Disclaimer: I only own the plot and my OCs. Anything you recognize as not mine belongs to Rick Riordan, Greco-Roman mythology, and/or their otherwise respective owners.

Author's Notes: Sorry it's been a couple weeks! I know this is gonna sound weird because we're in the middle of one of the books rn, but I had writer's block. Trying to manage 3 different dream storylines + changing the books as needed is a lot more complicated than it sounds lol.

Anyways, that's why the chapter title changed, because I decided to hold off on continuing the Kronos/Drífa storyline for now. Some things have to be revealed before the arrival of the babies with them, but that's on a more flexible storyline than the BotL stuff is. Does that make sense?

As always, I hope you enjoy. Until the next chapter,

~TGWSI/Selene Borealis

~The Finding Home Saga~

~Finding Home~

~Chapter 93: I Perform A Jailbreak~

Once again, I didn't get a night of restful sleep, except this time it was because of a dream.

I was in the stateroom of the Princess Andromeda. The windows were open on the moonlit sea. Cold wind rustled the velvet drapes.

Luke knelt on a Persian rug in front of the golden sarcophagus of Kronos. In the moonlight, his sandy blonde hair looked even brighter, almost white. He wore an ancient Greek chiton and a white himation, the kind of cape that flowed down his shoulders. The white clothes made him look timeless and surreal, like one of the minor gods on Mount Olympus.

And not to mention, undeniably handsome.

"Our spies report success, milord," he said. "Camp Half-Blood has sent out a quest, as you predicted. Our side of the bargain is almost complete."

Excellent. The voice of Kronos didn't speak so much as pierce my mind like a dagger. It was freezing with cruelty, a sharp contrast to how the voice of his essence had been with my great-great-grandmother. Like I said, he'd been more like a toddler then. Once we have the means to navigate, I will lead the vanguard through myself.

Luke closed his eyes as if collecting his thoughts. "Milord, perhaps it is too soon. Perhaps Krios or Hyperion should lead – "

No. The voice was quiet, but absolutely firm. I will lead. One more heart shall join our cause, and that will be sufficient. At last, I shall rise fully from Tartarus.

"But the form, milord..." Luke's voice started shaking.

Show me your sword, Luke Germanus Castellan.

A jolt went through me. I realized that I'd never heard anybody else besides him or me say his full name before.

Luke drew his sword. Backbiter's double edge glowed wickedly – half mortal steel, half celestial bronze.

You pledged your oath to me, Kronos reminded him. You took this sword as proof of your oath.

"Yes, milord. It's just – "

You wanted power. I gave you that. You are now beyond harm. Soon you will rule the worlds of gods and mortals – and with Percy Jackson as your side, as I have promised, if he is able to survive. Do you not wish to avenge yourself and all the other half-bloods? To see Olympus destroyed.

A shiver ran through Luke's body. I knew it was his doubt, but I didn't think anybody else would. Not even the King of the Titans. "Yes."

The coffin glowed, a golden light filling the room. Then make ready the strike force. As soon as the bargain is done, we shall move forward. First, Camp Half-Blood will be reduced to ashes. Once those bothersome heroes are mostly eliminated or on our side, then we will march to Olympus.

The light of the coffin faded. Luke got to his feet. He sheathed his sword, adjusted his white clothes, and took a deep breath.

Then, he exited the room.

He didn't say anything, not until he was well down the hall, more than out of the hearing range of Kronos, him not possessing a true corporeal body aside. My boyfriend sagged against one of the pillars in the hallway, running a hand over his face. His shoulders shook once with a suppressed sob.

"I'm sorry, Percy," he whispered. "I hope you'll one day forgive me."

"What do you mean, 'spies?'" Travis asked.

"I don't know, that's just what they said," I said.

I'd given him, Annabeth, and Katie a slightly polished version of my dream as soon as I'd woken up, leaving out the obvious bits. But I think Katie must've had some sort of idea: she was eyeing me speculatively, her arms crossed. She could probably sense the sheer terror that I was trying so hard to hide.

What on Earth did Luke think I'd need to forgive him for?

"Maybe he's talking about Quintus?" my best friend suggested. We all looked at her. She shrugged. "What? He just appeared this summer, kind of conveniently. And he has a hellhound."

