Burning Bright

"I can't claim to be overly familiar-- I've only seen two Bollywood movies, unfortunately. But... something to look into." Different musical scales and ways of playing meant more options for channeling his magic with more nuance, after all.

"I do appreciate that. Maybe when I'm a bit older or... more established. More competent at magic, at least. Maybe then I'd feel more confident to go... hopping through portals..." He could appreciate the sense of adventure and freedom but he was something of a creature of habit.

"I'll find you a song that sounds kinda like what I used to play sometime, if I can," She offered. Though she wasn't super big into music like he was, it was often a social hobby, and THAT was something she enjoyed.

"How old ARE you? Have you even been outside the continent?" People around here didn't travel nearly as much as Taika did. Shameful, if you asked her. Every young person should get out and get lost a little. Not really, god no, we just went over this, she's not getting him lost, BUT. You know! Travel! See the world!

She snorted, and shrugged, slinging her backpack back over her shoulders after fussing with it and zipping it up mid-stride. "Don't worry, you're not like...extra short to me. Pretty much anyone under...." She gestured to a point at about her shoulders. 6'5" or so. "It's all the same below here."

Regardless of his keeping up, the gate was easier. It took a few minutes to reach the nearest gate, but once arrived, she dialed in the location, and it brought them directly inside a high-rise building. "So like...a music apprenticeship? Or um- magic?" Didn't take long to go up one floor by stairs, and then she unlocked the door to her apartment. It was an office-turned-apartment that Lucifer had kindly given her when she arrived in this world. She ducked under the doorway and held the door open for Liron.

"Make yourself at home!" She for one would be kicking off her shoes by the door, right next to a pair of sandals (also her size) and hooks for coats. The apartment had a mix of nice staple furniture (big couch, bedroom had a bed with an extension at the foot) and cheap stuff that looked very walmart-grade. Beanbag chairs in front of a small TV that sat on the floor, folding plastic chairs and table in the dining area, some stackable plastic drawers shoved in a corner, and a coffee table that was solid wood but had clearly seen better days. Walls held a lot of nerd stuff; superhero posters, sci fi art, and hung in a place of honor over the couch was a full-sized replica Bat'leth.

He did laugh at the description and nodded. "A bit, yes. I do write mine down, but my magic is... kind of weird, and so the music helps to... buffer it from just reacting to what I feel or think." He'd had to do a lot of work to control it and build the mental blocks to prevent any strong desire or feeling from tapping into that well of metaphysical power available to him.

"Oh? What kind of instrument is it? Strings? Woodwind?" He was very much a nerd about instruments, and eager to learn about ones that he didn't already know about.

"Well, if you swear it on your honour..." he chuckled, then nodded. "Okay, good. I mean, not that you need someone to go off-world, but I just-- you know. My parents would probably freak out if I went dimension hopping without telling them." Since she had mentioned she'd been... lost in other dimensions...

"Anywhere in this dimension is fine." More or less, anyway.

He tilted his head, hair falling to the side. "No, I think they do tend to frown upon that-- I hear it lowers the land value, and they can't be having that."

Weird magic? Awesome. So cool. Love that. Weird magic tamed by music? Fucking poetic shit and she's here for it. Hell yeah.

"Oh, um..." Taika made a face, then held her hands close together, sort of trying to mimic how she played the instrument with gestures. "It was sort of like a music box, right? With a crank on one side? You steady it either on a table or with your teeth, you just kinda bite the stand...Your other hand controls the notes...um, it's kind of hard to describe...there's these little sliding...things...and you squeeze the metal bits down so they strike the um...moving part..." She shrugged. "It was kind of...I mean, I loved it, but the amount of moving parts, uh..it needed a lot of repairs. I wound up leaving it behind a few dimensions back."

Then she laughed and waved it off. "I mean, people around here would have hated it, though. It used a musical scale that most cultures around here think sounds like shit. Probably go over better in um...India?" Microtones are more commonly used there, though there were plenty of other types of music she wasn't aware of that used microtones too. And to be clear, SHE did not believe microtones sounded like shit. It was a matter of taste. Western music can be a little inflexible.

