The Great Eight (Temporary Hiatus)

Chaos 101

A new year in New Olympia. Though that didn't stop the usual traffic from being its routinely rowdy self. And it certainly didn't stop the usual angry drivers either. However, this new year is entirely different despite the similar sights. For this year, it just so happens that all the planets came into alignment. Giving any astronomy-inclined individual a thrill like no other. But with the good comes the bad, and unfortunately for a small group of unsuspecting teenagers, they were about to embark on the quest of their lives, literally.

For in New Olympia, an ominous presence makes himself known. Wearing a rather devilish suit and shined shoes, the godly man has no qualms for blending in to the city-scape. If he had cared to go unnoticed, he wouldn't have brought his giant friends with him. It is a wonder that none of the whizzing drivers speeding by haven't taken notice. But that's the daily traffic for you I suppose.

"Ah ha ha ha. There he is." The darkly clad man vocalized with his vengeful timbre. "You're looking well, Oracle." He addressed the fragile-looking, older gentleman. Startling the elder enough so to drop his roll of sushi onto the pavement below his station at his stool beside a vendor's cart.

"Eh? Oh come on now. You're just being nice. I am starting to look like a shaved cat." The Oracle waved his hand dismissively at the faux nicety. One can't exactly believe the embittered God of Time, fresh out of Tartarus. "But time has served you well, hasn't it Cronus?"

"Yes, time does serve me. As do you" Cronus spoke with an air of impatience as he leaned ever closer to the balding elder.

"I serve everyone! Unfortunately that includes you-" The Oracle proclaimed with no small degree of weariness. And was also, too, rudely cut off by Cronus grabbing his darkened shades which revealed a set of pupil-less eyes which were glowing an eerie blue hue.

"What do you see?" Cronus asked, or rather demanded, as he kneeled in front of the older, but technically younger than him, individual.

"A power-crazed, megalomaniac. Bent on vengeance." The Oracle snidely remarked.

"Am I really that obvious?" Cronus had the nerve to chuckle at the man's indignance. But turning serious, Cronus straightened up and enunciated," I know my plans are clear to you, Oracle. But what if anything stands in my way?"

The Oracle could only serve, as he clapped his hands together, rather dramatically with that bolt of light, to produce an electrifying, blue orb within his grasp. The same color as his eyes, or what stands in place for his eyes, to reveal a silhouetted vision of eight youngsters.

"Eight heroes. Teenagers." The man revealed with a large amount of surprise in his voice at what would seem to be rather horrible odds for the predetermined rivals who were set up against Cronus's, a literal God's, plans. "They can stop you."

Cronus took it upon himself to maneuver the corporeal vision into his own hands to examine it, almost put out by the pathetic adversaries. "Mortals?" He casually tossed back the man's glasses over his shoulder as his mind wrapped around the idea.

"Eeyup." The man affirmed succinctly, putting on his glasses once more.

"This can't be right!" Cronus crushed the orb in his grasp, having it dissolve into nothingness like the dream that it was, as he accused the man behind him.

"I'm always right!" The Oracle wagged his finger in the air before making a fist and smacking it into his other palm. "Over four thousand years without a mistake! Not bad, huh?" He couldn't help to toot his own horn too.

"And what about the gods?" Cronus inquired, still a bit in denial.

"The Gods will protect them from you." The Oracle jabbed back, almost pityingly.

"Hmm. Protected from me, are they? Well, I don't think they'll be expecting you boys!" He kissed his teeth as he looked back at his ghastly looking companions. "Find them! And destroy them!" Cronus ordered, as three ogre-ish giants walked off.

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"That's it! Now switch directions!" A young, sharp-eyed boy instructed to his fellow sailors that were trailing after him in the lake. Their yellow-orange life jackets a bit too tacky to wear, even for 2005. "Remember your points. Beam reach, broad reach, downwind -"

The sailor was interrupted by a dinosaur-esque screeching caused by a brown giant surfacing from the water right in front of him. Causing quite the stir, the boy could only whip around in panic as the monster smashed his boat to pieces, leaving him to desperately swim away from what would've been a nice and normal sailing day. But surprisingly, the boy gained an instinctive determination to both escape the monster's whirling arms and to lead said monster away from his prospective students who could only gawk on the scene before them. Needless to say, this day would become one of their most memorable if not most terrifying.

But the boy had no need to swim for long, when a set of purple wings, complete with a lion's body and a screeching eagle's head came swooping down. Just in time to whisk him out of the water and away from the giant's crushing blow. Though, trading one monster for another did not seem like the ideal situation at all for the youngster, who hollered and continued to panic as the conveniently arriving griffin held him aloft in its wicked talons.

"Hey! Let go of me!" And yet the adrenaline still pumping in the young man's veins allowed him to bravely yell at the creature and try to escape the seemingly, precarious situation. Though on second thought, "No! No wait! Don't let go of me!" He shook his head rapidly due to the lengthy view beneath his flailing legs, which still contained the crusty giant. "Maybe I was better off down there."

But another accompanying screech broke him out of his crisis. For rising out of the clouds, like this was a casual occurrence, was a man clad in a vintage aviator's hat and goggles astride another griffin. He was awkwardly clothed with an ancient, white robing you usually see in films about ancient Greece. Added with a pair of clumsily large combat boots with little wings on the heels to match the wings on his hat. And in his hand, an intricate staff with yet another set of wings, exactly like the modern insignia of medicine with the usual wings and twining strands beneath them, complete with a red orb in the center of the wings. Was it made entirely of gold?

"I'd climb up on her back if I were you. She's less likely to eat you that way." The eccentrically dressed man advised in a too calm manner for the situation.

"What!? Are you serious?" The boy hanging limply in the griffin's grasp exclaimed with an adequate amount of fear.

"Oh. She's okay. Really! Don't worry! I tamed her myself." The man somehow managed to get his griffin to fluidly swerve under the boy and to his other side as he stretched the hand not holding his staff to pat the griffin's beak.

"But she's a little hungry." The comically-inclined, shorter man said in a way that made it seem he always talked fast. "She missed her breakfast this morning. That's right isn't it honey?" Somehow the man magically managed to hang upside down from the, too, upside-griffin above the air-dried boy.

"You didn't have your 'brekky-wekky' today! Little cranky, aren't you girl." The man childishly attempted to soothe the narrow-eyed griffin. Said flying creature attempted to bite off his hand for his patronizing ministrations. Though, the man was either too quick, or the griffin had no real intention of biting his hand. One might never be able to answer that, considering this griffin's personality.

"Hey! Andrea, come on! Let go of him will ya'?" The man, still upside-down, wagged his finger disapprovingly at the eagle-lion. Which led to said creature to purr with a sadistic look. Then proceeded to toss her passenger from one set of claws to the next as they continued to soar into the sky, leaving a invisible trail of the boy's fearful yells.