The halls were dark. It was just after one in the morning and everyone was asleep except for five girls who tiptoed down the hallway.

"Ouch!" cried Kitty.

"SHHHH!" four people said at once. Kitty shrunk down and whispered an apology.

"What exactly are we doing?" Lin whispered. Christa turned to her.

"We're sneaking into the staff section."

"But why?"

"Well, originally we were going to sneak into Max's room, but instead we're sneaking into Miss Briggs room."

If they could have seen her in the dark, they would have seen an extremely confused look on Lin's face.

"Why would we want to sneak into Miss Briggs room?"

"Because I've heard that she has a book that tells how to make a drink that will make people fall in love with you."

"What?" Lin asked. "Out of plants?"

"Yup, and we're going to get it."

"Why don't we just ask her how to make it in class?"

Everyone froze, turning to Christa for an explanation. "Um," she said. "I didn't think of that," she said sheepishly. Everyone sighed in exasperation.

"Oh well!" Christa cried, her whisper becoming shrill. "Where would be the fun in that? Besides, I heard that she doesn't teach it to people anymore since there was an accident involving one of the delvers. Apparently the stuff was accidentally dropped into the bath houses and all of the delvers were covered."

"Oooh! Really?!" Jackie cried loudly.

"SHHHHHH!!" Everybody hushed her.

"Yeah, really," Christa said.

"What happened?" Cami asked.

"Well, they all fell in love with the students and let them do whatever they want. Apparently everything pretty much went to hell after that. One delver would be in love with a student and so would let them go past into the staff section, but the others wouldn't be in love with that one so they'd all fight and not let her go in. But then the one that THEY loved would come and they wanted to let them in, but the others didn't love THAT one. So there was a lot of fighting."

"What ended up happening to them all?" Lin asked curiously.

"Well, I heard that two students disappeared after a huge fight. Nobody knows where they went. It was in the third semester so there were boys there too. One boy and one girl disappeared. They were both from hall eleven. Now whenever there is an odd prank around the school, they're blamed. The girl was Jax and the boy was Drake."

They continued to inch their way along the hallway. "Hey Christa?" Lin asked curiously.

"Yeah?"

"Why are we crawling on the floor?"

"…………….. Because………"

"Because?" Lin asked.

"I thought it would make it more interesting."

They all sighed and stood up, dusting their clothes off and continued to make their way down the stairs. They all froze when they heard a muffled "Upchiya!"

Lin turned her head, wondering where the sound had come from. She heard it again and looked at the wall. Walking carefully, she put her ear next to the wall.

"Upchiya!" came the noise again.

The other girls looked at her quizzically. "It's in the wall," Lin mouthed.

"Oooooh," Christa said, obvious relief in her voice. "That's just Gaken." They all gave her blank stares. "You know, the one that got suck in the plumbing? It sounds like he's almost made it to the septic tank, then he'll be free."

They all nodded dumbly and continued to walk. Finally, they'd made it to the staff section. They looked around a corner and saw the delvers, sleeping next to the entrance. Lin turned to Christa.

"So, how are we supposed to get past them?" she asked. Christa pulled out a tub of Crisco.

"Where did you get that?" Kitty asked.

"Oh, I snuck into the kitchen earlier and took it."

"Why do we need Crisco?" Lin asked in a nervous voice.

"Because it soothes them."

"Oooookaaaay."

Christa walked forward quietly and opened the Crisco, smearing it all over her legs. She motioned for the others to come forward and do the same. They all shook their heads in unison. Christa motioned more fiercely for them to come, then finally the walked forward, each dipping their hands into the greasy substance and rubbing it over their legs, grimaces present on all of their faces.

Christa set the tub down and began to walk forward slowly. The others followed her quietly. Something moved and they all froze. A delver stirred in its sleep, cracking an eye open at them. It sniffed at the air then shut its eyes again. So the smell really DID soothe them. They crept forward and up the stairs. When they got there, there were two hallways leading in opposite directions.

"Which way is it?" Kitty asked. Christa shrugged.

"How about we split up," Christa said.

Lin was hesitant at first, but then nodded. Christa turned and looked at the group. "Okay, Kitty and Cami come with me." The two nodded.

"We'll go right, you and Jackie go left."

Lin nodded and they walked off, creeping through the hallways. Everything seemed incredibly quiet as they snuck through one of the doors.

"Jackie does not like this," Jackie said. Lin had found that Jackie had this odd habit of referring to herself in the third person, she would also say someone's name. Instead of saying "You did this" she would say, "Lin did this."

Lin glanced at her and noticed that she was clutching her carrot to her chest.

"Jackie, why did you bring that thing?" she whispered.

"Celery is not a thing, Celery is Celery."

Lin looked at her skeptically. "You named a carrot Celery?" she asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"Jackie sure did!"

Lin shook her head and walked forward again until they came to a door. Was this Miss Briggs room? She turned the handle slowly and peaked inside. Someone was asleep on the bed, but she couldn't tell who it was. She walked into the dark room, trying to get a look at the person's face.

She walked up to the bed and leaned over the edge, trying to look over the person's back to see their face, then she froze. It wasn't a person in the bed. It was a thing that could only be described by one word. A griffin. She held her breath as it stirred. What the hell was a griffin doing in a bed. A better question was, what in the hell was a griffin doing at a school, or anywhere for that matter?!

