An Anarchist in Westeros

[Neko-tama]

I have a few ideas for possible asoiaf fics, but probably only patience for actually writing one of them, if that, so I wanna put it to a vote what you'd like to see me take a shot at.

The story is gonna be about a version of me being reborn in Westeros, with extreme longevity. The excuse totally legitimate reason for which I'll tailor to the specific situation.

I've got a pretty broad range of interests, science, philosophy, antropology, and manufacture among them, so I'll be able to do a lot regardless of when and where I land.

Importantly, I don't want to write this as a management sim competence wank, but have actual characters, dialogue, and emotions involved, though I will write this flying by the seat of my pants. No plans made beforehand.

About me:
I'm an anarchist, which will be the main thing in the story next to the tech I bring. I got amateur level knowledge on computer science, engineering, architecture, chemistry, physics, biology, sociology, biology, history, antropology, politics, philosophy, and more or less extensive experience with diy projects, working with wood, steel, clay, soil, leather, pitch, and basically anything you might find in your garden, or on a walk through the forest.

Them's the choices:

-Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen. If you ever wanted to see an anarchist become queen, and struggle with having to wield authority she thinks no-one should have in the first place.

-Roose Boltons daughter. Similar to the first choice, but not on top of the hierarchy, and instead of the Dance it's the Others that are the looming threat.

-North of the Wall. Start with basically nothing, and have to go from there. Interesting challenge. Write in the time, and further details that you think might make it interesting.

-Commoner south of the Wall. I don't just start with nothing, but also have to contend with the powers that be. Options here are manifold. A reaver from the Iron Islands, a peasant in the north, a barmaid in the Riverlands, etc. Write in your ideas for when and where that you think would make things interesting.

---

SV doesn't want to let me post this yet due to length (I actually just misunderstood which field did what, but now I already wrote this) so I'm gonna filler ramble a bit about my previous projects.

I've posted on SB before, started three stories there. The first, The OP pixie was kinda crackie. Fun to write at first. The size, and mutenes of the MC made for a neat writing challenge, but it wasn't going anywhere, and I got into Gamer stories, so I started one of those, which turned out pretty well, but I kept overthinking the system, as I tend to do, so I stopped after a Purity interlude that was both hell to write, and poorly received.

I gave the Gamer shtick another go with a revised system and a different MC that would be easier to keep consistent, but it didn't flow, and I was putting too much pressure on myself to get everything right to have any fun with it, so that tapered out as well.

More recently I'm planning another Worm fic with a bio/nanotech tinker MC, which I'm trying to outline and everything in advance. It's gonna be great, I'm convinced, but I like to write just for fun and see where it takes me, so that's where this story comes in. There are gonna be plot holes, and inconsistencies, and poorly thought out ideas, and here, that's gonna be OK.

I also like to do art for my stories, though how good I am at it... You be the judge of that. I think I'm pretty decent considering how rarely I actually do artwork.

Anyway, enough of this. Don't forget to write in.

 

[Neko-tama]

Alright everyone, thanks for your input. Going by the numbers between here and SB the most requested would be Rhaenyra, however, as has been pointed out, nobility SIs have been done to death, and also somebody expressed scepticism about the ability of a barmaid to affect social change in a way that really rubbed me the wrong way, so I've decided to write that partially out of spite, partially because I might actually end up writing something original.

 

[Neko-tama]

"Can I open my eyes yet?" Edd asked, clearly getting antsy.

"Almost there," I reassured him. "Careful not to stumble over that root there, aand now!"

He opened his eyes to look at the little valley now before him. A frown made it's way onto his face. "You dragged me through the forest for half an age to show me... Trees?"

"It's more than that! Look closer!"

He strained his eyes before they went wide. "It's empty."

"Completely untouched," I confirmed. "Nobody lives within a quarter day's march from here. I checked."

I could see the gears turning in his head. "Isn't it too long a walk from home to be a secret base though? We'll hardly have much time to come here very often."

I shrugged. "You win some, you lose some. We can have a base that's easy to reach, or one that's actually gonna stay secret. I don't have to tell you how important it is that we stay undiscovered."

A shadow that had no business being on the pale features of an eight year old flickered over his face. His knuckles turned white as he clenched his fists.

"Well make them pay," I put my hand on his shoulders, and gave a gentle squeeze. "We just need to stick to my plan."

He nodded, and let out a breath. "Magic."

"Technology," I corrected reflexively.

Predictably, he rolled his eyes, the piercing dark green of his irises, and the contrast to his normally stern expression making for an oddly funny picture.

"Anything here you can use?" He asked instead of continuing the old debate.

I nodded. "Plenty! There is a little stream with a waterfall, extensive clay beds, a little cave, and plenty of limestone and quartz in the cliff face over there. Plus, plenty of trees, and a bunch of stinging nettles!"

He still seemed skeptical. "And you can make spells with that that can kill a knight?"

