Opening (Mythklok Interstitial)
Apr. 30th, 2011 04:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tikificTitle: Opening (Mythklok Interstitial)
Author: tikistitch
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Elias and his friends attend his first art opening
Warnings: Slash, AU, OCs, swearing
Notes: I've referred to this a couple of places, so I thought I'd write it. I'm hoping to get another real chapter out this week, but the story kind of decided to take a turn. (Mythklok does that sometimes.) Oh, and in case this isn't astoundingly clear, this takes place a few years in the future in my continuity.
"Now." Ganesh's hands were light on Elias's shoulders, signalling that this was a Serious Conversation about Stuff. Elias craned his neck to look up into his father's eyes. At 13, he was still a bit small for his age, and despite constant reassurances from his undeniably tall father that he had been similarly stature-imparied at that age, Elias was growing a bit impatient at the whole matter, and often found himself up on his toes, as if this would hurry things along.
"Now," Ganesh repeated. "You understand why we've insisted on your anonymity at the present time. The gallery owner was terribly cooperative in the matter. It is no reflection on you. But your father and I have agreed we think it best that you not assume an identity in the human world until your eighteenth birthday. So please keep in mind, despite your obvious excitement, that you cannot claim credit for the work."
Elias nodded, still impatient. As far as he was concerned, this matter had already been talked pretty much to death. It was sort of a hazard of having not one but two lawyer fathers.
"All right, then we may all enjoy your first art opening!"
"But what do you think of my piece? You never said!"
Ganesh bent down and kissed Elias lightly on his forehead. "You will need to inquire of others. I have absolutely no capability of being objective in this matter," he beamed. And then he strode off towards the milling gallery crowd, leaving Elias glaring.
Although, the distinct advantage, Elias had found, of having two fathers was that if you couldn't get what you wanted from the one, there was always the other. He ran off to locate Sariel.
Elias' installation was large, and so had been assembled outside. It was, fortunately, a bright sunny day. The concept was fairly simple: a maze that wandered here and there and up and down and all around, in three dimensions. The crowd standing outside was a mix of people waiting to go in and those who had just emerged.
"BOON!" Elias turned and grinned at the sound of his cousin's already booming voice. Liam was definitely not waiting around for his growth spurt: he was already almost a good head taller than Elias, who he greeted now with a hearty half hug. "You're a big deal now, huh?"
"Yeah, I'm not gonna be able to talk to assholes any more," Elias grinned.
Abby, Liam's dark-haired sister, kissed Elias a little bit awkwardly on the cheek. She looked like she's spent extra time trying to look as grown up as possible for the occasion.
"Not gonna slip your boyfriend some tongue, Lizard?" Liam urged.
"I'm so gonna put Cheese Whiz in your underpants again!" she shouted at her brother, completely breaking the carefully cultivated adult composure.
"Get your wings down! I was joking!" Liam laughed, ducking once successfully and once not so successfully as she tried to punch him in the arm. Uncle Wotan had foretold that Abby and Elias would marry some day. Although all of the other adults seemed to regard this as complete nonsense, Abby and Elias had always taken it as gospel truth. It was fine when they were littler and happily played in the mud together, flying around on small wings tormenting bog demons, but lately they had both begun to feel a bit awkward. Which completely delighted Liam.
Liam was not quite so delighted after being punched however. Abby packed a wallop.
"That hurt, Lizard!" he whined to his much smaller sister.
"Quit whining, Cheese Shorts!"
"WINGS DOWN, YOU TWO!' Both cousins ceased the feud immediately to the sound of their father's voice.
"Yes dad." "Yes, dad!"
"I will not have a blood feud at your cousin's openin'! You two useless Seraphim behave yourselves!"
"Yes, father." "Yes, dad."
"Well, an exciting occasion young Boon!" Wotan told Elias.
"Yessir," said Elias. He hadn't been shouted at, but Uncle Wotan was awfully big.
"Have you seen My Lady around? She spent about six hours on her damn outfit! She considers this a mighty big occasion!"
"That's good sir. No, sir, I haven't seen Auntie Raziel."
