"Cause of death was massive bleeding from the caroted arteries." Dr. Phil, one of the leading forensic pathologists in the city said in his most professional voice as he hovered over the late houswife. Darkwing listened to him as he went into full detail of the time of death and what he surmised was the murder weapon. As he listened, Darkwing couldn't help but lower his gaze at her body, lying still on the metallic table. She was nude, except for a white sheet that glowed under the flourescent light. The sheet covered her up to her shoulders, exposing her severed neck. Darkwing's stomach flopped.
"So they didn't strangle her, Phil?"
"No, that wasn't the cause of death..although..." he leaned over her body, picked up a tiny scapula, and directed their eyes to the discolored areas on her neck. "There are finger prints-"
He poked and prodded in the mutilated tissue and Darkwing shuddered. "Herb-I-I mean Mr. Muddlefoot's?"
Dr. Phil looked at him tartly. "Yes, and please don't interrupt. You know I hate it when you do that."
"Boo hoo." He replied sarcastically.
Dr. Phil sighed as he removed his glasses from his goose-bill and cleaned them with his starched lab coat. Replacing them on his face, he walked over to where Darkwing stood.
Darkwing was currently gazing at Binkie in an almost regrettable stare.
"You're looking at her as if she was your best friend."
His words broke Darkwing's sad and sympathetic gaze.
"Well, I knew her. A friend of a family I know. It's just such a shame..she was such an innocent and loving person. I can't see why anyone would want to kill her...or even could, for that matter." He sighed as he removed his hat, his state of mind seemed so incongruent to his usual thoughts of Binkie. She had always been so docile and sweet. Always smiling and always happy. She was the conservative mother-Brady Bunch clone, a rarety of the modern-day liberals of the millenium. Although while she was alive her chronic cheeriness got on his nerves, now he'd give so much to have her back. Tormenting Drake about Gosalyn's masculine ways, always knocking on their door in hope her generosity could be brought to good use at the Mallard's. She even went as far as knitting them all sweaters during the winter. There's just so much people take for granted.
"She was a mother?" Dr. Phil stated more than asked.
"Yeah, two boys. Honker and Tank." Darkwing's mind instantly began to churn and whirl once it found a good grasp on Tank. His cool manner after Binkie's slaughter, almost as if it had been a goldfish that died instead of his mother. Darkwing's eyes clouded over and Dr. Phil asked him what he was thinking.
"Oh, nothing. So, uh.. is that all? Everything you've told me I could have recited before the autopsy."
Dr. Phil smiled sardonicially, his lips laced in dis-like. "Well, Mr. Know-it-all, I don't think you could have guessed that she had been raped before death, hmm? Or...do you have some sort of psychic corpse-reading power?"
Darkwing gave him a dark look. "What! No...you're not serious."
Dr.Phil shook his thick head, his many chins jiggling like Jell-O. "On the contrary, serious as a heart attack." He remained emotionless as he walked the length of her body. He took the edge of the sheet that concealed her bottom half, and lifting it, asked, " Do you want to see?"
"NO!" His response was pure reflex. The brain didn't even have to register for him to spit it out. "Just...tell me."
"Muscular tears along the b.c walls, internal abrasions and severe strain against the organs and cervix-"
"Sperm sample?" Once again, Darkwing earned a harsh glare from Dr. Phil for interrupting. "Noo...but I did get a very small strip of fabric." He walked over to a table opposite the room. Darkwing followed him with his eyes.
Handing Darkwing a clear, plastic evidence bag, he stepped back and allowed the crimefighter light to see.
"What the hell," Darkwing's voice was scratchy enough to spit gravel.
"Object rape?"
"Object rape." Dr. Phil repeated him in confirmation. Darkwing inspected the piece of brown fabric no bigger than the tip of a finger.
" Investigators took a glance at it. Said they'd wanted to take it with them to the scene. Told 'em I needed to let you at least gander at it." Dr. Phil adjusted his glasses and leaned in further. "Figure you'd know just as easily. Got any clue?"
Darkwing inspected the piece with intense scrutiny. After a moment of deep congetation, he sighed and shook his head.
"Not a clue. It's imperative that I take it to the S.O.C, though. Something I'll run across will give me a hint."
