Activities Day - Oh What a Day!

Nothing much worth noting has happened between my arrival and today.  I did notice that I accidentally (?) bump into Gabriella, Jahiera, and Ren more than the other Scions.  Excepting our latest arrival, Dave (more on him shortly).  Dave is another Scion with which I feel some sort of connection.  I wish I understood more about Fate.  More importantly though, is I am not a lot more confused about Titanspawn.  This thing is giving me a big headache, and the first chance I get I simply must talk with Dr. Lord about this.

Dave Jones.  Above average height and musculature, and like me, he's obviously going to be leading the way when it comes to knocking the heads of Titans and their spawn.  I also had some first hand experience that he has some skills in increasing the overall combat effectiveness of our Band.  I've got a feeling Dave and I are going to be good friends.  Outside of fighting, Dave seems to have one other love - alcohol, especially beer.  He's planning on setting up his own microbrewery in our dorm too.  This definitely has some possibilities.  I'm not one to go get drunk for no reason, but my stepdad normally let me have a beer when he had one at home, and the family often allowed all of us to have some wine at dinner, so I think it will be very convenient to have a ready supply of beer.  It's a pity Dave thinks wine is a girly drink.  Actually, one of the strangest things was when I was talking with him and coming up with an idea that was meant as an alcoholic drink for the big kitty cats in our group.  I suggested Kumis, it's an alcoholic drink made from fermented mare's milk, sometimes mixed with blood, and was the drink of choice of Attila the Huns' mongol hordes.  Despite that, the fact it is low in alcohol content made Dave say it was a girly drink.  I like Dave, but I am sure I'll never understand him.  I'm also not sure if I'd want him as a roommate.  Though that really depends on if he can get his microbrewery set up in his room or if it takes up too much space and needs to go somewhere else on our floor.  I plan on studying and sleeping, even if I may not need a lot of both, and I don't want to be in a room that's a 24 hour bar.  One of the other interesting things about Dave is that he's a biker, which is cool, I'd love to have a motorcycle too.  Dave's also got something like a gang of biker friends of his that are attending college with us (though they aren't on our special dorm floor).  Hopefully Dave and his gang will let me hang out with them and work on their bikes.  I've worked on cars and all kinds of miscellaneous mechanical devices, but bikes are new to me.  Still, I have skills, and maybe I could teach them a trick or two just as they can hopefully teach me a trick or two.  This would be a lot of fun!  But maybe even more fun, since mortals seem to be a lot less able in combat that Scions, I am thinking I could do some modifications to their bikes.  Just imagine, rocket launchers, machine guns, and lasers!  Or maybe cool tricks like Q always has for vehicles that James Bond used.  This would be just awesome.  I sure hope Dave and his friends are interested as this would be a ton of fun!

Again Fate seemed to be driving things, as when we went to go see what clubs and stuff were here at Harmon, the five of us that I think all feel some sort of connection went out together.  We drifted apart as we went along, but got back together too.  And I don't ever remember seeing any of the other six Scions at any of the same places we were.

One of the first things I noticed was Gabriella running away from us, back towards our dorm.  This had me worried for at first, but it turns out she had rushed off to get some of her writing samples she needed to get on the school newspaper.

Most of us drifted over towards a place where there were a bunch of mats set up for a variety of sports that use them.  Wrestling was center stage at the time and Dave and I both indicated we were interested.  Gabriella started having some sort of vision or something while we were there.  Like last time, she looks like she got a little sick, but then recovered.  She warned us about not fighting some short guy.  I was definitely planning on heeding that advice, unless I thought doing so might put someone's life at risk.  But at this time, the guy running the wrestling demo asked me to wrestle their star wrestler.  Since this guy was tall, I had no objections.  He was a pretty good wrestler, but I still managed to win.

While a couple of the group wandered off to the archery group during my match, I was quite pleased to find Gabriella and Dave still around.  It makes me feel like I have friends who will watch my back, and my impression of both of them went up a notch.