"Probably off partying with those pretty bastards. We'll hunt her down. You two!" he said to the twins. "You come on with me, into the maze."
"But, I wanted to wait to go with Booooon," Abby whined, rather fluttering her eyes at the same. Elias felt his heart stop and restart. She had started to be able to do that lately, and it was horrible and nice all at the same time.
"There will be time for your angel mischief later! Now, come along!" Wotan led his children off into the installation. When Abby thought no one was looking, she looked back and blew a kiss at Boon. Liam spotted her and began to sass her, but then Wotan glared at the both of them and they tried to look innocent again.
"Boon!" came the musical voice. Elias smiled and went to greet Auntie Raziel, who had just emerged from the installation's exit completely surrounded by terribly attractive men all chattering away in what sounded like Italian. Boon knew these were all angelic artists' models.
Auntie Raziel was wearing a little hat and expensive-looking shoes, and then Elias was sort of confused what exactly it was supposed to be happening in between, which must have meant she thought this was a terribly important occasion. Usually the less he understood Auntie Raziel's outfit, the more time and care she had spent assembling it.
She pulled him down to kiss the top of his head - he liked her as one of the few relatives shorter than he. "Fellows, this is my nephew, Brahma Vishnu Maheshwara Elias Ogoun Sen Michel, an important new visual artist!" And then she began to introduce her companions, who all gushed in Italian and kissed him on both cheeks. Elias wondered if Lady Raziel hadn't heard he was supposed to be anonymous. On the other hand, these were angels, so he guessed it didn't matter so much as humans finding out about him.
"The Renaissance Angels are so, so impressed with your concept, Boon!" Raziel told him. "They begged me to ask you if you would ever consider doing portraiture?"
"Oh, yeah! But, I mostly work in digital media!" he told her. Raziel explained this to more excited babbling.
"They think that's fabulous! I'll put you in contact with them, OK?" Raziel asked as they wandered off in a swirl of Italian and odd sartorial choices.
Elias grinned, finding himself very attached to the concept of a house full of very good looking True Formed Renaissance angels, as he suspected Abby would suddenly find all sorts of excuses to visit.
"Hey Boon dood!"
"Hey Unky Pickles!" Elias grinned as the drummer ruffed his hair. He usually didn't like it when adults did that, but Unky Pickles seemed immune to most things. Elias had at some point determined that Pickles was the coolest single individual on the planet. He sometimes played drums himself when his cousin brought out his guitar. Liam was admittedly a bit lacking in musicianship, possibly because he was simply too damned lazy to practice, but, as one possessed of four arms, Elias was not actually a bad percussionist.
"I t'ink I lost da udder guys somewhere back dere," Pickles explained cheerfully, pointing to the installation.
Elias grinned. "I'm not surprised at Unky Toki getting lost. Or Unky Murderface. What happened to Unky Skwisgaar?"
"Dere was a part o' retirees I t'ink."
Elias grinned.
"An' Nathan' is prolly still screamin' in da tunnel part. He sez da acoustics is interestin'."
"Did you like it?"
"It's a trip, dood! I'm gonna go get some o' my special, er, art appreciation enhancement substance an' come back."
"Your Special Blend, Unky?" Elias grinned.
"Don't let yer dads hear yoo say dat. Where's Charles, anyways?"
"I've been waiting for him! He was supposed to be here." Elias hadn't quite realized he was starting to get nervous.
"Don't worry, little dood. He'll be here soon." And PIckles squeezed his shoulder and slouched off.
He heard a very soft, "Hey," from behind him.
"Dad!" Elias turned and dove for Sariel's arm, dearly wishing he had his second set out.
"I'm very sorry I'm late, Boon. I didn't want to miss this."
"Come inside with me now!" Elias urged. Sariel let himself be led inside the maze, where he walked silently with his son for some time.
"This is pretty impressive. Did you use any magic in building this?"
"No, dad wouldn't let me. He said I had to build it all."
"That was a good decision I think."
They wandered around through paths that seemed mildly impossible, sometimes winding upstairs or downstairs. There were times when it seemed like the next turn should bring them back to where they began, only it would take them some place new. A few places opened up to show the sky above, but there were also dark tunnels. Sometimes they happened into larger areas and crossed paths with other wanderers.
