It was an ordinary day at camp half-blood, campers were doing the usual camp activities, Pegasus riding, making crafts archery...you know the usual but then the most weirdest thing happened. Right in the centre of the arena a golden light erupted and started to expand, screams were heard from the campers and nearly all of them drew out a weapon. They were trained for this. What they didn't expect was the olympians standing with a scowl on their faces.
Athena stepped forward. "Greetings Romans and Greeks, the fates have sent us this book to read with all of you"
Chattering erupted in the stand "Don't take this personally" Percy started off "But we don't care about a book"
Zeus glared at him "You dare defy the fates?"
Percy was about to answer but Annabeth threw him a glare "No whats the book called?"
"It doesn't have a name" Athena smiled at her daughter.
"Now everyone get comfy" Hestia smiled brightly "It's going to be a long day."
Athena cleared her throat "INTRODUCTION
I HOPE I'M GETTING EXTRA CREDIT FOR THIS."
A bunch of "Huh's?" went around the arena while realisation his Percy.
A publisher in New York asked me to write down what I know about the Greek gods, and I was like, "Can we do this anonymously? Because I don't need the Olympians mad at me again."
"Okay" Apollo laughed "Who pissed us off"
"Yeah! What did this person do?" Hermes snickered.
But if it helps you to know your Greek gods, and survive an encounter with them if they ever show up in your face, then I guess writing all this down will be my good deed for the week.
If you don't know me, my name is Percy Jackson.
"Perce you better not say anything offensive" Annabeth hissed
"I dont know I'm recovering from amnesia" Percy stuttered.
"Yeah blame it on the amnesia" Poseidon laughed at his son while Percy blushed.
I'm a modern-day demigod—a half-god, half-mortal son of Poseidon
"A proud son of Poseidon that is"
—but I'm not going to say much about myself. My story has already been written down in some books that are total fiction (wink, wink) and I am just a character from the story (cough—yeah, right—cough).
"WHAT?!" everyone yelled.
"You have a book about you?"
"Thats so cool man"
"Am i mentioned?"
"WE MIGHT READ THEM AFTER-WOODS" Athena yelled "Let me finish this chapter"
Just go easy on me while I'm telling you about the gods, all right? There's like forty bajillion
"That's not a word Percy" Nico snickered.
"ThAtS NoT A wOrD PeRcY" Percy mimicked making Nico glare at him.
different versions of the myths, so don't be all Well, I heard it a different way, so you're WRONG!
I'm going to tell you the versions that make the most sense to me. I promise I didn't make any of this up. I got all these stories straight from the Ancient Greek and Roman dudes who wrote them down in the first place. Believe me, I couldn't make up stuff this weird.
So here we go. First I'll tell you how the world got made. Then I'll run down a list of gods and give you my two cents about each of them. I just hope I don't make them so mad they incinerate me before I—
AGGHHHHHHHHH!
"AHHHHH" Everyone yelled
"Relax" Percy laughed "I'm here"
Just kidding. Still here.
"Gods Percy" Piper laughed.
"This is why we're friends" Leo fist bumped Percy.
Anyway, I'll start with the Greek story of creation, which by the way, is seriously messed up. Wear your safety glasses and your raincoat. There will be blood.
Everyone just glanced in Percy.
THE BEGINNING
AND STUFF
"Nice title kelp-brain" Thalia snickered.
IN THE BEGINNING
, I wasn't there. I don't think the Ancient Greeks were, either. Nobody had a pen and paper to take notes, so I can't vouch for what follows, but I can tell you it's what the Greeks thought happened.
At first, there was pretty much nothing. A lot of nothing.
"Like alot of nothing" Jason agreed.
The first god, if you can call it that, was Chaos—a gloomy, soupy mist with all the matter in the cosmos just drifting around. Here's a fact for you: Chaos literally means the Gap, and we're not talking about the clothing store.
"There's a clothing store called the gap?" Clarisse asked making aphrodite gasp dramatically.
"I have to educate you" she muttered crazily.
Eventually Chaos got less chaotic. Maybe it got bored with being all gloomy and misty. Some of its matter collected and solidified into the earth, which unfortunately developed a living personality. She called herself Gaea, the Earth Mother.
