Disclaimer: This story takes place in the universe of Scyphi's The New Adventures of Darkwing Duck, a world where Darkwing has returned after a seven year disappearance into the Negaverse, Gosalyn and Honker are all grown up and fighting crime as the Crimson Avenger and Techno, where Negaduck has recently nearly taken over St. Canard with a multi-dimensional army, and now after his defeat the world is going through a few changes.

It's extremely important that you read Darkwing Duck Returns and NADWD first, as the prominent original characters (and in some cases, lack thereof), plot developments and daring twists from those stories will be used without much (if any, at times) explanation in these continued stories.

The War on Gosalyn – Let's Get Chaotic Pt. 1

The Very Same Evening, On The Soon-To-Be-Meaner Streets of St. Canard,

This was a very tense moment for Louie Duck.

It was more harrowing than an airship crash, more electrifying than a swordfight with pirates, more difficult to imagine than dodging a bullet at point blank range. It was, bar none, the most difficult task he had ever undertaken in his young life. And that included the time he'd had to fly an entire city across international lines.

Then again, that time he hadn't been alone. And somehow, the fact that he might soon not be alone only made this ordeal more nerve-wracking.

It was time to talk to his brothers.

Or perhaps it had long been time. He had been standing out on the sidewalk for over an hour, staring up at the building in front of him – the St. Canard Headquarters of McDuck Enterprises – without going in. It was just a few steps, really: nothing was stopping him but himself, and yet it felt like he was cemented to the spot.

"Excuse me, young man. You're standing in wet cement."

Perhaps for good reason.

He gave a yelp and jumped from the spot he'd dazedly blundered into. To his side was an old woman, staring at him as he frantically wiped the gunk from his feet like he was dressed in neon plaid.

"S-sorry." He said sheepishly. "Just… um… enjoying the sights."

She gave him one last disturbed look, and shuffled away – leaving him a wide berth.

He sighed. Not the best look for one of the Duck boys. And he had no doubts that once he walked into that building that was all he would be - again. Was he ready?

"I can wait around forever to be ready, or I can just do it," he said, trying to give himself a little more finality than he felt. "So let's go, Louie! It's only a building!"

And with that he bravely marched through the office's doors, sauntering up to the front desk with all the confidence of a duck who – by all accounts – probably did technically own the place. And if he tripped on the doorframe and nearly pratfalled right there in the lobby, it didn't matter… or at least, he was grateful that nobody drew attention to it.

With all dignity intact he planted his hands on the desk and gave the receptionist an uneasy grin.

"Er…" He said, keeping his head high. "Good evening?"

"Mr. Duck?" She stared unblinkingly at him. "You're here?"

He flinched, realizing that there were two other people she must have been very familiar with that he looked a lot like. "N-no!" He added quickly. "Of course, you must be thinking of my brothers! I'm…"

"Llewellyn Duck, yes." She droned, not missing a beat. "The bright green gave it away."

Louie pulled at his shirt, which was his usual color. "It's not that bright…"

Whether she agreed or not, the receptionist didn't linger on it. "Your brothers are already upstairs – the only people crazy enough to work this late in this town, besides those crazy enough to work for them." She rolled her eyes, but she seemed affectionate enough. "They've made preparations for you."

"Huh?" Louie was taken aback. "They have? But I only decided to visit them today, and I didn't tell them I was coming."

"I never said the plans were made today," she said, and the implications were clear: his brothers had been waiting for him to come for some time. Louie squirmed uncomfortably. The receptionist, gracefully, did not prod him further. "I'll tell them you're on your way."

No turning back now. She waved him back past the rest of the lobby, to the executive elevator. Even alone, it was an awkward trip up. He couldn't keep himself from squirming.

He kept kicking himself. Since when was he - the magnificent Masked Mallard! – such a coward? Although… as a note to himself, he might not want to mention thinking of himself as "magnificent" or in the third person to his brothers. He could hear the jokes now.

The thought made him laugh, and that lightened his mood enough to take him out of the elevator and down to where the receptionist said their office would be. Nobody else was there at this hour, at least not on this floor. In fact, most of the lights were already off. Clearly there was something to the receptionist's jab about their working habits.

But he heard voices down the hallway, in the only fully lit room. They were hard to mistake – after all, they matched his own voice perfectly. He crept up to the door and poked his head in.

Huey and Dewey were there in all their red and blue glory, just by themselves. They didn't notice him right away, they were both too busy – and maybe pirate hunting had made Louie's tread a little quieter than he realized.

They were poring over some kind of poster splayed out over a desk between them, and Dewey was holding… to be honest, Louie did wasn't sure. It looked like a cross between a Rubix cube and a crystal ball, with about a dozen more moving parts than seemed necessary. But Dewey was holding it close, so it had to have been important – or at least expensive.

Together, they were splitting their attention between the ball, the poster and an intercom – the only other item on the table. It was no wonder they didn't have enough focus to glance at the door.

"… Mrs. Quackfaster, I'm telling you this is important!" Dewey was hissing in annoyance as Louie drew closer. "We don't want to be interrupted right now."

"I think you'll want to make an exception for this, Mr. Duck," came the receptionist's voice. Obviously, she hadn't gotten a chance to introduce him yet. With how stubborn his brother's could be, Louie wasn't surprised. "Your-"

Case in point, while Dewey's tone could be called gentle, if irritated, Huey descended furiously onto the speaker before she could finish another sentence. "And I think if we don't have this presentation done by next week, Uncle Scrooge will have our tailfeathers!" He shouted. Louie snorted to himself. Same old Uncle Scrooge, it seemed. "So, why don't you tell whoever it is-"

Now seemed as good a time as any to make his entrance. "… guys?"

They both snapped to the door. Huey froze between words. Dewey dropped the ball on the table, where it shattered into a million and one pieces. Louie winced. Oops.

"I…" Huey stammered. "Er…"

"Well, there's a surprise!" Louie said, risking a joke. "Huey, at a loss for words."

Dewey chuckled wildly, as if he didn't really have control over the smile reaching over his beak. Huey kept gaping for a second, then calmly – efficiently even – turned back to the speaker.

"I deeply apologize for my tone, Mrs. Quackfaster," he said dully.

"I assume your 'guest' has arrived?" came her voice, self-satisfied and incredibly sarcastic. Louie grinned – he was starting to like her.

"You assume right," Huey drawled, sounding completely exasperated. He pounded his head on the desk. "Will another bouquet of violets do for our wisest and most valued employee?"

"It'll fit right in with the dozen other apology bouquet's you've arranged this week, Mr. Duck," she said back, matter-of-factly. "But I think we can keep comments about tailfeathers out of the weekly report to Mr. McDuck."

"Thank you," Huey groaned, and then turned off the intercom. He and Dewey shared a look – first resigned, then ambivalent, then flippant in a way Louie knew only he and his brothers could pull off. They kept eye contact for a half a second, and then suddenly leapt across the room, diving on Louie like a pair of lonesome puppies.

"LOUIE!" They said at once, enveloping him together into a crushing hug, one he was happy to return. He had missed this, too much.

Huey pulled back first, and punched him hard on the arm. "What gives, bro?" He barked. "Why haven't you been returning our calls?"

Dewey stepped back to join him, which now made two of them looking at Louie with disapproval - something he didn't miss. "You and Uncle Panchito went off the grid ages ago," Dewey elaborated. "We almost thought you…" He paused, uncomfortable. "… uh, didn't want to hear from us."

Louie looked at the floor. A thousand replies bubbled up inside him: apologies for abandoning them, and for being to much of a scaredy-cat to reach out. Assurances that he had wanted to talk to them more than anything. Or a babbling, long winded explanation of everything single thing that happened since he and Panchito set sail, in which he begged his brothers to understand how crazy things had gotten since he parted with them for the first time ever…

But none of them reached his beak. Instead, he found himself acting defensive.

"I've been doing some soul searching, that's all," he protested.

"Believe it or not-" Huey started.

Huey finished. "-we figured that out months ago." They both crossed their arms, staring at him in a way that made Louie want to crumble.

"It hasn't been that long…" He mumbled, even though he knew better than anyone – well, almost anyone - that it had been a long few months. He looked up at their faces, and saw a pair of disheartened faces. "But… I'm sorry. Really," he said, finally. "I meant to, but I just…"

He trailed off, but they understood - in the way that brothers could move past anything. "Forgiven so long ago, bro," Huey smirked.

Dewey nodded. "We're just glad to have you back." He said, and they pulled into another hug.

Louie chuckled, misty eyed, and looked back down to the floor. It was littered with shards of glass. "I'm also sorry for ruining your… whatever that was." He said, grimacing. Dewey and Huey, remembering at once what happened, shared a miserable look.

"Aw, man." Dewey said, matching Louie's sour look. "So much for that presentation. Uncle Scrooge really is gonna kill us."

"Eh, doesn't matter!" Huey shrugged. Louie and Huey stared at him – Huey, the biggest company bulldog of the trio, waving away a corporate disaster? But there he was, not giving it a second thought and looking at Louie like he was much more important. "I think we've got a good reason to put it on the backburner, don't you, Dew?"

And Dewey, who hated losing things, hated messes, and hated having things broken by other people's mistakes – especially his brothers – did the same thing. "You've got that right, Hue!" He said, beaming at his triplet. "We'll clean it up later."

It was official. Louie's misty eyes were leaking now. Why did he leave, again?

"And I'm sure Uncle Scrooge would agree, too."

Ah, yes. That was why.

