Afterlife
Umm...how to explain this one. Perhaps it's just a wonderfully wacky, weird idea of mine. I hope you like, and reviews are always appreciated.
Obviously, with the title - major character death warning.
Standard copyright disclaimers apply. ASOIAF of course, belongs to GRRM and not me.
And the whole world went dark.
When he awoke again, Jaime Lannister found himself lying face down on a flat outcropping of rock, a plateau of sorts. All he could see in front of him were a series of steps, hewn out of the rock leading upwards into the clouds.
Where was he? Was he dead? Surely, he knew that he was being executed. He had been led out to the execution block, his head had been placed and the command had already come. So why was he now here? Was this the afterlife? Surely after all he had done, he deserved to be burning in seven hells.
And yet, he was here, still somehow one handed, with only a set of steps leading upwards in front of him. So he began to walk, step by step, upwards, one foot in front of the other. The clouds got closer and closer, yet he continued to walk. His breathing did not seem to be affected at all. But then, when you were dead, did breathing matter at all?
He walked upwards again and again, one step and the next. The clouds were now below him, white fluffy plains. He was tempted once to step off, but it seemed as if there was an invisible barrier on the sides of stairs, so he continued to walk upwards.
Finally, the stairs stopped, and he reached another plateau. And there, he saw the first sign of human life since he had awoken. Her golden blonde hair immediately made him think of his sister, Cersei, dead before him. Her back was turned to him, but as he took another step forward she turned around.
"My dear sweet little boy," the woman with gold hair and green eyes said. It was his mother. "oh, how I've missed you."
"Mother? What are you doing here?" he asked.
"I've come to take you into paradise," his mother replied. And then, throwing all propriety into the wind, his mother ran towards him, enveloping him into a tight hug.
Tears ran down Jaime's eyes. He had missed his mother so much, for she had been long dead, he had lived so much of his life without her. To be reunited with her now, in death. Lady Joanna let go of her son, grabbing his left hand in her right, she began to pull him forwards.
When he looked up, he saw the great pearly gates in front of him. "Come, sweet child," Joanna said, "it is time to go in." The gates opened up, as if by magic.
Jaime looked at his mother sadly, "mother, I do not deserve Paradise."
"Of course you do," his mother replied, laughing, "silly child. Otherwise I would not be here." She tugged on his hand, insistent that he follow her through the gates.
"Mother," he said, his voice breaking with emotion, "I do not deserve this. Not after all I have done." He forced his mother to let go of him. "I was a bad man."
His mother looked upon him as if her heart were breaking. Her soulful green eyes clouded with tears. "Do you think I do not know? Did not see everything you did? And yet, you are still here with me."
"Mother," he said, "I..."
"Enough," a voice, male, low and resonating interrupted them. "Joanna, you may return through the gates. I will talk to the child here and explain."
Jaime turned around to see a white robed man, radiating wisdom. His face was obscured by a blinding light, all he could see was magnificence radiating around the man who had spoken. He saw his mother bow her head and re-enter through the gates. They closed behind her for the moment.
"Now, my child," the man said, as Jaime saw his covered face shift, transform into a perfect likeness of the Father that was in the Great Sept of Baelor. "Perhaps this is a more convenient guise for me to take whilst I speak with you." Two chairs of white marble suddenly appeared and the man gestured for Jaime to sit. "Or perhaps, I could take a more familiar guise." His body transformed again, this time into the guise of a young Tywin Lannister. "I invite you into the Paradise, yet you seem hesitant, young one." His now green-eyes bored into Jaime's own, as if Jaime's eyes were just open windows into his soul.
"As I told my mother, I do not deserve this," Jaime explained, "I was a very bad man."
The man opposite him chuckled, laughing, "and that is precisely why I chose for you to come into Paradise. It is rare that a man is able to realise his own faults, it is rare that a man does not think that he does not deserve Paradise. In fact, you think you deserve the Seven Hells for what you have done, do you not?
