of yourself last in any given situation. Which is good for the most part, meaning you won't get a swelled head or think that anyone owes you anything you haven't earned through hard work. But, and I know this will be impossible for you to believe right now, maybe ever, so just try to remember it academically for now, your looks are designed to put you in the top three percent of human attractiveness. Given the current world, that's closer to the top one percent really. Before the changes people held to a very high standard of beauty and there were a lot more people over all, so the pool was bigger. That doesn't matter to the percentages directly of course. Perfect skin, hair, teeth and build. A bit thin right now, so eat, but you can't get fat biologically speaking. Not that you'd even be able to try, your nature won't let you waste that much food.
“You can't think you're all that bright either. I still don't think I am and I was raised with testing and daily evidence that proved otherwise. The fact is though, your nearly twice as intelligent as an average person, slightly more so. Your physical endurance is naturally about four times what a good athlete might have, though you need to stay active for that to really show as special. I recommend running about twenty miles four or five times a week, then triple that once or twice a month. Most couldn't handle that. You can. Your also going to work yourself to death eventually if you don't at least diversify your interests. Life is more than building. What are you good at? What do you like doing? Other than building.”
Tor focused inside himself. It was a harder question than it sounded like on the surface. He could barely define fun and now someone wanted him to list what he liked? Simple, no doubt. Still, there had to be something.
“I like baking… I probably would have done that for a living if I didn't have so many brothers and sisters…”
Burks grimaced, “Right. You mother isn't exactly being… economical in the amount of children, is she? That's genetic for her too, I'm afraid. I'll talk about that whole thing later, nearly as interesting as our own situation I think. Probably more so given your sister… Go on.”
What did he like? Building, Baking… nothing else came to mind, except sex. Tor blushed and looked down. Well, who didn't like that? He said it out loud, and got a single nod and a gesture that said to keep going on. Running? Well, he didn't like it, but he could see the use. Fighting? He wasn't good at it, but it wasn't boring. Painful most the time when he practiced, but never as bland as just running was.
“So, places to start, I recommend breaking your day up evenly among those for a while, look for other things to occupy your time too. I always found music diverting myself. It pays to keep up with what other people are doing as well. Trends and fashions, what people are concerned about. It may feel useless at first, or like a waste of time, but these factors shape societies. Also… and this will be hard for you, I know, but I can't stress it enough… Learn to let people do things for themselves. Don't give them bread or even create jobs for them. Let them do their own work and just help make it possible. You have to help. Yes. But you help people more by letting them be self sufficient in the long run. Letting someone become dependent on you is making them into a slave in a very real way, even if there are no chains.”
The rest of what they talked about was interesting, but didn't shake his world nearly as much, he realized when it was all over. That he was designed to help protect the world was less mentally taxing than some of the other things that were said. He was smart? He got that he did all right with building, but actually intelligent in all areas? It seemed unlikely, but Burks assured him that all he had to do was apply himself and his mind wouldn't fail him.
In regards to appearance he had to shake his head and, rude or not he called Burks, his Ancient grandfather, a liar. Right to his face. He expected a beating for it, but that didn't come. Instead he was sat in front of a mirror and they talked about what made a person good looking. It was all there, but he didn't see it. He couldn't. It was just him.
Sighing the old man sat and… got young.
His face melted into a younger one over the course of minutes, until he finally looked about fourteen or so. Then he gestured up at the face.
“Good enough looking? Don't be polite about it, I can take your honest appraisal. I've looked like this for longer than Noram has been around, by nearly a thousand years. Go ahead, really look. Rip me apart, I won't be mad.”
The face was bare and clean shaven, attractive, nearly too pretty really, kind of girlish. It was the kind of face that all the girls at school talked about wanting in a man and gushed over, when they weren't discussing how much they loved all the massive and brutish combat giants. The skin was still pale, like his, but that just made him look better somehow, exotic. Almost everyone had darker skin than this. He didn't, but even his brothers and sisters did. His Mother didn't. Tiera his thirteen year old sister didn't, maybe a little, but those were the only ones he could think of, except his uncle Dan, who was like they were. So an Ancient trait?
The look wasn't like Count Ward, who was about the best looking man Tor had ever seen, but it was darn close in level, if totally different. Maybe even better looking? He spelled all this out to Lairdgren, hoping thousands of years really would give him some perspective.
Tor was calling him a bit feminine after all.
The man didn't say anything at all, just gave a grin that was slightly playful and lopsided, then pulled him back in front of the mirror. Not exactly in front of it, off to the side a little. The Count moved in front keeping Tor out of view.
“Now look, in the mirror, what do you see?”
Tor's reflection looked back at him. Only it wasn't his, it was Lairdgren's.
Oh.
In the reflection the face suddenly looked plain and boring, maybe slightly homely. When Tor looked at Burks, it was the same face only much better looking. Just because it wasn't him?
“We're genetically the same person Tor. We think alike, we look alike, everything. Yes, there are differences in the pattern, the main one being the combat rage, which was a trait of the original Cordes. It must have slipped in from Douglas's genes somehow, or your grandmothers side of the family… No, it has to be from Douglas… I don't have the genes for that at all, no one else in the family does. Other than that we're closer than identical twins would be.”
Oh.
Tor had to not think about it, because it scared him a little. Not that he was actually good looking, that was… nice. It would make things easier, wouldn't it? People liked good looking folk better. It was hard not to.
No it was that he still looked into the mirror and saw… a troll. Not literally, but when it was him, he knew the same face couldn't be more than average at best, even though on someone else it looked… fine. Excellent really. It was a face he could credit someone pretty like Petra actually wanting to spend time with, and not just doing it to be nice. Or even Collette. Or the Queen. The idea shook him more than a little. After all, they only liked him as a friend, right? They were fond of him, which was mainly because they were good people, not having anything to do with him at all…
The Ancient distracted him by growing older in front of his eyes, it was amazing.
“You probably can't do it yet, wait till you're about twenty-five or so, if I remember that correctly, and it will suddenly kick in. You'll just wake up one day and know. It won't be hard for you then. This…” He gestured to himself, now looking like he normally did.
“Is about the limit. I think the doctors that did the initial design were giving an eye towards vanity. Back then being old wasn't a good thing, not in Noram, so they left it out. Some of the others, Black and Red, can look older, and Red was designed to not be half as good looking as the rest of us, part of the program to allow for variety, since no one really knew what would work in the end. She can also shape shift into… well, it's something to see. If you ever get the chance you should ask her about it.” He let his hands go wide and smiled, a thing that touched his eyes and turned into a look that seemed carefully crafted to get attention somehow.
“I don't bother to hide who or what I am any more. Most people don't concern themselves with it, to tell the truth. You'd think it would be a big deal, but most adjust pretty well. Best to be open and just let people know if they ask. With you it should be even easier. You're the great Wizard Tor, so of course you won't age. Dan had problems with it though and I imagine your mother will. Well, we can just tell people that she's your mother. That could work.”
Dan, of course looked different than he did. Good looking, but not the same as Burks. They just weren't as similar for some reason.
