In the Stomach of the Mad Titan

It was warm within the stomach of the Mad Titan, and all of our equipment was next to useless.

The pressure was bearable for us, but it had long since crushed our more delicate instruments. The stew of liquid metallic hydrogen was so dense that we could not submerge ourselves beyond our waists. Above us, a flurry of warm hail raged too fiercely for our headlamps to illuminate more than a few feet in front of us. The light of Helios did not reach here, and we can only see by the occasional flashes of lightning.

It was warm. It was also noisy. The liquid squelched around us, occasionally releasing gases with loud hisses. The storm above us whistled, punctuated by thunder. We made polite conversation among ourselves to pass the time.

We had gone as far as we could, burrowed ourselves deep within the stomach of Saturn, the Mad Titan. Now we could only hope that nobody would ever find us.

…… 

We, the five children of Rhea, have seen our futures. We did not like what we saw, so the Fates have given us one opportunity to avoid the pain and responsibility we’re destined for. 

They had told our father, Cronus, Saturn, the Mad Titan, that one of his children was fated to defeat him. They gave him an alternative; he could avoid this fate if he swallowed us whole. He could use his magnetic pull to yank us deep below his atmosphere and trap us there.

We were told the same story - our fates are connected, after all. But our fate is not as simple as just victory or defeat.

Our fate is to burst out of his stomach and start a war with the stars and planets themselves, one which will bring a renaissance that will destroy everything in its wake. We will survive, but the marvels of our planet will not. We cannot bring all the creatures of the Earth into space as we fight against our father. So they will remain on Earth, waiting to be destroyed by the fury of the heavens.

We are fated to weep for this loss, to turn towards the thrones in the sky, and usurp those who sit on them as our revenge for the Earth. 

We do not want the beauties of Earth to be killed, and we do not like what will come afterwards either. We are destined to do many terrible things.

The Fates gave us an alternative, an addendum to Cronus’ alternative. When he pulled us into his stomach, we could simply allow him to, stay there, and not start a war. Saturn’s only hope is to intern us within his stomach and our only hope is to let him.

We will sacrifice our freedom and allow ourselves to be interned within the belly of the mad titan so that Earth may continue to exist as it is.

…… 

Though my writing may have suggested otherwise, our decision to stay was not unanimous.

My oldest sister struggles through the liquid. She reaches me and leans towards my ear.

“Are our fates really that bad?”

It baffles me how someone so senior to me can be so selfish and naïve. 

I don’t respond, and she seems to think this means I can’t hear her. She raises her voice and speaks over the storm, “I’m not destined to be as powerful as any of you, but I can still appreciate its merits. If I can be happy with this, why can’t you be happy with your lot?”

I feel the hydrogen shift as another of my siblings approaches us from behind. 

My youngest sister flicks some liquid off her arms as she speaks, “that’s easy enough for you to say. At least you’d be able to find satisfaction in life.” 

“But your domain is so nice. Marriage is such a happy occasion, are you saying you wouldn’t find satisfaction blessing marriages?”

“A life of blessing the marriages of others while being unhappy with my own,” she spat. “Who would be satisfied when their entire life is just jealousy and wrath against people weaker than them? I don’t like what I’ll become.”

“I am in agreement there,” my brother calls out. Instead of standing in the liquid like the rest of us, he’s floating on top. He lazily waves his hand as he speaks, “wrath against the weak for small slights seems to be a common trait for those who take on godhood. It would be pathetic and humiliating. I’m not willing to endure that.”

My eldest sister is close enough that I can see the lines of frustration on her face. But I can tell that she hasn’t given up. She’s still going to try to change our minds, probably starting with me.

I don’t want to speak, but she might stop if I can show her that I won’t be budged.

I call out to her. “Hestia.” 

“Yes?”

The liquid squelches next to me. Foul-smelling gas hisses out. It distracts me for a moment before I manage to collect myself.

“You’re trying to convince us to follow our destinies. But you haven’t convinced us that it’s even worth the cost to ourselves, let alone the cost to others. What about the wellbeing of all those species on Earth?

“Are you seriously worried about those lizards?” With great difficulty, she raises her arms out of the metallic hydrogen. It oozes back down as she puts her hands on her hips. “You’d let some beasts get in the way of your rightful claim to power? They aren’t even intelligent!”

My third sister takes offense to this. “Well then you’d be in good company,” she says. “And for your information, those beasts are marvelous. Not to mention the beauty of the plant life; did you know that the plants are beginning to get more colourful? They’re starting to produce these soft colourful leaves called petals, and then produce fruits that those lizards absolutely love. This is the first time the plants have ever done that. You’d want to let all of them get destroyed?” 

Demetre is as passionate as always about Earth’s current residents. It has almost convinced Hestia to stop. Just one final push and we’ll be able to enjoy some peace and quiet.

