One day Xavier and Nova, a pair of siblings with dark brown hair and dark brown eyes, Nova wears glasses and Xavier doesn't, were at a sleepover at a friend's house, when their friend was out of the room, a letter appeared in front of them. Xavier picked up the letter and opened it, in the letter it read,

 "Go home now, there you will find a gem with the gem you will use it to find their parents." 

After Xavier and Nova read the letter, they exchanged concerned looks and ran into the kitchen where their friend was.

"Sorry, we have to go now!" Nova said politely,

"Oh, it's alright. I'll see you guys later." Their friend said to them.

Xavier nodded before grabbing Nova's hand and dragging her outside before letting go of Nova's hand and signaling for her to follow him.

They fell from an opening in the bedroom floor landing in a mysterious jungle. Now surrounded by trees and dazed from the fall.

 “Are you ok?” Nova said.

 “Yeah” Xavier said panting. 

“We need to find the treasure” Nova said

. “What’s that pyramid thing"? Across the jungle they could see a stone pyramid poking out from the tree tops. 

“I don’t know? But we need to get out of here. Maybe that place has some answers on where we are or how to find Mom."

 Once inside the pyramid, Nova and Xavier were shocked to see pictures of their mom, all across the damp walls. 

"What is this? Mom, are you here?" Xavier yelled, but the sound of buzzing flies was all that answered him. In the flicker of the lit torch in the corner, Nova saw what looked like an old envelope. Nova opened 

the envelope to reveal a dirty old letter. 

"What does it say? Xavier said. 

"It says If you want to find me, you'll have to make some sacrifices."

"What is going on?" There was a sudden rumble and the floor lifted up slowly like an elevator.

 "We must of stepped on something." Nova said  "

Where are we now?" Xavier whispered

 “I don’t know but, it's so gloomy in here." Xavier and Nova looked out at a long hallway lined with unlit torches. 

As they started walking, the torches mysteriously lit up.

" Wow it’s so dusty in here.” Xavier starts to cough really badly.

“Are You okay?” Nova asked. A big boom echoed down the hall. “What was that?” Nova says.

 “ Be quiet Nova, let's just try to get out here.” Okay”. 

“ How about we run so we get out quicker” 

“ Okay” Nova says They start to run but soon they find themselves at a dead end.

 They look around exhausted, “It’s so dark, here, I can barely see anything.” Xavier said, 

“ Yeah it is super dark here.” Suddenly there was a loud crash, Nova jumps.

 “What was that?” Xavier said.

 “I-I’m not sure.” They both walk up where they heard the sound; they look around and see a stone door with what looks a key pad to open it .  Xavier says,

 “Now we have to find a code?"

 “Wait!" Nova whispered. "What’s that sound?”  A growling noise starts growing  closer, they look around shivering,  Nova feels someone tapping her shoulder, she turns around and sees an old lady looking straight at her and Xavier. 

"Oh, sorry you startled me. I didn't know anyone else was down here." The old woman looked at Nova and smiled.

 " That makes two of us dear." The old ladies' voice was so soft Nova could barely hear her.  

“Well nice to meet You two. My name is Charlie I come here every now and then to clean this place up. ”   Charlie says  

“ Charlie would you excuse us for just a minute. Xavier, can I talk to you for a second over here? 

“O- okay, sure.” They both walk to the corner. 

“What is the lady doing here, isn’t that a bit strange?” Nova said 

“ Yeah, it's kind of  weird but maybe she knows how to get out of here or where to find Mom."   

Nova and Xavier agree and returned to speak to the old lady. Xavier noticed her smile which gave him a sense of comfort and an itch of suspicion. They both looked at each other and looked back at her and say, 

“Sorry, we just needed to talk about something important”

“Is that so?” Charlie said in a very hushed way. Charlie was dressed in dirty robes that suggested that she either lives in the pyramid or is a frequent visitor. She moved toward the kids as if she is almost floating across the sand.

In Nova’s mind something seemed fishy about Charlie. ''What are you kids doing here?

 ''We were looking for our  Mom. We think that someone has kidnapped her. We saw this pyramid in the jungle and figured that she could be in here but, we got lost, and it doesn't look like anyone but us three are in here. We are hoping you know the way out of here?" said Nova. 

Charlie gives Nova a pat on the back and with a slight grin she says " Oh, don't worry dears. I will make sure that you get back to your mother. Now, right behind you is a door that leads straight to the entrance of the pyramid. We had to keep it locked in case animals tried to get in. We didn't want them running around knocking things over or trying to turn our precious historical building into their den."  

 Charlie looked at the door then back to them and said, “I think the code is 2567. My eyes are so bad, could you put the numbers in for me dear?" 

 Nova says, “No Problem. Thanks so much for the help.” 

