001 | video

[soothing]

[ ENCRYPTED 75% TO MEDICAL AND XENOBIOLOGY/GENETICS STAFF + BRUCE BANNER: ]
I took the liberty of checking out the blood samples we were able to get from the creatures at the end of the maze. Some of them seemed to have bacterial infections, which isn't surprising, but I also checked them against known DNA samples from Earth.

I don't want to alarm anyone, which is why I've encrypted this for now, but so far the results are all coming back in essentially the same manner. The DNA of these creatures is a mix between Earth creatures -- the lion is a large component, and there are also what appears to be genetic material from the Australian dingo and some sort of crocodile. However, at the present time it appears as though the largest genetic contribution comes from human beings.

Obviously the samples may have been compromised, as I've really only been able to work off their blood and some hair. I'm going to request a larger sample, preferably an entire specimen -- dead, obviously. Hopefully we can get more answers, and hopefully the human genetic material was just cross-contamination.

[ OPEN: ]
I've heard a few things about people returning to the end of the maze to clear out the rest of the creatures, in addition to a possible salvage operation. My name is Elizabeth Ross -- I'm a cellular biologist and university professor back home. If it's not too much trouble, I'd like to request a mostly intact -- though definitely dead -- specimen of the creatures. I'm sure there are a lot of people who are wondering just what they are and how they got here, not to mention how they've survived the jumps, and I'm hoping that an entire specimen might be able to give us some answers.

How is everyone feeling?

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[ video | 30% encrypted | love her anyway :c ]

[wolfdreamer]

[He shakes his head even as she is explaining this--her words are wise, and likely true--he trusts her, and she is yet so ill, he hates to think that she would worry for him, that her face would grow paler than it is, but--]

But if it could help, it should be done. Robb and Jon took the risk to venture into the maze--this would be no different.

I know I could do it, Sansa. I know I would be safe. I have been practicing, with Remus Lupin--only with Summer, but I could do this thing, too.

[ video | 30% encrypted | she loves you too boo :c ]

[wont]

[ Starks and their stubbornness; Starks and their bravery. Alayne loves it and fears it, for it threatens what she holds most dear, threatens to take it all away from her again — those things once stolen and only now regiven. ] Robb and Jon ventured into the maze with good company and, even so, returned sick. You've only just recovered and when you go to these beasts, you will go alone.

None of us can come with you. [ Spoken truly like a sister who has been forced to sit and watch, helpless and unable to do nothing, left behind in wakefulness with Summer and a limp body to hug and cradle gently but not disturb. ]

Summer loves you. He's of our blood. [ Alayne shakes her head once. ] It will not be the same.

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wolfdreamer]

[He is first irritated, the feeling flashing quick through him--Robb and Jon went and came back, and they were ill when they returned, but they still went, they were still allowed--and then he is too quick to let that feeling ebb, when her voice goes quiet. Perhaps it is a weakness, but for all his determination, he does not want Sansa to be sadder than she is.

None of us can come with you. But Arya could, only she isn't Arya any longer. The Night Wolf, and a warg, too--could she reach for one of the creatures the way that he could? The way that he had--once, only once--]

I think they are different. They aren't only creatures--there is something else, like creatures made from magic, or creatures trapped by magic-- I tried already, once, just for a moment. [I'm sorry, he thinks, I'm sorry--]

I could do it again. If it would help to learn of these creatures, I could do it. I wouldn't go far, and I wouldn't stay for very long-- I can help.

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wont]

I know you could do it again, [ It is not pandering, it is the truth; she has seen him travel how many times and how many times had he returned. ] I've no doubt in that, in you. But the professor has told me — there are more magics beyond yours and his. There are dark places and things that lurk in that dark.

[ Her brow pinches, earnest and tired. Entreating. ]

There are things in this world that — once they touch you — they cannot be taken back. [ Alayne speaks of magic but it is clear by her expression that there are other things as well. Things just as dark and deep and terrible. Things that touched her and left her changed; things that she had not feared but should have (gods forgive her). ] Please— do not face them on your own.

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wolfdreamer]

[Remus Lupin has spoken of such magics, of such mistakes and accidents--and he has always urged Bran to caution, even as Alayne urges him now. Caution and care. Once Bran had dreamed of being a knight and doing great things, but such dreams had ended with his fall. He could only run and move in another's skin now, but he always had his will and courage and the strength that had been given to him at his birth--or was it more than just the strength of his name? Ice in his blood, winter beneath his skin--a man of the north, even if he was only a child. A man could do as he pleased, but a child--

A Stark was always strong. Alayne, and Sansa beneath her skin--there was a strength to her, but it was harder and forged in a different fire. There were things that she had faced, secrets that she does not tell but that lurk behind her eyes--and so Bran is quiet as she makes her entreatment. There are thousand things warring in his chest and in his mind, and his heart is beating very hard, and he wants then to ask Alayne what she means, and will she tell him these secrets, so he can know--so she does not bear them alone.

But he doesn't ask. Not yet. Instead, he offers, quietly:]

I want to help. I want to help those on this ship, and-- and the creatures, too. Whatever is wrong with them.

[If he could, he would reach for her hand. They are together again, the Starks. They must stay together.]

I only want to help.

