Work Text:
“Stop fidgeting.” Sansa glanced sideways to her sister, pausing her study of the house. The cage strapped to her back rattled a little as she moved.
“My assassin pants are too tight. My snatch is cramped.” Arya continued to squirm, her own eyes also on the target.
“Firstly, gross. Secondly, you are not an assassin. You are a parrot liberator. A freedom fighter. A bird rescuer.” Sansa shifted her gaze back to the house, squatting large and covered in foliage in the middle of the lawn. It seemed to glow in the golden light of dusk, belying the evil that happened within.
“How did I get roped into this?”
“You are small, and you owe me a favour. Now pull yourself up over the wall and let’s do this thing.”
The house now sat empty since Harry and his lady friend had gone out for dinner. It was time to make their move.
They crossed the mossy stone wall surrounding the grounds easily enough, though Arya continued to grumble as they traversed the edge of the lawn according to their planned route, creeping closer to the back of the house and their entry point.
A faint but piercing shrieking sounded from the depths of the house as they reached the thickly vegetated trellis system.
“Oh I can hear him,” exclaimed Sansa, enchanted. “He sounds like a textbook Calyptorhynchus sothoryosii.”
“He sounds like a fucking parrot, Sansa.”
“Well yes, that’s what he is. A very rare black parrot. The Winterfell Animal Rescue Trust takes its intel seriously Arya. Samwell has complied a complete dossier on this poor parrot.”
“I know, I know. I read the plan. Snatch the bird from the evil clutches of the dude who stole him. Find its owner. Everyone’s happy, and no more favours owed to you.”
Sansa looked up. “Come on, we need to climb to the second storey and break in through the upstairs bathroom. This travel cage is getting heavy.”
“We should just smash a window on the ground floor,” said Arya, her tone dark. “Smash a window, rescue the bird, since he’s clearly down here. Beg for forgiveness from WART for the property damage. Pay a fine? Unsure. But that plan would be better that climbing a whole ass house.”
“No needless property damage, it’s against Winterfell Animal Rescue Trust’s charter. We get in through non-aggressive means and liberate stolen animals, Arya. Now climb.”
Ignoring Arya’s grumbling, Sansa looked up at her planned destination and took a deep breath.
She’d not intended to join a vigilante animal rescue organisation. Not really. She’d always followed the rules, always been a good girl growing up. Went to college, became a perfectly respectable veterinarian.
But she’d had enough.
Seen too many animals mistreated, stolen, used for backyard breeding. Been verbally abused by too many pet owners who thought she gouged them for the cost of life saving treatment when she barely covered costs. She needed to do more for the endless suffering inflicted by humans. So she was off the books now, doing the best she could officially as a vet and now the operator of the North’s largest network of animal shelters by day, and somewhat less officially as an animal rescuer by night.
They began to climb up the trellises that bracketed the back of the house.
Sansa grimaced at the wet vegetation crunching they made as they climbed. “This poor ivy, we’re making a mess of it.”
Arya hummed in acknowledgement, but replied, “this is a Braavosi ivy, very hardy. It’ll be fine.”
Sansa flopped onto her stomach when they reached the upper level, bracing herself on the gentle slope of the roof tiles. “Oof. I need to do some more time at the climbing wall at the gym. It’s been too long since we did anything other than a ground floor or stairs operation.”
“Weak,” whispered Arya, who wasn’t even puffed.
“Show off,” retorted Sansa, resting her gaze on the beautiful setting sun as she regained her equilibrium.
“Sansa look, is that one of yours?” Arya hissed suddenly.
Sansa froze and looked over to where Arya was pointing. A huge figure in black was effortlessly vaulting over the stone wall.
“Oh no, is that a burglar?” Sansa moaned.
“You have no right to complain when we are here to steal a bird.”
“Liberate a bird,” Sansa corrected snippily. “Rescue him.”
“Should we tell him we’re here? He might help us.” Arya sounded dubious.
“We don’t need help. We have a plan.”
