Escape from Camp Run-For-Your-Life, Page 3

Yes! It worked!

  * * *

  The next day, Uncle Ed drives you to Camp Pendleton. The real Camp Pendleton.

  “Maybe this time I’ll win a medal,” you say as you climb out of the car.

  “Maybe, kid. Oh, before I forget — I have something for you.” Uncle Ed hands you a slip of pale green paper.

  “What’s this?” you ask, mystified.

  “It’s a check,” Uncle Ed replies. “Didn’t I tell you? There’s a reward for capturing the Cemetery Man.”

  You peer down at the check. Your eyes bulge.

  You’ve never seen so many zeroes!

  As it turns out, you don’t win any medals at Camp Pendleton. But you don’t care. Because now you can buy all the medals you want!

  THE END

  You reach down and break off the skeleton’s cracked rib.

  A moment later, the rest of the bones crumble to dust!

  “We got the bone!” Kim crows.

  “Yeah,” you mutter. You wish you could feel excited. But you’re too creeped out. You just want to get out of here.

  You glance at your watch. 11:00 P.M. One hour to find the campsite!

  You and Kim hurry out of the cave. Kim examines her map by flashlight. “This way,” she calls, heading downhill.

  She seems confident about where she’s going. So you follow her. The moon is up, but it’s still very dark in the trees.

  After a few moments you come to a place where the trees are thinner. The ground seems strangely rocky.

  “Come on,” Kim orders, beckoning impatiently.

  You’re halfway across the rocky field when you stumble over something. You shine your flashlight down to see what it was.

  Whoa. It’s not a rock. It’s a gravestone.

  You’re in a graveyard!

  Turn to PAGE 137.

  The nurse, a bone-thin woman with a knobby bun, shrugs. “I’ve done the repairs, but I’m still not certain how well the transporter is working.”

  “Well, let’s use this one as a guinea pig,” Coach Rex suggests, pointing at you.

  “All right. Just step this way, dear,” the nurse coos. She steers you onto a large steel platform. “This won’t hurt at all.”

  Your head whips back and forth between Coach Rex and the nurse. “Wh-what are you going to do to me?” you stammer.

  Coach Rex tells you, “If you make it to Xentron, there’s no reason you can’t work the mines. I’m sure you’ll last as long as the average slave: three years.”

  “What’s Xentron? What mines?” you demand, terrified.

  Then, from above, a blue light sweeps over your body.

  You feel a tingling. Whoa! Coach Rex, the nurse, the infirmary — they’re all fading from sight!

  You’re really being transported. Just like in the movies!

  Unfortunately, the transporter isn’t working right. Instead of sending you to Xentron, it beams you directly into the sun. In seconds, you’re so hot Coach Rex could fry a blue egg on your head!

  But hey, it could be worse. At least you’ll get a tan this summer!

  THE END

  Uncle Ed turns around. His eyes are bulging.

  Coach Krump also turns around. His eyes are …

  Dead.

  Coach Krump has become a zombie!

  He moans, “Fooo!” and heads straight for you.

  “Get out of the way!” Uncle Ed shouts to you. He holds up the water gun. “I’m the master now, Krump. Do my bidding.”

  Krump turns to stare at Uncle Ed, drooling.

  You hold your breath. Your heart pounds.

  Can Uncle Ed really control the zombies?

  Go to PAGE 31.

  Someone is bending over the sleeping Tracy.

  Aiming a gun at her!

  You’re about to shout a warning. Then you see something that makes you laugh.

  The gun squirts liquid on her.

  It’s only a water gun!

  But Tracy sits bolt upright, screaming. Then her eyes film over. Her face seems to shrivel. She moans softly. “Uurrgghh …”

  You’ve heard that moan before.

  Tracy has turned into a zombie!

  Something in that water gun is transforming the living into the living dead!

  The person with the water gun creeps over to Ted’s sleeping bag. He squirts the liquid in Ted’s face.

  Ted wakes with a moan. He rises, hands outstretched.