"In time." I shot him a dirty look. "More importantly, I can make things that will make us rich. We just need some tools, and as much metal as we can get."

"Yeah, yeah." He knew that I knew that he knew. I drilled the plan into his head at every opportunity after all. I couldn't help but fret though. We were eight after all, and children were all idiots when it came to keeping secrets, and measured action.

"Remember. I need a-"

"A saw more than anything else. Yes. You've said, Betha. A quadgillion times."

"That's not an actual number," I muttered, crossing my arms, and focusing on the valley that spread before us instead of my only best friend.

"So, what do we need to do?"

That put a grin on my face, and I pulled - in lue of an actual shovel - my knife from its sheath. "Get ready to dig up some clay! We'll need a lot of bricks!"

---

---

Hey everybody! Sorry I took so long to get started on this, I was insanely busy the last months with work, and trying to organize some stuff IRL, so I have very little opportunity, and energy for writing. I'm still pretty swamped, so expect infrequent and short updates like this one for the next while.

I'm going to work a lot with description, and characterization by implication. I know that it's gonna bite me in the ass when people inevitably want this or that explained directly and explicitly, and especially once someone grasps a few implications that I hadn't thought of, but hey. We're all just here to have some fun.

 

[Neko-tama]

The day didn't end up being as productive as I might have liked. Our tiny bodies weren't suited for carrying anything in great quantity, and without a mold of some sort the few bricks we did manage to make weren't sufficiently rectangular for my taste and varied wildly in dimensions.

Still. Better than nothing, and at least the cave provided a place where we could dry them.

I didn't even want to think about how long this would take to get anywhere, if I had to worry about the rain ruining all we had wrought all the time.

Needless to say, by the time we got home we were covered in dirt, and completely exhausted.

Mother took one look at me from behind the bar, as I stumbled through the door, sighed and shook her head. She'd long given up on me being the responsible child and doing chores.

Father... Father was less resigned.

"Where have you been, Betha?"

I turned around slowly, coming face to face with a small, half bald, potbellied man whose red face belied his calm tone.

Impotent hatred rose in my throat, but I bit it back, and answered just as calmly. "Playing outside with Edd."

I'd expected the slap. Even most of the patrons of our establishment barely spared a glance, most of them coming through regularly, and already being used to the family dynamic.

"I told you not to associate with that boy!"

Rubbing the sting in my cheek away, I entertained the fantasy of putting my knife through his throat for a moment before thinking better of it. "Yes Father."

"Well?" he asked, impatience tinging his voice. "Don't do it then!"

Fuming, I looked to the floor, not in deference, but because I might not be able to control myself if I had to look at him. "No, Father." No, I wasn't going to listen to him that was.

His insecure obsession with status was plainly ridiculous, considering where he stood in the eyes of most people. The youngest son of a merchant, married to a former whore, eeking out a living by giving travelers a slightly better place to sleep than a tent, and food that was cooked in an actual kitchen rather than over a campfire. Ale when we happened to have some.

He wasn't even a lowly copper counting Merchant, but a dog living from the scraps under said merchants' tables. Any peasant man, be he ever so poor was two steps up in the social ladder from him. Arguably even Edds father was more respectable than him.

"Now, get to washing clothes!"

"Yes, Father." Another service we provided for our patrons. Naturally my job.

He stomped away with a muttered "Stupid brat!", and left me to it.

Moments like this made me yearn for the world I saw in my dreams, where children were allowed to play rather than work, and women were as well respected as men were, at least in the little pocket where my dreams took place.

I let out a breath, and steadied myself. I'd get there, I knew. I just needed to stick to the plan.

---

"Betty!"

I looked up from my work of trying in vein to remove skidmarks from undercloths.

Cat was a welcome sight. Two years older than me, I could tell she'd be very pretty one day. Her violet eyes, and pale hair spoke of her lineage that involved the bastard of a dragonlord somewhere, and her brown freckled skin told of her dornish mother.

Her gap toothed grin, and choppy, short hair were the reason I liked her. She had a rebelious streak a mile wide, though we rarely talked.

"Kitty!" A grin spread on my own face. "Got away from your parents again?"

"Had to," she admitted. "They didn't like me cuttin' my hair short again."

I rolled my eyes. "Bugger 'em! Your body, your choice."

She clocked her head curiously, then her smile turned thoughtful. "Yeah... Yeah! I like that!"

It struck me how novel the thought seemed to her. It went without saying in the pocket of paradise I dreamed about. That it should be any different here? It was a sobering thought.

"Nothin' to do in the fields anyway," she chattered away. "They just wanna harp on my appearance all day."

"I thought Dornish were more relaxed about that kind of thing?"

She huffed. "Not my mommy. Now scoot over, I'll help you with that."

I gave her a grateful smile, and did as she asked.

