Hand Puppet Horror

Written by Benny Alano

Illustrated by Jessica Geis

The characters depicted in this story are fictitious, and any similari-ties to actual events, locations or people, living or dead, are entirely coincidental. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the author, except for brief quota-tions in reviews. For information regarding permissions please email the author, BennyAlano@yahoo.com ISBN 10 – 1460938917 ISBN 13 – 978-1460938911 Copyright © 2011 by Benny Alano All rights reserved Interior design by Lyle Perez-Tinics Illustrations and cover art done by Jessica Geis Jgeis01@gmail.com

Other works by Benny Alano

Attack of the Vampire Snowmen

Zombie Slime From Another Time (Coming soon)

Hand Puppet Horror 2 (Coming Soon)

Blaine’s Brains: A Zombie Birthday (Coming soon)

The Haunted Doll House (Coming soon)

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Chapter 1 The Puppets Are Alive!

“Ahhhhhh,” I hear screams as I walk to room 202. “They’re alive! Somebody help us!” The cries for help continue. My return trip from the bathroom is halted by

my fourth grade classmates’ yells of terror. I stop right outside the door and press my ear against it.

“Ahhhhhh,” a voice yells. I jump back in fright. I look up and down the hall. There are no

adults to call for help. It’s all up to me. Whatever is happening in my classroom, I will stop it. I put my hand on the door handle as another

scream rings in my ear. Slowly, I turn the knob, but I release it quickly.

What if it’s a monster? I think. I’ll need a weapon.

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I look down toward the door and sitting there is the softball size rock my new teacher, Mrs. Han-sen, uses to keep the door open. My class recently started the fourth grade; we’re still getting use to everything. I quickly snatch the rock off the floor. Now that I’m armed with some sort of

weapon, I’m ready to enter my classroom. The screams continue as I put my hand back on the handle. I pull it open and yell, “I’m here to help!” Looking around the room, I see that there is no

danger. No big scary monster with spikes poking out of its face. No vampires drinking the blood of my friends. No ghosts haunting the room. Every-thing is calm, well except that everyone is playing with the hand puppets we made before I went to the bathroom. Everybody stares at me as I hold the door open

with one arm and hold the rock in a throwing po-sition with the other. Sammy, one of my best friends who sits at my table, starts laughing. Be-fore I know it, everyone is laughing at me, even Mrs. Hansen. I can’t believe I actually thought that my

classmates were in danger. But what about the screams and the cries for help? Surely there must be something else to this. Becky is my other best friend; she sits to my

left at the same table. She has her hand puppet in her hand and pretends to attack Sammy. Becky is very pretty. She has long blond hair with baby

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blue eyes. Her eyes are a lot bluer than mine. Mine are darker. A hundred little tiny freckles cover her nose and cheeks. When I make her laugh, her cheeks always turn red. Now I get it. It’s all pretend. “Jay Jennings, put that rock down and get back

to your seat,” Mrs. Hansen says to me after she is done laughing. “Sorry,” I reply, feeling embarrassed. I put the

rock back where I found it and let the door close behind me. The room explodes with more cries for help as my classmates continue attacking each other with their hand puppets. I run back to my seat and put mine on. We used small brown paper bags for the pup-

pet’s bodies. Many of my classmates decided to make animals like giraffes, zebras and monkeys, which are my favorite, but not me. I love Hallow-een and even though it’s a month or so away, I like to scare people all year long. That’s why my puppet is a big scary monster. Mrs. Hanson brought in all these cool things so

we can make our puppets during our once a month arts and crafts time session. Now that we’re in fourth grade, it’s less fun and more work. There were foam eyes and all these wild hairdos. Some even looked like Sammy’s flat top haircut. My puppet, who I named Yeti Booger, is green like a booger. He has big beady eyes with a big purple nose. White horns stick out of the side of his head

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and his black hair is super sharp and spiky. He has a big mouth that looks like he’s smiling, but really, he showing off his shark-like teeth! I put a lot of pretend fur all over his face and body. Now he really looks like a Yeti. If you don’t know what a Yeti is, it’s another word for Bigfoot. If you

don’t know what Bigfoot is then I’ll tell ya.

Bigfoot is a huge ape-like creature that walks upright like a human. Some say that he lives in the woods. There have been many sightings of Bigfoot all across the United States, but a lot of them are in the woods of Northern California. There have even been some videos of him, too. Other people say that he doesn’t exist, but I believe he’s out there. One day, I will lead a search expedition for the Yeti. Becky has her back to me. She’s too busy at-

tacking Sammy to notice me. I sneakily put Yeti Booger up to the side of her neck and yell,

“RRRAAAAA!”

“Ahhhhhhh,” she jumps. I laugh because she's really scared.

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“You scared me, Jay,” she says with a smile, and then laughs when one of Yeti Booger’s horns falls off. I have people to scare, I’ll fix it later. I spin in my seat to find my next victim. I look

to the back of the class and Greg, the school bully, has two real scary looking puppets in his hands. Both of them are completely red with white horns sticking out of their heads. He’s attacking everyone at his table, but no one dares to attack him back. Not even me. Fred, the bookworm,

stares into a big, old and dusty book! If there’s a book in the room, I’m sure Fred has read it. I sneakily crouch behind him. When my green puppet is within reach I yell,

“RRRAAAA!” and attack him. I put my puppet on top of his book and jump at his face. Fred is not as impressed at as Becky. “Real ma-

ture, Jay,” he says, using a finger to push his glasses back up. His hair is slick and combed to the sides. What a fuddy duddy. He stares back into his old book and continues to read. “I’ll show you scary,” he says under his breath.

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I ignore him and think about who to attack next. Suddenly, a large shadow casts over my

crouched body. I look up and Greg is standing be-hind me. He has both of his puppets ready to at-tack me. I quickly try to get to my feet, but he pushes me over. I fall to the ground with Yeti Booger raised high. Greg uses both of his puppets to attack mine. Yeti Booger is no match for Greg’s red demon puppets. He swings at Yeti, and reaches for him like he wants to take it away from me. I clutch my hand into a fist to keep my puppet in place. I feel his hands squeeze around mine and it hurts. “Ouch!” I yell. “Let me go.” Greg gives my fist another squeeze, crumpling

Yeti Booger. Sharpe edges from the brown paper bag poke my hand. “Ha, ha, you lose,” Greg says as he turns and walks away, searching for his next victim. I feel the ground tremble as he strides away. “Are you okay?” Becky asks helping me to my

feet. “Yeah, but Yeti Booger isn’t.” I lift the puppet

into view. It is crumpled around my hand. Yeti Booger’s mouth is wrinkled back into his green body. I look to see where Mrs. Hansen is to tell her

what Greg did, but she’s at her desk looking over papers. I’m sure she’s getting our next lesson

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ready and I don’t want to be the one to hurry it along. I forget about telling her and head back to my seat, so does Becky. I try to take the puppet off my hand, but I can’t. Every time I try it feels like a sharp edge is cutting through my skin. “Take Yeti Booger off and we’ll fix him,” Becky

offers, holding Yeti’s fallen horn in one hand and a bottle of glue in the other. “I’m trying,” I say, looking at the crumpled

hand puppet. “Let me help,” Becky says. She puts her hand

over Yeti Booger’s hair and yanks up. “Ouch!” I yell really loud. The teeth of Yeti

Booger somehow dug themselves into the palm of my hand like they were real teeth. As Becky pulls the bag off, it makes a big gash on my hand. Blood gushes out all over Yeti Booger and on my side of the table.