Writing Games: Tell Me a Story – The Firework Giant
Tell Me a Story: The Firework Giant
Pete and his friends had gone to the park to watch the city’s fireworks display for the Fourth of July. In the crowd, Pete somehow got separated from his friends, so he was watching the fireworks by himself when he noticed the colorful bursts seemed to form the shape of a man. A giant man, up there in the sky. A giant man, who was reaching his arm down to Pete and…
Tell me a story about Pete and the Firework Giant. Did the giant come down to Earth, or bring Pete up into the sky? Did he talk to Pete, or take him on an adventure? How did Pete feel when he saw the fireworks come to life? When his adventure was over, what did Pete do? Did he tell anyone what had happened – and did they believe him?
When you’ve finished the story, come back and share it with us! JediBoy’s story …
A giant man, who was reaching his arm down to Pete and…
he caught Pete and lifted Pete up into the sky. Pete said, “Who are you? Let me go back down to Earth with my mother and father.”
Now the giant said, “My name is Atlas. I am named after the great giant who held up the sky in Greek mythology, as you might see. But I don’t hold up the sky, but I bright up the sky. I light up the sky on the Fourth of July. That’s why I come on the Fourth of July. Some people when they meet me call me the Fireworks Giant.”
“I wanted to take you to my twin Atlas – we’re both called Atlas. The only difference is we look different. He’s green and I’m all different colors. Some people call me the Rainbow Giant, and call him the Jungle Giant.”
Pete says, “Where is he?”
The giant says, “He is right now on the top of Mount Olympus.”
“How much time will it take to get there?”
“Only a second. After I am supposed to be shut off, I can travel to Mount Olympus to see my brother. He holds up the sky, as you might recognize.” Pete was 8, and he had heard a lot about Greek mythology. He was the greatest listener to Greek mythology in the entire school.
In about two hours, the fireworks were over. He traveled all the way, at light-speed, to Mount Olympus. There was his brother, Atlas.
Atlas, the Fireworks Giant, said, “There’s Atlas.”
“Okay,” said Pete, “see you!”
Atlas said, “I’m staying here!”
“Oh,” said Pete.
Then Atlas greeted Atlas and Pete. “Brother! Who is this boy you have?” Atlas thundered.
Now this particular Atlas, the brother who is not the Fireworks Giant, but the Jungle Giant, is a giant of giants. That means he is big as a giant to giants!
Pete looked so small to him, he could barely see Pete.
There were a lot of monsters there as well, but it seems that all the monsters were very nice. There was a minotaur, a centaur, a satyr, and also a hydra. For some strange reason, there were some Norse monsters as well. There was Fenris the wolf, Mongor the Midgard Serpent, and Erna the daughter of Loki, a half-god, half-frost giant. She was the goddess of this place where mostly all of the Vikings in the world, in Midgard, end up dead.
It happens that all the Greek gods are there and all the Norse gods are there as well. Zeus and Odin said, “Who are you?”
Now Atlas, the one who brought Pete there, said, “This is Pete.”
Then Atlas, the one who hadn’t been at the fireworks, said, “Pete, nice to meet you,” in a loud voice, thundering. He took a ten thousand-mile step, up to Pete. He said, “Climb on my shoulders.”
He bent way, way, way, way, way, way down. Pete climbed on his shoulders, then he went way, way, way, way, way, way up.
Pete said, “I’m a little hungry. Do you think I’m okay to have some ambrosia and nectar?” The gods looked among themselves. They said, “You may have one wish. You may have the wish to eat ambrosia and nectar once, or you may turn into a god and eat them whenever you like.” Now this was a very easy choice.
Pete said, “I choose to become a god!”
And he did. He was immortal. Now he was the god of the oceans, because Poseidon was very sick and was in an endless sleep. He was not dead, he was just in an endless sleep. He could not be awakened.
So Pete became the god of the oceans, and when Poseidon came back, he would probably become the god of archery so Apollo would just have time to poet.
There is going to be an adventure that he can take ten people along with him. There are some demigods there as well. He walks up to one of them – this guy has a pen and a wristwatch.
He says, “Hi, my name is Pete.” The guy says, “I am Percy Jackson, the son of Poseidon.”
There are a few old satyrs there and a young one, teenage, looking about to go off to college, about to finish high school, and he’s a satyr. There was a girl to his left, as well. She had a bronze knife on her belt. She said, “Hello, my name is Annabeth, and this is Grover Underwood. We are demigods, but Grover isn’t exactly. The gods put monsters under spells, so they are going to be nice for another thousand years, and then they will become mean again.”
Now Tar spoke up. He said, “Hello, my name is Tar. You may notice I have only one hand. That is because Fenris the wolf, over there, bit it off when he was mean.”
Odin and Zeus said, “To prove you are really immortal, you must go on a quest. You may choose ten companions, and they can be any god of your choice, as well as those Titans back there.” There were seven Titans: a Titan of the sky, a Titan of the water, a Titan of the land, a Titan of the South, a Titan of the West, a Titan of the North, and a Titan of the East.”
