NAMES OF THRONES: AN EPIDEMIC OF HODORITIS
By Quillon42
Peering upward with much trepidation now was the sliver of a direwolf named Summer, the peppy pup's ears shrinking back against its skull as it witnessed its young master Bran Stark making his way up the side of a crumbling battlement, the child as committed to climbing as his sister Arya was dedicated to "dancing," or as Jaime Lannister was invested in "loving" his own alluring sibling.
It was the latter of these that Bran would bear witness to now, as he made his way through a withering windowsill of stone only to find Ser Jaime perpetrating an entry through a much softer and delicate passage. When the owner of said bodily byway herself arched heavenward, and she registered the presence of the virtual prince of Winterfell, her wantonness-warped features contorting ever more with shock. Immediately she directed her prurient paladin of a brother:
"CERsss… (pant pant)
"CERSEI!"
at which point Jaime aborted his brazen barge into the queen's quay, and joined his sister in acknowledging the innocent intruder.
With a start the concupiscent Kingslayer headed to the dilapidated portal where Ned's son stood in suspense, the boy uncertain if he would see another afternoon in which he could again scale such stones as he had now.
Curiously the very errant knight looked upon the lad. "Jaime Jaime?"
Innocuously the youth shook his head, attempting all he could to disarm the situation. "Bran Bran Bran," he spluttered. "Bran Bran Bran."
The answer was insistent, the staccato response not unlike the taunts from a jab-baiting Don Flamenco. Yet the look in the stripling's eyes was desperate.
For certain, Cersei was not buying into the boy's stammering act. "Cersei," she seethed from her place upon the hassock of rock where she and Jaime cemented their intimate bond for the umpteenillionth time. "Csssersei."
Jaime looked back at his copulatory kin, then again at Bran. He shrugged sheepishly. "Jaime Jaime Jaime."
And then with an open, resolute hand, Jaime shoved Hodor's ward out the window, so the boy could delve into a descent which seemed to last days.
…
…
While the wily Lady Cersei continued to sit there in her frazzled stupor of incest and interruptus, she still seething ever so sexily, an untoward wave of revulsion washed over her. It was a sentiment most unpleasant, which the wife of the King had not experienced so keenly since that other nefarious night of nooky, that catastrophe of consummation with the coronated one whom at one point Cersei believed was to be the true love of her life.
The incident crystallized once more within the mind of this lithest of Lannisters: the lady lying in the royal bed with her betrothed of the Baratheons; she intoxicated with the ecstasy of having married the King, and he inebriated with elements far more banal and alcoholic; he resting the raft of his mass atop her dainty frame, and with breath so bitter and bleary with drink, his voice sounding that accursed name:
"…
"…
"…ROBERRRRRT…"
…
How could a man, even if a monarch, dare to scandalize his mistress in such a manner? For him to have conjured those old memories of his former paramour, and to have betrayed his wife in that way…she could never begin to forgive him for such an egregious sort of transgression.
…
From thence we turn to the tribulations of that third famed Lannister sibling from the first volume, he who was sublime in sapience if short in stature, the one whose most effective offense consisted not of the sword as was the case with Jaime, nor was it the warhammer as with Robert, but rather that of the paper, the pen, and of course…the tongue.
So it was that Tyrion took others to task using his wits as his weapons. Yea, before the certain doom he faced down in the Eyrie, before the repellant lady Lysa and her suckling son (who in this reality was punted out the floor portal before too long, as even his mother could no longer withstand his petulant pansyness)…it was in that moment, for instance, that the nimble-noggined dwarf made his brilliant bid for freedom:
"Tyrion."
What a fortunate happenstance for the haughty halfling to have filled his brain with all that wisdom from the volumes of tomes that he had studied over the years. And so it came to pass, courtesy of the imp's cunning: a trial by combat. Thankfully the hired sword Bronn took the brunt of the awful ordeal, and won the day for the wee one as well as for himself.
Next in that thickest of thickets, while entrenched in that most foreboding of forests known as the Vale, the tiny trooper and his brutish bodyguard again beset by terrible threats…the bluntest of barbaric arms inching toward the cheek of the cleverest and the littlest of Lannisters, the latter, in response to the fearsome sheerness that was Shagga:
"Tyrion Tyrion."
Once more, just like that, the tyke-sized thane talked his way out of an unflattering fate, the Lilliputian lord continuing on not only with his life but also with a battalion of barbarians at his back.
Certainly with such a show of prodigious power as the bevy of vikings that accompanied him, the bantam brother of Jaime and Cersei would show up their pompous father with a vengeance. Yet it was still in that tent, where all the schemes and stratagems of war were sired, that the diminutive noble again endured a dressing down.