And then they had arrived at a particularly isolated part.
"Huh. I think we're lost," Sariel said.
"Oh no! I always know the way out."
"No," said Sariel, sitting down on the floor and smiling. "I think we're lost."
Elias grinned and knelt down beside his father, who had twisted into a lotus position. This was a habit, despite rarely bothering to meditate as Ganesh wanted him to. Elias noticed Sariel distractedly patting his jacket for a nonexistent pack of Marlboros. His father had evidently smoked cigarettes before Elias was alive. Ganesh had forced him to quit, but Sariel had never quite gotten out of the habit of checking for them.
"So," said Elias when he could stand it no more.
"Do you like it?" Sariel asked him.
"What?"
"Do you like it? Do you like this?" Sariel repeated, pointing around him.
Elias thought for a moment. It was his. What was he talking about? His dad was always asking him weird questions like this. "Well, I like how people go in and wander around and I make them think about things and have reactions and all that stuff."
Sariel raised an eyebrow. "Is that a yes?"
Elias thought, and then nodded enthusiastically.
"So. You'd like to try more of this kinda stuff?"
Another nod.
"You know you can speak, right?"
Elias grinned and nodded again.
"I guess with two lawyers you must get tired of all the yacking," Sariel said, looking around. "This is nice and quiet." He started to rise and extended a hand. "Did you wanna get going?"
Elias somewhat reluctantly led his father out of the structure.
"SARIEL!"
"Hey Raziel. Nice dress. If that's what it's supposed to be."
The little angel put her arms around Elias's shoulders. "Could we POSSIBLY kidnap your little artiste? We're having a post-opening soiree at Valhalla, and the Renaissance angels are dying to chat with him."
"I'm gonna have a fucking house full of babbling angels!" Wotan thundered, draping an arm over Raziel.
"Yes, dear, you 're gonna have a fucking house full of babbling angels."
"You wanna go?" Sariel asked Elias, who was gazing distractedly over at Abby.
"Um. Yeah?"
"Back by midnight. You do as your Uncle Wotan says."
"Why don't you ever tell him to do as his Auntie Raziel says?" Raziel protested.
"'Cause I don't want him coming back dressed in a garden hose and cotton candy!"
"THIS IS COUTURE!"
"It looks like you raided the patio section at Wal*Mart."
"Wings down, you two!" Wotan scolded. Sariel and Raziel stuck their tongues out at each other. "Angels. I have a difficult time tellin' who's 13 and who's two thousand years old."
"I'm NOT two thousand year old," Raziel scoffed.
"Since when?" Sariel demanded.
"Come on, then, Boon, you'll lend some maturity to this sorry crowd," Wotan sighed, leading off a rather large and noisy gaggle of angelic beings.
Sariel noticed another being was now standing nearby.
"How did we ever produce this?" Ganesh asked waving at the installation, which was now looking quite lovely in silhouette as the sun lowered.
"Us? No fucking idea."
"I do watercolors on weekends. I simply don't know where he gets it."
"And he's only a kid."
"Well," allowed Ganesh. "Perhaps not so much any more. You've seen him look at his cousin."
"Raziel's daughter. Gods help us all."
"At any rate, it looks like no law school for this one."
"Ah, just as well," Sariel noted. "Three laywers in the family? Too goddam much."
"You may be right. Although young Abigail has expressed interest in interning."
"Yeah. Now, that one has the killer instinct."
"You know what I'm thinking?" Ganesh asked, draping an arm around Sariel.
"Yeah?" asked Sariel.
"I had heard rumors Pickles was on an errand to pick up some Special Blend."
"Hey, that always helped my art appreciation!" Sariel grinned. "You know what else I heard? There's a chamber somewhere in there where Skwisgaar was entertaining a whole busload of retirees."
"Ah! I think I know whereof you speak. Sounds perfect. Almost perfect. If only we had martinis!"
"We'll tell Boon to include a wet bar with his next installation," Sariel suggested.
"Drat, we might have to wait until our boy is 18."
"Hey, Pickles!" Sariel called, waving at the drummer, who pointed to a baggie under his coat. The two fathers grinned at each other and made their way to the maze.
