by R. L. Stine
“It will show the Horrors around the park that you are a Very Special Guest,” Ned said. “No more standing in line. Just show your token and go right in.”
“And food is free at all our restaurants,” Byron added. “Just show your special token.”
“Byron will call you up one by one to receive your gift,” Ned announced.
Byron called me up first. I took the coin from him and went back to my seat. When I looked at it, I had a shock.
The token had a pyramid on it!
“Huh?” My mouth dropped open.
Why did I get an Egyptian one? Do they know about the mummies in my uncle’s village?
Wait. Did all the kids get pyramid tokens?
No. Matt’s token had a weird blob on it. Carly Beth’s had an ugly Halloween mask. Robby’s had a cartoon superhero.
Everyone seemed shocked and upset.
Did the other kids have something horrifying happen to them, too?
Is that what they see on their coins?
“We have a lot of questions!” Matt shouted up to the stage.
But Ned turned and walked off quickly. Byron started to follow him.
But then he turned back to us. And in a loud whisper, he said: “Inside the Bat Barn. Four o’clock sharp.”
I followed the other kids out into the afternoon sunlight. The park was crowded with people having fun. Across from us, a Horror in a clown suit was making balloon animals for little kids. The balloon animals all looked like rats.
We gathered under the shade of a big tree, and we all started talking at once.
“Something really scary happened to me,” I said. “With real mummies. And look at my token.” I held it up so they could see the pyramid on it.
The others all chimed in. Their tokens matched what happened to them during the year.
“It’s totally disturbing,” Billy said. “How could our worst nightmares follow us here?”
Michael had been quiet. I saw him studying his token intently. Suddenly, he let out a cry. “Look at this!”
We all turned and watched him pull a tiny chip from his coin. “I’ve seen this before. It’s a tracking device,” Michael said. “I bet they want to spy on us and track our every move.”
“We’ve got to lose these,” Robby said. “Right now.”
“But wait —” Carly Beth said. “You say you trust this Byron guy, right? He’s on our side? So if these really are tracking chips, they are a good idea!”
“Yes, we should keep them if Byron wants us to have them,” Sabrina said.
“No way!” Matt declared. “Don’t you see? They forced Byron to give us these things. That’s why he wants to meet us later.”
“I know about this electronic spying stuff,” Michael said. “No one is going to track me! I’ll show you what to do with these coins.”
He walked over to a redheaded kid who was slurping an ice-cream cone with his mom. He handed the coin to the kid. “It makes you a special visitor,” he said. “You can use it to get free food and stuff.”
“Cool! Thanks!” the kid exclaimed. He took the coin and showed it off to his mom.
So that’s what we did. We all gave our coins away to passing kids. Everyone except Carly Beth and Sabrina, that is. They kept theirs.
It was almost four o’clock. We hurried across the park to the Bat Barn. A fat, purple Horror greeted us at the entrance. He handed us all wide-brimmed hats. “It might keep the bats out of your hair!” he said.
I realized I was trembling. I wished I didn’t have to go into the Bat Barn.
We started into the long, dark building. Chittering bat cries rang out above our heads. I could see bats hanging upside down from the low rafters.
I looked away — and saw a piece of paper on the floor.
I picked it up and held it close to my eyes. It was hard to read in the little bit of light that crept into the barn.
Michael stepped up beside me, and I showed it to him. “It looks like a page from an amusement park guide,” I said.
We both stared at it. It showed kids in an old-fashioned Hall of Mirrors.
The headline read:
WELCOME TO THE MIRROR MANSION. Reflect on Where It Can Take You!
We passed it around. “Byron must have left this for us,” Billy said. “It has to be some kind of clue — like the other pages we found.”
His sister, Sheena, started to say something. But instead, a scream burst from her mouth.
And seconds later, we ALL began to scream as the bat attack began.
Bats swooped down on us — dozens of them. Screeching and whistling. Flapping furiously.
I tugged the hat down low on my head and gripped the brim. But I felt bat claws rake my shoulders. My back.
“They’re REAL!” I shrieked. “They’re not fakes!”
“Where … where is Byron?” someone cried over the screeching of the clawing, biting bats.
“We’re all ALONE here!” I screamed in horror. The last words from my mouth as the bats tore at my hair, my clothes … my face!
“Michael, this is crazy,” my friend Daisy Edwards whispered. “We shouldn’t be here.”
“Too late,” I whispered back. “We’re already here.”