While wrestling, I missed what went on with Jahiera and Ren at the archery club, but I heard about it later.  Part of it puzzles me and I am not sure if I should be annoyed or not.  Apparently one of the better archers here is a pretty-boy that looks something like that movie star Orlando Bloom, and he apparently has a a bunch of female fans.  The thing that puzzles/bothers me though is that when Jahiera and Ren walked up to this dude, he calls out a greeting to the "ladies."  Now almost all the people gathered around there were women, and I know I think Ren looks a bit on the effeminate side.  Side thought, maybe I should talk to Gabriella about Ren, Gabriella seems to have a great sense of style and maybe could help Ren to find a style that's less unisex but still him.  Back on track, anyway it could have been an accident or a simple oversight.  On the other hand, maybe this Bloom look alike was deliberately trying to put down Ren.  If that's the case, maybe I will have to have a talk with our comedian Cory.  I am sure Cory could come up with something suitable to cut down this guy a little.  But of course I still have to figure out if it was an honest mistake or if the dude is a jerk that needs a lesson.  I'll keep an eye on him, but with my poor people skills, maybe I better ask Gabriella if she can help on this.  I really don't like the idea of some snob picking on Ren.  I'll hope it's just an accident though.

Oh, and Jahiera apparently is very impressive with the bow as she thunked several arrows into the center of the target in rapid succession.

Another point of interest is that Ren met a girl who is also a computer geek while watching the archery.  My hunch is this is Fate at work again, but Ren seems so shy I don't know if he'll follow up with her about her informal computer club.  Maybe I can prod him some way.  Too bad I have all the subtlety of a bull in a china shop.  Looks like Gabriella might be able to help out here, but I don't want to bother her all the time.  She's really cool and I don't want her to think of me as a pest.  Maybe Dr. Lord can help me out on this one.  Life is complicated sometimes.

But over at the mats, things rapidly went strange.  A short guy - really, really short guy - came up to us.  He wasn't just short though, he was a dwarf, like in mythology or fantasy novels.  Apparently this was Coach Angus MacLaggin and he seemed to want to wrestle Dave and/or me.  After what Gabriella had said, I had no interest in such a contest.  But Dave seemed to want to mix it up.  Dave didn't know about Gabriella's oracular powers, and I didn't think it was a good time to explain (though I did explain once we were back in our dorm and others couldn't overhear).  Gabriella kept trying to tell him not to, and I told Dave to listen to Gabriella.  I guess that sunk in a bit, and with some effort, Dave refused the challenge.  I was glad as apparently it wasn't going to be a fair fight on the part of the dwarf (based on what Gabriella somehow just "knew").  Still, if Dave had accepted and looked like he was getting seriously hurt, I was quite prepared to jump in and see if two to one odds might even out with whatever magic the dwarf had on his side.

Apparently the MacLaggin was just testing us, he wanted our help and he needed to make sure of us first.  But at that moment, everone's least favorite Scion, Barry, stumbled onto the scene.  He looked pretty badly hurt, and mentioned something about bears before collapsing into unconsciousness.  MacLaggin then said the short version of the help he wanted was that Nemean bears were attacking his colony of dwarfs.  Then he suggested we go handle whatever was chasing Barry while he took care of Barry.

All of us were together at that point, and we were all ready to rumble.  I did a quick transformation to have my Relic Cestus take on its form for lethal damage.  I hoped mortals wouldn't notice as it wouldn't be a big, obvious thing.  But then Dave magically summoned his motorcycle.  A cool trick, but it shocked me a lot as I didn't think we were supposed to show off like that in front of mortals that didn't know about us.  The next part is a bit blurry in my memory.  We went off in the direction that Barry came from, the jaguar Tepini appeared, the cat Miyet changed into the lioness Miyet, Ren's bird appeared (well, that one wouldn't shock anyone), I had my armor form around me, Dave's biker gang showed up all of a sudden, and my Bandmates seemed to have various weapons appearing out of nowhere.  Hopefully this stuff took place far enough away from the school that mortals didn't notice, but I am just not sure.

Dave offered a ride to anyone, and I accepted.  Normally I would have insisted one of our ladies be allowed the convenience, but in this case I thought it best that Dave and I met the danger first as I think we were the best prepared for physical violence.  But the forest wasn't really the best place to get speed out of a motorcycle and all of the Band ended up reaching the Nemean bear at roughly the same time.