“Well, should we hide then? If he looks, he’ll see us.”
“Shit. This plan is cursed. I should have got Wylla to come with. Ugh, I should have taken an easier mission as my first one to lead.”
As if summoned, the figure now in front of the wall paused and appeared to look right at them. An audible, “What the actual fuck?” drifted across the garden to them.
Sansa groaned and dropped her forehead down onto the roof tiles. The surface felt oddly soft and moist.
“He’s coming over to us,” whispered Arya, pointing out the obvious. “On the plus side, he’s definitely trying to be sneaky.”
Sansa raised her head. The trellis groaned alarmingly under the man’s weight, but he scaled it quickly and efficiently. Arya even hummed in apparent approval.
“Oi, fuck off thieves,” said the newcomer, crouching in front of them, his scowl evident even in the low light. He was dressed entirely in black, as they both were, with much of his face concealed by a balaclava. “Come rob this piece of shit rich fucker another day.”
“We aren’t criminals, ser. We are animal extraction experts. You should be the one who doesn’t rob this individual,” Sansa summoned her best raised-by-Catelyn-Stark-with-faultless-manners whisper-shout, even if she deeply disagreed with her mother on the subject of a career (she had one) and marriage (she’d pick who she wanted and if she wanted to, not by bloodline thank you very much).
Arya snorted. “Nice one sis, smooth.”
“Animal extraction,” said the man in an odd voice.
“We’re on a bird rescue mission.” Sansa moderated her tone back to a quiet version of normal. “So if you insist on robbing Harry, we’ll need you to stay away from him.”
“That’s my fucking bird,” hissed the man, rising up from his couch to loom over them.
Sansa jumped to her feet, and though tall, she was still well shorter than the newcomer. “He’s been stolen enough! The poor dear. The criminals took him as part of a professional exotic bird stealing ring. He’ll have trauma.”
“No, I mean he’s actually my bird, you stupid bint. His name is Stranger. I’ve had him since he was a fledgling. I’m here for him.”
Sansa blinked at the rude man. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
“Seven fucking Hells.” The man yanked a phone out of his pants pocket and, carefully shielding the glow from the screen, pulled up a picture of a large black parrot from his photo folder. “Here,” he said, rudely thrusting the phone closer to Sansa.
“That could be any Calyptorhynchus sothoryosii,” she said dubiously, squinting at the photo. The obviously well-cared for bird sat happily on an indoor perch, a seed cracker with a slice of banana squashed on top clutched in his talon.
“Just call him a parrot,” whispered Arya.
“Fucks sake.” The man scrolled through more photos and thrust the phone at Sansa again. This time it was a video clip, with the sound turned to barely above a whisper. The screen showed a huge man with a heavily scarred face, holding on one outstretched palm a motley creature of grey fuzz and short black feathers. The man wore a blue Winterfell City Ambulance Service paramedic uniform, one so bright that the colour bled into surrounding pixels in the low-quality clip. “Turn the fucking camera off, Tormund, you ginger bastard,” said the scarred man on-screen in the newcomer’s rasping voice. “You’re scaring Stranger with your ugly mug. Poor boy is only a little thing.”
With infinite gentleness, the man stroked a huge finger down the baby bird’s chest. The little creature closed his eyes and relaxed into the touch.
The man clicked the screen off.
“Fine,” muttered Sansa into the silence. She swallowed heavily, moved by the love and care she’d seen from this stranger. “He’s your bird. I want to complete our mission, though. This is my first time running one and I want it to be a success.”
“I was going to fucking smash a window and get my bird,” said the man, his posture less aggressive now.
“No! That’ll be far too loud. Arya will slip in through the small upstairs bathroom window over there,” she jerked a thumb towards it, “and open a larger one for us. I’ll disable the alarm. We get the bird, then go.”
“There’s a fucking alarm?”
“Yes, but I have the passcode. This is a professional operation,” said Sansa, “we’ll be fine.”