Lin put one foot behind her and began to shift her weight on it to back up. As she did so a floorboard creaked. Lin continued to hold her breath as she looked back up from the floor to the griffin. Its eyes shot open.

Faster than she was able to keep track of, it was on its feet standing in front of her. It stared at her with cold yellow eyes, and it was then that Lin noticed its height. It wasn't as big as she thought a griffin would be, it was only the size of a medium dog. Still, its beak looked menacing enough for her to want to stay away from it. She heard Jackie let out a squeal behind her.

Lin took a step backward, never breaking eye contact with the beast. It lunged at her and she ducked, scrambling across the floor to the other side. Jackie had jumped into the room to help her and now the griffin blocked the door. Lin backed up against a wall as the creature slowly stalked towards them.

She looked around frantically, searching for a way to get out. Her eyes fell upon a trap door on the floor in the corner. It seemed that Jackie saw it at the same time that she did and both girls began inch their way towards it. They had just reached it as the griffin realized what they were doing. Before it could stop them, Lin threw the door open and jumped down, Jackie following right behind her.

They heard a loud shriek as the griffin tore at the door, too large to fit through it with its wingspan. They fell until they landed in something soft. The trap door remain open, allowing a small beam of moonlight to travel into this place. Jackie landed on top of Lin with an 'oof'.

Lin shoved her off and looked around them. It was warm wherever they were. It was weird that it would be warm in such a dark place. Slowly, her eyes adjusted and she couldn't believe what she was seeing. They were surrounded by dragons, dragons that were only about eight inches tall and a little over a foot long, and there were hundreds of them.

They both stared with wide eyes as the dragon stared back at them. They both stood and began to run before any of them could be burned to death. They heard the dragons shrieking behind them and the sounds of little feet slapping against the floor.

They ran faster down the dark dungeon hallway. A stream of flam came flying at Lin and nearly hit her in the butt. This spurred her on faster and they tore through the hallway.

Jackie turned to Lin. "What was that thing that Mr. Evans said about running away from things that are shooting things at you?" Jackie yelled over the loud sound of screeches and bursts of flame. Lin's mind reeled.

"Oh yeah! Zig zag!" They both began to, but were finding it hard to do so in the dark stone hallways.

"How do we get outta here?!" Lin screamed.

"Jackie doesn't know!" she cried, running up in front of Lin. They saw some familiar stair and ran towards them.

"Jackie, those are the stairs that lead up to the main hallways!" Lin yelled. Jackie nodded and tore up them. They ran into the hallway and stopped, panting for breath.

"I guess they can't go past the dungeon," Lin said breathlessly. A shriek sounded behind them and she heard little feet running up the steps. The two girls looked at each other for a moment then broke out into a run. They weren't sure quite where they were going, but as long as it was away from those things everything would be fine.

Lin heard a high pitched screech that sounded almost like an eagle. Her mind seemed to take a moment to work that out. 'Eagle? Why would there be an ea-' Her mind stopped for a moment, then one word entered it. Griffin. She turned and looked over her shoulder. There was the griffin, flapping towards them. A burst of flame brought her attention back to running as her skirt was singed.

"KYAAAA!" Jackie and Lin looked in front of them. Where did that come from?

"You will never catch us you accursed beings!" a loud voice yelled. Lin recognized that voice. It was Raven.

Lin ran towards their voices and could have wet herself at what she saw. There, running towards them, were Cami, Kitty, and Christa. That was not what shocked her, however. What shocked her, was the fact that they were being chased by a mob of chipmunks that were scurrying along the ground.

"Perish, puerile adversaries!" Raven yelled at the chipmunks.

Cami, or Raven as she was at the moment, was kicking any that got to close away. Christa looked up and saw Lin and Jackie.

"Hey you guys!" she called. "It seems that we've had a few complications!"

"Really?" Lin answered. "I hadn't noticed!" It seemed that the three girls who were currently fighting off the chipmunks noticed for the first time what Lin and Jackie were being chased by. She could see them pale visibly from twenty feet away.

The five girls finally met at a junction and ran down a hallway together. Teachers were now opening their doors and peaking out to see what all the noise was about. All five girls ran past them, zig zagging so as not to be caught by any streams of flame.

"Oh, how wonderful!" Mr. Evans cried. "You see? My class is superb!" he cried as the blur of teenage girls flew past him. They ran as fast as they could until they reached the dorms, having finally lost the mountains of creatures that were after them. They all panted as they slowed and then stopped.

"That……was…….." Lin said, pausing for breath between every word.

"We got it," Christa said, holding up a sheet of paper.

Lin glanced at it, then at everybody else. She and Jackie had their clothes singed while Raven, Christa, and Kitty had tears along their clothes and small scratches all over their faces.

Lin sighed and dusted herself off. "Well, I think that's about enough exercise for me tonight. I'm going to bed."

Christa nodded and began to walk towards her hall. "I'll need all of your help to make this."

"As long as it doesn't involve any more sneaking into the staff section," Lin said.

Christa laughed. "No, none of that. Although, we might have to sneak into the kitchen. Okay, well, take Cami with you and go back to your dorm before we're caught."

"I am not Cami!" Raven declared. "I am Raven Deathshadow, expert assassin!"

"Okay then, Raven, go back with Lin now and get some sleep will you?" Raven gave a curt nod and walked with them back to their dorm. They changed quickly and got into bed, falling asleep as soon as their head hit their pillows.