I made an extra effort and used one of my knacks to make sure I went first in the combat.  I figured the best thing to do would be to hit it hard and see if just pounding away would work or not.  I delivered a wicked blow, it probably would have knocked out a horse.  Unfortunately it only seemed to surprise the beastie for a moment, and I knew this was not going to be an easy battle.  I figured my next move would be to immobilize it, but while debating which way I should do that, Dave jumped in and grappled the monster.  Meanwhile, Gabriella had maneuvered herself into a nearby tree and planned to shoot from there, though since bears climb pretty well, I am not sure how much good that would have done her if the bear had gone after her.  At the same time, Jahiera had darted behind a nearby bush to keep out of the bear's sight.

Dave's clinching of the bear did some damage, but the big cats were having no luck - about the same as me.  I did so poorly that I fear any of my martial arts instructors would have hung their head in shame if they had seen me.  The rest of our Band was taking their time attacking, waiting for the perfect moment to hit a weak spot on the bear.  The only weakness I recalled was the Nemean's skin was susceptible to its claws/fangs - and I was too busy fighting to see how I could use that to my advantage.

Feisty little Ren aimed a blow at an eye, that while not causing major trauma, seemed to blind the beast in that eye.  That seemed like it should make battling the beastie easier.  The bear writhed in pain at this and tried to escape from Dave's clinch, but somehow Dave kept control over the monster.  Then Jahiera showed off her archery skill and nailed the critter in its open mouth, wounding it severely.  Next Gabriella followed Ren's example and shot out the bear's other eye.  I didn't think it was going to last much longer with the awesome teamwork the Band was displaying.

I was next to attack, and finally I dealt a blow worthy of my teachers.  I pounded the bear's skull so hard I swear I heard it's skull crack.  It was the last straw for the beast, and it collapsed at our feet.  It was a tough battle, but I have to say I was really proud of the Band, everyone pulled together and helped to take it down.  As my stepdad might say, my Bandmates are outstanding!

Dave decided he needed a drink and pulled out his magic everfull glass.  Which was when we were all surprised by a slow clapping coming out of nowhere.  I figured it was MacLaggin checking up on us, but it turned out to be Dr. Lord.  How did he know where we were?  The clapping implied he was there long enough to see at least part of the fight, how did he know he should be with us then?  I know magic can do stuff like that, but I am going to buy a bug detector, or parts to make one, and sweep myself and my fellow Bandmates.  I dislike the idea of being spied upon.  I know he's supposed to look out for us, but now I wonder exactly how closely he does that.

Since there are supposed to be more bears around, I mentioned to Gabriella about finding out their location and numbers.  By that I had meant to ask if she could get anything with her oracular powers, but she talked about sending her kitty cat as a scout.  My people skills are rather embarrassing at times, my attempt at subtlety was completely misunderstood by the most people savvy of our Band members.  I was a bit too flustered at the moment to explain it to her at that time, so I decided to talk to her about it later.

Meanwhile, Dave did some sort of Norse blessing or something on his glass and passed it around.  Fighting works up a sweat, so I quickly knocked back the contents of the glass...which was still full after I thought I should have drained it.  Most of the rest of the Band had a drink too, except for Gabriella.  Gabriella is a party girl and from things she's said I know she likes to drink, so it was kind of surprising to me that she refused.  But then after she refused, Dave tried to push her into at least drinking a little.  I didn't like that because the way I was raised, when a girl says no then she means no.  This seems to have caused some tension between Gabriella and Dave, I hope it doesn't snowball.  It also made me a bit suspicious of the drink I took out of Dave's glass.  But as I write this entry it's several hours later and I don't really feel any bad effects from it, so I don't know what to think.

