"Oscail."

The Fat Lady looked at Annabeth skeptically. Annabeth had said the right password, and the Fat Lady knew she was supposed to open up and let the student in, but she was. . . she was a Ravenclaw. The Fat Lady wasn't supposed to open up to anyone other than Gryffindors.

"C'mon, Oscail. I said the right password. Let me in." Annabeth was getting impatient. What if someone caught her out here? When the painting didn't swing open, she rolled her eyes.

"I'm not going to open."

"Do I have the right password?"

The lady in the painting scrunched her sculpted eyebrows.

"I'll take that as a yes," Annabeth declared. "I have the entry word, and yet you won't let me in. How do you think I got the password?" She didn't give the painting in pink any time to answer. "Right. I got it from another Gryffindor. Why do you think they gave it to me? Correct again. It was very, extremely important. And if you don't let me in, those plans have been shriveled by the Fat Lady. For all you know, Hogwarts could fall because you didn't let me in."

The woman without much of a chin looked very upset. Guiltily, she swung open to reveal the Gryffindor common room.

Annabeth's first thought: Red.

Scarlet was everywhere. Gold cushions were thrown on the velvet armchairs and couches, matching the embroidery on the side of armrests. A dying fire gave a warm glow, lighting the scorched bricks and the almost blackened mantle. The red walls were bold and distracting; they traced the few paintings that survived years of Gryffindor energy. Most of the paintings were asleep but one, who giggled when she saw Percy jump-hugged Annabeth, causing the two to topple onto the furry fabric. Without the eyes of other students, the two stayed there longer, taking in each other, happy to be reunited. "This is my common room, wadya' think?"

Annabeth took a second intake on the Gryffindor living space. It had a certain energy hanging in the air, as if the room was waiting for something big to happen, like the next prank or outrageous stunt. This tower was creating just for the Gryffindors, with their liveliness and high energy lifeway. She breathed in, letting the air of laughter and relaxed, yet on edge, feel seep into her lungs. "It's definitely red."

Percy smirked and sniggered a bit, happy to see Annabeth mesmerized by something that he was apart of.

Then, Percy kissed Annabeth.

Annabeth, almost on instinct, kissed back.

It just felt like the right thing to do. There was no hormonal pull, no real love, but just what felt normal. They were together. Both of them knew that. They just weren't sure how.

No blush came to either of them. The two demi-gods simply got up to see Rachel passed out cold on the couch by the fireplace. Annabeth woke her up, receiving a yawn and a mumbley "About time."

Rachel was cautious about letting Annabeth the Ravenclaw into the common room of the Gryffindor. She certainly wasn't worried about getting kicked out of this school; but she didn't exactly want to be punished for it. What other disciplines were there other than points being taken away from your house? Hopefully not as violent as her academy.

"Next time, we're going to your common room." Rachel said sleepily. Glancing at the time, Rachel, again, yawned. "I'm going to bed. Why'd you have to come so late anyways?"

"I had to make sure no one saw me," Annabeth said. "Some later years have later bedtimes." Just after she said 'bedtimes', she realized just how tired she was. "C'mon," she directed to Percy as Rachel crawled upstairs. "Let's go to bed, shall we?"

Percy wasn't that tired, but he took Annabeth upstairs to his dorm. Everyone was fast asleep, so she shed her robes to reveal her night clothes underneath. In the low light, Percy could barely make out the architecture-patterned pants, with a grey t-shirt overlapping them. "Nice pajamas." Percy whispered.

"I didn't pick them out." Annabeth said in a slightly annoyed voice, but smiled anyways. They both climbed into the four-poster bed, draping the velvet hangings around them. Velvet, apparently, was a common fabric for Gryffindors.

The two wiggled under the covers, laying next to each other, not saying a word. No awkwardness occurred between them. While Annabeth fell asleep quickly with her head next to his shoulder, but Percy took more time. A few times, his ADHD acted up and compelled him to jump up and move, but he forced himself to stay still. He, too, eventually drifted into sleep, his leg relaxed on Annabeth's.

.ii.

