Bartering with a deity ((Mahadevi))

Before the trusted servant of Mahadevi had walked up to the door of the shop, Alex had looked away from the front door of his shop and was starting to examine a diagram he had drawn the day before, a small statue he was planning on making on his own time. The picture was of a man in his mid sixties with a full beard and going bald, wearing a suit of mystical armor made of white diamond, wielding a great claymore that was also made of white diamond. As Alex looked at the picture, a small tear formed under his eye and is started to go down his cheek. "Dad... I'm sorry..." Alex whispered under his breath, then quickly wiped the tear away when he heard the door of his shop open up.

Alex was about to greet the man that had opened up the door to his shop when the man began a speech, announcing that a deity from India was about to enter his humble pottery shop and he should bow to her. Hearing that shocked Alex to the point that his jaw dropped open. "Excuse me?" he exclaimed in surprise, having trouble believing what he just heard. He had heard of a lot of crazy people, but someone that thought that they were a goddess? That took the cake, but sure enough Alex could see outside his store windows was a woman dressed in elegant clothes with tons of jewelry, and she had eight limbs. It was about that time that Alex remembered from history class in high school that most deities from India had multiple limbs, and this woman had just that.

Alex couldn't believe his eyes and ears. This announcer guy was serious! Alex was so surprised that he dropped the piece of paper he was looking at back on the counter in front of him, and didn't notice that the picture was now facing towards the door so anyone entering the shop could see the picture right side up. Alex looked like a complete idiot with his mouth hanging open and his eyes wide open as well. "You guys are serious, aren't you?" Alex stated quietly, forgetting completely that the man had told him to bow.

Even when the old servant whispered to Mahadevi about Alex's rudeness, Alex still stood there with his mouth hanging open and his flawless cyan eyes were wide with surprise. In this shocked state, Alex watched the woman deity enter his shop as she glanced around. It wasn't until she asked about the statue that had just left his pottery shop that Alex found his voice. "Yes... I made it..." Alex stated, though his voice had a squeak to it.

It wasn't until Alex said this that his senses suddenly came back and he realized just how rude he was being. He quickly blinked his eyes, shut his mouth, cleared his throat., and quickly bowed to Mahadevi. "What happen to my manners? My sincere apologies for my rudeness! It's not everyday that a goddess enters my humble pottery shop. Your presence here shocked me to the point that my mind was no longer functioning. I'm Alexander Davis." Alex stated calmly, and there wasn't any hint of the squeak being in his voice this time. Deep down Alex thought that she was just a mutant like he was, but everyone around her thought otherwise and he could tell it would be a bad idea to go against them.

Alex was still in the bowing position, and he noticed that the drawing he was looking at was currently facing Mahadevi. Deity or not, she didn't need to see that, so as he finished bowing and stood back up to his full height, he grabbed the piece of paper and flipped it over so she wouldn't see the picture on it. "And yes, I did make that statue that was just taken out of here. Do you have any questions about it? I'll be happy to answer them."

Alex noticed Mahadevi giving him a graceful nod when he found his manners, and was slightly relieved to see that she forgave him for not having them at first. He also notice her glancing at the paper he had flipped over, and was wondering if she was going to ask about it. Most people with money or power always seemed to think that they had the right to know everything and they believed they could take the ground right out from under your feet... and it was your own fault if you didn't get off of it fast enough, not theirs. He was wondering if she felt that way too. If she did feel that way, Alex hoped that she wouldn't ask about the paper, because she wouldn't like the answer he would give her.

When the goddess asked Alex if he worked with models though, Alex shoved his current thoughts aside and raised one eyebrow, clearly puzzled. He was about to say that he hadn't worked with a model before but before he could open his mouth, Mahadevi continued as to the reason why she wanted him to make a statue of her, one that would capture the attention of even those that thought the divine were myths. Thinking about it, Alex crossed his arms over his chest and rubbed his chin. "Hm... I've never worked with models before, but I'm sure I could. That statue you saw was made from imagination only. Having a person to model the clay after would be much easier.... and faster. That Greek goddess statue took me a better part of the week, because I had to constantly change the statue since I kept changing my mind. Hm..." Alex stated then continued thinking.

It was very doable actually... there was one thing holding him back though... and that was that this woman was, or at least claimed, to be a goddess so she wouldn't accept anything less then perfection. One small flaw and she might fly off the handle. He would just have to nail it. A second problem was time. If she wanted the statue to be life size, it could take him a whole day to make it, or more... unless he used his mutation to do it, in which case he could have it done within hours, if not one hour. "Hm... I guess I could do it and I can make it life size too, but I must beg you not to tell anyone how I made the statue." Alex stated, and he left it at that.

