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The Doclopedia #2,318
Traveling Moe: In The Castle Of Dracula
Traveling Moe is a 4 year old tabby cat who got accidentally sucked through a trans-dimensional portal and has traveled to various realities as his mad scientist human mom tries to get him home. Here is another of his tales.
Moe arrived on an Earth where classic horror monsters are real, just about a half mile from Castle Dracula in the Carpathian Mountains of Romania. A breeze was blowing downhill, so Moe, who had once spent 4 days on an Earth undergoing a zombie apocalypse, instantly recognized the scent.
Equally fortunate for Moe was the fact that he had recently spent 2 weeks on an Earth where sapient animals were in charge, caring for a few million iron age humans kept on various preserves. Just being there a couple of weeks had rewired his brain and given him sapience.
Which is why he decided that this undead shit had to end right here and now.
Moe was familiar with several sorts of undead, having once gone with his original human to visit friends that were into geek stuff. Something told him that this castle was probably a vampire hangout, since all the movies had them living in castles. So up to the castle he went.
When he walked through the front gate, he saw a very large and deranged human male tending to some horses and a carriage. Moe decided to avoid that
guy for a while, and so sneaked into the castle via a side door.
The interior was dusty, dirty and full of vermin. An odor of decomposition and blood was in the air. Moe did not sniff any other humans, but he did catch a whiff of wolves, probably a couple of days old.
Drawing upon his mostly Hammer Films based vampire lore, the daring cat soon found the stairway leading down to the basement. There, sure enough, were several plain wooden coffins, some containing local soil, some still new. There were also three much fancier wooden coffins arranged around a large stone sarcophagus. Dracula and his brides, Moe guessed. But how to kill them when one had no opposable thumbs and only weighed 12 pounds? Moe went back upstairs to think.
It was still a couple of hours before noon, so Moe figured he had 8 hours or more to get some sort of vampire killing plan together. As he sat on a high shelf, he saw the big human come in and head for the kitchen. The fearless vampire slaying kitty decided to go have a look at what was going on. There might be food involved.
Compared to the rest of the castle, the kitchen was very clean and dust free. He watched as the human went to a fireplace and stirred a small pot of soup. Moe was not sure what was in the soup, but it smelled disgusting. The fire, on the other hand, was giving him ideas.
The human, who Moe gathered was called Gregor, constantly talked to himself. This allowed Moe to learn that “Master and his brides” would wake up just after sunset to go “hunting in the village.” He also learned that the fire was warm, but the kitchen should never be dusty. That would be very bad. At one point, Gregor went to a cupboard and got out a bottle of what Moe was pretty sure was vodka. The human poured a small amount into a cup and drank it as he ate his nasty soup.
After he finished his meal, Gregor laid down on a small cot at the far end of the kitchen. In less than 2 minutes, he was snoring loudly. Moe sat for another few minutes thinking, then, once his plan was finalized, started looking for the items he would need.
Hours later, sunset was less than 30 minutes away and Moe had just awakened from a 15 minute nap. Time to check everything out before hitting the switch.
Gregor was still asleep, sort of. He was talking to his master about something. It didn’t really matter, because Moe pushed a large heavy pot off the shelf above Gregor’s cot and it dealt the madman a very serious blow to the head. Step one taken care of.
Moe was heading out of the kitchen when a voice shouted in his mind.
“Who has dared enter my castle and injure my servant? You shall pay for this trespass, mortal!”
Moe tried thinking back “I am not afraid of you, filthy undead creature.” Sundown was not far off now.
The voice replied “First, you will fear my children!”
Moe had a pretty good idea of what was next as he ran into the great hall. Rats were streaming down the staircases and hallways in their thousands. Despite a bit of fear, Moe was confident that he could avoid the rats for another few minutes. He was faster and smarter. Besides, he had counted on this.
The rat tsunami was after Moe as fast as their tiny legs would carry them. The cat lead them a merry chase all through the ground floor, stirring up dust as they went.
Sundown was now 2 minutes away.
On one pass near the kitchen, Moe bounced off the door, opening it wider. The fire in the fireplace was blazing nicely. The air was about as thick with dust as it was going to be, so Moe, now even more closely followed by the rats, hauled ass for the upper floors.
On the third floor, just a yard ahead of the crazed rats, Moe leapt out a broken window. The ground was 100 feet below. The courtyard was full of dead, leafless trees. Moe was falling straight toward an 80 foot pine. The sun went down.
In his crypt, Dracula awoke. He could hear the voice of the trespasser mocking him. Furious, he called out for his brides to wake up NOW!
Moe hit the upper branches on the pine, ran a few feet and launched himself toward the great dead oak between the pine and the castle wall. All the while, he was thinking insults toward Dracula.
The lids flew off all four coffins as Dracula and women climbed out. But wait, their coffins were covered in old dusty sheets. As they got up, they got tangled in them and filled the air with dust.
Moe was getting tired, but he ran through the oak at top speed. He could hear in his head Dracula’s scream of recognition and rage. He thought back three words.
“Fire kills vampires”
Too late, Dracula saw the three candles burning at the crypt entrance. A second later, dust hit the flames both there and in the kitchen.
Moe was just clearing the castle wall when the explosion happened. It propelled him an extra 60 feet into a small pond. He shot out of the cold water and into the forest. Once he felt safe, he watched Castle Dracula burn and collapse.
Then he crawled into a hollow log and fell asleep.
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