Disclaimer: Chapter 1 also had the song “It’s Raining Men” in it. I failed to remember to post it as another song I used, but it goes without saying that I did not write those lyrics. If I did, I’d hire someone to write these for me!

Drake sat silent, watching the ocean undulate with life as it expanded out to the horizon. The moon sat perched above his head like a wise superior, seemingly reading his mind and taking into account his lack of knowledge as to what to do.

He sighed as he listened to the seagulls sing in the distance. “I have absolutely no idea where to start on this case. It’s almost like…..one huge circle, or something.”

The Mallard shifted his weight from side to side, watching as the massive pillars of Audubon Bay bridge receded and fell into darkness between his feet. He could hear the waves crash upon the supports far, far below. He looked up at the near-full moon again, watching it watch him with a kind of ethereal patience.

“Do I save the damsel before I pummel the bad guy? I know I need to, but that’s going to put her in unnecessary danger….as well as risking me getting my neck rung for trying to distort her image of her husband. I mean, how do I brainwash someone like that? ‘Oh, hello Katherine. Darkwing Duck, here. Just a little F.Y.I. : your father, whom has been estranged from you for about ten years, wants me to strip you of your luxurious life so that we can prevent your drug-trafficking husband from killing you because you’re worth millions, and you don’t know it! Oh, and nice weather we’re having, hmm?’ Bah, I’m gonna get this girl killed.” In mid-statement, Drake got to where he was actually directing his thoughts to the moon, almost as if it was the brunette bombshell.

Brunette bombshell?Where did that come from?

Pulling a clipping of photos from the manila folder given from J Gander earlier that day, Drake began studying Katherine more closely. He didn’t have time to concentrate on them too much because of Gosalyn’s softball game she had had earlier that day. It was only then that he realized that his unconscious had managed to pick up on her attractiveness without him even consciously realizing it.

‘She really is gorgeous.’ Drake thought, not finding it necessary to state that out loud. Most of the photos were cameos of her, and some were black-and-whites that agents managed to snap while she was in various public places. ‘Her driver’s license picture even looks good!’

“Looks like you’re trying to understand a french tax form.”

Drake jerked his head up to see Morgana float into appearance, and he quickly tossed the photos back into the folder. “Uh, hey there….you….”

Morgana gave him a smile as she cocked her head to the side a little. “ ‘Uh…hey there..you..’ back.” She said as she took a seat beside him, giving him a kiss on his cheek.

“Sorry, I was looking through case file.” He gave her a sheepish grin, and she merely smiled back at him before looking out over the ocean.

“Oh, I will never get sick of this view,” she murmured as she gave a heartfelt sigh. “It always reminds me how mysterious life is.”

Drake gave a nod to concur. His mind immediately began to drift back onto the case, and he became so absorbed that several minutes were allowed to pass unhindered by conversation.

“What are you thinking about?” He heard her ask, and he immediately wished she didn’t. No only did he not want to tell her what he needed direly to tell her, but he hated it when people asked that question. Aren’t we all entitled to the secrecy of our thoughts?

“Uh, just about a case I’m working on.”

His lover nudged him a little and smiled. “Well, are you going to tell me about it, or are you merely going to spill to the moon like you have for the past half hour?”

Drake’s voice caught in his throat after she said that. “Ha…have you heard what I said…did you listen….”

Morgana laughed, “No, I didn’t eavesdrop on you. I just know you well enough that I would have bet one of my lives that you were doing that.” She then added as a side note, “but looking at your expression, I kind of wish I had eavesdropped.”

Drake shook his head. “Nah, just this and that, piffle really.”

He immediately thought against telling her. She was gazing out over the ocean with a kind of child-like awe brushed on her face. He then remembered all of the times he had decided against telling her or Gosalyn things that they needed to know: Gos always ended up kidnapped and Morgana always managed to smoke him like a char-grilled steak.

“Uh, Morg, there’s something that you probably should know…about this case.”

He watched his girlfriend look at him with a kind of concern. “Okay Dark, what is it?”

Drake cleared his throat, fumbling nervously with a stray string that dangled from his knee-length khaki shorts. “I am going to be involved in a case that requires me to…get to know a certain person…really well.”

Morgana raised her eyebrows at this a little. “Oh? Would that person be a female?”

Her boyfriend nodded. “Yeah.”

“And in ‘getting to know her’ you’re going to have to befriend her, right?”

“Yes.”

“And in doing all of that, you’ll have to get…close to her.”

“Yeah…see, Morg I’m going to have to extricate her from a certain situation. And, in order to do that, I’m going to have to first convince her that she needs to be extricated.”

Morgana didn’t look at him any longer, but out at the seemingly endless sea. “You know, Drake, that when women are torn from their husband/boyfriends, then they look for someone to pick up the pieces?”

Drake began to wonder then if Morgana can read minds.

“Yeah, I know. But I’m going to have to do this, or she’ll be killed.”

He waited for the right moment to slip his hand into hers. She accepted it, luckily.

He watched her nod a little, and then look at him. He gave her a smile that she mirrored, and he knew she was struggling to understand.

“Can I see a picture of her, Drake?”

Drake sat upright, noting the change in her voice. She sounded almost like a hesitant child asking a drunken parent if he’ll read her a bedtime story. The surge of power he had over her scared him.

“Su…sure.”

He extracted a photograph-the first one lying in the stack-out of the folder and handed it to her. In it, Katherine was standing by a tree, in a low-cut top and a skirt. She was facing the camera, but was looking off in another direction. Her face looked on the verge of expressing fear.

“She’s quite pretty.” Morgana commented, studying the girl intently.

“Oh…she’s just another woman-”

“No, she’s pretty.”

Drake wilted, “yeah, okay, she’s pretty.”

Morgana looked over at him as she handed the photo back. “Who is she?”

“Katherine Marshfield. Wife of a truck broker-turned-drug-smuggler.” Drake then gave Morgana a look and added, “ AND she’s J Gander’s estranged daughter.”

Morgana’s eyes nearly bulged from her head after he said that. “REALLY?”

He nodded.

“Evidentially, she and J Gander had a falling out when she was in her early twenties. She quit college, went into the air force, and he hasn’t talked to her since. I honestly can’t tell you how he stumbled upon her predicament, unless he had been using S.H.U.S.H resources to keep tabs on her all these years.”

