The Great Eight (Temporary Hiatus)

Chaos 101

In the neck of the Canadian woods a trained huntress, and what seems to be her apprentices far behind her, confidently bounds over logs twice her height in an effort to follow a set of deer tracks. Tracking it across a small stream and over a small hill valley until she arrives at an upward slope. Hiding herself behind some boulders she peers over them at such an angle, readying her bow. However, before she can properly survey the area in which her prey resides, her two apprentices make themselves known in a most unbecoming way.

"Ugh, why did I ever agree to bring you two doorknobs along?" The huntress asks herself rhetorically as she gives up, temporarily, on landing the killing blow. Instead, she is forced to address the two boys who looked to be overdressed for the hunt, and not to mention far too green. The both of them appearing way too clumsy and fearful as they trip over grass, twigs, and small rocks. The shorter one, managing to fall face first in front of our proud huntress, earning himself a grin full of grass.

"Ya' know I thought hunters used guns these days?" He ignorantly asks, at the same time insulting her craft, whether out of laziness or just a little trigger-happy to shoot innocent animals in the woods.

The huntress rolled her eyes in disapproval, turning her eyes away from the boys to salvage whatever patience she had. When we sees a prime buck entering into the glade. If the huntress was going to retort back to the boy, she surely wouldn't now since her eyes were locked on her nearby target.

Readying her bow, with a precision from years of experience it seems as well as some kind of innate and natural inclination, the huntress lines up her shot. And carefully, and oh so quietly, she is just about to take her shot when a loud series of bangs erupts from behind her and scares the buck off. Leaping back off into the woods where she would surely have to track him again. Enraged, she turns around to scold the boys who surely had made the racket in her opinion.

"Could you make anymore noise?" She whips her arm up to express her irritation as she pivots her body on her heels to look back. "Didn't you see there was a-"

Abruptly, her voice deadens when she sees the two boys she was scolding running away in terror. Not entirely out of character for their cowardice to show, the huntress takes a quick second to find their terror's source and makes the impertinent observation of a red giant's legs in either side of her vision, therefore causing her head to tilt up and see its grotesque face and fighting stance.

"- A big, ugly guy behind me!" She takes off, her green hat flying off as she darts over the boulders she was positioned at before. Running through a log with a gouge in its side large enough for her to run through, and weak enough for the giant to bash through. Then she proceeded to leap over a minor gorge in another effort to lose her assailant. Though his strides are far greater and they have no qualm about running over the gorge without so much as a moment of hesitancy. Seeing this, the young girl panics further, stressed out of her mind from this unusual and dangerous encounter. Luckily, her innate inclination for all things natural helps guide her body through the dense foliage as her mind is racing to come up with a solution. So distracted that she is, she barely notices how her body is able to lengthen and inhumanly quicken her strides. Whether this has happened before in her experiences or not, all that matters is that the huntress is now gaining an advantage as she zooms through the forest away from the giant crashing about behind her.

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"Okay, let me get this straight." The young man, now resting on top of the griffin in which toyed with him, spoke aloud to his fellow griffin-rider who was nonchalantly relaxing on his back. " You're Hermes?! The immortal messenger of the Greek gods of Olympus?"

"Ahh. Yes that's me." Hermes said despondently while pushing his goggles off his brown eyes. "Why do I always get stereotyped. I am also the god of trade, travel, luck, language, the list goes on! But who remembers that? No one." Hermes swiftly twisted his body back into a sitting position. Spreading his ligaments in an expression of hopelessness and depression, slouching back to normal after his statement.

"Well what do you want with me!?" The mortal boy exclaimed. Baffled that a god rescued him. "Where are you taking me?" Slightly shouting now over the winds blasting their faces, probably thinking he wants some goggles like his godly companion.

"What is this! I save your life and all I get are complaints and all these questions?" Hermes was now back to posing dramatically as he quipped back to his charge. "Have I heard a thank-you yet? No!" Hermes swings his staff above the griffin's head, which magically lowers it as if a reflex for this being commonplace behavior for the god hitching a ride on its back.

"Uh thanks " the young boy awkwardly replied at the reprimand. "I feel really safe now" he claims with the body language of a scared child. And chooses to change the subject off his lack of manners. "Man where are we? It sure looks bleak!" Asking yet another question to his rescuer.

"Canada" Hermes replies, unimpressed with his charge. But otherwise displaying interest at the trees below. Going so far as to fold himself over the griffin's side, who rumbles a bit at the abrupt imbalance, to try and get a closer look below. Sliding his goggles back on for a clearer picture, just in time to capture the scene of our huntress's plight.

" Uh oh! We better hurry up!" Hermes exclaimed, the young teenager following his lead as they direct the griffins to dive towards the ground.

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Back on the ground, the huntress and the giant are now in a clearing and circling each other. Each waiting for the other to make their move. Apparently, the giant had enough waiting and dives in fangs first like an angry goose. With some quick thinking, the huntress grabs a nearby stick with a stern look to her face, before using the stick to trip the giant while swinging her body low to the ground to her left. The giant face crashes to the ground while the huntress confidently swings the large stick around. In an effort to scare off the giant, who by now has spotted a fallen tree trunk and picks it up as his weapon. But the girl is not deterred in the slightest by the utter proportions of strength against her.

"You can always give up you know. " She states proudly as she faces her opponent down. Quickly dodging a brutal swing of the tree, she continues with " I don't mind." To which the giant tosses the tree at her, causing her to use her stick to vault over the projectile. Unfortunately loosing her weapon in the process as it breaks into splinters afterwards.

"Alright buster!" She stands from her crouch, to which she landed in after the stunt, and approaches the giant with all the pride and courage of a mongoose facing a snake. " If that's how you want to play it!"

Unfortunately, the giant only sees this as the perfect opportunity to crush the girl with yet another tree her found. As though they are in a forest full of them or something. Forcing the log down at his prey, his fatal strike doesn't connect as with a quick swoop one of the griffins shows up at the perfect time. The young boy riding the griffin manages to catch the girl's arm and bring her up behind him as the griffin screeches out and flies off just as rapidly as it had appeared.

Though this action goes unappreciated by the fiery girl who cries in indignation at the cut off of the fight, though she begrudgingly sits herself behind the boy as she gazes at the befuddled giant now quite the distance away from her.

"Nicely done, Jay!" Hermes comes into the picture to compliment the boy who took her away from her fight. "But you see, I brought a griffin for Atlanta. Now I have too many griffins." The god shrugs his shoulders at his problem, which seems insignificant to the new girl if her blank look is anything to go by. Which quickly changes into suspicion.

"Uh, how do you know my name?" She asks the god, a fact unbeknownst to her. " Who is that guy?" She asks her griffin riding buddy with a point of her thumb.

"That's Hermes. I'm Jay." The boy answers succinctly.

"Ugh, and I'm dreaming!" Atlanta scoffs out as they all, once again, continue their flight.