Pete said, “I will take all those seven Titans.” The Titans walked forward. They were as big as Atlas, the double-giant.
“You can choose three more,” said Zeus.
Pete looked around. “I will choose Percy, Annabeth and Grover.” They all walked up.
They left Mount Olympus.
But they forgot! What was their quest? They turned around and went back to Mount Olympus. They said, “What is our quest?”
Zeus said, “Find the golden apples of the Hesparides.”
Odin said that they would have to find Loki and destroy him, make sure he was destroyed for a billion years.
So the friends set off. On their way, their first danger was meeting a gigant-o wolf. They also encountered a bear and a lion with it. And even if they killed them, there was quicksand ahead, a bottomless stretch of quicksand. They would need a rope, and they didn’t have a rope.
Now, Pete had a pen, and it turned into a shield. He also had a tape recorder that turned into a bronze sword, a little Greek fire, and a potion from the Norse that would heal anybody with just a little drop. They said it was useless and they wouldn’t get hurt. They had even tried a little on Poseidon for his sleepiness, but it didn’t work.
They went along to fight the wolf, the bear and the lion. With the Titans, they absolutely won! Pete wound up with a scratch on his left arm. Good thing he was a righty. Bad news? It was where all three animals scraped, and they didn’t just scrape, but they bit there with their teeth. His arm was sprained badly and it was bleeding badly. They hooked it up on a cloth they had brought with them.
They went along. Pete had the pen transformed into a shield and was holding it so his arm would be protected there.
They came to the quicksand. They thought, “How could we get across when we don’t have a rope?”
There were travelers on the other side, but they didn’t see the Titans, they only saw the kids. Now Pete looked like a kid holding a pen and a tape recorder with his arm in cloth and blood coming out of it. The travelers thought, “Hey! We’ve gotta help those kids!”
The Titans thought, “We can fly! We can go across and get the rope and give it to the kids!” So that’s what they did. They flew across, got the rope and brought it over to the kids. The kids latched it on tight and got across the quicksand.
Grover gnaws on the rope because Loki’s after them, and he’s the one who set the bear, the lion and the wolf to kill them – or to scare the Titans because it’s real hard to kill a god and a couple of demigods.
Loki couldn’t fly. He jumped off a cliff. He falled like a rock. He was lost at sea, for there was an opening in the quicksand where there was a bottomless ocean of sea.
Now remember, Pete is a god. But he’s sort of not a god yet. If he can’t complete his quest, he’ll be a demigod.
The friends walk until they come across a dragon. Now, you remember Atlas, who is a giant’s giant? Well, this is a giant’s giant dragon! This is a huge dragon, probably as huge as a hotel’s tower.
They’ll have to fight! They had set up camp near there, and all the Titans had decided to take a nap, so the Titans are all sleeping. It’s four kids, four demigods, against a huge dragon.
They all drew their swords and shields and weapons and attacked the dragon. Grover had a bone for a club, and he saw a rhino’s horn and a vine. He grabbed both, used the vine to tie on the rhino’s horn to his bone, and now he had a spear.
There was a cyclops with the dragon, but this is a nice cyclops – the brother of Percy, it was Tyson! “PERCY!” he yelled, and gave Percy a bone-crushing hug.
Tyson took a tin can from Grover, and in a second he had crafted it into a shield for Grover.
Tyson grabbed his huge hammer for his metalwork, and crafted a small shield from another tin can from Grover, and decided to help them.
They all charged!
Finally, they defeated the dragon. Tyson said, “Me go on your journey with you?”
“Sure!” said Pete.
They go to the temple of Loki and they find him there, guarding the golden apples. They draw their weapons and fight Loki, with the Titans. They fight, and they fight, and they fight! But neither side wins.
Finally, the Titans defeat Loki for a billion years, and he will be in Tartarus for the gods of Greece to deal with. The kids got the golden apples and the Titans flew them back to Mount Olympus.
The gods said, “Very well.” Since Percy, Annabeth, Grover and Tyson went with them, they would all be gods too!
“Congratulations, Pete! You’re the god of archery!”
“Congratulations, Percy! You’re the god of the sea!”
Annabeth was the god of daggers, and she made so many with her husband, Tyson, that they became so popular, that daggers were used more than swords!
They all lived happily ever after. The end.
—
Here I thought JediBoy would turn this into a seasonal tale about the fireworks and other fun things we did and saw this weekend! Nope, he turned it into a long tale about some of his favorite characters from Greek and Norse mythology as well as his beloved Percy Jackson books! If you’ve read the books, there are some particularly fun lines in JediBoy’s story… I’m fond of “so Apollo would just have time to poet.” And I find it very telling that Pete had an easy time deciding to become a god!
Obviously I took dictation for this story too, and I’m not positive that I’ve spelled all the names correctly – I was typing as fast as I could as the story kept spilling forth from JediBoy’s eager mind.