Louie turned to Dewey with an uncomfortable, sheepish frown. "I'm… I'm not sure I want to tell Uncle Scrooge I'm back yet. If he knows he'll come straight here, and then we'll have to talk and it'll get all… you know…"

They both groaned. "You can't stay mad at him forever, Lou!" Huey scowled. "Okay, we get why you were mad, but-"

Louie raised a hand, and Huey stopped – but he was still frowning. "Look, I know alright?" He sighed. "While I was travelling, I met a lot of people who made mistakes just like Uncle Scrooge did. And those people… they no longer have the opportunity to make even those mistakes with people they care about." He hadn't talked about this – even to himself – for a long time, but it surprised him how easily the thought came now. "I… I know shutting Uncle Scrooge out for something he did ages ago, something he's regretted ever since, is just going to deny us both something good in the worst way. I just… can't do it right now."

He eyed his brothers, hoping they could understood. But he barely understood what he was going on about, so he was sure they would just think he was being ridiculous.

"Okay!"

"Sure, whatever."

Or they could shrug it off. Louie blinked.

"Really?" He stammered. That had taken the wind out of his emotional sails, and he was almost disappointed. "I mean, I've got more emotional speech memorized. Seriously. You do not know the depths of confession I've got within me."

Huey rolled his eyes, but he was still smirking. "If it helps you feel better, I suppose."

Louie glared half-heartedly at him, but knew his brother was being serious – at least about listening – so he went on. "It's… it's not that I didn't want to be here, with you guys. I just didn't want my path to be set on what we were supposed to be, because we're triplets and the Duck boys and Scrooge McDuck's heirs. So I tried to find… something else." He turned away, a sullen feeling in his chest. "And I guess that doesn't matter any more. You two have done so well for yourselves here. It's not like I can just walk in and be a part of it all now."

Dewey and Huey looked at each other again, then back at Louie – twin grins on their faces.

"Yeah, right!" Huey snickered.

"You're our brother, Lou." Dewey continued. "You're not getting out that easy."

"No way."

"Not a chance!"

All of a sudden, two pairs of arms were pulling Louie out of the door. "Now quit standing there, already," Huey was saying. "Nobody likes a wallflower."

"You heard Hue, dude. Come on in. Mind the glass."

"We've got an actual office on this floor. We can keep our feet un-jagged over there."

"Plus it's big and unnecessary and half the stuff in it is bio-degradable," Dewey wrapped his arm around Louie's shoulder. "You'll love it."

It was the sign of a true triplet that Louie never lost track of this back and forth as he was pulled along for the ride, though he was feeling a bit too despondent to join in. The two dragged him out of the room – which turned out to be a conference area the two liked to do moonlight work in, according to Huey – and down the hall all the way to the back, towards hallways that were a little more familiar to Louie… albeit for reasons he couldn't share with his brothers. Pete and NegaHonker's attempted invasion of the building was one heck of a story, but it technically wasn't one that he – Louie Duck - was present for. The Masked Mallard, yes. But Louie? No.

So he smiled and nodded along as the two of them told him all about what this or that room was for, hoping he could keep from saying something awkward. The distance was small, but quickly became unbearable: even when he was with his brothers, it was like part of himself stayed separate from them. And it only got harder when – to his dismay – the fight actually did come up.

"Yessir, I beat most of 'em with my bare hands."

Dewey softly pushed Huey on the shoulder, and tried to share an amused look at the show-offy display with his remaining brother – who was too busy trying not to look suspicious. "That, plus Uncle Scrooge and Gyro's latest security system," he said, chuckling. "And a little extra help."

"Psh," Huey waved him off. "Like we really needed the help from the cape brigade." Dewey raised an eyebrow. "Okay, maybe we needed a little help, but come on. The guy's still a clown."

Louie frowned. He – and clearly Dewey - remembered that night a little differently. "Who's a clown?" He blurted out, before he could stop himself.

Huey eyed him, a little too evenly. "You know. Purple? Dramatic? Stupid outfit? You were drooling all over him back in Duckburg?"

Louie had to mentally smack himself on the head. He was talking smack about Darkwing, the same way he always did. Obviously. Not that that was a good thing, but…

"And don't even get me started on the green guy."

Louie choked. Maybe not. "What?"

"Oh, hey!" Dewey said suddenly. "We're here!"

Louie had been so engrossed in the conversation he hadn't even wanted to be a part of that he hadn't been paying attention to where they were going. It was another glass door, like the one they had run to in their last adventure in this place. But instead of a security terminal on the other side, there was a small room that still managed with have all sorts of things fit inside. Even from across the door, Louie could see a trio of computers, plus a small handful of bookshelves and cluttered workstations, not to mention a set of beanbag chairs in the back and even a few hammocks.

It seemed like a pretty chill place to work. Louie could even recognize a few bits of personal memorabilia around the room: a harmless replica of Montedumas' infamous iron mask at one desk, which Count Roy had gratefully sent Dewey years ago. Huey's hard earned Senior Junior Woodchuck outfit, framed - if a little singed. And… was that a life-sized scale model of Mantis Boy hanging from the celing, Louie's favorite superhero? (Well, favorite fictional superhero). Had his brothers really tracked that down, just for him?

"This…" He said, lost for words. "This is…"

"Technically it's our own private office, so don't get any wild ideas. We mostly use it for work. We were supposed to have this mondo-sized room with a mountain of cool gadgets and video games and party stuff for breaks – I mean, for testing of course - but we decided to do the responsible adult thing and turn that into a company break room instead," Dewey said, grinning as if giving up the coolest room ever was somehow one of his happiest memories. "After all, it's not fair for only us to get a crack at all the cool tech Uncle Scrooge sends us. Plus…" he shoved Huey again, a lot harder this time. "… it just wouldn't do if the whole staff couldn't see me beat Hue in every game."

"Yeah? Say that to my face, brother dearest!" Huey said with a sneer, which only got uglier when Dewey did so… by taking out a mirror and started repeating himself to his reflection. The kind of joke only a triplet could make. "Anyway," Huey grumbled, rolling his eyes. "It works. We don't need that much space, and the staff loves it. But this is where the magic happens."

"It's a good thing Pete and his gang didn't find their way over here," Dewey mused. "Wouldn't have been our best look as co-CEOs."

Huey nodded, and to his surprise Louie could see that he actually looked a little disheartened. "Especially since we were competent enough to break McDuck Industries' proud streak of months without an intrusion."

Now Dewey was wincing, too – this wouldn't do. Louie was not about to see his brothers beat themselves up for an unexpected adventure that didn't even go badly. So he smiled, and said "pirates don't count. They're like the Beagle Boys. They don't quit, so they always get in eventually."

"I guess you'd know a bit about that by now too, huh?"

"What?!"

Dewey tilted his head, as if confused by Louie's reaction to his "simple" comment. "Hanging around Uncle Panchito." he elaborated. "I figure you must gotten into a dozen bandito firefights by the end of week one."

Panchito. He was talking about Panchito, of course. "Ha… yeah…" Slowly, Louie's heart rate beat down to normal. This secret was clearly going to kill him. "Mexican standoffs every other day."

Dewey clapped his hand on Louie's shoulder, which helped calm him down – just a little. "Then maybe we're not the only ones who could use a break." He pushed Louie towards the office door. "Go ahead!"

"Huh?"

"We didn't tell you the best part." Huey said. "Type in HDLouis17."

He was a little wigged out by the sudden shift – he was expecting them to show him in – but, cautiously, he typed out the letters like they said. As soon as he did the door slid open with a computerized voice. "Welcome, Mr. Louie Duck!"

He was stunned. "I'm… I'm in the system?"

Huey and Dewey shared a proud smirk. "Your very own password." Huey said. "We knew you'd be back. Y'know, eventually."

"Go on! Check it out!"

Louie walked in, and the door slid closed behind him – separating him and his brothers. He was still a little out of it. It wasn't much of an office, but it was his – or it could be, if he wanted it.

His own desk. His own chair. His own part of McDuck Industries. His own place with his brothers, waiting for him. He stopped at the Mantis Boy figure and gave it a soft pat. His…

"Alright, stop cryin' Lou." Huey snickered. Louie shot him a diry look – he was not crying. "We're coming in with you."

He stepped forward, but instead Dewey slinked in front of him and typed in his password on the keypad first – still smirking back at his brothers. But the look on his face dropped when they heard a sharp buzz and that computerized voice barked "access denied!"

Dewey blinked. "Huh, that's odd. My password isn't working."

"Don't tell me you forgot it!" Huey groaned.

The look on Dewey face spoke volumes about not dignifying insults to his intelligence with answers. Instead, he slammed his password on the keypad again, to no avail. "This is so crazy, it was working just fine a few hours ago!"

"Oh, move over!" Huey said, pushing Dewey aside – ignoring his rude gesture – and typing in his password instead. He too, got a buzz and a denial.

"Er…" he gulped sheepishly, not daring to look at Dewey's smug face. "Actually, mine's acting up now too."

"No kidding."

"It's alright, guys." Louie said. If they couldn't come in, he would just have to go out. There was plenty of time to do check out the office later. "It's probably just a mechanical problem."

"And it'll take ages to get a technician here this time of night," Dewey pinched the top of his beak, sighing. But Louie saw the silver lining – it was his thing, after all.

"Then that just gives us more time to catch up!" He left the office and rejoined his brothers, who shrugged more stiffly than they might have before all this. Though he understood: being in charge probably made every problem feel like a nightmare. "And hey, maybe we can figure it out together before anyone gets here!"

"Well, I guess a broken keypad or two is nothing compared to getting an island to fly, and we did that when we were kids." Dewey joked, getting a chuckle out of Huey as well.

