I finished this chapter sooner than I thought. And school starts in like four days. I'm definitely not looking forward to it.

percyjackson1234- I'm glad you like it. ^^

Enjoy~

We heard more voices as we went down the stairs.

"How much longer do you think the girl has?" one of them asked.

"Who knows?" another said. "She's a toughie. But maybe she'll hold out until the end of today or tomorrow dawn."

"If she lasts longer than that, we'll move her to the arena," the third person said and laughed. "We can make some good money off of that."

The first person sighed. "Alright then. Meeting adjourned."

Everyone shuffled around in a hurry to leave.

"So this must be where they have their meetings," Zoë whispered.

"What about the Teachers' Lounge?" Grover frowned.

"I think this is for like meetings where it doesn't concern the school aspect," Bianca clarified.

"This whole floor?" I asked.

We peeked out of the stairway, and yes, it did take up the whole floor.

"That's one big meeting room," I muttered. "I wish I had a room that big."

Bianca punched me. "There's no one in sight. Let's go down."

"But where are the stairs?" Zoë pointed out.

Sure enough, there were no stairs in sight.

"Did they hide them again?" Grover sighed.

"Look, there's a note," Bianca said.

She read it out loud.

"Percy, Grover, Bianca, and Zoë,

If you have found this note, you're on the right track. Well, you should've found it since you four were hiding behind the stairs a moment ago.

Anyway, I'm assuming you heard the last bits. I don't know where Annabeth is being held, but she's not in the third or fourth floor. This is the twelfth floor, if you didn't know.

As you've noticed, the stairs are hidden for each floor. We teachers use the elevator, but I won't recommend that. All the stairs are hidden someplace obvious. For instance, the stairway is underneath the table like a trapdoor.

Good luck,

Chiron"

"A trapdoor style door, huh," Grover said.

He crawled underneath the table, complaining about the disgusting things teachers did to the table.

"Hey, found it! It's really dusty though," he coughed.

We crawled underneath the table where Grover lifted up a tile to reveal a set of stairs underneath.

"Ladies first," I said.

"You just don't want your face to get cut off," Bianca said, and gave me a teasing smile.

"My face doesn't deserve to be cut off," I smirked.

She rolled her eyes as she went in after Zoë.

The eleventh floor was more of a storage room. There were strange chemicals and explosives everywhere.

"Let's get out of here," Zoë said.

She pushed back a shelf without spilling any chemicals. She pried open a door and went down the stairs.

"Is she okay?" I asked.

Bianca exchanged glances with Grover. "Yeah. She's probably just stressed out or something. I hope we find Annabeth soon. She doesn't sound like she has long."

We went down the stairs to the tenth floor. And great…

"More monsters."

"And these aren't caged," Zoë said.

There were cages, but they were all unlocked. I had a feeling that the monsters came from other rooms too on this floor. I heard the familiar clattering of teeth in the corner.

"They let them out," I guessed.

The monsters didn't seem to be exactly… complete. There was something wrong with them. I mean, sure they all wanted to kill us, but their appearance didn't seem right.

There was a man and bull fusion that had human arms which didn't look right on its bull body. And there was a lion with the tail of a serpent and goat legs, but there were unnatural seams that connected them. Those were only a few examples.

"Get ready to fight," Zoë murmured. She readied her bow.

I uncapped the pen and it turned into a sword. Bianca nocked an arrow and shot it at one of the monsters.

After that, it was mayhem.

The monsters charged, and we tried to fight them off. But they were big and this room was a bit tight for them. There were also those skeletons who shot us every once in a while. I was protected because of my coat, but it wouldn't help it they shot my head or something.

Bianca screamed as one of the monsters threw her against the wall.

"Bianca!" I yelled.

Grover toppled over some cages on the monster.

"Thanks," she said. "Watch out!"

She shot an arrow at a scorpion, killing it.

A skeleton shot a bullet at Zoë, but she quickly dodged it and killed off a monstrous skin-less lion. The skeleton shot again, but I deflected it a second before it could hit her.

"Thank you," she said. She seemed surprised that I had saved her from a bullet.

"Anytime," I said.

I slashed my sword against the lion/snake/goat thing, but its tail came around and bit my ankle.

"Ah!" I screamed, and fell on one knee.

"Percy!" Grover said.

"This is hopeless," Bianca said.

I didn't want to admit it, but she was right. Our clothes were in tatters, and we were covered in scratches and dirt. And the ankle bite was hurting me a lot. My vision was turning blurry.

"We have to do something," Zoë said. She shot arrows at the monsters, keeping them away from us as much as possible.

Bianca bit her lip. "Stay here, I'll be right back."

She ran up the stairs and came back about a minute later with a bomb.

"Bianca, it's not going to work," I said. "They'll probably kick it down the poop chute or something."

I pointed out the other poop chute in the corner of the room.

"I know," she said. She handed me the dagger that I found in my bed. She pressed it in my hand. "And give this to Nico." Tears formed in her eyes and she pulled out a ring with a skull on it. "It's all I have left of our father."

My eyes widened. "Bianca, you're not going to—"

"It's the only way," she said. Tears were streaming out like no end. "You guys, go back up. This room is protected with special walls. It shouldn't blow up the whole building."

