And so the story truly begins…

The full moon spotlighted over Manny and Frida as they slowly made their way onto the roof of the Miracle City Museum. For all of the security precautions that were supposedly taken for one teensy artifact, they seemed to overlook the skylight in the room that was housing it. When Manny and Frida reached the top, the two of them were able to get a good sight of the full room, and it's centerpiece.

"Check it out." Manny tapped a clawed finger, pointing to the artifact that they saw. The two teens pressed their faces against the windows.

"Wow, this is gonna be easy!" chirped Frida, with the desire to get the heist over with as soon as possible.

"It's too easy Frida, why do you think we brought the laser spray?

"Oh yeah."

Manny took his claw and scratched a perfect circle into the glass. He popped out the remains of the makeshift opening, held Frida close to him once more, and jumped through the hole. El Tigre shot his hand towards the direction of the ceiling and swung towards the giant sign, landing on top of it. Frida took the canister out of her backpack, and sprayed all over the room, revealing the bright red lasers, but it wasn't just a few of them crossing over each other Those lasers made up various intricate patterns, layered out carefully on one another.

"Whoa," commented Frida. "Those people are not playing around."

"This is way too complex for us!" lamented Manny. "We'll never get through- hey, I found the off switch!", his eyes shifted to a conveniently labeled control on the ceiling. He switched it to the left, shutting down all of the red beams surrounding their target.

Frida couldn't take it anymore, the anxiety was killing her. "Dude, I know this is kind of the point, but this is just feeling very illegal right now!" Grandpapi's refusal at doing the plundering should have tipped-off Manny, but when his best friend, the biggest lover of mischief and chaos in all of Miracle City was having doubts, perhaps backing down wasn't such a bad idea now?

"I know it is, and I'll definitely get grounded and arrested for it, but it will all be worth it to see Grandpapi happy! I will get the chameleon for him, this I swear!"

"But the curse-"

"Aw how bad can a little statue be?" shrugged Manny, he jumped from the ceiling onto the floor, and stared greedily at the chameleon. He took the opportunity to admire it in the case up close and was even more pleased with it than in the museum. The gold that it was made from was completely untarnished and still looked as if it had just been forged, and the jewels sparkled like a thousand tiny suns. Manny was impressed. He knew that Grandpapi would like it. He'd probably add it to the collection as his favorites. Once he fully examined it, Manny shook his head. He'll have plenty of him to look at it some more.

"Hey little guy," grinned Manny. "You're gonna be getting a nice new home soon."

"In other failed villainy news, the biggest villain in Miracle City Puma Loco was thwarted in his recent thievery attempts by none other than his very own grandson El Tigre." Puma was watching TV in his bedroom, sitting on his bed with Little Mule and Senior Chappi napping by his side. He growled at the condescending way that the anchor on the news reported the story.

"Ai, the humiliation!" Puma screamed at the thought of all the villains in Miracle City watching, startling the pets into waking. "I work my way to the top of villainy, following the examples of my ancestors, and we never gave ourselves away at this point in our legacies!" Puma grudgingly watched the video clip of White Pantera escorting him and El Tigre out of the glass factory played, the trio being surrounded by laughing civilians and even some of the escaped criminals. Just as Puma was about to change the channel, he caught sight of Manny on the screen, who was walking out next to White Pantera. The boy looked down sadly. His arms dangled to the ground from his slumped shoulders, and his ears, tail, and the white tufts of fur on his mask drooped as well. Puma's heart was sinking . He was so angered by his failure that he didn't even consider Manny's feelings.

"I no mean to make Manny feel worthless," Grandpapi confessed to Little Mule, ashamed of the way he was acting towards his grandson. "I was a bit too tough on him, he still learning after all." Grandpapi couldn't stand watching that news broadcast anymore, it just racked up more guilt within him. He picked up the remote to change the channel, where a wrestling match was being announced. Perfecto! He got off his bed and made his way towards Manny's bedroom.

