The left tunnel, which seemed to be the best option at first, was a decent idea. It was straight with no side exits, twists, or turns. Unfortunately, it was a dead end. A large boulder was blocking the path, but the group needed to move. Something that wasn't human was approaching quickly. 

"Tyson," Percy said urgently. "Can you-?"

"Yes!" the cyclops grinned. He slammed his large shoulder against the rock. The force from the attack caused dust to trickle down as the whole corridor shook. 

"Hurry!" Grover said. "Don't bring the roof down, but hurry!"

"No. Take your time. It's not like we have a monster on our tails," Finley said sarcastically before whispering under her breath. "It's not like any of us are claustrophobic."

The boulder finally gave with a horrible grinding noise. Tyson pushed it into a small room and the group rushed through. 

"Close the entrance!" Annabeth hissed. 

Everyone pushed the boulder back into place. Whatever had been chasing them wailed in frustration once the rock was in place. 

"We trapped it," Percy sighed in relief. 

"Or trapped ourselves," Grover countered. 

Finley turned to see they were in a twenty-square-foot cement room. The opposite wall was covered with metal bars. They tunneled into a prison cell. 

"What in Hades?" Annabeth swore as she tugged on the bars. They didn't budge. However, through the bars, you could see rows of cells in a ring around a dark courtyard. It was about three stories high with metal doors and metal catwalks. 

"A prison," Percy declared. 

"No," Finley said exasperatedly as she began to breathe heavily. "It's a shopping mall!"

"Maybe Tyson can break-" Percy continued, choosing to ignore Finley. 

"Shh," Grover hushed. "Listen."

Somewhere above them, deep sobbing echoed through the building. Along with the sobbing was a deep and raspy voice. It was muttering in some foreign language, not the Finley needed to know. She already knew it couldn't be good. 

"What's that language?" Percy questioned, his sea-green eyes scanning the group. 

"Can't be!" Tyson murmured as his eye widened. 

"Please share," Finley stated, running her hands down her pant legs, hoping to calm down. 

Thankfully, she began to calm down. 

"Wait!" Grover called as Tyson bent the bars of their cell door wide enough for a cyclops to fit through. 

Tyson didn't wait, he took off down the corridor, and the others followed. 

"I know this place," Annabeth declared as they ran. "This is Alcatraz."

"You mean that island near San Francisco?" 

"Like Al Capone?" 

These were the first two questions to leave the mouths of Percy and Finley. 

"My school took a field trip here." Annabeth nodded, her blonde hair flying behind her as she ran. "It's like a museum."

It was clear Percy was skeptical about going through the maze and appearing on the other side of America within hours. However, he didn't say anything. He knew Annabeth had been going to school in San Francisco, but it was still odd for him. 

"Freeze," Grover cautioned, but Tyson kept running. "Stop! Tyson! Can't you see it?"

Finley's gaze followed to where he had been pointing. "Shit..."

The creature had the body of a centaur with a woman's body from the waist up. But she wasn't a centaur like Chiron. No, this monster had the bottom half of dragon—at least twenty feet long, black and scaly with enormous claws and a barbed tail. Her legs were like tangled vines, but they weren't vines. They were snakes, snakes of all kinds. The woman's hair, much like Medusa's, was full of snakes. Around her waist, her skin bubbled and morphed, occasionally producing heads of animals (a vicious wolf, a bear, a lion). 

Finley didn't need a Ph.D. in monsterology or whatever Annabeth called it. She knew this monster was old, older than one would originally believe. 

"It's her," Tyson whimpered. It was odd for someone so large to cower back, but size shouldn't determine whether or not you can fear something. 

"Get down!" Grover whispered urgently. 

As the group crouched in the shadows, Finley realized they didn't need to. The monster wasn't paying attention to them. Her attention was focused on a figure in the corner, which was sobbing. The dragon woman hissed and mumbled in some ancient tongue. 

