Zombie Town (2 page)

Half an hour later, Karen and I climbed off the bus at the mall. We ran through the rain to the cineplex across the street. A huge poster hung on the wall outside. It showed a zombie’s bloodshot eyes and wide-open mouth. Shreds of human skin dangled from his rotting teeth.

My stomach flip-flopped. “Forget about buying me popcorn,” I groaned.

We paid for our tickets. Karen bought herself a giant tub of buttered popcorn. Then we went into the theater.

The place was empty.

“Weird,” I said as we walked down the aisle. “This movie is a big hit? Where is everyone?”

“This is excellent.” Karen edged into the second row. “We won’t have to worry about seeing over somebody’s head.”

“I guess.” Actually, I didn’t care if I couldn’t see. I didn’t
want
to see. Maybe a bunch of seven-foot-tall basketball players would come in and block our view.

A couple of minutes went by. No one came and sat in front of us. Nobody even came into the theater.

I glanced around. All I saw were row after row of empty seats. This isn’t just weird, I thought. It’s wrong. Something is wrong.

And then I heard it. A low, creaking sound. The creaking grew louder.

I jumped up when I heard a crash. “What was that?” I gasped.

“I see it! A zombie!” Karen screamed. “Run! Run for your life!”

“Where? Where?” I cried.

She laughed. “Chill, Mike. That was the door closing. That’s all.”

I stared over my shoulder. Karen was right. Someone had closed the door. Now the auditorium was even darker. I sank back into my seat. “We’re still the only ones here.”

“So what?” Karen asked.

“It doesn’t make any sense, that’s what!” I cried. “This is the most popular movie in the country. We’re all alone in here. Where is everybody?”

“Who cares?” Karen shoved a handful of buttery popcorn into her mouth. “It’s cool that nobody’s here,” she mumbled, chomping down another handful of popcorn. “We have the whole place to ourselves.”

I didn’t want the whole place to ourselves. I didn’t want to be here at all. “I’m getting a really creepy feeling, Karen. I think we…”

“Quiet,” she whispered. “It’s starting!”

The lights dimmed completely. After a few seconds, some shadowy shapes began moving across the screen. Soft, eerie moaning sounds came from the speakers.

No commercials? I thought. No previews of other movies? What’s going on here?

Then I heard voices. Kid’s voices.

The screen grew a little brighter. Three kids about my age were walking through a park, laughing and kidding each other. One of them dropped his backpack. Papers and notebooks spilled out. The kids stopped to pick them up.

The moaning grew louder, but the kids didn’t notice it. The camera shifted to a grove of bushes behind them.

My heart began to pound.

The bushes rustled. A hand pushed the branches aside. A human hand, with black dirt under long, ragged fingernails.

Black dirt—from the grave.

I cringed as an ugly face peered out from the bushes. Then another one. And another.

The faces had green skin. And one of them had grime all over its nose. Then, as they gazed at the kids, I noticed something.

The nose wasn’t grimy. It was missing. The zombie had a gaping black hole in the middle of his face.

It’s only make-up, I reminded myself. It’s only a movie!

The zombies began to make grunting noises.

Hungry
grunting noises.

Karen poked me in the side. “Get ready,” she whispered. “They’re about to eat their first victims. They have to keep eating people to stay alive, you know.”

“Don’t remind me,” I muttered. I clutched the arms of my seat.

The zombies shoved the bushes aside and staggered into the open. The camera closed in on the noseless zombie’s face.

As he gazed hungrily at the kids, one of his eyeballs slid out of the socket.

My stomach flipped over. Oh, man! I thought. Why did I ever let Karen talk me into this?

On the screen, the kids turned their heads. Their eyes grew wide with horror. The zombies loomed over them, moaning and smacking their rotted, swollen lips.

I knew what was coming. And I didn’t want to see it. As the kids screamed in terror, I squeezed my eyes shut.

A piercing shriek rang out.

I started to cover my ears, but the shriek suddenly stopped. Then I heard a sputtering noise, sort of like a piece of plastic fluttering in the wind.

I opened my eyes, just a slit.

Huh? The screen had gone dark.

I glanced around.

Except for the dim red glow of the exit sign, the theater was dark.

Dark and totally silent.

“I don’t believe it!” Karen cried.

“What?” I asked. “What’s going on?”

“Didn’t you hear that sputtering sound?” she replied. “It was the film flapping around. The projector broke.”

“Oh. Too bad,” I lied. Secretly, I felt relieved. Now I wouldn’t have to see the rest of the film. “I guess we’d better go.”

“No way. The movie just started,” Karen declared. “They’ll fix it. Just wait.”

Karen leaned back in her seat and chomped on her popcorn. I kept my fingers crossed that somebody would announce that the film had been ripped to shreds.

A couple of minutes went by.

“Hey, projectionist!” Karen shouted. “How long until the movie starts again?”

No answer.

We swiveled around in our seats and glanced up at the projection booth above the balcony. The booth was empty.

Just like the theater.

Karen stood up. “The projectionist must be out in the lobby. Let’s go see.”

We stumbled up the aisle to the door. I pushed on the bar.

The door didn’t open. I pushed harder. No. It still wouldn’t open. “It’s stuck,” I groaned.