Dr. Phil waved him on with a passive hand as he walked across to the neighboring gerny, taking a white donut box and removing a pastry.
"Go on, take it. Most of those losers don't know their asses from a hole in the ground. If it was up to me you'd be in charge."
"And see, a year ago you would've liked to see me behind bars." Darkwing said, wishing he could smile but finding it an inappropriate time to do so.
Dr. Phil took a bite of his jelly donut and leaned against a counter. Behind him lay a deep sink, housing a huge mass of organs and tissue. Darkwing could feel himself getting queasy and took a step towards the door.
"People change, my friend. A person can change in any which way over a remarkably short amount of time. I may work with dead people every day, but...even the dead have their secrets to tell." The doctor studied the crimefighter a moment before giving a glance at the pallored woman on the table and then back at Darkwing. Darkwing looked away. He knew who he was referring to. If what he said were true, then Herb could have very well killed Binkie. Tied her down and...
"Her wrists!" Darkwing startled Dr. Phil by jumping from his place. "Were her wrists bruised?"
Dr. Phil finished his donut, wiping jam from his mouth against his bloodied lab coat. The two colors mixed together in an illusory image. Binkie's blood and jam.
"Actually, they were. Restraints, I'm assuming. Bruising along the tissue proves that no one's hands were used to hold her down, and a hairline fracture in 3 of the seven carpals suggests struggle. Complete fractures in all ankle tarsals and a completely broken right wrist." He removed Binkie's hand from under the blanket, setting it into view. The hand looked swollen, almost engorged. A sickening bluish-black hue.
"And you have no idea what the restraints were?" Darkwing asked as he glanced over the wrist.
"Once again, the demand of your expertise is imperative."
Not bothering to smile, Darkwing's investigative mind went to work. It took but a brief moment to realize what it was. "...Tape bruise." He murmered, almost in a trance.
"Tape?"
He snapped himself from the daze. "Uh, yeah. Well, adhesive bandages. Athletic tape. You know, what a sport's player uses to tape an ankle of wrist in order to keep from injuring something further."
Dr. Phil walked over and leaned over her body, mumbling inaudibly.
"Yes. I see the small areas where the skin was torn off. It's hard to find because of the bruising." He looked over at his caped comrade, who was still examining her wrist. "Darkwing, what if it was duct tape? Wouldn't that have the same effect?"
Darkwing gave him a look as the question endeared him and he withdrew his rather large magnifying glass from his double-breasted jacket. He knelt low over Binkie's wrist, and gazing through the huge instrument, looked with the scrutiny of someone trying to weasel out a single flea on a mutt's backside. "Good question..even better answer." He stood upright.
"The marks left from the tape are designed in a criss-cross type fashion. Duct tape is practically water-resistant and therefore has a more straight-lined adhesive pattern, unlike athlete's tape, which can loose its ability to adhere."
A gentle twitch of the eye was all he received from the astonished doctor. "How in holy hell did you come up with such an accurate hypothesis?"
Darkwing gave him a mere glance before returning to his inspection. "My dau-errI mean my friend's daughter is really active in sports..." The doctor was looking at him more closely. "Y-ya know..tike's gotten so close to me that I mistake her for my own." He chuckled a little, which rolled into a clearing-of-the-throat and an abrupt change of the subject.
"Well, very perceptive." Dr. Phil amended. "But inquiring minds must ask..who would tie her down with athlete's tape? Why not a neck tie, or a rope, or..."
"Whatever was at hand." Darkwing interjected. "Had to grab something quickly."
Dr. Phil gave a short shake of the head and walked back over to his donut box, currently more fascinated with the sugary-fried treat oozing jam than another victimized murder.
"But I don't know why anyone in that family would own athletic tape-" Darkwing left his position over her body and placed his hand to his chin in thought. "Binkie hardly left the house. Honker's more into mollecular division than sports, and Tank just wants to eat and/or destroy everything."
"Maybe Mr. Muddlefoot or the kids had a non-sports related injury."
Darkwing completely ignored the doctor, whose suggestions were doing nothing but hindering his thought process, and began to wonder if Gosalyn had left it over there one day. She had no joint or muscle injuries, but the child had a very vivid imagination and could think up a million and one things to use that tape for. 'Nah, she's out of that rambunctious stage.' He reasoned, pursing his lips involuntarily. He also didn't notice anything bandaged on anyone else.
