What's In A Name?

[grantuseyes]

Micolash sits cross-legged on a table. Strewn all around him are ink pots (some overturned and spilled), parchment paper (in stacks and scattered alike), pens and nibs and a few sticks of charcoal. His fingers are stained with ink and there are a few splotches somehow on his face and on his pinstripe trousers, along with a dark handprint on the metal collar of his cage. The side of his left hand, the one he's currently holding a pen with, is smudged even worse with black.

There are discarded drawings all around him, some that look like false starts on some manner of monsters. Some are just pages crammed with drawings of eyes, or scrawls repeating phrases or rambling prose. Some are crumpled up into paper wads or have half-hearted attempts at scratching out or erasing the contents.

The parchment Micolash currently has in front of him is being scrutinized by the scholar. Looking over his handiwork and trying to determine if it passes whatever muster he's going for. It's certainly a drawing of SOMETHING.

Whatever verdict he's pondering, it doesn't prevent Micolash from looking up and addressing whatever person is wandering close to his work station.

"What does your name mean? Do you know? Do you care?"

Comments

[grantuseyes]

"...Why the form of a man, though." This really is extremely perplexing to Micolash, to the point he can't let it go without comment. "Be you a god, would you not be more...comfortable as a form closer to the cosmos? A form made to traverse the spark and the stars? The human flesh is maddeningly limiting!"

Oops, he might be a doubter after all. Because really now; what kind of god just goes around looking like a pirate had a baby with an angel? Boring and restricting! Gods should have far more eyes, for starters.

[pirateangelbaby]

...what kind of question is that?

"I rather like my... form." Honestly, this is the first time Thor's had a complaint that wasn't spawned of envy or, in one memorable case, looking far too much like a certain someone's deceased father. Is it the eye? He'd thought it made him look distinguished. Kingly. More like his deceased father. Sure, the pirate look isn't for everyone, but Thor had thought it suited him a bit.

As for being human, well, Thor can't exactly disagree. He was human once, for about a week, and it was the most humbling experience of his life. That humans tend to think of Asgardians as looking like them instead of the other way around will never cease to amuse him, though. "I am made to travel the stars. I do it a lot, actually. Why would my body matter?"

[grantuseyes]

"Because the human form is unfit for such things, you ridiculous man." Micolash sounds teasing. Maybe edging into patronizing. "Not enough eyes for enlightenment, a woeful lack of the deep sea's elegant simplicity, vulnerable and delicate flesh. A wretched body beholden to having to feed it, bathe it, rest it, empty it...The list is endless! If you had any say in the matter, surely you would not settle for such a feeble. Humble. Useless form."

Micolash is officially a Doubting Thomas now. This guy is delusional. Thinks he's a god when he clearly is not. Probably because he's missing an eye. He's even further behind now than the usual human, and that's saying a lot.

[pirateangelbaby]

Oh yes, that's definitely insulting, whether intentional or not. After what happened to him at the equinox, Thor is a lot less willing to jump straight into antagonizing him right back; you never know what horrible consequences might come attached to something like that. This calls for caution, something Thor is... okay, not exactly the best at, let's be real.

Besides, these ramblings don't sound entirely sane. "Appearances can be deceptive," Thor says, after a long moment's thought on how to respond to that without straight-up calling the caged man crazy. "I'm not human, no matter how I look."

[grantuseyes]

"Prove it."

What the fuck, Micolash.

He gives a sallow smile, folding his hands together while waiting expectantly for evidence of godhood. Either this obnoxiously handsome fellow is trying to play him for a fool, bandying lies about his divinity, OR! He's actually a god! Just one with awful, awful taste! Either way, Micolash comes out on top. Calling out a charlatan or getting to see a higher being; both good outcomes in his mind.

[pirateangelbaby]

Thor would usually jump at the chance to show off, driven by a deep-seated desire to be as impressive as possible to all and sundry. Stronger than that, however, is an even deeper need to not piss off the autumn spirit again even by accident. Maybe she might take 'this creepy guy with a stupid cage on his head dared me to do it' as a good reason, or redirect her blame to him, but does he want to take that chance?

