The Zombie Chasers Read online

  The Zombie Chasers

  By John Kloepfer

  Illustrated by Steve Wolfhard

  For Abigail—J. K.

  To my mom and dad for their love and patience—S. W.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Dusk settled over the neighborhood. The humid air was thick…

  Chapter 2

  Zack should have been a better hostage.

  Chapter 3

  In the Clarke family kitchen, Madison Miller was sitting in…

  Chapter 4

  Madison slammed the bedroom door behind them. Zack’s forearms tightened…

  Chapter 5

  Madison whirled around and watched in horror as her beloved…

  Chapter 6

  Twinkles cocked his head in confusion. “I guess it’s just…

  Chapter 7

  Rice’s house was dark and empty except for the bluish…

  Chapter 8

  Madison swerved, dodging the crash. She straightened the wheel as…

  Chapter 9

  Moonlight shimmered in through the glass storefront, sparkling off the…

  Chapter 10

  Zack, Rice, and Madison listened to the hammering of their…

  Chapter 11

  She hoisted Rice to his feet by his shoulder strap,…

  Chapter 12

  The Volvo made a right onto Locust Lane, and they…

  Chapter 13

  Greg Bansal-Jones could best be classified as an eighth-grade super…

  Chapter 14

  The Volvo crunched onward over the gritty unpaved road, spraying…

  Chapter 15

  After a quick debate, which Madison won by decree, it…

  Chapter 16

  Madison stepped around the corner of the towering stone vault,…

  Chapter 17

  Zack jumped down and stepped on the defeated zombie’s chest.

  Chapter 18

  “We’re not taking any chances.” Rice said. “Time to tape…

  Chapter 19

  “Wait,” Madison said, sniffling. “Where’s the headstone?”

  The Next Zombie Chasers Novel, Undead Ahead

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author and the Illustrator

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Zack walking home

  CHAPTER 1

  Dusk settled over the neighborhood. The humid air was thick as pulp.

  Zack Clarke turned onto Locust Lane after a slow walk home, expecting the usual Friday night action on his block: the Zimmer twins grinding out tricks on their skateboards across the parkway; Mrs. Mansfield coming home from the video store with bags of fast food and DVDs for her lazy children; or Old Man Stratton prowling the sidewalks, a disintegrating paperback clutched in his veiny hand. But on this muggy Arizona evening, there wasn’t a soul to be seen.

  Hunched down under the weight of his backpack, Zack quickened his pace, eager to get home. Earlier in the day, a food fight had landed him in after-school work detention, polishing his middle school’s linoleum floors. Now all Zack wanted was the one leftover slice of chocolate birthday cake waiting in the refrigerator, wrapped in plastic and tagged with a Post-it: ZACK’S B-DAY CAKE, DO NOT TOUCH!

  Zack could see his house now, his mom’s Volvo station wagon sitting in the driveway. Every light in the house was off—all except the one in his sister’s bedroom above the garage. He watched from the sidewalk as Zoe’s room went dark, leaving the house looking empty and deserted.

  But Zack knew that his older sister, Zoe, and her evil trio of eighth-grade she-devils—Madison Miller, Ryan York, and Samantha Donovan—were having one of their notorious sleepovers at his house. So until Mom and Dad returned from parent-teacher night at his school, it would just be him. And them.

  As he reached the stoop, a street lamp flickered and went dead, casting the entire lawn in shadow. He pushed the front door open slowly. “Hello!” he called out into the darkness. “Zoe?”

  Suddenly, the door slammed shut, and he felt a paper bag crinkle down over his head. A voice shouted, “Gotcha!”

  In an instant, four pairs of hands grabbed Zack by his elbows and ankles, hoisted him off the ground, and began to carry him through the foyer. Caught in their monster-tight grip, Zack squirmed uselessly, unable to twist free.

