Dexter at Dawn
a Dexter series/Game of Thrones crossover
by Technomad
Chapter One
It was a bright, sunny dawn, with the sun just peeping over the Eastern horizon. The moon, that fat, beautiful witness to so many wonderful things, had just set, and I had much to do. I was bobbing around in my boat, out on the Atlantic with the skyline of Miami comfortably far away...but I was not alone. Not quite.
I'd been up all night, with a particularly amusing playmate. I'd investigated him thoroughly and he more than fit the Code of Harry, so I'd had no problem letting the Dark Passenger take control when I paid him a late-night visit. He'd been acquiring and fileting victims for some time. Foolishly, he kept souvenirs hidden in his house that left me...and the Dark Passenger...in no doubt whatsoever of his worthiness to join the others who had done their last Dark Dance with me. He, like me, had been an equal-opportunity monster. In some ways, he was more equal-opportunity than I had ever been or wanted to be. Men and women, I could see...but children? That, to my mind, was utterly unacceptable.
So, I had paid him a visit, with the Dark Passenger firmly in the driver's seat, and now he was headed over the side to join my other victims at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. With my latest delivery to Davy Jones' Morgue and Fish Feeder complete, I broke out some fishing gear. After all, I was ostensibly out fishing for the day. My new wife, Rita, and her children were on a visit to relatives in Jacksonville, but one way a monster like me keeps from being exposed as a monster like me is keeping up appearances. There were no other boats anywhere near by, and I honestly expected to get in a little fishing. If I could get some good fish, they'd be waiting for Rita in the freezer at home when she got back, and she would turn them into heavenly delights for the palate. My mouth watered at the thought. Food is my favorite thing to eat, and what Rita did with food was incredibly good. Dexter's mighty metabolism needs frequent nourishment.
For a little while, I bobbed out there, my fishing line in the water, waiting for a nibble. It was a wonderful day to be out on the water. The sky was clear and cloudless, despite the fact that a storm had blown through the night before. The storm, oddly enough, had apparently come up out of nowhere, and had caught our usually-very-alert weather people almost completely by surprise. There was litter and junk on the water, and I wondered what had happened. Had some poor hapless fool's boat gone down in the blow?
And then I saw it. Half-awash in the gentle waves, it looked like it had once been a piece of a wooden boat. This was odd enough by itself to be well worth investigating, but I could see a person, sprawled out on the deck, moving feebly. I put the boat about and went to see what I could do. This was not out of human concern. I do not have such a thing, save for Rita, her children Cody and Astor, and my sister, Deborah.
If the rest of the human race were to drop dead, it wouldn't bother me until I found that doughnuts were no longer available. Being a police worker (even if not a fully-sworn policeman) I find doughnuts to be an excellent fuel for long hours at crime scenes, as well as an excellent way to ingratiate myself with my co-workers.
However, I knew that conspicuously saving someone who might otherwise have drowned would be excellent for my public image. Being seen as a compassionate, caring person would make it much less easy for people to believe Sergeant Doakes. Sergeant Doakes had been the one person on the Miami Police force who had seen me for what I was. Like me, he was, or had been, a stone killer with a Dark Passenger not unlike my own. But after he'd lost his hands, feet and tongue at the hands of a rogue surgeon, he was no longer a major threat to my freedom and life. He was still around, though, and still determined to expose me.
When I came up to the wreck, I could see that whoever was aboard was young. While I have little or no use for most people, I do have a soft spot for children. I made my boat fast to the wreckage, made sure my life jacket was in place, and scrambled aboard to see if the person was alive.
At first, I couldn't be sure, but then I heard a soft cough, and I knew that I had a live one on my hands. I squatted down to see what I was dealing with, feeling rather like I might at a crime scene investigating a newly-made corpse. It was a girl, and she looked to be almost exactly my stepdaughter Cody's age. I poked her in the side, to see what would happen, and was rewarded with a fit of coughing. She rolled over, and her eyes blinked open.
As our eyes met, I was very startled. She had a Dark Passenger of her own, and, as far as I could tell, one at least as developed as my own! Just like Cody and Astor, she was one of us. And I knew I had to train her in the Path of Harry, to make sure that her Dark Passenger didn't lead her to a very nasty end in Old Sparky, or, at least, a life-long stint as a guest of the great State of Florida.
I felt I should introduce myself. "Hi. I'm Dexter Morgan. I saw you out here and could see you were in trouble. What's your name?"
She coughed, and spat out some sea water, and her eyes focused more clearly on me. "A girl...a girl is called many things, but you may call a girl Arya Stark." Under us, the wreckage was groaning, doing things I didn't like the sound or feel of one bit. We were about a mile off the coast. That's a very long swim, even for Dauntless Dexter, much less with an apparently-injured girl in tow.
"Well, Miss Stark, would you step aboard my boat? This thing we're on is acting like it's about to break up."