...maybe. If he doesn't go all out, maybe she won't be so mad this time?

It's trivially easy to call to the clouds above, as easy as breathing, nudging their currents to build up charge where there was none before, his one remaining eye glowing electric blue in its socket. The storm that sings in his blood is given shape, even if it's only a little one, a drop of an ocean of potential. "The Nexus will not thank me to call up a typhoon," he warns, as a distant rumble of thunder rolls across the skies above him.

[grantuseyes]

Wait until he learns there's a direct link between the creepy guy with a stupid cage on his head and the autumn spirit! herself! Maybe she just has intensely bad taste in charges she extends her patronage to.

When Micolash hears the thunder, he's suddenly and swiftly to his feet, standing up on the table to gaze up at the sky. Watching the gathering clouds with wonder. "The summoning of sparks," he says softly, eyes still turned skyward. "Beholden to no darkbeast or beast abhorrent, beholden to no chalice. How marvelous..."

Micolash really should be more careful, wearing a tall, metal implement during a thunderstorm. And his cage has the worst defense against bolt out of all the helms and hats. To further demonstrate his lack of self-preservation, a hand even reaches upwards as if to touch at those gathering clouds.

[pirateangelbaby]

Thor briefly considers nudging the storm into rewarding that foolish gesture, but he's not that kind of man, so he discards the thought immediately, tempting as it is. Instead he raises his own hand, pulling an opposite charge from the ground beneath his feet, drawing the storm's power to himself like a living lightning rod.

It's not the most powerful bolt he's ever commanded, not even close, but it's vibrant and blinding, and no less beautiful to Thor as the small thunderhead uses him to complete its path to the ground, the energies dancing along bare skin and armor. Thor holds his hands apart, palms facing each other, and lets the lightning play across the space between them. It's not often he gets the chance to simply bask in the energies of the storm, rather than send its fury to sear bone and flesh, and there's a small smile on his face as the leaders jump from finger to finger. Though not so much that he's forgotten the point of showing off. "Proof enough?"

[grantuseyes]

His hand snatches back down when he sees the storm is changing. He would hate to interrupt the display! Once Thor has the lightning in his grasp, Micolash quickly drops back down into sitting with his gangly legs all haphazard. Watching closely with eyes wide enough to catch the light of the sparks.

When finally asked if this is sufficient proof, Micolash claps with appreciation! "How fascinating! No tool, no weapon, to channel it? You're not holding spark paper in your hands just to trick me, are you?" He says it in a faux conspiratorial voice, playful in his suspicions. But then he heaves a big sigh while folding up his knees so he can rest his elbows atop them, hands under his cage to rest his head there.

"Sparks, however, are the realm of beasts. What other creature can conjure the blue energies but the darkbeasts? Our own darling specimen, Paarl, continued to emanate them even after its death; lightning existed in its very bones. And lightning is horrifically harmful to kin! Ah, you remind me of Archibald overall. A genius I took to harbouring in my college to develop his tools and weapons that focused on the sparks. Weaponry helpful in warding off what our rivals would send after us. Beautiful and powerful, yes, but the antithesis of the divine, I'm afraid."

Oh, come on.

[pirateangelbaby]

Bullshit. Thor rolls his eye and sends the remnants of the lightning through his feet into the earth, the fractal patterns of lichtenberg figures radiating out from the spot he's standing, burnt into the ground. "And yet you yourself just said it's 'not beholden to darkbeasts.' Which is it?"

It's occurred to him that this is probably a bad idea, picking a fight with a crazy man, but it's not like he hasn't done that recently even.

[grantuseyes]

"It is not beholden to one, is it? Unless you yourself are an. Unfortunate and unusual case of dark beasthood." He says it jovial and teasingly, as this guy would be the worst looking darkbeast ever if he was one shaped like THAT. A bad look for a god AND a beast. Will Thor's ego ever be the same after this?

"It is remarkable, to see a man carry and direct sparks as you do. But of course only a man would harness such energy. Your methods are intriguing. Your talents are not."

And that's the verdict, apparently. Godhood still clearly in doubt. Micolash says this all as though it should just be simple statements and not something deeply insulting. Facts aren't insulting!