"What is she saying?" Percy whispered from where he crouched, behind Finley. His breath dance across the back of her neck, and she hoped her involuntary shiver wasn't noticeable. "What language is that?"

"Not English," Finley whispered. 

"Wonderful answer, Sunny," Percy rolled his eyes. 

"Always, Seaweed Brain," Finley grinned. 

"The tongue of the old times," Tyson shivered. He looked as scared as Finley felt. "What Mother Earth spoke to Titans and...her other children. Before the gods."

"You understand it?" Percy asked. "Can you translate?"

Tyson closed his eye and began to speak in a horrible, raspy woman's voice. "You will work for the master or suffer."

Annabeth shuddered. "I hate it when he does that."

As a Cyclopes, Tyson has an inhuman ability to hear things and an uncanny ability to mimic voices. It was almost like he entered a trance while speaking in their voices. 

"I will not serve," Tyson said in a deep and wounded voice. 

"Then I shall enjoy your pain, Briares," Tyson faltered in the monster's voice at the use of the name. "If you thought your first imprisonment was unbearable, you have yet to feel true torment. Think on this until I return."

The dragon woman moved toward the stairwell. She spread her wide bat wings and leaped off the catwalk, soaring across the courtyard. Hot sulfurous wind-blasted Finley's face as the monster flew over. 

"H-h-horrible," Grover whimpered as the monster disappeared. "I've never smelled any monster that strong."

"Smells like a boy's room, but worse," Finley scrunched up her nose. 

"Hey!" Percy objected before frowning. "How would you know-"

"I have brothers, Seaweed Brain," she gave him a light shove. 

"Cyclopes' worst nightmare," Tyson murmured. "Kampê."

"Who?" Percy asked. 

"Every Cyclops knows about her. Stories about her scare us when we're babies. She was our jailer in the bad years."

Annabeth nodded "I remember now When the Titans ruled, they imprisoned Gaea and Ouranos's earlier children—the Cyclopes and the Hekatonkheires."

"The Heka-what?" Percy asked. 

"The Hundred-Handed Ones," Finley nodded. "They called them that for obvious reasons. They had a hundred hands. They were the elder brothers of the Cyclopes."

"Very powerful," Tyson said. "Wonderful! As tall as the sky. So strong they could break mountains!"

"Cool," Percy nodded. "Unless you're a mountain."

"Poor innocent mountains," Finley pouted. 

"Kampê was the jailer," Tyson said. "She worked for Kronos. She kept our brothers locked up in Tartarus, tortured them always until Zeus came. He killed Kampê and freed Cyclopes and Hundred-Handed Ones to help fight against the Titans in the big war."

Finley was struck with a raging pain in her head at the mention of Tartarus. Images of a river flashed in her mind, but it was of water. It was a river of fire. 

"And now Kampê is back," Percy stated. 

"Bad," Tyson summarized. 

"So who's in that cell?" Percy asked. "You said a name-"

"Briares!" Tyson perked up. "He is a Hundred-Handed One. They are as tall as the sky and-"

"They break mountains," Annabeth nodded. 

Finley furrowed her brows. There was no way someone as tall as the sky could fit in one of these cells. 

"I guess we should check it out," Annabeth said, "before Kampê comes back."

The weeping got louder as they approached the cell. Briares was human-sized with very pale skin, the color of milk. He wore a loincloth like a big diaper His feet seemed too big for his body, with cracked dirty nails, eight toes on each foot. The top half of his body sprouted more arms than anyone could count. All his arms were tangled together, that his chest looked kind of like a forkful of spaghetti. 

"Either the sky isn't as tall as it used to be," Percy whispered to Finley, "or he's short."

"Be nice," Finley hissed. "He's vertically challenged."

"Honestly, you two," Annabeth rolled her grey eyes. 

Tyson didn't pay attention to the trio. 

"Briares!" he called, falling to his knees. 

The sobbing stopped. 

"Great Hundred-Handed One!" Tyson said. "Help us!"