"Yes, I do."
"Perhaps you would not be so hasty as to want to go to the Seven Hells if I let you have a look." Suddenly, a circle in the clouds beneath them turned transparent, as the man he was conversing with shifted his visage once more to become the Father.
Jaime stared down through the hole. He saw a small cottage, in front of it, a young girl, a crofter's daughter holding out a purse. A line of women, young, old, beautiful, ugly, women of all kinds lined up outside with a silver coin in each hand. The door opened, and a woman exited the door, her lips smiling, satiated. She thanked the young girl collecting coin, and the next woman in line deposited her coin in the small pouch the girl held.
The door opened once more, and Jaime looked inside. What he saw horrified him. His father, was chained to the bedposts, unable to move. The woman had already half stripped her clothing off, in readiness. The door closed, and he could see no more. It was obvious what was going to happen.
"Yes," the man in the guise of the Father said, as if confirming Jaime's thoughts. "It is his punishment, to be used for pleasure like he did with young Tysha. Perhaps when he repents, he will be able to move on, but that father of yours is a stubborn one." The image in the circle shifted. "Look again."
Jaime dared to look again, half afraid he would see something horrible. He looked and saw a young girl with a bracelet around her wrist. She looked somehow familiar, and then he remembered, his sister's young companion, Melara Heatherspoon. And then the picture shifted again, his twin sister, Cersei with a corresponding collar around her neck. It was obvious that Melara was controlling her every movement. He saw his sister bay like a dog, roll in the mud like a pig, all at Melara's doing. He looked away, he could not take it, watching his sister being humiliated.
"Your sister," the man in the guise of the Father said, "she craved power and control. So as her punishment, I gave control of her to Melara.
"Isn't that cruel?"
"Perhaps, but it is the only way she will learn. And once she has learned, then Paradise will be opened to her." The man in the guise of the Father spoke with wisdom. "But there is one more thing that I want you to see."
The image in the circle in the clouds shifted again. This time, he knew, it was clear. King Aerys was standing chained to a post, fire burning all around him. He could see the shrieking King, mouth opened wide in what Jaime must know to be a horrible scream. "He will burn for five hundred thousand lifetimes, one for each life that he would have taken had you not stopped him."
"Is that why because I stopped Aerys?" Jaime asked. "Is that why you want me to come to Paradise."
The man in the guise of the Father turned to him as the image faded. He smiled, no, more smirked if the Father could smirk, "so are you sure that you do not want to choose the Seven Hells. I am sure I can think of some creative punishment for you. But you see, it would be pointless, because you already know your wrongs."
"Still..." Jaime said, "I do not deserve..."
The man sighed, "perhaps," he paused, "if you are so insistent in not choosing to follow me into Paradise, then I offer you a choice. You may return to the world of the living and continue to live your life."
"But I'm dead, aren't I?" Jaime interrupted.
"Little details," the man said, "if I am here welcoming you into Paradise, who do you think I am?"
Jaime's eyes widened as he realised. He had not believed for so long that he had almost forgotten what he had learned when he was little at the Septon's feet. "Are you the Father?"
"That is one of my guises that you men have given me," the man replied. "I can be these things too." His image shifted quickly, now an old crone, then a young maiden, a smith. R'hllor, the Black Goat of Qohor. "I am more than those things that men have made me into. By my power, anything is possible." He shifted back into the Father.
He returned to the original topic. "Or you can choose to live again. I can put you back into your body with foreknowledge of this possibility and you can live again, maybe play things differently." The God who appeared in the guise of the Father looked expectantly at Jaime. "You could always choose to come into Paradise with me and your mother, of course. It is a rare thing that one could have a choice. It is a gift from me. Choose and use it wisely."
At that moment, Jaime was racked with indecision. Paradise, with mother, going back and starting again, or going back and continuing on. He took a moment to think about it. He would not regret whatever choice he chose.
He spoke.