She shook her head, apparently trying to clear it, and got to her hands and knees. "A girl...a girl finds she has trouble standing up." I picked her up, being careful not to touch her in places I shouldn't, and got her over to where she could roll into my boat. Once she was aboard, I jumped on myself, untying the painter that was holding my boat to the wreck. And not a moment too soon.
As I started the engine (startling the girl; she acted like she'd never seen or heard of such a thing), the wreckage started sinking. I turned my boat around and headed for shore as fast as I could. As we sped through the water, I flipped out my cell phone and called for help. By the time we got to shore, the cavalry had arrived. An ambulance was waiting for us, and standing beside it were several police, including my stepsister Deborah.
"Why, hello, Deborah," I said, smiling politely. "Bit of a surprise to see you here. This isn't a murder." For all that Deborah looks like a supermodel, she's Dirty Harry's meaner twin sister down in her soul. She gave me a scowl that would have had Clint Eastwood jealous.
"No, idiot, but I happened to be nearby when your call came in, and the Captain said that since I'm your sister, I should go down and find out what's happened." She stepped closer, looking at Miss Stark. "Who...or what...is that, Dex?"
"That is a child, Deborah," I said, in my most patient tones. "Children are byproducts of sexual intercourse, and often found within marriages, which is why you are apparently unfamiliar with them." She gave me another scowl, then reached out to help Miss Stark up.
"Are you all right, miss?" she asked. Deborah is not exactly a people person, but in her job, she often has to deal with traumatized people, and she's had to learn a few skills. "Do you know where you are? What is your name?"
"A girl is called Arya Stark. A girl does not know where she is."
Deborah turned and gave the EMTs on the ambulance a questioning look. "Right. Apparent aphasia and partial amnesia. We'll take her to the hospital and examine her. Mr. Morgan, Sergeant Morgan, you'll come along with us, please."
After I'd tied up my boat at the dock, and Deborah had posted a policeman to make sure that the boat didn't decide to mysteriously disappear (this is Miami, after all; a wretched hive of scum and villainy that makes Mos Eisley Spaceport look like Sesame Street) Deb and I got into her cruiser and followed the ambulance to the hospital.
If I were ever injured, whether in the pursuit of my hobby or otherwise, I would want to be taken to Jackson Memorial Hospital. They've got more experience treating injuries, including combat-related injuries such as gunshots, than anywhere else in the US and very few places elsewhere, at least outside of active war zones. So, when I saw that we were headed there, I relaxed. Miss Stark would be in the best possible hands. Once we were there, we found ourselves dealing with one of the dread curses of police work. Florida bureaucracy, in all its glory. We were filling out forms left, right and center, asserting that we had no idea who Miss Stark was or where she had come from.
"You say, Mr. Morgan, that you found her on a sinking boat off the Miami shoreline?" one skeptical questioner asked. I felt the Dark Passenger rear up in anger at being questioned so, but kept a firm grip on it and answered civilly.
"Yes, that's how it was. My wife and children are out of town, and I thought I'd get in a day of fishing. I was out getting an early start, and saw her drifting there. I can show you where her boat went down, if you want to look for it."
"We might just do that." I could see that he was skeptical, but clearly Miss Stark was not some Latin illegal immigrant. They had tried questioning her in Spanish...I had heard them...and she had shown no sign whatsoever of understanding. Same went for Portuguese, and other European languages. Discomfited Dexter had no idea of where she had sprung from, and from what I could tell, nobody else did, either.
After a while, a doctor came up to us. "Mr. Morgan? Sergeant Morgan?" When we admitted our identities, he went on: "Miss Stark is, overall, in fairly good shape physically. She shows signs of dehydration and has apparently not eaten in several days. However…" he paused.
"However?" I asked. I do not have human feelings...how can a monster have human feelings?...but I had developed an interest in Miss Stark's well-being. We who have Dark Passengers are rare in this world, and I wanted to make sure she survived, so I could set her feet on the Harry Path.
"She shows signs of amnesia, and of delusions. She keeps speaking of places that do not exist. We can find no mention of a 'Westeros,' a 'Winterfell Castle,' a 'Kings Landing,' a 'City of Braavos,' or the other places she keeps insisting she's been to, or is from. And she apparently had no idea that electric lights existed, or of how to operate a light switch, or what a television was."
"That's really strange," Deborah said, and I nodded agreement. Not only did I not want to get one of her famous savage arm punches, but this time I honestly agreed with her. Anybody would know what those things were, even if they were from a place where they were not in use. And Miss Stark did not look as though she hailed from the sort of Fourth World hellhole where such things could not be found.
"We're going to keep her here for a while, but when she's ready to be released, we'll need someplace to put her. Since you found her, Mr. Morgan, would you like to take her in?"
"Me?" I asked. Devious Dexter did not want to seem to be too eager to take in a girl just ripening into womanhood. Evil-minded people could so easily misinterpret such a gesture, no matter how innocently intended. "I don't know. I have a stepdaughter about her age, though. I'd have to ask my wife."
