Meanwhile, somewhere in the depths of the pan cosmic imaginarium…
It took several long and treacherous trans-dimensional jumps for the Shadowblade to reach the outer rim of the Mount Olympus bubble that floated in the depths of the pan cosmic imaginarium.
She was shaped like a boomerang, metallic black and sleek. Although one could not discern her colour or shape as she emerged fully cloaked from the stealth wormhole.
Inside the craft, Guido Gargantua's elite squad of ninja gorillas from the Fifth Column of Baphomet, prepared for the suicide of all suicidal missions. They were about the sneak into the palace of a god and slay his beloved bipedal pooch. Hey Man, Nice Shot by Filter, played from the Shadowblade's surround sound system.
"Does this triquillion parakeet, disguised as a human, actually know what he's doing?" asked the ninja gorilla wielding the antique blunderbuss.
"If he didn't," replied Guido, "then we'd already be detected by the Olympus security system, which means the big fella with the thunderbolts, would smite us by now."
"Which means we'd all be dead," added a ninja gorilla wearing a bra fashioned from coconuts and a yellow with black polka dots tutu. They were busy applying lip gloss camouflage to their chunky lips.
Big Budgie ignored their remarks. He sat at a bench built into the fuselage and stared at the computer holographic displays. Tsunami of security code, written in Nerdanese, streamed across his field of view. Big Budgie was focused, attentive and meditative. He was in his zone. The code was his ocean and he was the shark.
"Shihan Gargantua," said a ninja gorilla, sliding dozens of knives into sheaths strapped to his forearms, torso and shins, "I'm gunna fling a knife, right between Fabien's beady little eyes."
"Not before I give him the flogging of his life with these green babies," interjected the ninja gorilla, holding a bunch of broccolis in each of his black leathery paws.
"On the weird scale ranked from one to eleven," said Big Budgie, "You guys are a 13."
"Says the purple triquillion parakeet using a hard light holographic implant to make himself look like a Mediterranean version of Seth Rogen," said the ninja gorilla with the blunderbuss.
"Remember Big Budgie," added Shihan Guido Gargantua, "that we are Fifth Column of Baphomet. This is the way."
"This is the way," repeated the rest of the ninja gorillas.
Without taking his eyes off the endless streams of coding, Big Budgie moaned and groaned in protest, "You can't take the mantra from the Mandalorians and just pass it off as your own."
"The Fifth Column of Baphomet predates Star Wars," boomed the gorilla with the blunderbuss, "what's to say that it wasn't stolen from us in the first place?"
"Touché," sighed Big Budgie, before he paused, snickered and added, "I'm guessing you lot preferred The Book of Boba Fett though."
"The Mandalorian was okay," said the gorilla wielding the sais, placing them in sheaths strapped to his heavily muscled lats, "but The Book of Boba Fett is better."
Big Budgie scoffed.
The gorilla with the bo-staff added, "But Andor was a heavily overrated, complete pile of donkey excrement."
"Awe, for fudge sake, come on!" complained Big Budgie, "what the fudge is wrong with you lot? Andor is a fudging masterpiece!"
"Nope," said the gorilla with the coconut knockers and tutu, "Andor was very boring and way too slow."
"Yeah," said the gorilla with the tonfas, "a better sleeping pill than watching test cricket on a hot Saturday afternoon in summer while a bunch of bananas roasts in the oven."
"Fudging hell, for fudge sake, it's a slow burn!" argued Big Budgie.
"Half of that statement is correct," added the gorilla with the throwing knives.
Big Budgie paused for a second, before head butting his head several times into the metallic bench top. The 2-dimensional holographic screens flickered momentarily.
"Feel better?" asked Shihan Guido Gargantua.
"Much better, thank you," Big Budgie replied, returning his attention to the endless stream of coding.
The lights inside the Shadowblade faded to near darkness and flicked to red as the ship, fully cloaked, dove towards the peaks of Mount Olympus. The main fuselage door slid open and exposed the darkness of the night. A conjured-up moon provided some illumination as it sat behind drifting pillows of white-yellow clouds. The light of the moon reflected off the waters below, an ocean that stretched from the mirage of a horizon, to the cliffs of Mount Olympus Island. The air was cool and crisp. The ninja gorillas, including Shihan Guido Gargantua, formed a line.
