nexus_crossings | What's a God to a non-believer?

What's a God to a non-believer?

There are some parts of the woods, especially lately, that have been overgrown and - to be frank - dangerous. When certain people have gone deep into the woods, to some of the more serious hiking paths, they've found them overgrown with crazy plants and vines. The entire place has repelled people and Alec hasn't been seen.

He's been thinking. Thinking about Metropolis, thinking about how he almost killed people. Thinking about how he probably did. Then thinking about that mugger and that...that hero doing their job.

He was a monster. He is a monster and the green of his world is far more encouraging in those pursuits. The Avatar needs no one.

It's the Nexus's green, it's web of life, that's intervened, bringing him out of his impassible woods and trails, pulling him towards civilization. Inch by inch. Mile by mile. It'd be hard to see him however, he's keeping to the shadows. Hiding in the woods nearest to those concerned before an unnatural, inhuman voice speaks.

"What keeps you human when you don't have to be?"

Superman gave him an answer, but it's far easier for him. He can be normal.

He has control.

Trying to get at him is pretty impossible, currently. There's a massive tangle of vines and creepers and trees. He could be anywhere. Be any one of them. Tread cautiously.

He is a monster after all.

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Interesting.

Alec hasn't been paying attention but he looks now. Truly looks. It might be a bit unnerving, a big green creature just staring for far longer then normal.

There. The faintest tinge of yet another green.

"...Yes." his voice is soft, "Yes. Faint but still there. So you...understand. How sometimes they can be...direct. Forceful. Dangerous but also...boring."

He can't roll his eyes but he does sit, "I find soil, neutrients, all of that is fascinating to me - far more then it used to be - but it doesn't hold my attention for as long as they wish. You are the first human with a connection to the green I've seen who wasn't...a season. A being with duties."

"So you understand."

Jacob's not sure what he means by faint but still there and he's been wary of magic long enough that it's a little worrisome, but he nods because that's exactly what it was like.

"Yeah. Direct, forceful, and dangerous. A lot of people got taken by the forest before they found me. And yeah...boring." Being stuck literally in a tree while waiting for his friends to show up was both terrifying and seemed like forever, even if it hadn't been all that long. Not forever to the trees, of course. "But they needed help badly, and while...it would have been great if they asked first...they didn't have a way of communication. I was glad to help. Their language is...different. Almost alien. But if that forest was cut down, all forests in our world would die."

But out of his friends, none of the Librarians had any frame of reference for the experience, and he was usually closed off about things--especially magical things--so he'd been reluctant to talk about it. It was weird to talk about it out loud, but more importantly--to someone else who understood.

"Really? Guess...it's not common here either." He's not sure if he should be worried or flattered. The life of a Librarian, pretty much. "But yeah. I understand."

"I was a botanist." his voice is soft, "I would have given my right eye to understand plants the way I do now. Their language can be pretty alien and when you encounter other greens from other planets..."

"I'm grateful to have someone who understands. How did you end up learning of our language in such a way Mr..."

"A botanist, wow. I can imagine..." That made sense, of course, they'd choose a botanist. He balks at the thought of alien plants--as amazing as that is, in his world aliens are one of the few myths that have stayed actual myths and not been reality. Though clearly alternate universes, or places like the Nexus, that was not the case.

"Jacob Stone." He offers a smile, even if he can't help a lot, every little bit counts. "Well, it's a funny story. Not funny, funny, just...unexpected. I was at a team-building camp...thing...with my friends. We work together. Anyway people were encroaching onto the forest, like how the camp was built, and I randomly got a splinter--or not so randomly, I guess. I started hearin'...uh, voices? Voices sayin' help us. And when I was with...another friend, out in the woods, vines came out and grabbed me. Next thing I knew, I was part of the forest, sorta...part of a tree. In the tree. That's how they could speak through me, we could speak together, to warn people--and my friends who found me, about what would happen if the forest was cut down, and how it needs to be protected. We were given the Zero Seed, which could reconstitute the forest if it was ever destroyed. Then...they let me go."

It was now or never, and it would give context to how he'd even been in that situation in the first place. "See, I'm a linguist, a historian, but I'm also a Librarian." A slightly dramatic pause. "In my world, we're the ones who protect people from magic and magical artifacts, we go out and collect them so that they won't fall into the wrong hands. The Zero Seed was safest with us."

"That sort of thing leaves an imprint on a person. The green remembers those who it likes." At the mention of Zero seed he can only assume it's an artifact important to his world's green.