"I hate her"
"She can rot in tatutras"
Now Gaea was the actual earth—the rocks, the hills, the valleys, the whole enchilada.
"I like enchildas but she makes it yucky" Grover gagged.
But she could also take on humanlike form. She liked to walk across the earth—which was basically walking across herself—in the shape of a matronly woman with a flowing green dress, curly black hair, and a serene smile on her face. The smile hid a nasty disposition. You'll see that soon enough.
Already have"
Scary peice of minotaur dung"
After a long time alone, Gaea looked up into the misty nothing above the earth and said to herself: "You know what would be good? A sky. I could really go for a sky. And it would be nice if he was also a handsome man I could fall in love with, because I'm kind of lonely down here with just these rocks."
"She totally said that" Annabeth had sarcasm dripping down her voice.
"I know right!" Percy agreed
Either Chaos heard her and cooperated, or Gaea simply willed it to happen. Above the earth, the sky formed—a protective dome that was blue in the daytime and black at night. The sky named himself Ouranos—and, yeah, that's another spelling for Uranus. There's pretty much no way you can pronounce that name without people snickering. It just sounds wrong.
"So true"
Why he didn't choose a better name for himself—like Deathbringer or José—
Im sorry for your future children" Chris said seriously.
I don't know, but it might explain why Ouranos was so cranky all the time.
"Yea i wouldve been cranky all the time aswell" Leo agreed .
Like Gaea, Ouranos could take human shape and visit the earth—which was good, because the sky is way up there and long-distance relationships never work out.
"At least Percy knows that" Piper nudged annabeth.
Annabeth rolled her eyes "Turns out Percy's a genius after all." Percy just stuck his tounge out.
In physical form, he looked like a tall, buff guy with longish dark hair. He wore only a loincloth, and his skin changed color—sometimes blue with cloudy patterns across his muscles, sometimes dark with glimmering stars. Hey, Gaea dreamed him up to look like that. Don't blame me. Sometimes you'll see pictures of him holding a zodiac wheel, representing all the constellations that pass through the sky over and over for eternity.
A bunch of sarcastic yeahs went around the area.
Anyway, Ouranos and Gaea got married.
"They suit"Aphrodite nodded.
Happily ever after?
"Nooo"
Not exactly.
Part of the problem was that Chaos got a little creation-happy. It thought to its misty, gloomy self: Hey, Earth and Sky. That was fun! I wonder what else I can make.
"Thats so me if i find out i can create stuff lol" Leo said.
"Did you just say lol?" jake mason said from besides him.
Jason just rolled his eyes "Forget about him. The roman camp is coming tonight"
The gods nodded there heads.
Soon it created all sorts of other problems—and by that I mean gods. Water collected out of the mist of Chaos, pooled in the deepest parts of the earth, and formed the first seas, which naturally developed a consciousness—the god Pontus.
"We kinda got along at first" Poseidon said.
"Kinda?" Percy looked at his dad and poseidon just waved him off.
Then Chaos really went nuts and thought: I know! How about a dome like the sky, but at the bottom of the earth! That would be awesome!
So another dome came into being beneath the earth, but it was dark and murky and generally not very nice, since it was always hidden from the light of the sky. This was Tartarus
Annabeth, Percy and Nico just winced.
, the Pit of Evil; and as you can guess from the name, when he developed a godly personality, he didn't win any popularity contests.
The problem was, both Pontus and Tartarus liked Gaea, which put some pressure on her relationship with Ouranos.
"She was really popular back then huh"
"Guys used to chase her around?"
"Shes sooo lucky!"
That was the Aphrodite cabin.
A bunch of other primordial gods popped up, but if I tried to name them all we'd be here for weeks. Chaos and Tartarus had a kid together (don't ask how; I don't know)
That shut up alot of questions about to be fired.
called Nyx, who was the embodiment of night. Then Nyx, somehow all by herself, had a daughter named Hemera, who was Day. Those two never got along because they were as different as…well, you know.
According to some stories, Chaos also created Eros, the god of procreation…in other words, mommy gods and daddy gods having lots of little baby gods.
"A way of putting it"Hades snickered.
His making this PG" Poseidon laughed.