He then realized something... he wasn't quite sure how the people of India made their statues look. He had bought a few books on making Indian art pieces, but he never took a good look at the statues. Luckily most of the books were under the counter. "Hm, I'm sure I have a book on how they make divine statues over in India. Give me a second..." Alex stated and quickly bent over to look under the counter, not realizing he left the paper with the picture of his father drawn on it unprotected, so Mahadevi could grab it and glance at it while he was down there. "Ah! Found it!" Alex stated after searching for about a second, and stood up... and gave himself a bonk on the back of the head from the underside of the counter when he stood up. "Ow. Why is it I always become a klutz in front of customers?" Alex asked himself as he rubbed the back of his head and placed the large heavy book on the counter, and opened it up to the page that talked about Indian statues.

The moment Alex saw how the end result of most Indian statues were, he bit his lower lip and gulped nervously. Now he was having second thoughts. He glanced up at Mahadevi, back down at the book, then back up at the goddess again, this time with a little bit of blush on his cheeks. "Uh... oh dear. I think I might have to stray a little from normal India artwork." Alex stated with a second gulp. Sure, all of the statues were in unique posing positions, but he could manage that. Most of the statues that had multiple arms had a different object in each hand, and that was also doable. It was how the statues were clothed... or lack there of... that had Alex worried. "Uh... every single statue of people in this book are a bit... what would be an appropriate word... exposed. Um... how close to traditional Indian artwork do you want this to be?" Alex stated hesitantly, unable to hide the blush from his face.

It wasn't until after Alex had begged Mahadevi not to reveal the method of how he was going to make her statue that he saw something about the goddess's eyes change. Was she intrigued with him now? He couldn't really tell since reading a person's face expression was a skill that he royally lacked. Even so, Alex could tell that she was thinking that he had something that she was entitled too. What ever it was though, she would have to learn that in the western world, everything comes with a price, deity or not.

After Alex had asked if they were sticking to traditional Indian art for the statue, he noticed that Mahadevi had instructed her servant to close and lock the front door to Alex's shop, and the OPEN sign was now turned off. Apparently she wanted him to do the statue right then and there, not at a more appropriate time. With a sigh, Alex pushed a button under the counter which closed the shutters for the front windows so there wouldn't be any prying eyes watching them either. The back of his shop was too cluttered for this work, and there wasn't enough room in the basement of his shop either. This bit of artwork was going to be done in the shop itself since it was the only place that Alex had enough space for him to work and for her to pose.

When the goddess stated that she wanted something unique that had never been done before, Alex was relieved, or at least a little. From his point of view, he had interpreted what she had just stated as she was going to pose fully clothed. However, that sense of relief and that thought both vanished when Mahadevi continued in saying that there was no reason to hide perfection from the eyes of the devoted. Did that mean she planned on posing with a different dress that was far more elegant... or was she going to be exposed just like the Indian statues in the book? Alex wasn't sure. Either way though, he had to get ready to do this statue.

Clearing his throat, Alex walked into the back of the shop. "Okay then, but I have several different types of clay. Sometimes the most expensive isn't the best. Let me show you four different types of clay. We'll begin as soon as you decide on a type of clay. Also, do you want me to paint if afterwards so it will look exactly like you?" Alex stated as he opened up a few cabinets in the back of the shop and grabbed a few blocks of clay for her to take a look at.... and once again, he had left the picture of his father unattended to.

Soon the malachite manipulator came back with four blocks of clay in hand, each wrapped up in clear plastic. One was a reddish brown, another was pure white, and another one was the normal gray. The last one was golden in color, and to the untrained eye it looked like Alex had just placed a brick of solid gold down as one of Mahadevi's choices. "We'll do it right here since this is the most open spot of the shop I have." Alex stated as he started to remove the clay stained smock he had been wearing, then removed the white button down shirt that he had on under the smock, so now he was only wearing a t-shirt. As a result his arms were fully exposed, revealing the malachite bracers he was wearing on his forearms, along with a few of his battle scars that were on his arms. The underside of his black Pegasus with red demon wings tattoo was visible as well.

"I'm ready when you are." Alex stated calmly as his flawless cyan eyes started to glow green.