The elegant witch looked at him curiously. “Do you think that’s what he did?”

Drake nodded. “Definitely, and I don’t blame him. I would, too if put in that situation.”

Morgana looked a little downtrodden, and Drake knew instinctively that she was concerned about his engagement in the private lives of these people…especially Katherine.

Drake turned towards her, and taking her hands in his, leaned in close.

“Trust me, this will be a piece of cake.” He leaned in a little further, almost until they were beak to beak. He whispered to her, looking directly into her green eyes, “I promise you that no one on earth will ever be capable of keeping me from being soo in love with you.”

Morgana nodded, smiling. “No one on earth?”

“Or… on any planets, constellations, dimensions, or hereafters.”

She kissed him on the mouth, and whispered, “Okay.”

“Okay?”

She nodded, and he took her around the shoulders with an arm. “ Good, now’s just a matter of starting.”

Morgana leaned in and rested her head on his chest, enjoying the smell of his cologne and the fact that she would rather be there than anywhere else.

“I never knew you to be afraid to start on a case. Usually you’re ecstatic.”

Drake squinted his eyes a little as the silhouette of a whale surfacing came into view in the distance, hindered by nothing.

“Well, I can’t just go running in there throwing kicks, I’ve gotta be more stealthful.”

He took a deep breath, and Morgana sat up to look at him. A concerned look grazed her beautiful features, and Drake felt a pang of guilt for having put it there.

“You’ve got to do undercover work, you mean?”

“Really undercover.” The civilian/crimefighter responded.

“As in…” She trailed off.

“Yep, say hello to Drake Mallard, the guy who has to take off his superhero persona to be a superhero.”

Morgana chuckled a little as Drake gently held her close to him, yet he knew she didn’t find a bit of the scenario funny.

The moon continued to gaze at them.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Loud techno music poured from every orifice of the dimmed building. Jack watched with keen interest from the safety of his office as his night club became jammed with people struggling to get in, and once in, struggling to keep from dancing themselves into cardiac arrest.

“I’m glad some of our stash found its way here a few months ago,” a rat with dark shades and sporting a gray suit said in a gravely voice. Jack closed the blinds and turned towards his accomplice.

“Yeah, it’s rakin’ in a good extra thirty grand each month.” Jack smiled at himself as he walked the length of his office over to his corner bar, where he topped off his drink.

The rat lit a thick cigar and took another sip of his martini. “You think we’ll ever get busted here? If the cops fall onto this, they’re bound to figure out our shipments.”

Jack waved him off as he took a seat behind his desk on the far side of the dim room. “Tito, this place is a well-oiled machine. The only ones who know have been paid-”

“You paid off St. Canard’s finest off?”

Jack swayed his head a little from side-to-side, weighing the answer. “Well…some. And whoever I didn’t pay off’s too stupid to even consider bustin’ us.”

Tito took a drag from his cigar and asked, “What about that Darkwing Duck creep that’s running around? I hear he wouldn’t take a mil’ if you tried to get him to lay off an old lady crossin’ the street before the light flashed.”

Jack pursed his lips in disgust at Tito’s comment. Opening his drawer and looking around, Jack looked up at the rat with an evil grin.

“I’ve got the ultimate payoff for sons of bitches like him.”

“What is it?”

Jack Marshfield extracted a loaded 9mm handgun, its barrel sparkling against the filtering moonlight.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Drake, now donning his Darkwing garb, sat on a worn leather chair placed in front of his series of newly-updated super computers. He was typing furiously when Launchpad showed up, a sandwich and a bottle of water in tow.

“Wow, DW, what have ya got there?” The pilot asked as he sat the turkey on wheat and bottle beside where Darkwing sat. Darkwing smiled devilishly, his face almost maniacal in the eery glow of the computer.

“Jack Marshfield’s online schedule. I >ahem< stumbled upon it some time ago.”

Launchpad looked dubious. “But DW, haven’t you been trying to hack into it for the past four hours? Isn’t that why Honker was here ‘til nearly midnight?”

“No, no, no, Lp, it’s ‘stumble’ not hack. Hacking is illegal, ‘stumbling’ isn’t.”

“But DW, I thought you always told me that ‘ignorance is no exception to the law’.”

Darkwing could already see where this is headed. Trying to control his temper, the crimefighter growled, “I am doing this for S.H.U.S.H. NOTHING is illegal when S.H.U.S.H is involved!”

Launchpad didn’t pursue the subject, but instead asked, “Well, what does his schedule say?”

Darkwing clicked onto a screen, and with the typing of a few buttons, brought up an online calendar.

“Evidentially, James left this afternoon to go on a business meeting in Chicago, and by the way I gather, he’s going alone.”

“So Katherine will be around tomorrow?”

Darkwing sighed and sat back in his chair, closing his eyes and massaging them with his thumb and index finger. “ I’m hoping so. Jack shouldn’t be back until later on in the week.”

The sidekick stood, leaning against a table. “That’ll give us time to scope the place out, maybe even get acquainted with his wife?”

Darkwing nodded, emitting a sigh and looking upward. He didn’t want to look at Launchpad as he said, “Before Jack Marshfield makes it his late wife.”

The masked mallard stood from his seat, stretched, popped his back, and began to make his descent down the stairs. Launchpad watched him go, then turned and eyed the turkey sandwich he had just brought. Without missing a beat, Darkwing called up to him, “Lp, let me know if anything comes up in town…I’m gonna go check on Gos and lay down for a bit.”

“Sure thing, DW.”

“Oh, and you can have my sandwich!”

Launchpad’s eyes lit up, “Thanks, DW! You’re swell!” and with that, attacked what could be considered the sidekick’s fifth dinner that evening.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Darkwing spun into a house that was dangerously quiet. No television playing, no stereo blasting, no motorized chainsaw or endangered species lying around…..

“Gosalyn?”

Darkwing jogged upstairs to his daughter’s room, and peered into the partially-open door. Gosalyn was lying on her stomach on her bed, flipping casually through a magazine while her head swayed rhythmically to music encased in headphones.

“Hey kiddo.”

Gosalyn looked up at him. “HEY DAD!” She screamed, and immediately saw him cringe and went to turn off her MP3 player.

