Stars in the Sky| The Titan's Curse Male Reader Insert

12. Thalia Asks For Some Dam Help

We found a tow truck at the edge of the dump. It looked like it was older than the gods themselves, but the engine started and it had a full tank of gas for some reason, so we decided to borrow it.

Zoe had made me an arm sling out of the shafts of a few arrows and what was left of my tattered jacket sleeve. She didn't speak a single word, but gave a quick nod when I thanked her.

Thalia drove. She seemed the least stunned out of all of us.

"The skeletons are still out there," she reminded us. "We need to keep moving."

She navigated us through the desert under clear blue skies. The sand was so bright that it hurt my eyes to look at it. Thalia and Zoe chosen the two seats in the truck while Percy, Bianca, Grover, and I sat on the rusty truck bed, leaning against the two wrench. The air was cool and dry, which was nice, but the nice weather felt like an insult after my arm had been...I don't even know what to call it. I still had it. It was attached to me, but I couldn't feel it. I couldn't move it. I couldn't even channel magic through it. Anytime I tried, energy just began leaking out into the air. My pathways had been ruptured what felt like hundred times over. It was nothing but deadweight. I would've asked one of the others to just cut it off if there wasn't a risk of bleeding out from it.

Someone poked my shoulder gently. I opened my eyes to see Bianca staring at me with big, guilty eyes. Grover and Percy were having their own quiet conversation on the other side of the tow wrench.

"(Name)," Bianca softly said. "I..."

I wanted to glare at her. I wanted to be angry—to yell, scream, cry at her. But I didn't have it in me. I was so mentally exhausted that the only thing I could feel was tired. I was angrier at Zoe than her anyway. Bianca was twelve years old and this was her first quest not even two days after learning that she was a demigod. Of course she would make some bad decisions. Percy and I had been at camp for at least a week before the quest for the master bolt, but Bianca had no time to acclimate. I couldn't blame her for messing up, even if I desperately wanted to.

"It's fine," I responded quietly. It wasn't, but I didn't want to make her feel any guiltier. "Things happen."

"It's not fine!" She hissed out. "I made you sacrifice your arm for a stupid toy!" She looked about ready to throw the figurine.

"Bianca," I got her attention. "You made a mistake. That's normal. It could've ended worse. We got out of there alive, that's all that matters."

My words didn't seem to make her feel any better though.

Good, I thought to myself, she deserves to feel bad.

I had no idea where that thought came from, but I felt horrible because I knew that I didn't deny it.

I stared down at the dead weight connected to me. It looked disgusting. I hated looking at it. When no one was looking, I silently casted a sheet of Mist over it. It shifted until my arm looked like nothing had happened to it. It looked normal. I wanted to cry. No matter how it looked, it was still gone. I didn't want to go back to camp and have everyone treat me like I'm fragile. I could still fight. I would...just have to relearn some things.

The tow truck ran out of gas at the edge of a river canyon. Not that it mattered any, since the road was a dead-end at this point.

Thalia got out and slammed the door. Immediately, one of the tires blew, which was a great indication of how this quest was going so far. "Great. What now?"

I didn't even bother my usual joking answer to try to lift the mood. Instead, I scanned the area around us. There was desert all around us, with occasional clumps of barren mountains here and there. The only interesting thing was the canyon. The river itself wasn't anything amazing, maybe fifty yards across. Green water with a few rapids, but it carved a huge scar in the desert. The rock clips dropped away below us. I was really getting tired of cliffs, valleys, gorges, and other things like that.