Chapter Text
1: I Definitely Should Never Become a Grief Counselor
"It - it was for Nico. It's the only one he didn't have. Tell him - tell him I'm sorry."
"Bianca, no!"
She ignored me. ~The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan
She was gone, we looked everywhere, but that didn't matter. Thalia yelling in rage and stabbing Talos didn't matter, the fact that she was just gone, disappeared like my mother (even without the gold glittering, we didn't find a body, she was gone) didn't matter.
And me explaining all of this to Nico even as my eyes started stinging and I watched the way the moon made his skin gray, white like bones, almost - and I didn't even get to tell him about the whole FDR Drive thing. No, the - it was about the Lotus Casino. How he and Bianca were put there, or taken there. How they were definitely taken OUT of there for some reason, some way to control the prophecy, whatever it was.
All I know is how sick I feel after the pavilion cracks. After trying to explain what Bianca said to me, but I could've stopped her. I should have! And Nico was right, saying that I promised to protect his sister. Because I did, and I failed.
So of course the kid wouldn't listen, but he also didn't even try to run from the dam zombie. All he did was yell at it, and probably me - definitely me - to "go away!" And then he said he hated me, which, he's got a right to. I should've laid out in the path of that dam Talos, should've taken it on myself. I could've gotten inside just as easy as Bianca did - maybe.
Probably.
I still don't know, but Nico ran away and the shadows of the woods swallowed him, and I felt just as awful as I did waking up after I thought I'd lost my mom.
Because she was all I had, and for Nico that was Bianca. His big sister. Poor kid, he lost everything and I -
I just STOOD there.