Briares looked up. His face was long and sad. His nose is rocked and has deep brown eyes...with no whites or pupils. 

"Run while you can, Cyclops," Briares said miserably. "I cannot even help myself."

"You are a Hundred-Handed One!" Tyson insisted. "You can do anything!"

Briares whipped his nose with five hands. The rest of his hands played rock, paper, scissors. A few more rebellious hands were making animal shadows on the wall. 

"I cannot!" Briares cried. "Kampê is back! The Titans will rise and throw us back into Tartarus."

"Put on your brave face!" Tyson urged. 

Briares face morphed into something else. He had an upturned nose and arched brows. It was clear he was trying to be brave, but then his face fell. 

"No good," he said. "My scared face keeps coming back."

Finley wished his statement didn't strike her core. She knew what it was like to put on a brave face. From what she could tell through her visions, her life would only get harder. 

"How did you do that?" Percy asked. 

"Don't be rude!" Annabeth elbowed him. "The Hundred-Handed Ones all have fifty different faces."

"Must make it hard to take pictures," Finley remarked. 

"It will be okay, Briares! We will help you! Can I have your autograph?" Tyson continued.

Finley didn't have the heart to tell him it might not be the best time to get an autograph. 

"Do you have one hundred pens?" Briares sniffed. 

"Guys," Grover interrupted. "We have to get out of here. Kampê will be back. She'll sense us sooner or later."

"Break the bars," Annabeth said.

"Yes!" Tyson said, smiling proudly. "Briares can do it. He is very strong. Stronger than Cyclopes, even! Watch!"

Briares whimpered. A dozen of his hands started playing patty-cake, but none of them made any attempt to break the bars.
"If he's so strong," Percy said, "why is he stuck in jail?"

Finley ribbed him. "He's terrified," she whispered. "Kampê had imprisoned him in Tartarus for thousands of years. How would you feel?"

The Hundred-Handed One covered his face again.

"Briares?" Tyson asked. "What...what is wrong? Show us your great strength!"

"Tyson," Annabeth said, "I think you'd better break the bars."

Tyson's smile melted slowly.

"I will break the bars," he repeated. He grabbed the cell door and ripped it off its hinges like it was made of wet clay.

"Come on, Briares," Annabeth said. "Let's get you out of here."

She held out her hand. For a second, Briares's face morphed to a hopeful expression. Several of his arms reached out, but twice as many slapped them away.

"I cannot," he said. "She will punish me."

"It's all right," Annabeth promised. "You fought the Titans before, and you won, remember?"

"I remember the war." Briares's face morphed again—furrowed brow and a pouting mouth. His brooding face, Finley guessed. "Lightning shook the world. We threw many rocks. The Titans and the monsters almost won. Now they are getting strong again. Kampê said so."

"Don't listen to her," Percy said. "Come on!"
He didn't move. The group knew they didn't have enough time. Finley's gears turned as she struggled to find a solution. 

"One game of rock, paper, scissors," Percy blurted out. "If I win, you come with us. If I lose, we'll leave you in jail."

Annabeth looked at him like he was crazy.

Briares's face morphed to doubtful. "I always win rock, paper, scissors."

"Then let's do it!" Percy pounded his fist in his palm three times. Briares did the same with all one hundred hands, which sounded like an army marching three steps forward. He came up with a whole avalanche of rocks, a classroom set of scissors, and enough paper to make a fleet of airplanes.

"I told you," he said sadly. "I always—" His face morphed to confusion. "What is that you made?"

"A gun," Percy told him, showing him his finger gun. It was a trick Paul Blofis had pulled on him, but he wasn't going to tell him that. "A gun beats anything."

"That's not fair."

"Technically," Finley grinned. "Percy won. Briares, I believe you have to hold your end of the deal."

Briares sniffled. "Demigods are cheaters." But he slowly rose to his feet and followed them out of the cell.

Tyson froze.

On the ground floor right below, Kampê was snarling at them.

Finley's hazel eyes widened in surprise. 

"Well fu-"