Moon Mask Read Online Free PDF

proposed Progenitor Race, was the Moon Mask itself.
    Until now.
    He gazed reverently at the metal and shook off his reverie, turning the mask over. He struggled to keep his emotions in check, wanting to jump and whoop and laugh and scream in joy whilst resisting the urge to collapse to his knees and sob. All the years of ridicule, all the whispered murmurings behind his back, the rolling eyes, the scoffing cackles, now, he would throw them right back at the ignominious disbelievers.
    “It’s a piece of the Moon Mask! Sid, it’s the Moon Mask!” He whooped like a boy on Christmas morning, splashing back down into the water. “Oh my god, this is incredible!”
    “Ben!” Sid called.
    “I mean, this could well be the greatest discovery since-”
    “Ben!” Sid snapped, alongside Nadia’s own warning.
    King turned. And froze.
    Plodding up the ramp from the murky pool, moving with little haste yet exuding the utmost menace, was a nine foot long crocodilian. Its armour-like scales glistened as beads of water dripped off it, whilst, in the shaking beam of his torch, the beast’s eyes shone hellish red.
    He stared back at the enormous monster as it took another waddling stride, then another, the muscles of its legs flexing. “Um,” he mumbled. “It’s a crocodile. I’m stuck down here with a goddamn crocodile!”
    “Are you sure it is not a caiman?” Nadia queried. While Orinoco Crocodiles were known to populate the area, their numbers were so depleted by hunting that a black caiman would be more probable.
    Sid shot her friend an angry glance then peered back down the hole. “Ben, get out of there!”
    King tried not to panic. Despite the crocodile’s plodding manner, he knew it was faster than he could ever hope to be and should he panic and make a dash for the dangling rope it would have its jaws around him in seconds.
    Slowly, cautiously, he took a step towards the rope while tucking the mask into his satchel. Then he paused. “What about the remains?”
    “We’ll come back for them later,” Sid said urgently.
    “Okay,” he gulped and began a gentle, non-aggressive movement through the water towards the rope. Each footstep however brought him closer to the reptile and-
    A splash of water and a lunging shadow!
    Ben dived backwards, out of the wide-open jaws of a second crocodile. He went underwater, unprepared, and gulped in a mouthful of the foul tasting liquid before scrambling to his feet and back-stepping away from the beast as its shadow vanished beneath the surface.
    His heart raced, his body shook with fear- no, not fear. This went beyond fear! This was a feeling he had never experienced before, this was-
    “Ben!” Sid called anxiously. “There are more of them in the water!”
    “ You think!?” he snapped.
    Indeed, beyond the shelf, where the water dropped to indeterminable depth, he could make out the disjointed silhouettes of maybe three, even four more of the monsters.
    “Damn!” he cursed. “I’m dead! I’m dead! I’m dead!”
    An explosion of red and purple light blasted into the chamber, half blinding him. The flare, fired from Nadia’s flare gun, part of the essential survival gear they were required to carry, shot down. It exploded just above the surface of the water, the bright light glaring from its black surface. It stunned the crocodilians, many of them lashing up out of the water and thrashing about.
    “Quick! Now!” Nadia shouted.
    Ben didn’t need to be told twice. He sprinted off the mark, darting to the dangling rope and the salvation which lay at the top of the long climb. But, as he was within arm’s reach, another croc broke the surface, jaws gaping open, breath foul and stinking. Somehow, King, marginally faster, twisted out of range, staggered back, hit the wall. The living dinosaur closed in, coming about for a second attempt.
    King fumbled inside his satchel, found his own flare gun, jammed a cartridge into the barrel, pressed his back against the wall, closed