"Manny!" Grandpapi knocked on the door. "Wrestling's on la televisión, you wanna watch with me?"

No answer.

"Come on Manny, chu no es giving me the silent treatment, huh?"

Still no answer.

Grandpapi sighed. "Look, I'm sorry for how I treated you, can't we just forget about it and watch some wrestling together?"

With the third round of silence in a row, Grandpapi opened the door himself, to find what appeared to be the teens in bed, with the lights still turned on oddly enough. "Manny?" Puma approached Manny's bed to check if he was sleeping, only to find a soccer ball and some extra pillows in his place. He walked up to the mattress on the floor that Frida was supposedly sleeping on. "Frida?" he uncovered the bulge, revealing a watermelon and two cans of tuna strapped onto it. They were nowhere in sight. Not that he was concerned, though. They must have snuck out to the arcade, or to tee-pee some buildings, they'll be back soon enough.

"Ah de childrens these days." chuckled Grandpapi fondly. When he made his way towards the exit, he heard a crackling sound beneath his foot. He caught a glimpse of a familiar looking image and picked up the paper he stepped on to get a closer look.

"Oh, no."gasped Grandpapi when he put together this pamphlet and Manny's earlier insistence and realized where the two youngsters have gone. "No, no, no, no, no!" thousands of negative fantasies and flashbacks were racing through his mind, each one worse than the last. What were those two thinking?! Of all the stunts they could have pulled tonight, they had to go with the one that he told them to stay clear from! Grandpapi's blood started increasingly boiling from a dangerous combination of anxiety and rage, making him holler from the top of his lungs. "When I get my hands on them, I gonna-!" he ripped the paper in half before stopping in realization. He couldn't afford to be angry right now, he'll have every opportunity to yell at Manny and Frida after he takes them home, but now there was not a moment to waste! He needed to get to the museum, fast. Without thinking twice, Grandpapi activated his mech suit and flew through the wall as fast as humanly possible, determined to get there before it was too late.

Frida was glancing down at Manny from the top of the sign, biting her nails on the hand that she wasn't using to grip the edge. The closer he approached the case, the more tense she was getting. Finally, she couldn't take it. She needed to get the confession off her chest "Okay, I'm caving in, we shouldn't be doing this!".

"What?!" Manny exclaimed. "This was your idea!"

"You know better than to listen to me!"

"Well, you know better than to expect me to not listen to you! Why are you so worried anyway?"

"Hello?!" Frida aggressively pointed to the sign.

"There's no curse! This is just a cheap tactic to scare off thieves!"

"And how do you know?"

"Can you just let me steal the thing?!"

"No! You don't know what consequences it's gonna bring!"

"Consequences? Who are you and what have you done with Frida?!"

"Manny, you get away from that thing!"

"Or what?." Manny spat those two words at this best friend and went back to his robbery. Before he could even touch the glass case, his vision went red and something dropped down hard on him. Frida jumped from the sign and landed on Manny's back, covering his eyes with her goggles, and tripped him by yanking the straps. The two children continued their squabble on the ground. Frida had Manny pinned down, and the latter tried in vain to push the former off of him, but every time he did manage to succeed, Frida was not giving up, and kept jumping back on him. When shoving didn't work, Manny's hands were met with Frida slapping them away, causing the two of them to resort to simple slap and poke fights. Manny, however, realized that he could easily penetrate the glass and grab the statue. While distracting Frida with repeated pokes to her face, he shot his hand through the barrier, but not with intended results. Rather than getting the statue, Manny's hand ejected from both sides of the case, getting stuck in the place where it was supposed to shoot out, and that automatically set the alarm off. Manny hurriedly retracted his hand, knocking the case over in the process, completely shattering the glass and knocking out the chameleon.

