to
life.
Gears spin,
lights strobe,
conveyor belts rotate,
and the mannequins
start
moving.
Their limbs are jerky, like marionettes. A few stay at their stations, pulling levers or sorting dolls, but the rest
—far too many—
begin walking
toward
us.
They clog the aisle we just walked down.
No way to get through.
The only way out is into the unknown.
Toward the voice of the missing kid.
“RUN!” I yell.
I don’t have to tell the others twice.
We dart away, dodging mannequins that swing their arms blindly. Tanesha cuts down a side passage, and we follow hastily. It’s narrow and steam and pipes twist every which way, but we duck and run and try to find our way through the flashing lights and fog. My breath is hot in my throat and Tanesha and Julie pant at my side over the harsh roar and hiss of the machinery. The passage widens ahead of us, and I hear someone yelling out. Behind us, mannequins crowd through the passage, pushing past and over one another as they reach out with their cold plastic hands …
They’re gaining on us.
Panicked, we burst out into another wide room. More machines and conveyor belts wall us in, but there aren’t any mannequins in here. Just rows and rows of toy boxes. I stare around, trying to figure out the exit.
Boxes tumble behind me and I yelp.
Tanesha is toppling boxes over the passageway’s entrance, forming a large pile.
“That won’t hold them for long,” she says as she stares up at the mound of boxes. Behind them, we can hear the mannequins thumping against the cardboard. The boxes jolt with every thud.
“We have to get out of here,” I say. “Do you see—”
“There!” Julie yells. I turn and follow her pointing finger.
High on a stalled conveyor belt are three large boxes, bigger than I am tall. Plastic front and cardboard back, the type you’d find a doll or action figure in.
Except these aren’t holding toys.
They’re holding kids.
Matthew—the leader of the Creepy Crawlies—bangs on the plastic and calls out for help the moment he sees us. His voice is muffled through the plastic.
“We have to help them,” Julie says.
I nod. “You two keep the mannequins at bay. I’ll go grab him.”
The conveyor belt the box is on stretches between two giant machines, easily two stories off the ground. Just looking at it gives me vertigo. But while Tanesha and Julie press themselves to the pile of boxes, I run toward one of the machines and start climbing, clambering up boxes and grabbing on to gears. Everything is chaos—Julie and Tanesha yelling out in frustration, the kids in the boxes calling for help, the thudding of mannequin fists, and the distant grind of machinery.
My foot slips on a box, and the pile I’ve been standing on crumbles out from under me. I grab on to a pipe and hold on for dear life.
The pipe
slowly
pulls
d
o
w
n.
I look up in fear; it’s not a pipe after all, but a lever! And the moment it clicks into place, the machine I was climbing purrs into motion. Lights flash and a siren wails, and behind me, there’s a crash of boxes hitting the ground as a mannequin arm breaks through. My heart thuds painfully in my throat as I struggle to get a foothold. When I look up again, shock pulses through me.
The conveyor belt is moving, pulling the Creepy Crawlies toward the second machine.
And judging from the grinding noise in that other machine, I don’t want them to reach the end of it.
I gather all my strength and climb the rest of the way up the machine, then wobble my way out across the moving conveyor belt. It groans and rattles and pulls beneath my feet. I try not to look down.
But I can’t help it.
I do.
My vision sways.
I’m so high up.
I hate heights.
Almost as much as Julie hates dolls.
For a moment, I think I’m going to faint. Until I hear the kids thudding on the walls of their boxes again, and I remember that I am needed. There’s no time for weakness or fear.
I run over to the nearest box and rip open the tape holding it shut. The side opens and Matthew collapses in front of me, gasping for air.
“Thank you,” he says.
I reach down and help him up.
“Don’t thank me yet,” I say when he stands. “We still have to get out of here.”
Below us, Julie and Tanesha shriek and run as the entire pyramid of fallen boxes explodes away, and the mannequins that were chasing us stumble into the room.
Hurriedly, Matthew and I release his two teammates from their cardboard prisons. We leap onto a pile of boxes and slide down to the floor. Tanesha and Julie stand there, watching the mannequins spill in with terrified expressions on their zombie faces.
“What are we going to do?” Julie yells.
“It’s the machines!” Matthew replies. “If we can turn them off, the mannequins will stop.”
I don’t ask if he’s sure, because there’s no time—we’re trapped, and this is our only chance.
“Quick! Find an off button!”
We run to machines and press buttons and pull levers. My pulse races.
This isn’t going to work.
Behind us, the mannequins stagger closer, reaching out. Tanesha yells and swats at one that grabs her hair; the mannequin falls back to the ground and shatters.
One near me grabs my arm. I try to fight it off, but it’s strong, too strong, and when it pulls me around to face it my vision shifts, and it’s not a mannequin in a worker’s uniform facing me, but the faceless bride.
“You did this,” she hisses, her grip cold as ice and strong as iron. The rest of the factory fades away, until it is just her and me in the darkness. “This is your fault. For what you have done, I will keep you here forever!”
I try to fight her off, but she’s strong, so strong—
“Got it!” Julie yells.
