The Red Envelope

About the author

Xavier has two dogs and likes play sports with his friends

Chapter 1

Dear John,

If you are reading this letter something has gone terribly wrong. The fate of Frank rests in your hands. You have 24 hours to find the treasure that lies in the jungle temple before the Romans do. There will be an 8,000 dollar reward. You have the map, hurry they are coming for you,

Thomas Walter.

“Bang, bang,” there was a loud knock at the door.

“Let me in,” a deep loud voice bellowed! It was a Roman soldier. John climbed down to the seller and ran out the door. As he reached the the edge of the woods the door crashed open. By the time the soldier reached the back door John was gone.

John heard footsteps behind him as he raced through the tall trees. The footsteps were getting closer. He dove off the side of the trail and crashed into a nearby bush. He looked up right as three Roman soldiers ran into sight.

“I swear I saw him right here” the biggest one said.

“The kings gonna kill us if we don’t find him. Let's go before he gets away.” the shortest one said clearly annoyed. They ran off in the other direction yelling and cursing each other.

John stayed behind the bush for a while until he was sure they were gone. He stood up and walked a little deeper into the woods so no one could find him. Then he sat down on a nearby rock. He was in the middle of the woods, surrounded by so many trees that he couldn't tell if it was day or night. At this point it didn't matter if it was dark. He was tired so he fell right to sleep.

Chapter 2

John woke up the next day to a strange low voice, “Are you sure it's him.” Startled, John opened up his eyes and what he saw horrified him. He saw the ugliest three creatures he had ever seen. They were short, round, furry, orange creatures that strangely resembled the body of an undersized chubby bears. Their faces looked like humans. They quickly noticed he was awake.The biggest one which was no taller than 4 feet tall said, “Rise and shine”.

John quickly scanned the room trying to find all the doors and windows that he could escape through if he needed to. The room was small and dimly lit by the early morning sun. Everything in it was made of old rotting wood and smelled like a dead animal. He felt sick and responded in the only way he could think, “Who are you and where am I?”

“Welcome to our humble home” one creature said, “I’m Simon, he's Richard, and he’s….

The biggest one cut him off and reached out his hand, “I’m Aldo.” John hesitantly took it and as they shook hands, he slowly began to trust the orange creatures. “I’m John,” he said.

“Let's get right to business,” Simon said, “I found the letter and a map of the woods in your bag. We want the money too so you have two options. Either we help each other or we kill you. If you help us we will split the treasure four ways, your choice.”

John didn't like the idea of being killed that much and he also wanted some help on the long journey ahead. He agreed, “Deal.”

They set off early the next morning before sunrise. It was the middle of October and the air was cold and foggy.

Chapter 3

Their feet sank into the wet mud as they made their way through the dark woods. The fog was so thick they could barely make out the silhouettes of each other. They were unprepared for the sheer cold of the woods and their legs were drenched in mud. They couldn’t see the path below and hoped that they were on the right path.

A few hours later the decided to stop for a break. It was around 6 A.M. and they were starving and tired from trudging through the mud. The sun was just coming up and the sunlight slipped through the trees. They all decided to take a short nap.

John woke up about thirty minutes later and spent another half hour studying the map and rereading the letter. The others were still sound asleep and according to the letter they had until the night to find the treasure and John new they would need to hurry. He yelled, “Wake up!”, and proceed to shake them. One by one they slowly got up. They were too tired to complain so they reluctantly got ready to go.

They walked for about another mile until they reached their first obstacle. There was a huge pond about a mile in every direction. If they went around it they knew they would lose a couple hours that they couldn’t afford to lose. The only thing they could do was swim.

Chapter 4

As John dived into the water a chill went down his spine. The dark murky water was freezing! Most of them were good swimmers so they swam pretty quickly but Richard still was waiting on the shore.

“Are you coming” John said.

“I don't know how to swim” Richard edmited.

John didn’t know what else he could do and they were short on time so he put Richard on his back and began to swim. They were lucky Richard was small and light, so John was able to move a steady pace.

After about forty minutes of freezing cold swimming they finally reached the other side. They were wet and shivering and didn’t have anything to dry them off so they decided to take a break, before they entered the woods again, to dry off.

They could tell the sun was starting to go down and they needed to hurry, “Come on guys let's get going we don’t have much time” said John. They were all dry so they started to walk back toward the dark woods.

They had picked up the pace and were almost running. Everytime there feet hit the ground mud splashed up and drenched them in wet slimy mud. They ran for a while until they reached a strange opening in the woods.

“What's that?” Aldo said as they entered the clearing. There was a huge pit in the middle of the clearing. They walked slowly toward the pit until they reached the front of it. It was at least a hundred feet wide and appeared to go down forever.

“We need to go down” said John.

They all stared at him until Richard said, “What?”

“We need to go down the pit until we reach the treasure. Do you see the map leads us right to here this is the entrance to the temple.

“How are we going to get down?” Simon said.

“Simple we jump on the rocks” John said pointing to the different rocks hanging off of the sides of the pit.

“We don’t even know how deep it is” Said Richard.

John picked up a rock and threw it into the pit. “1, 2, 3, 4” they began to count, “5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 …. Clink,” the sound as it finally hit the bottom.

“Alright let's go” John said, then before anyone could argue, he jumped.

Chapter 5

John hit the first rock about 15 feet down with a thud and immediately shouted, “I’m good” even though he clearly was a little shaken up. He slowly got back up and shouted “Let's go” then hopped to the next rock.

The creatures followed John but they were a lot slower than him and had to keep reminding him to wait for them. They slowly made their way down toward the depth of the dark cavern.

They had a problem, there were no more rocks to jump to. Suddenly Aldo screamed, “Aaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!” He had slipped and was falling toward the bottom of the cavern. They heard a splash.

Aldo shouted up to them, “I landed in water i’m fine,” he sounded excited, “You guys have to jump, I think I found the door.”

One after one they splashed into the cold water below. John looked up through the cavern, the sun was going down and they did not have much time. “Come on guys” John said encouragingly, then John grabbed a torch and raced toward the opening in the side of the cavern that they believed to be the door.

As they sprinted through the dimly lit labyrinth their feet splashed against the wet stone ground. They ran for a while until they entered a huge room and what they saw in the middle of the room made them stop dead in their tracks. They had found the treasure!