“Hey sorry pop.”

Darkwing shrugged it off and stepped into her room. “Hey hon-hey, Osama Bin Laden is still missing….do you think he could possibly be anywhere amongst all of this mess?”

Gosalyn looked at the superhero-turned-dad with a smile. She always loved it when he turned parental while as Darkwing Duck. It always resurrected a feeling of comfort and protection.

His daughter looked around the room innocently, and with a smile said, “If I find him and get a reward, I’m buying a small country.”

“What on earth would you do with a small country?” Her father asked her with a smile.

The girl shrugged, “Oh, just make everyone call me Queen Gosalyn….and every Friday would be ‘baseball’ day, all rivers and lakes would be composed of chocolate ice cream…and oh! we’d have poison arrow frogs that would turn carnivorous and would chew the pituitary glands out of people!”

Darkwing’s original intent was to ask Gosalyn a pretty big question, now he was re-thinking it seriously.

“Gos, do you even know what a pituitary gland does?”

The redhead sat up, pulled the edge of an old pair of softball socks she wore, and replied, “It wouldn’t matter if a frog chewed it out.”

Darkwing removed his gray fedora, scratched his head in thought, and with a half smile consented. “Well….tha-that would be true, I suppose.”

He walked over to the bed, and scooting his daughter over, took a seat beside her. Gosalyn studied his face a moment, unsure of what his intentions were. Could he be punishing her for something? Um…no, not likely. His eyes weren’t beaded up and his eyebrows aren’t doing that twitchy-thing when he gets real peeved. He must not have heard about that incident with the chicken feet and the fish guts in the high school cafeteria’s beef stew line….ahh, she didn’t worry. It’d be another good week before he got wind of that.

“Uh, Gos, I’ve got something I need your help on. Morgana’s out helping her dad shave her Aunt Tilly’s back and…well, it’s kind of a girl thing.”

Gosalyn raised an eyebrow. “Dad, you’ve got a serious girlfriend and a sixteen year-old daughter. You honestly don’t know about it yet?”

It took Darkwing a moment to realize her implication, and when he did he made that genuine oh-gross-me-out face that is native to just about every male on the planet.

“Oh, no! No, not that. No, um, actually, I’m currently dealing with a case-”

“OOH, A CASE!! CAN I COME? I WANNA COME! LET ME COME!”

He shook his head, for he should have seen it coming. “Gos, the best you’re going to do is help me by answering this question, so do you want to help or not?”

Gosalyn sighed, and nodded. “Fine. I’m hitting with my coach tomorrow afternoon, anyway.”

“Okay, anyway, without going into it…I’ve got to, finagle this woman, and I need to know what the best way is to….go about it.”

He saw his daughter’s eyes grow wide and mirror his gross face. He sighed.

“NO, not that either!”

“Dad, we’ve got a huge lack of communication, here.”

Darkwing closed his eyes for a moment, trying to think of the best way to articulate. Opening them again, he looked and noticed how calm and collected his daughter was. She really could be intimidating when she wanted to be.

“Okay, this woman…I need to be able to persuade her that her husband is no good for her, but in order to do that, I’ve got to befriend her. And in order to befriend her, I’ve got to make her think I’m trustworthy.”

Gosalyn bit her lower lip in thought. “Well, how long have you known her?”

The masked mallard swallowed hard. “We’ve never…formally met.”

“Oh. Well then, you’re going to have to meet her.”

Darkwing’s shoulders slumped. “Really, you think?” he said rather sarcastically.

“AND, I wasn’t finished yet…and, you’re gonna have to be charming. See, when a girl meets someone, she usually files that person in her memory bank in one of three places: under ‘potential dating interest’, ‘someone trustworthy’, or ‘oh God this guy is a conceited pig and needs to be castrated’.”

Darkwing looked at her with his mouth gaped open. “Really?”

His daughter nodded. “I know basing people off of first impressions is kinda taboo, but it really is what girls do, especially when talking to guys.”

Darkwing looked away in thought, wondering how many women thought of him as that third option.

“So the best bet is to try to come off as an initial ‘someone trustworthy’, right?”

Gosalyn nodded. “Well, either one of the first two would work.”

Darkwing nodded, thinking. “Okay, well how do I come across as trustworthy?”

Gosalyn stood up and walked over to a mini-fridge that sat across the room, and after she extracted a Koo Koo Kola, grabbed a blue hoodie off of the floor. The words “St. Canard Lady Blue Jays” blazed across the front in a hue that resembled her hair as she pulled the shoulder-length do up in a ponytail.

“Well, you could become friends, and little-by-little implement in-”

“I don’t have that kind of time, Gos.”

Gosalyn popped the top on her soda, took a sip, and ran a wayward hand through her bangs. “Well, you could kind of hit on her, and then send her flowers.”

Darkwing crinkled his beak at the thought. “Isn’t that a little too brazen? Wouldn’t that make me come off as number three on that list?”

“Okay, what about candy-”

“Too mushy.”

“Jewelry-”

“Too personal.”

“The movies?”

“Too impersonal.”

“Dinner?”

“Brazen, again.”

“Sex?”

Darkwing opened his mouth to respond, and instantly felt a little embarrassed that she had just said that. With a short smile, he replied, “Probably not the best route…”

She laughed as she jumped onto her bed. She engrossed herself in thought for a moment before she sat up on her knees. In a fit of excitement, she tossed her soda in the air, the entire can spewing out all over her father. To top it off, the damn aluminum can hit him square on the head.

“Oopsie, sorry dad.”

“I love your ‘oopsies’. They are always such a blatant reminder of how mortal I am.” Darkwing mumbled as he rubbed his head.

“Okay, I was excited. How about this, you need to set up a pseudo-fight. Someone is attacking her, and you completely grill ‘em, I mean total annihilation!”

Darkwing looked a little doubtful, but Gosalyn seemed confident. Watching her swing her fists in the air, he asked, “You really think that would work?”

“Oh yeah. I mean, you need someone who’ll put up a good fake-fight. But girls fall for that stuff. They love it when they just meet a guy and he acts all heroic and blah, blah, blah.”

“Well, fighting I can do.” Darkwing reasoned. “But who would I get to fight me?”

