THE OLYMPICS
Author's Note: Hello to you, and thanks for taking the time to click on this story. As you may obviously know, I am a fan of PJO/HoO. In this story though, it will not follow the major canon plot of the Heroes of Olympus journey. This is an AU of the series which I will explain further in the note. This story is mostly inspired by THG, but this will not be a crossover as I've made changes to the world and made my own alterations and modifications to construct a similar world, yet fit for PJO/HoO. I promise you that this story won't follow any plot of The Hunger Games, but I took the idea of the Games and transformed it to fit a Greco-Roman style. Hopefully it'll sound interesting enough for you to move on. ALSO, all the gods/goddesses mentioned in this story will also be in an AU, meaning that if a certain god is supposed to be this sort of fish creature with horse legs and a lion head, noh. That will not apply to this story. All the deities mentioned in this story are either gods/goddesses with human forms or spirits that have possessed humans to produce offspring. Just so that people won't get confused with the mythology of things.
Another note, this story is based off an idea that I've been creating for a Wattpad novel since August of 2013. But I thought that I'd try to apply that here and see if the idea is actually a good one. I've had so many documents brainstorming characters, plot twist ideas, geographical features, world building, and even figuring out the powers that I wanted to give my mutants, but since the PJO/HoO series also contains beings of immense powers, I've decided to try out a different approach in this fanfic. Hopefully you'll like it!
Synopsis: In a world where demigods are the ruling species on the planet and gods and goddesses control the natural order and govern the nation of Rome (which used to be the United States of America), an annual tournament known as the Olympics is played out to test the courage, skill, strength, and determination of each citizen that is picked into playing. Titus Price is a young demigod residing in Sector 4 with his mother. The thing about Titus is that he doesn't know who his godly parent is. His mother, scarred by unrequited love and heartbreak, refuses to ever bring up the memory of his father. When he is selected to participate in this year's Olympics, his fear of dying surfaces as he doesn't know what his power is. One the eve of his leave, he is visited by a man that could help him save his life in the arenas and, hopefully, save his family.
Short Summary: Titus Price, a young demigod residing in Sector 4 of Rome, is selected to participate in this year's annual Olympics, a tournament consisting of hostile challenges and levels to test a demigod's strength, skill, and courage. Doomed to not knowing what his power is or who his godly parent may be, he must train himself to survive the life-threatening levels and win the Olympic Games.
CHAPTER ONE – SELECTION
Today's broadcasts consist of nothing but advertising campaigns for the Olympics; figurines of past champions and arena tapestries from the Handicrafts district in Sector 6, faux blades and swords forged from the hands of the Hephaestus children in Sector 7. There were also reruns of past years of the Olympics being played on different channels, though I pay no attention to it on the holographic screens in the school hallways.
The bell sounds in the hallways, our clock displaying the current time in digital format. 3:30pm, the woman's voice from the clock speaks as the rest of the students gathered our things before exiting the room. I shrug my bag over my shoulders and grip on one of the shoulder straps as I maneuver through the crowded hallways. Most of the conversations that I can pick up were talks about the tournament. Typical conversation for the tournament season, I suppose. There's nothing people would rather want to talk about than gossiping about how the arenas are being designed for this year, wondering if the Aphrodite and Venus players would be hotter than the previous years' competitors, and thinking of scenarios about how the Athena players would whip up a scheme or a trap to advance to the next level.
Marcus sneaks up behind me and jumps onto my back and I almost tumble over but luckily I grab one of the locker handles of some freshman's locker before my face could kiss the floor. He helps me up and brushes his blond bangs to the side. Whoever thought about bringing back the Justin Bieber haircut should be scorned by Aphrodite. He laughs in amusement as I straighten myself up, dusting my fluorescent blue shirt.
"Finally caught you," Marcus says with joy, "otherwise I would've had to pulverize you for trying to escape. You didn't forget about the party tonight did you?"
"What?" I blink before the memory comes back to me in a matter of seconds, changing my expression from clueless to inspired. "Oh yeah, the tournament party that you're hosting this year. Nope, didn't forget about that, man."
He grins excitedly and nods. "Good, because letting Del and Candice unload all food would probably kill them if they don't get an extra set of hands to help them. And since you're the muscles of the gang, you should do it."
"Exercising three times a week in the water doesn't mean that I'm suddenly Heracles, Marcus." I roll my eyes before gripping his collar, motioning us towards the front gates of the school and leaving the campus to head to his place.
The air traffic is heavy today and it usually is during this time of the year. As the cars travelling overheard swiftly propel against the air, Marcus and I use our hover boards to get across the highways and into the suburban neighborhood where he and I grew up together. The air is clean thanks to the major use of solar energy to replace gasoline. As we hover across the sidewalk, Candice and Del greet us in front of Marcus' doorstep. Candice grins with a perky attitude as she brushes her golden wavy hair while Del shuffles over from the porch steps and onto the pavement. I roll my eyes at him in a playful manner.