But then I get real confused.  Or at least lost.  Ren is obviously an animal lover, which I think is a good thing as I like animals too.  But Ren starts going on like these Nemean bears might be good guys, and the victims of the dwarfs.  I'm afraid I lost it here, I had a quick flashback of Alicia's broken body at the party and started yelling at Ren telling him how I know Titanspawn and that they are all evil, etc.  But I guess my naivete of the supernatural had me sticking my foot in my mouth as apparently not all Titanspawn are evil.  Coach MacLaggin, who had arrived in the meantime, even said that dwarfs were Titanspawn.  I mean I know from the stories that dwarfs tend to be neutral, though some are kind of good while others are more evil.  But this was the first I heard that dwarfs were Titanspawn.  And Dr. Lord was there when MacLaggin arrived and didn't give any sign that dwarfs were evil.  I really don't know what to think about this anymore.  My dad only told me a little about the Titans and their spawn, and this was the first time I had ever heard that Titanspawn might not be evil.  I guess it makes sense though, as Zeus and others are technically Titanspawn.  But now I feel like I need a score card or something to know who's on which side of the war.  I'm making it my number one priority tomorrow to talk to Dr. Lord and see if he can give me a list or refer me to a book or something to give me a better idea of what's what in this war.

Getting back to the aftermath of the battle, Gabriella stepped in front of me and calmed me down.  I don't think I would have gone berserk on Ren like at that party, but Gabriella's presence certainly helped me calm down fast.  They say that "music hath charms to soothe the savage breast," but I say music has nothing on Gabriella.  That Gabriella is one special woman.  I apologized to Ren, but after I get a better explanation of Titanspawn and the war from Dr. Lord, I think I should make a better apology to Ren.  I'm just so confused now.

One more strange thing that happened is Dr. Lord hurried off shortly after MacLaggin arrived.  It looks like they don't get along, but I am pretty sure Dr. Lord could have squashed MacLaggin, so I am puzzled why he left so fast.

MacLaggin asked me about my divine parent, and when I told him I was the son of Hephaestus, he said the two of us needed to talk.  I don't know if it was because of my ignorance about Titanspawn, if Hephaestus has some special significance to MacLaggin, or maybe he realized that I probably have something in common with dwarfs since we like - and are good at - making things.  Or maybe its something else.  I have enough on my mind right now that I can't be bothered to worry about this this for the time being.

MacLaggin also offered to make some armor and/or weapons out of the Nemean bear for our band.  Considering what I recall about the Nemean lion, this should help out our group.  I don't see much that I would benefit from this stuff, but maybe after the others get something, if there is a left over claw or fang big enoough to make into a knife that would be a fine souvenir.  I think more important though is making armor for my Bandmates, looks like most of them have no armor at all!  If Dave's biker leathers don't have some magic in them, I'll vote he should be the first one equipped with Nemean bear armor as I expect he and I will be in the forefront of most battles.  But from what was said, there are other bears, so maybe the rest of the Band might end up with Nemean bear armor too.  Though I wonder if Gabriella is too fashion conscious to wear that sort of thing.  In the meantime, I'll add talking to my bandmates and seeing about getting them all at least bulletproof vests.  Those are light and affordable, and certainly better than the nothing they're running around in.  Also, as there is at least one place I know of that does custom work on this, we probably can special order something that Gabriella wouldn't object to - though if she's interested in that, it's a good thing she has a trust fund.

That's all I can think of for now, but I'm so confused I have no idea if I left out anything important.  I simply MUST talk to Dr. Lord tomorrow before my head explodes.

First Day Thoughts and Impressions

Fate.  Physics does tell us that simultaneity is just an illusion as it depends upon one's frame of reference.  But for practical purposes four of us Scions did arrive simultaneously at the same place at Harmon University just as our advisor came out to greet us.  As we all used different means of transportation, the odds of something like this must be astronomical - worse than getting a royal fizzbin.  It has to be what my real dad must have meant when he talked about Fate.  Just think if we could channel that, winning the lottery would be a breeze, breaking a casino could be done on a whim, and on the quantum mechanical level you could probably use such things to teleport large objects.  I must take time to research this effect more in the future.

Dr. Alan Lord.  He's our advisor, a demigod Scion - but very little like the stories of the well known Heracles.  For some unknown reason I get the impression that appearances are deceiving when I look at him.  Like we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg.  He also seems conflicted about us.  He seems resentful at having to teach us anything, and even more resentful that he has no control over it or the scheduling.  At the same time, he seems like a man that tries to be fair.  Plus even though it's not a task he'd have chosen to give himself I get the impression he will do his best to teach us because anything he does, he aims to do well.  He's also got a huge jaguar which, interestingly enough, apparently is invisible to mortals.  I wondered how that works, and later Dr. Lord explained that his kitty cat was in a ghost form and that allowed us Scions to see but not mortals.  Being invisible, if only to mortals, is a trick I'd like to learn...but the idea of a ghost form makes me wonder how practical that would be.  Still, could come in very handy as I think were supposed to keep the mortals in the dark about us and what's really going on.