  This is awful! All your fellow hikers are becoming zombies!

  You’d better wake Coach Krump. Maybe he’ll know what to do.

  Quietly, you unzip your sleeping bag. You crawl around the campfire to where Coach is sleeping.

  But his sleeping bag is empty!

  Quick! Turn to PAGE 25.

  You know the person running toward the shack. Her name is Kim. She goes to your school back home. You’ve disliked her since you did a geography project together. Kim complained the whole time. Even worse — you had to do all the work.

  “I don’t believe this!” she exclaims when she catches sight of you. “Of all the camps in the whole country, I end up at the same one as you.”

  Great. She’s already complaining! you think.

  A pale, heavyset man in a white shirt comes puffing up.

  “I’m Coach Krump,” he says. “Okay, listen up, campers. The point of the hike is to earn your Outdoors Medal.”

  He reaches in his pocket and pulls out a shiny disk. “This is the medal,” he says. He holds it up.

  It gleams in the sunshine as if made of gold. A small figure is carved on it. You can’t quite make out what it is.

  “Cool,” you murmur. You reach for the medal to examine it more closely.

  Coach Krump snatches it away.

  “Hands off!” he thunders.

  Go on to PAGE 52.

  Take a deep breath, because you’re about to dive into the stinky muck!

  You double up and head for the bottom. At first, you can’t see anything. The muddy water hurts your eyes. But when you get a few feet below the surface, the water clears.

  There’s no sign of the kid who went down. You look all around. Nothing.

  But, wait! There’s something lying at the bottom of the lake. Something white. You swim in for a closer look.

  Teeth grin up at you.

  Whoa.

  It’s a skull!

  A human skull!

  Swim on to PAGE 116.

  The sides of your sneakers brush the stadium wall as you sail over it.

  You made it!

  You escaped from Camp Run-for-Your-Life!

  You hit the ground running. And you don’t slow down until you’re miles away, deep in the woods. Where no one can find you.

  You’d like to call Uncle Ed, but you don’t have any quarters in your gym shorts. So you’re forced to walk. Luckily, you remember that your friend Colleen just moved to a town only a few miles away from the camp. You’re pretty sure you can find it.

  You reach Colleen’s house the next morning, hungry and exhausted. Colleen’s parents have already gone to work. She’s home alone. And boy, is she surprised to see you!

  “Want some scrambled eggs?” she offers.

  You shudder. You’ll never eat eggs again!

  “So what happened to you?” Colleen demands as you devour peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in her kitchen. “I thought you were going to some great sports camp. Didn’t you like it?”

  You swallow a bite of sandwich and wash it down with milk.

  “Let me put it this way,” you say at last. “Next summer, I’m going to a computer camp!”

  THE END

  “FOOD FIGHT!” you bellow.

  You stand up and fling a handful of blue eggs at the kid across the table. They splat all over his face. Pat flips his toast like a Frisbee at another kid. You both laugh.

  Without warning, a big hand grabs you by the collar.

  Uh-oh! It’s Coach Rex!

  Veins bulge in his forehead. “Come with me,”
he growls.

  Coach Rex takes you from the cafeteria to his office.

  “So you’re messing with the eggs,” he snarls. “Throwing around vital nourishment.”

  “No!” you gasp. “I was just having fun.”

  You blink. You can almost see steam coming from Coach Rex’s ears.

  “Let me show you something,” he says. “I think you’ll find it very interesting.”

  What could be more interesting than blue eggs? Turn to PAGE 15 to find out.

  You get your pile of eggs, topped by toast. As you search for an empty seat, you see someone you know from home.

  “Hey, Pat!” you exclaim.

  You sit down next to a thin, fast-talking kid. He lives a few blocks from you. You’re glad to see a familiar face.

  “Hi,” Pat answers. “I just got here a couple of days ago. Most of the kids have already been here a few weeks.”

  He hasn’t touched his eggs. He tells you, “I’m not hungry.”