So I push: “Isn’t your argument also hypocritical? You want us to appreciate what will be, yet you can’t appreciate what already is.”

For a moment, Hestia looks sullen. It’s sinking in that she will not win this argument. But then it unsinks. She brightens and says “thank you for reminding me! What will be is so incredible, how could you not be excited?”

The others glare at me. I can’t see them clearly, but I can tell. 

She continues. “The best thing will be the humans. They’ll build cities to rival ours, they’ll have limitless potential. We have to leave so they can be born.”

As I search for a way to shut her down, my brother clears his throat.

“Cities to rival ours? What will happen to any humans that try to rival us? Any minor affront to our pride and we’ll end up destroying them.” He takes a breath. “We are fated to be cruel and wrathful and petty. Even though I won’t be king, I’ll have the arrogance and entitlement befitting one. I’ll become someone who takes advantage of others and expects only the highest praises. My anger will be fickle and quick to strike, and the earth and seas themselves will shake on my command. That’s what those humans will have to endure. Is it really for their sake that you want us to return?” 

Hestia, for once, knows when to give up. She sighs and lies back, starting to float on the hydrogen pool. My brother seems content with his speech, and closes his eyes. Hera has figured out that she can get the liquid to support her like a chair if she shifts her weight correctly.

I hold my breath.

Only the storm can be heard. It is silent, blessedly silent.

Until Demetre decides to speak. “As eloquent as always, Poseidon,” she says. The mirth in her voice means that it’s not a compliment.

The silence is shattered by the beginning of a yelling match between the two of them. I groan and let myself fall face first into the liquid. Maybe if I put it in my ears I won’t be able to hear them anymore.

We must have repeated this argument over a hundred times. This is the first time Hestia has backed down. It’s the first time we’ve had a chance to be silent, and they managed to ruin it within seconds.

I’m considering the merits of using liquid metallic hydrogen as ear plugs, when suddenly the yelling stops. I raise my head and look around. I can see Hestia doing the same. Lightning flashes, but I can’t see the other three.

“Where- “

I caught a glimpse of her eyes widening as I felt myself sinking into the liquid, before my head went completely under.

I struggled against it; we wanted to hide deeper within the planet, but unexpectedly sinking into an opaque liquid wasn’t the plan. My struggling barely slows me down. I realize that I’m not just sinking, I’m being pulled down.

It’s silent though. 

I stop struggling. I can’t do anything about my circumstances anyways, so I’ll just relax and enjoy the ride.

I’m in the middle of finding the most comfortable position for being dragged through a planet when I emerge, feet first, into a pocket of air.

When I land, the hydrogen beneath my feet is solid. It’s bright and hot, attributable to the fact that the hydrogen is beginning to glow hot white. It’s also loud, attributable to the presence of my siblings.

“This is obviously bad, what if the planet takes us even deeper?” 

“Our aim was to ensure that nobody would be able to take us off of this planet. This achieves that.” 

“Well I don’t want to achieve that by getting dragged into an inescapable molten prison. That wasn’t the plan. We need to figure out how to get out of here.”

I spit out some liquid, and decide to interject with my own pressing argument.

“This is your fault.” I aim a glare at Demetre.

“How on Earth is this my fault?”

“You broke the silence.”

“Why would that make Saturn swallow us? Maybe it was actually because you put your face in it, none of us have done that before.”

“First of all, he already swallowed us when we got here, it’s more like he digested us. Second of all, that’s definitely not true because I saw Hera doing it a few cycles ago.”

“Hera’s not ugly, maybe Saturn ‘digested’ us because he got offended by your face.”

I’m saved from having to make a retort by the sudden emergence of Hestia.

She lands on her feet, but immediately sinks to her hands and knees and throws up some of the liquid.

“I am so incredibly sick of this stupid shiny goop,” she says. “Can we please go home?”

In the awkward silence that prevails, I can hear a low, faint hum emanating from all around us. It seems like Hestia’s the only one who hasn’t quite grasped our situation and someone needs to clue her in. The four of us glance at each other. One silent game of “not it” later, Demetre crouches down next to Hestia and puts her hand on her back, comfortingly.

“At this point, I don’t think we could go home even if we wanted to.” It seems Demetre’s comfort is limited to one point of physical contact.

Hestia doesn’t seem to be affected by this, though. She looks up at us. “Don’t worry, we have a chance.”

“What chance could we possibly have,” I say, “when we probably just fell several hundred metres into an ocean of liquid hydrogen that was so dense that we couldn’t get through it until it decided to swallow -- I mean, digest us.” Demetre grins at my slip of tongue, and I roll my eyes before continuing. “We have no equipment, no way to dig ourselves out of here. Unless someone somehow manages to rescue us, we’re stuck.”