Gosalyn shrugged, “How about Launchpad?”

He shook his head. “No, she might actually meet him.”

The girl nodded. “Um, I could dress up as a boy and fight you.”

Darkwing smiled and leaned in to kiss her on the forehead. Ruffling her bangs, he said, “Thanks but no thanks. I could never swing at you, you’d beat me up.”

Gosalyn laughed. “Okay…hmm…OH! I know! Tank!”

“Tank Muddlefoot?” Darkwing looked even more doubtful.

Gosalyn sprang to her feet, and since she was nearly Darkwing’s height, nearly kicked him in the head. “Sure! He’ll be gone next week for football camp all summer, so she won’t ever get to know him. Plus, he’s huge now! He must weight 300 pounds from football! Just pay him twenty bucks and he’ll let you do it.”

Darkwing shifted his head from side to side, weighing the pluses. After a moment, he smiled.

“Okay, I’ll do it. I’ll set up something in town, have him harass her, and I’ll beat him up.”

“Keen gear! That’s awesome! Tank needs a good beating!”

Darkwing smiled and shook his head a little. Seeing his jovialness as a prime opportunity, Gosalyn hopped off of the bed.

“How did you get so smart, kiddo?” her father asked as he pulled her in for a hug.

“Well, when you have a dad like you, it kinda rubs off now and again.” Came a reply.

Darkwing held her a moment, and with eyes still closed asked, “So what is it you want?”

Gosalyn didn’t let him take a breath. “This new baseball glove that’s out. It’s killer, dad! I mean you just stand there and the ball practically gets sucked into the glove!”

Her father nodded, thinking. “Now Gos, honey, what did I tell you about manipulating people like that?”

The teen put an index finger to her chin. “That…oh darn! I should have hinted at how much of an inconvenience it was to sacrifice my time BEFORE I ask for something, shouldn’t I?”

That awarded her an extra tight hug. “That’s my girl.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

“TESTING…TESTING….TESTING….ONE…TWO…THREE…CHA CHA CHA.”

“Launchpad, I can hear you.” Drake said back into the small, clear piece that hung from the piece in his ear. He walked down his front porch to see Launchpad exiting a rather beat up looking white van. The words ‘Dos Nuevo Pool Cleaning: We’ve got the right stuff!’ was written across the sides in dark blue. Two Hispanic cartoon characters were scrawled across as well, the expressions on their face doing nothing but annoying the piss out of Drake.

“Sounds like the equipment works.” Launchpad speculated, as they both stood in front of the side of the van. Launchpad gave the paint job a side glancing before asking, “I don’t get it. Why would a pool company be named ‘Two Eggs’ pool cleaning?”

Drake, in a sleeveless white tee shirt and strategically dirtied, baggy white shorts, and a white hat gave a half exasperated look. “No, whenever it’s termed like that, it means…..something else.”

“What?” Launchpad asked earnestly.

Drake cleared his throat. “Uh..err, you know…..”

All he received was a blank stare.

Rolling his eyes heavenward, Drake edged, “You know….oh, come on Lp-think of a part of anatomy that involves two…egg-shaped structures….”

Launchpad gave it thought. “Ohhhhhh..heheh, I didn’t even think. But why?”

The shorter mallard shook his head. “Beats me, why do people think it’s hilarious to watch punk guys shoot bottle rockets out of their keister?”

Launchpad looked at his boss. “Well, DW, some people can’t afford to buy those soda bottles whenever they want….”

Drake glared up at his sidekick before telling him to go change into his spy wear. As his sidekick ventured into the house, Drake turned to gaze at the old van that S.H.U.S.H. managed to confiscate with a look that resembled both disgust and morbid curiosity. Before long, a voice calling his name broke his train of thought.

He turned around to see Tank Muddlefoot, now eighteen and dangerously close to Herb’s height and weight, approach him with his common disinterested expression.

“Tank, how are you?”

“Twenty dollars.” The ruddy sideburn-encased mouth muttered.

“What?”

“Twenty dollars. Gos told me you have something I can do to make twenty bucks.”

Drake nodded and led the boy away from the street, noticing as he grazed his arm that the boy was pure muscle.

“ I’ve got a little project going on, and if you comply you’ll most certainly be twenty dollars richer. Okay, I am going to call your cell phone. Whenever I say, meet me at this address-” Drake handed him a slip of paper with Jack Marshfield’s address scribbled on it. “-and there will be a dark-haired lady. I want you to start harassing her, say something like ‘I don’t like what your husband did to my dad’…or something. You know, make it up. Then, I’ll come to her rescue. You and I’ll scuffle, and I’ll pretend to..beat you up.”

The monster of a boy had a slight grin held on his face as he heard this. “YOU beat me up?”

Drake rolled his eyes. “Yes. We scuffle, I hit you a good few, and you go.”

Tank gazed up at the bloomed maple trees in the Mallard front yard, engrossed in thought. After a moment, he said, “Sure, okay. I’ll do it. Twenty bucks. I’ll even let you hit me for real.”

Drake rose his eyebrows. “Really? Well, I don’t-”

“No, don’t mention it. I can take a hit. Only on one condition…”

Drake looked at him.

“I get to hit you one good time.”

The boy had a smile on him that could make a monk cry. Yet, Drake reasoned, if he DID get hit one good time, it definitely would make the scenario that much more believable.

Tank extended his hand, eager to accept the verbal contract. Drake sighed and shook it.

“Sure okay.”

Tank nodded. “A ‘right, just let me know when.” The boy said as he began to walk through the lawn and back to his house.

“Yeah, okay…hey, Tank! Do you even want to know WHY we’re doing all of this? Or at least why there’s a pool truck in my front yard?” Drake added the last part to himself, wondering if it was necessary to make up some elaborate lie.

Tank merely called over his shoulder. “I already know! Get laid! Oldest trick in the book! I’m just glad to see I don’t live next door to a pansy! Otherwise, I don’t care!”

Drake, his fists clenched at the end of tight arms, would have choked him then had he not already sacrificed twenty bucks.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Darkwing Duck, yet no longer Darkwing but now Steve the pool service guy, squatted in the back of the ancient white van, sitting amongst thick, orange, furry interior that made his skin crawl and that smelled like chlorine and decaying animals.