"Ha, yeah, I wouldn't take some random guy to other dimensions. You really have to be ready to leave everything behind." Fal hadn't lost anyone lately, but...never could be too sure things wouldn't go sideways again someday. And Taika had lost a good many people in other dimensions. Not everyone could handle never going back.

"Shapeshifter parent is cool. One of mine can but doesn't do it much." Least of all publicly, for Lucifer. And even then it was mostly into animal forms or a few 'set' options the Fallen was intrinsically drawn to.

"You could probably do a cool Godzilla costume for Halloween or something," he offered.

His brow did furrow at her mention of the atmosphere being potentially lethal if not for what she was, which... he wasn't sure of, but had thought it rude to just ask. "Right. I suppose people would have... had to adapt to those sort of conditions."

He nodded, definitely understanding the need to refine and work on magic to get it right. "I have to mess around with the spells a lot to get them to do what I actually want. Some of it is instinctual, but sometimes... I don't know if I'd say it wants me to play something specific, but sometimes I need to get a bit unconventional to get the right outcome. But even then, I usually end up having to practice it over and over before it approaches anything consistent..." It wasn't always a matter of play the right chords in order. He still needed to shape the more... metaphysical aspects of the spell. In some ways the music was just a way he found it easier to get the right thoughts or feelings or concepts in the right order.

At the offer, his eyes did widen a bit. He wasn't really... used to people just offering that sort of thing. Fae, maybe, but that was... more innuendo than not. And often in less pleasant ways. They had only just met... but he was intrigued and he didn't really get to talk to anyone sort of around his own age about magic much.

But her ability to shapeshift could potentially explain her ability to survive a weird atmosphere. She wasn't totally sure if that was it. She's a cambion, not a scientist!

Taika listened intently about his way with magic, though her face screwed up a little about it. "That sounds...a little too abstract, for me! I like having written spells, it feels more um...you know, concrete? I guess for me it's something I'm already good at. I can play a little music, but um- only a uh- an instrument I haven't been able to find here." Much as she'd searched, after the original fell out of tune.

Yeah, that was a sudden offer! But that's just how Taika operates. "I'm not a serial killer, on my honor!" Taika snorted, crossing her heart as she said it. Mixing stuff up there, but you get the idea. "It's in this dimension. I'd have to get Fal to take me if I wanted to go off-world." She opened her phone and pulled up the address on the Maps app, turning it to show him. "It's...kind of an office building, buuuut...you know. Not a great place to kidnap a guy. I don't think the landlord would approve."

Liron's hand came up to half cover his face and in particular the grin he couldn't quite get rid of. It always looked a little odd on his features, in his opinion. Like his Fallen parent's face, it was more suited to seriousness or at least neutral contemplation, or smaller or more complex displays of positive emotions.

"Let's not get into an argument over who's worse at what-- I'm no Kendrick, unfortunately, and I definitely don't think you deserve anything like Drake in terms of diss tracks." He was, however, very fascinated by the concept of diss tracks and even older songs and poems and how they had been used to rip apart the metaphorical power of others-- and even in Ireland, he'd been reading, such spiritual slights against the King or another of high rank could be as impactful as a physical wound.

"I'd have to fall back on hackneyed, shallow digs at your height, which would get boring after the second bar, probably. Something about you blocking out the sun, or... stomping around like Godzilla..."

When she went back through the sketches, he kept a closer eye on them, tracing along the shapes and silhouettes presented. "An orange sky?" He wondered what made it like that-- light being different, dust in the atmosphere... "It is interesting that superheroes as a concept crop up in other places. Did they have more mainstream people with strange abilities, or still thought of as more of a fantasy type thing but just more popular?"

He nodded along at her explanation. "Garlic is a lot harder, even if you know to press on it first to loosen the outside and all the other little tips one of my parents has told me over the years. Plus the oils always linger if you touch them." Which wasn't a problem for Rook, but Liron didn't like spreading the garlic smell with his hands.

