The Universal Stones

In the beginning, the primordial deities, Gaia (Mother Earth) and Uranus (Father Sky), gave birth to twelve children, known as the Titans. The Titans, including Oceanus, Coeus, Theia, Rhea, Themis, and the most powerful, Cronus (just to name a few), ruled over the entire universe. While the Titans held immense power, Gaia and Uranus knew that there must be balance. So, together, they created the six Universal Stones.

The stones control six aspects of the universe - Reality, Time, Mind, Power, Soul, and Space. The Titans' offspring are commonly referred to as the Olympians, which are led by Zeus. For example, Cronus and Rhea gave birth to Hestia, Demeter, Hera, Hades, Poseidon, and Zeus. As the children of the Titans became more powerful, Gaia and Uranus began to worry. They saw that it could be easy for one god to gain control of all six stones, so they smashed each stone into two pieces. Each piece held half of the stone's original power, and when the two pieces are put back together, the stone held all of the power of that one aspect. Gaia dispersed five of the stones while Uranus dispersed five throughout the galaxy. Neither of them knew where the other hid the stones. Together, they held onto one of stones and gave the last one to Cronus, their youngest son who reigned over all of the Titans.

Growing up, Zeus was always given difficult labor tasks since he was the youngest kid. Over time, he gained a lot of strength and became the most powerful of his siblings. One day, as he was building a new throne for his father, he overheard Cronus drunkenly admit to knowing the location of one of the Universal Stones. He always thought that the tale of the stones was made up, but he now assumed that the Universal Stones legend that his grandparents used to tell him as a young boy was true, and that there were in fact, twelve stones hidden in the universe. After that night, Zeus became greedy and wanted the stones for himself. He provoked his brothers and sisters to help him overthrow the Titans, assuming that each one held a Universal Stone. Then the Titan War began.

After ten years, Zeus and the other Olympian gods and goddesses defeated their parents and ruled over the universe; however, Zeus was not satisfied. He managed to steal the Power stone from his father, but quickly realized that this was only the beginning of a long journey.

Zeus's brother, Poseidon, god of the sea, found both halves of the Reality stone. Poseidon knew of the power that a whole Universal Stone held, and kept it hidden until after the Titan War. After the war, he told Zeus about what he found. Zeus told him of his plan to get all of the Universal Stones and rule the entire universe alongside his brothers and sisters.

Hades, god of the underworld, knew of Zeus's plan to gain control of all the Universal Stones, and did not approve. Hades had one half of the Soul stone in the underworld and hid it so deep that even the immortal Zeus would have to die before he could take it.

It took five thousand years for Zeus to figure out the location of eleven of the Universal Stones. He sent his wife, Hera, to find the location of the last Universal Stone. Now, he had to find ways to take them.

Hera, the goddess of marriage, was beautiful and smart, but became jealous after learning that her husband, Zeus, had taken many other lovers. One night, Hera overheard Zeus speaking to Poseidon about his plan to obtain all of the Universal Stones, and she became very vindictive. After many years of using her beauty and intelligence to locate the last Universal Stone, she finally found it. Hera knew the location but told Zeus she was unable to find the last stone because it was destroyed by Mother Earth.

At first, Zeus believed her but Poseidon heard that the last stone existed from one of his loyal warriors. Zeus began searching for it, but everyone he spoke with were devout followers to Hera, and they told him that it was destroyed or that they had never heard of the Universal Stones. Zeus became furious and went to look for Hera. Hera did not stray from her story, so Zeus took her from Mount Olympus and made her come with him on his journey for all twelve Universal Stones.

And Zeus's journey began.

Image Information: The Fall of the Titans by Cornelis Cornelisz van Haarlem

Author's Note:

My story is based off one of my favorite movies, Marvel's The Infinity War, which is about Marvel's Avengers and how they have to fight together against Thenos, who is trying to steal all six infinity stones so that he can rule the whole universe. With my story, I came up with the idea that Gaia and Uranus help maintain balance in the world in order to create the plot. I split the stones in half because I wanted to make twelve stones for the twelve Olympian gods and goddesses, as well as the twelve Titans and Titannesses. Since the movie ends with a cliffhanger, I decided to do the same with my story.

You may be familiar with Greek Mythology, but let me refresh your memory. Here is the lineage: Uranus (heaven) and Gaia (earth) had children - the (twelve) Titans. Then, the Titans had their children: the Olympians (Zeus, Poseidon and so on). Well, the Olympians got tired of the Titans having all the power, so they decided to go to war, and the Olympians won. This war has many names: Titan War, Battle of the Gods, War of the Titans, Battle of the Titans, or Titanomachy. The most common name is the Titan War. The Titan War lasted ten years. I really appreciate Greek Mythology and the Titans, but I decided to make this story more about the gods and goddesses that live on Mount Olympus.

I came up with the idea of using Greek gods and goddesses as the main characters after reading Tony Kline's Ovid I Unit.

I was unsure of which Greek goddess to utilize in my story so I used the Crash Course video Great Goddesses to help me determine which goddess would be best suited for this role. In the video, the narrator describes how powerful and respected Hera was in Greek mythology, but she had a hidden dark side. Since Hera was beautiful, smart, and the Queen of Mount Olympus, she was very sought after by men, but she remained faithful to Zeus. After learning that he had many other lovers, Hera found herself becoming very jealous of the other women and became vengeful. I thought she perfectly embodied the character that I wanted to portray since the character needed to hide the last stone from Zeus.

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