“Okay Lp, got the equipment figured out?” Darkwing coughed a little to prevent getting nauseas. He looked at his sidekick, who was also in a dingy white outfit and held a clothespin on his beak, who gave him a thumbs up sign once he slipped a pair of black headphones over his pseudo-ears. He sat amongst an array of machines, one being a computer screen that typed out anything said through the microphone hidden beneath Drake’s cloths onto a screen.

“Now remember Launchpad, I am going to set these cameras in inconspicuous parts of the house-” Darkwing held out a small sack filled with tiny black pin-looking objects, all complete with a little lens on the end.

“-you let me know if they are positioned correctly, got it?”

“Got it, DW.”

Darkwing stuffed the sack of small cameras into a pocket of his shorts, and taking out a small suitcase, slid into the front driver’s seat to begin applying the finishing touches to his ‘Steve’ uniform.

Launchpad watched as the masked mallard, self-proclaimed master of disguise, applied touches to his face to allow for distinguishable differences between him and Drake Mallard.

“So when are you gonna make yourself known to her as Drake…DW?” Launchpad questioned as he pulled out a bag of chips from beneath his shirt.

Darkwing checked himself in the mirror and smiled at his adept skill. 007 had nothing on him.

“A very super-secret source-”

“J Gander?”

“….yeah…J Gander told me that he knew from certain ‘people’ that she likes to take a daily run every day.”

“So you’re going to have her get attacked when she’s running...”

Launchpad trailed off as Darkwing silenced him. “Shhh! Rest assured, Lp, I’ve got it covered. The dashing Darkwing Duck never goes without a plan!”

The benevolent sidekick nodded. “Well, what if you are to get in trouble in there? Do you want a secret word for me to recognize to come bail ya out?”

Darkwing opened his mouth to object to it, then thought better. He thought for a moment. “Yeah, okay. That wouldn’t hurt, I suppose. What phrase would pop out in your head?”

Launchpad opened his mouth and literally dumped the entire bag of potato chips into his mouth. Chewing them loudly (and inadvertently in Darkwing’s ear due to the earpiece), his mind derailed long enough for him to say, “Mmm! These new cinnamon Apple Betty Boppers are yuuuuummmmy!”

Darkwing had to physically restrain himself from choking the duck into unconsciousness.

“Ooh, that can be it! Apple Betty Boppers!” Launchpad looked up to see an ardent duck glaring back at him. The pilot immediately recoiled. “Or…not.”

Darkwing took a deep breath. “Fine, Apple…Betty…Boppers. Good, swell…okay, I’m going in. Lp, you be ready to okay me on the cameras. And keep an eye open!” With that, Darkwing slid out of the driver’s side door of the crusty van, ignoring what Launchpad had murmured in his wake.

“Gee, I thought I was supposed to keep both eyes open.”

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Darkwing made his way slowly up the snow-white stairs that led to a house fit to be a White House replacement. He stood for a moment before ringing the bell, mesmerized that human beings actually inhabited a place of such voluptuousness.

Taking a moment to adjust a contact that turned his baby-blues a shade of dark brown, Drake cleared his throat and rang the doorbell of the elite estate.

The door opened almost immediately.

“Mmmmyyyyyeeeeesssss?” A rather plump goose in a black suit moaned as he faced the shorter duck. Drake blinked a couple of times as he stared at the man’s eyes…or, to be more accurate, the folds of skin that masked where a person’s eyes usually sat.

“Uhh, ya thar….M’ name’s Steve and I came for da pool inspecteeeeooonnn.” Drake drawled, immediately wondering just what accent he was trying to feign.

The butler skin-eyed him suspiciously. “Sir, I have no record of there being a need for a pool in-spec-tooor.”

“Well, I ya reckon the city sent me…” Drake adjusted the worn white baseball hat that had served many years as Gosalyn’s lucky hat before becoming too ratty for even her to sport out. “Countin’ what’s goin’ ‘round in dese thar rich folk pools, ya never can be too careful.”

The butler’s goose bill quivered slightly. “What’s going around…sir?”

Drake nodded. “Yep, I reckon all this El Nino-La Nina-El Gordita-Enchilada-storms is causin’ parasites to run amok….”

“In pools?”

“Not just any ol’ pool! It’s gotta be a pool of class…it takes special multi-plasmoric (Did I just make that word up?) pool chlroinies to do tha trick…and bye and bye, Mr. Marshfield here’s a fine user of them chlorinies.”

The butler’s face seemed to show emotion caught between bewilderance and skepticism.

“Well, I suppose if the master of the house takes more precaution…”

“Well, ya can shit in one hand and wish in the other, and see what fills up faster!” Drake immediately grimaced at what he had just said. Yet to counter the butler’s intention of kicking him to the curb, Drake grabbed the pool skimmer he had sitting by his feet and said, “Y’ know, if I leave here and you’uns gots them parasites, thar’s gonna be some consequences and reprocussions…”

“Like what?” The butler seemed to fall victim to the ‘more disturbed’ element of his personality, which gave Drake the needed edge.

The short duck in white leaned against the pole he held, wrapped his right arm around it, and began to name off whatever came into his head. “Oh Lawd! E’erything you can imagine….nausea, diarrhea, partial blindness, paralysis, gout, gas, overactive bladder, underactive thyroid, limps, gimps, chimps, mumps, lumps, frumps…”

“Frumps?”

“You don’t wanna know.”

“Oh.”

Drake continued, “Oozin’ fingernails, nosebleeds, psychotic tendencies…uh, sexual over-aggressiveness….”

The butler looked at him oddly, “ sexual over-aggressiveness?”

The shorter duck stared back at him. “Did I say sexual? M’bad, I meant homo sexual over-aggressiveness.”

The butler’s face stretched in horror enough that Drake could actually see that he had eyes that time. With a quick motion, he pulled Drake into the house and slammed the door behind him.

“Okay, okay! No one wants to be a part of that…” The butler’s British accent quavered as he shuddered inwardly. Drake smiled, satisfied at his performance.

“Great! Now lead me to it and I’ll just-”

“Wait sir, which one do you want to venture into first?”

Drake stopped short, his eyes widening. He had to suppress a smile when he realized the potential he had for scouting the entire house. Ha, and Launchpad suggested they be exterminators!

