The Battle of the Labyrinth

Run!”
    Tyson darted to one side, but the snake used its head like a club and knocked him off his feet.
    “No!” Grover yelled. But before Tyson could regain his balance, the snake wrapped around him and started to squeeze.
    Tyson strained, pushing with all his immense strength, but the snake squeezed tighter. Grover frantically hit the snake with his reed pipes, but he might as well have been banging on a stone wall.
    The whole room shook as the snake flexed its muscles, shuddering to overcome Tyson’s strength.
    Grover began to play with pipes, and stalactites rained down from the ceiling. The whole cave seemed about to collapse. . . .
    I woke with Annabeth shaking my shoulder. “Percy, wake up!”
    “Tyson—Tyson’s in trouble!” I said. “We have to help him!”
    “First things first,” she said. “Earthquake!”
    Sure enough, the room was rumbling. “Rachel!” I yelled.
    Her eyes opened instantly. She grabbed her pack, and the three of us ran. We were almost to the far tunnel when a column next to us groaned and buckled. We kept going as a hundred tons of marble crashed down behind us.
    We made it to the corridor and turned just in time to see the other columns toppling. A cloud of white dust billowed over us, and we kept running.
    “You know what?” Annabeth said. “I like this way after all.”
    It wasn’t long before we saw light up ahead—like regular electric lighting.
    “There,” Rachel said.
    We followed her into a stainless steel hallway, like I imagined they’d have on a space station or something. Fluorescent lights glowed from the ceiling. The floor was a metal grate.
    I was so used to being in the darkness that I had to squint. Annabeth and Rachel both looked pale in the harsh illumination.
    “This way,” Rachel said, beginning to run. “We’re close!”
    “This is so wrong!” Annabeth said. “The workshop should be in the oldest section of the maze. This can’t—”
    She faltered, because we’d arrived at a set of metal double doors. Inscribed in the steel, at eye level, was a large blue Greek L.
    “We’re here,” Rachel announced. “Daedalus’s workshop.”
    * * *
    Annabeth pressed the symbol on the doors and they hissed open.
    “So much for ancient architecture,” I said.
    Annabeth scowled. Together we walked inside.
    The first thing that struck me was the daylight—blazing sun coming through giant windows. Not the kind of thing you expect in the heart of a dungeon. The workshop was like an artist’s studio, with thirty-foot ceilings and industrial lighting, polished stone floors, and workbenches along with windows. A spiral staircase led up to a second-story loft. Half a dozen easels displayed hand-drawn diagrams for buildings and machines that looked like Leonardo da Vinci sketches. Several laptop computers were scattered around on the tables. Glass jars of green oil— Greek fire—lined one shelf. There were inventions, too— weird metal machines I couldn’t make sense of. One was a bronze chair with a bunch of electrical wires attached to it, like some kind of torture device. In another corner stood a giant metal egg about the size of a man. There was a grandfather clock that appeared to be made entirely of glass, so you could see all the gears turning. And hanging on the wall were several sets of bronze and silver wings.
    “Di immortales,” Annabeth muttered. She ran to the nearest easel and looked at the sketch. “He’s a genius. Look at the curves on this building!”
    “And an artist,” Rachel said in amazement. “These wings are amazing!”
    The wings looked more advanced than the ones I’d seen in my dreams. The feathers were more tightly interwoven.
    Instead of wax seals, self-adhesive strips ran down the sides.
    I kept my hand on Riptide. Apparently Daedalus was not at home, but the workshop looked like it had been recently used. The laptops were running their screen savers. A half-eaten blueberry muffin and a coffee cup sat on a workbench.
    I walked to the window. The view outside was amazing. I recognized the Rocky Mountains in the distance. We were high up in the foothills, at least five hundred feet, and down below a valley spread out, filled with a tumbled collection of red mesas and boulders and spires of stone. It looked like some huge kid had been building a toy city with skyscraper-size blocks, and then decided to knock it over.
    “Where are we?” I wondered.
    “Colorado Springs,” a voice said behind us. “The Garden