"Delyceus, stop your-"
"My name is Del!" He exclaims as he retorts. I laugh heartily with a lopsided grin, knowing that calling him by his birth name annoys him. He looks at me with an expression of displeasure, brows pointing downward as his bottom lip sticks out in a pout, crossed arms for effect.
"Anyway," I say, "should we get this party going or what?"
From the trunk of Marcus' Tesla car, we gather out the bags containing the junk food and drinks and the new three-dimensional projection screen for his media center (which is rather light considering that it's basically a small column-like pedestal with a small metal button on its top center.) We bring the stuff into his villa and set the bags of potato chips and fizzy drinks onto the classical-white marble island counter in the kitchen while Marcus and I head into his media center to hook up the television set.
Basically what this thing does is that if we connect to the television and turn both of them on, the three-dimensional projection screen will create an atmospheric hologram that fills the entire room to sink you into the show you're watching. The only exception about this particular device is that it's only meant for the broadcasts of the Olympics, giving you a deeper feel and experience into the games to let you feel like you're right inside of the arenas.
In the past two hours, we've managed to hook up the media center with the surround sound system after looking for the right steps to tell us how to activate the pedestal. Candice and Del had already set up the food in the living room. A few more of our friends show up during the duration of the time before the broadcast of the Player Selection starts. Candice's best friend Jane, loyal daughter of Triton, arrives last with Connor, descendant of the family line of Proteus.
"Well, well," Marcus teases, "if it isn't the great shape-shifter of the sector."
Connor nudges his forearm. "Shut up, Marc. You're just jealous because I can turn into a dragon and all you can do-"
"Will you guys cut it out and help me with the last cord?" I demand as I struggle to strap in the last cord into the surround sound speakers. Seriously these guys are like children of a war god, always bickering about the smallest things. The girls giggle on the faux Nemean Lion fur couch as they much on a handful of cheese balls.
Eventually, we're all settled in and wait for the broadcast to begin. The pedestal projects a 3D live image of the amphitheater in the capital city of the nation, Olympus, where thousands of spectators are seated on the marble benches semi-circling around the concrete stage. Beams of lights oscillate along the night sky like movie premiere lights as the crowd cheers in anticipation for the host to come on stage while the giant flat screen hung on the stage wall shows glimpses of the past year's arenas and players for them to reminisce on.
I sit next to Marcus, who's munching on a handful of low-calorie potato chips, and I lean my head against my hand as my elbow rests on the arm rest of the couch. Sometimes I try to not watch the Olympics, mainly because of the bloodshed that could possibly happen to the players. My mother would always get angry every time she found out I watched the Olympics with friends, particularly Marcus and Del. The two would reenact the previous battles and cosplay some of their favorite heroes.
"They are bad influences on you," my mother would always say. "You need to find new friends, Titus. It's not good for your mentality to watch this kind of sport." Though she tolerates both of them because she knows that since we all grew up together in our neighborhood, it's impossible to separate us from each other.
The commencement anthem plays in the surround speakers, and it's loud. It's as if we're in the actual amphitheater watching from the stands. The music sounds as the main attraction comes into view. The lights around the amphitheater stands dim as the stage lights illuminate as the host of the games walks onto the stage with a cocky grin wearing aviator shades that reflected the crowd like a mirror and a digital camouflage military outfit with the sleeves of the uniform ripped apart from the shoulders.
The audience cheers vivaciously and enthusiastically as the god of war steps onto the podium in the center.
"It has been a long year," Ares begins with a confident nod, "but the season of contest has come once again, and it will be unlike any other tournament you will ever experience; new levels, harder tasks, and deadly traps just waiting for the players to come across."
My eyes are fixed on Ares as he continues with his commencement speech. It is rare that any god shows up in front of such a large crowd, especially an Olympian. But taking in the fact that most of the world's population consists of demigods and about less than 25% human, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't have to hide from us, their children. That's where my mind goes into another direction. My mind casts away into another direction, leaving my friends to continuously watch the Player Selection broadcast.
My dad is the one pressing subject that my mother hates to be brought up by me. It's just… an eighteen year old growing up without knowing who his father figure was is, in my realm, utterly sad. Everyone else in the sectors knew who their godly parent or spirit is. All the gods and spirits that dealt with Poseidon's element have their children situated here in Sector 4. There were times where I would hear a voice in my head; a calm yet stormy voice that would periodically assist me in helpless situations. Sometimes I wonder if it's him, or if I'm just hearing things. Every time I tell my mom about it, she just tells me that I'm hallucinating or going crazy. She probably knows about it already considering the fact that she doesn't act surprised whenever I tell her. It's almost as if she hears it in her head too.
Del shakes me back to reality as I hear the audience roar with applause. I fix my eyes on the center stage of the amphitheater and Ares vanishes. The podium sinks under the stage before the space seals completely. A woman with dark-blonde hair dressed in dark navy-blue business attire catwalks onto the stage, and the audience cheers yet again. She raises her fists in the air with excitement.