"Shihan," asked the ninja gorilla with the tonfas, "aren't you bringing your naginata?"
"No," Guido replied, "for a billion years, Fabien has kept the ninja gorilla race in tortuous bondage, enslaving our minds and forcing us to be his pan cosmic saboteurs and assassins. For that, I'm using nothing but my bare hands on Fabien."
"Up close and personal, Shihan?" asked the ninja gorilla with the sais.
"Too right," Guido replied.
One by one, they jumped into the darkness. Each wore a black fanny pack that contained a wing suit. They glided silently towards the palace of the Greek pantheon. Eventually, each landed in various places, sneaking inside, creeping up to and eliminating the clockwork, mechanical guards, handcrafted by Hephaestus.
He was Hera's child, the result of a fling with a mortal mechanic from Logan in Brisbane. Hera had a thing for tradies. There was something about a mortal man, covered in gearbox grease and smeared in engine oil, along with a protruding arse crack, drizzled in manly monkey sweat. She found it all to be so primal, so irresistible. Hera told Zeus that Hephaestus was simply the product of parthenogenesis. No need to cause a scene and have him nuke all of South East Queensland with thunderbolts in a jealous rage.
I digress.
Anyway, Fabien the French Bulldog was alone in the living room. He was about to begin a movie marathon, The Pack, Cujo, Rottweilers, An American Werewolf in London, The Grey. He had them all on VHS, ready to go, while he sat on his doggie bean bag and licked his lychees.
And then in the living room, there was a sudden shimmer of light as a ninja gorilla uncloaked himself. It was the one wielding the blunderbuss, "Woof, woof, yah mofo – KABOOM!"
Fabien yelped and leapt from the bean bag just moments before it exploded into a cloud of Styrofoam. He ran out of the living room and skidded into the hallway. A trail of throwing knives plunged into the walls as he managed to dodge, bob, duck and weave the volley of death.
Everyone was out. Hera was at the pub playing pokies, Ares went to a Communards concert, Hephaestus was at the Willowbank Raceway watching the drag racing and Eris, although grounded for the next millennium for flipping Zeus the bird, had snuck out to hook up with her big hunky, Scandinavian boyfriend.
Only Zeus was home and he was busy singing to Informer by Snow that played from his radio in the shower. Yeah, a one hit wonder from the 1990's, rapped by a white reggae wannabe. It was now, further murdered by a god taking a shower, lathered in soap while singing a very fragmented version of the lyrics with a heavy Greek accent.
Fabien scuttled towards the sanctuary of Zeus and Hera's bedroom. He almost made it before a bunch of broccolis, slammed into his side at hypersonic speed. Fabien gave a yelp as the force of the broccoli blow, pummelled him into the wall.
"Apostats!" Fabien sneered between moments of yelps and whimpering, "paieras tu!"
"Speak pan cosmic common," said the gorilla with the blunderbuss as he walked into the hallway, "no one can understand you."
Fabien snarled and with a heavy French accent, spoke in pan cosmic common, "Oh, mark my words, you will regret the days that I brought your ancestors out of the jungle and into the darkness to do my bidding!"
The ninja gorilla with the coconut knockers strutted towards Fabien, "You're not so tough aftera_"
KAZAAAP!
They disintegrated into a faint cloud of soot.
Fabien sneered, snickered and barked in enjoyment.
Unbeknownst to everyone, Zeus had heard Fabien's yelps and whimpering and without a thought for decency, bolted butt naked from the shower.
"You fudging sack of…" stalled the ninja gorilla wielding the blunderbuss, "oh my, what a ginormous_"
You see, a gorilla's charcoaled dipstick is only three to at best, six centimetres long.
Zeus on the other hand, had something that was much bigger. It turns out, that Zeus was NOT a little god.
Nope, if a stonemason chipped away to create an anatomical replica of Zeus, that statue would defy the laws of tradition.
Stunned by the sheer sight of such immensity, the ninja gorilla dropped his blunderbuss. He was zapped into ash before the blunderbuss hit the floor.
The ninja gorilla with one bunch of broccoli leftover, tried to shield his eyes from such Greek hyperbole but he too, was promptly smitten.