“Ahh, whichever one’s the one most used…y’know, so if I’s gots to go get re-enforcements, then I can tackle the worst first….y’know, momma always told me ‘Steven, Steven ya’s got to make a body proud! Ya gots to! Ya goin’ hafta go out dar and—she used to say this as we sat down ‘round a dinnah of beans n’ cornbread n’ mountain oysters--”

“Mountain oysters?”

“Ya don’t wanna know.”

“Oh.” The butler cleared his throat and ushered him on into the house.

Drake walked through the huge stone pillars, looking for potential places to hide the cameras. Well, he didn’t have to search hard, they were everywhere.

“I suppose you can start with the pool in the back yard, then move onto the pool on the third floor, the one on the west side of the first floor, and the one in the….oh.”

Drake stopped and watched as the butler’s face reddened.

“What?”

“Well,” the burly goose began by leaning in and whispering. “Sir’s got a new…establishment down underground. Kind of a….fun chamber.”

Drake could tell he was hesitant to reveal any secrets until he told the man, “Go on, momma always taught me ta ne’er tell a body’s secrets.”

The butler looked from side to side, nodded, and began to walk with him through the house. “Well,” he began in a sort of hushed whisper, “He added on a third basement recently to…serve as a place to meet his plethora of mistresses….but you can’t say a word to the missus!”

Drake shook his head. “Ain’t no one sayin’ nutin’ to nobody. Does it have a pool, too?”

The butler nodded, and Drake could barely keep his excitement.

The butler was about to usher the pool cleaner further through the house when the sound of a phone ringing became the predominant distraction. The butler began to look antsy, and Drake put a hand on his shoulder. “Go on, just lead me in the general direction…ee.”

The butler, having feeling more in touch with the inept pool cleaner, pointed down a lavish hallway. “Thank you. Down through the double French doors.”

Drake watched as the butler left his sight, and he immediately pulled out his package of mini-cameras to start distributing about the house.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

It took Drake fifteen or so minutes just to find the exit that led out into the back yard, yet in that time, he had strategically set cameras in just about every room of the house from the front foyer to the back on the first floor. Each time he had set a camera, he would wait and would almost immediately hear a hushed, “Apple Betty Boppers…Apple Betty Boppers…Apple Betty Boppers.” He really had to explain the Launchpad the way to use an emergency secret code.

Whistling to himself as he stepped out onto the back patio, Drake walked over to the pool to begin a process of what he hoped would appear to be skilled pool-checking.

That is, until he heard someone call to him.

Drake looked up to see a thin blonde duck lying in a pool chair directly across the pool from him. He looked up as she acknowledged him, and even though he knew better, he blurted out, “Katherine?”

“Uh, no…” The blonde repeated. She then stood up and walked around the edge of the pool towards him, and Drake, being the guy he was, couldn’t help watching her in her black bikini with white polka dots.

“Who are you?” Her sunglasses glimmered at him from the reflection off of the pool water as she approached. Her demeanor was much less cute than her body, and he found himself wishing that she wouldn’t spoil the scene by talking.

“I…uh…Steve. Ya, my name’s S..Steve.”

He could tell the woman was looking at him contemptuously as he stuttered out a name.

“What are you doing here?” She partially demanded.

“I…I’m here to check the pools.”

“Jack didn’t tell me anything about any pool-checker.”

Drake blinked. “Uh…that’s…cuz…we didn’t tell ‘em. Emergency…issued by the state.” He noticed he was much better at lying to ugly men than he was to women.

The blonde dug her fists into her hips and shifted her weight towards him. “Well, I think that it kind of rude, barging up in here like that.”

Drake gulped. “S..sorry m’am. Are you a relative?”

The girl immediately lost her assertiveness. In a small voice, she said, “no” before walking away from him.

The muscles in Drake’s face lightened when he realized what her position was here. He then speculated with a grin that she could instruct him around the vicinity of that hidden basement better than that butler could.

“Are you a…friend of Jack Marshfield’s?”

He watched as her face turned a bright shade of red in contrast to her black bathing suit as it became apparent to her that he wasn’t as stupid as he was sounding to her. “Uh….I guess you could-”

“Or maybe just here to….”

She was too angry to finish. “Okay! That is enough, mister! Just clean the damn pool and be on your little inbred way, okay?”

Drake glared at her, “Just chill, okay lady? I really could care less who..I mean WHAT you are doing here!”

The woman looked absolutely appalled as Drake glowered at her, shoving the skimmer into the pool and stirring it around like a witch stirs her cauldron. He immediately stopped when he realized how ridiculous it looked.

“Oh…My…God…I CANNOT believe you just said that to me!! You…you…you…have no—and what the hell happened to your accent?!”

Drake’s eyes widened significantly when he realized that his last statement to her was made without his my-mother-knows-her-cousin-a-little-too-well accent.

“That’s it, I’m calling Jack! This stops NOW!” She screeched at him as he watched her storm over to a glass table where her phone sat.

Drake ran up behind her, and retorted, “FINE! And while you do that, I think I’ll give MRS. Katherine MARSHFIELD a call and let her know an UNWANTED guest is interfering with my interest in her health and safety!”

The blonde growled and slapped her cell phone shut. It didn’t placate her at all to also realize that Steve smelt nothing like he looked. His cologne smelt so good…..

She snapped back into reality. “FINE!”

“Fine!”

“Fine!”

They gave each other glowers before he turned to walk away. As he was about to walk back into the house, he could hear the woman scream, “HELL’S BELLS!!!!!!”

Drake stopped dead in his tracks.

At first, he dismissed it. He remembered instantly where he’d heard it before, but…surely not. He then gave a glimpse back over his shoulder at her.

He could feel his breath shortening, and his heart began to race in his chest. He suddenly became very aware of his surroundings….a bird flapping above him, a bumble bee on a flower a few feet away…her breathing….

Not realizing he had just dropped the pool skimmer, he slowly made his way around to face her—not too fast, as to prevent fainting—and with a quivering voice, said, “Wha…what did you just say?”

She was livid, and in taking off her sunglasses, he had her. He knew it. He knew it. Oh God, it was her.

“What?” She said, and Drake heard it in a kind of reverberating octave. He shook his head.

