“And when we left the refinery, you asked for food, remember?” Doug threw both hands up in the air. “And we ended up in a fish market!” Doug pointed to my token. “Man, we should go somewhere now! Tell it to take us somewhere, Arcade!”

“No, we SHOULD NOT go somewhere now!” Zoe stomped a foot. “Arcade doesn’t know what he’s doing! He has no idea what the power of pure gold can do.”

I held up my Gold Rush book. “Maybe we can find out here.” As soon as I said that, it was like the Triple T Token turned into a tiny firework on my chest. It jumped and blew out a few sparks toward Doug and Zoe. They jumped back.

“Don’t do it, Arcade! DON’T DO IT!” And as soon as she said that, showers of gold flakes fell from the ceiling.

“Well, it looks like we’re going somewhere. Glitter never lies.” I held out my hands and caught several gold flakes.

Doug ran in the kitchen and brought out a few pie tins. “Here! Catch it, just in case it’s real!”

“This isn’t real gold, Doug.” Zoe said. “It’s glitter.”

I looked a little closer at the bits in my hand, pressing and moving them around with my finger. It had a different texture than glitter. “Uh, Zoe. I think Doug might be on to something.” Loopy came bounding down the stairs. “Hey, Loop! You wanna go on a gold adventure?” Loopy barked and tried to lick some of the gold flakes off my shoe.

“No way, Arcade.”

I looked at my sister with a smile. “Aw, c’mon. We wouldn’t want to disappoint Loopy.” I picked him up with one hand and rested the hot token in my other. “Show us the power of pure gold!” I shouted. A large fountain of sparks flew out of the center of the token, and gold elevator doors appeared in the middle of the living room. “Grab the book!” I yelled to Doug.

I held Loopy tight and pulled the token from the chain. It came loose, and a golden coin slot shaped like a miner’s pan appeared in front of the doors. I threw the token in, and they opened.

Chapter 15
Preteen 49ers

“These elevators are getting fancier,” Zoe said as the doors closed behind us. She walked around, smoothing her hand along all four walls. “If I didn’t think it was impossible, I’d say these walls are made of pure gold.”

“Why would it be impossible? Don’t you see? I asked the token to show us the power of pure gold, and here we are.”

Zoe gave me an intense stare. “Arcade, why are you doing this? What if this adventure doesn’t turn out the way you want?”