"Tywin…Tywin…Tywin."
Damn him, that blasted bastard. To have come so far and to have accomplished so much…and yet to still be put in his place by this brash, patronizing patriarch.
Clenching his fists and his face, the infinitesimal intellectual cursed his diabolical dad…until he thought of the crossbow, that one armament other than intelligence with which the mini-man was as skillful as Joffrey was sucky. The father-son conflict herein would have to be won with those kinds of quarrels, and not the ones of the oral ilk.
Because when it came down to it, after all, actions certainly spoke louder than…saying one's name over and over and over again like a complete effing idiot.
It was now at the outdoor tournament, featuring those doughtiest of jousters to grace the greens for the entertainment of their sovereign so stout in heart and in husk, that one Lord Petyr Baelish imparted advices most subversive into the impressionable ear of Sansa Stark. To be certain, one seated close to the pair would surely perceive the shrewd sagacity of Catelyn Tully's teenage admirer as that same Baelish whispered, ever so clandestinely to Eddard's daughter:
"Littlejerkoff."
And then again, days on ahead, when the welfare of Winterfell had waned so wearily, and that same Lord Stark would attempt to rally his allies in vain against the Lannisters listing upward in influence toward that hellish firmament upon which was situated that seat of sheer unbridled absolutist endowment known as the Iron Throne…forsooth, it was just in that aborted instant of attempted counterrevolt when Petyr placed his sleazy stiletto, verily his very own pewter peter across the throat of his too-trusting friend Ned, then cogently cooed into his cochlea:
"Littleshitpiece."
Then days beyond this incident, in a scene conveyed exclusively on cable and not on paper, when that same Baelish strode alongside his peer in power known as Lord Varys, the two sharing insights about their kingdom and insults against each other, they ceasing such animated activity only to acknowledge their new Grace, King Joffrey, as Petyr said unto the prepubescent despot, with the utmost of respectful address:
"Littlethingamajig."
Whereupon the cruelest of child-kings then grinned in gratitude at said laudatory declaration of fealty which Baelish bestowed upon his putrescent personage.
Perhaps the day prior or so, it was this same prepubescent pustule who passed judgment upon the noblest of Neds, condemning the same to beheading in place of banishment.
One who was there would have witnessed the silken-skinned Sansa Stark as she watched her husband, still semi-adoringly, she at this point still enmeshed in an imperial infatuation, even if it were on the wane given her small-fry swain's atrocious antics upon the throne.
Now, after the Sansa's dignified dad spoke to the people and admitted his alleged crimes against Robert Baratheon, his supposed treason:
"Eddard Neddy Ned…Eddard Neddy Ned…"
and received a rock upon his brow for belting out the truth, the newly-minted kid-king took the fore as he then addressed the crowd, to elucidate the fate of Sansa's dignified dad…
First a gentler expression amidst the dominating fop's features. "Joffrey, Joffrey, Joffrey."
Sansa looked on with placid satisfaction, gratified that her semi-man was making good on the promise he made to her regarding her father.
An instant following, however, and the runt-ruler's countenance curdled into a sneer, complete with a mouth askew that made him resemble a recent victim of a stroke.
"Joffrey, JOFFREY, JOFFREY!"
It was all too much for the dainty dame of the teen tyrant. Just a second after the declamation which doomed Lord Stark to decapitation, Sansa shuddered, then fell to her feet in a faint as the crowd ejaculated into a chaos.
From a far humbler vantage, the other daughter of Winterfell watched as the severe Ser Ilyn sauntered up to Eddard with Ice in hand. Arya was about look away in the utmost of anguish…
…when suddenly Neddy nimbly hoisted up his honor-hallowed head, cracking the chin of the executioner as the latter approached. The stalwart Stark then flexed ferociously, shattering his shackles a second later, and whisked up his weapon from the one who would have shucked his scalp from his shoulders. Then swinging said sword in a circle above his head:
[WHOOOOOOSSSHHH WHOOOOOOSSSHHH WHOOOOOOSSSHHH]
"Eddard Neddy Ned!"
he commenced a force centrifugal (or centripetal maybe; whatever the hell it would be) to levitate his limber form away from that stage of slaughter. In the midst of it all, Joffrey jaunted forward, attempting to stop Stark personally…and for his efforts, his Number Two Ticonderoga neck was met with the gelid edge of Ice.
Said sword then whipped around all the more so that Ned virtually shapeshifted into a whirlwind, the Lord launching himself into the airspace above this cancerously corrupt community which would have horridly had his head.