Other stories claim Eros was the son of Aphrodite. We'll get to her later. I don't know which version is true, but I do know Gaea and Ouranos started having kids—with very mixed results.
First, they had a batch of twelve—six girls and six boys called the Titans. These kids looked human, but they were much taller and more powerful.
"Yep thats also a fact"
You'd figure twelve kids would be enough for anybody, right? I mean, with a family that big, you've basically got your own reality TV show.
"What would that TV show be called?" Hermes asked out of the blue.
"Earths 12?" Apollo said more like a question.
"TEC short for The Earths Children" Leo smugly stated. Hestaphestus high fived him.
Plus, once the Titans were born, things started to go sour with Ouranos and Gaea's marriage. Ouranos spent a lot more time hanging out in the sky.
"Bad husband" Hera scowled.
He didn't visit.
"Thats pretty bad"
He didn't help with the kids.
"His a-" Hera was cut off by Athena.
"We get it let me finsih the chapter"
Gaea got resentful. The two of them started fighting. As the kids grew older, Ouranos would yell at them and basically act like a horrible dad.
"Probably started drinking" Dinosyious muttered.
A few times, Gaea and Ouranos tried to patch things up. Gaea decided maybe if they had another set of kids, it would bring them closer….
"Nah not going to work"
I know, right? Bad idea.
"Really bad." Piper agreed.
She gave birth to triplets. The problem: these new kids defined the word UGLY.
"Your soo mean percy" Thalia hit percy upside the head.
They were as big and strong as Titans, except hulking and brutish and in desperate need of a body wax. Worst of all, each kid had a single eye in the middle of his forehead.
"Cyclopes" Was the only thing that left the campers lips.
Talk about a face only a mother could love. Well, Gaea loved these guys. She named them the Elder Cyclopes, and eventually they would spawn a whole race of other, lesser Cyclopes. But that was much later.
When Ouranos saw the Cyclops triplets, he freaked. "These cannot be my kids! They don't even look like me!"
"Oh" Travis started
"My" Connor continued.
"Gods" They finished together.
"They are your children, you deadbeat!" Gaea screamed back. "Don't you dare leave me to raise them on my own!"
"Don't worry, I won't," Ouranos growled.
He stormed off and came back with thick chains made from the night sky's pure darkness. He bound up the Cyclopes and tossed them into Tartarus, which was the only part of creation where Ouranos wouldn't have to look at them.
Harsh, right?
Gaea screamed and wailed, but Ouranos refused to release the Cyclopes. No one else dared to oppose his orders, because by this time he was getting a reputation as a pretty scary dude.
"He was" Zues nodded.
"Mother Rhea told us about him" Hades said.
"I am king of the universe!" he bellowed. "How could I not be? I am literally above everything else."
"I hate you!" Gaea wailed.
"Bah! You will do as I say. I am the first and best of the primordial gods."
"I was born before you!" Gaea protested. "You wouldn't even be here if I didn't—"
"Don't test me," he snarled. "I've got plenty more chains of darkness."
As you can guess, Gaea threw a total earthquake fit, but she didn't see what else she could do. Her first kids, the Titans, were almost adults now. They felt bad for Mom.
"Atleast they cared" Annabeth said.
"Yes" Percy sarcastically agreed "They care for evil.
They didn't like their dad much either—Gaea was always bad-mouthing him, with good reason—but the Titans were scared of Ouranos and felt helpless to stop him.
I have to keep it together for the kids, Gaea thought. Maybe I should give it one more try with Ouranos.
"Ha she though" Leo laughed.
She arranged a nice romantic evening—candles, roses, soft music. They must have rekindled some of the old magic. A few months later, Gaea gave birth to one more set of triplets.
"Its good that you know ypur ancient history perce" Nico laughed.
As if she needed more proof that her marriage to Ouranos was dead….
"Thats one way of putting it" Poseidon joked.
"Oh yeah and BTW, i sense a divorce coming" Apollo said to poseidon making him snicker.
The new kids were even more monstrous than the Cyclopes. Each one had a hundred arms all around his chest like sea urchin spines, and fifty teeny, tiny heads clustered on his shoulders. It didn't matter to Gaea. She loved their little faces—all hundred and fifty of them.
