Disclaimer: I do not own Count Duckula. (Yes, I am VAPX007: stater of the obvious!)

A/N: Here I add a third thread of interest to my tapestry of evil ...

PSYCHO-TRANSMISSION

Welcome, dear reader, to Transylvania ... Oh, yes, you are most welcome here indeed! Mwahahaha!

Through the moist still air of the quiet Transylvanian village the sounds of maniacal laughter echo from afar!

Goosewing shrieked excitedly in the cockpit of his Zeppelin, "Finally, vis zis mein Docktor Von Goosewing patent pending psycho-transmission amplifier, I shall destroy ze foul fiend vonce and fur alles!" Goosewing's teeth glimmered as he grinned at himself in the mirror of his workshop. "Yah, to defeat a wampire, one must first zhink like a wampire! Und vhen I use zhis machine on Count Duckula, zhen, helpless to me he vill be."

Goosewing climbed down the rope ladder from his zeppelin and walked cautiously along the corridors of Castle Duckula, watching his vampirometer. Goosewing had to find Count Duckula before the manservant found Goosewing. The vampire hunter turned the corner and crashed into a solid, mountainous object.

"Ooh." Nanny turned around as he stood back up. "Cheeky."

"Vas ist los?" Goosewing looked up at the monstrosity in a maid's outfit in a shock. "Uh, madam. You haven't seen a wampire 'round here?" He straightened his tie and gripped tightly onto the psycho-transmission amplifier, feeling nervous and sweaty as the huge chicken with her arm in a sling looked blankly down at him. Then he had an idea. 'If I could have the help of this woman, it would greatly improve my chances at getting to Count Duckula.'

"Ahem. I vould like to show you mein transmission unit, mein ... radio. It is most simple to operate, vone just points it at the person and svitches it on like zo."

Count Duckula was in the kitchen raiding the fridge, too hungry once again to wait for dinner.

"Oo, carrot juice." He grabbed the small bottle and pulled off the top. He took a swig and spat it back out. "That's not c-carrot juice!" He raced to the sink, and began gulping down a copious amount of water. Once he'd recovered from his horror, he turned around. "Igor!" He screamed at the top of his voice.

Igor appeared shortly from around the door frame.

Count Duckula clenched his fists, balling his fury that Igor had tricked him once again. "That was a cheap trick, Igor. Really low."
"Alas, it is true; I am reduced to mediocrity, in my attempts to return my master to his former glory."
"Oh, you're so poetic, Igor!" The count groaned, fed up. "That's not getting you out of this one."
"Of course not sir." Igor's eyes glimmered with a shard of hope.

But instead, Count Duckula's mind drifted elsewhere. "Hey, have you seen Nanny around today?" Duckula listened; "I don't hear anything breaking."
"Well, there is very little left for her to break, sir." Igor, the faithful manservant always obliged his master's topics of conversation.
"That's true; except for the portraits, and the cobwebs, and that silly hall of mirrors."
"I can't imagine why you let that dreadful man do such a thing."
"It seemed like a good idea at the time. But where is Nanny, anyway?"

Igor cursed under his breath. If he couldn't make his master a vampire, couldn't he at least make him a hot-tempered monster? That was why he had replaced the carrot juice with blood. Only when the young master was angry was he at his most savage.

Duckula moved off, his mind set to locating his doting, dotty Nanny. Igor suppressed a sigh, and dutifully followed.

After about five minutes, Duckula turned a corner and crashed into Nanny. He straightened his beak. "Oh, there you are, Nanny." Nanny didn't turn around. "Nanny? Nanny!"
She shook, and turned, "Oh, Duckyboos."

"Dammerunt. Was ist loss mit meine machine ...?"
Duckula skirted a bit around Nanny, his eyes widened. "Goosewing!"
Goosewing's expression was keen. "Yah, das ist correct, you fiend! Und take zis!" He fired.

Goosewing zapped Duckula with his new weapon before Igor could get past Nanny in the narrow corridor to protect him.

"Master!" Igor grabbed Duckula before he crumpled to the floor. He was still whole; that was something at least.

"Ugh, what ... happened?" The count was standing back on his feet now.
"Your threats are futile, Doctor von Goosewing." Igor growled. "The Duckula's have always been resilient against the slayers. And you have still to deal with me, as yet!"

Goosewing hesitated. 'Und now, I realise I left mein high quality stake in ze balloon.' He looked back to the vision of Igor and Duckula in front of him.

"Wait a minute! Goosewing?" Duckula said in alarm and stepped forwards towards Goosewing. "What was that thing you hit me with?"
Goosewing gulped. He was not willing to take the threat of Igor and Count Duckula unarmed. The vampire hunter dropped the transmitter and ran. "Help! Women, children und me first!"

"No! Wait just a minute!" He heard the vampire yell from behind, and then Count Duckula cried out in pain.

Goosewing raced upstairs and climbed up the rope to his balloon. Once again he had narrowly escaped his enemy.