As it was, then, Stark commenced his commute into exile, helicoptering himself away to meet with his most unwedlocky son Snow by the Wall. And through Eddard's eventful escape, scads of Edtards such as this author felt fulfilled that such a noble was not negated by the wayward world of Westeros.
It was just as the man was making away from the sordid scene, though:
"ARYA ARRY NAN!"
[WHOOOOOSH WHOOOOOSH WHOOOOOSH]
that the daring younger daughter of the family whipped out her own weapon, she swinging it over her head to hover up above the malevolent mob as well.
Beckoning with a sideways nod, Ned: "EDDARD NEDDY NED!"
"ARYA ARRY NAN!"
Yet the girl's father was mystified that the adolescent assassin was soaring in the opposite direction to his own. She disappeared into the distance for several instants, leaving Edd literally hanging in the air with Ice…
…when suddenly the dodgier daughter made her way back with a curious mass under her arm.
"EDDARD NEDDY NED!"
"ARYA ARRY NAN!"
Now the little lady dropped down upon the place of execution to deposit the animated corpse of another, very zombified Lady, to chomp upon the arm of the Queen while the latter lamented the passing of her ass of a son. In the ensuing seconds, the undead direwolf incised upon the incestuous sister's limb, then turned to Lord Varys, who was nearby on that putrid platform, and
[RRRRREEEAAAAAHHHHH]
vomited out very particular and personal parts of the man which he lost long ago. Having accomplished the impromptu mini-mission, then,
"ARYA ARRY NAN!"
Arya took to the skies once more, Zombie Lady scooping up Sansa by the scruff of her neck as they went. As Eddard received his older daughter in hand in midair, and he left the scene via Icegyro while Arya exited by way of Needlechopper, the latter randomly considered that the next order of direwolf business should be to convince Grey Wind to regurgitate those fingers to give back to the Greatjon.
…But speaking of once-discarded digits…
"Cersei!"
The regent threw her head to one side ever so melodramatically.
"CERSEI!"
The viewpoint veered to the empress's other side as she histrionically cried out once more.
"CERSEI! CERSEI! CERSEI!"
The Queen took to screaming from several camera angles, just as she did when her son died in the televised version of the reader's reality (and again, this author has heretofore only seen Season One…but Joffrey was such a bastard that it necessitated a quick Youtube view of his death scene in Season Four).
She then settled down a mite, the Cerse once more relegated to seethe sexily in her indefatigable angst. While this happened, Lord Varys, who had screwed back on those body parts bestowed upon him by Arya and Lady, went to stand behind Her Majesty, he espying down her gown (as the camera did sort of in Joffrey's death scene, to be fair), just trying to see if he could get a rise out of the spectacle.
When a twitch did issue from the ex-eunuch's undercarriage, making the Spider's appendage as potent as Shelob's understinger once more, the man grinned…realizing that he was very, very Varys once again. In time, the man's reputation would grow to such that both Lancel and Jaime would be out of jobs in comforting the Queen; Varys would soon experience much more than just a mere spectacle with Cersei.
But in the meantime now, the rulers of Westeros were restlessly adjusting and aligning, getting ready to Clash™ as the second volume's title dictated. Joffrey jostled at crossbows both actual and Freudian, as Sansa was now out of reach and Margaery was a bit of a ways off. (Septa Mordane, by the way, was spared here to stitch the kid's head back on, as had happened with Christopher Lloyd at the end of that one "scary" episode ages ago in Amazing Stories (God this author has just shown his age so miserably)).
In other section of the fantasyscape, the Khaleesi readied her Dothraki for their own conquests, out in the hinterlands, the Queen and Jorah enjoying one another as they explored the wilderness out there together. Let it be known, however, that Daenerys of Targaryen would in time, even beyond the Song of Ice and Fire, have to contend with the even more terrifying omnipotence of Chrisserys of Teigenyen, who hails from the land of Buzzfidia and reigns across the multiverse with her own consort, Jo(h)n of the Legends (also known as the Uberjo(h)n), and who necessarily represents the opinions of and thus speaks for all humans in every reality, as well as all other animals everywhere in addition to all monerans. (The spread of said siren's influence to protists has not yet been confirmed as of this writing).
EPILOGUE
So it was that only after the occasioning of all of the above incidents did Bran Stark finish his descent from the destroyed battlement. Unlike in the canonical (and inferior) rendition of this tale, here the child was caught by one hulking hunk of unintelligence who went by the handle of Hodor. The shock of Bran's barreling down into the man's arms left the latter at an utter loss for words.
"The fuck, man," was all that he could think to say.