  You notice he looks kind of sick. He’s pale. And his eyes have dark circles under them.

  “Well, I’m starved,” you announce.

  You plunge your fork into your eggs and lift it up to your mouth.

  Your hand suddenly freezes.

  Whoa!

  The egg yolks are blue.

  Turn to PAGE 10.

  You race back past the snake pit and snatch the javelin out of Coach Rex’s hands.

  You dart back to Brad’s side. Hooking the point of the javelin under the rattlesnake’s body, you lift the furious reptile away from Brad. You toss it back into the pit. It writhes and hisses angrily.

  Then you hold the javelin out to Brad. “Grab hold,” you command, and pull him to his feet.

  You’re a hero. But does Brad thank you for saving him?

  No way! Instead, he shoves you to the ground.

  “Eat my dust, sucker!” he sneers. Then he sprints down the track and crosses the finish line.

  What a jerk!

  “We have a winner!” Coach Rex cries. He holds Brad’s arm aloft. Brad is led to the victory platform.

  You stand on the track. Now what are you going to do? Brad won the special prize — the mountain bike. The mountain bike that was your hope for escaping Camp Run-for-Your-Life.

  Are you trapped here?

  If you really want to know, turn to PAGE 43.

  You lie on the bunk, thinking about your first day in camp. At first, you only hear your bunkmates snoring.

  Then you hear a voice. A voice you know well: Coach Rex. He’s talking to another coach as they make the rounds of the cabins.

  And what they’re saying makes your blood run cold.

  “This is a pretty good crop of specimens,” Rex is saying.

  “Is the transporter ready?” asks the other.

  “As soon as we fix the wormhole lens unit,” Coach Rex answers.

  Specimens?

  Transporter?

  Wormhole lens unit?

  What are they talking about?

  Find out more on PAGE 88.

  Coach Rex’s voice booms over the loudspeaker. “Congratulations, camper!” he tells Brad.

  Yeah, yeah, you think glumly.

  Then you hear Coach Rex’s next words. And a shiver shakes your entire body.

  “In a few minutes, you will be transported from the infirmary to the planet Xentron,” Coach Rex announces. “There you will have the honor of being the Overmaster’s slave. After you’ve served him for a period of time, he will serve you — for dinner!”

  Your jaw drops. So that’s the special prize! Going to an alien planet as a slave! And then getting eaten!

  You thought this kind of thing only happened in movies. Horror movies!

  Then you have a terrible thought.

  What is second prize?

  Uh-oh. You’ve got to get out of here, before Coach Rex turns his attention to you.

  But how?

  Then an idea pops into your head.

  Turn to PAGE 93 to find out more about your idea.

  You slip inside and shut the door. Slowly, silently, you creep through the dark hall.

  EEEee-EEEee-EEEee! A weird, high, pulsing sound drifts through an open door.

  You peek around the edge of the doorway. Steps. Going down — to the cellar, probably.

  Your heart thuds as you pad down the steps. There’s another door at the bottom. The pulsing sound is coming from behind it.

  You slowly open the door.

  What you see makes your eyes bug out!

  The room inside looks like NASA mission control! People in headphones stride back and forth from radar screens to electronic maps. “We’ve got an interstellar–Camp Running Leaf linkup,” someone is yelling.

  “Wow!” you gasp aloud.

  Big mistake.

  Find out why on PAGE 104.

  “You be the zombie,” you tell Uncle Ed. “After all, you’re the secret agent.”

  You and Uncle Ed track the Cemetery Man and his army to a clearing near Camp Running Leaf.

  “Hide behind this tree until I give you the signal,” Uncle Ed whispers.

  Then he lurches into the middle of the clearing, moaning.

  You peek around the tree. Isn’t Uncle Ed getting a little too close to the zombie campers?

  Before you can warn him, Samantha darts over and bites him on the leg. “Fooo,” she moans.

  Uncle Ed shudders. His eyes instantly glaze over.

  His skin turns ashy and starts to curl away from his bones.

