Iowa Sucks for Vampires

"Okay, Marcus, be careful. Remember what the sign said," said John. His son was a dutiful eight years old. Polite kid, and he followed rules well, but the urge to explore is always strong in the ones smart enough to listen.

"I know, Dad. That's why we brought our helmets!" said Marcus.

"We brought those because we rode our bikes here anyway, buddy," said John.

"Oh, right. Gotcha. Gotcha," said Marcus. He turned on his flashlight and dashed into the small cave with his father striding behind.

"Slow, buddy. It's not just your head to think about. Don't trip." John easily caught up to his son, who had halted and stood just around the corner from the light at the entrance.

"Dad, it's dark in here," said Marcus. He was shifting his flashlight at cracks and lumps in the rock, no doubt a little spooked.

"I know. We talked about that." Marcus struggled with darkness. John and Emilia had helped their boy work through some cognitive therapy for night terrors, but he still got them from time to time. At least he could describe them and try to process them in the mornings now. "It's only because the light can't get in. Remember what we said about cavemen?"

Marcus looked at his feet, shining the flashlight at the leafy detritus. "They thought caves were kind of like magic shelters, right?"

"That's the theory," said John. "Portals to the Underworld."

Marcus laughed despite himself. "Like your dumb weirdo horror?"

John smiled. "Yes, like my dumb weirdo horror. But remember, that was before people understood much. Those stories I like are about imagining what else we don't understand, because the instinct for fear never goes away in any organism."

Marcus was silent for a beat. "Organism is a living thing, right?"

John said, "Yes. Good job."

Marcus's silence indicated he was chewing the inside of his cheek and pressing his lips, John knew. "What about plants?"

Got him. "Well," said John, buying a second to consider the kid-wisdom, "some scientists think they have a kind of chemical warning system to other plants, so maybe."

Marcus turned to his father, smiling. "I'm not scared of this cave."

John smiled back. "Do you want to go a little further?"

Marcus turned back and cast his flashlight down the short path to the next turn. "Yeah, but slow." All cautious determination.

"Good plan," said John.

They carefully trod a little further in. Ice Cave in Decorah, Iowa, is narrow and short, and now, in early November, there was supposed to be the signature covering of ice in the back. John had been in bigger caves when he was younger, but Marcus had never been in one at all.

Marcus started and dropped his flashlight when what looked like a burlap sack fell from a crack in the ceiling of the cave. John snatched the boy's hood and pulled him slowly back, shining his own flashlight at the the thing, which slowly moved on the floor of the cave. "Marcus, take my flashlight and carefully go out of the cave the way we came in. I'll get yours," said John. He handed his son the flashlight.

Marcus hesitated. "Dad?"

"Go! Carefully!" shouted John. His son left. John stood, watching the pile of fabric shift in the beam of his son's flashlight on the ground. "Shit," he muttered.

Marcus stood yards back outside the entrance. He gripped his father's big flashlight, still switched on, useless in the overcast fall afternoon, rocking slightly from foot to foot. "Dad!" he called. He felt his heart whumping. This was the feeling he felt at night, in the darkness, since he was a child. "Dad," he said again, powerless.

John burst out of the cave cursing. He was half-dragging, half-carrying what looked like a gangly, skinny, grey kid wearing what looked like a potato sack. Marcus noticed it actually was a potato sack.

John tossed the sick-looking kid a few feet ahead of him, still well short of his son. "And that is why we're careful," he said, a little winded but grinning.

Marcus felt his heart skip seeing his father, and he was a little calmer now. "Who is that?" he asked.

John stood arms akimbo and caught his breath for a beat. "Well," he began, "it's no one now. Not anymore. Thing's about run its course."

Marcus looked at the kid. But it wasn't a kid. It was more like a starved man, with almost no hair and skin with veins that looked brown. As it weakly clawed at the ground and slowly propped itself up to look at the child, its eyes yellow and unseeing but its tongue lolling in the air towards him, Marcus felt his heart speed up again, this time excitedly. "Dad! Holy sh--sorry, holy crap! That's a vampire! Oh, man it's almost dead! Whoa," said Marcus.

"No," said John, "it's already dead. The word we use for a vampire is dust." John walked up and kicked its arms out from under its wobbly head and gave its ribs a good stomp. The sound of rotted branches crumpling weakly.

"Dust," said Marcus. "Because of ... prions, right?" His teacher talked about those during science.

"Right," said John. "Prions are not organisms, but it's kind of like they're trying to be. The vampire prion came out of the cities, where it can spread really well, but out here its a dead end." John looked down at the struggling thing. It was trying to prop itself up again. "We have to snuff it. Do you have your phone?"

Marcus frowned. "Yeah, but Mom said I hit my limit."

"Tell you what, take as many pictures as you want, and if you want to post it, I'll talk to your mother about it," said John.

"Really?!" Marcus beamed.