As was the ninja gorilla with the throwing knives, the one with the nunchucks, the other with the sais and the one with the tonfas. All were left stunned in amazement at the immensity of all that symbolised Zeus, before being zapped into dust clouds of carbon.
Guido raced into the hallway. His headband now wrapped tightly to cover his eyes.
"For my fallen brothers!" he cried as he launched a flying sidekick towards Zeus, who dodged it with ease.
"For the Fifth Column!" he shouted as he launched a series of roundhouse and spinning crescent kicks at Zeus. This was no easy feat, since a gorilla's short stumpy legs, are up to twenty percent shorter than their arms.
The god blocked and evaded the kicks with ease.
"For Baphomet!" roared Guido as he pummelled boxing combinations towards Zeus' head.
Not a single knuckle touched the god.
"Enough," said Zeus, "I grow bored," he proceeded to rip the headband from Guido's eyes.
He couldn't help himself. Guido stared down at Zeus' leviathan. It was too much to behold. Guido collapsed to the ground. The spirit of defeat, overwhelmed him.
Zeus walked over and picked up Fabien. He comforted the Frenchie in his arms as he circled Guido.
"You think you can come here to my kingdom? You think you can offend my dog and live? This! Is! Olympus!" bellowed Zeus as he kicked Guido across the hallway. The ninja gorilla slammed into a wall with such force that he cracked the stone.
"Yesss… Yesss…" whispered Fabien, "smite him Zeus, smite him goooooood."
Zeus smiled and while he held Fabien with his left hand, he raised his right hand and pointed his finger tips towards Guido.
Guido spat blood but looked up at Zeus in defiance and let out a laugh. He buckled and clutched his ribs in pain.
"What's so funny, yah malaka?" asked Zeus.
"This…is…Olympus!" laughed and giggled Guido, holding his chest in pain – most of his ribs broken, spittles of blood dripping from his mouth, "what, are you; some kind of Zac Snyder fan boy or something?"
Zeus paused, "What if I am? Have you watched 300? Have you seen Watchmen? Both fudging masterpieces."
Guido giggled, but now even the giggles made him clutch his chest in agony, "I have only two words as a rebuttal Zeus."
"Oh yeah?" sneered Zeus, "and what are these two words that you speak of?"
Guido smiled, "Rebel…Moon."
Zeus shook his head, clearly angered, "Oh I'm going to enjoy frying this malaka."
"Oh, I as well," sneered Fabien, "Il est temps de mourir, sale gueule de gorille."
Sparks began to sizzle at the tip of Zeus' fingertips as he savoured the moment.
Suddenly, there appeared a flash behind the god as someone slid between Zeus' feet. He narrowly missed slapping the head of something over-godly, by just half an inch, as he slid across the marble floors towards Guido.
It was Big Budgie. When he made it to Guido, he placed his right arm on the gorilla's muscular back.
"Hold on," he said as he flicked the switch on the portable teleportation beacon he held in his left hand. The two disappeared in a flash of light.
Zeus was startled and then filled with rage.
Back on the Shadowblade, Big Budgie helped Guido to slump into the co-pilot's chair in the cockpit. He buckled the gorilla in, who at this point in time, faded in and out of consciousness.
Big Budgie sat in the pilot's chair and assumed manual control of the Shadowblade.
"I failed," sobbed Guido, "it is my fault that my brother's fell."
"Don't be so hard on yourself," said Big Budgie as he keyed coordinates into the trans-dimensional navcom, "he blindsided you and your troop with the sheer length and girth of that celestial monster."
The Shadowblade rocked from several blows of thunderbolts.
"He's pursuing us," added Big Budgie, "time to leave."
The Shadowblade disappeared in the flash of a trans-dimensional jump.
Zeus hovered in the skies above Mount Olympus. Another flash appeared and he was temporarily stunned by the headlights of Hera's bombed up, flying red Datsun as she returned from playing pokies at the pub.
"Oh, piss off Zeus, put that thing away before it's harpooned by a Japanese marine biologist. I'm not in the mood."
Zeus ignored his wife as her car drifted by. He stared vengefully into the darkness, "Whether in this realm or the next, I will have my revenge."