  Guess what?

  He’s not pretending to be a zombie any longer.

  Uncle Ed spins and points to your hiding place. “Foooo!” he moans.

  The zombies stalk toward you. Horrified, you turn and run.

  But before you get very far, you feel something wet hit the back of your neck.

  Oh, nooooo …

  Are you brave enough to turn around on PAGE 130?

  “What’s the matter now?” you ask.

  “It’s nearly sunset,” Kim whines. “And we’re nowhere near Zombie Cave. It’s your fault. You picked the wrong route.”

  You realize you might not make it to the campsite by midnight.

  You’ve got to move faster!

  You gaze at the river, wondering what to do. Then you spot something that might solve your problem.

  Just ahead, a small green rowboat is hauled up on the bank. A sign on the boat says PRIVATE PROPERTY.

  “If we row, we’ll reach the other side of the mountain in no time,” you tell Kim.

  “The boat doesn’t belong to us,” she objects. “If we get in trouble, it’ll be your fault.”

  “Fine,” you snap. You’d almost rather go to jail than listen to Kim whine for one more minute!

  “Besides,” Kim adds, “the map says there are rapids ahead.”

  Rapids? That could be a real problem.

  What are you going to do?

  To take the boat anyway, go to PAGE 9.

  Continue on foot on PAGE 72.

  A freshly risen zombie staggers toward you.

  “Fooo!” it groans. “FOOO!”

  Finally, you get what it’s saying.

  FOOD. As in — you!

  You’re in a total terror meltdown.

  A zombie grabs you. You knock its hand away. Another has Kim down. It’s about to bite her!

  You tackle the monster and pull it off her. Your fingers sink deep into the rotten flesh of its arm. Yecch!

  “Run!” you scream. You and Kim sprint out of the graveyard.

  The zombie’s heavy footsteps thud behind you.

  Then Kim trips over a tree root. She hits the ground hard. “Noooo!” she shrieks. “Help me! I hurt my ankle! Help me!”

  The zombie is only a few feet away. You know that if you were hurt, Kim would leave you hanging.

  So should you stick your neck out for her?

  Help Kim on PAGE 102

  Or keep running to PAGE 28.

  “A zomb
ie!” Kim shrieks.

  “What are you talking about?” a familiar voice cries.

  It’s Coach Krump! You practically faint with relief.

  “Where have you been?” the coach demands. “It’s almost midnight.”

  You start to tell him about the zombies, but the coach waves you off. “Camp’s just over this ridge,” he tells you. “Didn’t you see the sign?” He points to a white sign that says CAMP-OUT.

  You follow him to the campsite. The other kids are already in their sleeping bags, snoring.

  “Isn’t there any food? I’m starving,” Kim complains.

  “You missed the cookout,” the coach replies. He doesn’t seem to care that you’re both hungry. “It’s time to sleep.”

  “How about our medals?” you ask. “We’re the only ones who got a bone from Zombie Cave.”

  “We’ll talk about it tomorrow!” Coach Krump snaps. “Now turn in.”

  What a grouch!

  You crawl into your sleeping bag. You’re just dozing off when a noise awakens you. You glance across the campfire …

  And feel your heart stop in fear.

  Go on to PAGE 35.

  “Coach Krump is the Cemetery Man?” you gasp.

  What does it all mean?

  Uncle Ed lays his hand on your shoulder. “Listen carefully. We don’t have much time,” he warns. “You see, the Cemetery Man is a chemist. He — well, to put it simply, he developed a chemical that will bring the dead back to life. The thing is, his formula has a horrible side effect. One drop on the skin will turn living humans temporarily into zombies!”

  You remember Coach Krump’s water gun. And the beaker in the cemetery. They must have held the zombie-making chemical!

  You stare at Uncle Ed in horror. “But why?” you blurt. “Why is he making all these zombies?”

  “He’s creating an army,” Uncle Ed explains. “The zombies are completely under his control. We think he plans to take over the world!”