Name: Morpheus

 

Domain (s): Sleep and Dreams

 

Apppearance: Morpheus appears as a human man of indeterminate age. He stands about 5'7", with curly hair of a deep chestnut brown. Sleepy blue eyes peer out of a pudgy round face, most noted for a distracted smile framed by a moustache and soft beard of the same chestnut as his hair. His torso is just as round and pudgy as his face, though as a God, his frame possesses far more power than the average mortal. Morpheus has been known to show surprising physical power on rare occassion. Morpheus is usually clad in a flowing robe of midnight-blue, composed of glittering stardust and belted with a band of solid, jewel-encrusted gold. His cloak, solid-black and gleaming with trapped stars and a subtle iridescence, flows as he moves. His curly purple slippers bear bells atop them that jingle as he walks. He sometimes bears a short golden rod.

 

Personality: Morpheus is a rather pleasant fellow, kind in a distracted, sleepy sort of way. He means well, but he drifts on the surface of events and does not usually do well with either researching things or follow-up. Morpheus has never really had much interaction with the rest of the Pantheon, or with mortals, so he is tentative, lonely, and shy. The modern world is confusing to him. When moved, he becomes a being of great passion or great wrath. Violence is something he finds distasteful, so he tries to avoid it, but don't rule him out. Morpheus may not be skilled in combat, but he can do a lot of damage on a battlefield.

 

Background: Morpheus is the son of Hypnos, and the grandson of Nyx, though his mother is not known. Some say that his mother was Mnemosyne, the Titan who controlled Memory, but no one is really sure. As one of the original deities, born before the Olympians came to power, Morpheus has a insight on the primal state of the universe. He doesn't talk about the elder times though, as a rule. Morpheus has always been of a retiring bent, much to the concern of his grandmother, who fears that he is too detached from the world. Morpheus was given dominion over the Dreamscape, the world of dreams, and in time, his father gave to him the dominion of Sleep (as Hypnos retreated into the Underworld with his brother Thanatos). Morpheus was absent throughout much of the Titanomachy, emerging to fight alongside the Olympians in the final battle. He put an army of Titans to sleep, enabling Zeus and the other gods to sneak up on them and breach their Citadel's final defenses.

 

After the war ended, Zeus formally acknowledged Morpheus as the God of Sleep and Dreams. At which point Morpheus retreated to his bed in the Poppy Cave and went to sleep. He has been asleep for all the thousands of years since, out of touch with the rest of the Pantheon save for his Grandmother Nyx and Dionysous on occassion. Dionysous's revelers often find themselves in the more bizzare reaches of the Dreamscape, requiring Morpheus to go fetch them. Both Nyx and Dionysous have shown an interest in getting Morpheus interested in the waking world, but dragging him from his beloved Dreamscape has proven difficult until recently, when Nyx finally talked Morpheus into re-emerging in the waking world.   

 

         

Powers: Morpheus has the power to control the dreams of mortals and those Gods who sleep. He can twist and mold them in anyway he desires. He can command the creatures created in dreams and those native to the Dreamscape, both the benevolent and the malevolent. He can send dreams and nightmares to whomever he wishes, though he does not send them to the Gods as a rule. He can bring the dreams and nightmares of mortals and Gods to tangible, physical life and banish them back to the Dreamscape at will. He shares the powers of teleportation and immortality that all Gods possess. He can enter and leave the Dreamscape whenever he pleases, from wherever he wishes, and bring people and objects with him. Morpheus's Cloak has the power to instantly put mortals and Gods alike into a deep slumber, breakable only by Morpheus himself. The effect is activated when he waves or snaps his Cloak at those he would put to sleep. He once used it to put an entire army of Titans to sleep, for example, just by waving it at them. No one is sure where he got the Cloak, since he predates Hephaestus.   

 

Favorite City: Thessalonica, though he still much prefers his spiraling Palace of Wonders in the Dreamscape. He hasn't actually been to Thessalonica since it was a ragtag bunch of huts by the sea but he has good memories of the place.