"Hello, Olympus! Are you all ready for another year of the Olympics?!"
The crowd is energized and kindles cheerful applauses as Chloto, or Chloe as she prefers to be called, nods back to the crowd with amusement, a gleeful smile forming upon her lips. "Good, because I'm getting excited!"
An elongated chasm forms behind her as the doors of the concrete stage open to lift up a large holographic screen that showcases the Selection Wheel to choose the players who will participate in this year's Olympics. This is where the ambience in the room darkens and the mood switches from excitement to anxiety. We all know that demigods between the ages of 16 and 21 have their names logged into the system for this particular reason. It's only a matter of the Fates to choose who will get picked to go into this hostile tournament.
The icon of the Wheel spins as it waits for Chloe's signal to spin, but first she calls upon her two other sisters to come up to the stage to assist her in selecting. Lachesis and Atropos walk onto the stage with similar looking outfits, only Atropos's business attire is the color of satin red while Lachesis's is white. They all greet each other by kisses on either cheek before they get down to business. The lights on the top of the stands beam down onto the stage for center of attention.
"Alright folks, let's spin- the- Wheel!" The audience chants the last three words along with the Moirai before Chloe focuses her attention onto the screen. As she thrusts her palm towards the screen, the Wheel begins to spin like a lottery ticket wheel. Thousands upon thousands of names circulate off of the Wheel as Lachesis begins to measure just how long it takes for Chloe to spin the Wheel before she signal Atropos to sever the bunch of ticket names rolled out of the Wheel. As an animate sword cuts the batch apart, the information on the last ticket of the severed roll shows up onto the screen with a three-dimensional body image of the player.
As usually, they always start Hades' district since it's the first. A nineteen year old who looks like the epitome of death is shown on the screen as his icon spins in a slow manner upon a flat pedestal next to the information given on the other side of the screen. The ladies announce the first player as well as his godly parent: Jack Bates (son of Thanatos), makes a few comments and amusing jokes about him looking like his father, and proceed to the spinning of the wheel again.
They do this repeatedly before they reach our sector. Candice and Jane hold each other's hands as an act of nervousness and Marcus clings onto a couch pillow and buries his chin in it as he rocks back and forth. Del constantly stuffs his mouth with a handful of cheese puffs, which is the typical thing of him to do whenever he's nervous. I stare blankly onto the screen as they start spinning the wheel again, my heart pounding to see if any of our names coming up on that screen.
In any case, the players from each sector could be of the same gender. It didn't matter of choosing one boy and one girl, just as long as there are two participants from each district. This is to coincide with the fact that in Artemis's sector, it is all women. They're not her children, but they are considered part of her Hunters. Also, it is where the Amazons reside in so her sector is considered pretty powerful.
When the Wheel stops and Atropos severs the ticket roll, the information shows up on the screen along with his figure. Candice and Jane let out deep breaths as if they've been holding it for a long while; same with the boys. A seventeen year old named Walter Queens who is the son of Thetis, the leader of the sea nymphs, shows up on screen. He had jet-black spiky hair that seems to illuminate a dark shade of ocean blue whenever the light hits his head at a different angle. His skin looks like a mixture of creamy white and a slight tint of sky blue. The intimidating expression on his face is unnerving. It states that he resides in the wealthier parts of the sector just up in the hills. The Fates make a few comments with a round of bad puns which makes the audience laugh in an awkward fashion before they proceed to selecting the next player from our sector.
As the Fates spin the next contestant, the information unfolds onto the screen and it's as if the temperature in the room just drops because I'm shaking. The girls gasp and Del drops his bowl of cheese balls, making it spill and scatter all over the carpet. A dreadful expression forms upon my face as I see my figure hover over the pedestal with my background information showing up onto the screen.
"Well well, here's something you don't see every day. It looks like we've got a son of Poseidon on our hands! Ladies and gentlemen please give a great applause to our next player, Titus Price!" As the broadcast continues until they cough up the last player, the torch bearer walks upon the stage with the sacred torch as he walks upon the steps of the pyramid to get to the top, where the Olympic torch awaits the kindling of the flame to commence the season of the Olympics. Once the bearer ignites the Olympic torch, the crowd cheers vivaciously and the Fates announce on the microphone. "Let the Olympics begin!"
Author's Note: Okay, so I've decided to stop there because I was afraid this chapter might get too long. But on the other hand, this story might be very long so what the hell. I hope you guys enjoyed this first chapter. Remember that the spirits/creatures/gods in the story have no relations to their true forms outside of this story. It's an AU after all. Also note that in this story, the Olympics may be in a different form as you've just read about the Player Selection broadcast. So this won't be like your modern day Olympics, just so you don't get confused with anything. Hopefully I've cleared some things up. See you guys in the next chapter!