And just like that, the mannequin is just a mannequin in coveralls again. The machines around us whir to a halt. The floor is crowded with mannequin workers, at least a hundred. But they’ve stopped. They’ve all stopped.
I wrench myself free from the frozen mannequin’s grasp and, trembling, make my way over to the group.
“Let’s get out of here,” I say. My voice shakes. What was that vision? What did she mean, this was all my fault?
And was she telling the truth? What if we truly can’t escape?
We navigate our way through the aisles of the factory. Now that the mannequins are all turned off, the halls are actually somewhat empty. Matthew asks us what’s going on, but when it becomes clear that no one really has a clue, we all fall into silence.
Some rescue mission this is.
“I don’t get it,” Tanesha says after a while. Our feet echo down the aisle, and her voice seems far too loud in the silence. “This is a toy factory, right?” She looks at Matthew when she says it, as if he is in charge of how it all turned out.
Matthew nods.
“So we’ve seen mannequin workers and empty boxes, but where are all the toys?”
“There were loads earlier,” Megan—one of the Creepy Crawlies—says. “That’s how we were captured. I was putting up a display of possessed teddy bears when they actually came alive and attacked. The toys dragged us away and put us into those boxes.”
I swallow hard and look down a passing side aisle. Light flickers at the end, and the shadows on the floor move.
“So where are they now?” Julie asks.
“Let’s not find out,” I say. “We need to worry about finding the exit.”
“If there is an exit,” Julie whispers, so quiet I barely hear it.
We round a corner, and there, at the far end of a dark hall, is a blinking red sign with one unmistakable word: EXIT.
Matthew whoops in excitement and runs ahead of us.
I call out his name. Yell at him to stop.
He trips.
Lights flicker on.
We’ve found the missing toys.
Every single surface in the wide-open room is covered with toys. And these aren’t the cute toys you’d see at a store either. The dolls are missing heads and arms, and the teddy bears have vicious fangs, and the action figures all look like monstrous mutants. Even though they’re all shorter than my knee, I still flinch back at the sight of them.
There are hundreds.
Thousands.
And they’re all looking at us.
“What do we do?” Tanesha asks.
The exit sign flickers on the other side of the room, but the only way to get there is through the toys. Even though they’re still right now, I have no doubt that the moment we step in there, they’re going to attack.
My mind races.
Once more, machines line every wall, and conveyor belts stretch overhead. If we could make it up there, we could maybe sneak our way across. The trouble is, the nearest ladder is twenty feet away, and I’d have to wade through the toys to get there.
I take a step forward.
As one, all the toys in the room step toward me. Just one step, but their feet thud like thunder.
I freeze. The toys freeze as well.
I take a step back.
The toys take a step back.
“They’re mirroring us,” I whisper, and I hope I’m telling the truth.
I step to my left.
Sure enough, the toys follow suit. They might just be mirroring us now, but I have no doubt that if we were to step fully into that room, they’d rip us apart.
“How are we going to get past them?” Julie asks. Tears build at the corners of her eyes.
“We need a distraction,” Tanesha says. She looks around, but there’s nothing in the room except us and the toys.
That’s when things click. I gesture to the boxlike machine beside us. It’s about six feet tall, and we can totally reach the top if we help each other. There’s nothing nearby, but at least it gets us off the floor.
“Everybody up!” I say. “Quickly.”
They do so, hoisting each other up until they’re all safe and sound atop the machine. All of them except me.
“Stay here,” I say to them. “I’ll be right back.”
Then I take off down the hall behind us, heading to do what I’m positive is a very bad idea.
I’ve done a lot of stupid stuff in my life, but as I run away from a horde of mechanized mannequins I intentionally reanimated, I know without a doubt that this is the worst.
Their feet echo like gunshots on the concrete floor behind me. I don’t look back. My breath burns and my legs want to give out—I’ve never been the most athletic kid—but I keep running. Down the long aisle leading toward my friends. Toward the exit.
Toward the horde of toys that I know will tear us apart if we don’t distract them.
I reach the exit chamber and veer toward the machine my friends were safely on. It isn’t there! It’s farther into the room, right in the middle of the toys, and it’s then that I realize my mistake: The machine is on tracks, and it’s heading straight for the exit. When I pulled the lever to make the mannequins come alive, I must have triggered the motion on the machine. It slowly inches its way toward the exit door, bringing my friends and the Creepy Crawlies to safety … and farther away from me.
I panic.
There’s nowhere to hide or climb, and the moment I run into the room, the dolls and teddy bears and action figures spring to life.
They swarm toward me in a tide of tiny plastic hands and sharp teeth.
The dolls cry out my name in creepy baby voices, their blank glass eyes trained on me.
The teddy bears growl loudly as their claws extend from tiny furry paws.
I try to back up, but the mannequins are right behind me.
“Kevin!” my friends call out. But it’s too late.
Tiny, cold plastic arms wrap around my chest.
I yell out as the dolls grab me. Yell out as my friends reach the safety of the exit. I know I should feel happy, because they got away. They’re going to be safe. Wasn’t that the plan all along?