"Maybe Mr. Muddlefoot walked. He was heavy-set, which could put additonal strain on all joints. Maybe he strained an ankle."
Darkwing looked over at the egg-shaped man with a pot-gut and balding head.
"No, not Herb. He wouldn't break a sweat if it meant his life." His mind then reminded him of how bad Herb had perspired when Drake had splintered the door trying to get in. You could give the credit to a man tied up and set on fire.
Darkwing hissed at himself to think as minutes rolled by and still no intimations surfaced. Dr. Phil noticed his tension and urged the masked mallard to calm down before he had a stroke.
"This is crazy! I'm wasting time. I'm going to investigate." Darkwing threw his hands up in exasperation as he grabbed his gray fedora and charged for the door.
Dr. Phil shooed him on. "Go on, kid. More power to ya." He then added more to himself. "Now I can go play golf."
Darkwing disregarded what the doctor had said, and almost made it out the door before the man's afterthought registered in his mind. Doing a double-take and running back into the room (and nearly scaring the old man into cardiac arrest), he exploded into the doorway and demanded, "WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?"
The doctor remained speechless, silenced by his beseechment. He looked like a deer caught in the path of a semi.
" Tell me, dammit!!!"
"Err..I..uh..More power to ya?"
"After that!!"
"Playing golf?"
"YESS!" He howled effusively as he exposed the bag containing the single fabric, extracted from Binkie's most private empire.
Darkwing examined the piece, and once he felt the evidence vindicated his thoughts, gave a triumphant grin. "Right here is a piece of fabric off of Herb's pro-series golf clubs. The handles are imported leather. Leather that's very hard to define. " He could kiss himself for halfway listening to Herb as he flashed his new golf clubs one day last week, rambling about the handle's firm grip.
"That would explain the athletic tape?" Dr.Phil said quietly, almost afraid to re-kindle the crimefighter's vivacity.
"It does when he used it to keep his jammed finger from interrupting his putting."
The doctor raised an eyebrow. "Jammed finger?"
"Opening a soup can."
"Got athlete's tape over all else?"
"Borrowed it from the next-door neighbors." Vague and (at the time) irrelevent memories clawed their way back into his conscious thought as he remembered Launchpad trying to tell him something about lending Herb the tape, which Drake ignored. Hey, what could he do? He was in a very intriguing phone conversation with Morgana.
Sighing at all the information given to him at once, the doctor applauded openly. " Tell me, how do you know so much about so much?"
Darkwing confiscated the evidence bag and smiled.
"I'm Darkwing Duck, and I'm just that good."

**********************************************

Darkwing Duck arrived at the Muddlefoots' as the morning sun perched radiantly in the eastern horizion. Investigators were scrambling about, gathering evidence and conversing amongst their colleagues on possible equations to the devious answer.
As Darkwing stepped over the police tape and into the open house, all that seemed to enter his mind were sounds of ignorant assumption and pretentious accusations.
"Well, Muddlefoot could've done this..."
"I bet he was sick of her always doing that..."
Darkwing resisted telling them all to shove it up sideways; none of them knew Herb nor Binkie. All of them were merely assuming unjustified truths: husband gets sick of wife, husband gets drunk, husband slaughters wife and goes psycho. They were all riding their endless merry-go-rounds in a perverse world where no one cares beyond what's recommended.
His mind threw him back when he was a child, walking the creekbeds amidst the woods that surrounded his grandmother's house as a young boy. He remembered tripping over what felt like a swollen leg of a deceased calf that had lain in the sun too long. Yet when he picked himself up, he realized he had unearthed a fairly new corpse. It was of an older woman, her cloths tattered and her eyes gouged from the feeding ravens. He remembered how his chest tightened to the point of suffocation as he ran, blindedly sprinting through the dense woods until he found the small dirt path that led back to his grandmother's home. His grandmother had ran out to meet him, and he realized only then that he had screamed the entire way. He had cared, but not about the woman. Only that the dirty-white face of a corpse with oozing caverns for eyes would haunt his memories the rest of his life.
