady truce with rogue ex-cop Jaime Lannister, chances of finding the child should be high. The added difficulty of course is that the world's fallen apart. It's not earth anymore; and this world where zombies rule creates and corrupts. And what started as a simple rescue mission will become a daily war between life and death, love and hate, right and wrong. The stakes are as high as the heartbeats, and blood doesn't stop flowing. It's a brave new world.

Disclaimer ~ My latest scheme was worthy even of Conniversei Lannister, but I'm afraid even so, A Song of Ice and Fire still belongs to the King in New Mexico.

Prologue

To die is nothing; to stop living is a tragedy.

Victor Hugo

Catelyn Tully-Stark felt the scream tear from her worn throat with more stridence than she heard it with. She was faintly aware of fragmented sobs choking through the house; she was faintly aware they were hers. She tore down the stairway, hands running along the walls, throwing her leaden limbs down four at a time. Cat stumbled as she landed on the laminate flooring of the landing, feet slipping sideways as she dared steal that half-moment, steadied herself against the wall. Body feeling ungainly and heavy, out of control, Catelyn watched the hallway distort. The tears were blinding her, tangling her eyelashes, by the seven, they were everywhere. A final sob lurched through her and she heaved from her post, staggering foreward and reeling around the corner, into the living room.

Beyond the roaring world of her heart in her howling head, deafening silence encased the Stark house. She felt herself collapse against the bottom of the sprawling sofa, the deadweight of her own grief anchoring her there. No, no, I have to get up, I have to get up, up. Catelyn clawed at the couch, desperate to rise, she needed to, she needed to, and yet the relentless hammering of her heart, frantic against her lungs, a bird encaged in her ribs, it drew all her strength, all, all…

Catelyn's fingers slipped against the fabric, though, hands stained scarlet, sticky with the crimson flow of death. This was death's house now, the Stranger had claimed them all. She managed to struggle to her feet, legs threatening to give as she tore into the kitchen, heaving, sobbing shattered-glass gasps scraping her lungs raw as she trembled, red hair all afloat, strands clinging to her pallid, sweat-drenched skin with desperation. In her interlude, by some miracle Cat found the strength to lift her arm long enough to clear her face of the red locks, and felt the blood from her fingers rubbing off across her skin.

Ned's blood, Ned's blood, Ned's blood, Ned's blood, Ned's blood.

As Cat's howls slashed through the desolation of her home, she raised her trembling hands, the ruby so stark in contrast to her suddenly so pale palms. Ned, Ned, Eddard… Wherever her eyes perchanced to flit, she saw him, him and Robb, oh Robb, Robb… Eddard who she'd loved and trusted and lived for, neck a russet ruin of torn tendons and sluggish wine-coloured blood, so much blood, dyeing the carpet, crusting in Ned's hair, Ned's beautiful dark hair. Fleeting images stung her recollection like so many hornets; his serious grey eyes and hearty chuckle, the eve of their first meal together, your relationship with this one went to hell with your little-fingered stalker, Cat, Brandon had laughed, once they could laugh about it, so why not try the next brother down?; his smile at their wedding, with petals and silk and crystalline light ablur around them, and he was all she could see, he was all she could see; running giddy, hand-in-hand into their first house together; the look he gave her as they together cradled the baby, the tiny, wrinkled, squalling baby, with wisps of her hair and snatches of that warm Stark smile that had become her home; Eddard and Robb, Robb and Eddard, oh Gods, oh Gods. Love wasn't meant to hurt this much, oh gods.

She roared again as she swept through the kitchen, tearing photos from their magnetized places across the fridge, their blu-tack on the cupboards. It didn't matter why, she just needed to, she wanted to, oh, the children, Eddard, the children. The blood on her hands smudged the memories as her fingers skittered across the pictures, and with each one fresh wavering sobs came howling forth. Their wedding day, their untried jubilance, the white lilies entwined in her hair, because they'd never thought a love, a happiness like that could be; In the hospital, the shadows in her awed eyes as she held Robb, Eddard as reverential, taken by Lysa an hour after the birth; Robb, four years old, cradling the newborn Sansa; Ned, Brandon, Lyanna, Benjen, and her, in the middle, the blood distorted the felt-tipped 'a worthy, honorary Stark'; Sansa holding her new sister with motherly care;Arya tugging at little Bran's hair as he struggled to blow the six candles out on his birthday cake; Rickon laughing. Laughing, oh, oh, it hurt, it hurt. Regardless of the blood, Cat clutched the pictures in an iron grip, to her heart, and she could feel its beats rippling through her.

Eddard, dormant, on the floor of their bedroom, neck barely in tact, the blood, oh the blood, it was everywhere. His beautiful grey eyes, once so overflowing with life and humanity and love, dead. Nothing behind them. And Robb, oh, Robb, Robb didn't bear thinking about, she couldn't think about Robb, the beautiful, beautiful child, her beautiful boy, her first, red curls matted, eyes as lifeless as his fathers as he stumbled on towards her, ravaged hands gasping thin air so slowly, jerkily. But no, no, it wasn't Robb, it hadn't been Robb, by the seven it wasn't Robb! It wasn't Robb, that staggering creature who'd tried to devour her, that thing, that dead, dead thing she'd driven her knife into so many times, so desperately, while she choked on the tears and the blood that speckled her face.