“What did you say?”

She rose an eyebrow at him. None of your damn bus-”

“DID YOU SAY HELL’S BELLS?!” He roared.

Her eyes elongated by three feet. “YES!” She roared back.

Drake mirrored the seemingly astonished look on her face as he asked, much quieter, “What is your name?”

The blonde responded in a quieter tone as well, “There’s no way in hell I’m-”

“Is it Candice? Candice Waddleton?”

The fear in her face had left her. “How did you…who did you talk…”

Drake took a step forward. “Guys call you ‘Candy’ don’t they?”

Candice took a step backwards, weirded out that the pool guy had suddenly taken on a Hannibal Lector persona.

“I…I don’t know what you’re talking about…”

Drake shook his head as he approached her, his arms at his sides, his eyes glistening. She looked directly into his eyes and realized that she had seem him somewhere before…maybe not, because she didn’t recognize the brown…..

“You are thirty four years old. You were born on…October 18th…..you were ALMOST born on the 19th but your mother had you at exactly midnight and so decided to have your birthday on the earlier date….”

Drake had backed Candice all the way up to the water. She was almost shaking in fear, and when Drake noticed it, he shook himself of his freaky façade.

“Look, I’m…I’m not gonna hurt you…”

Her lower lip was quivering. How did this man know her? Did he look her up? Is he a stalker? For some reason, her mind screamed no to all of those. He felt so familiar…she felt such an urge to take him in her arms then that she nearly fainted, nearly fell back into the pool.

Gathering her ground, she shoved him hard in the chest, and he stumbled backwards. He remained where he was, arm limp as his sides. Trying to remain strong but failing horribly at it, Candice looked at him, “Who are you…”

He looked at her. Without another word, Drake took off his hat, rubbed the excess make-up and fake three-day beard off of his chin, and then removed the brown contacts. He blinked his baby blues into life again, and looked at her. Without so much as a breath, Drake nodded. “It’s me, Candice. Drake Mallard.”

She could feel herself falling backwards.

A cough. A sputter. She felt her lungs practically heaving themselves out of her mouth as she blinked the water from her eyes and looked up. She was lying on her back, and he was leaning over her, water dripping from his bill. His hair was wet and the plumage on the top of his held fell in a kind of shag….

She shook herself as she screamed bloody murder.

“Shh! Shh!! Candice, shh!!”

Candice clawed her way to her feet and backed away from him. He held his arms up in a sign of peace.

“Candice, you’re going to have to calm….”

“NO!!” She screamed. “NO! I WILL NOT CALM DOWN!! YOU…YOU’RE YOU…” she shook her head in utter disbelief. “I can’t believe it….I WON’T! YOU’RE DEAD! YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD! YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO HAVE DIED EIGHTEEN YEARS AGO!!!!!”

In a fit of anxiety, Drake grabbed her by the shoulders. She clawed at him, and he realized just how ecstatic she was. “Candice, you’re going to have to be quiet!”

“HOW CAN I BE QUIET WHEN A GHOST IS ATTACKING ME?!?!?!?!”

Drake dropped his gentle hold on her and threw his hands up. “There! I’m no longer touching you! Will you calm down?”

Candice stopped screaming, but that didn’t stop her from making any sound at all. She was still whimpering.

“You…you are dead….we buried you….eighteen….eighteen…” she broke down into sobs then, because she knew it wasn’t true. She knew it was him standing before her, because she knew Drake. Drake watched as tears fell down her gentle face, her entire body shaking violently. Drake took a step towards her, and when she showed no sign of retaliation, he took another step. Before they knew it, they were in each other’s arms. She, being roughly his height, sobbed uncontrollably on his shoulder as she wrapped her arms around his tight body.

“I’m sorry, I…I’m so sorry..” he whispered to her, the tears he hoped he could prevent finding their way to his eyes.

“how…” he heard her mumble.

He held her for what seemed like an eternity, and when she finally gained the strength to stand, she looked up to face him.

It was him. She knew it was. Just as her subconscious screamed it at her a moment before she fell into the pool; her conscious as slapping her repeatedly in the face with it. She could not believe it.

“Candice, I know what must be going through your head right now….”

Candice was able to stand on her own, but tears still ran down her face in an angry storm. Turning from him, she closed her eyes as she resurrected some of the most painful memories that could have ever befallen her.

“No…no you don’t. You don’t see a girl standing there with police while they pull your car out of the bay…” she had to stop for a moment. The memories hurt. They hurt so bad.

She turned to face him. “You weren’t there when they held services. You weren’t there when your obituary came out in the front page of the newspaper. YOU weren’t there when I had to force myself to wonder WHY you killed yourself…..you killed yourself when I was the most important thing in your life.”

Drake opened his mouth but no words could form. He didn’t mean for it to be ruled a suicide. He meant for it to be ruled an accident….someone who just fell asleep at the wheel and ran off into the bay.

“I…I didn’t mean to-”

“You didn’t mean to what, Drake?!! You didn’t mean to run your car off into the bay?! Or you didn’t mean to tell the one person who LOVED you more than anything that you were alright?!!! What in the hell was going through your head?!” She was still crying horribly, and Drake felt his heart crack open and fall into powdery pieces on the floor of his chest.

Drake began to rub the back of his neck involuntarily, and Candice knew he was at a loss for words. He always used to do that when he was at a loss for words…

“I..I never meant for it to be ruled a suicide…” Tears fell from his eyes as well. He stopped himself momentarily to gather his courage. He couldn’t cry...he couldn’t cry….this is why he never looked for her….

Candice looked at him, her face frozen in a mixture of horror and what was, ironically, growing anger. She began to stutter at him, and had to stop to find her bearings. In a hushed gasp, she said, “You…you mean you actually FAKED your death?!!”

Drake looked at her, his mouth moving but no words coming out.

He watched then as the anger seemed to melt from her features. Drake could feel his body relieving a little…and as she walked up to him, he could feel forgiveness floating about. She looked into his eyes, and in a gentle motion, placed the palms of her hands on his face, cradling his face. She gave a small smile, and he could feel himself gaining control. Everything was going to be okay.

“Candice, I..I had a calling. I really can’t say what, but I had a calling I had to answer to.” He gave a little half smile that mirrored her look of utter understanding and benevolence.