"See what I mean?" Each of Louie's hands found one of his brothers' shoulders, and he couldn't have felt happier just being around them. He gently pushed the three of them away from the office, leaving mechanical problems and now-that-he-thought-about-it harrowing questions about his future aside. Right now, he just wanted to enjoy a long night with his two favorite guys in the world. "How about we head back to your not-an-office from before, get a late night pizza and-"

It was about then that the explosions started. Or at least, that the three of them could hear the sound. After having faced had so much danger in such a short time, Louie knew unsanctioned chaos when he heard it, and he figured he brothers knew too. Something was wrong.

Not for the first time, Louie wondered why these family moments things couldn't just be simple for once.

Huey and Dewey were still reacting. "What the heck was that?" "Something's going on outside!" It was an odd feeling, but for once he was the one between them taking charge.

"Where's the nearest window!"

Even if it was just to find a good spot to see from.

But the question did its job, regardless of how epic or not it was. Huey and Dewey's attention re-focused, and in unison they both pointed down the left hallway. Louie led the way, sprinting through the corridors until they reached a conference room not unlike the one he and Darkwing had crashed through (only a little, he swore) only a few weeks before. He ran to the window – floor to ceiling, so it was impossible not to get a good view – and plastered his beak against the glass.

He didn't like what he saw. And if the gasps and cursing from his side as his brothers joined him were any indication, he was not alone.

It was chaos outside. Broken glass. Screams. People ran down the streets carrying bags, some laughing maniacally or others just screaming incoherently. They were shooting fireworks into windows, gazing transfixed at the explosions like moviegoers watching an action scene. People down on the streets were in a total confusion: some huddled underneath awnings or behind trees, and others still were staring at events Louie and company couldn't even see from halfway up a skyscraper. But on their level drones were zipping here and there, the same ones Louie had seen all over the city since the day he got here, but this time instead of flying about doing tasks in an orderly fashion they were zig zagging around hectic and unpredictable – zeroing in on random people out of nowhere and divebombing onto the street below.

It was like they were going haywire. Or – to heck with that – it was like the whole city was going haywire.

"Quackaroonie!" Huey said, fearfully gaping first one way, then the other, rapidly looking back and forth over and over again as if expecting to get a better picture if he could see everything at once. "Everyone's going crazy!"

"But why? I don't get it!" Dewey asked, though he knew the others couldn't answer that. No matter what anyone was doing, none of the brothers could see a reason for it all. "This doesn't make sense at all. We're not under attack!"

"Don't be too sure." Louie pointed upwards. There, just beyond the cloudbank – invisible if you weren't already looking for it – was the telltale shadow of an airship. The pirates.

"Aw, dang it!" Huey groaned. "What does Pete want now?"

Louie didn't want to guess. He had a sneaking suspicion, down in his gut, that all of this was connected in the worst way possible. And like a true adventurer, his worst fears were to be realized sooner rather than later.

"I don't know," he tried to pull this together, before that pit in his stomach got any bigger. "But I think we should-"

He didn't get to finish. With a SMASH, the three were interrupted – three of the flying robots hurtled through the windows, shattering the wall to pieces. The Duck brothers leapt backwards to avoid getting cut, but it was like trying to dodge the splash from cannonball.

"Not again!" Dewey hissed, as they dodged raining glass. "The cleaning guy is gonna murder us in our sleep!"

Louis felt they had more important things to worry about. "It's a bunch of those drone thingies!" He shouted, pointing up at the robots. The three automatons hovered above them, pointed down in a way that none of them particularly liked.

Huey rolled his eyes, though only because sass tended to be his nervous reflex. "Those aren't drone thingies, Lou," he said, somehow gulping and admonishing at the same time – kind of impressive, on any other day. "They're our TeleConstructors! G-get it right."

Louis at little interest in a lesson right now. The robots drifted closer, vibrating menacingly. At the center of their mass, right under their cameras, a bright light started to glow, dim then terrifyingly bright. If TeleConstructors were capable of emotion or thought, Louis might have thought they looked offended at being called "drones," because all three of them recognized the high pitched whine they were emanating as the sound of a weapon being charged…

"Yeah… no bro." Louie tried to push his brothers behind him, as they all backed away far too slowly. "I have a sneaking suspicion they're not yours any more…"

Darkwing Tower, Around The Same Time

"I don't like it."

Getting interrogated by Darkwing Duck was usually a perverse kind of fun, at least where the more mischievous supervillains were considered. A little banter, a couple laughable attempts at threats, followed by the actually serious threats once the caped ham act proved to be a dud, and maybe a dust up if said villain managed to escape in the meantime.

Rowe managed to escape the cuffs Darkwing had slapped on him some time ago, but unlike the usual he had no desire to pick a fight, and he was not having fun.

"You said that already," he sighed in exasperation.

For that matter, Darkwing didn't seem to be having fun either. He had paced back and forth so much that he was actually making a groove in his floor. And he had to have known Rowe was no longer bound by now, but he didn't seem to care.

"I know, and I still don't like it, so there!" Darkwing snapped back. He looked at Launchpad, who shrugged, then at Techno, who gave him a look that actually matched Rowe's. Then, finally, he took a deep breath. "Look, it's just… what's the word?"

"Difficult to swallow?" Rowe offered. He didn't mind. He knew what this looked like.

"Extremely vexing, that's what I was going to say." It was a sign of how much Rowe felt the same that he didn't comment on Darkwing actually using the word "vexing" in normal conversation. "So, let me get this straight. You – taking advantage of Crimson actually being NegaCrimson, despite that running the risk of jeopardizing her whole disguise-"

Rowe shrugged. "Like anyone left in this town not in this room even knows the difference."

"Shh!" Darkwing hissed, before diving back into the rant he was trying to play off as a recap. "You and Bushroot – doing all that - got NegaCrimson's help to track down Quackerjack, who is the most deranged of you, let's note-"

A grin this time. "I dunno, I think the Re-Animator guy gives him a run for his money!"

"I said shush!"

"SHUSH? I didn't say anything about SHUSH." Okay, maybe there was a little banter. But they had to lower the tension in the room somehow. Rowe had the feeling the pilot had his hands full doing that duty these days.

And speaking of which, Launchpad chuckled. "He got you there, DW."

Darkwing twitched, but in that fit of temper came the opportunity to take another calming breath. "Right." He said - still tense, but slightly less so. "So you were tracking down Quackerjack, for reasons unknown –" He threw in an obvious jab, smirking at the face Rowe pulled in response. "- and somehow that ended with you flying through the city on the back of a TeleConstructor. Twice."

"A evening ride over the whole city, mate," Rowe joked. "All that was missin' was a musical number."

"We really ought to pencil in more of those, DW. Karaoke night?"

"For the love of Pete, LP-" Launchpad jokingly hid behind a chair. Despite the brevity, Darkwing's temper was clearly not easily conquered – but he was trying. He stopped himself again, then continued. "And that all ended at the factory? Or was it Barksalot Park?"

"Both. We found the whole line of 'em tinkered with, then Quackerjack at the park."

"And here's the part I don't believe…" Darkwing paused, this time out of necessity. One had to brace himself for news like this. "Quackerjack was giving out balloons to kids?"

He shuddered. Rowe shuddered. Techno and Launchpad shuddered. It almost felt like the bridge itself shuddered for a second. The only person who didn't was NegaCrimson, who was sitting in the corner cheerfully crocheting a sweater – she simply looked up at and said "it was so sweet!"

They ignored her, for now. "Terrified me too, mate." Rowe said, with a convincing quaver in his voice. The very thought of a kindly Quackerjack was alien in the worst way, like staring at the villain of an H. P. Looncraft novel. "But it was true. And then, while we were tryin' to make sense of it all, one of those TeleConstructors came down with a message from Crimson, and then…"

They all turned to NegaCrimson again. Sensing the attention, she grinned ear to ear and showed them the sweater – which had a nice little doggie pattern sewn into it. "Like it?" She giggled. "I'm making one for everyone. It's no use trying to save the world if you get a cold doing it!"

Everyone shuddered again – and this time he was sure the world was gibbering alongside them. All except Techno, who looked like he was trying to choose between having a nervous breakdown or a wildly inappropriate laughing fit. Rowe had totally picked the latter before coming by, so his throat was already hoarse and it was time to get down to business, darn it – but he'd be broiled if he wasn't going to shake down Techno later for the footage he knew the kid had to be taking…

"So, she's been zapped by a Tron Manipulator. And now she's…" Darkwing sighed, looking at her with an unreadable look. Description seemed to fail him.

They had managed to get her to ditch the frilly dress and twintails and go back to the normal uniform, but she was still exuding an air of unrelenting perkiness that just felt wrong. "A cut character from the Cute Little Lost Bunnies show," Rowe joked, but without much humor in his voice. "If only Negaduck could see this."

"She's actually acting a lot like how she did when we first met," Darkwing noted, and Rowe realized what he was seeing on the hero's face. It was sadness, but the wistful, reminiscent kind. Sadness about something you'll never see again. "Before Negaduck brainwashed her, and took her childhood away."

"Don't be sad, Mr. Darkwing!" NegaCrimson smiled. "I turned out alright! I could stand to be less rude, though, I'll make that a new resolution!"

She went on to mutter at length about new and exciting ways to be a kinder, more cherubic soul in the coming years, which the rest of them mostly tuned out. But Darkwing turned away, a frown on his beak. "You really did, G-NegaCrimson," he said to himself. "But now we have to get you back too."

He just kept losing daughters these days, didn't he? It was the first time he had thought of NegaGosalyn in the same terms he had his own Gosalyn since the two were children, but in his mind the comparison of his failures now was too obvious to ignore. Though he could at least console himself knowing that this one wasn't going anywhere.

