Yay! I'm so happy! (Oh, yes, I'm acting really childish.) Someone added my story into the Story Alert subscription! *Dying of happiness* I never thought that this story would be good. I'm trying my best, though!

-L

Leo Valdez sat in Bunker Five, melting pieces of celestial bronze scraps with the flames that licked across his palm. Once in a while, he would extinguish the fire to hammer some parts down. Clara had asked him to make a new sword for her, since her old one had perished a few months ago in a burning inferno during the battle against Gaea's army. Leo stood up and stretched before sitting down on the stool again. He had already made the sword, and started to do some final touch-ups.

As a daughter of Hecate, Clara Benitez couldn't just take a random sword from the huge collection of weapons in the Armory. Children of Hecate had magical powers, so normal demigod weapons were likely to crumble to dust in their hands when they were nervous. The sword that Leo was making for Clara was special-the metal was coated with a layer of Anti-Crumble, a solution that Leo invented. Yes, he was such a genius, wasn't he?

Now that Leo was one of the heroes who had defeated Gaea, he had climbed up the popularity ladder of Camp Half-blood. The people on the top were, of course, Percy and Annabeth, who had survived Tartarus. Speaking of Annabeth…they had been through so much together that the scary blonde girl was almost like family. Of course, he didn't like her that way. If he did, Percy would probably chase him around the camp with a herd of stampeding pegasi. Or maybe the Party Ponies. Leo had heard about the wild cousins of Chiron, and thought that they were quite awesome. Not as awesome as Leo himself, Bad-boy Supreme, of course. Well, no matter how awesome he was, he wouldn't want to get on the Party Ponies' bad side. He wouldn't want a horse-shoe shaped dent on his head to destroy his drastically handsome self.

Fine, fine, Leo knew that he wasn't really all that good-looking, but he hoped that with his witty humour, he could win a girl's heart. After he became a hero, some Aphrodite girls had started batting their eyelashes at him and tossing him-dare he say it?-seductive smiles when they passed by. They had treated him like dirt when he had just come to camp. However, he didn't like them. With their flawless looks and perfectly-manicured nails, they looked like the mean, popular girls that used to make fun of him when he had attended school. Not to mention that they were always caked with the sufficient amount of make-up for a whole horde of super models.

Okay, back to the topic on Annabeth. Yes, Percy would also skewer him with his celestial bronze sword, Riptide while Annabeth stood on the sidelines and watched. From what Leo heard about the curses the arai gave Percy during his little 'tour' in Tartarus, it wouldn't be really fun. But Annabeth was in a coma. Even if Leo did have a crush on her, she wouldn't be there to watch Percy beat him up and into demigod pulp. Oh, yeah, Nico Di Angelo might be tracking him down, too. Leo had heard from Piper that Nico had a huge crush on the daughter of Athena. The other Aphrodite girls must really be rubbing off her. She'd never seemed like the gossiping type to Leo. Leo still had his suspicions. That Hades kid seemed so gloomy, it was almost impossible for him to love anyone. Okay, maybe he did love Bianca Di Angelo and Hazel Levesque, but they were siblings (in Hazel's case, half-siblings).

Leo put the finished xiphos down and stood back to admire his work. The celestial bronze gleamed in the dimly-lit cave, casting a faint glow on the anvil. The grip was wrapped with leather, like Riptide. Leo had learnt that the grip was really important-while it served as a surface for decoration, it also helped to increase the amount of friction between the palm of its wielder and the surface of the grip so that the hilt would not slip from the wielder's hand easily. The word pharmakis was inscribed in the hilt. Ancient Greek for witch, Leo knew. The reason why it was named that…well, the sword was meant for a child of Hecate, which meant that it had to be magic.

Above the inscription on the hilt was a hole the shape of a teardrop. The hole was the opening to the inside of the blade, where it became an extremely thin tunnel that ended at the tip of the blade. The hole was for Clara's stone. Every demigod child of Hecate had a stone that held some of their magic. When the stone was inserted into the hole, the magic of the stone would seep through the tunnel, causing the sword to possess magic. Cool, huh? Leo patted himself on the shoulder for coming up with such a brilliant idea. It could put Riptide to shame, any day.