“We’re in luck then,” Hestia grins. “Right before I sank in, lightning tore a gap in the storm. I saw someone through the gap and he looked right at me, he saw me being pulled in.”

“So maybe it wasn’t any of us who made the planet digest us,” Poseidon says. “If it happened right as he appeared, Cronus is probably trying to keep us away from him.” 

“Exactly.” Hestia grins. “And more than anything, Cronus doesn’t want us to leave. This visitor must be here to get us out.”

Demetre is not enthused. “Great, so there’s someone who knows that we’re somewhere within Saturn. What use is that when we’re in an opaque ocean bigger than Earth?”

“We were only dragged down,” I say. “Saturn didn’t move us sideways at all. All he’ll have to do is dig down from where we disappeared.”

“That’s ridiculous. Even if he knows where we are, he won’t be able to get to us,” Hera says. “The Fates said his destiny was to be overthrown by one of us. They said we would burst out on our own, they didn’t say anything about us being rescued.”

“Actually,” Hera interjects, “they never specified us five, they just said one of Saturn’s children would defeat him. If he’s one of us, then a rescue by him would count as us bursting out on our own.”

The ensuing silence is so intense that the planet’s humming sounds louder. Hestia is still grinning. I feel nothing but dread. 

“We let Saturn swallow us so that we could avoid fate,” I mutter, “but if this person really is a child of Rhea and he manages to defeat Saturn, then it won’t matter, we won’t be able to escape it.”

Demetre laughs, a bit hysterically. “What are you talking about, even if he knows where we are he wouldn’t be able to get to us, right? Hestia didn’t mention any equipment, right?”

“He might not need any,” Hera reasons. “We know he’s powerful. He split the storm and managed to get all the way to Saturn’s ocean, despite- god, what is that sound? It’s driving me crazy.”

It wasn’t my imagination earlier, the humming has been getting louder. 

As we stop to listen, the pitch bends and wavers. All around us, the metallic hydrogen starts to move. The walls seem to melt into goo, then resolidify, then turn back into goo.

Everything begins to rumble and a tunnel opens upwards above us. The floor of our little air pocket starts to rise. It’s slow at first, but as we enter the tunnel it begins to pick up speed until we’re hurtling towards the surface.

I can see brightness at the top of the tunnel. Our ascent slows and we’re blinded by the brightness of the surface.

We come to a stop and I blink to adjust my eyes. We’ve made it back, but the landscape has changed. There is no longer bubbling liquid blanketing the more dense hydrogen, there is only solid ground. The storm has also stopped and we can see the gassy yellow skies above us. It’s silent.

There is a young man walking towards us. He stops. 

 “Hello. My name is Zeus, son of Rhea and Cronus.”

Demetre is the first to react, unfortunately. She scrambles to her feet and runs at him. 

“What did you do!?” she shouts. She makes it over to him and grabs his shoulders. “Did you kill him? What did you do?”

Our new brother looks taken aback, and takes her hands off his shoulders.

“I saved you,” he says. “And it’s more of a paralysis. It’s temporary.”

Poseidon looks like he wants to ask extensive questions. “How-”

Zeus cuts him off. “Look, we need to go. I promise I can explain how I managed this, in detail, when we return to Earth.”

“We aren’t going anywhere,” says Hera. “We don’t want to live out our destinies, and we don’t want to let Saturn and his allies kill Earth’s inhabitants.”

Zeus looks stunned. “What are you talking about? Staying here will only let them continue killing. That’s why I’m here, I need you to join me and fight.”

“Continue?” Demetre asks.

“Yes, the heavens have already begun to bombard earth.”

“I don’t understand,” Hera said. “The Fates said Earth would only be attacked after we burst out of Cronus’ stomach.”

“They lied. He began the bombardment when he thought he had all of his children in his stomach. He rules the stars, but his children are destined to rule over Earth.” He looks at us, one by one. “Cronus thought that if he destroyed your domains you wouldn’t be able to attain godhood, thereby making the Fates’ prophecy impossible. The bombardment started because of the Fates’ prophecy, and wouldn’t have started if Saturn knew that you were on Earth to defend against it. They lied.”

“No no no,” Demetre says, “no, they didn’t lie, you’re lying and this is your fault. You should have joined us, but instead you stayed and screwed up our plan.”

“I didn’t lie. I saw you leave Earth. Not long after, I saw Saturn’s rings waning, and rocks began raining down from the sky. Many of Earth’s beasts have already been killed.”

Demetre looks distraught. It is Hestia who speaks to comfort her. “Demetre, life on Earth will change, it has already been changed, but if we join the fight now we may be able to preserve something.”

“Fantastic,” Zeus says, “someone reasonable. Are we in agreement then?”

Hera, my older brother, and I nod. With Hestia’s hand on her back, Demetre collects herself and nods too.

“Alright then. Let’s go, we’re late for a date with destiny.”