Darkness had no weight.
Yet it pressed in from every direction with no edges.
There was no beginning, nor end.
No ground beneath. No ceiling above. Just darkness.
And time.
This existed in it.
Or drifted. Or floated. There was no way to know.
This had been here a while. This was bored.
Counting started.
One…
Two…
Three…
This lost count.
This came up with an idea. Each thought would count as one. Every time This thought, This added one.
The count was held tight, clung to. It was very important.
This counted 7,950,883,411 times.
Then this lost count again.
Reset. One. Two. Three.
This gave up.
Numbers had stopped meaning anything.
Boredom soon became the only thing This felt.
This sat inside the darkness. This didn't mind. What else was there to do?
Time went by slowly like this. Perpetual, dark and unchanging.
Then something changed.
At first it was subtle, almost unnoticeable, like one of This's own thoughts.
A faint pull tugged at a corner of this it hadn't known existed.
The pull grew stronger. It wrapped around all of this.
For the first time, This had felt something.
Compression. Like being forced through something far too narrow.
The pull quickly became violent. It grabbed ahold of whatever This was and pulled forward. The momentum tore thoughts apart, and left This with no chance to resist. This tried to hold onto anything but failed.
Giving in to the compression, everything around This collapsed into an even deeper darkness.
Then the compression vanished entirely.
For a brief moment This remained in the deep darkness, until an intense barrage of new feelings slammed into it.
A biting sensation unlike anything before, and a strong pumping deep within.
Following the pumping urged within, This felt like a gate was open. Slowly the darkness; the only thing This knew, was replaced by a glorious and bright light.
It was entirely different from the familiar darkness This had known, it was blinding and made This feel something it had never before.
Still focused on the light, This subconsciously pulled something into itself, shallow at first, then with greedy fervor, until the inside felt full. The action brought a subtle, unfamiliar good feeling.
This was still trying to make sense of the new sensations when something came very close.
The nearby thing thought loudly. The thoughts were similar to This's own, but they did not come from inside this.
"Lady Sansa, we really shouldn't be out here too long, how about we have some tea?"
The words "Lady Sansa" echoed strangely inside this.
Then it hit.
Without warning, a violent storm crashed into This's mind.
Thousands upon thousands of memories, images, words, and feelings that were not its own slammed in all at once, like someone had forced an 8 billion thought count into its head in a single moment.
Faces. Voices. Rooms. Sansa. A strong father. A kind Mother. Lessons. Songs. Dreams of princes and feasts and the warmth of summer. Fear. Excitement. Loneliness. Love. Everything something called "Sansa Stark" had ever known; flooded in chaotically without a single moment of reprieve.
This reeled.
Too much. Too fast. None of it made sense.
The world spun. The loud thoughts from outside mixed with the unknown thoughts within.
'Where is this?' This asked, but no answer came, only fragments of what Sansa considered "home".
The sensations piled higher, and the thoughts continued rushing in. The thumping inside grew faster, louder, like something was about to burst.
"Lady Sansa? Are you alright?" This heard the thoughts but could not comprehend them, they only added to unknown stinging sensation in its mind.
This felt bad. Earlier there had only been darkness.
Now there was too much of everything.
This moved the top part of whatever this was. Suddenly it could sense everything around it. No familiar darkness anywhere.
Suddenly an overwhelming urge rose inside This.
Move. Get away.
Before This could properly think, it had begun moving forward at a surprising speed.
This had never experienced movement, but even this knew it was too fast. It only wanted to escape the crushing flood of memories, the loud voices, the blinding light, the endless new sensations.
But now it could do nothing but follow the urging pull to keep moving forward.
This pushed between two tall shapes and left the moving things behind. The thick white covering grew deeper with every step, clinging to This and making each movement harder.
The thoughts which inexplicabley sounded grew quieter and more distant the further it moved.
"LADY SANSA!"
"My lady, stop!"
