Zeus’s Nightmare

• Michael Alexander, Grade 6
• Short Story
• 2013

Long ago, when the Gods ruled the heavens, earth and underground, Zeus was the considered the most powerful of all Gods, holding power and dominance within his lightning bolts. Every day, people of the Earth held ceremonies for the Gods, offering sacrifices and prayers, however, as time progressed, Zeus was considered the most powerful God of Heaven and Earth. Sacrifices and prayers for Zeus increased with his arrogance.
Zeus was very pleased with the amount of sacrifices and prayers given to him and started boasting of his popularity to the other Gods, angering them. One day he would boast about the cow that was sacrificed to him or the million prayers being spoken in his ear on the next. Soon the other Gods were offered nothing but wheat and their names were only uttered from sentences. Zeus had been offered everything and he developed arrogance and grew possessive with his sacrifices, offering nothing to the others.
These angered Gods held a meeting to raise this problem to heaven. “We should get rid of Zeus” argued one. “No, we should bring havoc to all humans who worship him!” declared another. Finally Athena, the god of war stood up, “We need Zeus in order to maintain balance to heaven and earth, and all we need is to cut his arrogance from him.”
Suddenly, Hermes flew into the meeting holding a message from the king of the underworld, Hades. The underground had heard of Zeus’s new found arrogance and Hades, who had always wanted to pay back the burden placed on him by Zeus, had a plan which would change Zeus and the humans on earth. Each God agreed to aid Hades in attempt to stop Zeus’ spiteful nature.
In matter of minutes, Hades sent every one of his little devils and helpers up to earth and began to cause disasters on earth and people were begging Zeus to help. Zeus grabbed his lightning bolts and sent them zipping to earth. However, the helpers were sneaky and hard to catch. Zeus, angered by Hades’ devils sent bolt after bolt on to earth and after the third bolt had been struck on the same place, fire erupted from the ground.
Fires spread and disasters struck tenfold as Zeus, blinded by rage, sent more bolts. Humans started bad mouthing Zeus, spitting on his name and cursing his existence. Zeus finally stopped and glanced down upon his disastrous work. It was a nightmare. All the villages were burning and people were dying. The earth was screaming in pain.
Zeus begged the other Gods to help in this nightmare and he pleaded until they forgave his arrogance and boasting. Poseidon brought rain and small streams to calm the burning fires and Athena fought off Hades’ helpers. Soon the Earth was brought back to normal and was peaceful once again.
People stopped worshiping Zeus for a decade and shifted towards the other Gods who had calmed down Zeus’s fires. However, as arrogant as Zeus was before, the other Gods shared their offerings with Zeus. Although Zeus’ arrogance had disappeared, the other gods secretly asked Hades to continue sending his helpers onto earth to give Zeus the opportunity to gain his honor.
Zeus sends his lightning bolts to chase Hades’ helpers away, however, the memory of his fires was burned into his mind forever and he never sent a lightning bolt in the same place ever again in the fear of creating another nightmare and losing the trust of the earth. This is why, to this day, lightning never strikes in the same place twice.