...That would explain why I'd felt so uneasy around him.

"I don't think hellhounds are sentient enough to count as a 'spy,' Katie," Travis said, a smile spreading across his face.

She raised an eyebrow. "Why? Have you ever tried to talk to one before?"

"It doesn't matter," Annabeth said.

I frowned. "Chase – "

"There's no way that we can make an IM to Camp without sunlight, and there's been little to no sunlight down here," she reasoned, taking her hair out of its ponytail so she could put it in a better one. "We need to keep moving; we've been here for too long as it is. If we come across a room with enough sunlight that you can make a rainbow like you did last winter, Percy, we can stop to do that. But only if we do."

None of us liked it, but we could see that she had a point. I'd made the promise to not use the whistle for Mrs. O'Leary, and this was an instance too simple for it anyways.

But now, with the prospect that Quintus was a spy, I was even more assured.

We went on our way once we gathered all of our things. There were several rooms that we went through, all of them basically much of the same as the last. We finally came upon a tunnel, but here was the bad news: it had no side exits, twists or turns. It was a dead end.

After walking quickly for a hundred yards, we ran into a rather large boulder that completely blocked our path.

"Maybe we should go back," Travis said.

Annabeth chewed her lip. "Maybe."

She didn't sound like she liked that idea.

I snorted. "What, do you think we can move that boulder?"

Unfortunately, she was actually considering it. "There's no harm in trying," she said. "I think – I can figure something out. Percy, stand back; you shouldn't help unless we absolutely need you to."

Annoyed, but knowing that she was right because of the two lives that were sequestered within me, I did as I was told.

They were able to do it. The task took a lot of sweat, grit, pushing, and the usage of Travis' sword (which thankfully didn't get bent), and Katie's vines. But, in the end, they were able to move the boulder without my help.

Travis had to duck his head in order to get on the other side of the boulder. He, Annabeth, and Katie worked together to move the boulder back into place.

"Guys – " I said.

They ignored me.

"Guys!"

It wasn't until after they were done that I was able to get their attention. "Well, nobody's going to be following us through there," Travis said, slapping his palms against each other.

"Yeah, and unless you guys have any better ideas, we might not be able to get back out," I deadpanned.

We were now in a twenty-foot-square cement room and the opposite wall was covered with metal bars. We'd gone straight into a cell.

"What in Hades?" Annabeth tugged on the bars. They didn't budge.

Through the bars we could see rows of cells in ring around a dark courtyard – at least three stories of metal doors and metal catwalks.

"A prison," Travis groaned. "Oh, great!"

"Shhh!" Katie said. "Listen."

Somewhere above us, deep sobbing echoed through the building. There was another sound, too – a raspy voice muttering something that I couldn't make out. The words were strange, like rocks in a tumbler.

"What's that language?" I asked.

Annabeth cocked her head. "I don't know...but I think I might have a way to get us out of here."

From her bag, she pulled out an electric torch, of all things. Except, unlike the mortal ones, when she turned this one on, out came green fire. Greek fire.

Aka, one of the most dangerous weapons in the entire world.

"Whoa," Katie said, her eyes wide. "Where did you get that?"

"Early birthday present from Bianca," Annabeth replied, as if that was enough explanation on its own.

The torch did the trick. In the span of five minutes, she was able to break off two of the bars by melting their metal so we could all get through. We made sure to put them on the ground as quietly as possible, so hopefully nobody would find us.

The prison was dark, only a few dim fluorescent lights flickering above.

"I know this place," the daughter of Athena realized. "This is Alcatraz."

"You mean that island near San Francisco?" I recalled learning something about it in one of my history classes – it'd been occupied during the late '60s/early '70s as a Native American protest. That was all I really remembered about it, though, besides it obviously being a prison.

Annabeth nodded. "My school took a field trip here. It's like a museum."

It didn't seem possible that we could've popped out of the Labyrinth on the other side of the country, but I knew that Annabeth, of all people, would know what she was talking about.

"Wait," Travis said.

We all stopped and looked where he was pointing, and my stomach did a somersault. On the second-floor balcony, across the courtyard, was a monster more horrible than anything I'd seen before.

