What's at Stake

The year was 1954, and Dr. Canard was delighted at the new mummified body that had arrived in his workroom at the Museum of Antiquities. Canard was an elderly man, but even though he had to walk with a cane, his mind was as spry as ever. As he approached the imposing box, a little orange tabby cat named Kronos was equally as interested.

Kronos was the official mouser for the museum basement. Always offering a soft meow and a leg rub, Kronos had endeared himself to the elderly scientist. Currently, he was sitting near Canard, sharing his excitement. Canard’s assistants were busy prying the box open.

When they removed the sides, an abundance of packing material spilled out, which Kronos took an immediate interest in. Besides hunting invading mice, Kronos loved to play … and had become rather notorious for stealing things from basement workrooms. So far, he had stolen six pens, seven handkerchiefs, one empty bottle of acetaminophen, a finger bone, and a shoe. And that was just what the research inhabitants of the basement had been able to find.

Today was a special day for Canard. The mummy that was currently being unpacked would be the star piece in the museum’s season opening. It was discovered in a recently unearthed burial site in Romania and promised to hold numerous clues about the culture and lifestyle of those who buried it.

As Canard’s youthful assistants carefully carried the mummy over to the workbench, they all gasped. It was as described, but certainly something else to see up close. It appeared to be an extremely small man wrapped very tightly in burial cloth … with a stake through his heart. It was also so well preserved that it bordered on the miraculous. Of course, they made plenty of vampire jokes, especially given the fact that the mummy originated in Romania.

By the time the mummy had been unwrapped, the assistants were eager to go home, it being an hour after their usual departure time.

“Listen, doc, I know this is exciting and all, but I’ve got a wife and kids waiting for me,” explained Joey.

“Same, doc. My wife is going to be mad as a hornet if I don’t get home soon,” added Tommy as he reached for his lunch bucket and hat.

The other two, Bill and Jack, agreed with them.

Canard reluctantly let them go. Then, turning to Kronos, who had been carefully watching the entire process, said, “Well, it looks like you're my assistant for the rest of the night.” Kronos nodded his head in agreement and then let out a plaintive meow.

“Ah, it is dinner time! Let me get you some tuna,” said Canard in a happy tone. He turned his back on the mummy and shuffled through his cluttered desk to find a can of tuna. As he was looking for it, Kronos hopped up on the mummy. Being the orange cat he was, Kronos began to slap at the wooden stake. He had loosened it somewhat when Canard called him over for his dinner. Canard hadn’t noticed what Kronos had been up to.

Canard sat down to check the notes made by his assistants and make some minor edits, and double-checked the dimensions they recorded. After a few hours, he realized the Kronos had wandered away, probably to start his evening shift of mousing. Canard still hadn’t noticed that Kronos had loosed the wooden stake.

The next morning, Canard arrived back at the museum a few hours before his colleagues arrived and found Kronos outside his workroom door, once again with that plaintive meow for food.

Canard leaned down to scratch Kronos on the head, and Kronos aggressively rubbed his head against Canard’s hand. As Canard opened the workroom door, Kronos rushed in, his tail up in a little crook.

After a few minutes, the coffee was on, and Kronos had been fed. While Canard sipped a cup of coffee and reviewed some interoffice mail that had been awaiting him, Kronos silently hopped back onto the mummy’s chest. His little paw kept swiping at that wooden stake until it completely fell loose and landed rather loudly on the floor.

Canard, completely preoccupied with the task at hand, didn’t notice Kronos bat it way under a table. He did, however, notice a chill that fell across the room and, after a few minutes, reached for the sweater hanging on the back of the chair.

When his assistants arrived a few hours later, Jack immediately noticed that the stake was missing, and the group undertook a rescue mission for it. However, they were unable to find and jokingly accused Kronos of participating in its disappearance. Looking in his usual hiding places for treasure didn’t yield it.

The group of men continued with the inspection and study of the mummy and its wrappings for the rest of the day, certain that one of them would soon come across the stake. If not, they agreed, one would have to be fabricated for the season opening so that the mummy would look complete. Canard did not like this and was determined to find it.

They also noticed the drop in temperature. Joey was the first to notice it. “Dr. Canard, would you be ok with me making a pot of coffee? I’m getting a little sleepy, and I sure could use something hot to drink.”

“Of course!” replied Canard good-naturedly. “I can make it for you. I’ve reached a good place to pause in my research,” he continued behind a large stack of books on Romania and common burial practices. He was fascinated by the stake and was determined to find out why it was present.

After about four hours of work, the group noticed that each step seemed so heavy, each voice seemed to grow weaker, and any effort just seemed too much. They were exhausted, way more than was typical for an eight-hour workday. Even Canard, with his boundless energy and enthusiasm, moved more slowly and seemed overwhelmed.

The group toughed it out for another four hours and didn’t notice when Kronos quietly slipped back into the workroom, carrying the stake from beneath a stack of boxes and gently playing with it out of their line of sight.

