Attack of the Shark-Headed Zombie (6 page)

“Mrrrrhhhs!”
The zombie moaned in pain. It sounded hurt and confused.

Keats’s trick had worked!

Just before the zombie had broken into the attic, Keats had come up with a plan. He had put his baseball cap and jacket on the suit of armor. Meanwhile, he had hidden behind a box across the attic.

The zombie was really angry now. With a flipper, it touched its sore mouth. Then it shoved the suit of armor like a bully pushing a kid on the playground. The armor rocked back and forth. It toppled on the zombie, trapping it against the wall.

“Now!” Keats told himself. He leapt out from behind the box.

The zombie saw Keats and let out an angry burp. But it was stuck under the heavy armor.

Keats looked for the spot where the floor seemed the most rotten. He jumped as high as he could. Then his feet hit the floor. With a
giant
crack!
, the old boards gave way. Keats plunged through the attic floor.

He landed hard on a thick shag rug in the room below. His legs buckled and he fell to his knees. But he was okay, and so was the wand.

Keats must have picked the wrong spot on the floor of the attic. He had hoped to end up in the garage with Henry. Instead he was in a living room. A huge television from around 1965 filled one corner, and a big orange couch sat across from it. Through an open door, Keats saw the hallway with the weird faces on the carpet. On the other side of the room was a second door. It was closed.

How could he get to the garage?

Keats was just getting to his feet when he heard the zombie up in the attic. It was throwing aside the suit of armor.

Oh no! Keats looked up at the hole he had
made. It was closing. At that instant the zombie dove headfirst toward Keats.

Keats pressed down into the rug, waiting for the zombie to land on him. But it never did.

The zombie had jerked to a stop. It was hanging upside down in the air, just inches above Keats. The zombie’s flapping flippers couldn’t quite reach him. Neither could its snapping jaws.

What happened?
Keats wondered as he slid from under the zombie. Then he saw the answer.

The hole had closed around the zombie’s tail! It had trapped the zombie like a wriggling trout on a hook.

There was no time for a victory dance. The zombie was curling up toward the ceiling and pounding on it with its flippers. It would break free before long.

Keats had two choices. He could go out the open door to the hallway with the weird face carpet. But that way could be a dead end.
After all, the attic, kitchen, and library were all sealed up.

Or he could try the closed door on the other side of the room. But that meant passing pretty close to the zombie.

The zombie was almost loose. Keats would only have time to choose one door.

Be like Henry
, Keats thought.
Take a chance. Try the closed door.

Holding his breath against the fish smell, he inched along the wall and past the upside-down zombie. The creature was too busy flapping at the ceiling to notice him.

Keats reached the small door and opened it. “Yes!” he said. It was another hallway!

He stepped through the door just as the zombie jerked out of the ceiling.

Keats turned to see the zombie and pieces of the ceiling fall to the shag rug.
Boing!
The
zombie was up in a flash, bouncing toward Keats.

At the last second, though, the zombie stopped. It cocked its head, looking at the doorway, which was now shimmering. Keats could tell the zombie didn’t want to get stuck again. It wasn’t going to risk coming through just as the doorway was becoming a wall.

Since he was safe, Keats couldn’t resist doing something else Henry might do. He gave the zombie a funny salute and said, “Better luck next time!”

The zombie let out a frustrated burp and waved its flippers angrily. Then the doorway vanished. A wall separated the zombie and Keats.

He laughed. He had done it. He had escaped the zombie!

Now he just had to keep his fingers crossed
that this hall led to the garage. Keats hurried down the dark passageway. As he went, he opened different doors. There were closets and a bathroom. But no garage.

He opened the last door. It was the garage!

And, even better, Henry was there. With his back to Keats, he was standing on the middle of the bed. Right where he’d landed when he fell from the attic.

Keats was so happy to see his cousin. He burst in without looking at anything else. The door behind him vanished. And so did Keats’s smile.

“Rats,” he said.

Keats wished he had looked more carefully before rushing into the garage.

Why?

Because the shark-headed zombie was already there.

