What happens when Dracula’s blood work comes back? The Hospital calls in the CDC.

This piece originally appeared in the Monster Mashup Part 1: a collection of short monster jokes that all end with the same aristocrats punchline.

Dracula Gets a Checkup

Dracula worked the thermometer between his canines. When he took it out it read seventy-degrees. The mirror over the sink hung open, reflecting an indentation where the vampire was sitting. He slammed it shut.

Maybe one of those bright young things from last night was into holistic skincare. He or she could’ve covered a zit in garlic. It could’ve run down his or her neck. Maybe he or she played a little too rough, threw out a tendon and rubbed garlic on to keep the inflammation down. Maybe it was still on his or her breath when he or she swapped tongues. That’s the trouble with masked affairs, you never know what you’re going to get.

Lying on the exam table, Dracula replayed the masquerade in his head. He did an inventory of everyone he’d touched and everyone who’d touched him. He counted bodies on his fingers. The longer he waited the heavier his eyes got. When he woke up the walls were covered in plastic.

A doctor stood over him in a hazmat suit. “Mr. Alucard?”

Dracula sat up.

The doctor flipped through a chart. “It’s not food poisoning.”

Dracula sighed. His bright red eyes traced the borders of the hermetic bubble. “What’s all this then?”

The doctor ran his glove down a long list. “When the blood work came back, you tested positive for a couple of things.”

Dracula examined his hand. “It’s not silver poisoning is it?”

All those buckles and gags from last night, he’d just assumed they were stainless steel.

The doctor consulted his chart. “Argyria? No, but you did test positive for diphtheria, malaria, measles, polio, and typhoid fever, but it was the smallpox that got you on the CDC’s radar.”

Dracula stroked his chin.

“Mr. Alucard, have you visited any virology labs recently?”

Dracula shrugged. “Not that I can recall.”

The doctor’s mask did little to conceal his skeptical squint. “Think on it. There’s two places you could’ve contracted it. Maybe you can remember if the guards spoke English or Russian?”

Dracula twiddled his talons. “I haven’t been to the motherland in a long time.”

The doctor nodded. “Okay, that narrows it down. Do you recall wandering into any subterranean layers sometime this week?”

Dracula clicked his nails together. “The bondage dungeon might have been underground.”

“Might have?”

“I was blindfolded, escorted by a choke chain through a field of glass, nails, and razor wire.” Dracula shook his head. “All and all, it was a pretty tepid affair.”

The doctor nodded matter-of-factly. “Do you think you might have come into contact with any bodily fluids at this gathering?”

Dracula chuckled. “Might have? I was swimming in them.”

The doctor tapped his fingers to the muzzle of his mask. “Now this is important, do you think any blood might have gotten into your mouth?”

Dracula looked to his feet. They dangled over the exam table. “Well, I do partake from time to time.”

The doctor dropped his chart. “How long have you been drinking blood?”

Dracula tilted his head back and forth. “Since, maybe say, the rise of the Ottomans.”

The doctor threw his hands up, walked to the border of the bubble, and turned on his heel. “Mr. Alucard, you might not want to give me a straight answer, but the CDC will want to know all about your bondage and bloodletting gathering. If you can’t tell me where it was, can you at least tell me the name of the group who was running it?”

Dracula was already shaking his head when the answer came to him. He snapped his fingers. “The Aristocrats.”

•••

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