"Wow, Leo. It's…" Clara trailed off, obviously amazed at Pharmakis. Leo grinned and said, "There's more!"

Clara gave him the pendant that she always wore around her neck. A green stone that Leo couldn't identify was attached to the silver chain. It looked like a cross between emerald and jade. Leo fit the stone into the hole in the sword's hilt and they watched as magical fluid flowed through the thin tunnel in the blade. The sword started glowing green.

"Yes!" Leo whooped with joy, jumping up and pumping his fist in the air. "Now run along and tell your sister that Uncle Leo made that wicked sword!"

However, the moment Clara bade him farewell and turned around, his smile faded. Clara's caramel-brown hair reminded him of someone…he shook his head to dismiss the thought, but the face of a certain girl that he had left on Ogygia remained etched in his mind. Leo thanked the gods that he didn't specify when he would return to the island and save her. He feared that he had made an empty promise, like what she had said. Whenever he thought about their kiss, his lips would tingle. It was his first full-contact kiss-and his last. He also thanked the gods that it was his last, because he certainly didn't want any of the Aphrodite girls sticking their tongues down his throat. Just thinking about it made his stomach churn.

Leo had sworn on the River Styx that he would go back for her. Since no man found Ogygia twice, it was practically impossible to return to her island. She had said that it was a rule. Leo was born to be a rule-breaker. She had said that it was impossible. Leo had been told that many things were impossible (mainly told by the ever-so-discouraging Lady of Mud, Queen Dirt Face), but they were eventually proved to be otherwise. She had told him that there was no way he was going to go back. Too bad, Team Leo said that there was a way. She had insisted that she hated him. Yeah, right, and Leo was a satyr.

But there was no way Leo could be in love with an immortal girl. Even if he did go back, and she did love him (no way, Leo thought), she would still be around fifteen or sixteen when Leo lay in his grave. So let's just focuse on the getting-her-back part.

Leo turned around and trudged back to Bunker Five, his thoughts still lingering on the familiar scent of cinnamon and wood smoke.

Festus' head lay idle on the platform in Bunker Five. A layer of dust conveyed that it had been like that for some time. The bronze no longer shone with its former brightness, and the hard surface was covered with dents and scratches from the battle with Gaea. Leo had said that he would try to build the bronze dragon, but he was so busy that he hardly ever had time to sit down and think. So day after day, month after month, the dragon's head lay there like a New Year's Resolution, waiting for the son of Hephaestus to attend to it.

Leo had detached it from the Argo II so that he could build it into the magnificent bronze dragon it once was. He wanted to do it so that he could return to Ogygia. But somehow, he couldn't bring himself to really pick up a pencil and sketch out the blueprint. Part of him wanted to see Calypso again-the other part knew that he couldn't. Well, he couldn't until he had built Festus the Awesome Flying Dragon.

Staring at Festus' head, Leo reached out and brushed some of the dust off. A cloud of dust billowed in front of him, tickling his nostrils and making him sneeze.

"Getting dusty, eh, pal?" he managed to choke out while he patted the bronze head affectionately (or as affectionately as he could when he was sneezing). He ran a hand over the dull metal and sensed the gears below the bronze surface. "Well, you're gonna be saying goodbye to the dust soon."

Leo rushed to his work table, plopped down on the stool, snatched a pencil and got to work. The graphite tip flew over the paper, forming a rough sketch of a celestial bronze dragon. After adding a few quick lines for the tail, Leo started to calculate the measurements. He glanced back at the dragon's head to make sure that they were accurate. Was it just him, or did the metal surface seem shinier?

The son of Hephaestus surveyed the blueprint that he had drawn and nodded in satisfaction before pinning it onto the board above his worktable.

Leo Valdez would be even busier than before, but he didn't care. Anything to get his best dragon pal back.

Festus is coming ba-ack, Festus is coming ba-ack... Oops, I think I have a high sugar intake or something. Anyway, I'm glad. :)

-L