Karen leaned her shoulder against the door and shoved. I pushed on the bar.

The door didn’t budge.

“It’s not stuck—it’s locked!” I cried. I pounded on it with my fists. “Hey, somebody—we’re locked in here! Let us out!”

We waited for a few seconds. Nothing happened. I pounded and shouted again, but no one came.

“This is so not cool,” Karen declared.

“Yeah.” I turned and gazed at the rows of empty seats. My heart started to thud, and my mouth felt dry. “Why isn’t someone opening the door?”

“I don’t know.” Karen glanced around. “But we’re not stuck, Mike. We can get out through the emergency door.” She pointed down the aisle.

I gazed at the glowing red exit sign. Yes! The sooner we got out of here, the better.

As we hurried down the sloping aisle, Karen tripped on the leg of a seat. Her tub of popcorn flew out of her hand. Popcorn rolled down the aisle like an avalanche.

“There goes four dollars down the drain,” she griped. “Down the aisle, I mean! I’m going to ask for a free refill.”

“Who’s going to give it to you?” I asked. “There isn’t anyone here!”

“Somebody has to be around,” she argued. “They probably all took a break at the same time or something.”

Maybe she’s right, I thought. But I didn’t care. Once we got out, I was going home. Karen could stay and watch the movie alone. Let her call me a wimp.

We reached the bottom of the aisle. I stepped up to the emergency door—and pushed hard with both hands.

Nothing happened.

Karen joined me. We both pushed. Then we tried pulling.

The door didn’t move.

My heart began to pound again. We’re trapped in here, I realized.

Someone locked us in. But—why?

“Wh-what are we going to do?” I stammered. My legs were shaking. I dropped into the nearest seat.

“Don’t panic,” Karen said. “It’s no big deal. Really.” She swallowed hard. “Well…maybe it
is
a little creepy.”

“No kidding.” I leaned against the seat back and stared around. I couldn’t see anything but the shadows of the empty seats. I couldn’t hear anything but my heart pounding.

“Hellooo!” Karen suddenly shouted. “We’re stuck in here! If this is a joke, we’re not laughing! Let us out!”

No one answered. When Karen’s voice stopped echoing, the theater grew silent again.

We have to get out of here, I thought. There has to be a way! I glanced up at the blank movie screen. “Let’s go back there, behind the screen,” I suggested. “Maybe there’s another emergency door.”

Maybe even a telephone, I thought. I was definitely ready to dial 911.

We hopped onto the dusty stage and pulled back one end of the screen. As we stepped behind it, a disgusting, putrid smell swept over us.

“Whoa, gross!” Karen exclaimed. “What
is
that?”

I clapped my hands over my mouth and nose. “I don’t know,” I mumbled. “Rotten eggs, maybe?”

“Eeew! I think I’m going to be sick,” Karen groaned. Her face turned green.

“Hold it until we get outside. Look!” I pointed across the stage to a door with another red
EXIT
sign above it.

“Great!” Karen cried. “Let’s get out of here before I puke.”

We started toward the door. But halfway across the stage, I heard something.

A shuffling noise, like someone’s feet scraping across the dusty wood floor. Then I heard a soft wheezing sound. In and out. In and out.

I grabbed Karen’s arm. The shuffling noise came again. “Did you hear that?” I asked.

“It’s probably the screen moving back and forth.” She tried to tug her arm free.

“No, wait. There’s something else. Listen!” I whispered.

Karen gave me an annoyed glance. She started to say something, but I held up my hand to silence her.

In the silence, I heard the wheezing again. In and out. Getting louder. Louder.

“Unnh…unnnnh!”

My skin prickled.

Karen’s eyes grew wide. “What is that?” she whispered.

I shook my head.

“Unnnnh!” The frightening sound came closer. We heard the shuffling again.

Then a figure slowly emerged from the shadows near the door. The eerie red glow of the exit sign lit up his face.

“Noooooooo!” Karen moaned.

My teeth started to chatter. I couldn’t speak.

A zombie stared at us from across the stage.

A zombie, with green skin and a haunted, hungry look in his eyes.

No, not his eyes. His
eye
! One eye was missing. And as the living corpse turned, I could see that half his face was missing, too. As if someone had ripped off the skin on his right side.

“Karen!” I gasped. “It’s—it’s—a zombie from the movie!”

“His mouth! Look at his mouth!” she cried.

“Huh?”

“See what’s stuck in his teeth?”

I forced myself to stare into the zombie’s mouth. Something silver glittered between two rotting teeth.

A buckle.

I had seen that buckle before. In the movie. On the backpack the kid had dropped right before the zombies attacked.

That buckle—was that all that was left of the kid?

Did the zombie eat the rest of him?

But that was a movie! I told myself. It wasn’t real! It couldn’t be!

My knees started to shake again. Chill after chill ran down my back.

The zombie’s one eye slipped out of its socket and rested on its cheekbone.

The ugly creature let out a loud moan. Karen and I jumped back, screaming.

The zombie lifted his head. The eye locked on us. Then the creature raised half-rotted arms and took a lurching step. “Unnnh…unnnnnh!”

“Karen…Karen…” I whispered. “It’s coming after us!”