This makes him an ally. When he discusses being a linguist and historian he nods, and the notion of a librarian makes him nod. It's amazing what I'm taking in stride.

"And you keep it safe from other human beings and beings that would use it against us?"

He pauses, "Against the green. Use against the green."

Jacob nods, he's understanding now what he truly means by the green.

"Yeah, it was...an experience, that's for sure. And there's no safer place for it than the Library. It'll be kept safe...pretty much forever, in there."

He glances back up at him.

"The government--our government's also protecting the forest, so hopefully it won't ever have to come to actually using it."

"Your government is...enlightened."

He settles in, "I was working on a bio-restorative formula that would have created hardier plants. To improve, food scarcity in dangerous regions that were affected by global warming."

Humanity. One of the vines on the ground twitches, "As are you Jacob Stone, Librarian. I assume that's some sort of title?"

"They're usually not," he says wryly. "But we've dealt with that particular government organization before, and while I don't think they exactly trust us, they know well enough not to mess with forces they don't understand."

There's a curious tone to his voice. "That's impressive. Did it work?"

Another faint smile ghosts across his face. "Thanks, well. I try, anyway. Yeah. We're part of the Library. It's..." He tries to think of the best way to put it. "Imagine the Library of Alexandria? Except magical, containing all the world's lost knowledge as well as magical, mythical artifacts. Nestled in its own little pocket dimension."

"...As well as could be expected. I never finished it." Why would he need to when he could make plants grow with a thought? when they were a part of him?

The thought makes him uncomfortable. He could solve world hunger. Easily. With a snap of his fingers. The green would just grow in places it shouldn't be. Throwing the world out of balance.

"It sounds amazing. I haven't been to a real library in a long time, though I did frequently in Grad school in Metropolis. Beings like...like me don't get out very much. As evidenced by the..."

He gestures at the flowers, at jacob's bench, "I miss easy access to books and access to artifacts-I know someone who'd be very interested in that."

he pauses, "If a man named John Constantine ever tries to get in there be sure to keep him out. He's a liar."

"Hmm. That's too bad." He's not entirely sure if that meant he did indeed instead use his plant-powers to provide for people affected by food scarcity...but it was probably best not to prod at the moment.

"It is. It's incredible." Despite everything that's happened and what he'd had to put up with, his reverence and awe of the Library remains unchanged and evident in his voice. "...that's too bad. I wish there was a way around it for you, I'd miss that like you wouldn't believe." And he genuinely feels sorry for his plight, he can't imagine what it'd be like without easy access to books, even if at one point in his life he had to hide how much he loved them. Metropolis rings enough of a bell, but he's not that into comic books, even if he did read them a lot as a kid.

"We have a pretty decent security system, but I'll keep that in mind." A magical security system, but that's been breached before. Multiple times. He's definitely not going to mention that in public out here.

"...The nexus provides me a degree of freedom I don't have other places." Alec murmured, "But without friends who I can trust in my swamp I'm...well. I used to be fond of going to the movies too. I once tried to sneak in in a popcorn seed. They uh-they emptied the theater. Evacuated it."

The thought still makes him angry.

"I do miss it though. Reading. I've often wondered if there is a kingdom for it."

He paused, "You are a librarian, you do research? Science? Maybe we...could trade. I don't want anything special but since you've proven yourself an ally to the green perhaps if I..." he almost said wrote, "If I dictated the histories of the green, or at least the relevant ones...You could bring me books from the nexus's library. I'm sure there has to be one."

His green rebelled at that. A rumbling in his mind but the Nexus's green held it at bay with a positive look. The flowers tilt toward him and seemingly nod.

"The first avatar of the green was a trilobite. There's a triceratops in my...magical genetics as well somewhere."

"I'm...sorry to hear that." Things one takes for granted, like simply going to the movies, was out of the question for someone like Alec, and Jacob shakes his head. He'd be angry too.

Jacob's face lights but because that sounds amazing!?

"Really? You'd do that? I'm not as good with science as my uh, colleagues, but I would love to hear that, man. If it's okay with you, I'd wanna write it down for our Library, in my world. I'm sure there's one in the Nexus, but I also might be able to find some rare things you can borrow from our Library, as long as they're returned."

It's probably a terrible idea and Jenkins, the caretaker, would be pissed, but Jacob didn't care, since Alec already knew about the Library now. As long as the books weren't something that taught people arcane magic to take over the world, sharing knowledge was a wonderful, necessary thing.