Gabriella Velas.  She's one of the four of us that arrived together.  Strange, I seem to feel a connection between the four of us that I don't feel with the other Scions I met later that day.  Anyway, she's hot.  Like supermodel hot.  Or possibly it would be more accurate to say that Gabriella has the kind of beauty that most top models only wish they had.  Even better, she seems pretty nice - not like some of the stuck up, brainless girls that used to chase me in high school.  But what seems the most amazing to me is that she has some sort of divine power like the Oracle at Delphi (but without breathing in any strange fumes, speaking in tongues, or the like).  With a gift like that, I will definitely be listening to whatever she has to say.  Hmm, I wonder if she can use that talent to see what the questions are on upcoming tests?  And how does that prophetic ability work?  Sight, sound, both, more?  A single "vision" that always comes true?  Or maybe possible futures?  If she saw possible futures that might be support for M-theory.  I wonder if she'd be willing to talk to me about this, or if it's too personal a topic.  She seems pretty understanding, so I think I'll just try to ask her if we're ever alone some time.  And mustn't forget she's got a cute pet jaguar, Tepini.  I wonder if Tepini would like to wrestle with me?  It's said that many martial arts techniques were taken from watching animals.  So maybe I could learn to fight better by watching or rough housing with her big kitty.

Jahiera Saladin.  Another of the four of us that arrived together.  She's tiny, more than two feet shorter than me, about 5' tall and looks like she'd weigh about 100 lb. soaking wet.  She's quite pretty too.  But perhaps unfortunately for her, I bet a lot of guys won't even notice her if she's hanging out with Gabriella.  If I understood her correctly, this is Jahiera's first time going to school.  She had some sort of home schooling, but she seems smart as a whip.  Is a whip actually smart?  Whatever.  I know my IQ is in the range that the psychologists say make it difficult to accurately measure, but Jahiera seems like she might be even smarter than me.  That's certainly impressive.  She's Egyptian, but she also speaks Italian like I do, a pity she doesn't know Greek.  But she speaks Hebrew like Kobi and his family, so maybe she can help me keep in practice.  Jahi also has a pet cat named Miyet.  Or maybe she has a lioness named Miyet.  They seem to be the same creature...or something like that.  If this is some sort of shape change, I wonder which form is the natural/real one?  If Tepini wouldn't want to rough house with me, maybe Miyet would.  Or maybe the three of us could work out together.  That sure would be cool!

Ren Panganiban.  The last to be mentioned of the four of us that arrived together.  (Ladies first, sorry Ren.)  Ren is kind of feminine looking and the shortest of us guy Scions, about five and a half feet tall.  But he's another really smart one.  He and Jaheira make me think of that old expression, "the smaller, the smarter."  He seems nice, but kind of shy.  He's a computer geek, so I bet he'll be cool to hang out with.  Maybe later on when we know more stuff, I can build a miniature super computer and he could program some AI into it - that would be freaking awesome!  Apparently he's got a cousin that's a Scion too, but he's somewhere out on the left coast.  Breaking the pattern of large cats, but not of having animal companions, Ren has a pet bird.  I figure it's something special, but he hasn't talked about it much yet and I haven't asked either...though he did caution us about bleeding near it.  Seems like I am the odd man out as of us new arrivals I was the only one without a pet.  Though how well a bird will survive with all these large kitty cats might be problematic.  Hmmm, and maybe with a little more know how I can build something for his bird.  Maybe some laser, or better yet a taser, it can shoot to discourage the cats.  I wonder if Ren would have a problem with that.  I wonder if the bird would object.  Well it's moot for now, but it's something to keep in mind for the future.  But if I make something for his bird, maybe I should make something for the kitties.  Cybernetic arms so they could open doors or use guns might be useful.  I wonder if anyone will be interested in this.  I mean we could have stuff better than "sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their frickin' heads" like Dr. Evil wanted!

