Lt. Kobayashi opened his eyes. His vision had been blurry for the first few days, but he could hear, and his sight was improving by the day. Had he traveled back in time? He could understand the language—it was English, save for some strange words they used.
A beautiful girl, no more than sixteen, was looking at him. She had red hair, Tully-blue eyes, and high cheekbones.
"My sweet Artys," she said, unlacing what seemed to be a woolen shift before baring her breast.
Oh god…
Well, there were worse things in life than being breastfed by a beautiful woman. The girl must be his mother. He was starving, and any reluctance he felt vanished as his baby instincts took over. He latched on and nursed.
It was the most delicious thing he'd ever tasted. Must be my baby taste buds, he thought, trying to stifle any humiliation.
Weeks passed; all he did was feed and rest. His sight was now better than it had ever been. It must be the serum, he thought. No way a child born so prematurely could breathe, much less eat and see. Not in the Middle Ages.
The way people dressed certainly looked medieval—but why were they speaking English he could understand? Even Shakespearean English would be hard for a modern person.
A man with rainbow-colored crystals hanging from a chain doused his hair in scented oils and named him Artys of House Arryn. The ritual seemed almost Catholic, yet the man spoke of seven gods. That was no religion Aoi had ever heard of. Was this some alternate Earth?
From what he could tell, he was at least noble, and a firstborn. Life might not be too bad for him.
He tried not to think of his men in Afghanistan. He still remembered his mother's tearful goodbye when he left, and his father standing stoic as ever in his business suit—though even in his eyes, there had been sadness.
Aoi would never see them again. The thought brought tears.
I wish I had been a better son, he thought. Keep marching. What's done is done. Torturing yourself by remembering won't change anything.
Killed by an IED. What a shit way to die. The shrapnel must have cut his femoral artery. At least it wasn't painful—just needless and pointless, like the war.
There were other women besides his mother who breastfed him. They gossiped constantly. There was a war going on, and his father—apparently a man named Jon Arryn—was a rebel alongside Robert Baratheon and Eddard Stark. They spoke of a dragon prince named Rhaegar.
Aoi hoped there weren't real dragons and this wasn't some fantasy world. But he was coming to the bitter realization that it was.
The wet nurses spoke of seasons in years. How on earth could people survive winters that lasted multiple years with medieval technology?
And if this truly was a medieval world, and his father was rebelling against the king, and lost… Aoi, as heir, would likely end up thrown down a well. No Geneva Convention here.
No point wondering about it now. Just drink and shit. That's all I can do anyway. He resigned himself glumly.
Aoi needed three wet nurses along with his mother to feed him. His appetite was ravenous—he needed strength to grow. He had been born prematurely by a few months—or moons, as these people called them.
The old man with chains of multiple metals hovered over him with his mother. Aoi assumed he was a doctor of some sort.
"My lady, he is as hale and healthy as any babe could ever be. I can scarcely believe it. He is growing faster than any babe I have seen," the old man said.
A red-haired, freckled teen appeared beside his mother.
"Of course he's growing. I've never seen him without a teat in his mouth. A greedy little monster, he is."
"Go away, Edmure!" his mother snapped, scooping Aoi up gingerly and pressing him against her chest as she rocked him.
"Don't worry, little man—I love teats too," the boy grinned before being chased off.
Ugh. How the mighty have fallen, Aoi thought to himself, and promptly wet himself.