Author: tikistitch
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Elias and his friends attend his first art opening
Warnings: Slash, AU, OCs, swearing
Notes: I've referred to this a couple of places, so I thought I'd write it. I'm hoping to get another real chapter out this week, but the story kind of decided to take a turn. (Mythklok does that sometimes.) Oh, and in case this isn't astoundingly clear, this takes place a few years in the future in my continuity.
"Now." Ganesh's hands were light on Elias's shoulders, signalling that this was a Serious Conversation about Stuff. Elias craned his neck to look up into his father's eyes. At 13, he was still a bit small for his age, and despite constant reassurances from his undeniably tall father that he had been similarly stature-imparied at that age, Elias was growing a bit impatient at the whole matter, and often found himself up on his toes, as if this would hurry things along.
"Now," Ganesh repeated. "You understand why we've insisted on your anonymity at the present time. The gallery owner was terribly cooperative in the matter. It is no reflection on you. But your father and I have agreed we think it best that you not assume an identity in the human world until your eighteenth birthday. So please keep in mind, despite your obvious excitement, that you cannot claim credit for the work."
Elias nodded, still impatient. As far as he was concerned, this matter had already been talked pretty much to death. It was sort of a hazard of having not one but two lawyer fathers.
"All right, then we may all enjoy your first art opening!"
"But what do you think of my piece? You never said!"
Ganesh bent down and kissed Elias lightly on his forehead. "You will need to inquire of others. I have absolutely no capability of being objective in this matter," he beamed. And then he strode off towards the milling gallery crowd, leaving Elias glaring.
Although, the distinct advantage, Elias had found, of having two fathers was that if you couldn't get what you wanted from the one, there was always the other. He ran off to locate Sariel.
Elias' installation was large, and so had been assembled outside. It was, fortunately, a bright sunny day. The concept was fairly simple: a maze that wandered here and there and up and down and all around, in three dimensions. The crowd standing outside was a mix of people waiting to go in and those who had just emerged.
"BOON!" Elias turned and grinned at the sound of his cousin's already booming voice. Liam was definitely not waiting around for his growth spurt: he was already almost a good head taller than Elias, who he greeted now with a hearty half hug. "You're a big deal now, huh?"
"Yeah, I'm not gonna be able to talk to assholes any more," Elias grinned.
Abby, Liam's dark-haired sister, kissed Elias a little bit awkwardly on the cheek. She looked like she's spent extra time trying to look as grown up as possible for the occasion.
"Not gonna slip your boyfriend some tongue, Lizard?" Liam urged.
"I'm so gonna put Cheese Whiz in your underpants again!" she shouted at her brother, completely breaking the carefully cultivated adult composure.
"Get your wings down! I was joking!" Liam laughed, ducking once successfully and once not so successfully as she tried to punch him in the arm. Uncle Wotan had foretold that Abby and Elias would marry some day. Although all of the other adults seemed to regard this as complete nonsense, Abby and Elias had always taken it as gospel truth. It was fine when they were littler and happily played in the mud together, flying around on small wings tormenting bog demons, but lately they had both begun to feel a bit awkward. Which completely delighted Liam.
Liam was not quite so delighted after being punched however. Abby packed a wallop.
"That hurt, Lizard!" he whined to his much smaller sister.
"Quit whining, Cheese Shorts!"
"WINGS DOWN, YOU TWO!' Both cousins ceased the feud immediately to the sound of their father's voice.
"Yes dad." "Yes, dad!"
"I will not have a blood feud at your cousin's openin'! You two useless Seraphim behave yourselves!"
"Yes, father." "Yes, dad."
"Well, an exciting occasion young Boon!" Wotan told Elias.
"Yessir," said Elias. He hadn't been shouted at, but Uncle Wotan was awfully big.
"Have you seen My Lady around? She spent about six hours on her damn outfit! She considers this a mighty big occasion!"
"That's good sir. No, sir, I haven't seen Auntie Raziel."
"Probably off partying with those pretty bastards. We'll hunt her down. You two!" he said to the twins. "You come on with me, into the maze."