Sonia Wu.  Another short girl, but taller than Jahiera.  Kind of average looking, but some nice musculature.  The muscles are no doubt earned from her martial arts workouts.  She's apparently really into martial arts, though more the artsy stuff than the practical stuff.  Still, Jet Li trained a lot that way and he's pretty amazing with or without wires.  Plus I have a hunch that some of the old legends that made this artsy, sorta fake, wuxia stuff were probably based on Scions who were martial artists.  So those artsy skills may be some pretty potent combat skills - at least for us Scions.  Hopefully she'll be interested in training together.  I had several good partners and teachers back in Dale City, but so far she's the only one here I have seen that shares this sort of interest with me.  Plus I hear she's got a good DVD collection of her wuxia stuff, so maybe she'd like to watch some of those movies together or at least let me borrow them so I can watch them.  She also has an animal, but it apparently it's not a pet but somehow her half-brother.  It's a monkey, which makes sense because of her father is Sun Wukong - though I doubt the movie The Forbidden Kingdom portrayed him accurately.  But I wonder if half-brother is literal in this case, or more in keeping with the brother/sister way of speaking that I've seen in chinese martial arts flicks.  I wonder if it would be rude to ask her about that.  But I do need to talk to her about her half-brother, I need to make sure he won't wander into my room when I'm not around and play with my shotgun.  Hopefully I'll get a chance to talk to her about this tomorrow.

Sadie Parr.  The last of our female Scions - and the least.  The first three all seem cool, but this girl is a female dog (OOC note to readers, I do hope you all know the proper name for a female dog).  She's about average height for a girl, and I would have said she was - unbelievable as it may seem - hotter than Gabriella.  Then Sadie opened her mouth.  No amount of outer beauty can possibly hide that inner ugliness.  I mean if attitude was ichor, she'd be a goddess - and not just any goddess but like the queen of all the pantheons.  As it is, I feel sorry for poor Jahiera who got stuck with Sadie as a roommate.  Sadie has money too, so that probably only makes her attitude worse.  I will definitely avoid her.  Though I do wonder how someone about two feet shorter than me can so effortlessly look down her nose at me.  But I sure as hell don't wonder enough about that to spend any more time with her than is absolutely necessary.

Lionel Applegate.  My roommate, unfortunately.  Tall, thin, and ugly.  I mean ugly like someone beat him with with the ugly stick - repeatedly.  This wouldn't be a problem, if it wasn't for the fact I am also getting bad vibes off of him.  Maybe it's just my imagination, but I keep thinking "I've got a bad feeling about this" whenever I see him.  He doesn't want me messing with his stuff, which I can respect, mostly.  But he's already got padlocks on a bunch of his stuff.  Besides, I looked up his divine dad on the internet earlier this evening, and Lionel seems to share some interests.  The one that worries me most is that he looks the type that will get into biological warfare.  Which means I sure as hell won't be touching his stuff, not unless I have a hazmat suit or something.  Plus he's got a weird stone statue.  Every time I went out to do something and then came back, it was in a different position than when I left.  And this even happened when Lionel wasn't in the room!  Sometimes I think its eyes are following me.  Again, I don't know how much is my imagination, but Lionel and his statue give me the creeps.  If I get a chance before school starts, I will see if I can find some place to buy some miniature cameras and motion detectors.  Or buy the parts needed to make 'em, whatever.  Then I can set them up and maybe find out how that statue is moving.  I think I normally am pretty open minded, but I'm already thinking about trying to change roommates.  Ren would be my first choice so far, if it was just my pick, but Hank (next entry) seems pretty compatible to me too.  Oh, and Lionel doesn't seem to wash his hair.  I wonder how he'd take it if I bought a large bottle of shampoo and just left it on his bed when he wasn't around.

Hank Owens.  Average height, maybe a little taller, but muscular.  I don't know much about him, but he's ROTC and is thinking about the Marines.  Since my stepdad is a Marine, I know a lot about them and respect them too.  So I figure Hank's probably an OK guy.  I do kind of wonder how he would handle a full time career as a Marine with whatever sort of duties we Scions are supposed to be handling in the war against the Titans.  I mean even an average job would allow a lot more flexibility in scheduling that being in the military.  Hopefully I'll get a chance to hang out with him more and get to know him better.  It's strange though, despite liking Sonia and Hank from the very first, I don't seem drawn to them the same way as I do to Gabriella, Jahiera, and Ren.  I guess this is all part of the way Fate hits us Scions, but I sure wish I understood it better.  Also, perhaps strangely, the first six to arrive here don't seem to have the same connection with any of the others like the four of us that arrived together.  I wonder if that means anything.