Several times they woke up together, fear imbedded into their eyes. It calmed them to see that each other was unhurt, that they were safe with them. More than once, one woke up the other from thrashing or a violent awakening. It was like clockwork; each responded to the other. Twice, Percy and Annabeth shamelessly cried together.

Finally, Percy woke up from the morning light, without nightmares. He glimpsed at the clock. 5:37. Gently shaking Annabeth awake, he gestured to the timepiece. Blinking, she sighed quietly and hugged Percy. Slipping on her slippers, she whispered, "Next time, you come over to my tower."

Stealthily, she made her way out the red common room and into the quarts and marble one. Seeing everyone asleep, and checking twice that she was in the same time frame, she dug through her book bag and took out A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration, knowing she couldn't fall back asleep even if she wanted too. Soon she was lost, not knowing what half the words meant. Being tired, her dyslexia was a pain. Only a few words popped out to her; there were some greek roots in the spells, which Annabeth thought was very interesting. Where did magic originate? Maybe Hecate blessed these people? Maybe Hecate is in their ancestry?

Frustrated from the unanswerable questions, Annabeth dropped the book and put her head in her hands. How was she going to get out of this puzzle?

Luna turned in her sleep. She looked so peaceful, her straight hair placed so elegantly upon her head and shoulders. Her arms were spread wide, as if she was welcoming something into her life. Her pale pink lips curved upwards just a bit, easily accepting whatever had weaved its way into her sleep. Annabeth wondered what it would be like to be such an open, patient girl, with ever so little worry.

Then she flickered.

Luna Lovegood was replaced by a brunette, who had her back turned to Annabeth's eyes. Next, the brunette was replaced by Luna. This kept on; each change lasting about half a second. Annabeth quickly realized the brunette was Pandora-Luna's mother. Slipping off her bed, Annabeth realized everything else was in sync with Luna's flicker. There was a burn mark by Valarie's bed that Annabeth had never noticed before. Pandora's bed sheets still weren't completely white, and a sun-tanned, dirty-blonde girl resided in Gene's bed. Parchment was strewn near Zoe's bed, but was tidied up in Luna's time. The curtains were also down for Zoe's bed in both time zones.

Then, it stopped.

Annabeth doubled checked when she was. Still in Luna's time.

Upset, she quietly stormed into the bathroom. Cranking the water to its coldest temperature, she finally let out a held in scream. The water continued to chill, and Annabeth mellowed the iced water with shattering teeth. This was not a good day.

.ii.

Rachel skipped the sixth step on her way down to the common room. She yawned from getting out of bed early.

"Hey, Rachel!"

A quirky voice called Rachel over. It came from Hermione Granger, who had bonded with her over the past few days. "Oh, hey, Jean." Rachel smiled with a tired look in her eyes. She had called Hermione 'Jean' since their first encounter. She couldn't pronounce Hermione's name, anyways. "So, I was thinking, we have, Transfiguration, right? Professor McGonagall said for the spell to work, it takes a lot of concentration-but, what if you weren't concentrated? What if you were thinking of spaghetti, and you were supposed to turn a pin into a pen, would the pin turn into spaghetti? Or a pen and spaghetti hybrid?"

Hermione took a moment to process this. "It might also shiver and turn soft. Do you have your paper for Herbology?"

Rachel snapped her fingers. "Oh! Thanks for reminding me. It's in my trunk. I'll be right back." Racing upstairs the girl's tower, she stuffed the parchment in her book bag, and leaped downstairs. Percy was waiting casually at the bottom, glancing at Rachel when she bounced down. Hermione gave a toothy grin at her.

Percy liked Hermione. She was smart, and cared about her studies. Annabeth was, in many ways, a lot like her.

He had just came from Ravenclaw tower, and Percy hadn't gotten sleep since. The Ravenclaw common room seemed so much more harsher than his own, with hard marble and quarts floor and walls. The only comfy things were couches by the fireplace. The fire wasn't even lit, anyways. It was, instead, filled to the brim with books and work tables; which seemed fitting for 'The Wittiest House'. He yawned, because although he had slept better than ever before, he had to catch up on shut-eye from the previous nights.