"You know, it's kind of funny…" Launchpad added out of the blue. NegaCrimson turned avidly to look him, apparently waiting for a joke. Darkwing, meanwhile, gave him the stink eye. "Not ha ha funny, but… well… Nega-er…" He glanced at the only one in the room not privy to secret identities. Rowe stuck out his tongue at him. "Techno's double came over here to catch NegaCrimson with the Tron Manipulator and turn her evil, right? And in the end Crimson stopped him, then did it herself."

"Except NegaCrimson isn't evil now, she's good. Extremely good," Techno said. "There's so many positrons in her system that her DNA is practically generating choir music."

"Maybe she was trying to turn her evil, but messed up," Launchpad replied. But Darkwing shut that down.

"No." He said, eyeing NegaCrimson's cheerful behavior. If coming from someone who didn't know NegaGosalyn's past, he might have bought a mistake, but… "This was deliberate. What I don't get it why NegaCrimson, and why now? Some kind of sick joke?"

Techno nodded. "And it has to be related to Quackerjack as well. And Glomgold. Specific people are being manipulated, but what's her game?"

The room fell silent, as the trio of crimefighters – and one crime-starter – tried to puzzle out the mystery. Then Rowe stood up suddenly – forgetting that he was supposed to be under interrogation - as something he forgot came back to him.

"Maybe not, mate! Just before the genuine article attacked, sorry-" he muttered the last part to NegaCrimson, who simply smiled and shrugged then went back to her patterns. "Right before that, NegaCrimson said she figured it all out – the whole plan! Hell if I know what she meant, though."

"She did?" Darkwing blinked. That almost explained it. "But… no, that can't be why, can it? It's not like having your trons manipulated affects your memory, and it certainly doesn't make you any less intelligent, so NegaCrimson would easily still… remember what she… found out…"

They all looked at NegaCrimson again, then back to one another, and in unison the whole room facepalmed at the same time.

"You shouldn't do that, you know!" NegaCrimson cooed from the corner. "You might damage a blood vessel." She winced, extra dramatically. "Gosh, that would give me the willies!"

Darkwing flinched. Beside him, Rowe and Techno both held back a snort – though Techno was thoroughly ashamed about it - while Launchpad just looked freaked out.

"NegaCrimson, honey?" He said through his teeth. As he approached her, she looked up with a wide smile and actual puppy dog eyes, and he (as well as Rowe and Techno) nearly lost his nerve – but in the end, he had to push forward. "What in the wonderful world of Deersney is going on?"

"I thought you'd never ask!" She squealed happily. "It actually a really smart plan! I'm so proud of my double for thinking it up!"

"I'm sure you are," he said flatly, "but we're going to have to stop it, sweetie."

"O-oh, right. Sorry! I'll do better!" She jumped and dropped her sweater, causing a round of less-amused flinches. It was difficult not to see in this quirky version of their ally the sense of compliance that Negaduck must have taken advantage of at first. "Anyway, it's so simple to understand once you get it – not that I'm saying you can't, Mr. Darkwing!" Darkwing frowned, though less at the accidental shot than at the delay the apology came with. "You all remember how she and the pirates kidnapped the Dark Avenger last month, right?" Then she added, with a placating look. "Except you of course, Rowe!"

Rowe was happy for some acknowledgement, but he still needed a refresher course. "That that emo Crimson double from the universe with the killer robots, right?"

"Darkwarrior Duck's protégé, yes." Darkwing explained. "A symbol of dwindling despotism turned virtuous vanguard of valor."

"Nice alliteration Darkwing!" NegaCrimson squealed happily and began searching for a piece of paper. "We really have to start writing these down-"

Darkwing groaned. He really should have known better. "NegaCrimson, please!"

"Right, right," she said, getting back on track. "Well, with the TeleConstructors getting messed with, I started thinking: who had the technical knowhow to take control of those? None other than my hacker genius sister from the Warriorverse, of course! They could use the same algorithm she wanted to use in my universe – which I still think is way too harsh an idea, but…"

Darking nodded along, following so far. "Makes sense," he said. "But what does that have to do with Quackerjack?"

"Nothing at all!" She replied, so bluntly chipper that Darkwing nearly fell over. She quickly continued before he could react badly. "But the thing we're all forgetting is that it wasn't just Quackerjack that got taken. That poor thing Julia Plumis was there with him too, and we never found her."

Darkwing and Techno went rigid – gears were starting to turn on their own now. But Rowe was still confused. "You said that before, mate. What do you mean? What's Extra got to do with all this?"

"Well, I can't imagine the Dark Avenger would want to work with the pirates! She's so melodramatic, but she's a good egg."

"… but Extra could just copy her skills!" Darkwing finished for her. "Of course!"

"Pretty clever, right?" NegaCrimson said, looking far prouder than she should have. "I mean, it's pretty mean too. Can't condone that."

"That explains Glomgold, too," Techno added. Images of the news were flying across his visor, as he quickly read up on the CEO's situation. "Extra's price for getting on board must have been revenge! Now the whole world knows how he ruined her life, and every other awful thing he's done."

"You're tellin' me Extra sold out the Fearsome Five for the Crimson Marauder?" Rowe growled. "Oh, mate, that gal is gettin' the book thrown at her!"

"She is technically acting in accordance with your guild's charter," NegaCrimson noted, though doing much less for Rowe's mood than she seemed to expect.

Techno looked away from his infodump for a moment. "Wait, the Fearsome Five actually have a charter?"

"Yes, we have a charter, mate!" Said Rowe, who was far past tired of the question. "But this goes way beyond freelancing!"

"I dunno. I didn't think she was that bad." Launchpad frowned. "Kind of obsessed, but handing an army of flying robots to the pirates are a whole other level."

"NegaCrimson might have a point. I wouldn't be so hard on her. I doubt she knows what the Crimson Marauder's real plan is. I doubt anyone knows but the Marauder herself." Techno said darkly. "Crimson must have zapped Quackerjack to keep him from going back to your group, Rowe, which means the Fearsome Five is in the crosshairs too."

Rowe went pale. With that line the interrogation and any further speculation were officially over, as far as he was concerned. "Then if it's all the same to you lot, I've got someplace I need to be."

He inched towards one of the tower's windows, half-expecting some resistance. But none came. "Go ahead, Rowe." Darkwing said. "I think we've got our own problems, now."

Rowe didn't need to be told twice. In an instant, he was gone.

Techno turned to Darkwing. "Are you sure it was a good idea to let him go?" He said – he didn't necessarily disagree, but it needed to be said. "We have to assume that if Crimson outfitted one TeleConstructor with a Tron Manipulator, she did for all of them. This is definitely an 'all hands on deck' kind of situation."

"Exactly why he'd never stick around even if we made him," Darkwing replied. "Let him go back to his own. If it gets so bad that we need the Fearsome Five's help again, we know where they are."

"Gee, I hope not," Launchpad said, fishing his phone out of his jacket. It was buzzing, but he held off on answering it. "They charge through the nose for hero work. It's practically criminal!"

"Imagine that." Darkwing said, with a dry quip. "But no time to think about that." He turned to Launchpad. "Since this is an 'all hands on deck' situation, we need to call SHUSH. Let's see them deny us tron-based defenses now!"

"Way ahead of you, DW!" Launchpad replied. He pointed excitedly to his phone. "This is Mia right now. She still sorta in Navis' good graces: we can drum up a collab no problem!"

"Your sense of optimism never fails, LP." Though skeptical, Darkwing gestured for Launchpad to quickly pick up the phone – and Launchpad didn't need to be told twice.

"Hopefully they're not having trouble too, or else-" Techno began to add, though he never got to finish the thought, for almost as soon as Launchpad accepted the call the line exploded. The voice coming through the other end was so loud, one wouldn't be blamed for thinking it was on speakerphone.

"MAYDAY, MAYDAY! IT'S A MADHOUSE!"

The sudden shouting made everyone in the room leap in surprise, and Launchpad nearly dropped the phone. But the reaction was only momentary, and the message itself was as clear as it was loud.

"Wonderful." Techno sunk down into the chair previously occupied by Rowe. "That's what I get for tempting fate…"

"Mia! Are you there?" Launchpad had gone from boundless optimism to tense worry at once. "What's going on!"

"It's the Director! She's gone insane!" Now that she wasn't shouting, Mia's voice was soft and warbled, as if she were in someplace with an echo. A soundproof room – or maybe one of the labs – seemed most likely. "She's talking about pillaging the city!"

"She's what?!" Darkwing shouted.

"That's what I said!" Mia voice came roughly through. "I don't know what happened – suddenly she and half the department were sweeping over the rest, grabbing people and dragging them away. Then she went on the PA system, ordering agents to use SHUSH resources to circumvent city defenses and steal valuables! Anyone who objects, she arrests, and they come back singing her graces, helping her take anyone else."

"No! She's one step ahead of us!" Darkwing said, teeth grit. None of them were stupid enough to think this was a coincidence.

"She?" Came Mia's confused reply, having heard him.

"Mia, answer this!" Darkwing cut through the question, for now. "Are there any TeleConstructors flying around SHUSH HQ?"

"Tons!" Mia reported quickly. "I think the Director is commandeering them for some reason, but I can't figure out her endgame."

"More like the other way around!" Darkwing explained – he took the phone from Launchpad and said his next words very clearly. "Listen Mia, this is Crimson! She's taken control of McDuck's TeleConstructors, and they've all been outfitted with Tron Manipulators. SHUSH is being systematically struck sinister!"

A string of nasty phrases came through from Mia's side the phone. "I can't believe this – right under our nose! How do we fix this?"

"First you have to get here!" Launchpad bellowed, snatching the phone back from Darkwing.

