Free Zombie Town by R.L. Stine Page A

was creeping me out. My imagination whirred into overdrive, and I started asking myself scary questions…
    Why are we the only ones here? Is this some kind of trap?
    What if the doors are locked? What if we’re locked in here?
    It’s too dark and too quiet. Something HORRIFYING is about to happen.
    And that’s where this book starts. With two kids, Mike and Karen, locked in a dark moviehouse…and something HORRIFYING is about to happen.
    Enjoy.

“See, Mike? Any minute now, it’s going to pour,” Karen said. “We’ll get soaked.”
    I sat on my front steps and stared up at the sky. Dark clouds rolled low overhead. Thunder rumbled in the distance.
    I sighed. Why couldn’t it be sunny?
    “It’s so not a good day for skateboarding,” Karen said.
    “Right,” I agreed. “But we could hang out and play Diablo III on my new laptop.”
    “We already played it at least a hundred times,” she complained. She grabbed my arm. “Come on, Mike! We have to do this!”
    I sighed again. Karen is my best friend. She lives across the street from me, and we almost always hang out together on Saturdays. Since we couldn’t skateboard today, we were trying to decide what to do.
    Actually, I was the only one trying to decide. Karen already knew.
    She wanted to go see Zombie Town.
    Zombie Town is a horror movie. A terrifying horror movie about a bunch of hideous, flesh-eating zombies who take over a whole town. No one escapes. The zombies eat almost everyone. The survivors get turned into zombies.
    Everyone at our school is dying to see Zombie Town. Everyone except me.
    I hate scary movies. They give me nightmares. They give me day mares! It’s embarrassing. I mean, I’m twelve. They shouldn’t bother me, right? But I can’t help it.
    “Well?” Karen asked. “Come on, Mike. Let’s go check it out!”
    “It’s going to be really gross, you know,” I reminded her. “All those decaying zombies eating people and tearing out their guts.”
    She laughed. “Cool!”
    Cool? Karen would say that, I thought. She’s not afraid of anything.
    “Please, Mike,” Karen pleaded. “Don’t wimp out on me. Everyone knows there’s no such thing as zombies.”
    I tried to think of other things to do. Help Mr. Bradley next door rake his leaves? No. It would be raining soon. Play with my little brother Zach? Yuck! Go shopping with Mom and Dad? Boring! Clean my room? Was I that desperate?
    I really, really didn’t want to see this movie. But I didn’t want to act like a wimp, either. “Okay, I’ll go,” I finally agreed. “But you buy the popcorn.”
    “Deal! Meet you at the bus stop in ten minutes!”
    Karen ran across the street, and I went inside to tell my parents our plan. I could feel myself getting nervous already. And I hadn’t even left my house!
    Get a grip, I thought. After all, it has been a year since I’ve seen a scary movie. Maybe now that I’m twelve, I can handle it.
    Maybe.
    If only I had stayed home…

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