"Yes, just make sure you anonymize the face, because this used to be somebody's family member, okay?" said John in his teaching voice.

"Gotcha. Thank you, Dad."

"You're welcome. I'm proud of you, Marcus."

Marcus felt heat in his face. He pursed his lips, playing the conscientious Upper Midwesterner, mostly learned from his teachers, because his parents were from the East. "Do we need to do anything else?" He had heard of how they dealt with vampires in the cities, but seeing one in person out here was like finding an agate the size of your head.

"You can call it in if you want. Do you know what to tell the police?" asked John.

Marcus thought about that. "I don't remember what they call it. Doable Vector Prion ... something that starts with an 's' ... sin-dome?"

"Durable, and Syn-drome," said John. "Good job!"

Marcus smiled and dug in his pocket for his phone. He slowly approached the vampire and opened the camera. Click. A slightly better angle. Click. He reviewed the shots and opened the dialler.

"911, what's your emergency?"

"Hi, my Dad and me were in Ice Cave and we have to snuff it."

"Ok. I need you to be more specific. Did you say snuff it?"

"Sorry, we found a vampire. Durable Vector Prion Syndrome."

"Ok, you're being very brave and very calm. Please don't do anything yet. Can I talk to your Dad?"

"Sure, here he is," said Marcus, pretty glad he had an excuse to get off the phone. He strode confidently in a wide arc around the weak thing and handed it to his father.

"Hi, this is John Corbin."

"Hello, you and your son are reporting a DVPS case at Ice Cave, correct?"

"Correct. Febrile, rustvein adult, approaching termination in cloister mode. Kinda shocked in made it this far past summer."

"Oh, I gotcha, you bet. Sounds like you've been around the block."

"My wife and I freelanced back in Pittsburgh years ago, the really nasty ones. Spooked me at first, but it's harmless. My son's giving it a wide berth. Got a response time for me?"

"Yes, sir, just five minutes."

"Okay, great. Thanks." John ended the call and handed the phone back to Marcus. "Welp," he said to his son, "go down to the riverbank ahead of me, I can drag it down."

Marcus sprinted the steps and to the right, where the dirt road dropped down for better river access. John walked up to the thing and grabbed it by a bunched up bit of the scruff of its sack it had clothed itself in, hauling it with a quick pace in his step. It only weighed a dozen pounds or so, the prions having emptied the bones of most material but leaving an improbably strong architecture behind. It tried to reach behind itself and claw at him, its head craning back as its tongue groped the air. The teeth would be too brittle to bite, but the nails might have enough of a snag, having been ground against rock for who knows how long. That it had held out through the long, Iowa summer days was remarkable enough, since feeding on livestock during the winter in direct competition with coyotes and armed farmers made them stupid, starved, or destroyed come spring. John hoped the "vector" was not slowly becoming more "durable." If that was the case, the sophisticated undead in the cities, with their voluntary feeders and hearty "scene," would soon feel the wrath of the cynical, postmodern, heavily armed CDC. At least his son was academically prepared, if his generation was to bear witness to a resurgence of the Night.

He hated that capital-lettered word. The Chamber, as the the well-connected former people with DVPS called themselves, thought they deserved recognition. They called for rights and appealed to voluntarism to justify their partial consumption of the willing and the creation of new vectors. John lived in daylight, with his wife in son in a state with a better, higher UV index for rapid incineration, close to running water, as was necessary to dilute and flush the clingy prions away, to the Gulf, ultimately. Today was too overcast for the former. But zombie sharks were easy to destroy.

Marcus was waiting by the bank, hopping-happy. John could see the police rolling down the road, paved now, as he marched and swung and slammed the thing into the ground to waylay its groping. It was too weak to even hiss.

The police rolled up as John tossed the thing down on the edge of the bank. There was a nice, quick flow here where the river was straight. No substantial eddies for prions to gather in, and they would all be in the center of the swiftwater, smothered, well before the next bend in the river.

The police emerged from their cruisers, and simply stood. "Heya, John," one called.

"Afternoon, Norm," John called back. John looked to Marcus. "Well?"

Marcus looked to the police, then back to his father. "You mean--I get to?"

John just smiled.

Marcus was not convinced. "Wait, I get to snuff it to dust!?"

"Marcus, DVPS is a sad disease, and we can send a copy of your pictures to the police to help the family find closure, whoever they are. But you were very brave today," said John. "You remember that word? Closure?"

"It means, like, closing the door and then being okay?" clarified Marcus.

"Kick it in, son, you got this!" another cop hollered.

Marcus gave a big grin and carefully walked up to the thing. "I'm sorry you died, but you're not allowed to make anybody else die," he said. The pile of weak, demented biology looked around for what spoke to it, but never made a fix. Marcus kicked once, twice, toppling it over into the water, where it instantly bubbled, slimed, and dissipated, and an empty, holey potato sack floated lazily downstream.

Previously from the Written Bird

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