"Hey! LP-"

Launchpad shot Darkwing a rare warning look, but only once Darkwing let it go did he go back to yelling into the phone. "Listen, Mia. You gotta find a way outta there! We can meet up, figure out how to save everybody!"

Mia's voice became noticeable softer at the promise of someone to rely on, but her optimism was measured –a spy to the last, after all. "Easier said than done, Launchpad. I-"

There was a sharp CRASH from through the phone, and the sound of Mia yelping in surprise. "They found me! One of them's coming in!"

"Mia! No, get out!"

"Launchpad! I-I'm sorry-"

There was the piercing hiss of a weapon being fired, then a terrible shriek from Mia. Then nothing.

It was easy to forget that Launchpad was a very burly person, since he was such a gentle giant. But now, as he clenched the phone so hard the case started to crack in his hands, as almost seemed as if Darkwing and Techno were looking at another person. They all stayed still, on bated breath, waiting for a word – a response – anything to tell them what happening on the other end of the line.

But the silence built, but for the sound of Launchpad's breathing, until…

Mia's voice came in, calm and plain. In her voice was a terrible kind of chuckle, a telltale sign of what they had been too far away to stop. "On second thought, Launchpad…" she purred, cold. "I think I'll decline your offer. But thanks for the information, love."

"No, Mia!"

CLICK

The phone went dead, and again everything was silent for a long moment.

Darkwing tentatively walked up to his friend – the closest he ever had – and put his hand on his shoulder. "L-Launchpad. I'm sorry."

Launchpad shocked him by smiling, almost the same was always. He shrugged, and thought there was a falter in his eyes, it didn't slow him down. "It's alright, DW." He said – it wasn't up to usual bright tone, but he was trying anyway. "We just… got more people to save now, is all."

Darkwing nodded, accepting the resolve, and if Launchpad's grin was maybe a bit too big, or came off a smidge too forced, neither Darkwing nor Techno felt the need to comment on it.

It was the plain truth, besides, and Darkwing swore to respect it. Launchpad's strong positive spirit rarely failed to amaze him. Though dim at times and all too tactless, his sidekick had stayed by Darkwing's side through every trial, good or terrible. Never once did Launchpad lose his faith even one bit, even when the uphill fight to get Gosalyn back from this nightmare had nearly worn Darkwing himself down.

It was the least Darkwing could do to return the favor now, when someone Launchpad cared about was suffering the same fate.

"I won't let her down, LP."

"We won't, DW." Launchpad said resolutely. "Heck if I'm sitting this one out."

Now it was Darkwing's turn to grin. "That's my sidekick."

There was that feeling. When you had a sidekick by your… well, side… sometimes it felt like you could do anything. Even stupid things that would probably get you killed, and Darkwing got the feeling they would need to do a few of those by the end of the night.

He glanced over to Techno, though, and his smile fell a bit – a sidekick without a hero, on the other hand, was a sad thing to see. Honker had gone through this just as badly as Darkwing had – and Darkwing wouldn't fail him, either. "Come on, Tech. We need to regroup."

Heroic speech time. He lived for these moments, and yes it was only to two partners who had heard all his material hundreds of times by now - but this is how these things were done: start with something grand! "Buck up, men! Sure, we lost SHUSH and there's probably an army of superspies filing to maraud the city, and there's panic in the streets as hundreds of killer robots hypnotize the public into a furor. And yes, we might be outgunned and might see our fair city reduced to rubble again for the second time in a year and this would never have happened if the new SHUSH had just LISTENED TO US FOR ONCE, but NOOO-"

"Darkwing! Calm down, you're hyperventilating!"

The hero paused. That would explain why he was finding it a bit hard to breathe.

The other two were looking at him in concern rather than awe, so this probably hadn't been one of his better speeches. The whole "don't fail them" push was not getting off to the best start, but Darkwing worked best when stressed out. At least, that's what he tried to tell everyone.

So he shrugged, instead. "Not a problem. Who's panicking?" Launchpad and Techno shared a skeptical look, but he ignored them. "A true hero makes due with what he has, no matter the opposition! And on that note…" His heart rose, and he came to an idea. Maybe they had an advantage, after all. "I know she's on protection duty, but we might need a teensey bit of help from-"

Techno cut him off, though he had the polite sense to wince while doing it. "If you're going to say 'Morgana,' I've been trying to call her ever since Mia said SHUSH was falling. No answer."

Darkwing's beak collided with the nearest wall – of course Morg and Christine were offline: if Crimson was going after Darkwing's allies before him, Morgana would naturally be the first she thought of. But it still felt distinctly unfair. They were losing people left and right, and hadn't even been given a chance to protect them!

If stress was his motivator, this battle was doing a great job providing it. "OH, COME ON!"

Macawber Mansion,

Charlie Merriweather was considered a bit of a strange case among his friends – and this was beyond the usual mockery for being adopted or being an orphan from idiots he learned to ignore. While the rest of the kids his age daydreamed about being superheroes and fighting bad guys like Negaduck and Quackerjack single handed, Charlie was far less interested in that sort of thing. He used to be, but it didn't catch his interest the way it once did.

It was a lot less necessary to daydream the fantastical life when you lived it. His mother was dating Darkwing Duck: by this point in his young life he had been kidnapped by supervillains, gotten to talk to real life superheroes and gotten firsthand tours of the secret lairs kids he knew could only imagine about. Darkwing wasn't this unbelievable icon to him anymore. He was just Drake - part of the family, almost like a dad to him – funny, kind of a goofball, way less infallible than the stories said but somehow that much more inspiring because of it. The hero lost his luster, though Charlie thought he'd gained something a little better in the exchange.

But it wasn't as if he could explain that to his incredulous friends. A less trustworthy kid might have, but he wasn't about to betray Darkwing's secrets like that.

There was another reason, though, that he wasn't so into playing superheroes any more – the kind of thing you only really got to know when you lived it a couple of times. How it was exciting – so exciting - at first but then got sort of terrifying in reality, even overwhelming, and as a kid he had no options but to ride it out in his mother's arms and hope it would be all right. He would never admit it, but while there were times he loved knowing a superhero family, there were also times where he wished his mother had never gotten involved with one.

Times like this, where he found his mother and the nice woman who took them in reeling in the foyer. Except she didn't seem so nice any more, and neither did his mom. The turned to him, and the look in their eyes shook him to the core. It was an angry, hateful look his mother had never even in her most frustrated moments given him before.

Something was wrong, and he had no idea what.

"M-mom?" He said tentatively, hoping this feeling was just his imagination.

She stepped forward, and he couldn't help but take a step back. She noted the movement, and scowled. "Oh, Charlie. Naughty boy. Always wandering around, never listening to your mother!" He flinched at every word she spat. He didn't understand: he hadn't been a bad son. Sure, he had played around as kids do, but he'd still been good! Hadn't she said so, so many times? That couldn't have been a lie.

"I'm going to have to discipline you." She continued in a low, dangerous voice. "Come here, you little brat…"

"All wretched children these days never learn," Morgana agreed, shocking Charlie again. Where was the woman who had always welcomed him so kindly? "But I might know a few spells we can use to make him listen." Charlie slid back as far as he could to the end of the hall. There was still some space between them, but that lifeline was getting shorter. "Or… perhaps a few spells in which we which can use him, period. I haven't experimented with new ingredients in some time."

His mother suddenly turned on Ms. Morgana, swiping at her beak out of nowhere. "Don't touch the boy, you jumped up witch! He's mine!"

"Presumptuous mortal!" Morgana shrieked. "You scrape by with Dark on the rebound and that makes you think you can talk to me any way you want?!

They fell upon each other, flailing and punching, which meant their attention was off Charlie. But he had no idea what to do. He pressed against the wall, too terrified to make a sound – until out of the corner of his eye caught sight of a tiny spider huddled around the corner.

It was Morgana's familiar Archie, and it looked as terrified as Charlie. It kept staring at him and pointing down the hall. He didn't know if he should be trusting strange arachnids so easily – what if he ended up in a giant spider web? - but he had to take whatever help he could get. So he slipped off the wall and ran in the direction Archie was pointing, hoping they didn't see him.

Unfortunately, he wasn't quiet enough. "He's getting away, you idiot!" He heard his mother screech from around the corner. "After him! We can fight later!"

This was awful – he was running away from his own mother. Never, in the whole time since she had adopted him, had he run away. But here he was sprinting as fast as he could, and he didn't look back.

He could hear them bounding down the hall behind him. Something shot by his ear – a blast of magic – and a flowerpot by the wall turned into a mangy rat, like something out of a movie. Was Morgana really trying to do that to him?

At the end of the hall, a pair of bats were hovering and pointing frantically – he supposed they were with the spider. He didn't think too hard about it, he just turned sharp around the corner and followed them to the end of the hall. No more space to run, but now that he was there he knew where they were leading him: it was the entrance to the Catacombs.

He had just explored a little bit of the tunnels an hour before, but he took Morgana's warning about getting lost to heart and hadn't gone too far from the entrance. But it was clear what these animals were suggesting: if he went farther in, maybe he could find some place to hide.

But on the other hand, he might never come out again…

"There he is!" They were at the end of the hall! Morgana was like a shadowy monster, swooping in to seize him, but his mother's animalistic snarl was almost worse. "Stop right there, Charlie. Unless you want to have worms coming out of your eyeballs!"

There was no more time to be afraid. Gulping, the threw open the door to the Catacombs and ran in, the bats and Archie by his side . It was dark and unknown, but he didn't stop this time – he kept going on and on until the door was long gone behind him…

Morgana and Christine stopped at the entrance. They stared down into the darkness where Charlie had disappeared, furious at being foiled even momentarily. "He's escaping into those Catacombs you told him about!" Christine said furiously. "This is your fault!"

