Gods have been on this earth for ages. They look like any other person you may meet on the street in almost every manner. The biggest divide between them and mortals is their ability to regenerate from any injury, including death. The second difference is the powers of the gods. A majority of gods have abilities such as conjuring lightning or great storms or manipulating the ground and creating tremors that shake cities. No god is the same. Gods are born the same as any mortal, and can live a majority of their first mortal lifecycle without knowing they're a god, because most gods only realize they have these abilities after dying or being injured to a great degree, only to be healed completely in less than a week.
There exists a hierarchy of gods, at the top is the alder gods, which are composed of the God Of Fire, the God Of The Forge, the Goddess Of Storms, and the God Of War. These four are the oldest known gods and have played a hand in a majority of human history. The next tier down of gods are the major gods, which are those who existed in some pantheon and have or had a major following. Then there are the gods which have lived for more than two hundred years, any other god is labeled a minor god. Additionally, should a god not have any powers beyond immortality, they are dubbed a demigod, there can exist a major demigod or minor demigod should they gain enough power or live long enough.
The most influential god of the day is the God Of Fire, who has attempted to throw the world into chaos for ages without end, save for the periods in which the other elder gods have stopped him and held him captive.
The most current attempt by the God Of Fire was the assasination attempt of the United Nations during a global conference, despite his falure, he did cause knowledge of gods and their existence to become public knowledge and made a call for all gods wishing to no longer hide away from the danger which is mortals, and promised a change which would lead to a better world with only gods.
The God Of Fire's declaration prompted many gods to stir chaos in attempts to gain his favor, these chaotic outbursts across the world have caused the nations of the world to create a new organization for the protection of humanity: the Universal Protection and Defence Collaboration, which exists as a global branch of the military with little to no restrictions in its actions so long as they are against gods. The UPDC was originally very effective, but over time it became less so, prompting the creation of a universal draft. One of the people who'd been called by the draft was Samual Daniels, an American who was studying arcitecture in Wyoming when he was drafted.
This is his story.
My head is pounding, I think I'm on the floor of my dorm but I might be outside because of the puddle I'm lying in. Last night exists only as blurry flashes, I think I might have beat up someone, I hope they're not a god, they might show up looking for another fight and I don't think I can take on a god that isn't off guard.
Suddenly the lights turn on and now I can't see because of the blinding shift. I think someone is picking me up, must be a big person, they're lifting me up like I weigh nothing. I'm not a short guy by any means, I mean five foot ten is a decent height, I mean I'm a giant compared to Juan, but that's only because he stopped growing at four foot two. Also I've been living in the gym for the past three weeks since I got notified of my being drafted. Juan says I'm fucked up because of it and shouldn't be standing much less growing muscle because of how little sleep or any rest I've been getting, and the drinking probably doesn't help. No matter in worrying about that now, all I need to do is survive my four years then I can go back home and figure out how to put my life back together.
Over the past three weeks I've gone to the school gym at my college, skipped every class during the week, gone to shooting ranges and tried out every gun I could until I knew it better than the people who worked there, and slept a little bit in between. My mentality going into the armed forces is that if I'm good enough I can survive it and rebuild my life, it's a pipe dream because of the enemy. Gods are hard as hell to kill, much less keep dead. I've heard stuff about a collar being made that stops a god from doing weird stuff.
I'm thrown onto a bus, I think I've been wiped down a little because I feel less wet on my front, I think I smell like vomit though, it probably wasn't a puddle.
The bus is just like a school bus from elementary school, the seats are too small and I'm stuck kneeing the guy in front of me while being knee'd by the guy behind me.
My night is coming back to me more now, I think I beat up Brad, the guy dating my ex-girlfriend. She broke up with me after I started skipping classes because of the draft, she said I was destroying myself and she couldn't watch that. I kind of feel bad about Brad too, it's not his fualt she's dating him, and he's kinda good looking. Brad's a tall guys, six foot something, and big too, probably works out quite a bit. I think I spoke with him a few times, he was doing something, what was he doing? Maybe it'll come back to me.
The bus is full of guys from sixteen to what looks fourty, though they might be thirty five but look worse because they know they won't survive their four years. Each person looks depressed or hung over, save one woman in the back who's filling out some papers while the bus is moving along. She looks to be about twenty five to thirty, short brown hair and a suit. She looks out of place, like this is a job interview for her.
I grab hold of my seat and the back of the seat in front of me and shakily stand up before sitting back down because of a bump in the road. I get back up again and lurch towards the back of the bus before grabbing hold of another seat to stop my fall. I straighten up and sit down next to the woman, "What'r you filling out?" I slur out quietly.
"Are you drunk?" She loudly asks,
"No, jus' hung-over. Now, what'r you filling out?" I slur again.
"My dad said he got me a tallying position, so this is just completion papers to make sure I can get payed correctly." She says proudly.
"Damn, any chance your daddy can pull some strings for me?" I ask, she scrunches up her face in disgust.
"No, you're going to get what you deserve, I worked for this." She said, she kinda sounds like I just offended her somehow. I was just making a joke.
I sloppily get back up and move back to my seat where I slump down and fall asleep, this is going to be a shitty ride.
I'm shaken by a big looking guy, "C'mon, you've got orientation in ten, follow the crowd." He says while pointing at the line of people leaving the bus. I get up and fall against him quickly before getting in the line. My head is still pounding, I guess the nap didn't help.
Orientation is a basic run down of the facilities and being told we'll stay there until we get some kind of assignment. After that three people are sent off because they already got an assignment, the woman with the short hair being one of them. After that the remaining people were brought to some testing rooms for various things. There was a written response room where all the questions were about random things like geography and math. After the written response room was a shooting range. I had finished with my tryout and didn't care about the results of it, I was lying down in the back of the room.
While lying down I was trying to sleep, but even with the bulky headphones that were handed out, the gunfire was loud and sparratic, keeping me from getting to sleep. All of a sudden the lights turn red and begin flashing. This is not good for my headache. It's like my head is being squeezed each time the light flashes. The two guards in the room drop their guns and run to the two double doors before closing them and putting some metal things near the base that close them, at least that's what I think they do.
The doors shake as a loud bang comes from the other side. I'm a little shaky but I can still stand enough to get up and start walking towards the guns the two guards had dropped. Another bang echos from beyond the door and this time the guards are knocked back from the impact of whatever is on the other side.
I've made it over to where the two guns were dropped, then a larger bang comes from the door and the guards are flung several meters away and the doors follow them. There's a large rat, about as tall as me, give or take. I guess that's what knocked down the door.
I shoot it a few times in the head and it drops to the ground. Behind it are more rats, each of them snarling and drooling from bloody mouths with matted fur like the first. Riding one of the rats is the god I'd assume made them. She looks worse than the rats, she looks like she hasn't eaten in days, has bloodied neon green prison clothes, and her hair is messily covering her face and is clumping to the blood all over her. I don't know if it's hers or someone else's, and frankly, I don't think I care. These gods are the reason my life has ended so I'm going to make them pay for it.
I shoot her a few times then dive into the hoard of rats, they scratch me up a bit, at least I think they do. I'm shooting them and they're slashing at me and I'm lost in the bloody mess if it all.
I come out of the swarm of giant dead rats to find everyone else frozen in what I'm guessing is fear. I wipe my hand across my face to get some of the blood off and say, "Everyone get a gun, I'm not letting a single one of you die."