Titan's Curse: Loved One Lost

"What did she want with you?" Bianca asked, once Percy told them about Aphrodite.

"Oh, uh, not sure," Percy stuttered, his cheeks suspiciously red. "She said to be careful in her husband's junkyard. She said not to pick anything up."

Zoe narrowed her eyes. "The goddess of love would not make a special trip to tell thee that. Be careful, Percy. Aphrodite has led many heroes astray."

"For once I agree with Zoe," Thalia said. "You can't trust Aphrodite."

Nico noticed Grover and Percy having a weird staring contest until Nico mentally announced Percy's lose when he glanced away from the satyr's intense stare. "So," Percy said, anxiously, "how do we get out of here?"

"That way," Zoe said. "That is west."

"How can you tell?"

With only the light of the full moon, Nico could still clearly see her rolling her eyes. "Ursa Major is in the north," she said, "which means that must be west." She pointed west, then at the northern constellation, which was hard to make out because there were so many other stars.

"Oh, yeah," Percy said. "The bear thing." Nico chuckled.

Zoe looked offended. "Show some respect. It was a fine bear. A worthy opponent."

"You act like it was real."

"Guys," Grover broke in. "Look!"

They reached the crest of a junk mountain. Piles of metal objects glinted in the moonlight: broken heads of bronze horses, metal legs from human statues, smashed chariots, tons of shields and swords and other weapons, along with more modern stuff, like cars that gleamed gold and silver, refrigerators, washing machines, and computer monitors.

"Whoa," Bianca said. "That stuff... some of it looks like real gold."

"Cool!" Nico ran off to look at the junk.

"It is," Thalia said grimly. "Like Percy said, don't touch anything. This is the junkyard of the gods."

"Junk?" Grover picked up a beautiful crown made of gold, silver, and jewels. It was broken on one side, as if it had been split by an axe.

"You call this junk?" He bit off a point and began to chew.

"It's delicious!"

Thalia swatted the crown out of his hands. "I'm serious! And Bianca, control your brother before he-"

"Look!" Bianca said. She raced down the hill, tripping over bronze coils and golden plates. She picked up a bow that glowed silver in moonlight.

"A Hunter's bow!" She yelped in surprise as the bow began to shrink, and became a hair clip shaped like a crescent moon. "It's just like Percy's sword!"

"What! That's amazing! I want a weapon like Percy's." Nico came over to inspect with his sister.

Thalia face-palmed. "Nevermind."

Zoe's face was grim. "Leave it, Bianca."

"But—"

"It is here for a reason. Anything thrown away in this junkyard must stay in this yard. It is defective. Or cursed."

Bianca reluctantly set the hair clip down.

"I don't like this place," Thalia said. She gripped the shaft of her spear.

"You think we're going to get attacked by killer refrigerators?" Percy asked.

She glared at the older demigod. "Zoe is right, Percy. Things get thrown away here for a reason. Now come on, let's get across the yard."

"That's the second time you've agreed with Zoe," Percy muttered, and Nico snickered upon hearing him. They both shared a grin behind Thalia's back.

The group started picking their way through the hills and valleys of junk. The stuff seemed to go on forever, and if it hadn't been for Ursa Major, Nico and the others would've gotten lost hours ago. All the hills pretty much looked the same. It was a hard temptation for Nico to resist when there were so many cool junks piled unused around him. Like he picked up one sword that looked like it was made of gold instead of Celestial bronze or the pack of Mythomagic card set that was so rare, Nico was almost in tears when he had to leave them behind.

The others weren't faring any better. Percy found an electric guitar shaped like Apollo's lyre—his green eyes admiring the sweet item. Grover found a broken tree made out of metal. It had been chopped to pieces, but some of the branches still had golden birds in them, and they whirred around when Grover picked them up, trying to flap their wings.

As Nico stared longingly at a PS2 console, someone quietly called his name, "Nico."

The young demigod turned to find his sister, Bianca, smiling hesitantly at him. "Bianca. What's up?"

"Nico, can I talk to you for a second?" Bianca fidgeted with the hunter bag slung around her shoulder which Nico knew she only did when she was nervous of the response she'd receive.

"Sure." Nico shrugged and started walking alongside his sister, glad for the distraction away from the temping objects.

"You still not mad at me, are you?"