“How the fuck did you get…?” The man’s voice trailed off, and he sighed. “You know what? I don’t care. I just want my bird back.”
Bran, their official hacker, had supplied a list of passcodes for Sansa to try with what he claimed would be a ninety-five percent success rate at the end of it. Sansa did not wish to think about the other five percent.
Arya, who had started fidgeting again during the bird video once the threat from the newcomer seemed to be over, spoke up, “let’s fucking go. It’s cold out here and I’d rather be anywhere other than some criminal’s roof with my sister and some random bird loving giant.”
“Oh right. I’m Sansa and this is Arya,” said Sansa.
“Good one Sansa, give the dude our real names during the commission of a crime. Maybe you should also give him your phone number and blood type.”
The man snorted. “Sandor,” he said, now sounding long suffering rather than verging on hostile like he was earlier. “Also my real name, since we’re apparently a bloody sharing circle.”
“Thanks for your trust,” Sansa said breathlessly, trying to scramble for some professionalism.
“All for one and one for all,” said Arya sardonically. “Let’s do this. We’ll need to hustle.”
At that, Arya swiftly shimmied up the short slope of roof and then through the cracked open upper window.
“There’s an upstairs access point and a downstairs one,” said Sansa, “but Bran said this window is in a sensor shadow. So it’ll start the countdown when we leave the vicinity of it.”
Sandor hummed dubiously, his balaclava clad face turned toward where Arya had just disappeared.
The larger window opened with a click and Sansa took a deep breath. She’d done this before. Not lead a mission, but rescued animals. It was her life’s work; she could do this.
“Okay,” she whispered brightly, “let’s get your bird back.”
“Damn fucking straight.”
The window was a bit of a squeeze for Sansa, but she didn’t check how the much larger Sandor was faring. She beelined directly for the adjoining bedroom with Arya hot on her heels, locating the alarm box immediately, knowing she had a limited time to deactivate it.
“Okay, let’s try Harry’s date of birth.”
The box beeped a menacing negative as Sandor joined them, pulling his rumpled clothes straight.
“Shit,” Sansa muttered. “Okay, his year of birth.”
It beeped again as the same distinctly parrot-like squawking from earlier sounded from downstairs.
“How many goes do you get before security gets called and we go to jail?” asked Arya in the same casual tone of voice she’d use to order a coffee.
“Five,” said Sansa through gritted teeth. “Alright, month and year of birth.”
Another shrill beep of rejection.
“Okay, um, the postcode for this suburb,” said Sansa, starting to sweat.
The rejection beep felt like a dagger in her heart.
“We’re basically out of time,” said Arya helpfully. “You sound like you’ve exhausted Bran’s list.”
“No,” lied Sansa with false bravado. She hunched her shoulders and made a face at the box. “Okay, this time. Come on, you stupid machine, don’t make me beg.” She held her breath and punched in a one–two–three–four combo as quickly as she could, as if speed would make any difference to the box noticing the panicked guess of a combination.
A cheerful bleep announced the alarm disengaging and Sansa opened one eye, then the other.
“What a cunt passcode,” said Sandor. “One, two, three, four, absolute rubbish.”
“Come on,” said Sansa breathlessly. Her heart raced from the close call, and she felt oddly exhilarated. Even more that she usually did on rescue missions. “We have a bird to find.”
“That won’t be hard,” said Arya darkly, “listen, he’s still going off.”
In the distance, from downstairs, sounded muffled screeching again, and what sounded like the word “fuckers” but in a distinctly avian ‘voice’.
“Stranger,” said Sandor, and bolted through the bedroom door and downstairs.
“Like I said, we should have broken in downstairs,” muttered Arya, “save this absolute bollocks fucking around.”
“We’re a professional animal liberation organisation. Arya, we follow the plan. This way had an alarm dead zone, and no noisy broken windows.”
