revivalproject | my tears are always frozen

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my tears are always frozen | calibration

WHO: Sansa Stark
WHERE: tunnels
WHAT: Calibrations
WHEN: 3 June - 10 June
WARNINGS: Sansa's memories include sexual assault and torture. If you do not wish to play that, do not choose the wedding gown prompt. The others are free from this.

Sansa knows of calibrations. She'd hoped to never experience the horror of her mind being on display for others but here she is again, stripped bare to be seen once more. She's terrified of it. There are those who know her darkest secrets, the ones she tries to keep buried, but more and more each day she meets people who don't know. People who might pity her if they knew. People who would see her as less because they know what she is and that she's a ghost of a woman sometimes.

There's a wedding gown split in two and marred by bright, crimson blood. There's a hunting knife that seems too modern for this sitting room of stone and glass. There's a pair of silken slippers, chewed a bit on the heels. There's a drawing of a girl and a wolf half-finished, as if the artist were pulled away by something else and hadn't had the time to return.

As she walks through her mind once again, she takes in these differences. There's a carved wooden throne with the direwolves of House Stark, a silver crown laying in the seat. There's a scroll undone, the words just enough to make out. The final thing in this room of note is golden ring with a lion's head, a ring she's not had in years. She wishes she had it now.

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( Vincent crosses another threshold into a room where an eerie comfort settles over him. The decor of gray stone and fogged glass beckons to Vincent like a familiar scent of solace. No memory comes to mind of what the solace is as he idly trespasses through the room, and he allows himself to feel it regardless of its source.

The slippers, the throne, these things take only some of his interest, but what calls to him the loudest is the gown asunder with crimson stains. He walks to the ruined fabric and towers over it with a heavy frown to his lips. The collar of his red cloak hides most of his face, but the discontent that shows is evident from the furrow to his brow. )

( The gown is full of awful memories, painful trials completed in blood and pain. Sansa notices him standing there and she trembles a bit but she's prepared to tell the story.

It's easier to show than tell so she shows the horror of her wedding night, stripped of dignity and raped while one of her childhood friends was forced to watch. There's every night after for nigh upon a year where she went away from her body and drifted in her mind so she could disconnect herself from the pain and misery. There were times when she considered slitting her own throat to be away from it.

The day she escaped had been terrifying but necessary. The scars of Ramsay are both physical, still writ upon her skin from his knives, and mental. Her nightmares are lucid, the touches she wants are sometimes reminders of him. When she speaks, there's a tremble in her voice. )

If it's any consolation, I killed him. He suffered and while it didn't take as long as he had me, it was enough to know he lived his last moments terrified the way he terrified me. He made me nothing so I made him nothing.

( Soon the wedding dress fades from ruin and returns to its former construction. A redheaded girl wears the tailored threads. Her hair looks soft, brushed, fresh, and crafted into something he assumes took some time to shape, unlike his ebony locks, which are thick, long, and sprouted messily around his head from the red bandana he wears around his temple. The vision before him changes, and it's confirmation he doesn't need that the gown was indeed for her wedding, and he now watches the ceremony. These images, quick and necessary, are what he needs to know before darkness befalls the vision. She is in a room with two men, one was her husband, and another he does not know but understands to be a childhood friend of hers. Then the attack ensues with maleficence, he strips her, forces her, bends her, and marks her. Vincent wants to intervene and save her while bringing out the demons within him to dominate the violator.

Vincent watches her fade into a gray silhouette of the girl she once was. He watches the shadows trail at her feet and around her with a hunger she would not survive. He concludes her defeat with the substantial impression of suicidal contemplation. However, she shows him the revenge taken on her husband.

He turns to the woman when she speaks to him. His eyes trace over her face and fall to her lips as trepidation pursues her words. He made me nothing, so I made him nothing.. The last of her words were powerful enough to prey on his memories, and he feels empathy for her. She doesn't need his approval, she doesn't need his judgment, but he offers his appraisal of her actions with a strong nod toward her. )

( That quick nod is something that keeps Sansa from feeling ashamed of herself. Ramsay often made her feel filthy and ashamed even though she was still Sansa Stark, the Lady of Winterfell and heir to the entire North. She was something by birth, not by decree of a bastard Lannister king, and she could take comfort in that.

She draws closer to the man who'd seen her memory, wanting to express her gratitude that he doesn't seem to be terrified of her or pity her. )

I am Queen now. Here, I am a mother. I like to think I've shoved that into a box far away in my mind but sometimes I remember it.

( His lips part at her mention of being a mother. He's momentarily shocked to be told that information and quickly works out the paradox of knowing a secret intimate-terror without knowing something more common such as her being a mother. The conclusion is he does not know her at all, outside this room, outside this memory. She should have the right to what she would share with him. This environment was not a circumstance in which she permitted his curiosity, let alone the resolution to his inquisitive intrusion within her dream. )

I apologize; I did not come here intentionally.

( He resists looking back to the gown. )

What we lock up will always remain. Waiting.

I know you didn't come here out of your own will. I'm more upset at our captors than anyone. I hate that memory and that time in my life for obvious reasons but it...it made me someone I needed to be.