It was sort of like a centaur, with a woman's body from the waist up. But instead of a horse's lower body, it had the body of a dragon – at least twenty feet long, black and scaly with enormous claws and a barbed tail. Her legs looked like they were tangled in vines, but then I realized they were sprouting snakes, hundreds of vipers darting around, constantly looking for something to bite. The woman's hair was also made of snakes, like Medusa's.

Weirdest of all, around her waist, where the woman part met the dragon part, her skin bubbled and morphed, occasionally producing the heads of animals – a vicious wolf, a bear, a lion, as if she was wearing a belt of ever-changing creatures.

I got the feeling that I was looking at something half-formed, a monster so old it was from the beginning of time, before shapes had been fully defined.

"Get down!" Katie hissed.

We crouched in the shadows, but the monster wasn't paying us any attention. It seemed to be talking to someone inside a cell on the second floor. That's where the sobbing was coming from. The dragon woman said something in her weird rumbling language.

"What's she saying?" I muttered. "What's that language?"

"I have an idea, but you're not going to like it," Annabeth murmured back. "What do you guys remember about the original Titanomachy?"

I hated how she said "original." "You mean the war between the Titans and the gods?"

"Yeah," Katie whispered back. "It was a long war. Ten years. The gods were losing. They needed help. Gaia told them to seek out..." She swallowed thickly, apparently realizing what Annabeth was trying to say. "She told them to free her elder children, the Cyclopes and the Hundred-Handed Ones, from their prison in Tartarus."

Annabeth nodded. "There was a monster who was serving as their warden," she said. "I think that's her. And...she must be talking in the primordial language, what Gaia and the other ancient deities would have spoken before the gods."

I was wondering if I could somehow translate the monster's speech, given that I was the champion of Rhea, although I didn't have the slightest idea of how I would explain something like that without revealing prematurely she was my second patron.

But then, the dragon lady turned towards the stairwell, vipers hissing around her legs like grass skirts. She spread her wings that I hadn't noticed before – huge bat wings she kept folded against her dragon back. She leaped off of the catwalk and soared across the courtyard.

We crouched lower in the shadows. A hot, sulfurous wind blasted over my face as the monster flew over. She quickly disappeared around the corner.

"Μὰ – Μὰ θεούς," Travis coughed, waving his hand in front of his face.

Annabeth grimaced. "That's definitely Kampê, alright."

"You said she was the warden for the Cyclopes and the Hundred-Handed Ones," I said. "How much you wanna bet that one of them is in there?" I pointed to the cell Kampê had just been in front of.

Annabeth visibly debated her options.

"I guess we should check out," she said finally, "before Kampê comes back."

As we approached the cell, the weeping got louder. When I first saw the creature inside, I wasn't exactly sure of what I was looking at. He was human-sized, not giant like I was expecting based off of what I had since remembered about the elder children of Gaia and Ouranos, and his skin was very pale, like the color of milk. He wore a loincloth like a big diaper. His feet seemed too big for his body, with cracked dirty toenails, and there were eight toes on each foot.

But the top half of his body was the weird part – he made Janus look downright normal. His chest sprouted more arms than I could count, in rows, all around his body. The arms looked like normal arms, but there were so many of them, all tangled together, that his chest kind of looked like a forkful of spaghetti somebody had twirled together. Several of his hands were covering his face as he sobbed.

Something took over me. I rushed forwards, crouching down in front of the cell despite the absolute pain that it caused me, and it wasn't until I was there that I realized what it was:

My maternal instincts, or whatever else you want to call them.

"Percy!" Annabeth whisper-shouted at me.

I don't know if I can really explain it, but somehow I knew that the Hundred-Handed One was sobbing like a little kid. Not like a being who had fought with the gods for his freedom, hurling so many gigantic rocks at the Titans that many of them had been buried underneath them. No, like a child who had just seen the scariest thing he had ever faced, and all he wanted was some comfort.

And maybe...maybe he basically was a kid, right now. I mean, he was a being thousands and thousands of years older than I was, if not millions, but...no one really knew how long the Cyclopes and the Hundred-Handed Ones had spent in Tartarus. For most of history, the immortals didn't perceive time the same way that we mortals do.

If he was scared of going back, I could understand him reverting to the behaviors he had expressed during his time in Tartarus. Especially if he was terrified out of his mind of Kampê, which I was pretty sure he was.

I was terrified of her.