Oh Robb, oh Eddard… Catelyn collapsed, shaking with sobs against the cold tiles of the kitchen floor, the bloody photographs falling to the floor, slipping away from her, away from her. Their names were thunder in her ears, mingling with bursting words of denial and prayer, but she could barely feel herself screaming them, screaming any of it. Sansa, Arya… Bran, Rickon… Out, with friends, away, away from her protection, gone. Gotten. Catelyn wasn't fool enough to hope.

She did hear the stuttering footsteps, and felt the fear pulsing through her icy veins sluggish as blood from a wound. She felt as though she ought to be moving faster, but her limbs would not obey her, falling about with jolting aches as she rose and frantically, painfully wrenched open the cutlery drawer. The first had gone down with a knife, why not this one, why not all of them, she could do it, why not, why, not, why, why, why… Her hands closed around the metal-studded hilt of the blade she always used to cut up the pineapple Bran loved so.

The sharpness of razored claws tearing through the muscle in her back jerked her agonizingly back, but she didn't feel any pain, not like the pain of the sorrow, and yet she hollered and spun, red hair like blood, sticking, and her mouth was dry, so dry, vocal cords scraping, papery. Catelyn thrust herself at the thing that had once been Jory Cassel, probably popped by to check in on them, to borrow some coffee, anything but this. One eye was desolation and ruin. She slammed the side of herself into him, stabbing and stabbing and stabbing, but the knife kept getting lodged, and she had to fight to draw it out, whilst the beast's stiff, bloody fingers scratched at her face, caught in her hair. It took longer than Robb's shade had, but eventually it fell to the floor with her. The tiles came rushing up to meet the side of her face and something crashed inside her ears. Cat could feel something hot trickling down the side of her neck.

The next thing she knew was a battered plastic bottle of Evian being thrust in her face. Catelyn groaned, tried to hold out her hands to decline, to say no, but her limbs once more failed to obey her. Her mind was reeling. The outbreak had started in Dorne, they said, so far south, so far, and it was contained, they said it was contained. The bottle was offered up again, and again, and slowly, vaguely, jerky images were filling in the spaces around it, and her mind was inch by inch regaining control. Attached to the bottle was the girl who lived next door, the tall one, from, from, where was she from? Tarth Island, off… What a strange thing to remember.

"Drink, Catelyn, you have to drink!" Her voice spurted out across the house, low and desperate and strong and scared. "Drink, Cat, please!"

"Mhn – Please, the children, Brienne, the children…" It was devouring her from the inside out, that one thought. Robb's eyes, Sansa's beautiful hair. Arya's cheery laugh, so loud and sweet. Bran and his grin as he climbed. Rickon's arms clinging to her leg. And Eddard, oh by the Seven, Eddard. "The children…"

Brienne looked entirely unsure of what to say, how to console a silhouette of a woman, someone who'd lost it all. Just be, Catelyn wanted to say, there's nothing you can do. But the words evaded her. She was still lying in the kitchen, and the light bulbs swam overhead. In the corner, the monster of Jory Cassel, who had once been such a good friend, had been removed, with a substantial smear of blood marking his final resting place. The children, gods be good, where were the children? She tried to remember, to battle through the overwhelming anguish, but it was hard, she was choking on her own memories, on her own pain, the pain that dwarfed everything else there'd ever been. Where were the children? Remember, Catelyn, please, for the love of god remember. Bran's voice, sweet, wise Bran… We're going to out to play, with Meera and Jo. We'll be in for tea, I promise!

Meera and Jo, Meera and Jojen Reed, Howland's little ones… Out… Out… Out. They were gone, and it hit her with the force of a ton, gone, gone. Bran and tiny Rickon, her toddler, he was three, her babies, her soul, gone, gone… If this is what the infection had caved in in her own home, surely it had obliterated the teeming outside world, surely, surely. Cat felt a steadily stuttering wail break free from her throat as she struggled to rise. Rickon, Bran, my boys, my sweet young precious special beautiful boys. And Arya… Gone. Gone. Could it be? Her youngest little girl, so full of life, so full of life, how could she be gone, of all people, how could little Arya be gone, Gods, no. Out with her bull of a friend, Gendry something, he'd protect her against most, Cat prayed, Cat knew, but against this Cat doubted. If they weren't dead, they were all alone out there. They would not last long, they were just children, damn it, Ned, they were just children.

"The children, Brienne, Gods, the children…" She took the Evian in her violently shaking grasp, smearing the scratched plastic with red, so tremulous even the water shook. Uncapped, she raised it and drank. The water was warmed, and yet did enough to soothe her scraping throat. Sansa, tall pretty Sansa, gone off with that bad-news blonde days ago… It's just a weekend trip, mum, and Sandor's going to be there, he's nineteen, and Joff's dad got him a bodyguard, they're that rich, Mum, please. Bodyguard. It had taken so long for Sansa and Eddard to convince her it was safe, and then her first little girl disappeared in the Baratheon's VW. Could…? She daren't hope, she daren't hope.