"But, I wanted to wait to go with Booooon," Abby whined, rather fluttering her eyes at the same. Elias felt his heart stop and restart. She had started to be able to do that lately, and it was horrible and nice all at the same time.
"There will be time for your angel mischief later! Now, come along!" Wotan led his children off into the installation. When Abby thought no one was looking, she looked back and blew a kiss at Boon. Liam spotted her and began to sass her, but then Wotan glared at the both of them and they tried to look innocent again.
"Boon!" came the musical voice. Elias smiled and went to greet Auntie Raziel, who had just emerged from the installation's exit completely surrounded by terribly attractive men all chattering away in what sounded like Italian. Boon knew these were all angelic artists' models.
Auntie Raziel was wearing a little hat and expensive-looking shoes, and then Elias was sort of confused what exactly it was supposed to be happening in between, which must have meant she thought this was a terribly important occasion. Usually the less he understood Auntie Raziel's outfit, the more time and care she had spent assembling it.
She pulled him down to kiss the top of his head - he liked her as one of the few relatives shorter than he. "Fellows, this is my nephew, Brahma Vishnu Maheshwara Elias Ogoun Sen Michel, an important new visual artist!" And then she began to introduce her companions, who all gushed in Italian and kissed him on both cheeks. Elias wondered if Lady Raziel hadn't heard he was supposed to be anonymous. On the other hand, these were angels, so he guessed it didn't matter so much as humans finding out about him.
"The Renaissance Angels are so, so impressed with your concept, Boon!" Raziel told him. "They begged me to ask you if you would ever consider doing portraiture?"
"Oh, yeah! But, I mostly work in digital media!" he told her. Raziel explained this to more excited babbling.
"They think that's fabulous! I'll put you in contact with them, OK?" Raziel asked as they wandered off in a swirl of Italian and odd sartorial choices.
Elias grinned, finding himself very attached to the concept of a house full of very good looking True Formed Renaissance angels, as he suspected Abby would suddenly find all sorts of excuses to visit.
"Hey Boon dood!"
"Hey Unky Pickles!" Elias grinned as the drummer ruffed his hair. He usually didn't like it when adults did that, but Unky Pickles seemed immune to most things. Elias had at some point determined that Pickles was the coolest single individual on the planet. He sometimes played drums himself when his cousin brought out his guitar. Liam was admittedly a bit lacking in musicianship, possibly because he was simply too damned lazy to practice, but, as one possessed of four arms, Elias was not actually a bad percussionist.
"I t'ink I lost da udder guys somewhere back dere," Pickles explained cheerfully, pointing to the installation.
Elias grinned. "I'm not surprised at Unky Toki getting lost. Or Unky Murderface. What happened to Unky Skwisgaar?"
"Dere was a part o' retirees I t'ink."
Elias grinned.
"An' Nathan' is prolly still screamin' in da tunnel part. He sez da acoustics is interestin'."
"Did you like it?"
"It's a trip, dood! I'm gonna go get some o' my special, er, art appreciation enhancement substance an' come back."
"Your Special Blend, Unky?" Elias grinned.
"Don't let yer dads hear yoo say dat. Where's Charles, anyways?"
"I've been waiting for him! He was supposed to be here." Elias hadn't quite realized he was starting to get nervous.
"Don't worry, little dood. He'll be here soon." And PIckles squeezed his shoulder and slouched off.
He heard a very soft, "Hey," from behind him.
"Dad!" Elias turned and dove for Sariel's arm, dearly wishing he had his second set out.
"I'm very sorry I'm late, Boon. I didn't want to miss this."
"Come inside with me now!" Elias urged. Sariel let himself be led inside the maze, where he walked silently with his son for some time.
"This is pretty impressive. Did you use any magic in building this?"
"No, dad wouldn't let me. He said I had to build it all."
"That was a good decision I think."
They wandered around through paths that seemed mildly impossible, sometimes winding upstairs or downstairs. There were times when it seemed like the next turn should bring them back to where they began, only it would take them some place new. A few places opened up to show the sky above, but there were also dark tunnels. Sometimes they happened into larger areas and crossed paths with other wanderers.