"Do that, Dex," urged Deborah. She grinned at me. "This ought to be interesting."
"Will you excuse me?" I asked. When they nodded, Dutiful Dexter went aside a little way and pulled out a cell phone, hitting a button to dial a particular number. After two rings, a familiar voice came over the line.
"Dexter? I hadn't expected...I mean, we're in the middle of breakfast...what are you calling about at this hour of the morning?"
Being familiar with Rita's way of talking, I interpreted it with ease. "Well, Rita, I had a little surprise this morning when I was out fishing…" I explained what had happened as concisely and precisely as I could. "I figured I'd better tell you before you saw it on the morning news."
"Oh, Dexter!" Rita gushed. "You're so wonderful! Of course, you're great with the kids...Astor and Cody both think you're great...but this is something new...I never thought I'd be married to a hero…"
"Not a hero, really," I demurred. Diplomatic Dexter tries to shun the limelight, since so much of what I do is things that others just wouldn't understand. "I just did what anybody would do."
"And they think you should take custody of her?" Rita squealed. "When will she be able to leave the hospital?" For Rita, that was quite coherent. Normally, the more excited she is, the more her sentences tend to fall apart. I approved of this way, though. Even though I'm married to the woman, there are times when I find her difficult, at best, to communicate with.
"They aren't sure, Rita," I said. "She's apparently got partial amnesia, and some kind of delusional symptoms. She keeps talking about places that don't exist and doesn't seem to recognize or know how to deal with all sorts of common, everyday things. She didn't seem to recognize electric lights, televisions or automobiles."
"Can they cure her?"
"They say they can make her able to function well enough to be released in a few weeks. Do you want us to accept the offer of custody? At least until they can locate some relatives who can take her in?"
"Of course! Astor will love to have a girl her own age around!" I was interested, myself, in how both Astor and Cody would react to Arya. They would probably be able to see her "shadow," as they referred to my Dark Passenger, and Arya might well be able to sense theirs. That might well make for a bond between them. Astor had mentioned sometimes that she was lonely and would like to have more girl friends. Arya might be just what the Dexter ordered.
Over the next couple of weeks, Arya seemed to adjust with remarkable speed. She never needed to be shown anything twice, and soaked up information with a solemn intensity that reminded me, again, of Astor and Cody.
"A girl is very grateful," she told me, when I told her that it had been proposed that she stay with me and my family. "A girl had no more family where she came from."
"Is Arya Stark your real name?" I asked. "Or do you want us to call you something else?"
"A girl's name is immaterial. 'Arya Stark' does as well as any. Names are immaterial."
That was a take I hadn't run across before, but after chewing it over, I had to admit that she made a lot of sense. Double-Named Dexter, after all, hadn't always been "Dexter Morgan." According to the papers I had found among my stepfather Harry Morgan's papers after his death, I had been named "Dexter Moser" once.
For that matter, I had an older brother out there, a brother with his own Dark Passenger. Sometimes I wondered where he was and what he was doing. I hoped that he would stay alive and free. Not because I sympathized with his probable activities...if nothing else, he had not had the benefit of Harry's training on the Path of Harry…but just knowing that someone, somewhere, shared my DNA was comforting.
Finally, the day came when Arya was deemed fit to be released from the hospital. They had given her tests to determine where she belonged in school, and much to people's surprise, she had shown that she could handle language and mathematical concepts with skill equal to a high-schooler. The only area where she needed help was the sciences. There, she had apparently never been exposed to even the simplest concepts, and she'd need special tutoring to bring her up to the level where a girl her age was supposed to be.
I was there when they sat her in the wheelchair to wheel her to the front door. "A girl can walk perfectly well," she said, but when it was explained that this was an invariable rule for those being released from the hospital, she submitted with good grace. She had been unfailingly polite and courteous, submitting to endless questioning with patience I admired, and Dutiful Dexter walked alongside her to the front door of the hospital.
At the door, Rita was waiting, in a state of High Jitter such as even I had seldom or never seen her in. Beside her, Astor and Cody stood, self-contained as always. "Oh, Arya! It's so good to see you out of the hospital! Welcome to Miami!" For Rita, that was pretty coherent.
There were several reporters there, pushing each other out of the way to snap pictures. They'd have been shouting questions at her, but Deborah had used her police authority to round up some officers whose job was to keep the news-vultures in line. After everybody else was distributed in the car, with Rita beside me in the front seat and the children in back, we pulled out and headed to our home.
When we got there, Arya got out of the car and looked the house over. "A girl is very grateful," she said, which made Rita all but dance and squeal with happiness, and then she looked at me. That look said, as plain as day, that we'd be having a good long talk, soon. Preferably where nobody else could overhear us. When Dark Passengers meet, this is a good idea.