Everyone started to laugh.
She called the triplets the Hundred-Handed Ones. She'd barely had time to give them names, though, when Ouranos marched over, took one look at them, and snatched them from Gaea's arms. Without a word, he wrapped them in chains and tossed them into Tartarus like bags of recycling.
"Recycling is good" Demeter shouted.
Clearly, the sky dude had issues.
Lots of issues.
Well, that was pretty much it for Gaea. She wailed and moaned and caused so many earthquakes that her Titan kids came running to see what was wrong.
"Your father is a complete _!"
I don't know what she called him, but I have a feeling that's when the first cuss words were invented.
"Percy you need help man" Leo clapped him on the shoulder.
She explained what had happened. Then she raised her arms and caused the ground to rumble beneath her. She summoned the hardest substance she could find from her earthy domain, shaped it with her anger, and created the first weapon ever made—a curved iron blade about three feet long. She fixed it to a wooden handle made from a nearby tree branch, then showed her invention to the Titans.
"Behold, my children!" she said. "The instrument of my revenge. I will call it a scythe!"
"I hate that weapon" Percy grumbled.
The Titans muttered among themselves: What is that for? Why is it curved? How do you spell scythe?
"I thought you were the goddess of wisdom" Apollo joked. Making both athena amd Artemis glare.
"One of you needs to step up!" Gaea cried. "Ouranos isn't worthy to be the king of the cosmos. One of you will kill him and take his place."
"Just kill you're dad" Leo muttered
"That's so normal" Jason continued.
The Titans looked pretty uncomfortable.
"I would be too" Percy nodded his head in understanding.
"So…explain this whole killing thing," said Oceanus. He was the oldest Titan boy, but he mostly hung out in the far reaches of the sea with the primordial water god, whom he called Uncle Pontus. "What does it mean, to kill?"
"Like destroy him"
"She wants us to exterminate our dad," Themis guessed. She was one of the smartest girls, and she immediately got the concept of punishing someone for a crime. "Like, make him not exist anymore."
"Is that even possible?" asked her sister Rhea. "I thought we were all immortal."
"An immortal can fade" Zeus said in a singing matter.
Gaea snarled in frustration. "Don't be cowards! It's very simple. You take this sharp pointy blade and you cut your dad into small pieces so he can't bother us again. Whichever of you does this will be the ruler of the universe! Also, I will make you those cookies you used to like, with the sprinkles."
"Okay!" Apollo, Hermes, leo and Percy yelled.
"They better be blue though"
Now, in modern times, we have a word for this sort of behavior. We call it psycho.
"Crazy people are my fave" Dinosyious hummed.
Everyone sitting near him just moved away.
Back then, the rules of behavior were a lot looser. Maybe you'll feel better about your own relatives, knowing that the first family in creation was also the first dysfunctional family.
The Titans started mumbling and pointing to each other like, "Hey, you'd be good at killing Dad."
"He would."
"Uh, no, I think you should do it."
I agree"
"I'd love to kill Dad, honestly, but I've got this thing I have to do, so—"
He cant do it"
"I'll do it!" said a voice from the back.
"Yeah he will"
The youngest of the twelve shouldered his way forward. Kronos was smaller than his brothers and sisters. He wasn't the smartest or the strongest or the fastest. But he was the most power-hungry.
"You're so straight foward" Annabeth face palmed.
I suppose when you're the youngest of twelve kids, you're always looking for ways to stand out and get noticed. The youngest Titan loved the idea of taking over the world, especially if it meant being the boss of all his siblings.
A few nodded.
The offer of cookies with sprinkles didn't hurt, either.
"That's totally the reason why" Jason snorted.
Kronos stood about nine feet tall, which was runty for a Titan. He didn't look as dangerous as some of his brothers, but the kid was crafty. He'd already gotten the nickname "the Crooked One" among his siblings, because he would fight dirty in their wrestling matches and was never where you expected him to be.
He had his mother's smile and dark curly hair. He had his father's cruelty. When he looked at you, you could never tell if he was about to punch you or tell you a joke.
"Thats how we think about Clarrise" Connor mock gasped.
His beard-
"Whats going on here?"
Oh the joy, the romans have arrived.