"Darkwing Duck, I was wondering when you'd get here. Pleasure to have you on board." Darkwing jerked back to the present and turned to greet a rather plump-looking goose in an expensive suit and tie. "The sheriff notified me that you were coming. He told everyone to wait until you have a looksie at the place before the guys got started."
Darkwing had to shake himself a moment before replying. The mallard generously accepted the detective's hand and shook it. "So that's why they're all standing around like buffoons."
The detective laughed deeply, and patting Darkwing on the back, replied, "Just doing what they do best."
Darkwing acknowledged the insult as just another reason he had an unspoken reverence for Detective Sherman.
"So what have you found so far?" Darkwing asked as they stepped further into the house. The detective sighed and rubbed the back of his head. "Just the obvious: The evident weapon of choice was a butcher knife, the gun Muddlefoot held when the neighbors came in-did you know that man had to disarm Herb Muddlefoot?"
'Yeah,' Darkwing thought wearily. 'I am that man.'
"Yes, that was what I heard. Mallard, right?" Darkwing feigned ignorance.
"Yeah, Drake Mallard. Said he heard screams and ran over-his teenage daughter was over here with the Muddlefoot boy at the time."
Darkwing nodded passively, already aware of the story in an all-too-well memory wheel. Detective Sherman removed a hankerchief from his back pocket to saturate the sweat that had accumulated on his brow. "Good thing Mallard came. That girl of his might have been next."
Darkwing nodded, goosebumps radiating down his back like pinpricks. He was expected to reply, so he merely whispered, "I didn't think Muddlefoot was capable of doing such a thing."
"Well, if Muddlefoot didn't kill her, whoever did was a damn nutcase, that's for sure. Binkie was raped, beaten, and then bled to death. That poor girl would have been the next victim. Everybody who's had any experience in homicides knows that the females are always the worst off. Dominance of the species."
Darkwing's heart nearly plummeted to his webbed feet as he walked on, trying despertly not to think what would have happened if he hadn't been home to hear the screams.

Upon entering the kitchen, Darkwing and two officers searched the floor around where Binkie had made her final resting place. The police dusted while Darkwing yanked out his patented microscope and got to work. One officer opened a huge food pantry, and flipped on the light. He immediently backed away, a look of sheer disgust plastered on his face. Darkwing and several others went to the doorway and peered inside, only to find a rather beaten golf club with blood all over the upper half. The shiny steel was dimmed from the crimson. Blood and what appeared to be tissue lined the entire floor. Darkwing backed away from the area, nausiated.
"It's the rape tool, alright." One officer muttered as he picked the club up and stuffed it in an enormous sterilized bag.
"Wait." Darkwing held out a stern hand, causing everyone to halt in their tracks. He quickly removed a transparent bag containing the solitary piece of fabric extracted from Binkie's cervix. Removing the piece of fabric with tweezers, he took the club and inspected the handle. "This fabric isn't manufactured in the U.S., and it's fibers-studied under a microscope-are almost five times as thick as that of any leather found here or imported from other countries..." he trailed off as he found a small, almost untracable bare patch on the handle. Taking the fabric on the needle, he ever so gently placed it into the patch where it had once been like a piece into a jigsaw. Perfect match.
"So what does this mean?" One officer asked as he received the club that was tossed at him by the nausiated crusader.
"That material on the handle of that club is almost rip-proof. Whoever raped her did it with every ounce of strength, and judging by her fractured hands and feet, whoever did this did it while she was alive." As he said this everyone in the room recoiled, clutching their stomachs. The grueling realism of the scenario hit him hard as he felt the tart, soupy bile bubble up his throat, stinging his tongue. Darkwing barely had time to run through the kitchen door and outside before he threw up.
Detective Sherman ordered the half-sick officers to continue gathering clues as he also walked outside, hands buried in his pockets. Darkwing had sprinted as far into his own yard as possible, preserving the crime scene. When he had thrown up everything he possibly could, he stumbled back to the Muddlefoot's open door, leaning against the frame and breathing heavily.
The pudgy detective offered him a clean hankerchief, which the crimefighter accepted gratefully. "Mr. Mallard probably didn't like you spewin' all in his yard." he motioned with his head, his hands still hidden.
