We can push on through till morning; [OTA | MINGLE POST]

[markwatney]

WHO: Mark & Anyone
WHERE: The Town Hall
WHEN: Feb 16, afternoon through evening
OPEN TO: EVERYONE! This is a mingle post!
WARNINGS: N/A - Please warn in thread subject lines if needed
STATUS: Open

---

When we all get together and have our town meetings, the truth is that a lot of times we don't come up with the sort of solutions we're looking for. I'm not trying to say we're complacent -- Or at least not all of us, not the people speaking up in the meetings -- but just that the nature of living here, such as it is, means that answers aren't exactly forthcoming.

But the latest meeting, the one about organizing, creating some kind of formal entity to oversee the group of us, it threw something into sharp relief for me: I've been talking for a long time about how we all need to be sharing our knowledge as a safeguard, but I haven't been doing much to make this happen beyond sharing my own personal knowledge. And that's really just not acceptable -- Not here, not when we've apparently got an entire section of the population asking for active leadership and another section who might just be too shy or apathetic to admit it.

So, I've been trying to figure out a way to kickstart this project. A way for people to even put out there the sort of knowledge they have to share. You have to start somewhere.

I've never had a problem getting people together to help with the field, but somehow we've been neglecting the town hall building right next to it this entire time. It's one of the biggest buildings in town, but it's still coated in dust and cobwebs, piles of leaves drifted into corners. The inn is starting to get a little crowded during meetings; it might be nice to have a little more room, a place where people come to share.

Regardless of how you feel about community leadership, I think most of us can get behind that.

A couple days before, I put out the call: A cleaning party. We get together, clean out the town hall, and afterward we have a little potluck. People can bring premade dishes, or we can cook out back over a bonfire. We can just be around each other, in a relatively safe space, just having a moment to relax and say hello. Meet someone new, find out where to begin.

After everything that's happened recently, I really think we could use it. I'm just hoping I'm not the only one who shows up.

[CLEANING PARTY & MIXER! Threads can take place during the CLEANING portion, after during the MIXER or BOTH. They can be indoors, upstairs, in the attic, out back by the bonfire, chowing down, whatever -- It's 100% cool to improvise! Mark will have expressly told folks this is about getting to know each other and what they can each do, too. There are some additional OOC notes here.]

Comments

[tooktheblack]

"No, it hasn't. We've escaped it, somehow," Jon said. He wondered how long his luck would run, though, considering Starks hadn't had the best run of luck these past years. Could he think himself safe in such a place? A place that would strike down his sister?

"I worry, though. I can fight what I can see," he said. "I can't fight something that strikes from the air without warning. What good does an arrow do me for something like that?"

[thekittenqueen]

"Do you think there is something behind this?" She asked him, frowning as she considered the possibilities. "I remember once believing that it was impossible that someone could control this place. Yet...this escalation of events. I don't know anymore how true that is."

She glanced back up at Jon and smiled sadly. "The earthquakes seemed to get worse before they disappeared. I would guess that the lightening will end soon as well." Before something else happened.

[tooktheblack]

"I don't know, my lady," Jon admitted. It frustrated him to no end to not be able to pinpoint how and why these things kept happening but it was something he hadn't been able to predict the entire time he'd been here. Why should he suddenly be able to do so now?

"I assume they're going to get worse before they get better, considering the earthquakes, but I don't want to put that out there and give anyone any ideas."

[thekittenqueen]

She smiled, chuckling under her breath. "I don't know why I asked that. There are no answers in this place. You would have no better idea than I do." It was the not knowing that frustrated her the most. She hated telling the new arrivals that she didn't know anything about this world, only the bare minimum.

"I suspect the same as well." Her voice was soft, thoughtful and concerned. "Is it wise though not to prepare? I feel all that we are doing is drifting until the next anomaly comes."

[tooktheblack]

"Preparation is never a bad thing," Jon agreed. "And being prepared might help us to stave off injury or famine. It's just frustrating to not have the answers."

He sighed a little and gave Margaery a look both anguished and frustrated. "I hate not having the answers for people. People look to me. I should have answers for them."

[thekittenqueen]

She understood his frustration. He was a leader, being without answers or a means to protect others would feel like failure.

"I know, but there is little we can do." Which was the sad truth. She hated being out of control of the situation, but there was nothing to be done. "The least you can do is help to keep others calm. People look to you."

[tooktheblack]

"They might look to me but I don't have nearly enough answers," Jon admitted. It was probably a poor idea to admit these things to Margaery, whose house he didn't exactly trust, but she herself was kind enough. Besides, Sansa liked her.

"I don't feel like I can truly lead if I don't know what to tell people. I'm just fighting in the darkness."

[thekittenqueen]

"None of us do." Survival had taken the place of House politics. Even if she still had her mind focused on how she lived before, there was no point in it. She was dead and in this realm. This was all she had. If she disappeared, it wasn't Westeros she was returning to. It was why it didn't matter for her to admit that much to him, showing how in the dark she was. "It isn't an easy situation, but sometimes we must remain strong for others and seem as though we have control in a frightening situation."

Her thoughts drifted to Loras in the cell.

"Tell them that even if we don't have the answers, we at least have the means to continue trying."

[tooktheblack]

"There's a reason you're the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms," Jon said, laughing softly. Margaery did have a way of bolstering his spirits, making him think he was something much grander than a bastard who had risen high in the Night's Watch.

"Men must love you, Margaery."

[thekittenqueen]

"High praise, Lord Commander." She beamed at him, touched by the praise. This was something that she had missed from their early days in this world. They had been playful and warm once. "Being a queen seems so long ago, but at least I have the opportunity to offer advice to those that might want it."