Nico had not expected that and truthfully, he didn't want to think about their earlier fight right now. The issue wasn't really on the top of his mind when he was being chased and nearly killed by skeletons and a pig. He had simply forgotten about it until…

"Well now that you mention it."

Bianca sighed. "Nico, I don't want you thinking that I'm abandoning you or anything like that."

Nico snorted, old feelings dredging back up. "Then what do you want me to think after you ditched me for the Hunters? "

"I didn't ditch you!" It was a good thing the group was ahead of them so they didn't have to witness this brother-sister feud. "If I hadn't met good guys like Percy, I wouldn't have felt okay leaving you at camp. It might seem selfish, Nico but I joined the hunters because I wanted my own life and friends.

When she noticed the hurt look on his face, she crouched down to his level and cupped her brother's cheeks "Don't get me wrong, Nico, I love you. But sometimes…being a big sister twenty four hours a day is not easy."

Nico roughly pulled himself away from her and started walking again towards the group. "Why won't you just say what it's really about? It's what we thought our parents did before we found out we were demigods. "

"What are you talking about, Nico? I don't get you. Do you want me to quit being a huntress because you can't handle being on your own without me-".

"I can take care of myself!"

"Then what, Nico? Why are you still mad? "Bianca crossed her arms over her chest, both Di Angelo's tempers raging from the argument.

Then Nico answered with a small voice. "I'm just a burden to you, aren't I? I don't know why you won't just say it. You could have stayed in camp like the other demigods there and meet new friends and have your own life; I don't understand why'd you have to go to such lengths to be away from me."

"Nico..."

But Nico didn't want to listen to her excuses anymore. He jogged up closer to the group and stayed with them. Thankfully, nobody questioned the brother and sister's glum looks as they continued on trekking the mounds of junk. Finally, they saw the edge of the junkyard about half a mile ahead of them, the lights of a highway stretching through the desert. But between them and the road…

"What is that?" Bianca gasped.

Ahead of them was a hill much bigger and longer than the others. It was like a metal mesa, the length of a football field and as tall as goalposts. At one end of the mesa was a row of ten thick metal columns, wedged tightly together.

Bianca frowned. "They look like—"

"Toes," Grover said. Bianca nodded. "Really, really large toes."

"Do you think there's someone under this pile of junk?" Nico asked, staring at the toes in fascination and curiosity. His earlier feelings put aside for now in the face of something new and weird.

Zoe and Thalia exchanged nervous looks. "Let's go around," Thalia said. "Far around."

"But the road is right over there," Percy protested. "Quicker to climb over."

Ping.

Thalia hefted her spear and Zoe drew her bow, but then they realized it was only Grover. He had thrown a piece of scrap metal at the toes and hit one, making a deep echo, as if the column were hollow.

"Why did you do that?" Zoe demanded.

Grover cringed. "I don't know. I, uh, don't like fake feet?"

Nico patted Grover on the back as if to console him. "I don't like fake feet either." The satyr just gave him a strange look.

"Come on." Thalia looked at Percy. "Around."

Percy didn't argue this time. Nico glanced back at the toes, there was something familiar about it with the piles of junk around them...something in Greek mythology, but Nico, for the life of him, couldn't recall. After several minutes of walking, they finally stepped onto the highway, an abandoned but well-lit stretch of black asphalt.

"We made it out," Zoe said. "Thank the gods."

She spoke her words too soon though. At that moment, Nico heard a sound like a thousand trash compactors crushing metal. Nico whirled around. Behind them, the scrap mountain was boiling, rising up. The ten toes tilted over, and Nico's eyes widened as he remembered from mythology what monster lay under that heap of junk. The thing that rose up from the metal was a bronze giant in full Greek battle armor.

He was impossibly tall—a skyscraper with legs and arms, gleaming wickedly in the moonlight. He looked down at them, and his face was deformed. The left side was partially melted off. His joints creaked with rust, and across his armored chest, written in thick dust by some giant finger, were the words WASH ME.

"Talos!" Zoe gasped.

Nico's eyes widened. Oh crap, how could I forget?

"Who—who's Talos?" Percy stuttered.

"One of Hephaestus's creations," Thalia said. "But that can't be the original. It's too small. A prototype, maybe. A defective model."

