Alex Neptune, Monster Avenger by David Owen

Author:David Owen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Usborne Publishing Ltd

Air rushed in Alex’s ears as he slipped down a curving, soft-walled tunnel. At first, he thought it was just the wind and the speed of descent. Then he caught its rhythm – air sucking downwards, then blowing back up the tunnel – and realized it was breathing.

He was falling inside the Water Dragon.

Alex flailed in panic. The walls of the tunnel were strangely sticky. He was sliding through gunk, which was thickening under his legs, slowing his descent enough to straighten up and regain control. A faint green light below his feet silhouetted his friends falling ahead of him.

“Brace yourselves!” Alex shouted.

Anil whimpered. “Why?”

“Because at the bottom of steep tunnels there’s usually a—”

Zoey and Anil dropped out of sight. The blowhole ended abruptly and Alex’s stomach lurched as he fell into empty air. Grey water rushed up from below. Alex threw out his hands to summon air bubbles around his friends’ faces before they splashed down.

Except there was no splash. The water didn’t swallow him up. It cratered softly underneath him, thick and cloying like treacle. Alex began to sink into the liquid as if being absorbed. It glooped around his legs, sticky strings stretching from his arms when he tried to wrench them clear.

Zoey floundered beside him, fruitlessly poking at the air bubble covering her nose and mouth. Alex slapped the surface of the gunk and both their bubbles popped.

“Go flat on your back and kick,” she said, pointing behind him.

An outcrop of jagged rock rose from the swamp. Alex stopped struggling and flattened himself evenly so he was no longer sinking. Then, carefully, he kicked both legs at once like a flipper to drive himself backwards.

Once he reached the outcrop, he dragged himself ashore. The grey-and-green rock was surprisingly brittle, crumbling to gravel under his hands. Alex heaved Zoey up beside him, their hands clamming stickily together.

“That might be the single most disgusting thing that’s ever happened to me.” Zoey scooped clear goop off her cheeks and out of her fringe. Rock dust had stuck to her hand and she rubbed it between her fingers. “Dragon bogies. We’re actually inside the dragon!”

She laughed – only a little manically – and Alex couldn’t help but join in. They had made it! Their most ridiculous plan yet had actually worked. The most dangerous part might still lie ahead, but allowing himself this moment of triumph made it seem distinctly less impossible.

Plus it distracted him from the horror of being covered head-to-toe in dragon snot.

“Where’s Anil?” he asked, sitting up so that slime sloughed off his skin.

Swinging movement overhead caught their attention. Anil hung upside down from a sticky green ribbon that had snagged his ankle. An air bubble sealed off his nose and mouth so they hadn’t heard his calls for help.

“I’m stuck on mucus,” Anil said as soon as the bubble was popped.

Their friend dangled too high above the snot rocks for them to reach. Alex moved to touch the mucus swamp, wondering if it would respond to his powers.

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