She chuckled, shaking her head. "Perhaps? What makes you say as much now?"

[tooktheblack]

"You just managed to inspire me, after all. It's something that I think queens should do. I think Cersei inspired fear in men, and loathing, and nobody wants to fight for a woman like that."

He smiled a bit deeper. "But you and Sansa, you have something different. You have something that makes a man want to go to the ends of the earth to make you happy. It's a dangerous thing."

[thekittenqueen]

"I am happy to inspire you." She was honest in that. She had always considered Jon a friend and it pained her to see him frustrated. Helping him laugh once more eased her mind considerably.

"Do you speak from experience, Jon?" She asked, her smile only growing brighter. "Have I made an impression on you?"

[tooktheblack]

"Well, impressions have been made," Jon conceded. He could admit that much and, honestly, outside of the world of Westeros and the politics of the Seven Kingdoms, much of what would keep he and Margaery apart didn't truly matter.

He did not agree with her treatment of Ygritte, though, but that was something he could try to move past.

"Hopefully I've made some too?"

[thekittenqueen]

She laughed, well aware of the impression she must have made with him. The matter with Ygritte had been sorted and the women had a grudging acceptance of the other. They could chat more often now without trouble and Margaery had apologized. Still, it wasn't something she wanted to think about. She was not that person.

The last thing she had wanted was for it to hurt her friendship with Jon.

"Of course you have, all of them favorable." She smiled warmly at him. "You have a great sense of honor and kindness. I have known very few men who could manage both or remain unblemished by the politics of our world. I admire you very much."

[tooktheblack]

"I'm still a man of the Night's Watch even if my loyalty is to House Stark first," Jon admitted. "It bears to reason that I would still try to remain neutral. I am always going to put my family first. I know that I will never be able to be neutral where House Stark is concerned - but hopefully I can be level-headed in other matters."

He paused for a moment, lost in memory. "I want to be like my lord father. He was a good man and he was a good lord. I think the Lannisters made a mistake in killing him. He was an honorable man. Westeros needs honorable men."

[thekittenqueen]

"I didn't know Lord Stark, but I heard nothing but kind words about him. He was well respected, even in High Garden." It had been an outrage when he was executed, but at that time, Margaery and her family had been in Renly's camp. There had been little that she could offer the Starks in way of help, aside from encouraging Renly to unite with them.

"Honorable men are rare in our world. It is why they stand out in memory." She didn't want to argue with him over it. Honorable men had a way of getting killed. They belonged in a better world than Westeros, where only the ruthless survived.

[tooktheblack]

"Honorable men tend to leave the world without their head upon their shoulders," Jon said dryly. He had been stabbed by those he'd called friends and brothers and his lord father had been executed solely for doing the right thing. It seemed there was little room for honor in the world any longer.

"I still have honor, yes, but at great price."

[thekittenqueen]

"Our world is not kind to honorable men." She agreed, though lamented that reality. There were some truly good men that had been killed too soon. "It doesn't mean that honor should simply be forgotten. When you return," if he returned, "I truly believe that you will find a way to survive and rebuild your house."

She smiled, "It wouldn't be remarkable if honor were easy to keep."

[tooktheblack]

"I hope that House Stark can be rebuilt but there is no one left with the Stark name. I am a bastard, after all, and Sansa's been both a Lannister and a Bolton. There's no one left in the male line that can truly be a Stark."

He hoped that the lords of the North would recognize Sansa as their queen but it seemed, instead, they preferred a king even if he was bastard-born.

[thekittenqueen]

"I understand," she said softly, her face becoming haunted and distant. "House Tyrell will end the moment that my grandmother passes. There is nothing left of us and I can't imagine High Garden will last either." She swallowed, staving off any tears that threatened to appear. She would mourn later, in private.

"You and Sansa have each other, that is no small thing. There is a chance that you could be named 'Stark'. It isn't unheard of and you deserve your father's name."

[tooktheblack]

"I could be legitimized, I suppose, but I don't think any Baratheon or Lannister kings are going to do it."

Then again, Margaery was the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms through her marriage to Tommen. Perhaps she could legitimize him, if she saw it fit. It wouldn't do much for an independent North, though.

"And there is your brother, isn't there? Couldn't he leave the Kingsguard?"

[thekittenqueen]

"Aren't you king?" What would stop him from doing so with the backing of his northern lords? He had told her of his future, while she had kept hers to herself, until now.

She frowned, not wishing to reflect overly long on Loras or how he had been at the end. The broken man that he had become, willing to be mutilated to escape the Sparrows. That wound was still too fresh for her.

"No," she responded. "Only my grandmother remains."

[tooktheblack]

"I am but only for lack of choice. I'm sure if one of my brothers were alive, they'd be king instead," Jon said, shrugging a bit. His grasp on the title was tenuous at best and it was a heavy crown to bear; it wasn't something he'd been born to.

"I shouldn't burden you with talk of home. We've both escaped for the time being, haven't we?"

[thekittenqueen]

"Yet it is a title you hold. Don't begrudge it, Jon. There is a great deal of good you could do with it. It sets you as perhaps one of the last hopes of the realm." There were so few families left that could withstand the Lannisters. With the Vale, the North could.

There was a sad smile on her face. "You have escaped." She hadn't.

[tooktheblack]

"Escaped for now. I cannot guarantee that I will escape permanently, though, so you and I are the same in that regard," Jon said, giving her a tight smile.

"I only hope I am worthy of the title. There have been a great many unworthy kings in Westeros of late. I want to make it different. I want to be a good king, if I can."