Cory Jackson.  He's ... interesting ... sort of ... but I'm glad I'm not his roommate.  His dad is Coyote and he wants some sort of career in comedy.  He'll probably be great at parties, but I'm really glad I am not his roommate and hence a likely target for trying out his practical jokes.  He's got an animal, a coyote of course, but like Sonia he says it's his half-brother.  Despite my curiosity, I will not ask.  I figure the less he notices me, the less frequently I'll be the victim of some untimely practical joke.  Not that I figure we won't all be targeted as time goes on, but why give him extra reasons to choose me?

Barry Winston.  The last male Scion here, and like Sadie, probably the least.  This idiot redneck is some sort of bigoted Christian that mistook his divine father (who is some sort of Persian god) as a Christian angel.  He thinks were all a bunch of pagan idiots who are acting stupid because we believe what our divine parents told us.  I really wanted to educate him.  Specifically I was thinking of starting by teaching him first hand the meaning of the word "defenestration."  His brain is so dense a new thought probably takes years to surface.  As the saying goes, "With friends like these, who needs enemies?"  Dr. Lord did basically say we were allowed to handle him as roughly as necessary, with the proviso that we were not to kill him.  I guess the war against the Titans takes all kinds, or makes for strange bedfellows, or whatever.  Dr. Lord did try to set Barry straight, but I doubt much of it will stick.  Dr. Lord also teleported him out to somewhere in the woods for awhile, so at least he won't be bothering us while we get settled in.  Though maybe I am being too hard as Barry does have a dog.  I've noticed most dog owners have some redeeming qualities.  Too bad none of us realized the dog was there until after Dr. Lord left, because it would be a shame to let him starve or poop in the room while Barry's away.  I guess I'll take care of the cute doggie until Barry comes back.  But I'll check around with the others to see if anyone else is willing to or wants to share the chores.

Besides the Scions I met today, our dorm itself is worth mentioning.  All of us Scions have a floor to ourselves, the 11th floor, but the building we're in only has 10 floors.  It's apparently some sort of special place made by some god or gods.  Dr. Lord didn't really explain much.  But no sense in asking questions now because I think I just know too little to understand something like this.  But if it's anything like the TARDIS, I will definitely make the effort to learn how to create something like this.  The potential uses are mind boggling.  Another unique thing about our dorm is that we access our floor via an elevator that is apparently invisible to mortals but not us Scions.  I doubt it's a ghost form, like Dr. Lord's kitty cat used, so once I better understand science and the supernatural I will have to look into that as well.

That's all I can think of for my first day here.  I wonder what tomorrow will bring.

Start Reading Here

Welcome to this gaming blog.  For those of you that randomly wound up here while crawling the web, this is a blog about a fictional character I invented for a role playing game called Scion that is published by White Wolf.  They have some pretty cool ideas about games, and they're easy to find on the net.  Scion is a game based in part on mythology, or perhaps better to say several mythologies.  They've got like a dozen or so historical mythologies that they have tweaked (or sometimes majorly altered) to fit into this game universe.  Which means though Scion may make mythology fun, it is definitely NOT faithful to existing mythologies.  Typically it's a contemporary fantasy (meaning a fantasy set in a world similar to our real world at this point in time), where the fantastic elements are drawn as much as possible from mythology.  It can be played other ways, after all it's just a game.

For those of you who came here knowing about Scion, then I really have nothing special you need to hear.  Unless of course the you are a player of one of my fellow Band members.  For my fellow Band members, you should know that in the game that this the blog data is an encrypted file...and it's written in Greek (though Google Translate should get you by that hurdle).  As the computer is also password protected (with a different password), your character probably can't read the blog - unless your character is Ren or is being assisted by Ren.  A final word of warning, Alex's thought processes are a strange mixture of normal and bizarre, so reading this may have an impact on how you role play with my odd but mostly likable Alex.