"Hey. Hey, it's okay," I soothed. My voice took on that tone that could only be described as a "Mom voice." I didn't know I'd had it in me yet. "It's alright. You're okay."

The sobbing stopped.

The Hundred-Handed One looked up. His face was long and sad, with a crooked nose and bad teeth. He had deep brown eyes – and I mean completely brown, with no whites or black pupils, like eyes formed out of clay.

"Who – who are you?" he asked.

"My name is Percy Jackson, and these are my friends, Annabeth Chase, Katie Gardner, and Travis Stoll. We're demigods," I said, gesturing over to them. Kindly, I added, "Can you tell me your name?"

"Br – Briares," he said. "If you are demigods, then you – you should leave! Quickly, before she sees you!"

He wiped his nose with five or six hands. Several others were fidgeting with little pieces of metal and wood from a broken bed. It was amazing to watch. The hands seemed to have a mind of their own. They built a toy boat out of wood, then disassembled it just as fast. Other hands were scratching at the cement floor for no apparent reason. Others were playing rock, paper, scissors. A few others were making ducky and doggie shadow puppets against the wall.

"We're not going to do that," I said firmly. "We want to help you."

"'Help?'" he cried. His voice became loud. "There is no help! Kampê is back! The Titans will rise and throw us into Tartarus!"

"We're going to help you," I insisted. "But you're going to have to be brave. Can you put on your brave face for me?"

Immediately, Briares' face morphed into something else. Same brown eyes, but otherwise totally different features. He had an upturned nose, arched eyebrows, and a weird smile, like he was trying to act brave. But then his face turned back to what it had been before.

Fifty faces, I remembered. The Hundred-Handed Ones had as many arms as their name said, and fifty faces.

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

"We need to get out of here," Katie spoke up then. I turned to glare at her, but she was defiant. "What? Kampê will be back. She'll see us sooner or later."

"We're not leaving him behind," I said. I'd refuse to allow it. Just the thought of it made my heart feel like it would tear in two.

Briares didn't deserve this.

"We need to break the bars," Annabeth said.

I almost sighed in relief, glad that she was agreeing with me.

Rather than asking Briares to break the bars like I thought she would (and fail at), Annabeth took out her torch again. She got rid of three of the bars this time. About the same amount of time passed as before, and that made me nervous.

When the last bar was broken off, I reached out my hand. "Come on, Briares," I said. "Let's get you out of here."

For a second, Briares' face morphed into 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 alright," Annabeth said. "You fought the Titans before, and you won, remember?"

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

"Don't listen to her," Travis said. "Come on!"

I knew that wasn't going to work. And indeed, Briares didn't move.

But Katie was right. We didn't have much time before Kampê returned.

Suddenly, an idea popped into my head.

If Briares was like a kid right now, then maybe –

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

Annabeth looked at me like I was crazy.

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

"Then let's do it!" I pounded my fist in my palm three times.

Briares did the same with all one hundred of his 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 into confusion. "What is that you made?"

"A gun," I told him, showing him my finger gun. It was a trick I'd learned a long time ago. "A gun beats anything."

"That's not fair."

"I didn't say anything about fair," I reasoned. "You know Kampê's not going to be fair if we hang around. She's going to blame you for us taking off the bars. Now, come on!"

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

I started to feel hopeful. All we had to do was get downstairs and find the Labyrinth entrance.

But then, Travis and Katie froze.

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

"The other way," I said.

We bolted down the catwalk. This time, Briares was happy to follow us. In fact, he sprinted out front, a hundred arms waving in panic.

Behind us, I heard the sound of giant wings as Kampê took to the air. She hissed and growled in her ancient language, but I didn't need a translation to know she was planning on killing us.

We scrambled down the stairs, through a corridor, and past a guard's station – out into another block of prison cells.

"Left!" Annabeth cried out. "I remember this from the tour!"

We burst outside and found ourselves in the prison yard, ringed by security towers and barbed wire. After being inside for so long, the daylight almost blinded me. Tourists were milling about, taking pictures. The wind whipped off the cold bay. In the south, San Francisco gleamed all white and beautiful, but in the north, over Mount Tamalpais, there were huge storm clouds swirling. The whole sky seemed like a black top spinning from the mountain where Atlas was once again imprisoned, and where the Titan palace of Mount Othrys was rising anew. It was hard to believe that the tourists couldn't see the supernatural storm brewing, but they didn't give any hint that anything was wrong.