“Really, Drake? Where did the call lead you?”

“Actually, I spent about ten years overseas. I studied martial arts training and various other forms of combat in Seoul South Korea, and in central-”

“Did you have fun?” She cut him off and he was caught off guard by it.

“Well, I suppose….”

Her smile faded as fire burned behind her eyes. In a flash, she slugged him hard in the stomach, and when he cringed forward she drop-kicked him directly into the face, reeling him backwards and onto his back.

“YOU SELF-CENTERED SON OF A BITCH!” Drake looked up to see her standing over him, and while he shook the dizziness that resided in his mind, he began to remember her short fuse…..

“Candice, please-”

“NO, YOU ‘PLEASE’ DRAKE MALLARD! You please recognize that you have to be the WORST person IN THE WORLD!!”

Drake always knew about her temper. She could be amazingly jovial one minute, and completely irrational the next. And, judging from the blood that had begun to drip from a busted lip, she was being rash, to say the least.

Candice was doing some sort of pace/stomp in front of him, and unbeknownst to the squabblers, the help inside the house was having a hayday.

“Go and fetch some popped kernels.” The butler, better known as Brum to his fellow servents, said.

“Why don’t YOU go in der and fetch the POP CORN, butler boy?” A heavy older woman with a thick Cajun accent spouted from a slender beak as they watched from a kitchen window.

Brum gave her a look that uttered a refusal to comply.

“What do ya think, should we call the cops?”

Brum looked at her and shook his head. “Master Jack gave us specific instructions to avoid her being publicized….”

The older cook, her name being Thelda, smiled and nodded. “Good, I’m enjoyin’ this too much, anyway.”

Brum smiled, and they continued their gazes from the safety of the pantry-window.

Outside, Drake had managed to get into sitting position as he gingerly dabbed his bleeding lip with the tail of his shirt.

Candice was trying hard to compose herself, but failing horribly at it. With her face darker than the blood falling from his lip, she hissed at him. “You…you LEFT ME….and not….and I…..”

“Candice, I didn’t mean to hurt you like that, okay? I was young! I was young, and I listened to my instincts!”

The blonde shook, wracked in anger-induced spasms, and looking down at him, she growled, “Do you have any idea that you ruined my life, then? I could have gone to college, I could have had a career, but NOOO! Now I’m pumping sludge for a living and regretting my past to the point of no control!!”

Drake sighed and let his head drop. Looking back up at her, she instantly felt a twinge of defensiveness growing in the depths of his chest. “I am failing to see how I ruined your life, doomed you from the day I…died…”

It was her turn to list off of her fingers. “You left me thinking that life with me was too horrible to fathom; you run your vehicle off a BRIDGE, which is a rather grizzly way to die; and, to top it all off, you left me PREGNANT!!! How’s that for life-altering?!”

It took Drake a moment to absorb what she had said, and once he did, he felt himself fly to his feet. It was almost like an out-of-body experience.

“Wha..wha..what?”

Candice crossed her arms looking at him in a sick sort of triumph. “Pregnant. You left me P-R-E-G-N-A-N-T.”

His mouth nearly unhinged from his jaw. “WHAT?! Who…what….where..how….”

She looked at him skeptically. “Must I really explain how?”

He looked utterly indignant, like someone had just spat in his face. “WHY THE HELL DID YOU NOT TELL ME?!!”

“I WAS GOING TO AND THEN YOU RAN YOUR CAR OFF IN THE BAY!!!!” Came a screaming reply. It was only then that Drake realized that they were close enough to each other to touch beaks. He jerked his head back.

Throwing up his arms, the mallard flailed them wildly overhead, seemingly signaling an invisible airplane for landing. “I…I’m at a loss for words.”

“Apparently not.”

He narrowed her eyes at her. “I cannot believe you did not tell me you were pregnant! How dare you!”

She dropped her arms to her side. “I was going to! I had just found out that day that I was! And you know what the worst part was? When I found out, I was elated! I was elated because I thought that I was going to get to spend the rest of my life with YOU!” She had advanced on him, backed him into a chair, and proceeded to poke at his shoulder as she yelled. He allowed her to do it, feeling almost like someone had disconnected his head from the rest of his body.

“…but then your car was PULLED from the bay, your body was missing—which I assumed you were shark food—and they stated to me, plain as day mind you, that the father of my child had killed himself!”

He didn’t try to retort, but stood there looking at her. “So, what…did you do?”

She stopped, beak open, ready to continue yelling. Closing her mouth and crossing her arms, she said in a quieter tone, “You mean did I keep it?”

He took a hard swallow and nodded.

She weighed the options a moment before talking. She was tempted to lie to him, but doing so didn’t seem to aid her in any particular way at the time.

Leaning into him, their eyes nearly crossing as they stared at each other, she hissed, “Yesss. I didn’t have an abortion. I knew how damned pro-life you were….which I felt oddly ironic considering you’d just killed yourself.”

Drake gulped, struggling for breath. In a quavering tone, he stammered, “Do you have him….her…?”

“Adoption.” She quickly spat at him before walking away.

He watched her go, and when she didn’t turn around, he bellowed, “THAT’S IT?! THAT’S ALL YOU’RE GOING TO TELL ME?!”

She turned around, “What else am I supposed to say?”

Drake looked around wildly, almost wishing someone else was there to mirror the utter shock he felt. “You..we…” he had to stop for a moment to compose himself, for he was stammering incoherently, caught in a whirlwind of dumbfounded ness, anger, and a horrible sense of traumatic realization.

“You mean to tell me that there is a child out there somewhere that I fathered...somewhere in the world….” He suddenly felt nauseous.

Giving him a sick smile laced in disdain and contempt, she hissed venomously, “And your birthday is September 4th……happy birthday and merry fucking Christmas.”

He watched her turn and walk away, suddenly feeling too weak for words.

Copyright June 24, 2005 by Lesley Hall. The song “It’s a Wild World” by Cat Stevens is, obviously, not mine, but is THE BEST song ever!! I do suggest hearing it. Please, please, please respond!!! This is my first fanfic since “Bad Moon Rising” and I’m dying to know what you guys think!! See that ‘submit review’ button? It’s right there…to your left in the corner…there ya go, lol.