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wont]

You want to be strong, I know you do. And you are strong, Bran. Stronger than I ever was at your age, stronger than I'll ever be. But— [ But there is bravery and there is foolishness. I've lost too many brothers already. But no, she cannot say those words, no matter how deep they cut into her. They are Sansa's words and he needs Sansa now, not Alayne, but she knows they would cut Bran deeper, and she means only to protect, not to harm. ]

—it is a selfishness, I know. To beg you to stay, rooted to this hard earth beside me, when all your heart wishes is to fly and be free. [ She knew of his dreams and how they'd fallen from the sky just as he'd fallen from that tower years ago. Turned to lead, just like his dead legs. He would never be a knight, just as she would never be queen; and each, they would never be whole again. ] You want to help other people and all I want is to keep you safe. It's terrible of me, and selfish, but—

There are other ways to be brave beyond simply throwing ourselves to the animals. [ Animals, Alayne says and perhaps she means beasts, but perhaps she means lions and dragons as well; perhaps she means men who are monsters too. ] I have to believe it to be true.

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wolfdreamer]

[It isn't true, he wants to tell her, there is strength in you, too, but she will only drop her eyes and tell him that it is not so--or else she will say nothing at all. Strength is not what they argue over, but still he feels the need to correct her.

Instead, he tells her:] It isn't selfish.

[Or perhaps it is, but Bran understands. It's the same selfishness that would keep Robb and Jon close to them, and the same that would bring Arya back, and the same selfishness that would turn Sansa from Lord Baelish, to turn her hair auburn and her name to Stark once more. It is the greed and selfishness of love, and what can he say to that?

He wants to, still; he wants to help. There is no one aboard the ship that could help like this, only Bran and Bran alone. But how can he refuse Sansa when he understands her?]

How else would I be brave? Lady Elizabeth Ross has asked to see-- [Though what is there to see, truly?] --but showing her will not help anyone on this ship.

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wont]

[ Oh, but it is selfish. It is, it is. Alayne knows how readily she would lie to keep Sansa's brothers close to her; she knows that she would not hesitate to manipulate others into harm's way if it would shield those that she loves most of all. At first it had been a terrible realization, but she has since come to embrace it — albeit tentatively and with a critical judgment in her own hearts. Did it mean that she was less deserving of their love, did it mean she have no honor? Was she no longer good?

Petyr had given her the means to survive and, if she was truly selfish, that is what she would do. But no, instead, she turns those weapons outwards and uses them to protect the Starks instead. Surely, that was some measure of salvation, wasn't it? Absolution enough to be worthy of their love. ]

The lady Elizabeth has more than one question that demands answering, and every morsel of information brought to her may serve to better her understanding. And thus help the ship and its passengers. There are others that may bring her a beast, living or dead, but you— you've eyes and ears that no one else has. You can bring her tales of the beasts as they live amongst themselves — in the dark, where nobody but you can see.

Use what has been given to you, but use it wisely. You can do so, little brother, without risking yourself so readily.

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wolfdreamer]

[But they would be better watched by their own. That is the truth of it. There are few animals aboard the ship; it is no wood, where he might find a squirrel or fox to borrow. He had not used such creatures while he was yet in Westeros, but they would not be difficult, not after the practice he's been getting while here aboard the ship. It's just that there are no such creatures--only their direwolves, and a few pets--

And Sansa's crows. The thought comes late, because the crows have come late, but they are so noisy Bran should have thought of them first. These strange beasts of the ship would be difficult to get hold of, even with all of his practice, but a bird would be simpler.]

Could I borrow one of of your crows, Sansa? That would be less risk. They cannot see so well in the dark, I think, but I could get very close.

[She will say yes, of course she will--in part because she wants him to leave the thought of the beasts. The crows she will like better. Fly, the three-eyed crow had told him. And now he was going to fly.]

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wont]

[ There is the question she'd hoped for, the conclusion she wished that Bran would eventually reach.

The trap had been set and easily sprung, but — no, that is not how Alayne should think of it, for what sister would readily look to bait her own brother so easily. Then no again, for Bran is not her brother, but how readily that gets confused in her mind these days. The badge sewn over her heart, the one that bears the name Alayne Stone, frays more and more with each passing week, revealing Sansa underneath.

Instead, she changes the words her mind thinks, shifts them to something less dire and dogged, less cruel around the edges. The path is laid and she leads him to it. Bran is smart — smarter than any of the other Stark children, Alayne thinks — and so it does not take much goading for him to find his way there. ]

You may borrow all of my crows, if it please you. Every single one, Bran. [ She smiles at him, encouragingly. ] I cannot think of a finger idea.

[ video | 30% encrypted ]

[wolfdreamer]

[It does not feel like a trick. It feels like a good idea, one that Bran warms to quickly under Alayne's smile. And if he harbors any further thought of reaching out to those creatures, he keeps it to himself--but he does think it; he is not a man grown but he is not a child, either, and so he thinks it.

But for all that, it is still a good idea, easy to take to. Flying. And that more than anything makes Bran think that perhaps this is where he is meant to be, less a prison and more another stop on the road going north, beyond the Wall. There are things here to learn.

He does not say that to Alayne, either; he smiles at her and lets her see how pleased he is at the prospect.]

I will practice with them--so they can be helpful for more than just this. [What else they will be used for, he isn't sure--but surely there will be some good use for them.] Thank you, Sansa.