Dusk had well and truly fallen now, but it was clear that Stranger, the large, quite magnificent specimen of a rare Calyptorhynchus sothoryosii had been housed a far too small cage in a large room downstairs. Other cages are scattered around beside it, though they sat ominously empty. Lounge furniture and a coffee table were positioned haphazardly in the middle of the room. A bar cabinet and a set of drawers and a closet had been placed along two of the walls with nick-nacks and drinking accoutrement on top at various points. It was an odd room, half living space, half storage area. Sansa quickly pulled out her phone and took a few photos for evidence. As far as Bran and the other researchers had been able to gather, Harry Hardyng was a low-level thief in part of a larger criminal organisation who stole exotic pets to order. Sansa didn’t know why Stranger hadn’t been sent on to any potential buyers.
“You have moss on your face from when you went all dramatic and face-planted the roof, by the way,” Arya said, interrupting her train of thoughts. Sansa looked down at her sister, who peered at her. “Looks like thuidium delicatulum. Delicate fern moss in Common.”
“Arya, you’ve become a nerd.” Sansa wiped her forehead with a gloved hand, though she was doubtless smearing green around.
“Says the vet spouting weird parrot names. Don’t tell anyone I can correctly classify smears of moss. At least not until I make tenure in the Botany department, and Mum will maybe leave me alone about working instead of having babies.”
“Ugh I feel that,” muttered Sansa, and sighed.
“Stranger, you bastard,” Sandor was saying, drawing their attention again. “It was bloody quiet without you.”
“Ugly Cunt,” Stranger crooned. “Stranger wants a cracker.”
Sandor snorted. “Aye, I missed you too. I’ve got one right h….”
They all froze at the sound of the front door slamming open and accompanying drunk laughter.
“You two, inside this armoire,” hissed Arya, pointing at the closet. “I’ll get under the far away settee and hide the cage with me.”
Sansa and Sandor exchanged a startled glance, then, as one, headed towards their hiding place, Sansa first shrugging off the travel cage ‘backpack’ and thrusting it towards Arya.
“Oh this is Lysian,” exclaimed Sansa in the quietest of voices, as they both hastily climbed in to the space amongst an impressive hanging waistcoat collection, Sansa pushing them to each side as best and quietly as she could. “Mum has one. These types of armoires are antiques, very sturdy.”
“Looks like a fucking closet to me,” breathed Sandor in her ear, but the voices came closer and his grip on her tightened. They had to be sandwiched tightly together, mercifully upright but awkwardly close, in the armoire/closet, Sandor having to bend at the knees, otherwise his head wouldn’t fit at all.
Sansa had been on quite a few animal liberation efforts since she joined WART, but they’d mostly been outdoors affairs. They certainly hadn’t involved closets. Certainly not closets with large paramedics.
Harry Hardyng, junior bird thief, entered the room, still drunkenly talking. “I’m always forgetting to set the stupid alarm when I go to sleep. Now I’m obviously doing it when I go out.” He turned the light on in the room, sending illumination drifting through the thin slatted door of Sansa’s hiding place.
“You’ve got so much on your mind, Harry babes, that’s a teeny little mistake,” said a female voice, also drunkenly slurring her words. “Just remember to set the alarm next time. No damage done.”
“There is a lot of pressure on me in my uncle’s business empire.” Harry’s voice bore a distinctly whiny tone. “They need me to keep going, be on the top of my game. Peak performance. I’m his heir, you see. It’s a super important role that I’ve been groomed for.”
Even though Harry was clearly drunk, Sansa would have thought he sounded like a self-important idiot even before she knew he abducted innocent birds.
“Wow, that is so interesting, Harry,” the woman simpered.
“Oi, Ugly Cunt,” Stranger called, quiet compared to earlier. “Where’s my cracker?”
Sandor tensed.
“Did he call you a snuggly client? Aww, what a sweetheart.”
The sounds of rustling and kissing briefly interrupted the conversation and Sansa’s heart sank even more, if that were possible.
“He’s a rare Capybara southron black parrot,” said Harry, breathless. “I call him Noble.”
“That’s so fancy.” A slurping noise sounded, and the woman squealed and giggled.