Before getting to his blogs, a bit about Alexander Efasteyo...

Alex is the son of Hephaestus and a mortal woman (originally from Greece, but living in the US).  He grew up in a loving family.  He has two half-sisters, but he never even thinks of the "half" - they're just his baby sisters whom he loves.  He had a fairly normal, happy life growing up.  However, he was always large for his age - finally stopping growing when he hit 7'3" (and he's also a light 295 pounds at the start of the game, but if Griff allows, I'd like him to gain 5 lb. each time he picks up a new dot of Strength and/or Epic Strength).  He's also something of a genius, though that's mostly channeled into inventing things or fixing things.  His deep thinking is usually not very fast thinking, and that combined with his absent mindedness tend to mask his intelligence.  While it was never a secret that his stepdad was not his dad, he had never met his biological father and had been told that his father was a visiting professor who seemingly vanished off the face of the earth a week or two after Alex was conceived.

Despite a more or less normal life at first, things went very strange for him not long after his 17th birthday.  Alex was at a Halloween costume party/dance with his girl friend, and after excusing himself to use the restroom, he got a very strange visit by a guy that claimed to be his father.  The strange parts being the two golden robots that accompanied the man, and the fact the man said that the Greek gods (and other pantheons) are real and that they are fighting an ongoing battle against Titans.  The attack by several cyclopes that occurred shortly after hearing this tended to help convince Alex of the reality of the situation.  Unfortunately several students were killed or seriously injured during this attack, and Alex's girl friend was among the first to be killed.  The sight of her broken body caused Alex to go berserk and charge the one eyed monstrosities.  Eventually all the cyclopes were killed.  But the price was heavy and left Alex with a burning hate for Titans and their spawn.

Time passed, but the tragedy from that party left the whole student body mostly depressed that year.  Summer finally helped restore Alex to a more normal mood, and he was looking forward to going to the special university that Hephaestus had selected for him.  With lots of hugs, kisses, and more than a few tears, he finally said his good byes and drove out to his new school.

After getting a brief introduction to other special students (all Scions, though all from different pantheons), Alex started moving his stuff into his half of a dorm room.  A general description follows...

Alex's shelves contain his text books and several supplemental books for classes he's currently taking - mostly appropriate books from the Schaum's Outline Series.  Plus he has a few other personal books, notably: The Art of War by Sun Tzu, A Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi, the 91st editition of the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, and Bulfinch's Mythology.  The rest of the shelves have various mechanical or electrical parts, loosely grouped together based on his latest tinkering.  He has some no name computer system (tower configuration, and actually something he put together himself after buying the components separately) under his desk - though of course the monitor, keyboard, etc. rest on top of the desk.  (For those who care, his computer is password protected.)  Some of his clothes are hung in the closet, but most are in the chest of drawers.  Also in the top drawer of his chest of drawers is "hidden" his shotgun, extra ammo, and gun cleaning kit.  In this case hidden merely means it is under some clean rags made from old clothes making the shotgun not so terribly obvious.  (If small children should ever come visit the floor, Alex will permanently move the shotgun to the top shelf of the closet, making such a shelf if one does not already exist.  The shotgun is also kept loaded, so hopefully Sonia's half brother doesn't like playing with guns.)  Alex has a couple of small tool boxes, actually small tackle boxes, which he stores under his bed if he's not using them or carrying them around in his backpack.  Alex has a handful of posters.  They look something like this: Bruce Lee, Nikola Tesla, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, and MacGyver - though the last one has duct tape listed as also being needed.  On top of his chest of drawers, he has a picture of his mother, one of his stepfather, one each of his two (half) sisters, and a picture of himself with his best friend Kobi plus some others dressed in gis wearing newly earned black belts.  On his desk he has a picture of his entire family (including himself), a picture of his deceased girl friend Alicia (if anyone looks at the back of this picture there is written in black felt pen "I will NEVER forget"), and a picture of his two sisters together.  He also has a miniature refrigerator, and while it is not working at the moment, he does keep a chemistry set (one of the more elaborate kits made for kids) in the refrigerator when he's not playing around with it.  Perhaps the only other thing worth noting in his room is his "Girls of Harmon U" calendar.