WHILE KEATS HAD
been running down that last hallway, the zombie must have gone back up to the attic. Then it had busted through the attic floor to the garage!

Now the zombie was circling Henry, coming closer and closer to the bed. Standing up on the mattress, Henry looked as if he was stuck on a raft with a hungry shark swimming around him.

Only the shark-headed zombie didn’t need water to swim. It wriggled on its belly through the old newspapers and trash that covered the floor. The creature glided smoothly in the garbage, the way it had in the ground outside. Keats guessed this was easier for it than all that clumsy hopping.

“Henry!” Keats called. “Are you okay?”

At the sound of Keats’s voice, the zombie
glanced his way. Keats scrambled up onto a nearby workbench. But the zombie didn’t come after him. It seemed to be having too much fun scaring Henry. And it just kept circling the bed.

Henry turned around. He held two lightbulbs. “Keats!” Henry said with a big smile. “Wow, am I glad to see you!”

“Me too,” Keats said. “Why didn’t you get out of the garage when you had the chance?”

“I couldn’t,” Henry answered. “My foot got stuck in a mattress spring when I hit the bed. I just got it free when that thing showed up.”

As if hearing its name, the zombie’s head popped out of the trash. Its jaws snapped in the air near Henry.

“Watch out!” Keats yelled.

Henry threw a lightbulb at the zombie. It ducked back under the garbage. And the bulb shattered against a rusty lawn mower.

“I’ve been holding the zombie back with the lightbulbs,” Henry explained. “It’s scared of them for some reason. But most of them broke when I fell.”

Keats nodded. “Toss me the lightbulb!” he shouted. “I’ll put it in the wand and say the spell.”

Up on the workbench, he was about fifteen feet away from Henry.

“Okay,” Henry said. “But don’t drop it! It’s the last one.”

Henry got ready for a throw. Just then the shark-headed zombie bumped the bed. If Henry had thrown the bulb, it would have shattered on the floor.

Henry was about to try another toss when the zombie rammed the bed again. This time it hit the bed so hard that Henry fell over on the mattress. He quickly got back to his feet.

“Did the bulb break?” Keats asked.

“No, it’s okay,” Henry said. “But the zombie isn’t going to let me get a good throw.”

“All right,” Keats said. “I’ll toss the wand to you.”

At that moment the zombie leapt into the air between Henry and Keats. Its mouth opened and closed with a
clack.
It hit the floor and kept wriggling around the bed.

“Don’t throw the wand!” Henry shouted. “The zombie will catch it. I think it can understand what we’re saying.”

Keats’s mind raced. Without the bulb he couldn’t make the wand work. What could they do?

The zombie’s circles grew even smaller. Now it was chewing through the edges of the mattress. Bits of stuffing and feathers flew into the air. The garage looked like the site of a crazy pillow fight.

Trying to keep his balance on the bed, Henry bounced from foot to foot. Meanwhile, Keats’s brain bounced from idea to idea.

But he didn’t say any of the ideas out loud. Especially now that he knew the zombie could understand words.

The boys were running out of time. Soon the zombie would eat more of the bed and
Henry would be in big trouble. Then the cousins looked right at each other. And a silent idea passed between them.

After a second Henry said, “I’ve got a new World’s Greatest Plan.” He made his voice sound sad. “I’m just going to stay right here and not try to get away.”

The zombie heard this and slowed down. It reminded Keats of a cat that wants to toy with a mouse a little longer.

But there was one thing the zombie didn’t notice, or just didn’t understand. Keats saw it, though.

Henry was scratching his chin.

Keats hoped they both had the same plan. To be sure, he asked, “I guess you’re the one who is
chicken
now?”

Henry nodded and got ready.

At the same time, the boys said, “Put the
cluck right up there or the yolk will hit our hair!”

Blip! Blip!
Two chickens popped into the air over the zombie. Flapping their wings, the
chickens laid eggs that fell and smashed on the zombie’s face. For the moment it couldn’t see a thing.

Henry moved like a flash. He leapt off the bed, jumping over the zombie. Henry landed next to the workbench and climbed up next to Keats. The chickens fluttered to the floor and vanished with two more clucks.