"Seriously though, a triceratops?" This is the coolest thing.

"The green is older then life on earth. Part of a web of magic that extends to other planets. Triceratops, neanderthals, an Egyptian prince, franciscan monks, roman soldiers. They had different names. Hera, dionysus, osiris. All have the same meaning."

It sounds so serious, when all he wanted really was a book or two. Something he would have asked a friend, or Linda to do.

"I'll read anything. And I mean anything. romance, horror, I'd only read up to book 2 in Harry Potter before I died."

As wary as he is of magic, this is still incredible, regardless, and there's an overly excitable look of scholarly eagerness on his face. How much had this...green affected his own world? Besides that which he's directly experienced...

"I can't wait to hear all about it!" A pause. "Of course, the last time we dealt with Egyptian gods it was pretty much the end of the world..."

This is what happens when Librarians get involved, alas.

"Wow, you've...got a lot of catching up to do. I'll put books three through seven in the pile." A grin.

Edited 2018-07-29 23:58 (UTC)

Seven.

Abby would have been so happy. She loved those books. Pleased, Alec doesn't smile anymore but he nods, clearly pleased.

"...Osiris in my world isn't that sort of figure I can promise you that. How bad was it for you?"

"Well, we had to deal with Apep, the god of Chaos, it was a pretty big deal and we only barely won without the world plunging into literal chaos and evil." A pause. "He also summoned Anubis at one point, which ended up nearly gettin' us all killed with werewolves. So yeah. Pretty bad."

A shrug, which might look dismissive, but his voice betrays the fact that despite the victory, he's still not comfortable with how it was achieved.

"We almost lost one of our Librarians tryin' to defeat Apep. Me and the others...we used magic to turn him from a god into a mortal human being."

Hmngh.

The god of the green, the plant elemental, the man known as Alec Holland stares at his big green hands before nodding slowly, "I am sorry for your friend."

Any friend of the green's friends- His red eyes close and he shakes his head for a moment, "Those are things I am also capable of. Not that I want to do it, I just- know it. Power's a fickle stupid thing."

He sighs and the air fills with oxygen and the flowers brighten, "Don't ever become a God Jacob. If you can help it."

Jacob nods, his brows furrowed, the appreciation in his face. At least they made it in time, if they'd been a few minutes--seconds slower, it would have been over.

"...sounds terrifyin', if I'm bein' honest."

And Jacob was not used to being honest, not even to himself, though he'd been becoming more comfortable with it ever since he became a Librarian.

"And I think that makes tryin' to hold onto your humanity worth it, y'know? Apep and...and others like him, they had no frame of reference for mortality, no empathy, no...anything."

Despite everything, he smirks. "I'll do my best not to."

Hearing about beings with no frame of reference for morality or empathy is exactly the reason why he has struggled against the idea of being a monster. Of giving into his darker natures. Not even as the swamp thing - simply as a being having seen what Parliaments unchecked - avatars unchecked could do.

"I've known avatars like that." Anton Arcane. He has a deep faith that Abigail would never walk Arcane's path.

"When you have absolute power, absolute authority it is very hard to see why you should bother with humanity. My knowledge stretches...a millennia if I dig deeply enough. Not just to me, but to the green itself...Yet the green..."

He pauses, "There was an Avatar...I'll speak to him again if I can find him in the green and ask if he would have his story told - he was a samurai warrior. When I was first...changed he impressed upon me the importance of this as a calling but to give myself a code of honor and conduct. Loosely translated I think the way he phrased it was "It's a job, not a way of life."

"I try...to hold onto that."

Absolute power corrupts absolutely, "You are wise Jacob Stone, friend of the green. Should godhood happen, since I know better then a lot of people that destiny is a fickle...fickle creature - remember that it's a job. Not a calling. What people don't reckon with is how much absolute power...strips from you."

He pauses and looks a little desperate, "...I'm honestly looking forward to sharing some of this knowledge with another human."

And the parliament, and his green, can sit on a thorn about it.

"And that's also why we...why Librarians do what we do. Why we protect magical artifacts. An ambitious person gets ahold of one certain artifact and--and that's it, it's goodbye, world-as-we-knew-it."

There's a look of awe that he can't help--he would love to hear from a samurai? But he sobers because what Alec says hits him deep.

It's a job, not a way of life.