Sansa winced and shook her head. She felt Sandor heave a sigh.
Sansa patted, then squeezed his arm and tried to give him a reassuring look. He stared at her in the gloom, utterly unreadable. Hopefully he wasn’t judging the leftover smudge of moss of her forehead. It was hard to tell when she couldn’t see more than the shadow of his eyes.
Sandor really did smell very nice, Sansa realised. The vague scent of engine oil she associated with people who worked closely with vehicles and a general masculineness. She wondered idly if he’d give her a tour of his ambulance. Or if he might develop an interest in animal rescue. They could use some help with human first aid. The most medically trained person in WART was currently her and Sansa had recently found herself getting a little sick of Wylla’s requests for ketamine at every opportunity.
Sandor’s already firm and delightfully muscular body went even more stiff, and Sansa dragged herself back to her present, closeted, reality.
Stranger was muttering discontentedly, and the sounds of a human make-out session only increased.
“Oh baby, so sexy. I want you to beg for my big fat man meat.”
“Oh yes, big boy. I beg you for your man salami. Your burning meat candle. Light me up, honey bunny.”
Sansa couldn’t help her reflexive look back at Sandor, unable to keep the expression of horror off her face. “Oh no,” she mouthed silently. Then, “meat candle?”
Stranger squawked incoherently, then babbled something that sounded like he wanted crackers now. Sansa’s heart broke for the poor hungry parrot having to witness the events in the room.
Sandor shook his head silently and shrugged.
Sansa clutched the front of Sandor’s shirt in both hands and squeezed it desperately. She also did not wish to listen to a bird thief getting sexy. She particularly did not with to listen to a bird thief getting sexy whilst she was intimately trapped in an Lysian armoire with the bird’s owner. She really particularly did not want to overhear anything about Harry’s ‘meat’.
Rustling sounded from the room and Sansa tried to make herself disappear. It was hard not to fidget uncomfortably, stuck in such a small space with such a large man.
She also really hoped now wouldn’t be the time Harry needed to indulge in a spot of waistcoat-related role play.
“STRANGER WANTS A CRACKER,” shouted Stranger abruptly. “PUT YOUR FUCKING PANTS ON MAN MEAT. STRANGER WANTS A CRACKER.”
Sandor’s chest shook slightly under her fists, and she realised he’d started laughing, managing with some heroism to stay quiet.
“BUNCH OF CUNTS. GIVE STRANGER A FUCKING CRACKER. TITTY CRACKERS.”
The rustling, slurping, and moaning stopped.
“Okay, Harry,” said the woman stridently, “your bird is making me uncomfortable.”
“TITTIES, TITTIES,” screamed Stranger. “WHO’S A TITTY BOY THEN? BYE BYE MAN MEAT.”
Sansa was getting a clearer idea of why the parrot might be staying with Harry for the moment rather than immediately being sold on.
“Harry please, the bird is staring at me. He’s staring at my lovely jubblies.”
“Fine, fine,” said Harry, finally sounding a little strained. “We can go upstairs. Noble is a little highly strung.”
“BUNCH OF CUNTS,” Stranger screeched.
Harry and the woman kissed and continued rustling, but sounded like they were moving upstairs.
“We’ll give them a few minutes to, ah, resume activities,” whispered Sansa, right into Sandor’s ear. The undamaged one, as she recalled from the video. “It’ll be a good distraction.”
Sandor visibly shuddered. “Aye, that’s one word for it.”
The doors suddenly swung open, and Sansa froze.
“You two look cozy,” grumbled Arya, “but we have a parrot to rescue, and I want to go home.”
“We wanted to make sure they were distracted,” hissed Sansa indignantly, and glanced towards where Harry and the woman would have gone through the door. “You’re cutting it fine.”
She released Sandor’s shirt and took Arya’s outstretched hand, carefully stepping out of the cupboard, groaning as her muscles protested as she straightened up. Sandor didn’t manage quite as gracefully when he followed her with a pained grunt, but then he was much larger and had been far more confined than her.