( Sansa squeezes her eyes shut, trying not to dwell on it. You will die. Your house will die. Your words will die. There will be nothing of you left. She says it to herself over and over when she remembers this time in her life so she can push it back down. )

It's not your fault, though. My name is Sansa Stark.

( Vincent repeats her name in his mind a few times before he offers his own. He feels responsible, still, for having focused on the gown. A harrowing memory to share with a stranger when he could have chosen to focus on something else. Sansa Stark. The memories he experienced were not just visions but sounds, smells, and feelings. Did he project these senses, or did they come from her as well? More so, the names that came to mind, the attributes which helped mold the scene were not necessarily shown to him but given to him. He was provided just enough to understand the context of the environment Sansa experienced. )

Vincent Valentine.

Edited 2020-06-17 08:17 (UTC)

It is my pleasure, even if that memory isn't the way I would have chosen to meet. You know my darkest secret now, the thing I've hidden away. I have to trust you with it and I hope that I can, Vincent. Only one other has seen that memory.

( Sansa remembers James, the Soldat, and it hurts to think that the new version doesn't remember her. Still, she's shared this with Vincent now and she has a bond she won't be able to sever. Not with a heavy secret like that. )

Please tell me that you don't think badly of me or pity me. I fear it always.

Pity is for the weak and incapable.

( Vincent pulls a breath in and holds it. He holds her eyes with his own and exhales. Despite this being a dream, he still is very aware of himself, such as his breath, the weight on his feet, the feel of the air against him. )

I will not tell anyone and I will not judge you.

Then I shall say I am glad you don't see me as weak and incapable, then. If I ever discover something of yours, I will keep it secret and safe. Thank you.

( Sansa wishes there was a way to be more hospitable in places like this and she unfortunately doesn't know how to buffer the strangeness of being in someone's mind. )

Did you want to ask anything about me? It's my mind and my memories. None of the rest of them are that bad.

( Vincent offers a small nod, his eyes move across her body before returning to her face. He was conflicted in requesting more information, but he thought perhaps asking for something vague would comfort her, or maybe it was him that was in discomfort by the horror shared to him. )

Anything you wish to tell me, in this room or not.

It wasn't considered rape because he was my husband. He was allowed to do all of those things because I had no rights to myself where I'm from. I like this place better even if I'm a queen back home.

( A beat. )

Do you think that makes me a coward?

( He knew of cultures on Gaia, history where such things were the same as she had described. Women, men, children, races, were considered property. He didn't believe in that, and he was bothered by the thought if he were in those cultures or in that time era if he would have felt different.

He wasn't sure what she meant, in regard to her asking if he thought she was a coward. )

A coward for having rights here versus not having rights back home? No. I don't think you're a coward for what you deserve, for autonomy.

Good. I want to live my own life and know new things and not the backward ways of my home. I know I have duties to return to, I know, but I want to enjoy myself here.

( This isn't necessarily enjoyable but most of life on Temba is. This is just a bit of bad with a lot of good. )

What of you? Is your world like this one or like mine?

( There was only a glimpse of what he saw of her world, however, the same could be said for the experience he's had thus far from this world. )

I have not been here long enough to say for sure. However, it appears people from my world and yours are similar. The elements of control, power, wealth, sacrifice, cruelty.. those are all familiar as is the love, loyalty, and traditions.

I find it strange to think of so many worlds out there inhabited by similar races, ecosystems, and social parallels.

You'd think they'd all be different, really, but I find that people are motivated by the same things wherever you go. Some places are better than others, certainly, but there's still greed and vice.

( Sansa has enjoyed seeing other places and other ways of living; she'd taken someone of it back to Westeros with her before she'd been crowned queen and she thinks it will do them good. Now, though, she's at the mercy of whatever planet or obstacle the Agrii throw at them. )

I would assume so, perhaps there are far many more worlds sustaining life that we do not know.. to have so many from different worlds with similar backgrounds.

( He thought about Jenova, an alien from the cosmos that fell onto Gaia so long ago. The creature had come from some place, maybe someone from Jenova's home world would show up here - or was here, what sort of encounter might that be like? )

There seem to be dozens just from what I've seen and each one is more alien to me than the next. I have found that I love learning a great bit more than I ever did back home. I was a politician there. I'm something different here.

What were you?

( She's so curious to know. )

( Vincent allows a moment before he responds to Sansa's question. The first few adjectives were not necessarily kind, fair, nor comforting to share.

His crimson eyes cast to the floor between them. There's enough space between them in that he hopes Sansa feels unthreatened by his proximity. He recalls her words to him, her memories shared with him, and he can piece together her role as a politician. Queen.. That was only part of who she was back home, and perhaps little to do with who she was here.

He cannot say the same for himself, in that the adjectives that would describe him back home would still describe him here. Sansa was a Queen, no matter what world she was in - but she did not have her kingdom to rule here. Vincent was a monster in his world, and he still had those demons inside him here.

What were you? He still is. )

A fighter.

( He moved, just slightly, to show the gun belted to his hip. Cerberus. )

I fought to protect my world. There were forces of humankind, and from the cosmos, which threatened to deplete and destroy it.

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my tears are always frozen | calibration

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