SUNSPEAKER, percy jackson.

0𝟏𝟕. never meet your heroes

seventeen
never meet your heroes

BRIARES WASN'T AS AMAZING AS TYSON had described him. When they reached the cell, the weeping got louder.

Briares was human-size and his skin was pale, like the color of milk. He wore a loincloth and his feet seemed too big for his body, with cracked dirty toenails, and eight toes on each foot. But the top half of his body was the weird part. His chest sprouted more arms than Lennon 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 looked kind of like a forkful of spaghetti somebody had twirled together. Several of his hands were covering his face as he sobbed.

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

Annabeth elbowed Percy and hissed, rubbing his ribs. The blonde only sent him a glare.

Tyson didn't pay any attention. He fell to his knees. "Briares!"

The sobbing stopped.

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

Briars looked up. His face was long and sad. He had deep brown eyes, that had no black pupils, like eyes formed out of clay.

"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!"

Briars wiped his nose with five or six hands. Several others were fidgeting with little pieces of metal and wood from a broken bed. 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.

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

"Put on your brave face!" Tyson said.

Immediately Briares's 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.

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

"How did you do that?" Percy asked.

"Percy," Lenon frowned. "Don't be rude,"

"The Hundred-Handed Ones all have fifty different faces," Annabeth informed him.

"Must make it hard to get a yearbook picture," He commented. Lennon's mouth upturned slightly at his comment.

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

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

"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.

Lennon watched sadly. Briares was terrified. After all, Kampê had imprisoned him in Tartarus for thousands of years. Lennon knows for a fact she would never be the same if she'd been imprisoned like him.