Grover stood there with his jaw open, and Zoë had tears welling in her eyes, but they went up.

"Percy, go," she said. "Please."

"But Bianca…" I said. "No, give me the bomb. I'll do it. You go up."

She shook her head. "You have to go find Annabeth." She gave me a hug, which she shouldn't have done with a bomb in hand, but I hugged her back. "Thank you for everything."

She pushed me up the stairs and I saw her go into the middle of the crowd of monsters.

"Perce," Grover said, and pulled me up right before the explosion.

The explosion shook the floor and the chemicals rattled and started falling. Maybe the explosion wouldn't destroy this floor, but the chemicals would.

Grover shoved us down the stairs again and we found the next stairway right on the place that Bianca stood with the bomb. It seemed like a cruel joke. Bianca was nowhere to be seen. I hesitated, but they pulled me down with them.

"Percy, let me see your ankle," Grover said.

Right. My ankle. I had been in so much pain a little while ago, but now I was numb from Bianca's death.

"I should've went," I murmured as Grover treated my ankle. "It should've been me."

Zoë didn't reply. I knew she was close with Bianca. Then I realized she was crying. It shocked me for some reason, seeing her cry.

"Percy, don't say that," Grover said. He seemed to be near tears too. "Annabeth's gone, and if you were gone too…"

"Sorry," I said. "Zoë, are you ready to keep going?"

She wiped her tears ago, but more spilled out. "Yes."

"We can stop for a while is you want," I offered.

"No. Let's keep going," Zoë said.

"Zoë, we can all see that you need some rest. We all need some rest," I said.

"Very well then," she said.

I put slight weight on my ankle. It didn't hurt.

"We're all shocked from her death," Grover said. "Don't blame yourself."

"I promised to keep her safe," I muttered. "I couldn't."

"Don't beat yourself up for that," Grover said. "You might want to go talk to Zoë. I can't imagine how hard it must be for her."

I moved over to Zoë who was sitting on the opposite side of the room. This whole floor was empty, but looked like they had plans for it that they never finished. "You alright?"

Zoë nodded, her eyes red. "She was a nice friend. She was like a sister to me."

"I'm sorry that I let her do that. I shouldn't have let her," I said.

"It was a hopeless fight," Zoë said. "And she is only the first. There will be a second."

"What?"

"It is nothing," she said. "We should get moving."

She helped me up and we found the next staircase in the closet.

"What floor is this?" I asked. "I lost track."

"We're going down to the eighth floor," Grover counted. "Annabeth's not in the third or fourth floor. So she'll be somewhere from here to the fifth floor."

"Let's just do a quick lookover for each floor then. We can't afford to lose any time," I said.

"Yes, it is almost curfew," Zoë said.

"Already?" I asked.

"Time flies," she muttered.

There was nothing interesting on the eighth floor. It reminded me of a hotel. There were many rooms with beds, a closet, and a restroom. And it was much more fancier than our dorm rooms.

We found the stairway after a bit of work—by that, I mean like an hour or more. It was in one of the rooms under the bed. Yeesh. I felt sorry for the unfortunate person who would come up here and bump their head on a bed.

"Let's keep moving," Grover urged, and passed us some food that he had took from the fridge.

"Thanks, man," I said.

We went down to the seventh floor which was just one big room like the twelfth floor. It was just computers, screens, and files. I definitely wasn't interested in it, seeing that I was dyslexic.

"Next floor?" Grover asked.

Zoë nodded and found the next stairway under a box tower of files. "We only have a few more floors left."

We rushed down the stairs. The sixth floor didn't seem very pleasant. It was designed like a cell with big cages like the one on the roof on the other building.

"Here?" I asked.

"A quick lookover. If she's not here, next floor," Grover said.

We split up into the hallways and rooms. Then I heard the screaming and yelling.

"Get away from me you pig!" a girl yelled. She sounded like Annabeth. I ran toward her voice.

"I can't afford to have you spreading false rumors about this place," somebody else said, and there was a slap sound.

"Well, duh. That's why you shoved me in like multiple cages with your prototype monsters and make me do your dirty work!" Annabeth yelled. "For like a month too!"

"You found a way to contact them didn't you?"

"Like I just said, I was in multiple cages. Nobody was there. How could I possibly contact them?" she said. "And you had a 24/7 guard duty on me. Is there no privacy?"

I followed her voice. This floor seemed like a maze. I ended up in different places because of the echoes.

I heard Annabeth cry out. "You'd better watch your mouth girl. Before I feed you to the drakon."

"I hope it'll eat you instead," she spat. "A big fat pig like you should taste pretty good."

There was a thump sound that echoed throughout the floor.

"You should be glad that you're not in a cage anymore," the person snapped. "If you survive this night, well move you somewhere else."

"You're such an idiot, telling me all your plans," she taunted, and there were footsteps signaling the leave of that guy.

I hid behind the cages as the man passed by. It was Dr. Thorn. Great.

"Annabeth!" I called.

"Percy?" her voice was uncertain, like she wasn't sure if I was real or not.

I followed her voice and ended up in a room with a bloody cage. That jarred me, but not as much as the other thing I saw.

Annabeth was standing on the edge of the wall, holding up a broken wall that held up this whole building.