 Xavier types in the code :2567. The door made a fast beeping sound and then  creaked open.   “It worked!" When Nova and Xavier looked Inside they saw  another dark and dusty hallway lined with unlit torches and several rooms. Nova, a little nervous, asks 

"How far until we reach the entrance?" Nova was not excited about having to travel down this hallway. It was very creepy and the fact that it was locked by a door like that made her scared. Xavier and Nova slowly stepped through the door. 

" All you need to do is go down this hallway and turn left and in just a couple minutes you will reach the entrance."  

The hallway looked really long and Xavier and Nova imagined it would take way longer to reach the entrance. Xavier turns to see Charlie still standing in the doorway.

 "Aren't you coming with us." he asked. 

"Well I figured I would clean up a little around here and meet you in just a little bit." Charlie closes the door very quickly. The sound of the door beeping made the kids nervous. For some reason Charlie had locked them into this hallway.

"Why didn't she come with us? What if we get lost again?" Nova's voice was shaky and giving Xavier a sense in his heart that something was terribly wrong. 

" I don't know Nova. We need to get out of this place fast. Something isn't right. No more messing around. We head straight for the entrance. Don't wait for Charlie to find us. We need to go the rest of the way on our own."

Xavier and Nova noticed a light down the hallway. It was coming from the floor behind a closed door. When they opened the door they were relived to see their mother, sitting in a dark room.  

'' MOM! We were so worried but, we finally found you'' Nova panted.  Nova noticed a bottle filled with purple liquid on the floor. " Oh thank goodness I  am really thirsty''. Nova brought the bottle to her lips. Her mother leapt up and knocked the bottle out of her hand. 

''DON'T Drink That!" Xavier came to help his mother who was falling over with weakness. 

" Mom. What is going on? Where are we?" 

At that moment a faint voice was heard near the door. Their mother grabbed the hands of Nova and whispered in a panic. 

"Hide!" 

Xavier hid behind the door while Nova and her mother crawled under a stone bench that stretched the entire back wall of the room. The back of the room was so dark that the shadows hid them well. The faint voice soon got louder. It was Charlie. Xavier noticed she seemed to be talking to someone else. 

"Copy that. All three are secure somewhere in the laboratory hallway." There was a static noise and then a muffled voice Xavier couldn't make out. Xavier thought to himself, Who was she talking to? What do they want with us? 

 Soon after Xavier heard footsteps moving fast down the hallway and then there was silence. Nova and her mom crawled out of the shadows of the bench and Xavier met them both in the center of the room. Their mom wrapped her arms around her children. 

"What are you two doing here? You shouldn't be here." Xavier put his hands on his mother's shoulders to center her concentration. "Mom. What is going on?" 

Their mom takes a deep breath and gathers herself. 

"Ok. come over here. If they come back we don't want them to see us." She moves herself and the children back to the shadows. "Here sit. Ok. This all started 18 years ago when I met your father. We were students at a special school for the gifted, The Academy of Alchemy. The school taught us how to make potions and create magical objects."

Xavier and Nova listened as their mother continued this unbelievable story. 

"Your father and I were in the same classes. Two 12 year old kids trying to make potions to turn kids into ferrets, or sleeping potions for the teachers on test day. But one day, we stubbled across something really interesting. We were in the process of making a potion that would cause uncontrollable burping. We tried it out on one of our teachers, we were amazed to find that the teacher didn't burp at all. Instead, when they drank the potion, they would soon following the directions of the first voice they heard. We had our teacher dance like a chicken, take the class out for Ice cream, and give the whole class the day off. It was great." Iris chuckled. 

Nova and Xavier didn't know what to think. They both sat, dazed at the idea that their mother and father were some sort of magical couple. As their mother continued her story, they couldn't help but wonder if they were magical too. 

"But what started out as harmless fun soon turned into something very different. Your father started using the potion to control teachers to give him the best grades and free meals. He even used it to make teachers give him money. After that, I told him I wasn't going to be involved in that anymore. Your father never really learned how to make the potion so, I was making it for him. I told him I was done. Eventually we fell in love, got married, and had you two wonderful kids." 

Nova and Xavier grinned as they heard this but, they knew that this story was on its way to becoming something they did not want hear.

"For years we were happy. Your father truly adored you both. But something began to change in him. He would always take trips for work. He was never around and then one day he said he found a rare magical gem that would allow him to go anywhere in the world in an instant. After that he was almost never home until one day he just disappeared. You kids were so young I didn't want you to know that he abandoned us." 

Xavier and Nova are almost brought to tears as they hear what really happened to their father and why he left them all those years ago.

"Then one day I get a mysterious letter in the mail. It was from South America. Inside the letter was a piece of paper and a small gem. I held the gem in my hand and read the piece of paper which consisted of only one word. "Potion." Before I knew it, I was teleported here inside this pyramid. I must have dropped the gem inside the house which explains how you guys got here." 

Nova couldn't believe here dad was capable of such things. She was really young when he left but she always remembered her father as a loving man who would never do anything to hurt his family.