#rhllors

Daensa Detective Pikachu AU for @rhllors

“take me home, darling, all men are cads,” sansa says throwing her arm over podrick’s shoulder.

except it’s not podrick and the young man who she’s just thrown herself on stiffens and when she looks into his eyes she sees eyes that are a startling shade of blue--almost violet in the night of the costume part.

“i’m so sorry,” sansa says at once, dropping her arm and feeling heat rise on her face.  “my friend is dressed in the same costume as...” 

at least from behind they had been.  pod in his shitty, plastic armor pretending to be don quixote and sansa dressed as dulcinea...it was a clever costume idea, she’d thought, and pod had been eager enough--relieved that he had someone going to this party with him at all.

but this man in his shitty plastic armor is very much not pod.  very much not pod indeed.

“ivanhoe,” the man says, holding out a hand.  “sorry to hear all men are cads.  it’s a pity what they’re reduced to these days.”  behind him, she hears the sounds of yelling as two party attendees chug their beer down as quickly as they can.

“dulcinea,” sansa replies, and he smiles.

“i take it you were on the hunt for your don quixote?” he asks.  “if you’ll accept the help of a...lesser knight, i’d assist you in your quest, though i will confess,” he smiles, “it’s a rare day that it’s dulcinea searching for her don quixote.” his eyes twinkle.  “i feel like there’s room for a remix novel in there.”

“i’ll have to write it one day,” sansa says, cocking her head, and giving him a smile.  he really has such lovely eyes and the smile is still playing at his lips.  “though of course, if you don’t tell me your true name, i shan’t be able to give you any credit for the idea.”

“ned,” he replies and a shiver runs down her spine.  “ned dayne, at your service, lady,” he tips his head in a half-bow.  “and you?”

“You had one f-fucking job,” Bill sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, smearing white face paint on the pads of his fingers.

“What? It said ‘French Toast’ at the Halloween store!” Richie rolled his eyes. “Just be glad I didn’t insist on Molly Ringwald wearing it!”

Beverly, dressed as an egg covered in TV static, silently extended her middle finger. 

“You’re wearing a miniskirt,” Stan pointed out. “With your track pants under it.”

“So! It’s 1989! I can wear whatever I want!”

“The theme was for us to b-be brunch, Richie,” Bill said, pointing to his face. 

“Your mom painted your face to look like an egg and your shirt just says ‘Benedict’. Real creative, bro.” Richie shrugged. “At least I’m the creative one. Look! I have a purse!”

“I mean,” Ben started. “Nobody else is going to be wearing...that at the Halloween Spook Shimmy. We might win Best Group Costume.”

“We can’t have two toasts, though,” Eddie said. “I read the handbook. No duplicates in the group.” He eyed Richie and Mike. “One of you is going to have to change.”

“No way!” Mike laughed, shoulders moving under his sandwich board. “My grandma hand-painted this piece of cardboard for me! And I’m just regular ol’ toast. See! I got a little patch of butter right here!”

He looks up as the Red Keep crumbles all around them, shaking his head. The dragon wheels up above, spewing flame onto the city.

“Go home, girl,” he growls. “The fire will get her, or one of the Dothraki. Or maybe that dragon will eat her. It doesn’t matter; she’s dead.” He turns to look at her. “And you’ll be dead too if you don’t get out of here.”

Arya gives him a look of disbelief and then starts to walk past him. “I’m going to kill her.”

He grabs her arm, yanking her back. “You think you wanted revenge a long time? I’ve been after it all my life. It’s all I care about. And look at me.” She turns to look over her shoulder but he grabs her, forcing her to look back at him. “Look at me!” He knows what he looks like. He knows what he is. A monster. A hound. A hollow shell of a man. “You wanna be like me?” 

When she doesn’t say anything, he lets go of her arm, reaching up to cup her head, and in a gentler tone, he says, “You come with me, you die here.”

Gods, she’s small. She’s not a child anymore, but looking down at her, he thinks that she could have been his. She looks like his sister, in some ways. Lynora. Only nine when she died. When Gregor killed her.

He said revenge was all he cares about, but that isn’t true. He cares about this girl, strange as it seems. He fought for her. He almost died for her. He would have died for her. Dying for Gregor, for his piece of shit brother, seems...

“If she’s going to die, so is he,” she says softly. “Why risk your life killing him when he’s going to die anyway? Even if he lives long enough to face Daenerys, you know she’ll want him dead.”

He hesitates. She’s right. If Cersei’s going to die, so is Gregor. And no, it won’t be by his hand, but it’ll be because of the dragon queen. Aerys’s daughter. The only family left of Elia Martell and her son. And won’t he just hate that? 

“Come with me,” Arya urges. “Live. Leave your brother here to die at Cersei’s side.”

His eyes flicker up to the door.

“Sandor. You’ve saved me more times than I can count,” she says, and his eyes snap back to her. “Let me return the favor. Come with me.”

He looks at her...and then nods. “Alright. Let’s get out of here, if we can.”

She smiles. 

“You’re a real pain in the ass, you know?” he pretends to grumble as they turn around and head back the way they came. “Second time now you wouldn't let me die when I wanted.”

“You think I’m a pain in the ass? Have you heard yourself snore?”

1. plunking characters from a wildly gritty story into a domestic setting. I live for that shit. 

2. Character gets roped into babysitting despite having no prior experience. Chaos ensues.

3. This is very specific but like. Any kind of Cyrano de Bergerac/You’ve Got Mail scenario where A and B know each other irl but also one of them is desperately in love with the other and they maintain this loving written relationship but irl they don’t acknowledge it and let the other person think it’s someone else until the BIG REVEAL.

4. Characters who died are alive because fuck you that’s why

“The real lie detector test is you,” Sandor explains to the little girl. “You can smell a lie. Sense it. All in the blink of an eye.”

“You mean like this? Sandor, I really admire your tattoos.” Arya looks down, back up, and blinks twice. “Sandor, that side part makes it look like you have a full head of air.” Double blink again.

He stands up, seething.

“Can we blow something up so we can walk away from it in slow motion now?” she asks, utterly unafraid of the expression on his face.

He rubs his temple. “Fine. But you can’t look back at the explosion. It’s only cool if you don’t look back.”

“Can we do it with sunglasses?”

Sandor stares after Arya for a long moment. 

“Where the fuck is she going?”

“She has a purpose to serve. As do we all.”

“Your fucking Lord of Light tell you that?”

She smiles mysteriously at him. “The Lord of Light tells me nothing. He shows me what I need to know.”

“You fucking red priests are all the same, aren’t you?” Sandor huffs. 

“Why do you mock us when you yourself have seen visions in the flames?”

The sneer drops from his face. “How d’you know that?”

She only smiles mysteriously. 

Also I didn’t like the “I'mma be gone forever” implication so I choose to believe Arya pops up in winterfell at random convenient moments every couple of months and scares the shit out of Sansa