  His captors plopped him down hard on an old wooden desk chair, the bag still over his head. Someone was holding his wrists behind the chair, bending his arms back as if he were a handcuffed prisoner. He writhed and kicked, trying to buck loose. Frustrated and exhausted, Zack went limp, playing possum for a second, before thrashing wildly in one final burst of energy.

  That’s when he heard a digital beep, and someone lifted the bag off his head. His sister, Zoe, stood before him. Directly behind her, their father’s laptop sat open on the coffee table, and Zack could see himself on the computer screen.

  “Zoe, what are you doing? You know Dad doesn’t let us play with the webcam.”

  “I’m not playing, little brother,” she said, flipping her dark hair back and cocking her head all too glamorously, like America’s Next Top Psycho preparing for her closeup. “I’m producing a new reality show for VH1. It’s called Hostage Makeover. You want to be in it?” A sinister grin stretched across her face.

  “I’d rather die in my own vomit,” Zack answered.

  “Tough luck, kiddo,” Zoe snickered. “Look alive, girls!”

  Samantha and Ryan entered the living room and shimmied behind Zack. Ryan held a giant roll of duct tape in one hand, and when Zack turned around, she tucked it behind her back. “No peeking, young Zachariah!” she chided, patting him on the head.

  “Okay, Zacky, you hold still!” Zoe gestured to her two minions. A second later, Ryan and Samantha were circling Zack, taping his upper arms and shoulders firmly to the back of the chair, quickly moving on to his legs until they were sure he couldn’t escape. The mysterious pair of hands behind him finally unclasped his wrists. Zack felt the blood rush, throbbing in his fingertips.

  Again, he tried to wriggle free, but the tape was too strong.

  Zoe adjusted the webcam to capture her brother’s struggle. Then she crouched down in front of the computer and spoke: “Welcome to the premiere of Hostage Makeover. I am your host, Zoe Clarke. You’ve already met our captive, my unfortunate-looking younger brother, Zachary Arbutus Clarke.” She stepped away from the laptop. “Tell us how you’re feeling, Hostage Boy.”

  “Zoe, seriously, lay off.” Zack said.

  “Zoe, seriously, lay off,” a voice mimicked him.

  Madison Miller emerged from behind the chair, holding a polka-dotted makeup case. Madison was the prettiest girl in school, with long, almost blond, light brown hair, and just a few faint freckles dotting her button nose. She was also one of the tallest girls in the eighth grade, and she towered over Zack, gazing down at him with her big blue eyes.

  “Shut up, Madison. No one’s talking to you.”

  “Shut up, Madison. No one’s talking to you,” Madison continued in her baby voice.

  “Stop copying me,” Zack insisted.

  “Stop copying me.” Madison wouldn’t quit.

  “I’m an idiot,” Zack said, trying to outsmart her.

  “Yes, Zachary, I’m afraid you are.”

  Game over.

  Madison opened up the makeup case and pulled out what looked like colored pencils. Then she took a sip of her favorite drink, kiwi-strawberry Vital VeganPowerPunch.

  “You know, Madison,” Zack said. “I heard something, that if you drink too much of that stuff it can, like, mess with your whole biological makeup.”

  “Did someone say ‘makeup’?” Zoe chir
ped.

  With that, Madison pulled out a frightening array of cosmetics and placed them on the coffee table. Zack had no idea what all this stuff was used for, other than cluttering up Zoe’s bathroom.

  “Listen up, little bro.” Zoe formed a little rectangle with her index fingers and thumbs and peered through it like some kind of Hollywood director. “If you play nice, we’re gonna make you look really, really pretty. But if you disturb me while I’m filming, we will make you look silly, then I will lock you in your room, put this video on YouTube, and email the link to everyone at school. Now be a good hostage.”

  “Zoe, let me go or I’ll tell Mom and Dad that you’ve been sneaking out of the house at night,” Zack blurted in desperation.

  “Oh, dear brother,” Zoe sneered. “Good hostages don’t make threats.”

  She hit the space bar and yelled, “Action!”

  CHAPTER 2

  Zack should have been a better hostage.

