I’m so so sorry for months long wait. I lost inspiration and took a summer break but I’m back! First: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/1251840016 Next: none yet! Previous: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/1281914698/ Chapter Ten: After a few days, we were about two-thirds of the way to Arizona’s border. “So where do you think this junkyard is in Arizona?” I asked. “No clue,” Mora admitted. “But I think we’ll know it when we see it.” All of a sudden, black limousine rolled down the narrow road. Mor pulled over to let them pass, but to our surprise, they pulled over near us. A biker guy with a leather vest and sunglasses stepped out and a woman who reminded me of Tate followed. “Ugh. All this dirt is ruining my outfit.” She scrunched her nose. She was wearing a deep red, silk dress and black stilettos. She kept trying to tame her champagne blonde hair with her hands. She gave up and climbed back into the car. The biker guy came and knocked on our window. “Hey, punks. The lady wants to talk to you.” He pointed at me. “Me? Who are you?” I asked harshly. He just laughed and said, “Can you guess? I don’t think you get along well with my kids.” Tate’s eyes widened and whispered, “It’s Lord Ares.” “Is my mom in that car?” Mor asked. “Yeah and you’ll get your turn. Now, she requested little Penny here.” I internally cringed, but pushed open the door. I climbed into the limo snd sat down. Aphrodite’s image flickered, but often looked similar to Tate. “What do you want to tell me?” I said, trying to keep my cool. “Well, I heard about your quest and thought I would give you a little help, like I did almost exactly like this for another group of heroes.” “So, where is it?” I asked. “The Junkyard of the Gods moves to slow, or occasionally speed, heroes along. As long as you go as directly west as you can, you will find it.” “Okay, is that it?” I said. “Beware the replica of Talos,” Aphrodite warned. Talos really must be bad. “Also, I would like to see my daughter before I go.” I climbed out and Ares nodded his head at the limo, indicating that Mora could go in. I slid back into the back and Tate asked, “What did Aphrodite want?” “She said that if we drive straight west, we’ll find the junkyard. She also said to beware Talos.” “It must be because he guarded Crete and threw boulders at Jason and the Argonauts, so the replica must also be guarding the junkyard,” Tate replied. Leave it to the daughter of Athena to sprout facts. A second later, Mora got in and slammed the door. “Be careful, beware Talos, and drive safe is all my mother has to say to me?” they muttered under their breath. They cranked up the radio. “Oh, Mor, we have to drive directly west and it’ll find us,” I supplied. “Okay,” they said and luckily, there was a road going west. ————————————————————————— We were only driving for maybe twenty minutes when a large scrapyard came into view.
“Well, this must be it,” Tate said, leaning forward to get a better view. As we drove closer, I saw a large, bronze statue. “Talos,” I whispered. Tate nodded. I squinted and saw many, many more smaller, bronze figures. They appeared to be human size, but we were still pretty far way, so I couldn’t tell for sure. “Automatons, of course,” Tate realized. “Bronze with brains.” Mor pulled over and climbed out to see better. I realized that we would probably have to fight these automatons. My breathing and pulse quickened. Tate reached over, took my hand, and started walking me through my panic attack. I finally calmed down and realized she had slid over to be right next to me. “It’s all right, Nell, I’m here,” she said. I froze up for a second. I never really liked nicknames, but from Tate, it was so different. She stroked my hair and I found myself leaning forward. Tate also started inching closer to me. Our faces were maybe an inch or two apart and I could feel our breath mingling when Mora called, “Hey, lovebirds! As much as I hate to interrupt, you’re going to want to see this!” The largest one, Talos, has risen up and was looking straight at us. Every heavy step he took toward us shook the ground. He covered a lot of ground with every step and would soon be close enough to kιll us.