"I'll ask you not to be even more of a fool today," Morgana eyed her coldly. "If the brat thinks that's an escape, he's mistaken. I'll simply teleport him back to the entrance…"

She waved her hand, expecting a wave of pure enchantment to make her statement so. But nothing happened. She tried again, but still no result.

"Something the matter with your so-called magic?" Christine asked, sporting a smug smirk.

"The house isn't responding to me." Morgana said tersely. "At least, not as easily. It's rebelling against me for some reason, just like Eek, Squeak and Archie." She sighed. "Always with these little annoyances…"

"Can't you even get your pests in order? Which one of us is the fool again?"

Morgana raised her hand against Christine, magic crackling between her fingers. "Keep testing me, mortal! Just try it!" She barked. "If he and the turncoats can't be brought to us, we'll simply have to go and get them! Simple."

Christine stared at her like she was crazy. "What happened to getting lost in there forever? I'm not starving to death for that runt!"

But Morgana was already gliding through the doorway. "Don't be absurd. I know these tunnels like the back of my hand." Christine hesitated for a moment, then – not to be outdone – fervidly followed Morgana into the ether.

"We'll have them all in that hand soon enough…"

Back at Darkwing Tower

"Still no response from Morgana, Darkwing."

It was a report none of them wanted to hear, but it was starting to look like a night where getting what they wanted wouldn't be an option.

"Thanks, Techno," Darkwing said, trying not to let his worry show. Who knew what was happening to them in this chaos? His mind kept drifting to thoughts of them being torn apart by hordes of tron addled civilians, or them going mad under one of the TeleConstructors' influences – and not to mention little Charlie. He couldn't bear to think what the kid might be going through.

But the worst part was, now he had to make the terrible choice of whether there was time to check. Morgana lived all the way across town, and the city was descending into chaos right now. Was it irresponsible to waste time checking on what could simply be a case of them being justifiably distracted right now?

No, this was too much of a coincidence to ignore – not with an enemy who knew everyone he cared about and had intimate knowledge of all of them thought. It was terrible to think of Gosalyn that way, but it was true. She had become the most personal villain he had ever faced, striking in ways he had become complacent to. And he couldn't lose them to that too: not Chris, not Charlie, and not Morg.

Not to forget that he wasn't entirely sure they were getting out of this one without magical assistance. The phrase "totally blindsided" popped into his head once or twice. Plus, they didn't have any other leads.

He turned to Launchpad, who was giving the Thunderquack the quickest tune-up of his life. "What do you say, LP. Think we can swing over there and see what's going on for ourselves?"

"Should be able to!" Launchpad said steadily. "Might even be able to take out some of those robot things on the way." He shut the compartment he was working on and made his way up the cockpit, by way of invitation.

"Excellent!" Darkwing said, scrambling up the side of the plane to join him. "Let's get dangerous!"

"Wait!"

Darkwing stopped short and glared disbelievingly down at Techno. Nobody ever said "wait" when one was getting dangerous. When a getting dangerous was declared, getting dangerous was done. That was the rule. And if there was ever a time for dangerous to be gotten as much as conceivably possible, it was now.

"This had better be a very good objection, Techno," Darkwing warned.

Techno frowned apologetically at him, but he also hadn't moved from his spot below the plane. "I can't get Morgana still, but I'm receiving something strange coming in from an unlisted frequency," he explained. He nodded to Launchpad. "Tune to these coordinates…"

Launchpad dutifully fiddled with the radio, until they came to the frequency Techno was talking about. There was a melody playing through the speakers, light and jazzy, but nothing that seemed too important at first glance.

"It's just music, Tech!" Darkwing snapped irritably. His patience was at an end, but Techno wasn't budging – and he didn't understand why. "So… what…"

He trailed off, starting to catch what Techno must have been referring to. There was a voice singing along to the music, in soft, suggestive words…

"Sometimes I love you.

Sometimes I hate you.

But when I hate you

It's because I love you.

That's how I am, what can I do…"

"Aw, that's sweet!" NegaGosalyn cooed, from beside Techno.

"That's Crimson!" Darkwing leapt in front of the radio, now listening closely to anything else that might be coming through. Launchpad was shoved into the side of his seat, but he didn't particularly mind. Or at least, he understood.

"Huh." Launchpad said, bobbing along to the song. "I never took Gos for a jazz fan."

"She's not," Techno murmured. "It's a message." He glanced away from the others, making himself look as if he were deep in thought and not deeply affected by it.

Then suddenly, the music stopped – and it was just Crimson, cheerfully calling into the airwaves. "Hello, out there! This is DJ Crimson Marauder on Pirate Radio, coming out live to everyone at Darkwing Tower!"

The three shared an anxious look. These weren't just vague hints. It was a message, directly for them

Crimson seemed to be enjoying the non-existent atmosphere, because she kept up the shock jock act. "I see we've got a Mr. Honker Muddlefoot from St. Canard on the radio today! Oh, and one Drake Mallard on the line too! What's the word, birds?"

Their faces quickly went from anxious to alarmed. Techno and Darkwing froze, beneath their masks. They knew the Crimson Marauder cared little for her own or anyone else's secret identity except as a bargaining chip to allow her more entertainment, but they never expected her to reveal them outright on the radio where anyone could hear.

They weren't prepared for something so sudden – they could deflect the truth or hide it otherwise, but she had caught them with their feathers plucked.

And she knew it, from the laughter in her voice. "Oh, relax. This is a secure line. The pirates don't even know what I'm doing right now. At least, not yet. It's just me and you guys."

Techno and Darkwing sighed in relief, but Launchpad gasped. "Whoa! You can see us?" He whipped his head around, trying to find a camera, but Crimson merely chuckled in response.

"Hi, Launchpad! And no. I think we've already established that you're predictable. But unlike last time, this isn't a recording. You guys never call me, so I took the initiative."

"I'll do you one better," Techno cut in. He was tiring of the emotional roller coaster. "Let us know where you are, and we'll drop by."

"Look up, genius."

All four of them turned to the window, but Techno and NegaCrimson were closest. They rushed over and looked outside to see – just peaking out from past the cloud cover - the pirates' airship slowly maneuver above the city.

"I decided to be a pal and show my new friends around my old home. It's not like anyone is too interested in stopping us right now."

Darkwing scowled - "Wanna bet?" – then winced. It wasn't his best comeback, but it was all he had right now. He couldn't let Crimson how badly they had been caught.

But of course, she already knew. "Putting that lame line aside, let's see your options. By now Rowe has probably abandoned you guys, and in a panic you're trying to call SHUSH or Morgana, right?"

Darkwing's heart sunk. He knew what she was about to say before she even said it. He knew holding out on hope for Morgana and Chris was probably a lost cause, but…

"I wouldn't bother. SHUSH is going through a little refocusing right now, and Morgana… well, I always thought she didn't do the wicked witch spiel as much as she should've. Problem solved!"

… but, nothing. Darkwing sunk into the seat of the Thunderquack, not quite defeated, but certainly stalled for ideas. Launchpad clapped his hand on his shoulder, the same way Darkwing had to him just a few minutes before. The show of support seemed to work a little, but it was slow going.

Techno winced on his behalf. The losses just kept piling up, didn't they? It could be as bad as Negaduck's invasion, but the real kicker was how every strike Crimson made was personal. Every one cut deep, and she knew it.

Despite that pain, though, he had to keep going. They had to find something in her words: something they could use – which meant let her jab and jeer at their failures. But chances were Crimson would know what they were trying by keeping her talking, which made the attempt a lot more nerve-wracking. "So, this is your big plan?" Techno accused, though already suspecting it wasn't so simple. "Turn everyone in the city evil, just like what happened to you? Then what, conquer the world? Kind of cliché for you, Crimson."

"In what world have I ever come off as that boring?" She replied, sounding bored just hearing the theory. "Wait, don't answer that. With the number of idiot doubles I have out there, there's bound to be at least one. Still, who says I'm only turning good folks evil? Maybe I'm turning people good too? A civil service, if they weren't so good they couldn't think straight."

Everyone glanced at NegaCrimson, who gave a cheerful wave at all the attention. Techno waved back weakly, and tried not to cringe. If there was ever proof of the kind of damage Crimson could do with excessive goodness, it was right there.

"You sure that was a good idea?" He shot back, though he was also trying to convince himself a little. "I doubt the good people of St. Canard would be so mixed up they wouldn't fight back!"

On cue, NegaGosalyn chimed in with the worst thing she could've said. "Fight? I don't know. That seems kind of violent!" Techno bit back a groan – he brought that on himself, for getting his hopes up.

And yet again, Crimson was loving it. "Ha! Case in point! Is that my supposedly depressing double?" She devolved into peals of laughter. "Oh, I knew that was going to be funny! It's funny, right? Her prancing around giving out hugs and flowers? Tell me it was hilarious!"

Techno staunchly denied ever believing that a moment of NegaGosalyn's horribly cherubic antics were funny. He didn't laugh at her grim visage in that frilly dress. He didn't snort at her flowery chirping. And he definitely didn't capture a roll of photos and video for later watching. If he did any of the sort, he would certainly never let Crimson know in her current state. Later, maybe, if and when she was better, but for now he wouldn't give her an inch of satisfaction.

After a minute, Crimson had to accept she wasn't getting anything out of him – though she seemed to take his silence as admission regardless – and continued her speech, if a bit grumpier than before. "Fun fact: society can't function if everyone is evil. Can't function if everyone is good, either. People learn to fit their role. Businessmen find that killer instinct. Politicians learn to lie. Teachers learn to care. 'Heroes' learn to protect. But what if they can't fit those roles any more?"