At the rate that Canard and his assistants were going, he wasn’t sure they’d have the mummy ready for the season opening. By their usual quitting time, the group, led by Jack, apologized to Canard that they couldn’t work any overtime, and Canard felt the same way, though he didn’t admit it. His assistants dragged themselves to the time clock upstairs and checked out. Canard made quick work of feeding Kronos and headed home, feeling more weary than he ever had.

The next day, Bill and Joey called in sick, feeling drained and sick. They were running slight temperatures, but not enough to warrant a doctor’s visit. Canard and the remaining two assistants, Tommy and Jack, struggled through the work and made very little progress. Kronos continued to play with the stake out of their sight, unaware that he had unleashed something very dangerous in the workroom.

Canard decided he would take another stab at researching what he could about the mummy. To date, he had only done a bit of manual research, but he was beginning to think something was off about the mummy. His team of research assistants continued to gather information and samples from the mummy.

“Doc,” said Tommy during their lunch break, “I feel like I’m wading through mud when I move, and like my brain is full of fog when I think. I’m sorry I’m not accomplishing more today.”

“Same, Doc,” added Jack. “My wife was worried about me the last few days. Said I’m not my usual happy, perky self.” Tommy and Canard both laughed. Jack was anything but perky, but he always worked fast and efficiently.”

Canard agreed with them about the fatigue and brain fog. But he would never mention this concern to them or his colleagues for fear of ridicule and loss of respect. Regardless of how ridiculous it seemed, the word “vampire” kept popping into his mind. He didn’t believe it to be the blood-sucking vampire of legend, but knew that some cultures had talked about another type of feeding creature that drained people of energy rather than blood. With the stake in its heart, there’s a good chance that the people who buried it felt it was a traditional vampire.

Looking at how little progress he and his team had made compared to projects in the past, he could no longer deny that something was wrong. Could it be that the well-preserved mummy lying on a table in his work area was slowly draining them to gain enough energy to resurrect?

Spying Kronos on the edge of his desk, Canard spoke quietly to him, “I’m being ridiculous, is what I’m being. Correlation does not imply causation, and I should know better. But I am still puzzled by the symptoms myself and the crew and have. I suppose I’m just getting old and feeble-minded.” He scratched Kronos’ little orange head and turned back to his books.

He spent the day poring through all the applicable manuscripts and books available to him in the museum and found what he was looking for. He found out that the area where the mummy had been buried had suffered a severe plague around the time of its estimated death and subsequent burial. The community was known for its preoccupation with vampires and upirs, and did indeed believe in using a stake to kill them.

Canard wasn’t so much wanting to tell anyone of his discovery as he wanted to find that stake and put it back in the mummy to see if that might help the situation. The next day, his last two assistants called in sick with extreme fatigue and a low temperature.

Canard didn’t bother to take his temperature. Yes, he was an elderly man who walked with a cane, but other than a bad hip, he still felt at the prime of his life. Until the mummy arrived with that stake, that is. And he still suspected Kronos of being involved with what had disappeared.

That morning, after fixing Kronos' breakfast and his own coffee, Canard decided additional help was needed. He couldn’t search the workroom as well as it needed to be searched for the missing stake. So he appealed directly to Kronos.

“I know you took it, and I’m not mad. But I need it very much, Kronos.”

Kronos looked at him and tilted his head just a little bit to the side. “

The little orange cat disappeared to retrieve the stake. He wasn’t even having fun playing with it anymore after he stole another bone from the archaeology division.

Canard began to document more information about the mummy, working at his desk at an agonizingly slow pace. After falling asleep, he was awakened about an hour later by Kronos nudging his hand. There, on his desk, was the stake.

“Ah!” said Canard, “Look what the cat dragged in!”

After petting Kronos and informing him of what a good cat he was, Canard leaned heavily on his cane as he walked toward the mummy. He placed one hand on the table for balance and placed the stake over the mummy’s heart, mimicking what he could remember of the photos his team had taken of its position. Releasing his other hand from the edge of the table, Canard began to press down.

Suddenly, the eyes of the mummy opened, flashing an incredible, preternatural blue color that almost seemed to glow. A wave of horrendous fatigue swept over Canard, and he struggled to stay on his feet and keep the stake raised. “No!” he cried in a trembling voice as he fought the fatigue to force the stake down. Now that the mummy had been unwrapped, its hands were free, and one grasped at Canard’s wrist but was still too weak to hold it. Determination surged through Canard as he thought of the “plague” that had tormented that village so many years ago, as he thought of the fatigue that was affecting his team of young, healthy men in their prime, and the exhaustion that was threatening to overwhelm him now. With every bit of strength he had left in his body, he pushed the stake into the body until the eyes shut.

The room instantly warmed a bit, but nothing else happened. There was no burst of energy, much to Canard’s disappointment. He kept working, just as exhausted as he had been, and fed Kronos before he left for home.

The next day, however, saw all four of his assistants back at work. Gone was the tiredness and the fever, and back was their usual enthusiasm. And the same was true of Canard: no longer was he slumping over his cane and falling asleep at his desk. They managed to make significant progress in catching up on their work and had a highly productive day.

Canard never said a word to anyone, but he did ensure that the stake was securely embedded in the body in such a way that Kronos couldn’t steal it again, and made it clear in his documentation that the stake was never to be removed.