"Is Ned…?" Brienne Evenfall stopped herself, but her mouth kept working, like the old goldfish Cat's father had kept for her when she was little. She too was splattered with specks of red, in amongst her clumping freckles, blood sticking stiff in strands of her cropped straw-coloured hair. Catelyn opened her mouth to say something, to say yes, to be as strong as she always thought she was, but a lurching sob choked forth instead. She didn't even realize anymore. That was all the confirmation Brienne needed. She rose to her feet from where she'd knelt, towering over Cat as she towered over everybody, stumbling to cupboards, cramming everything into an enormous, battered North Face backpack that Catelyn hadn't noticed before. Cans and packets.

Oh, Brienne. That felled her further. She thinks we're going somewhere together. She thinks I'm walking out of here. Despite herself, Brienne was just a naïve young girl. She thinks I'm getting up and walking out of here. I have to speak, I have to find the strength to speak. Catelyn raised her hand to shelter her face from the sudden onset of sunlight, through the great kitchen window. When imprinted memories came burning back she pushed them away, she tried, she blacked them out, no blood, no husband, no children, no, no, they had to go away if she had to be strong… One of the photographs splayed across the floor caught Cat's eye and she leaned out, inched aside until she could grasp it. Sansa's face, and her streaming auburn hair, she was so young, a little child, with an enormous grin and soft cheeks, and she looked down at the dancing candles of her birthday cake. She is alive, Catelyn told herself. She is alive and safe. That was a lie, though, nobody was safe. But in the van, with Sandor Clegane, the enormous burnt-faced brute Joffrey kept around, and whoever Robert hired to keep them sound… Are you waiting for me somewhere, Sansa? Are you waiting for your mother to come and find you and take you home?

Not your mother, Sansa, that much is clear. A final reel of desperation was unfurling in Catelyn's mind, blossoming and bleeding, and it was beautiful and frantic, and so sharp-edged that she couldn't think too deeply into it, or she'd cut herself on the shards. But could she afford to burden others with her loss, with her weighty trust?

"Catelyn, do you think – do you think you can stand, Catelyn?" Brienne was frowning as she knelt once more beside Catelyn's side, but Catelyn was almost at peace, a breath away from where she was. Could… could… Brienne's eyes met hers for a split second, bright blue and innocent and trusting, a young girl's eyes, like Sansa's. Like her children. Am I so selfish? And then the game changing recollection came, hazy, so hazy… Yes, Ms Stark – sorry, Cat, I know, I just… Yes, I have. Military training, actually, my brother went MIA three years ago, and I thought to go and find him if I trained and got in myself, and I did, but then Mum died having the stillborn, and I couldn't leave Dad, so I just…

"I fear –" The words clung and spurted from her throat painfully, but she had to keep going, and blacken away the images that stung, just clutch at the one that may still live on, draw force from that, and it was draining her, by the seven, it was draining her. "I will never stand again, Brienne." Catelyn had not the strength to touch where she'd felt the blood on her neck before, but she didn't need to. She'd watched the news tirelessly. A scratch did it too, and she had them in abundance, oozing crimson. The back of her shirt was sodden with the stuff.

"Don't say that, Cat, you'll live and get up and…" Brienne trailed off. Catelyn did not know Brienne more than perhaps three cups of coffee, but she felt like she did now. This girl, this huge brave girl has a chance in a thousand of finding my own, and if that is all I have, then that is what I have to nurture.

"I won't, I – " I'll be coming home to Ned, and Robb, I'll be coming home to Ned. "Sansa, my daughter, my eldest daughter…"

"Where is she?"

"Gone… Weekend at Kings Landing, with her – with her boyfriend, but now… Kings Landing fell but I know she got out, in my bones I know it, Brienne.. I… If she's alive…"

"I'll bring her to you."

She speaks with all the hope of youth and song, as Sansa did once. "No, no… I'm coming home now, Brienne, I have to go home now… But Sansa has a hope… Clever, she's clever… Brienne please, my little girl, my beautiful little girl, find her for me Brienne, find her and keep her safe, you have to keep her safe…" Catelyn did not know if Brienne would comply. She was asking her to risk everything for a girl she'd met perhaps twice in her life. Cat would not judge her if she just preserved herself. But it had to be tried, for the sake of everyone, for the sake of the beautiful, precious children she could not save.

And then the ice was closing in, and she let it all take her. Eddard and his moral integrity, so strong and loving and warm despite all the ice his family reputed as, the most selfless man to ever grace the earth, Cat knew, and she loved him, and she was so lucky to love him. And Robb, Robb, the beautiful first child they'd raised together, the man they'd made, so strong and perfect. She tried to call up pictures of her other children but they felt like goodbyes and finality, not greeting and sudden summer sunrays.

It was beautiful there.

Catelyn felt herself relax in a way she'd never done before, her aching soul cradled so gently against the earth and the certainty of life's wheel. She was done with sorrow. The darkness caressed her, and she felt Eddard's smile and smelt Robb's laugh, and her final earthly thought was of Brienne and Sansa, when everything went dark, and peaceful.

So peaceful.