Zodiac Heroes - Cast Down to Earth

Chapter 25 - Why Orion Keeps Popping Up In Every Conversation

(yes, that's the title)

Aries

Never in my entire life have I ever thought of another world ever existing.

The Planets, or whatever they called themselves, had to spend a long time trying to convince us that this Celestia place was real, and we were the Zodiac Signs.

"If we're from Celestia, then how come all I remember is life on Earth?" I asked.

"Orion's Banisher must've erased your memories of life on Celestia." Mars, the boy with fiery red hair, replied.

"Isn't that what Banishers do?" Mercury pointed out.

"Mercury, we get it." Jupiter, the Planet who was really just a taller version of Sagittarius, told him. "That's not what happened to the other fallen stars. Orion's banisher wasn't at it's full power at the time. The other fallen stars were sent to Earth with mere memories of Celestia, but not these guys. Orion sent the Zodiac Signs down with no trace at all of Celestia, so they had no idea that it existed. Worse of all, he de-aged them as well, leaving them to grow up and go to this- this high school thing."

"Hold on," Taurus said. Everyone turned to look at him. "You mean Banisher as in this canon-like machine that shoots purple light and makes things disappear?"

I didn't know where Taurus had the imagination to make something up like that.

Moon, the girl with short pearl blue hair, seemed to know something about that. "Yes, that's exactly what it is. How did you know?"

"I had a dream about it," Taurus replied. "About these fallen star people. Most of them seem to be teachers at our school. Except for one. I think it was Aquarius, except it couldn't have been."

The expression on Aquarius' face was a mixture of shock and confusion. "You saw me in a dream? What do you mean by 'it couldn't have been'?"

"I don't actually know." answered Taurus. "The you in the dream had white hair, one turquoise and one grey eye. You had wings too, for some reason."

"That sounds like the Aquarius I know." The dark brown haired Planet whose name was Saturn said. "That's his Celestial form."

"It's the form of all of you when you're in Celestia." Uranus added.

"So we are from Celestia, right?" Virgo asked.

Neptune threw his hands up in the air frustratedly. "They aren't getting anything. How are we supposed to tell them?"

"Patience, Neptune." Blonde haired Venus told him. She then turned to a tall blonde boy. "Sun, what do we do?"

"We'll tell them a story." Sun replied. "A true story." He added, eyeing my friends and I. "Unfortunately, I've never been good at stories. Pluto, take it away."

Pluto, the short, black haired girl, cleared her throat and said, "Alright, if you say so.

"A long, long time ago, there was Ancient Greece. It was a place where supposedly mythical creatures lived. It was also an era where many of today's constellations thrived. Great heroes like Perseus, Atalanta and Hercules; creatures like the Hydra and Pegasus; even gods and immortals who gave a piece of their spirit to the heavens. Of course, there's you twelve: the Zodiac Signs. Some were chosen to be constellations, and those constellations lived in Celestia: the magical celestial realm created for constellations and celestial spirits. The gods could also place heroes and creatures of their chose in Celestia after their deaths. Those in Celestia stayed immortal unless they chose to come down to the human realm.

"And thus the Celestians, residents of Celestia, lived in Celestia in peace and harmony. That was, until Orion hatched his plan to take over Celestia. The gods would've stopped him, but after the age of Ancient Greece and Rome, the gods haven't been seen. Legend says that they will appear when needed most, but that's a story for another time.

"So Orion. He became power hungry, and longed for more power and control over Celestia. He formed an army of people he knew he could trust, and the army existed for a long time without being discovered. Orion planned his conquest for years. When he was finally ready, people started noticing. They noticed how he was slowly getting more and more power hungry. Only the bravest of heroes dared to stop him. The thing was, the heroes that went to go stop him never came back. This was a branch of Orion's plan. Since people predicted that he was going to take over Celestia soon, he decided that the only way to make his Celestian conquest easier was to get rid of the heroes. He knew that all the heroes were strong, but there was one particular group of heroes that he wanted gone the most: the Zodiac Signs.

"They- I mean, you guys did go after Orion. The day you got cast down to Earth, everyone went in a stage of panic. Even us, the Planets, one of the oldest group of celestial spirits, were afraid. We hid from Orion's sight in fear that he would go after us soon. Orion conquered Celestia, and it has been under Orion's rule for 16 years now. Orion should've been proud of his accomplishment, but it wasn't enough. He wanted to wipe all the heroes from existence, especially you guys. He sent one of his most loyal- ah, servants, Medea, and his daughter down to Earth to keep an eye on all of the heroes. As for Orion, he's still in Celestia, making life miserable for all of us."

As Pluto finished her story, I felt the memories of Celestia coming back. Even though some details were still hazy, I knew what we had to do.

I nearly couldn't believe myself when I said, "So we've got to get back up there and stop Orion."

"But how?" Libra asked. "What do we do, take a spaceship?"

"Celestians carry gadgets around to help them get back to Celestia. Seeing as you twelve don't have them, you'll have to find another way." Moon replied.

Uranus started waving a book in the air like it was on fire. "I found something!"

"What is is?" Mars asked.

"A portal spell!" Uranus opened the book on a table, and everyone gathered around the table to take a look at it. "It's really complicated though. I can't explain it. You'll have to read it to understand."

She handed the book to Capricorn, who opened to the portal spell page, squinted at it, flipped it upside down, and said, "It's all in Greek."

"You'll figure something out soon." Mercury said. "Besides, you have those scrolls with you, don't you?"

"How did you know?" Gemini asked.

"I just do." Mercury replied.

Jupiter looked at the clock on the wall. "How long have we been here? You guys need to get back to your school!"

"Just let us know if you need anything." Neptune handed Pisces a sheet of paper. "That's the number of the phone in our living room. Call if there's an emergency or if you've found something."

We said our goodbyes, and got out the door. Then, we just stared at each other for a couple of minutes. Neither of us knew what to say about the fact that we were secretly constellations, and we had to make it back to Celestia and stop an evil villain.

"Well," I said. "We'd better get back to school and start finding out what's up with all this 'save the world' stuff before the world ends."

~~~

So, they found out the truth. How big of a deal is this? It's a very big deal.

Anyways, I hope everyone's doing okay. Have a good day/night, and stay safe!

Peace out,

The author owo