Dan's POV

For a moment, we were all frozen, staring at the small door. Nate slowly reached down and picked up his Sebastian name tag. He turned around to face the rest of us. "Do we plan on walking through the tiny door that was basically hidden by a security system?"

Phil nodded his head. "Yeah, that was our plan, wasn't it?" Nate gulped and turned around. It seemed as if the gravity of the situation had finally hit him.

"So, I guess we should clip our name tags onto our lab coats?" I offered. Phil nodded again but didn't say anything. I saw Jason's fist clench around his Marco name tag. I sighed, "Look, guys, if you don't want to go help Percy and everyone else who's down there, that's your choice. That's fine. It's completely your decision, but I'm still going–"

"We're all going, Dan," Phil cut me off. "We clearly aren't going to send someone by themselves. That's an easy way for you to be taken hostage or something."

"Yeah," Jason started in a sarcastic tone, "no way I'm missing the opportunity to see people I know being experimented on and tortured."

Nate punched his arm lightly. "You have to go if you want to save them. Plus, I for one am not missing the opportunity to see people's reaction to Dan's name being Jennifer. If he runs into another scientist, he'll have to think of something quick or we're all screwed. I know he'll think of something, but I can't wait to find out what it is." Nate smirked at me.

I sighed again, "Whatever makes you ready to go through with this, I guess. Anyways, do we want to make a plan of attack or anything before charging into that room or just go for it?"

"Plan," Nate and Jason responded simultaneously.

"Okay," I paused. "How are we supposed to plan for anything? We have no idea what's about to happen."

"Alright, I got this," Nate decided, stepping forward. "Our objective is to save Percy, as well as anyone else we find who needs help, correct?"

"Yup," Phil replied with a faint smile.

"So we're going to go through that door and search until we find Percy. However, there are multiple problems that we could run into by doing this. We need to stay hidden from scientists and stick together at all times. I imagine that the room will be swarming with actual scientists, so yelling across the room for one another definitely isn't an option, as it'll attract too much attention."

Phil and I exchanged glances before I commented, "No offense, but since when are you this good at mapping out obstacles?"

"Since the rest of you stopped helping," he replied sassily.

"Fair enough," Jason responded. "What do we do if someone gets separated from the group?"

"We find them without causing a commotion," Nate returned.

"Alright, but what if–"

"How about we stay optimistic and don't worry about everything that could go wrong?" Phil suggested.

Nate got ready to object, but I cut him off, "Yeah, let's not get anxious. We'll be fine, and even if Percy isn't there, we'll likely find some information that'll help us."

Nate's eyes widened. "What do you mean 'if Percy isn't–'."

Jason slapped his hand over Nate's mouth. "Percy will be here. I can feel it."

I barely heard Nate mutter, "Sixth sense bullshit."

I walked up to the small door and squatted down. I reached for the rusted doorknob and slowly, carefully turned it. The door creaked open, and waiting behind it was a long, dark, narrow tunnel. I turned back to face everyone else. "I'm leading, I assume?"

Phil leaned over to look behind the door. "Yeah, I'll follow behind Nate and Jason."

I glared at him. "Gee, thanks."

"Yup! No problem!"

I rolled my eyes and got on my hands and knees. "Alright, is everyone wearing a lab coat with a name tag just in case?"

"Yeah, now go in! I'm starting to get interested!" Jason cheered from behind me.

Nate giggled, "Dan, that was the first thing we did."

"Okay then, let's go help your friend," I instructed.

I began crawling through the tunnel and was almost immediately enveloped in darkness. As I crawled, I guided myself by feeling the walls. I regretted touching the walls the second I did so, as the walls were sticky with the same liquid that was on the name tags. I swallowed my discomfort and continued feeling the walls, running my hand through the slime.

After several minutes of crawling, I reached a turn in the tunnel. Before turning, I looked back down the tunnel and asked in a hushed voice, "You guys are still with me, right?"

I almost fell over when I heard Nate respond with, "Yeah," from right beside me. Phil and Jason replied shortly after.

I continued crawling and feeling my way through the tunnel, but there was another turn almost immediately after the first one. "Another turn," I whispered to Nate behind me before continuing through the tunnel.

After turning, I noticed a small light emitting from what I assumed was the end of the tunnel. I turned around and could see part of Nate's face. He made eye contact with me before mumbling, "Please keep crawling. I really want to see Percy. There's something I need to talk to him about."

I sent him a slightly confused glance before continuing down the tunnel. What was Nate going to tell Percy that he couldn't tell Jason?

I shrugged off the thought and looked straight ahead. As I neared the end of the tunnel, I began to hear noise. I also began to get a clear view of where the light was coming from. The end of the tunnel seemed to be a window of some kind.

Once I reached the end, I noticed that the floor had changed. It no longer felt like cold metal, but felt like carpet. I pressed myself against the side of the tunnel so that Nate could kneel next to me. His attention immediately went to the window, which I hadn't looked out of yet.

I peered out the window, and after my eyes had adjusted to the bright light shining in, I saw the room clearly.

Well, 'room' wasn't exactly the right term.

"What the hell? This is bigger than a gymnasium," Nate muttered beside me.

I pulled my attention away from the window and glanced behind us. I nearly screamed when I saw Phil and Jason directly behind me and Nate. "Forgot you two were there for a second."

"That's rude," Jason stated bluntly.

I sighed and glanced around the tunnel. I noticed a small, red button on the wall behind Nate. "Does that button say anything?" I asked.

Nate turned his head away from the window to the wall beside him. "No, can I press it anyway?"

Before I had the chance to oppose, Nate slammed his hand on the button. The tunnel filled with flashing yellow lights and a wall crashed closed behind Phil. I ignored the alarms going off and glared at Nate. "Are you kidding me?"

"What?!" Nate defended, "You can't just throw a red button at me and not expect me to hit it!"

"Nate, if we all die here, I'm blaming you," Jason mumbled beside me.

A dense fog sprayed out of the tunnel walls. "Oh that's just great! They're fucking drugging us!" I yelled.

"Nate, if we make it out of this alive, I'm going to fucking kill you!" Jason screamed.

"I'm sorry! If we die, I want you all to know that I had a super fun time despite our friends being tortured!" Nate yelled.

"Dan, you were an amazing best friend and surprisingly a good kisser and I just really want my last word to be cactus!" Phil shrieked.

"What the fuck do you mean 'surprisingly'?!" I screamed at Phil.

"My last word is going to be cactus, Dan! I refuse to explain why I said 'surprisingly'! Cactus!"

"Did you think I was going to be a bad kisser or some shit?!"

"You two better not die fighting!" Nate screamed.

"We wouldn't be dying if it wasn't for you!" I snapped back.

"You're the one who pointed out the button on the wall!"

"Wait, guys–"

"Jason, if you say something that isn't helpful or defending me, I swear–"

"Look up," Jason cut me off.

I looked up to find that the ceiling was gone, as well as the flashing yellow lights, dense fog, and alarm.

"Looks like your last word isn't going to be cactus," Nate murmured to Phil.

A/N

I've been laughing for a solid ten minutes

This isn't how I planned the chapter to go, but I was given an opportunity and took it.

Anyways, BUH-BYE BROTATOES!