Alex was waiting patiently for the goddess Mahadevi to make up her mind about which clay to use, but in truth Alex was guessing she would use the golden colored clay. It was a very rare brand of clay in that you couldn't buy it from anywhere, but you had to basically make it yourself by mixing several dyes into pure white clay. The malachite manipulator had just enough to make the statue, but he wouldn't have any left over afterwards... not even enough to fill a thimble. So when his important customer stated that she trusted his judgement, Alex was about to reach for the golden clay. It made sense alright since she was basically a goddess... or at least that what people believed her to be.

However right as he reached for it, Mahadevi derailed Alex's train of thought by asking him if he was among the people that were gifted with special powers. Before answering, Alex turned back to face Mahadevi and stared into her eyes for a moment... and looked away only after a single tear had made it half way down his cheek. "Yeah, I'm among those who have special powers... but mine is anything but a gift. Curse would be a better term. Sure, it's the reason why my art is so unique but it's still a curse." Alex stated as he wiped away the tear with a hankie he had in his back pocket, then reached out towards the blocks of clay he hand brought out.

Right after his left arm was fully extended towards the clay, a rod of malachite grew out of the malachite bracer on that arm and extended out over the clay. Once that was done, three claws grew out of the rod and each one grabbed onto a block of clay, but the gold clay was left alone. The rod retracted with the claws still holding onto the clay till it was roughly a foot long, then Alex aimed it towards the back of his shop. Once again the rod extended, and the three claws carried the three blocks of clay into the back of the shop. In appearance what Alex had made out of his malachite was very similar to a conveyer belt, though the contents hung from it instead of riding on top of it. It wasn't a half a minute later when several dozen blocks of golden clay, each one wrapped in plastic, was brought into the front of the shop via Alex's malachite conveyer and placed onto his counter. Now he had plenty of clay to work with, so Alex fully retracted the malachite till it had melted back into the bracer on his wrist.

That done, Alex turned back to face Mahadevi. "Anything you need to do before we begin? This will take at least an hour, maybe two."

Alex did notice Mahadevi's confused yet fascinated look on her face as his ability to manipulate malachite sprang to life as he moved the golden clay into the front of the shop while he prepared to create the statue of the deity that stood in his shop. After Alex had brought all of the clay into the area that he was going to work and had it all lined up on his counter, Alex then had a malachite rod stretch into the back of the shop and bring forwards what looked like a flat cart on wheels. He was going to have to move the statue around Mahadevi while he was making it since he couldn't see every side of her at once. This wasn't a picture that you only needed to see one side of the person you were painting... this was a statue that required Alex to move the statue around as he sculpted it so he could see different sides of the goddess when he needed to. While it would be easier to just have her stand on a turn-table and have it slowly rotate her as he created the sculpture, but Alex didn't have one of those.

Once the rolling flat cart was ready, Alex glanced over at Mahadevi as she removed her outer garments and stood there was only a few pieces of silk covering her. Seeing her like this immediately made Alex blush bright red and his eyes went wide. Clearly when she stated that she wasn't going to hide away perfection, she meant it. It took the malachite manipulator a few seconds to clear his head and focus back on what he was suppose to be doing right now, but he was still blushing. "Oi... I'd face an army without feeling fear any day, but put me with a beautiful woman or goddess and I turn redder then a ripe tomato..." Alex muttered under his breath, and he was hoping he had been quiet enough for the deity of India to not hear him. Finally ready to start, Alex extended his left arm towards the golden clay as two rods of malachite grew out form his bracer and reached for nearest block of clay.

However the moment that the almost seemed to demand that Alex explain why his ability to control malachite was more of a curse then a gift, Alex hesitated and glanced back at her before answering. "It wouldn't hinder me, but I'm not sure I should tell you. What you are asking requires me to trust you to the point that I'd be willing to put my life in your hands. That type of trust is built up over time and not given out on the spot, not even to a deity." Alex responded with a rather flat tone as the malachite rods grabbed onto the first block of golden clay. As Alex brought the clay towards him, the tips of the rods changed shape till they had what looked like razors on them and they started to shave away chunks of clay, then those chunks were reattached at a different angle and were also reshaped. After walking around Mahadevi once to make sure he had her back just right, the hunk of clay he was forming was a perfect replica of her left foot up to her ankle, and it was just as flawless as Mahadevi's real foot. Being careful not to change it shape, Alex lowered the golden clay foot onto the flat cart, then started to use another hunk of clay to form the right foot.