That's too small?! Nico thought wildly as the monster moved one hand to his sword belt and drew his weapon. The sound of it coming out of its sheath was horrible, metal screeching against metal. The blade was a hundred feet long. It looked rusty and dull, but Nico knew one hit would send you all the way back to camp.

"Someone took something," Zoe said. "Who took something?" She stared accusingly at Percy and Nico.

Percy shook his head. "I'm a lot of things, but I'm not a thief."

"Nico!" Thalia snapped.

"I didn't take anything, I swear!" No matter how much I wanted to. Nico looked towards Bianca to see if she believed him but her face was turned away from him. Nico had an uncomfortable feeling stirring in his belly when she didn't say anything.

However, there was no time to talk as the giant defective Talos took one step toward them, closing half the distance and making the ground shake.

"Run!" Grover yelped.

Despite the uselessness of the idea, everyone did it anyway. They split up like what they did against the boar but Bianca grabbed on to her brother.

"You're not leaving my sight this time!" She told him, running.

Thalia drew her shield and held it up as she ran down the highway. The giant swung his sword and took out a row of power lines, which exploded in sparks and scattered across Thalia's path. Zoe's arrows whistled toward the creature's face but shattered harmlessly against the metal. Grover brayed like a baby goat and went climbing up a mountain of metal.

Bianca, Percy and Nico ended up together, hiding behind a broken chariot. "You took something," Percy said. "That bow."

For a moment, Nico thought Percy was accusing him until Bianca exclaimed, "No!" her voice quivering.

"Give it back!" Percy insisted. "Throw it down!"

"I... I didn't take the bow! Besides, it's too late."

"What did you take?"

"Bianca?" Nico asked. His sister stared at him with wide, brown eyes. Before she could answer, Nico heard a massive creaking noise, and a shadow blotted out the sky.

"Move!" Percy tore down the hill, Bianca and Nico right behind him, as the giant's foot smashed a crater in the ground where they'd been hiding.

"Hey, Talos!" Grover yelled, but the monster raised his sword, looking down at the three of them.

Grover played a quick melody on his pipes. Over at the highway, the downed power lines began to dance. One of the poles with power lines still attached flew toward Talos's back leg and wrapped around his calf. The lines sparked and sent a jolt of electricity up the giant's backside. Talos whirled around, creaking and sparking. Nico knew a distraction when he saw one.

"Come on!" Percy told Bianca. But she stayed frozen. From her pocket, she brought out a small metal figurine, a statue of a god. Nico knew immediately what it was but he didn't understand why his sister would take it.

"It... it was for you, Nico. It was the only statue you didn't have."

"How can you think of Mythomagic at a time like this?" Percy said incredulously. Nico would have like to put some sense into her too but there were tears in her eyes. What could she have been thinking?

"Throw it down," Percy said. "Maybe the giant will leave us alone."

She dropped it reluctantly, but nothing happened. The giant kept coming after Grover. It stabbed its sword into a junk hill, missing Grover by a few feet, but scrap metal made an avalanche over him. Nico watched horrified. He couldn't see him anymore.

"No!" Thalia yelled. She pointed her spear, and a blue arc of lightning shot out, hitting the monster in his rusty knee, which buckled.

The giant collapsed, but immediately started to rise again. There weren't any emotions in its half- melted face, but Nico got the feeling that it was about as ticked off as a twenty-story-tall metal warrior could be.

"Crazy-idea time," Percy suddenly said.

Bianca looked at him nervously. "Anything."

Percy told them about the maintenance hatch under the giant's foot. "There may be a way to control the thing. Switches or something. I'm going to get inside."

"How? You'll have to stand under its foot! You'll be crushed."

"Distract it," Percy said. "I'll just have to time it right."

Bianca's jaw tightened. Oh no, Nico knew that look. "No. I'll go."

"What! Are you crazy? You can't go, Bianca!" Nico insisted.

"It's my fault the monster came after us," she said. "It's my responsibility. Here." She picked up the little god statue and pressed it into Nico's hand. "If anything happens, I'm sorry for that fight we had a while ago. You're not a burden, Nico. You're my brother."

Nico latched onto her hand atop his. "Is that why you took this? To apologize? I won't forgive you if you go! You'll die, Bianca!" Tears started gathering around his eyes. He couldn't let his sister go; he had a terrible feeling something was going to happen.