"Next time I shall get you, Count Duckula." He pushed his fist at the castle as it shrank into the distance. "Next time ... Next time I shall remember to have with me mein stake!" He groaned, rubbing his head. "Goosewing, you may be a genius, but you don't remember everything." He sighed and looked back to the castle. "Why? Why is it that I always come so close to destroying ze foul fiend, und yet, he always escapes me?"

He turned away from the view and set to making himself a cup of coffee.

"Ah well." He sipped the hot drink and settled back to watch the mountains drift by. "You know: you can't win zhem all."

"Ow, my head." Count Duckula whimpered, rubbing his head, looking up at Igor and Nanny in a daze.
"Oh, Duckyboos! Are you alright?"
"I'm fine, Nanny!" The count responded urgently, getting up off the floor as fast as he could to prepare himself for escaping Nanny's hug.

Igor approached his master. "Are you quite alright, Milord?"
"I think so, Igor." The young master's eyes were slightly defocused. "One thing's for sure: It hasn't affected my appetite." With that he turned on his heel and headed back to the kitchen.

As his master disappeared around the corner Igor spied what his master had tripped on: Goosewing's weapon. He picked it up. "Nanny, what is this?"
Nanny nodded knowingly at the device. "That doctor van whats-it called it a radio, Mr. Igor. But I didn't 'ear nothin' when he turned it on."

Igor frowned in thought. Just because it didn't work on Nanny's brain, didn't mean it hadn't worked on the vegetarian vampire's brain. 'Yes,' he reviewed his analysis, 'I do believe this is a delta wave amplifier.' His eyes narrowed. 'But what would it do to a vampire?' He looked up at the corner where the young master had disappeared behind and resolved to find out. If he could turn this somehow to his advantage ... It could almost be too good to be true! Igor grinned evilly.

A vampire hunter's delta waves … Goosewing's conviction, his understanding of the way vampires were … and he was transmitting all this to the young vampire. It was a stroke of good luck. Goosewing, despite his addled way of going about his job and being on the opposite side had just done Igor a great service.

Igor found Duckula munching away in the kitchen. "Ah. There you are, Milord." He stated.

Duckula, so absorbed in his foraging, jumped and whirled around. "Igor!" He snapped. "I thought I told you to quit sneaking up on me like that!"
"I beg Milord's pardon." Igor waited a beat. "One would think after eight hundred years I would have learned not to 'sneak up' on my masters while they are distracted with their feasts."
Duckula double-blinked. "How do you mean, Igor?"
"Whether it is a fridge or a village maiden, Milord, like your ancestors before you, your attention on your meal is devout." Igor turned and headed back out the door, leaving a stunned look on the young master's face.

As he went down the stairs, Igor chuckled to himself. "Yes, let him think on the similarities and acknowledge them. If my calculations are correct, Von Goosewing's perceptions of vampires will work upon my master's mind while he thinks he is alone and his defences are down." Igor stopped in the basement, looking for a moment at his torture equipment.

Igor moved onwards and to the revivication sarcophagus that the count also used to operate the castle's moving mechanism. "Let us hope Goosewing's gadget works to my favour." Igor sighed tiredly as he ended his journey at the cool racks. He pulled out a bottle and turned to go back to the kitchen.

The manservant paused at the doorway to the kitchen. "Sir?"

The half-eaten club sandwich was on the table, Duckula watching it from his chair before it.
"I doubt it will move without your assistance, Milord." Igor looked back to the green filled sandwich. "I believe it is quite dead."

The young master looked up with a sigh. "What is it, Igor?"
"I was just about to ask you that, sir."
Duckula frowned in confusion, staring at his meal on the plate. "I'm a vegetarian. I'm nothing like my ancestors."
"Not in my way of thinking, sir." Igor inwardly smirked. "Has Milord lost his appetite?"

"No, he certainly has not, Igor, and I know what that is." Duckula pointed accusingly at the bottle.
"I thought perhaps Milord would care for a drink with his supper."
"You know I don't drink that stuff so you can just put it away, Igor. I'm not interested."
"Very well, sir." Igor quietly put the bottle into the door of the fridge. When he turned back, the count had picked his sandwich back up and had taken another determined bite of it.

Igor watched his master eating for a moment. "Milord, it has been a long day. If that will be all, sir, I should like to retire?"
Duckula looked up, startled again. "Uhmhmm." He nodded to the manservant before his attention disappeared back into the task of consuming his sandwich.

Igor went down the stairs to his bedroom. "Perhaps tomorrow my master would prove a more malleable mallard." He chuckled to himself. "Now that I have Von Goosewing's assistance in the matter, perhaps together we can put some sense into the young master's head at last."

And so, dear readers, we leave this dismal place as we began.

As the disturbing sound of laughter echoes down the precipice to the peasant folk residing at the bottom of the hill, once more we say:

Goodnight out there, whatever you are!