“BUNCH OF CUNTS, WHERE ARE MY FUCKING CRACKERS?” sounded aggressively from the corner of the room, but luckily the moans now sounding from upstairs didn’t cease.
“I’ll cage him,” muttered Sandor, snatching the travel cage from where Arya had slid it under a settee and striding over to the bird. “Fucking lucky I’m here to deal with this.”
“I’m trained in bird handling,” whispered Sansa furiously, feeling the need to defend her professional credentials, even when in the midst of technically breaking and entering. She paused, and made a mental note to schedule an extra appointment with Doctor Tarth, her lovely therapist.
“Aye but the bastard bites and I’d rather he bit me,” rasped Sandor, blissfully unaware of any internal struggles Sansa might be having.
“OI UGLY CUNT, WHERES STRANGER’S CRACKER?” screeched Stranger, with marginally less volume than before.
Sandor reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of seed crackers. “Stranger, you bastard, here’re your crackers.”
“Seven fucking hells,” said the bird, now reasonably polite, “Stranger wants a fucking cracker.”
Sandor managed to bundle the bird into the travel cage with a minimum of biting, particularly with extra crackers to sweeten the deal.
“He’s so bloody loud,” said Arya, “he’ll alert the whole neighbourhood.”
“I put high potency parrot-safe hemp seeds in the crackers,” said Sandor. “They always calm him the fuck down.”
“Stranger wants a fucking cracker,” crooned Stranger happily. “Lovely jubblies.”
Arya hummed. “Maybe Arya wants a cracker too.”
“Come on, let’s get out of here before they realise Stranger is too quiet.”
They all looked up as the moaning intensified and rhythmic thumping began. A faint cry of “beg for my man meat” sounded.
“Fucking gross.” Arya made a face. “I’m going to need trauma counselling after this. I’m never leaving the botany labs ever again. The outside world can leave me out of its business.”
Sansa snorted. “Arya Stark, the botany labs are a hotbed of sexual intrigue and scandal. I’ve heard your stories.”
Arya hummed in agreement. “It’s true.”
“Let’s go.” Sandor looked over his shoulder as he strode off. “And it’s pretty bloody obvious you two have never spent time behind the scenes in an emergency room,” he rasped.
“Colour me intrigued,” whispered Sansa, as she scurried to catch up. “Vet school was bad enough. Not me, of course. I was too busy studying.”
“Good girl, eh?” Sandor carefully followed Sansa’s followed Sansa’s pointed directions to the downstairs side laundry door, which they could let themselves out of now that the alarms had been neutralised.
“Not so much anymore,” Sansa said lightly.
Sandor narrowed his eyes and glanced at her, but said nothing further.
They all hurried back through the property, with Stranger staying remarkably quiet. Just the occasional “Ugly Cunt,” aimed at Sandor and one request for another cracker.
They stopped for a brief rest when they were a block away, near Sansa’s car, under a secluded tree.
“Quick visual through the cage,” Sansa said briskly, “Stranger looks okay, but I want to have a better examination once we’re safe, and some follow-up visits. Or would you prefer your usual vet to do so?”
“You’ll do. He seems to like you well enough.” Sandor paused and cleared his throat. It was hard to determine his expression, but he looked a little awkward. “You need any volunteer medical personnel for your animal rescue service? I work graveyard shift Warriorsday through Smithsday, but I’m around Maidensday and Cronesday if you need help.”
“That would be amazing.” Sansa’s heart gave a little and unexpected flutter. “Let’s work out details after I examine Stranger.”
Sansa gave him the address of her clinic with plans to meet there in twenty minutes.
“Did you just pull?” said Arya incredulously. “Did you just pull a huge balaclava dude whilst doing a vigilante rescue operation? For fucks sake you have moss on your face.”
“No! We’re going to meet on a professional level to examine his parrot and set up future professional liaisons.”
“Uh huh.”
“Hush. Let’s go. I have a parrot to examine and a new member of my team to organise!”