Daisy was right. Sneaking into our teacher’s house was probably a bad idea.
But there we were, the three of us — me, Daisy, and our friend DeWayne Walker — standing in Mrs. Hardesty’s kitchen. My eyes darted around, trying to see in the dim light. All the shades were pulled.
“Weird. She keeps her house as dark as our classroom,” DeWayne said.
The kitchen smelled of cinnamon. Mrs. Hardesty had a lot of snapshots on her fridge door. I glanced at them quickly. The faces all seemed blurry. An empty egg carton stood open on the sink.
I led the way into the front room. The shades were down there, too.
The couch and four chairs all matched. They were black leather. I saw knitting needles sticking out of a ball of wool on a table beside the couch. A tall wooden clock on the mantel ticked loudly.
“I’m not happy about this,” Daisy whispered. “What if she comes home and finds us? We’re dead!”
“No worries,” I said. “She’s still at school.”
“Let’s dump the cat and get out of here,” DeWayne said. He raised the carrier in front of him. I could see the black cat’s blue eyes peering out at me.
You’re probably wondering why we sneaked into Mrs. Hardesty’s house with a black cat. Well, our plan was simple.
Mrs. H is very superstitious. So … she comes home. She looks down and sees this black cat rubbing against her ankles … and it totally freaks her mind!
I wished I could be there when she went nuts. But I planned to be far, far away.
The cat pawed the front of the carrier and meowed. I think it wanted out.
“Monster, just open the carrier,” DeWayne said. “Let it go, and we’re outta here.”
My friends call me Monster.
It’s kind of a cool nickname. You see, I’m a big dude. I’m twelve, but I look like a high school guy. I’m pretty strong, too.
That’s a good thing.
But I guess kids also call me Monster because of my temper. That’s a bad thing.
My parents say I have a short fuse. That means I explode a lot. But, hey, I’m not angry all the time. Just when someone pushes my buttons.
Which is why my two friends and I were in Mrs. Hardesty’s house. Our teacher had been pushing my buttons ever since she arrived at Adams Middle School.
“Let the cat out,” DeWayne said, holding the carrier up to my face.
“Not here,” I said. “Mrs. H will see it too soon. That’s no fun.”
“How about the basement?” Daisy said. “Mrs. Hardesty opens the basement door, and there’s a black cat at the bottom of the stairs, staring up at her. Can you picture it?”
“Awesome!” I said. I jabbed my finger into Daisy’s forehead. “I like the way you think.”
We searched the hall till we found the basement door. I pulled it open, and we stared down into the darkness. I fumbled for the light switch, and a bulb flashed on overhead.
I led the way down the creaky wooden steps. The cat meowed again. “Be patient,” I said. “You’ll have a nice, new basement to explore. And Mrs. H will take good care of you.”
We stepped into a short hallway. The air grew cold and damp. The basement was divided into two rooms. Both doors were shut.
DeWayne set the carrier down on the floor. He bent to open its door.
That’s when we heard the sound. A heavy thump. From one of the rooms.
We all froze. DeWayne’s hands shot up, away from the carrier. He stared at me, his mouth open. Daisy took a step back.
I heard a groan. Another thump.
My heart did a flip-flop in my chest. “There’s someone down here!” I whispered.
We didn’t say another word. DeWayne grabbed the carrier by the handle, we spun away from the doors, and took off.
We scrambled up the stairs. Our sneakers thudded loudly all the way up.
I was nearly at the top when I heard a metal chiiing. Something hit a stair and bounced down.
“Something fell out of my pocket!” I cried.
Was it my cell phone?
I couldn’t go back for it. We had to get out of there.
Someone — or something — was coming after us!
R.L. Stine’s books are read all over the world. So far, his books have sold more than 300 million copies, making him one of the most popular children’s authors in history. Besides Goosebumps, R.L. Stine has written the teen series Fear Street and the funny series Rotten School, as well as the Mostly Ghostly series, The Nightmare Room series, and the two-book thriller Dangerous Girls. R.L. Stine lives in New York with his wife, Jane, and Minnie, his King Charles spaniel. You can learn more about him at www.RLStine.com.
Goosebumps book series created by Parachute Press, Inc.
Goosebumps HorrorLand #6: Who’s Your Mummy?
copyright © 2009 by Scholastic Inc.
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, GOOSEBUMPS, GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
First printing, January 2009
e-ISBN 978-0-545-29490-4
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.