"Everything'll fall into chaos!" Launchpad declared. "That's terrible!"

"Duh. The pirates think I'm just helping them plunder the city: the positroned victims will give all their valuables the moment you ask nicely, and the negatroned ones'll team up with them to rob the rest blind. Blah, blah. Really, I just want to watch it all explode."

That was more like the Crimson he knew – or at least the evil version of her that he had come to know. Chaos and personal turmoil, all out of a twisted sense of entertainment.

And the worst part was, Techno knew exactly the feeling Crimson was trying to capture. That irony and contrast, the madcap swath of unpredictability. Like setting off an explosion in a video game, watching a meticulously scripted environment fall like dominos. If it wasn't happening to you, it might even seem like fun from a distance. And she knew he knew that, she had to. It was infuriating, in a way.

He noticed Darkwing and Launchpad watching him closely from the Thunderquack, and realized that he hadn't responded yet. They were probably counting on him, or more precisely Crimson's affinity for him despite her changes, to keep her talking.

"That's not going to-"

"'That's not going to happen!' 'You'll never get away with this!' 'This city will prove to you it's full of people who believe in good!'" Her voice took on a nasally tone, the same kind she used to use to make fun of him when they argued as kids. He still thought it was a very unfair impression. "I've been following that script even longer than you have, you know. I know I'm monologuing, but still – no need to break out the clichés!"

"Just look at Glomgold, that idiot." She went on, dropping the mockery for a more straightforward gloat. "Confessing everything he ever did, thanks to little ol' me. Now his business is in shambles, every ill-gotten treasure he ever stole is on the market – heck, people might be declaring war over some of the stuff he did! I got the idea from that time dad got tron split, remember that?" As if any of them could forget – Darkwing's memory of it was fuzzy, but it was one of the more stressful cases of his early career for everyone else. For Honker, it was maybe the first time he realized just how mad the Mallard family's adventures could get. "If half the world is mindlessly trying to hug everyone, and the other half is trying to stab everything in sight… well… say hello to a reality as screwed up as I am."

"Sounds like an entertaining evening," he said. "If you've got no compassion whatsoever."

"Thanks, I don't." She sighed flippantly. "And if you think it's a hoot from down there, just wait 'til you see it from my point of view."

It wasn't lost on Techno how that could be taken more than one way. His eyes narrowed – what was she getting at, here?

"You expect us to get to you?" He said, chancing a jab of his own. "Feeling fatalistic, Crimson?"

"Hardly. I expect you to know an invitation when I see one. The skys'll be totally clear for you, honest. But only for a limited time offer."

Techno blinked. That was unexpected. Unsure how to respond to an "offer" like that, Techno stalled for a comeback – but thankfully, Darkwing took the conversation back much to the young hero's relief. Keeping that up was starting to tire him out.

Darkwing scoffed into the Thunderquack radio. "Hah! Like we'll waltz straight into enemy territory, just like that!"

"Welcome back to the program, dad! Not talking to you." Darkwing was struck dumbfounded – to be honest, he was a little hurt. Villains the world over cowered at the sound of his voice, but it seemed he could never put a dent in his little girl. "This offer is only for one person. For Techno. For Honker. My Honker."

Techno jumped, but at Darkwing's apologetic look grimly found a response. The fact that she wanted him alone was… daunting. There would be no reprieve for him – even from this. "And I guess I'm supposed to thank you for being so courteous…" He paused, choking on the idea of saying her name with such venom. "… Gosalyn?"

Suddenly, the playful mood Crimson had kept up this whole time was gone. He should have known the use of her real name would do it – or maybe this was simply something that had been bubbling beneath the bravado this whole time. "Shut up!" She screamed hysterically. "You're supposed to be up here, trying to stop me! So get a move on! I can watch you fail just as the city goes up in flames!" She was breathing heavily, putting her heart and soul into this rant. But Techno was confused – where was this coming from? "And you will fail, because I'm not some two-bit villain. You'll fail, because you'll finally see I'm not who I was, either! And once you finally realize there's nothing left to save, I'll make you just like me!"

"And we can be together." His eyes widened. Plunging the city into chaos may have been her entertainment, but that was her big plan. Maybe all along. He thought back to everything he remembered her saying to him since having her trons altered, and it all made sense.

Whatever her plans for victory were, they were nothing without the moment she was attempting to set up. She needed this.

But she played it off, as if she hadn't just lost control. "Believe what you want, as long as it gets you up here. I'm getting bored. And neither you nor this city are gonna like me bored."

At that, the line went dead, leaving them with a lot to think about.

Then suddenly turned on again -bringing them even more trouble.

"And just so you don't think I was just pumping you information, this whole time you've been 'keeping me talking,' I've been setting up a little surprise for you."

"EXTERIOR DEFENSES ACTIVATED! MISSILE INCOMING!"

"What, like I haven't stalled a bad guy before. C'mon."

Then the line really went silent, and somehow all Techno could think was that he knew she knew what they were up to.

Darkwing did a kind of full body jerk as he snapped into action. "Darn it all! Not again!" He shouted. "Into the Thunderquack, now!"

Techno didn't need to be told twice. He grabbed NegaCrimson and yanked her into the plane, and without waiting for them to get seated properly Launchpad closed the cockpit and sent the Thunderquack into action. The jet burst out of the tower, just in time to see a rocket zoom across Audobon Bay from above. There wasn't enough time to outmaneuver or destroy it, only to watch and get as far away as they could. NegaCrimson waved at it as it went by.

The Tower's defenses went up – a bevy of impact and explosive shielding both old and brand new that Darkwing installed solely for emergencies, for fear of cluing in the public of the building's true nature. Metal plating covered the whole wing of the bridge, protecting it at least somewhat from any outside assault… but as it turned out, this was the wrong kind of protection.

The missile collided with the plating, and burst open to send a kind of shockwave across the air. Down on the road, the windows of cars shattered with the force of the blast, but there was neither fire nor smoke. The Thunderquack shuddered as the burst passed just behind them – for a split second, the systems went out then turned back on – but Launchpad was easily able to right it. For all the dramatic crashes he had been through in his life, avoiding disaster here was actually fairly simple.

Back at the Tower, there seemed to be only a little damage. A dent on the plating where the missile hit, perhaps, but nothing more terrible than that. It hadn't even harmed anyone down on the road, not a grain of debris. The plane-ful for heroes had to stare at the lack of carnage, more than a little confused.

"So… it was a dud?" Launchpad said. "Or… I guess a trick? Not that I'm complaining."

Darkwing shrugged. It was like his daughter to pull a prank like that, though this was obviously far more cruel than her usual jape. But Techno, sitting in the back slowly recovering from having been tossed around in the launch, had a darker perspective on the situation.

He tapped his visor trying to access the database for a damage report, but got nothing but a blank screen. It didn't take long to figure out why. "No. It was an EMP. Probably something Gos squirreled away from SHUSH in the chaos." He sunk his head into his hands. "I can't contact the Tower's systems. Everything's gone!"

Darkwing stood up in his seat. "Everything?"

"Pending a total fix and recall that we don't have the hours of time to perform, yes."

With another round of silence, the group took in just how screwed this all left them. Most of their allies gone before they could even reach out, the skies full of personality altering doom robots, and their only safe haven was now boarded up and out of commission. It was not a good day.

NegaGosalyn's attempt at cheering them up was not much help, either. "That's certainly terrible. But I say we just take a moment to appreciate how well planned this was!" She said, to resounding disapproval. She frowned – or, Techno could believe it, actually pouted when nobody spoke up. "Come on! We must be amazing if it takes such a big scheme to stop us!"

"We're not stopped yet," Darkwing grunted. "We… just don't have many options, is all. Ideas?" He canvassed the Thunderquack – those sitting here were the last line of defense. Well, mostly just Techno and Launchpad, but two out of three wasn't bad when half the city was already down. "Please have ideas."

Launchpad shifted uncomfortably, but noticing this Darkwing gestured for him to say whatever was on his mind. "Well… there is one." He said, pointing up.

He got exactly the skeptical look he was expecting. Darkwing shook his head. "The obvious trap? Sounds like a great time." Despite the clear distaste, however, he stopped himself – he wasn't exactly in the best place to not think the possibility over. "Well, I suppose it is our only option right now. We need to get you up there!" He concluded, somehow resigned and determined in a way only Darkwing could be.

"We can't go without an advantage." Techno said, considering it. "I'd just get cooked. Or worse."

Darkwing agreed. "We need something Crimson won't have accounted for." He said, to complete silence. "Don't all make your suggestions at once!"

NegaCrimson opened her mouth to respond.

"Unless it has to do with hugs or tea parties or anything else that involves making friends with the Pirates!"

NegaCrimson closed her mouth, with another pout.

But Techno, meanwhile, was grinning. Finally, they had a break. "If that's the case, we still have one thing!" He said, tapping his visor, and he was pleased to find that it – just like the Thunderquack itself – had been far enough from the EMP to remain functional.

After a moment, Elmo Sputterspark's face came up on his visual screen, still at their secret lab. From the nervous look on his face, it was clear he was aware something was going on – though it was likely he and Rockerduck were cut off from any of the chaos down there… at least for now.

Rockerduck, however, evidently didn't share this logical opinion: he was hiding under a desk far behind Elmo's screen, and didn't seem keen on coming out. He didn't even look up to say hello.

"Techno! Good to see your face!" Elmo spluttered. His eyes were full of concern. "What the heck is going on out there, if you don't mind me asking?"

