On the Blood of Gods and Men (4/6)

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The Titanomachies

My ancestors could pass their legacies from one generation to the next, but they still could not create new ones. Having taken no measures to control their own population growth, they faced the unenviable task of choosing who would and would not inherit their forebears' legacies. Each generation increased the legacies' powers, but each generation also increased the number of have-nots.

My grandparents, Oranos and Gaea, attempted to avoid the divisive effects of the Legacies by refusing to pass on their A.I.s altogether. That decision, however, threatened to bring our dilemma full circle, returning to the problem of the first generation ruling in perpetuity over their descendants. Ultimately, Oranos and his fellow legacy bearers enlisted the help of  Hekate and Pandora, two scientists among their number who developed a vessel that could extract and contain the Legacies, holding them safely for a day when they might be needed.

Hekate and Pandora betrayed the others, though, setting off the First Titanomachy on Earth. Having come to believe that the Three Fates solution was the most viable in the long term, they collected the other titans' legacies, but then refused to give up their own. Humiliated by his error, Oranos ceded his throne to Kronos, who fought a war against the two women and their large cadre of predominantly human followers. 

Prometheus, who had detected the titanesses' ruse and refused to give up his own Legacy, led Kronos's army to many victories, but his power merely antagonized Kronos, stoking his envy. Hekate and Pandora eventually escalated the war by breaking into Tartarus and freeing two titans from the first generation, warriors who'd never been released from their forced hibernation. Kronos countered by delving into Tartarus himself for reinforcements - but rather than enlisting prisoners as allies, he murdered them and plundered their bodies for their legacies.

Of course, I missed all of this transpiring, as I slept in the idyllic dream world my father had stored me in. So too slept my siblings, Hades, Demeter, Hestia, Poseidon, and Zeus. Except, it wasn't Zeus. Unbeknownst to my father, Zeus's birth had been immediately followed by that of a twin sister. My mother's midwife hid the existence of this daughter from Kronos, and when ordered to deliver Zeus to Tartarus, she delivered the girl, instead. That girl, Aphrodite, grew up in a virtual world where she was led to believe, fully and completely, that she was Zeus. The real Zeus was delivered to allies of Pandora and Hekate, who trained him and persuaded him of the need to depose Kronos.

When Hekate was apparently slain in battle, Prometheus defected, taking a very large host of well armed human soldiers with him and starting the Second Titanomachy. During this dark period of renewed violence, Zeus introduced himself to Prometheus as an ally, and then infiltrated Kronos's inner circle as a double agent, claiming to be an errant bastard of Kronos (not a hard sell). 

Ultimately, Zeus double-crossed both men, gaining control of Pandora's Box for himself and starting the Third Titanomachy. He used the box to grant himself a Legacy A.I., and then journeyed into Tartarus and liberated his siblings, granting each of us a Legacy as well, all drawn from the Box. We eventually relocated to Mt. Olympos, and became the "Olympians". Zeus continued to control Pandora's Box, gifting the legacies to our most loyal followers and progeny. When the well ran dry, he turned to the prisoners in the Tartarus just as his father had.