But as the dolls drag me to my knees and the toys swarm me, all I can think is that this is the most scared I’ve been in my entire life.
Darkness surrounds me.
Heavy, cold darkness, quiet as grave dirt.
Am I dead?
Is this what it feels like to be buried alive?
But no. My legs are sore and I’m thirsty and when I strain my ears I can hear something. Music.
Wait, is it … carnival music?
Instantly, I realize my mistake.
I’m not dead.
I’m not buried.
I’ve been taken to the next part of the haunted house.
The music gets louder, and it sounds like the sort of pipe organ waltz you’d hear on a merry-go-round. And as the music amplifies, lights flicker on above me. Long strings of white globes, the ceiling above them draped in red-and-black-striped fabric.
A circus tent.
I’m in the middle of a circus tent, in the middle of a great dirt ring.
The light and the music grow, revealing rows of bleachers circling me.
They aren’t empty.
Mannequins line every bench, all of them dressed in normal clothes—jeans and T-shirts and sweaters—and all of them posed as if waiting for me to do a trick. I look around. There’s no one and nothing else in the center ring with me, and the bleachers circle the entire stage. Except for one aisle to my right.
For a long time, I don’t move. I just stand there and listen to the carnival music and watch the crowd watch me. I wait for a mannequin to move. For toys to break in and grab me. But nothing happens. The mannequins are waiting. I take a step toward the aisle; with the thud of boots, two burly mannequins dressed as clowns step out from the shadows. Blocking the exit.
I take a step back into the ring, and a spotlight blinks on and nearly blinds me. The music swells to a roar; I realize the mannequins aren’t just posing.
They are watching me.
Waiting for me.
To do what?
I feel like I’m supposed to be putting on a show. Maybe that’s it? Maybe I’m supposed to perform, and when my act is done, I can leave? The question is, what can I possibly perform? All I’m good at is putting together haunted houses.
Maybe a joke will work?
“What’s a vampire’s favorite circus act?” I ask the audience.
Unsurprisingly, there’s no response.
“They always go for the juggler!” I yell out. I make sure to fake laugh at the end, too. “Get it? Juggler? Jugular?”
I sigh heavily. The audience doesn’t move. Jokes clearly aren’t the way forward.
“I can do a cartwheel?” I say. Again, no response, but it’s better than the mannequins attacking me, I guess. I ready myself and do a cartwheel.
Nothing happens. I just feel a little dizzy.
“What am I supposed to do?”
I stare around at the silent mannequins. Frustration builds. I feel like a fool, but there doesn’t seem to be any way out. There’s no way I want to try taking on the guards. Which means there’s only one more trick up my sleeve. It’s not a very good one at that.
Bobbing my head in time to the circus music, I close my eyes and start to dance.
I’m not a good dancer. I don’t know what I’m doing. I bounce up and down on my heels, nodding my head. When that doesn’t seem to be enough, I start hopping around from foot to foot, spinning and throwing my hands up in the air. I even throw in a dab or two for good measure. I feel like a fool. The lack of applause isn’t helping.
I don’t know how long I d
ance in the spotlight. I keep my eyes squeezed shut and spin around in circles and hope against hope that this will be enough to get me out of here.
Someone starts clapping.
I stop immediately and open my eyes.
Patricia stands in the aisle, shaking her head and watching me with a smile on her face.
“What in the world are you doing?” she asks.
“What are you doing here?” I reply. I feel the blush rising to my cheeks. I can’t believe she of all people saw that.
“Looking for stragglers,” she says. She drops her hands, and the smile slips, too. “Actually, I’m … lost.”
“Lost? How did you get in here?”
“I was in the attic and couldn’t find my way out of the labyrinth. I was running away from a really scary Minotaur when I fell down a hole. I must have blacked out, because the next thing I knew, I was here.”
“The others?”
“I managed to find Lily. She and Maribeth got out. What about you?”
“Same. We found the Creepy Crawlies and they got out with the rest of my team, but I was taken by the dolls.”
“Dolls?” Patricia asks. She shudders. “Now that’s creepy.”
“How did you get past the guards?” I ask.
I step closer to her, fully expecting the mannequins in the stands to rise and attack. They stay seated. Maybe I’m a better dancer than I thought?
“What guards?” she asks. “I saw a tent and heard music and came in to see you dancing like a fool.”
Again, the blush rises in my cheeks, but when she smiles at me this time, it isn’t quite so mean.
“Come on,” I say. “Let’s find the exit. It has to be here somewhere.”
She nods.
As I brush past her, something in the audience catches my eye. I pause and look back. But no, I must have been imagining it.
I thought it was the mannequin bride.
I don’t know what I expect to see when we leave the circus tent. But I know it’s not the long, twisting corridor of striped fabric that stretches out before us. I blink. I have to be seeing things.
“Is that going upside down?” I whisper.
The hall seems to spiral, so that farther down, the ceiling is actually the floor. Just looking at it makes my head hurt and spin.
Scare Me Page 8
