To Breathe or Not to Breathe (Night at the Museum fanfiction)

Chapter One: Discovery

"Uncle Larry?" I glanced at him, slightly worried.

"Yes?" He met my gaze in a slightly distracted manner.

"... What are we waiting for?"

"We're waiting for the sun to go down." Nicky spoke  up, answering for his dad. He looked excited, which wasn't normal for him, a highschool-aged kid who was at that stage where he thought everything was dumb and boring.

"Why?"

Nicky opened his mouth to reply, but Uncle Larry stopped him with a look. "You'll see." he replied mysteriously. "And remember, you're not allowed to tell anyone about this."

"Huh?" I tilted my head in confusion.

"Okay." Larry ignored me. "It should be happening in three... two... one..."

Suddenly, a loud noise made me stiffen and jerk upright. I glanced around in startlement, and what I saw made the color drain from my face. "Larry......"

The giant T-Rex skeleton was off its pedestal.

And it was moving.

It let out a horrifically loud growling sound, and I shrieked. It sounded angry.

I backed away until my back pressed up against a wall. "What's going on?" My breathing was fast and short, and panic filled my mind. I suffered from slight anxiety, and when I got afraid, the fear overpowered me and took me on a dizzying, wild roller coaster ride that I couldn't get off of until I calmed down.

The T-Rex turned to look at me, tilting its head in what seemed to me to be a threatening manner, as if it were imagining me as its next meal. All thoughts of the possible job opportunity, of Nicky, of Larry vanished from my mind.

I was going to die.

A trumpeting noise sounded behind me, and I cracked my neck jerking around to look back.

Then screamed.

My back wasn't against the wall, like I'd thought it was.

I was leaning against a giant, TERRIFYING woolly mammoth.

My fight-or-flight instinct took over and I was running out of the room, breathing hard as my mind struggled to comprehend the reality forcing itself onto me.

The exhibits were coming to life.

Another loud noise overwhelmed my senses as what seemed to be an army of miniature wax figures charged down the hall across from me, yelling at each other in louder voices than I would have believed possible for such small beings. A clanking sound echoed down the corridor and I gasped, mind racing, as a marble statue clunked towards me. I turned and fled in the opposite direction.

My heart pounded frantically as I raced up a flight of stairs, trying to get as far away from everything as possible. A roar came from a room, and I saw an enormous, hungry looking lion staring out at me menacingly. I turned down a hallway and kept running.

Suddenly, I smacked into something and was stopped in my tracks. Almost afraid to look, I peeked at the thing I'd bumped into, praying it wasn't some other terrifying monster.

It was a young man with dark hair and sparkling blue eyes. He was dressed in ancient Egyptian clothing, and looked just as startled as I was about our sudden collision. He looked to be around.... twenty? Twenty-one? Whatever the case, he couldn't be much older than me.

I backed away slowly, still breathing hard. Who was he?

"Oh!" He looked surprised. "Sorry, I wasn't watching where I was..."