We chatted a little about the people in the village. Inconsequential things like who was slacking on going to the little Sept - barely big enough to stand in, and no more than two people could enter at a time - or who had a falling out with which neighbor, when her face turned a bit more serious.

"Hey, uh... can you keep a secret, Betty?"

"Of course. What's up?"

"Y'know how they say that y'gonna like... notice boys at a certain age?"

I nodded, and couldn't help smirking a bit.

"I think I might be noticin' this... Person like that, but it don' make sense?"

"Oh?"

"Yeah." She looked down at the breeches she'd been scrubbing, her mind seeming a million miles away. "Y'know Retta?"

"Lauretta? The girl that pestered Ol' Lemon into apprenticing her?"

A brilliant smile spread on Kitty's face. "Yeah! She's amazin', isn't she?"

I laughed. "Yeah, she's quite something! What about- Oh!"

Her smile turned shy, as her dark cheeks got darker. "Yeah." Her eyes narrowed after a moment. "Like I said. It don' make sense."

"Why not?" my confusion was quite genuine. "Girls are pretty, right?"

"Well, yeah, but I'm a girl too!"

"Doesn't that just mean that she'll think you're pretty, too?" It all seemed quite obvious to me. In my dreams I was a woman who was 'married' to not just one, but three people, and two of them were women.

Come to think of it, in my dreams I was a woman who used to think she was a boy before she learned that being a woman was an option. Developing the technology that saved dream self from an early grave due to dysphoria would take a long time, and considerable resources, so gender was clearly quite different here.

Kitty gave me an odd look.

"You think it's not OK for us to like girls?"

"My daddy says it's 'abonination' in the eyes of the seven. Mommy says he's wrong, but that I can't like girls, cause I'm her daughter."

I let the mispronounciation slide, and we fell back into a companionable silence, working away, when she suddenly stopped.

"Did you say 'us'?"

 

[Neko-tama]

Edd eyed Cat with blatant distrust, and I rolled my eyes.

"I told you we needed to bring in more people."

He grunted unhappily, but conceded. "I guess you could have picked someone worse."

Cat, for her part, was completely unaffected by the exchange. "So what's the big secret you need my help with?"

Edd's distrustful expression was back in force. "Swear that you'll keep it secret! Swear it on your life!"

Cat seemed a bit taken aback at that, so I gave him a mild clap on the back of his head.

"You don't need to swear on your life, but it is really important that we don't let anything slip." I gave her a pleading look. "Please?"

She nodded slowly, her gaze shifting between the two of us. "Alright. I promise I'll keep it to myself."

I breathed a sigh of relief. "Good, good. Let's walk and talk." Following my own suggestion I briefly pondered how to introduce her to the oddities in my head. "So, have you ever heard of dragon dreams?"

"Who hasn't?"

"Good, so here's the thing…" And I told her.

"So, lemme see if I got this right." She summarised, while trudging through the forest behind me, her brow wrinkled in a mix of disbelief, and thought. "You dream of another life in another world, that's really different from this one, where you were some kind of revolufo- some kind of rebel?"

"Basically."

"And in those dreams you also know a bunch more about how the world works than even the greatest maester?"

"I mean… I don't know about in-depth knowledge, but-"

"And you know that it's real knowledge because you tested it by making liquid stone, and it worked?" she interrupted.

"Concrete. And just a sample so far, but yeah." I nodded along.

"And now you want to use your knowledge to be some sort of great rebel that kicks the nobility's butt?"

"Uh… Sure. Close enough." How that was her take-away from out of half an hour rant about power, and anti-hierarchical models for society was anybody's guess, but then Kitty was not a person that cared for complicated things. "Though the butt kicking isn't really the goal, just a side effect."

Edd snorted from the side. "Speak for yourself."

She nodded slowly once more, and her face brightened. "Sure! I'll help ya out!"

"Just like that?" It couldn't be that simple, could it?

"Of course! You talked about this freedom thing, right? That sounds really great!"

Then again, this was Cat. I shouldn't have been surprised.

"I'm so sick of people telling me what to do!" She went on. "Kitty, you can't do this. Kitty you have to do that. Kitty, you don't wanna end up like- " she stopped herself with a glance in Edd's direction. "Well,... You're right! They talk a big game about slavery, but we're basically slaves anyway! Bugger that!" she ended her impromptu speech with a raised fist, as if ready to punch out the concept of hierarchy.

A smile made its way over my face. "Damn right!"

Edd grunted in agreement, even though freedom wasn't his main goal.

"So what do we do right now?" She asked just as the cave entrance came into view.

"That depends," I said with a grin. "Have you ever done any pottery?"

Edd groaned, and soon we were making more bricks, and trying our hands at a variety of vessels that I'd explained beforehand.

Through our workpieces losing cohesion halfway through, and finished products breaking and cracking seemingly at random, we all made an important discovery that day.

We all fucking hated pottery!