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"Mary, it's only me, Gary. What in the hell is going on up here? The movie is off in number eleven and the crowd is ready to riot. Plus I smelled smoke." He said, the words spilling out of his mouth.

"The Bulb fried out and they're trying to fix it." Mary replied, running a still shaking hand through her hair. Gary sighed in relief.

"Thank God. For a moment there I thought the place was on fire again" He said laughing nervously, feeling the tension pour out of his body.

"I didn't even know you were here." Mary said, gathering up the boxes that she had dropped when they collided.

" Yeah, I figured I would come in and watch it. I mean, how often do we run a zombie movie, let alone a zombie movie at midnight. " Gary said. He was a horror fan and especially fond of zombie movies, which finally seemed to be making a come back in Hollywood. As he often said, Hollywood had recycled every other idea out there, so why not the walking dead?

"I just got here, myself," She continued. "I wasn't scheduled to work tonight but I had nothing better to do so I thought I would help out."

Gary glanced at his watch and laughed. She looked at him with a puzzled expression on her face.

"What is so funny?" Mary asked him, looking at her own watch in confusion.

"Its 12:23 in the morning" He replied, chuckling. "If you have nothing to do, you could always sleep. It's an odd concept, sleeping at one in the morning, but I have heard that some people actually do it." Mary laughed and playfully slapped his shoulder.

From back in the main projection room, there was loud laughing. Gary glanced back towards the source, eyebrows raised. "Who's working on it?" He asked, already knowing the answer.

"Joe, Cliff and Mike" Mary answered. Gary shook his head sadly.

Joe, Cliff and Mike were three of the biggest stoners employed at the theater. The worst part was that Mike was the general manager. It was plain to say that the place was not operated exactly as the corporate offices would have liked. However, Mike's philosophy in life was 'What that asshole George doesn't know, won't get me fired', George being the district manager.

Simultaneously, from the projector, there came a brilliant flash of blue light, a loud pop and a scream. Gary rushed to the scene, closely followed by Mary. On the floor lay a burnt and bloody Mike, with Joe and Cliff looking down at him.

"Whoa…Mike, dude, get up" Joe said.

Cliff picked up a broken broom handle from the floor and poked the lifeless form of Mike in the ribs.

"Is he okay?" Joe asked.

"I don't know, bro." Cliff said, still poking Mike.

Gary knocked the broom handle from Cliff's hand shouting "Leave him alone you idiots!" he checked for a pulse, but found none. "Mary, call 911. What happened here?"

"He was replacing the bulb when there was this surge or something" Joe replied.

"Yeah, man. The bulb blew up in his face" Cliff volunteered.

Mary retrieved her cellular phone and tried 911. After about five seconds a mechanical voice came on and told her "All Circuits are busy now, please try again later". She looked at the phone in wonder. Quickly, she tried again, and received the same message.

"It won't let me make the call. Try the theater's phone." She said to Joe, who did as told. He put it to his ear, and then set it back in its cradle.

"Lines dead," he said in a confused, and slightly scared tone.

Gary looked down at the auditorium, through the projector's window. The crowd seemed to have vanished into thin air. They were most likely in the lobby, screaming for blood. That was nothing new. Then he was struck by an idea.

"Rick!" He exclaimed "Cliff, stay here with him and do what you can". He ran for the door to the stairs.

Why hadn't he thought of it before? When they ran late midnight shows he always let some of his buddies in for free. One of them, Rick, was a cop. He would know what to do. Police were trained to handle this type of situation. Gary just hoped he was still here, as he had seen him getting up during the movie. Unfortunately, Gary didn't recall seeing him coming back.

He vaulted himself down the stairs as fast as was safely possible, closely followed by Joe and Mary. He threw the door to the lobby open and stopped. The lobby, although covered with far more trash than usual, was void of life. They quickly ran to auditorium eleven, thinking the audience had returned to their seats, as unlikely as that was. It too was trashed but empty. Soda cups were spilled and popcorn bags were strewn about, leaving a huge mess for the cleaning crew to go after later that night. A check of the other auditoriums resulted in the same conclusion. The audience had vanished.

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