"Sansa, come back!"
"Please, my lady! The snow!"
The words "Sansa" and "snow" kept surfacing from the tangled mess, but they brought no clarity. They only added to the noise.
This kept running.
Each step sent sharp sensations through This. The thick white covering clung and slowed it down, but This did not stop. The inside thumped harder. The sharp biting sensation of the cold spread, yet somehow it felt almost good.
It proved This was here.
The realization cut through the chaos for a single moment.
This was no longer in the dark.
This was alive.
This wasn't sure how long it had been moving, but the earlier urge to move had begun to fade and This felt something urging it in a new direction.
Following the urge, This no longer moved and let itself go, falling forward into the thick white covering.
For the first time since being brought here, This finally felt itself slowly calming down.
Not fighting, This let itself be swallowed by the darkness again.
It wasn't the same darkness. But it was close.
In this calm darkness, this began to organize its thoughts and understand what had happened.
This had been pulled from the darkness and forced into a new place. A mass of foreign memories still swirled inside it; memories of a girl named Sansa Stark, something called a family, in the memories they where called the Starks.
They lived in a place called Winterfell, entirely different from where This lived. This did not understand most of it yet. The memories were too raw, too unorganized, too much.
This felt the new body it now inhabited. Two gripping extensions. A steady thumping in the middle. The cold beneath it.
This could only get a slight understanding of its new abilities before a bright shape appeared within the darkness.
[Name: Sansa Stark/This
Age: 13
Race: Void
Gender: Female
Abilities: Mindscape
System note: To understand more, please spend time with the humans!]
This examined the strange shape. At first the lines where incoherent, then they slowly settled into something with meaning.
'Name? Sansa Stark?' Although This had only come to know about names recently, after seeing the lines, it felt like the complete meaning of them where shown directly to it.
The lines said This was Sansa.
Not This itself. But the body. The thump. The loud thoughts. The memories. It was all Sansa.
This instinctively denied the understanding.
If This was Sansa… then what was This?
Forgetting the messy thoughts for now, This read the rest of the shiny lines.
'Race: Void?' Understanding the lines, This felt even more confused then before. Even with the absolute understanding the lines gave This felt it still didn't make sense.
This's mind told it that void meant nothing. But this was clearly not nothing. This thought back to the familiar time in the darkness, even then it was never nothing.
This considered for a thought whether it could trust these lines or not. Saying This was nothing was like saying darkness was light.
Moving on This tried to understand the rest.
'Abilities: Mindscape'
The word appeared clearly. A faint understanding came with it, not a full explanation, but a feeling.
It was a sense of a space inside This, a quiet place where thoughts could be stored, sorted, and examined without the noise of the light. A place that belonged only to This.
This paused.
Mindscape..
Was This the darkness it kept returning to? The calm place where the large amount of memories could be slowly processed? The lines seemed to suggest it was something more.
But the understanding was incomplete.
This knew the name now, and it knew the "ability" existed somewhere inside it, but how to use it or what it really meant, was still unanswered for This.
This stared at the shiny lines for a long time, turning the new words over and over.
Void. Mindscape.
Two new things that only made This more confused.
If This was Void, why did it now feel so much?
If it had "Mindscape", why was its own mind still such a big mess?
The shiny box lingered for a moment longer, then quietly faded away, leaving this alone once more with the softer darkness and the endless flood of Sansa's memories.
This let itself rest, it was it's first time doing so, but This felt it was necessary.
For now, this only wanted to be alone with its thoughts… and whatever this new "Mindscape" really was.
________________________________________
I had been trudging through the knee-deep snow for the most part of dawn.
The search party had split up to cover more ground after Sansa had bolted past the gates. Father had sent them out as soon as he'd seen it, yet the light was already failing, and there wasn't a trace of my sister.
"Seven bloody hells," I muttered, voice low. "Why in the gods' names would Sansa run outside the walls at this hour? As if the North isn't cold enough inside the damn castle."