"Are you alright?"

Hermione's voice snapped him out of his thoughts. Percy's bright green eyes had dulled dramatically over the past few days. "Huh?"

"Nothing, it's just you look. . . . .tired." Hermione looked at him with a slight worry in her eyes.

"I'm, um, I'm fine, Jean. Just tired." Percy said.

Hermione didn't look completely convinced, but she let it go. "So. . . ." she looked at her schedule. "We have Transfiguration first, with Ravenclaw. Professor McGonagall said we'd be doing classwork today. . ."

Percy groaned. For the thousandth time, he wished he was out of this magic school and back to his world. What was going on with Kronos? Please, please, Percy thought. Let us be back before Kronos does any real damage. . . .

.ii.

Sitting in the back of the Transfiguration class, Percy stared at the textbook blankly. It wasn't his dyslexia that was getting to him, it was the sleepiness.

"Jackson." McGonagall looked down sternly at Percy. "Is there a problem with your reading?"

"I - no." Percy replied.

"Then I expect you to continue your classwork with ease," McGonagall raised her eyes at Percy, who nodded his head. He then proceeded to try to make sense of the letters before him. He barely understood what he wrote. Were flamingos harder or easier to Transfigure than eagles?

Annabeth, sitting beside Percy, glanced up from her text book. She wasn't doing so well herself, but she got the gist of it. Professor McGonagall left her stance over Percy, leaving for her desk to continue working, with an often eye sweeping to look for troubled students to hawk on. Annabeth yawned and started another paragraph for the difference between mammals and amphibians. The words blended together, much like rain was falling on fresh ink, dripping to the ground, staining his socks. . . . . .

A sharp gasp erupted from the classroom, shocking Percy clean out his daydreams. The whole room had eyes locked onto the three sitting together.

"Who's that?"

"How'd they get here?"

"Did they just apparate in here?"

"Am I the only one here who knows you can't apparate inside Hogwarts?"

"PERCY!"

A scarily familiar voice erupted from across the room, who yelled "AHHHHH!" and ran to Percy. James Potter cried out a relieved sound and starred in disbelief at the bewildered son of the sea god. "Blimey, mate, where've you been?"

Annabeth smeared her last sentence with her hair. Sirius shook her shoulders with vigor. "You and Percy been getten off, have you?"

Rachel cleared her throat, giving a look to the surrounding students to back off. Sirius turned to the noise, and made a disgusted expression. "Aw, they brought you with 'em? I was hoping you'd stay missing."

Standing up, Rachel leveled with his face. "I'd still be if I knew you'd be here."

Annabeth, sensing conflict, asked a question of her own. "I'm sorry, where-I mean, what day is it?"

"What the devil is going on here?"

A stern voice climbed above everyone else's. A young Professor McGonagall gave a stink eye to the first years below her. She gazed upon the three in the back of the class, utter bewilderment and relief struck in her eyes. "Jackson? Chase? Dare? How did you get in here?"

All three were speechless. Each stared at someone, as if they couldn't believe they were back where they started. "Well then," McGonagall said. "I'm afraid each of you will have to come with me to the headmaster's office immediately. And don't disappear randomly! Come now, you three, don't just stand there,"

Annabeth was the first to come to her wits. She lightly touched Percy and Rachael's arm to follow McGonagall, who ordered her students to stay put and work on their paper.

Rachel kept ahead of the two demi-gods. She, having the most sleep, had the slightest of springs in her step. Professor McGonagall walked briskly up a flight of stairs, and ushered them to hurry up. The four soon came across a statue resembling a rather large eagle. Or was it a hawk?

"Wafers," McGonagall said sheepishly to the stone. The statue suddenly rose up and revealed a moving staircase, which she set the children on before stepping on herself.

Once the staircase froze, the children who were out of time faced a door with only a simple, lion knocker. McGonagall pushed her way to the door and knocked, hard. A moment passed by, and a bearded man was smiling at the four. "Why, hello," the old man said. "What brings this unexpected visit?"