"We gotta get outta here!" Manny screamed in panic over the blaring sound. Frida quickly got off of him, and was waiting for Manny to zip them out, but much to her ire, Manny was still going for the chameleon, and she got ready to slap his darn hand away from it. But Manny and Frida diverted their attention away from the chameleon when they heard the skylight shatter, and saw Grandpapi zooming in his mech suit, still managing to make a perfect landing in spite of his rush, and hurriedly deactivated his mech suit.

"Grandpapi!" Manny was relieved to see his grandfather make it on time to save them, but unfortunately, Grandpapi didn't share that relief. He harshly grabbed Manny by his neckerchief and yanked him in order to face him.

"Manuel Pablo Gutierrez O'Brian Equiha Rivera!" Grandpapi roared at his grandson, unintentionally spitting in his face. "I have one rule for you that I actually expect you to obey, and you break it! When I tell your father about this, you gonna-"

"What is going on here?!" Grandpapi stopped mid-lecture at the sound of the door slamming and a concerned, feminine voice. He and Manny turned to see a familiar duo. Those were the same security guards from the field trip. At the sight of the thieves, the couple's eyes darted from the damage that was done in the room to those responsible for it. They were understandably furious at the trio, but they specifically glared daggers at Grandpapi.

"You!" snarled the female officer, pointing an accusing finger towards Grandpapi's direction. Her eyes burned at the sight of the criminal before her.

"Calm down, calm down!" the old man picked up the artifact and showed that it was unharmed. "It's all just a great, big misunderstanding! We just gonna put it back, get out, and-" just as Grandpapi was about to finish his sentence, the chameleon suddenly disintegrated in his hand. "Okay, you can't do anything about that now, adios!" Grandpapi grabbed Manny and Frida by their arms and huddled them towards him, about to transform into his mech suit. If only the crumbling room didn't prevent him from doing that. Before he could even jump inside with the kids, a small chunk of the sitting hit him in the head and knocked him out.

"No!" cried out Manny. "Grandpapi!" he desperately shook the unconscious figure to no avail. "I'm sorry, I never meant for this to happen!" the poor boy was on the verge of tears.

While Manny was attempting to awaken his grandfather, Frida was unsure of what else to do other than to sit on the sidelines helplessly, and for the first time ever, blame herself completely for everything. Yes, it was stupid for Manny to still go along with the robbery despite the red flags that were popping up, but if she hadn't suggested it in the first place, they wouldn't be in this mess right now. In the midst of her pity party, Frida noticed that the powdery remains of the chameleon were emitting a purple glow that was getting brighter by the minute, "Uh, Manny…" she whimpered, tugging her friend's sleeve with a shaking hand. When Manny turned to see the ash pile glowing, and slowly morphing into various odd shapes, until it turned into a giant, freakish, reptilian-like creature that resembled the little statue, still retaining the shimmering scales, only instead of the polished, flawless gold, it was an inky black, and it was about the size of one of the triceratops fossils in the dinosaur exhibit. The monster eyed it's glimmering red eyes at those who dare awake him and let out an ear-piercing screech.

"Manny, what do we do?!" screamed Frida, frantically shaking him.

"I don't know!" sobbed Manny.

The security guards were still on the other side of the room in the midst of the chaos, trying to dodge the collapsing facility. The man dutifully protected the woman from any dangers at all costs, pulling her out or blocking her from the direction of any falling debris, and continuously but unsuccessfully insisted that she retreat to a safer place. But when she saw the purple light beaming from the remains of the statue and heard the youngsters' cries, her instincts screamed at her to help them. She ran to the center of the room, rapidly dodging anything that might harm her. As soon as she reached the injured team, the big creature had it's claws raised, with intent to strike. Without even thinking, the woman jumped and threw herself onto the panicked youngsters and unconscious man. She kept urging for them to stick together as she shielded them from the danger. When the creature's claws were just an arm's length away to kill, a golden light emitted from the piled group, and they soon vanished. The chameleon stared at the empty spot where it's victims once stood, and turned to the older male officer, who without a word, disappeared as well.

Remember guys, feel free to leave some constructive criticism in the reviews! I really appreciate them!