Attack of the Shark-Headed Zombie Read Free Page A

three was gone. The page was torn. It was almost as if something had taken a bite out of it.
    “You’ve got to see this, Henry!” Keats said. “Mr. Cigam found a spell to zap the zombie with the wand. But it’s missing the most important part of—”
    “Ahhhhh!” Henry interrupted. He was standing by the counter with his back to Keats.
    Keats jumped. “What!” he demanded. “What is it now?”
    “Oh man. This is just nasty.” Henry held up a plate covered in furry mold. “When’s the last time Mr. Cigam washed the dishes?”
    “You scared me to death.” Keats shook his head. “Get serious, Henry. We have to find the wand. It must be in the sink buried under all those dishes.”
    “What a grouch,” Henry said. “Being chased by a zombie must be bad for your funny bone—” Suddenly Henry stopped and shouted, “Ahhhhh!”
    This time Keats didn’t freak out. “You need some new jokes, Henry.”
    “Uh, Keats,” Henry said quietly. It was the voice he used when he didn’t want Keats to panic. “I think
you
found the sink.”
    “Oh yeah?” Keats wasn’t going to fall for one of Henry’s pranks. “What makes you say that?”
    “Because you’re standing in it,” Henry said. “Look at your feet.”
    Keats did. Or tried to. He couldn’t see his feet. They were gone!
    His sneakers had been sucked into the kitchen floor like it was quicksand.
    “I’m sinking!” Keats shouted.

KEATS TRIED TO pull his feet free. But he couldn’t budge. If anything, struggling only made him sink faster. The floor quickly rose to his shins. Soon he would be sucked all the way down.
    Henry and the rest of the room were still on solid ground. This was the only part of the kitchen with a squishy spot.
    “That must be what Mr. Cigam’s note meantby the kitchen
sink
,” Henry said. “It’s some kind of sinkhole.”
    The floor was up to Keats’s knees now. It was like sliding into taffy. “Henry, help me!” he yelled.
    Thinking fast, Henry tied two crusty dish towels together and tossed one end to Keats. He grabbed it and Henry pulled. Just as Keats started to climb up, his foot bumped into something.
    “There’s something jammed in here,” Keats said.
    With one hand still on the towel rope, Keats reached into the spongy floor. There was a
gurgle
as he yanked out a small scepter, like a king might carry. Only this one had a lightbulb screwed into the top.
    Keats flung the rod to Henry. He put it on the counter so he could keep pulling.
    But crawling out of the sinkhole was getting harder. When Keats had tugged the rod free, it was like unclogging the drain in a bathtub. Things started going down the hole faster. The floor began to swirl a little as it spun around Keats.
    The moving floor made the table tip over. Still open to the marked page, the
How to Zap Anything
book fell and skidded toward the pit.

    “The spell!” Keats let go of the rope with one hand again. He reached for the book. But he was only able to grab one page. The page ripped off in his fingers and the rest of the book was sucked into the hole.
    There was a
shuuuwmack
sound. Suddenly everything stopped swirling. With Henry’s help, Keats pulled himself onto solid ground.
    “The book must have plugged up the hole again,” Keats said, getting to his feet. He uncrumpled the torn page in his hand. “But I saved the spell!”
    “Great job, Keats,” Henry said, and picked up the rod on the counter. “Do you think this is the wand Mr. Cigam was talking about?”
    Keats eyed it. “I thought a magic wand would look different. This is just a goofy stick with a lightbulb on top.” He shrugged. “But in this house, that’s weird enough to be right.”
    “Good point,” Henry agreed.
    BLAM!
The boys jumped as pounding started on the wall behind the counter.
    Keats began to panic again. “The zombie is trying to break into the house! It’s right on the other side of that wall!”
    Henry tried to calm him down. “That works out great,” he