  He stared at his reflection in the bedroom window. Zoe had kept her promise. The girls had made him look quite silly indeed, and now Zack was a prisoner in his own home.

  Madison had smeared his mouth with bright red-orange lipstick, while Samantha had caked his eyelids with silvery blue powder. Ryan sopped his hair from behind with gobs of mega-hold super-gel, styling seven spikes around his head like the Statue of Liberty. He looked like a deranged circus clown. Zoe has to pay for this, he thought. But before he could get any sort of revenge, Zack had to escape his locked bedroom and wash this horror show off his face.

  And after all he’d been through today, he wanted that cake now more than ever.

  Zack kneeled in front of the window and stared out over the neighborhood. Without his laptop or his cell phone—both of which Zoe had confiscated before locking him inside—it was the only way he could think of to pass the time. He found some comfort in watching without being seen, observing things from a distance.

  There was a word for this feeling, but he couldn’t come up with it. He just gazed down onto the deserted Friday night street, waiting for something to happen, desperately hoping for anyone, anything upon which to spy. But Locust Lane was dead still. Nobody around.

  Zack wandered across the room to check on his much-neglected ant farm. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually fed them—weeks ago, maybe months. Most of the ants had starved, and the ones still struggling to survive fought vigorously over the shiny black carcasses, ripping off legs from thoraxes. Zack thought about feeding them now, but he couldn’t even remember where he’d put their pellets. Probably in the back of the closet, he figured, along with everything else.

  And then it struck him.

  He threw open the closet door and crawled past piles of comic books and shoe boxes packed full of old DragonBall Z cards, way too embarrassing to play with, but way too good to throw out. A tiny dog bark sounded through the back wall of the closet. It was Twinkles, Madison’s new puppy. Twinkles had had an accident on the carpet, and Zoe had banished the little dog to her bedroom. Just like Zack was to his.

  Zack reached deep into the closet, his hand landing on the case of Poland Spring water that his over-prepared mom had stashed back there for reasons unknown. Stuffed between the water and a yellow Wiffle ball bat was a rolled-up rope ladder: the key element in his dad’s emergency fire-escape strategy. If being held prisoner and left to starve wasn’t an emergency, then Zack didn’t know what was. So he pried out a few waters from the pack and snagged the rope ladder, crawling backward into the bedroom.

  Zack dumped a bottle of water over his head and scrubbed the makeup off with the slightly ripe-smelling towel balled up on the floor. Sitting on the bed now, he noticed the cordless phone sticking out from beneath his rumpled Transformers bedspread.

  He grabbed the phone from under the covers and dialed. Three long rings and his best friend answered.

  “Rice residence. Rice speaking.”

  “Yo, dude, it’s me,” Zack said.

  “What’s the word, nerd?”

  “How’s the plague?” Zack shuddered, thinking about the pink crispy scabs caked in dried amber pus all over Rice’s body. He’d been out of school all week with chicken pox.

  “Itchy, man,” Rice replied. “Real itchy.”

  “Well, at least Zoe didn’t tie you up and give you a makeover.”

  “Dude, I saw it on YouTube! You’re, like, famous. Your voice sounds kind of whiny on video, though….”

  “I know you’re not supposed to hate your own family,” Zack said, staring out the window. “But I have a hard time believing we have the same blood pumping through our veins.”

  “Yeah, man, Zoe’s ruthless,” Rice agreed. “Hey, which friends does she have over?”

  “Madison Miller, Samantha Donovan, Ryan York,” Zack rattled off the hit list.

  “Duuuude,” Rice groaned into the phone. “You have no idea how lucky you are. I want your life for just one slumber party.”

  “Rice, they’d eat you alive,” Zack said.

  “I bet they’re playing Twister right now, huh?” Rice sighed. “I’d give up chocolate to see those girls playing Twister.”

  “Dude! That’s my sister!”

  “Chill, Zack, I was just messin’ around. I didn’t mean Zoe, man. Madison’s pretty cute, though. Not that your sis isn’t cute, I mean, dude, come on…you know.”