"Haah, you know our sister. And it's getting around that time in her life, isn't it? Where doing silly nonsense like this becomes fun."
The man next to me responded calmly, then let out a hearty chuckle, seemingly thinking of something humorous.
"Reminds me of when we were that age. Remember when we stole two horses and left for the brothel? We were around her age then, too. So don't be too harsh on her."
Rob looked at me for a few short moments whilst speaking. I gave a nod of acknowledgement and continued to search.
Robb and I kept pushing forward, and the snow was getting deeper the further we went. We were already far past the gates, and my toes were starting to freeze inside my boots, but there was no other choice.
Then I saw something.
In between two large twisted trees, I saw a small black ball-like object tightly curled into itself.
It was half buried in the snow and completely still.
For a second, my stomach dropped.
"Lady Sansa!" I called loudly, loud enough for my brother nearby to turn over and see what I saw.
I broke into a run, heart hammering.
Gods, if she was dead… frozen solid out here because she decided to wander off…
I knew what it was like to be clumsy or irrational; it was part of growth. But if that growth came at the cost of her life...
Loosely letting go of the thought, I inhaled sharply and skidded to my knees beside her. She was covered entirely by her cloak from her face down to her shoes.
I loosely held my lantern in one hand and allowed the light to spill across the snow-dusted cloak.
Grabbing the cloak, I removed it entirely in a moment of rashness.
Underneath was a young girl with ginger hair, overly pale skin and a bluish tint to her now puffy cheeks.
She lay on her side, eyes closed, with her small hands tucked close to her chest.
Expecting the worst, I reached out with gloved hands and gently rolled her toward me.
Pressing the back of my palm against her chest, I noticed the slow and even rhythm of her breaths.
She was alive.
I exhaled sharply, relief mixing with fresh annoyance. "What were you thinking, little sister?" I grumbled under my breath.
"Running out here alone in this weather? You could have died."
"Yes, that was stupid of her.. C'mon, let's take her home quickly." Hearing the presence beside me begin to trot off, I didn't refute and slid one arm under her knees, the other behind her back and lifted her.
As I stood, I adjusted her against my cloak and pulled it around her to shield her from the wind, when her eyes opened.
I froze mid-step.
Sansa stared deep into his eyes. Neither of them spoke. In her gaze, Jon saw a profound, unnatural calm that had no place on the face of a thirteen-year-old girl who had just collapsed in the snow at dusk.
Sansa stared deep into my eyes. I was too stunned to speak anything coherent in the moment; I hadn't expected her to wake up. Holding eye contact, for a moment, neither of us spoke, only silently looking.
Something was off...
Subconsciously, on my way here, I had already imagined what I'd see when I found my sister. A crying mess was my conclusion.
Whether she had found shelter and would freeze or not, I couldn't have known.
But I was certain she would be knee deep in regret and would be overjoyed that someone had found her.
Yet what was in front of me was the opposite.
Where fear should have been a deep layer of calm sat instead.
I had seen those eyes before.. on my father, although rarely.
We continued to stare at each other for a moment. I wasn't sure whether I was supposed to interpret this in any way. Thankfully, before I could overthink, she had closed her eyes again.
Her small body relaxed completely, perhaps after knowing it was her brother holding her. She even began to nudge in closer for warmth.
I stood there for a heartbeat longer, staring down at her peaceful face. "Gods…"
I shook my head, lightly muttering as I started the long walk back toward the distant lights of Winterfell.
"What was that look? You run off into the cold, collapse between the trees, and then look at me like you've already made peace with the Stranger himself…" I spoke absently, not expecting a response from my sister.
"Why would you do that? Father will want answers. Tch, and I'm the one who has to carry you back like a sack of grain while my toes freeze off…"
Despite my words, I held her carefully and carried her back to Winterfell. Yet the strange look in her eyes lingered in my mind the entire way back.