"It's...I think that's somethin' I needed to hear." He clears his throat. "Bein' a Librarian takes over your life. You can't have normal relationships, old friends fall away cause you're too busy and you can't tell 'em about why you haven't been home in six months because you were trying to recover a cursed Medusa-related statue."

"I think you're pretty damn wise yourself." He'd known quite a few people who could have used that reality check. To realize what absolute power really did. He doesn't want to think about something as wild as actual godhood befalling him, but one of his biggest fears was being cursed with magic, being unable to escape it, having that unknown, unpredictable power and not being able to outrun it. The remnants of the magic tattoo on his arm still bother him, they should have disappeared when he'd used it against Apep and the fact that it didn't was terrifying. Was there still magic there? But no matter how much he doesn't want magic, it keeps finding him--like with the forest, becoming their translator.

"Absolute power isn't anythin' I want. Any power isn't anythin' I want. But it happens, sometimes." Like with Cassie. But she embraced her gifts. "We end up using magic because there's no choice. Sometimes I'm the only one who can read a scroll for a spell because it's written in ancient Sanskrit or somethin'. Librarians do get corrupted, the last guy before our predecessor did. Turned evil." He falls silent a moment. "Job hazard. It's why we have a Guardian. She protects our souls. And does a pretty kickass job of it, too."

But he's so ready to hear this knowledge. "Me too--I mean, the opposite, learning about it. Happy to help." It's a real grin, brimming with the excitement of just learning. Especially something that he'd never have the chance to, back home.

By way of response Alec holds out a hand and a root begins to extend from it. It turns into a tree, a beautiful flowering tree in miniature. Staring at it, he pulls it from his palm with a shrug and plants it in the ground.

"...I needed to hear about that fear." He exhales oxygen and nods, "Being a part of the green means swimming in it. It's a part of me, I couldn't outrun it. These powers. Having friends like this is...what I needed. People who I can lean on so that I can swim in it and remember why I need to not dive deep."

Not yet at any rate. One day he will pass into the green. The thought terrifies him, joining the parliament, rooting.

"Yes. Come back. Bring books and I'll gather histories. It'll be a good excuse to get to know the people involved in all of this."

He spreads his hands wide to embrace the green world at large.

"also know this Jacob Stone. Doing this for me...If you find yourself struggling here or in danger, come to any woods or forest and it will defend you."

His motivation is partially selfish. This man is offering him companionship and friendship. He is offering him books and humanity. That can't be taken away. The other half is genuine. He can't do much by way of repaying him beyond knocking on doors in the green and hoping for stories worth sharing.

'It doesn't involve you doing anything." he gestured, "No magic. They simply...see you as a friend. As do I."

"...Thank you."

That's a certainly a...unique response, and Jacob watches the small tree for a moment, absolutely fascinated. He might be afraid of using magic, distrustful of people using it in general, but it still remains a source of wonder for him. Maybe he needs to see things like this more often than just bad guy after bad guy taking advantage of artifacts, re-enforcing his cynicism.

"...I have a friend that has gifts too. I'm afraid for her sometimes, and she just--she just loves magic, y'know? Got us into trouble a few times. Got us outta trouble, too. But I wanna help her, it's a part of her and...friends do help."

He nods, already mentally planning a list of what else to bring. But what Alec says next is surprising, and his face softens as he stammers, appreciative of the gesture.

"That's--that's real nice of you, I mean--thanks." A great smile. All of it, the gift of the forest to defend him, and making a new friend. He's truly eager to learn more about the new stories, and that's a gift in and of itself.

"It's nothin'. Don't really have a chance to make new friends much, either. So really, thank you."

"...Have faith in your friend but don't be afraid to do what you've done for me." he nods, "It can be lonely to have a connection to power like this."

He pauses, "Once a week Mr. Stone? Jacob? I always used to go to the movies on Tuesday. That would be a good day to meet...perhaps?"

"Yeah...I'm working on it." Needing to trust her more, trust people more in general...definitely still working on it. "I never really thought about how lonely it can be..."

He grins, nodding enthusiastically. "Jacob's fine. And Tuesday's fine. I'll bring along the books. And a couple of cold ones...you can't drink beer, can you? Just asking."

"No." Sadly. He was never much of a drinker but Barley is a bit of a conversationalist, "But don't let that stop you. I'll have water and sunlight and you can drink and listen."

Then. Sincerely, "I'm looking forward to it."

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bookbrawler - 2018-08-09 03:37 (UTC) - Expand

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