Bianca smiled at him, brushing a tear away with her thumb. "Sometimes we make sacrifices for those we love. I love you Nico. Never forget that." She brushed a lock of hair out his eye, kissed his forehead and immediately snatched her hand away from him before he could react.

"Bianca, no! "Percy yelled who had looked away to give the siblings a semblance of privacy. But she wasn't waiting for him. She charged at the monster's left foot.

Thalia had its attention for the moment. She'd learned that the giant was big but slow. If you could stay close to it and not get smashed, you could run around it and stay alive. At least, it was working so far. Bianca got right next to the giant's foot, trying to balance herself on the metal scraps that swayed and shifted with his weight.

Nico clenched the figurine tightly as he watched his sister worriedly from his shelter.

Zoe yelled, "What are you doing?"

"Get it to raise its foot!" she said.

Zoe shot an arrow toward the monster's face and it flew straight into one nostril. The giant straightened and shook its head.

"Hey, Junk Boy!" Percy yelled, running to help Bianca as well.

"Down here." Percy ran up to its big toe and stabbed it with Riptide. The magic blade cut a gash in the bronze.

Unfortunately, his plan worked. Talos looked down at Percy and raised his foot to squash him like a bug. Percy turned to run but the foot came down about two inches behind him and he was knocked into the air. The older demigod landed into what looked like an Olympus-Air refrigerator.

Nico sighed in relief when he saw Percy sit up in a daze but it was short lived when the monster stood on top of Percy, ready to finish him off. Luckily, Grover somehow dug himself out of the junk pile. He played his pipes frantically, and his music sent another power line pole whacking against Talos's thigh.

The monster turned. Grover should've run, but he must've been too exhausted from the effort of so much magic. He took two steps, fell, and didn't get back up.

"Grover!" Thalia and Percy both ran toward him, but Nico knew they'd be too late. The monster raised his sword to smash Grover.

Then he froze. Talos cocked his head to one side, like he was hearing strange new music. He started moving his arms and legs in weird ways, doing the Funky Chicken. Then he made a fist and punched himself in the face.

"Go, Bianca!" Percy yelled. Zoe looked horrified. "She is inside?"

The monster staggered around, and Nico realised the danger of just standing where they were. Thalia and Percy grabbed Grover and Nico and ran with them toward the highway. Zoe was already ahead.

Nico grabbed at Percy's sleeve, "How will Bianca get out?"

The older demigod gave him a conflicted look but wasn't able to say anything when the giant suddenly hit itself in the head again and dropped his sword. A shudder ran through his whole body and he staggered toward the power lines.

"Look out!" Percy yelled, but it was too late.

The giant's ankle snared the lines, and blue flickers of electricity shot up his body. Nico could only watch horrified as the giant careened back into the junkyard, and his right hand fell off, landing in the scrap metal with a horrible CLANG! His left arm came loose, too. He was falling apart at the joints. Talos began to run.

"Wait!" Zoe yelled.

They ran after him, but there was no way they could keep up. Pieces of the robot kept falling off, getting in our way.

Wha-what is that ringing sound?

Nico had been hearing that high-pitched tone ever since the giant got electrocuted and it didn't stop. There was a painful tug at his heart and Nico tried to deny what his mind and heart were telling him.

No, it can't be true. It can't. She said...she said she wouldn't abandon me.

The giant crumbled from the top down: his head, his chest, and finally, his legs collapsed. When they reached the wreckage the group and Nico searched frantically, yelling Bianca's name. They crawled around in the vast hollow pieces and the legs and the head. They searched until the sun started to rise, but Nico knew there was no luck. The ringing had finally stopped and Nico couldn't ignore anymore what his gut— his whole being—was telling him.

She was dead. Bianca was dead and there was nothing to bring her back.

He watched numbly as Zoe sat down and wept; Thalia yelled in rage and impaled her sword in the giant's smashed face. "We can keep searching," Percy said. "It's light now. We'll find her."

"No we won't," Grover said miserably. "It happened just as it was supposed to."

"What are you talking about?" The older demigod demanded.

He looked up at Percy with big watery eyes. "The prophecy. One shall be lost in the land without rain."

Nico wasn't crying yet but he was shaking uncontrollably. He clenched his fists tight and that's when he remembered the small figurine in his hand. Nico stared at it and for some reason a tide was unleashed inside him.

He wailed.