And then they had arrived at a particularly isolated part.
"Huh. I think we're lost," Sariel said.
"Oh no! I always know the way out."
"No," said Sariel, sitting down on the floor and smiling. "I think we're lost."
Elias grinned and knelt down beside his father, who had twisted into a lotus position. This was a habit, despite rarely bothering to meditate as Ganesh wanted him to. Elias noticed Sariel distractedly patting his jacket for a nonexistent pack of Marlboros. His father had evidently smoked cigarettes before Elias was alive. Ganesh had forced him to quit, but Sariel had never quite gotten out of the habit of checking for them.
"So," said Elias when he could stand it no more.
"Do you like it?" Sariel asked him.
"What?"
"Do you like it? Do you like this?" Sariel repeated, pointing around him.
Elias thought for a moment. It was his. What was he talking about? His dad was always asking him weird questions like this. "Well, I like how people go in and wander around and I make them think about things and have reactions and all that stuff."
Sariel raised an eyebrow. "Is that a yes?"
Elias thought, and then nodded enthusiastically.
"So. You'd like to try more of this kinda stuff?"
Another nod.
"You know you can speak, right?"
Elias grinned and nodded again.
"I guess with two lawyers you must get tired of all the yacking," Sariel said, looking around. "This is nice and quiet." He started to rise and extended a hand. "Did you wanna get going?"
Elias somewhat reluctantly led his father out of the structure.
"SARIEL!"
"Hey Raziel. Nice dress. If that's what it's supposed to be."
The little angel put her arms around Elias's shoulders. "Could we POSSIBLY kidnap your little artiste? We're having a post-opening soiree at Valhalla, and the Renaissance angels are dying to chat with him."
"I'm gonna have a fucking house full of babbling angels!" Wotan thundered, draping an arm over Raziel.
"Yes, dear, you 're gonna have a fucking house full of babbling angels."
"You wanna go?" Sariel asked Elias, who was gazing distractedly over at Abby.
"Um. Yeah?"
"Back by midnight. You do as your Uncle Wotan says."
"Why don't you ever tell him to do as his Auntie Raziel says?" Raziel protested.
"'Cause I don't want him coming back dressed in a garden hose and cotton candy!"
"THIS IS COUTURE!"
"It looks like you raided the patio section at Wal*Mart."
"Wings down, you two!" Wotan scolded. Sariel and Raziel stuck their tongues out at each other. "Angels. I have a difficult time tellin' who's 13 and who's two thousand years old."
"I'm NOT two thousand year old," Raziel scoffed.
"Since when?" Sariel demanded.
"Come on, then, Boon, you'll lend some maturity to this sorry crowd," Wotan sighed, leading off a rather large and noisy gaggle of angelic beings.
Sariel noticed another being was now standing nearby.
"How did we ever produce this?" Ganesh asked waving at the installation, which was now looking quite lovely in silhouette as the sun lowered.
"Us? No fucking idea."
"I do watercolors on weekends. I simply don't know where he gets it."
"And he's only a kid."
"Well," allowed Ganesh. "Perhaps not so much any more. You've seen him look at his cousin."
"Raziel's daughter. Gods help us all."
"At any rate, it looks like no law school for this one."
"Ah, just as well," Sariel noted. "Three laywers in the family? Too goddam much."
"You may be right. Although young Abigail has expressed interest in interning."
"Yeah. Now, that one has the killer instinct."
"You know what I'm thinking?" Ganesh asked, draping an arm around Sariel.
"Yeah?" asked Sariel.
"I had heard rumors Pickles was on an errand to pick up some Special Blend."
"Hey, that always helped my art appreciation!" Sariel grinned. "You know what else I heard? There's a chamber somewhere in there where Skwisgaar was entertaining a whole busload of retirees."
"Ah! I think I know whereof you speak. Sounds perfect. Almost perfect. If only we had martinis!"
"We'll tell Boon to include a wet bar with his next installation," Sariel suggested.
"Drat, we might have to wait until our boy is 18."
"Hey, Pickles!" Sariel called, waving at the drummer, who pointed to a baggie under his coat. The two fathers grinned at each other and made their way to the maze.