Taika snorted hard and then laughed wholeheartedly. "No, come on! Godzilla? Your diss track makes me sound so cool." She wouldn't actually try to convince him to write a song about her, that'd be hella embarrassing just by virtue of being a lot of effort, but the hypothetical was very funny to her.

"Yeah, orange sky. It was pretty! But uh- pretty sure it would have killed me if I weren't...you know. What I am." Which she hadn't told him explicitly yet, but. "Apparently it was um- something with the gasses in the atmosphere? A lot of methane and ozone? Something like that. Um, there were a lot of batman types around! People were generally more uh- athletic, so..." She shrugged. "Lots of alleged superpowers, but I think it was mostly, you know, smoke and mirrors. But it was fun!"

She brightened and nodded. "Exactly! I don't always want garlic hands." Devang had been a bit skeptical and discouraging of her using magic to peel garlic, but see, Liron gets it! "Thanks, I'm pretty happy with it! I do still seem to lose some of the garlic each time, though. Still working out the kinks. Doing it through music seems really cool. Can you uh, improvise really easily? Have you ever found the music needing you to play a note you didn't like..?" So many questions about musical magic! It seemed odd.

"Okay. Well. Thanks for not being mad about it. But also don't-- don't draw me like that, it's not fair." He brushed a hand over his face, laughing. "I wouldn't write a song about you being embarrassed." He could, though. If he thought of a good tune for it.

He did wince about the career prospects. "I can't really talk, musicians aren't exactly a thriving industry either, these days." Ah, the woe of artists in the modern age.

He couldn't exactly claim to have much of an eye for the artistry of the pieces from a technical view, but he liked how neat they were and how evocative or well shaped the balloons could be. The superheroes did have the side of his mouth tugging up. "I like the heroes... I'm not much of a comic or TV or... movie buff... but are any of them yours, or are they fan art?" And then he'd point just above the spell, brows up. "Did you make that magic up yourself, or did you learn it?"

Taika snorted, chuckled, and shrugged her hands. "Why wouldn't you? I'd be honored if somebody wrote a diss track about me, wow. I'm sure your song would be better than my drawing." Her drawings were...okay! She'd clearly seen a lot of superheroes, but she'd also clearly seen a lot of...interestingly proportioned superheroes. And some alien ones.

"Oh, mostly fan art..." Taika flipped back to a few of them, mouth pressed in a thin line over them self-critically, but she at least wasn't outright cringing. She had a pretty calm outlook on her art skills; that was just for fun. "But not of heroes from this universe. Mostly from...um. The other one, where the sky is more orangey. Superhero stuff was REALLY mainstream there."

The spell, she turned back to. "Oh, this? Sort of both. I found a spell for peeling oranges, and I adapted it for garlic. Garlic is way more trouble to peel than oranges, so it just made sense. It was a huge pain, but now I never have to peel garlic by hand again!"

To explain in brief though, he made the wiggly finger gesture of 'magic' since that was close enough to his... empathetic nephilim senses, and what he suspect, at this stage, might be some kind of influence from Rook's mutation, at least in terms of the sort of synaesthesia sense it sometimes gave him.

"Maybe even a futch," he offered, nodding. "There's always goth, too." Gender and aesthetics were a complex mire, one he skirted around the edges of noncommittally.

He did blush at the laughter, though he could tell it wasn't malicious, at least. Still, an olive green tinge would spread across his cheeks and up to his ears. Though it would deepen and he would be quickly offering to replace the pencil before she cut him off and added it to her case. "Sorry-- I should have asked."

He was curious about the contents of her bag, but he also knew that prying was rarely welcome. He would look at the chocolate for a moment before he took one, flush receding a little. "Cheers." He was delicate in unwrapping the foil and taking a bite. Aside from Rook's delivered home-made treats and the things Miles brought by, Liron could admit to himself that he tended towards a more rustic diet. Bread, eggs, honey, milk, meat, vegetables, fruit.

She waved off his apology. "Nah, it's all good. Magic green pencil, hell yeah! I'm keeping that thing forever. I can draw you blushing." She teased, although the shade of green wasn't QUITE perfect. Take what you can get!