Darkwing wiped his brow and replied, "Trust me, he doesn't mind."
The detective looked at him momentarily, looking closely with interest. "Darkwing, I don't mean to get personal, but did you have some sort of personal relationship with this woman?" he asked sympathetically as Darkwing stood on legs that resembled a new-born fawn.
"What do you mean by 'personal relationship'?"
Detective Sherman held up his hands in defense. "I'm not accusing you of anything, I was just wondering...with the whole interest in this case..you and her weren't..you know.."
"WHAT?!"
"Just asking!" The overdressed detective was pelting bullets as he recoiled.
"Is it a crime to be concerned for the safety of St. Canard?? Isn't that what heroes do?!"
"Of course. I was just wondering why you were so distraught-you've seen worse than that. Hell, just last month a ten year-old boy was gutted and hung from a flagpole-" Darkwing motioned for him to stop and put a hand over his face.
"Look, I never knew the woman. I just find it disturbing that whoever did this mutilated her from the inside out. Can you blame me?" He found strength enough to look up at the detective.
"Of course I don't. I just assumed you or someone and her...well, SOMETHING had to have set Herb Muddlefoot off; what better than to find out his wife was cheating on him?"
Darkwing shot him a glare then that could freeze the fiery pits of hell over. What an accusation to make! The man didn't even know Binkie! She had been as devoted to Herb as an angel to God. And what right did he have accusing Herb of such a malicious murder?
"That's a real pretentious assumption, detective."
"Darkwing, I-" but stopped when he saw Darkwing step off the small concrete step leading into the house, trip, and nearly fall to the ground. Luckily, he caught himself when he realized what he'd nearly fallen on: two blue high-heeled shoes, stamped deep in the mud from the previous night's rain.
"..her shoes." Detective Sherman marveled as they both dropped to squatting postion outside the suburban home. The mud had dried a little, preserving a huge mass of footprints fossilized all around them. Standing beside the door was a pair of Herb's boots, caked in mud and seeming to snarl like an animal backed into a corner.
"This has to be where the initial struggle took place." Darkwing perceived as he prodded the buried heels gently. "Well, that explains the broken ankles."
"And look-" the detective instructed as he pointed a few feet away from them into the grass. Darkwing went and snatched the object from the grass. "Athletic tape."
Darkwing could feel his stomach churning, with nothing left in it to spew out but feeling aggressive enough to try anyway. Yet before he even had a chance to retaliate from the onset sweep, a lanky officer stepped outside with two evidence bags, directing them at Darkwing. "Look at this."
Darkwing took the bags and peered into the first. It held a dishtowel saturated in blood. The second held three bloodied molars.
"Hmm, seems someone's teeth were knocked out."
"Binkie's?" The officer tried.
"Not unless the killer momentarily became sympathetic and wiped her mouth, and judging from the damage done here, that's very unlikely." Detective Sherman watched with increasing admiration as the masked mallard, more valuable than any detective known, began to put his analytical thinking to work.
"So what do you think?" The detective quizzed curiously after a moment. Darkwing handed the bags back to the officer and shot his index finger valiantly into the air. "Go have that blood tested a.s.a.p. Whoever murdered Binkie left their calling card on that dishtowel."
"What if that isn't the case?" Detective Sherman asked as he loosened his charcoal tie against the morning sun's piercing rays.
"It very well might not be. All I know is that if it is the case, it's our only shot at proving Herb innocent. His prints may be all over the place, but that can be easily planted. All I know is that there's no report of him having a damaged mouth."
Detective Sherman raised an eyebrow at him after he said this, ignoring the drops of sweat falling into his eyes. "Since when do you take the side of the number one suspect?"
Darkwing only looked at him before he walked back into the house. " Since I realized that this insubstantial evidence is leading to the capture of an innocent man and the freedom of a murderer. Innocent until proven guily. Remember that."

Copywright Lesley Hall..all characters are Disney's and not used for permission. Please ignore the fact that I embellished a little on Darkwing's coming-to-fame, but eventually people had to recognize him, folks! Please respond and ignore the fact that this chapter was a little slow. I've got to set the stage, so to speak. Please send reviews! Thanks! Oh, and CCR's 'Have You Ever Seen the Rain' is also not mine.