  “I’m hanging up now!” Zack placed the phone on the desktop, opened the window, and hooked the top of the ladder to the windowsill. As he threw the bundle of tangled rope over the ledge, he heard footsteps on the sidewalk below. The figure came into view: just Old Man Stratton out for his nightly stroll. He seemed slower than usual, walking with a miserable limp. The old codger grumbled angrily to himself and disappeared into the shadows between two streetlamps.

  Zack began his slow, shaky descent down the ladder, and the phone blared. He reached back through the window, clinging to the ladder with his free hand.

  “Rice?” Zack answered. “I can’t really talk right now.”

  “Dude, are you watching this?”

  “No, actually, I’m climbing out my window.”

  “Don’t do that, man! There’s zombies, like, all over the place….

  Hold on, hold on. They’re saying how to kill them.”

  “Sorry, Rice,” Zack said. “Gotta go.” He hung up the phone and placed it flat on the windowsill. He had no time for his friend’s stupid jokes.

  Halfway to the ground, Zack heard something coming from the bushes below: a violent rustling, followed by a loud animal squeal. He held his breath. Silence.

  There was another noise, similar, but not as loud as the first, as two jackrabbits tore out from the bush and darted across the lawn. He exhaled. Just a couple of dumb bunnies.

  Zack’s feet hit the mulch around the front hedges. He left the rope ladder dangling and hurried around the house, each step putting him closer to his last piece of birthday cake.

  The patio door off the kitchen slid open, and Zack let out a deep sigh of relief. He closed the sliding glass panel and flipped the latch to lock it in place. When he turned around, facing into the kitchen, his mouth dropped open in shock.

  CHAPTER 3

  In the Clarke family kitchen, Madison Miller was sitting in Zack’s spot, at Zack’s table, her eyes closed, savoring the first bite of Zack’s last piece of cake.

  “Yuuuummm,” she exhaled in an elongated whisper.

  “What are you doing?” Zack broke the silence. “That’s my triple-fudge, double-cream chocolate Oreo cake!”

  “Don’t you mean triple-fudge, double-soy-cream chocolate Oreo cake?” Madison chewed the gooey morsel slowly, taunting him from across the room.

  “You know that cake’s not vegan, Madison,” he informed her, reveling in this wonderful twist.

  Madison and Zoe had formed a vegetarian pact last summer, which had then blossomed into a strict vegan diet. Poor Zack had been subjected to a freezer full of Rice Dream ice cream ever since.


  “Right now, you’re eating baby chickens and buttery cow’s milk!” he continued with a mischievous smirk.

  “Eeeeeewwww!” Madison let out a glass-shattering demon screech and spewed the half-chewed chocolate all over the kitchen wall. She raced over to the sink and turned on the water.

  “Rinse it out real good,” he teased.

  But instead of putting her mouth to the faucet, Madison picked up what was left of Zack’s delicious cake, lifted it above her head, and slammed it down the drain. She hit the ON switch to the garbage disposal. The motor under the sink roared, and the cake spun violently into a watery chocolate sludge.

  Madison turned to him. “Zoe said your mom only bakes ‘animal-friendly’ cakes now!” She quoted with her fingers and lowered her voice. “I’m gonna kill her.”

  “Well, normally she does, Madison,” Zack explained. “But you see, that was my birthday cake….” He made his way to the center of the kitchen now, rubbing his palms together slyly as he went on. “And on my birthday, we don’t eat vegan. We eat regular.”

  Madison’s brow furrowed with rage. “Oh, I’m sorry, was that your cake, Zack? Your stupid, disgusting cake?”

  She leaned over the sink and sputtered out the remaining flecks of chocolate from the roof of her mouth. Then, reaching into her purse, she pulled out a new kiwi-strawberry VitalVeganPowerPunch and chugged back half the bottle.

  “I guess it’s not your fault you can’t read, but it was clearly labeled with my name. See?” he said holding up the plastic-wrapped note.