Attack of the Shark-Headed Zombie (2 page)

There was an address outside of town and a phone number to leave a message.

“We’ll have money for new bikes in no time!” Henry said. “There’s a pay phone right there. I’ll call and say we’ll take the job. It’s my new World’s Greatest Plan!”

Something about the help-wanted ad struck Keats as weird. He couldn’t put his finger on it. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” he said.

But, of course, it was too late to stop Henry. He was already dialing the phone.

THWACK! A BRANCH
snapped back and smacked Keats in the face.

“Blech,” he said, wiping a slimy leaf off his cheek. He couldn’t believe he was following Henry on one of his shortcuts. Again.

It was the morning after their bikes had gone into the lake. The cousins were squishing around the swampy woods looking for 1313 Houdini Way. That was the address on the ad.

“Admit it, Henry,” Keats said as his sneaker splashed into a pool of muck. “Your
short
cut is a
long
cut. We are so lost. We never should have left the road.”

“I know exactly where we are,” Henry said. He was scratching his chin, so Keats knew he wasn’t telling the truth.

“Okay, where are we?” Keats challenged.

Just then Keats’s foot caught on something. He fell forward, his hands scraping on pavement. It was the road! When he looked up, he saw a massive iron gate on the other side. The address on the gate said 1313 Houdini Way.

“We’re here!” Henry shouted. He pulled Keats back onto his feet. “See? No problem.”

Keats had to smile. Sometimes Henry’s plans
did
actually work out.

Past the gate, a long gravel driveway curved around dead trees. A gray house with dark windows squatted on top of the hill. It looked like a haunted house in a horror movie.

Keats took a step back. “Are you kidding?” he said.

“Come on,” Henry said. “Do you want to make money for new bikes or not?”

Tugging Keats along, Henry led the way to the house. They climbed the rickety old steps of the front porch and pressed the doorbell. Instead of a
ding-dong
, there was a buzzing noise. It sounded like
runawayrunaway.
The boys waited. But no one came.

Keats spotted a note taped next to the door. He plucked the note free and read it out loud:

“Shark-headed zombie?” Henry said.

“Extra wand?” Keats said.

Henry laughed, and then Keats did, too.

“Well,” Henry said, “at least Mr. Cigam knows how to joke around. Come on. Let’s start at the top of the list.
Weed the garden.
”

“I didn’t see a garden,” Keats said, putting Mr. Cigam’s note in his pocket. “Did you?”

They looked around. After a couple of minutes they found the “garden.” It was a big patch of weeds next to the house.

“Let’s get to work,” Henry said.

Under the blazing summer sun, the boys started yanking out weeds. They were the really prickly kind with deep roots. They took two hands—or even four—to tug out of the dirt.

With each weed they pulled out, Keats felt the ground shake a little. The first few times he stopped to look around. But after a while he decided the shaking must be his imagination.

Finally the cousins uprooted the last weed. Henry wiped the sweat off his face. “That’s done,” he said. “What’s the next job?”

Keats took out the to-do list to check. Then he froze. A black line was running through the words
weed the garden.
It was as if an invisible pen was crossing it off the list.

“Whoa,” Keats said. “Henry, look at this.”

But Henry was staring past Keats’s shoulder. Keats turned to look, too. About fifty yards away, he spotted a dark triangle sticking up from the ground. It was as high as his knees and moving through the grass.

“What is that?” Keats asked.

“If I didn’t know better,” Henry said, “I’d say it’s a fin.”

It
did
look like a fin gliding through the ground.

For a second the fin was all Keats could see. Then a huge mouth popped up out of the grass. Long, sharp teeth crunched down on twigs and rocks.

Some sort of strange creature was swimming through the ground.

It was gobbling up everything in its path. And it was heading straight for the boys!

Henry grabbed Keats’s arm and shouted, “Run!”

KEATS DIDN’T MOVE.
His eyes wide, he stared at the toothy jaws slicing through the grass and weeds. Keats had never seen anything like this.

It can’t be real
, Keats thought. Meanwhile, the thing was getting closer.

“Come on!” Henry yanked Keats’s arm again. Keats finally snapped out of it. The boys darted across the lawn. They sprinted up the steps of the front porch. Keats almost tripped
on the last step. But Henry grabbed him and held him up.

Their hands reached for the front door at the same time. It was locked! The boys pounded on the door and rang the doorbell. But there was no answer.

“I don’t get it!” Keats said. “Mr. Cigam gave us jobs to do inside. Why is the door locked?”

“He must have forgotten to leave it open,” Henry said. “I think we have bigger problems to deal with than Mr. Cigam’s bad memory.”

The cousins turned back toward the yard. The creature had followed them! It was half-way between the garden and porch, chewing up all the dirt and stones in its way.

Suddenly the creature stopped. It let out a huge, long burp.

BLLLUURRRP!

“Yuck,” Keats said.

Then the thing kept coming. In an instant it was at the porch steps.

“We should have run for the road!” Henry said. “Now we’re stuck here!”

The creature took an enormous bite out of the bottom porch step. The wooden step was thick, but it cracked like a toothpick. The boys pressed back against the locked door.

“What
is
that thing?” Keats shouted.

Henry said, “It looks like some kind of shark. But how can a shark swim in grass?”

Shark.
That word reminded Keats of the note.

“I bet it’s the shark-headed zombie,” he said. “Mr. Cigam wasn’t kidding!”

When the creature had chewed through the bottom porch step, it stopped again to burp. Then it started crunching on the second step.

Chomp! Crack! Chomp!

Henry jiggled the knob of the locked door. It still wouldn’t budge.

The zombie chewed faster as it got closer to the boys. It gnawed on the third step. Just a few feet were left between the cousins and the zombie.

Keats looked around the porch. His mind was racing. “According to
The Big Book of Locks
, three—”

“Oh man! This isn’t the library, Keats!” Henry said. “We don’t have time for a report on a boring book you just read!”

Keats ignored him. “According to
The Big Book of Locks
, three out of five people leave their keys under the doormat.”

Henry rolled his eyes. Keats lifted the doormat. A shiny ring of about ten keys glittered there in the sun.

“Woohoo!” Henry cheered. He slapped
Keats on the back. “I promise never to doubt you again. It’s my new World’s Greatest Plan.”

“Yeah, right,” Keats said. But he was smiling, too. Keats picked up the keys and tried one in the lock. The key didn’t fit. He tried another.

Henry kept poking him and saying, “Come on! Come on!”

“You’re not helping, Henry,” Keats muttered. “Just—”

Craaassh!
The shark-headed zombie’s jagged teeth chomped down on the top step. Its head poked over the edge of the porch. The smell of old fish came from its mouth.

“Hurry!” Henry shouted.

“I’m trying!” Keats chose another key. It didn’t fit. Then he tried the last key. It went in smoothly. The door opened with a click. In a
rush, Henry and Keats pushed into the house and fell sprawling onto a musty carpet.

Glancing back, Keats saw the shark-headed zombie jump into the air. It was like watching a fish leap out of the water. It did a half-twist and landed on the porch with a thud.

The creature flopped around for a second. Then it got its tail underneath its body and stood up. It looked unsteady, like a seal doing a new trick at the zoo.

The zombie was twice as tall as Keats, and it didn’t have just a shark’s head. It had flippers for arms, a tail, and black eyes. The thing’s skin was smooth and silver like a shark’s.

It took a single hop toward the boys.

Keats didn’t want to see any more. He slammed the wooden door shut. But Keats knew it wouldn’t keep the shark-headed zombie out for long.

“There’s an alarm!” Henry said. He was pointing at a big red button on the wall near the door. Keats squinted to read the writing on the button.