"It's even worse," Annabeth said, gazing to the north. "The storms have been bad all year, but that – "

"Keep moving," Briares wailed. "She is behind us!"

We ran to the far end of the yard, as far from the cellblock as possible.

"Kampê's too big to get through the doors," Travis said hopefully.

Then the wall exploded.

Tourists screamed as Kampê appeared from the dust and rubble, her wings spread out as wide as the yard. She was holding two swords – long bronze scimitars that glowed with a weird greenish aura, boiling wisps of vapor that smelled sour and hot even across the yard. Maybe not Greek fire, but definitely something equally as bad.

"Poison!" Katie said, grimacing.

I had the mind to agree with her. "Let's avoid the swords," I said.

"We need Briares to get to his full height!" Annabeth shouted.

But instead, Briares looked like he was trying to shrink even smaller. He appeared to be wearing his absolutely terrifiedface.

Kampê thundered towards us on her dragon legs, hundreds of snakes slithering around her body.

For a second, I'm not gonna lie, I thought about drawing Riptide and facing her, but along with the reminder that I was pregnant, my heart crawled into my throat.

Then Annabeth said what I was thinking: "Run!"

That was the end of the debate. There was no fighting this thing. We ran through the jail yard and out of the gates of the prison, the monster right behind us. Mortals screamed and ran. Emergency sirens began to blare.

We hit the wharf just as a tour boat was unloading. The new group of visitors froze as they saw us charging towards them, followed by a mob of frightened tourists, followed by...I don't know what they saw through the Mist, but it could not have been good.

"The boat?" Travis shouted.

"Too slow!" Annabeth screamed back. "We have to go back into the maze! It's our only chance!"

"But how are we going to do that?" exclaimed Katie.

"We need a diversion!" I said. I had an idea, and it was undeniably reckless of me, but I didn't know what else to do. I began to slow down. "Go!"

My friends all looked at me like I'd lost my mind. "Percy!"

Maybe I had. But I was the only one who could use my powers quickly enough and with enough power.

"I'll catch up!" I promised them. "Just go! Don't worry about me!"

I turned around, so I didn't get to see what they did.

Kampê was approaching us, a horrible glare on her horrible face. The snakes of her hair and her legs all lashed and hissed, their tongues darting in every direction. A lion popped out of the weird half-formed faces around her waist and roared.

Urging on my powers with the tug behind my navel and my hand, I caused a giant wave to rise up from the wharf behind me. More tourists screamed now than ever, something about tsunamis and earthquakes and maybe the end of the world.

I did my best to make sure that none of them would be swept out to sea, but it was hard – because I was trying to do the very opposite with Kampê. She thrashed in the water as soon as it came down on her, snarling and raging. She kept on marching forwards.

No, no, come on! I thought.

I needed more power.

The realization caused me to gasp, because that was exactly what I got. Once more, along with the tug behind my navel, there was another that was not quite my own. But the two worked together, and between them, I was able to bring Kampê out past the wharf, into the bay. I knew that wouldn't deter her for long, so I didn't waste any more time.

I found my friends and Briares in the cell where we'd come in, but the back of the wall was completely smooth – no sign of a boulder or anything.

"Percy!" Katie said. "Thank the gods."

I grimaced. I could feel the exhaustion from over-using my powers coming on. "Don't thank them yet!"

"Look for the mark!" Annabeth instructed.

"There!" Travis touched a tiny scratch, and it became a Greek Δ. The mark of Daedalus glowed blue, and the stone wall ground open.

It was just in the nick of time. Kampê was marching down the cellblock, her swords slicing indiscriminately through cell bars and stone walls in what I presumed was an effort to look intimidating. It was working.

Annabeth, Travis, Katie, Briares, and I ran inside the maze. As if sensing that we were trying to escape, the stone door closed in record timing. Its magic sealed us in. I could feel the whole tunnel shake as Kampê pounded against it, roaring furiously.

We didn't stick around to play knock, knock with her, though. We raced into the darkness, and for the first time (and the last), I was glad to be back in the Labyrinth.

Word Count: 4,396

Next Chapter Title: The Demon Dude Ranch