"Bad things, Elmo. Is the project ready? Or at least in any workable form at all?"

"Well… maybe," he replied. "But there's still concerns about the levels of radiation." Behind him Rockerduck muttered "wait, that thing's radioactive?!" and cowered even more. "I'm not sure it's suitable for a field test."

"Elmo…" Techno sighed heavily.

"I'm just saying, there's definitely a risk of danger. Perhaps a few more days of isolated testing-"

"Elmo!" Techno barked, which was unlike him enough that Elmo gulped. "We're at Code Red right now! The thing we were hoping wouldn't happen, is! Will it work?"

"Y-yes, of course. Despite reservation," Elmo added the last part as an aside, but it wasn't low enough for to miss it. He understood the concern, he really did, but there wasn't the time for it.

"Awesome," he said curtly. "Meet us… no-" He stopped, remembering that since they were at Code Red and any tron manipulation had "a non-zero chance" of making the tron-split scientist explode, asking him to leave the lab was a bad idea. "Wait, I'll come to you. Don't let anyone in, and prepare the tron sensing equipment for when I arrive. Just in case I get hit."

As Elmo muttered a "good luck" (and NegaGosalyn waved from behind him), he ended the call, and remotely opened the cockpit. The sounds of robotic flight and screaming citizens (as well as hysterically laughing citizens, serene citizens singing children's songs…) came in from outside, but they all tried their best to ignore them. "I'll be back soon, I hope." He said to Darkwing and Launchpad, while fighting off a laborious and certainly not hilarious hug from NegaGosalyn. He hopped to the edge of the cockpit, preparing to take flight on his own.

"Well find a safe place and send you the coordinates," Darkwing assured him. "Well meet up in forty five minutes to plan our next move. Just don't get zapped."

Techno nodded – that seemed like more than enough time to make the pickup. "What are you two going to do?" He asked. There as no way Darkwing would spent three quarters of an hour just waiting around while his city was devolving into madness.

To his surprise, Darkwing grimaced. "I too have an uncomfortable call I think I should make," he said, cryptically. "But first…" All of a sudden, that furious edge returned to his eyes. "… I'm going to find out how the heck all this started!"

Meanwhile, where "all this" started: McDuck Industries' St. Canard Headquarters,

The duck brothers sprinted down the hallway, lasers nipping at their heels and very manly, un-cowardly screams echoing from their beaks. The TeleConstructors were right behind them, raining light down upon the terrified triplets at an alarming rate.

As the one who probably got the most exercise recently, Louie was leading the pack – though only just. "Why are your robot thingies trying to kill us?!" He called back to his brothers.

"They're called TeleConstructors, doofus!" Huey shouted back.

"Yeah, that's important right now!"

"I don't think they're trying to kill us!" Dewey observed, cutting across the banter. He chanced a look back, though a near-trip made him think better of it sharpish. "Those lasers aren't burning anything. I don't know what they do, but I don't think they'll hurt us!"

Interesting, but not helpful in Louie's opinion. "Yeah, hard pass on finding out what they do instead!" he said. This place may have had a million hallways, but they couldn't run forever. "What's the safest place on this floor?"

"The office!" Huey replied, ducking as a laser whizzed past his head. "That glass is bulletproof, non-visible radiation proof, and it can double as a panic room!"

"Maybe," Dewey added, hopelessly. "But we can't get in!"

"You can't, but I can!" Louie made a sharp turn, down a path he was pretty sure would take them back to the office. "Follow me!"

Twists and turns led them past halls that all seemed to look the same – the pitfall to modern corporate aesthetic – but Dewey and Huey knew the halls better than most. They picked up from behind Louie's lead, and with their help they even managed to gain a little ground on the TeleConstructors – swooping into one room, then swooping out an unexpected exit - not much, but enough to give them the slip for a second. None of them had any doubt that their pursuers would be on them in no time at all.

When they finally made it to the office, there was someone waiting for them. Louie recognized her as the receptionist from before, but from his talk with his brothers he understood that she was a bit more vital to the company than that.

"Mrs. Quackfaster!" Huey panted heavily as they approached. "You have to get the staff out of here! We're under attack!"

Dewey slid to a stop behind him, while Louie had somehow ended up at the rear during the chase. "The TeleConstructors have gone haywire!" Dewey said. "They seem to be after us, but as long as we're in there we'll be safe, and they'll be too busy focusing on us to go after anyone else."

Mrs. Quackfaster stared at them. She didn't seem to have a reaction to what they were telling her – not a word of worry, or even a skeptical comment. Louie was put on edge. Something was wrong.

"Hmm… no." She said, a dark intent on her voice. She reached into her purse and - to their shock - pulled out a pistol, aiming it at her three employers. "I'm afraid you three are more valuable with me than in that room."

"What, like a ransom?"

"Mrs. Quackfaster…"

Louie had heard enough. He could hear the TeleConstructors whirring about behind him. They didn't the kind of time left for this. Thinking quickly, he made his knees buckle – by all appearances, it looked like the strain had caused him to faint. His brothers shouted his name and reached to catch him, but he waited until he heard Quackfaster give a small "what?" in surprise before making his move. He twisted out of his brothers' grip and – in one motion – pulled off his shirt (leaving him in his undershirt, for now) and threw it into the receptionist's face.

"What the- get this off of me!"

She dropped the gun and tried to pull the garment off of her, but he had thrown it too well. It wrapped around her, making itself difficult to move: a technique he had seen Darkwing pull off once or twice.

In the time this brief distraction gave them, Louie ran forward to the security panel and typed in his passcode. The door opened – thank their lucky stars – and, making sure not to cross the doorframe first, grabbed his brothers and shoved them into the room, then grabbed his shirt from Quackfaster's head, whipped it off and dove inside himself.

The door shut with just enough time for him to cross in. He didn't wait for anyone to congratulate him. He grabbed Dewey – it seemed like the smartest choice – and pushed him towards the inside keypad. "Panic room mode! Activate now! Now now now!"

Luckily, the code to lock in the panic settings worked regardless of who was typing it in. A metal sheet locked onto wall the door was on as a security display appeared on the far wall - on the others side, they could see the TeleConstructors zoom around the corner towards them before the metal blocked off the outside entirely, leaving the robots and Quackfaster stuck together.

There were a couple bangs on the metal, but nothing that even scratched the glass behind it, and eventually they stopped. A quick glance at the security monitors told Louie that all four threats had seemingly given up upon realizing there was no way in. There was no sign of any of them, now.

It could have been less messy, but they were safe for now. His brothers, however, were not handling the stress quite as optimistically.

Dewey leaned against one of the walls, in shock, while Huey clutched his feathers frantically – trying to make sense out of all of this. "Mrs. Quackfaster's behind this? N-no! She's been working with the family since before we were born! Why would she-"

"I don't think it's just her."

While his brothers were decompressing, Louie had rushed to one of the computers and brought up the news. Now, he offered the screen for them to see. Dozens of clips flashed past the monitor, of regular people going mad and irregular people getting worse. It was a veritable crime wave, and the culprits for the most part were people who it seemed would never have done the things they were caught doing – grandparents and children alive - and meanwhile, people like Glomgold were confessing, villains were handing out treats, and worst of all dogs and cats (well, non-anthropomorphic ones) were living together.

It was mass hysteria. Dewey gawked at the screen, hardly able to believe it. "This… this doesn't make any sense. The way people are acting…"

"Like the opposite of themselves," Louie finished. He took a deep, steely breath, knowing exactly what this was. "It's the pirates."

Huey was skeptical. Louie supposed he couldn't blame him. "You think a bunch of scurvy thugs are making the whole city go crazy? How does that make sense?"

"They're got a…" Louie paused, realizing that not only did his brothers not know about tron manipulation or how it all tied into their current crisis, but he could never explain how he knew. "… look, I dunno, but somehow making people act weird. See?" He pointed to the screen, as a mob of churchgoers donned eyepatches and hooks, and sidled up with the army of buccaneers. On another channel, an all-too-happy bank manager gossiped gaily with a reporter about how he handed over the contents of his vault to the "nice men with the peg legs who came by."

"There's no way this is normal. It's like people are being brainwashed into joining them, or being so nice they help the bad guys anyway."

"And they wanted us, too."

"Sure. With you guys and the power of McDuck Industries on their side, they could be unstoppable. Imagine if you got zapped and tried to rob Uncle Scrooge. It'd…" he meant to sigh, but it came out as a very stressful wheeze. This was too much, way too much. He absently tried to fiddle with the pouches on his utility belt, before remembering that he wasn't wearing it. Why hadn't he come prepared?! "It'd be a mess! A complete mess."

This had to have been what they had been afraid of. What Pete and the evil version of Crimson were building up to: it was happening today. Darkwing had to be out there fighting right now, but… he couldn't join him. He couldn't stop it now – he couldn't leave, not when his brothers were a target.

Keeping them safe had to be his number one priority. No matter what the pirates threw at the city, he had to protect them.

And speaking of his brothers, they had gone a bit quiet. No incredulous comment from Huey, no reassuring analysis from Dewey. The banter had suddenly stopped – and that, if anything, was the most unnerving part. Louie turned to them, expecting them to be still freaking out, but instead they were staring at him - as if they expecting something. He eyed them right back, not sure what was going on.

"Um…"

"Well?" Huey said pointedly. "Aren't you going to do something?"

Louie blinked. What, were they triplet-reading his mind now? "M-me?"

"Yes, you! You're going out there, right?"

This was a bizarre turn, and Louie didn't like it. Why were they putting him on the spot like this? They couldn't be implying what it looked like, could they? It was impossible. "What are you talking about?" He stammered, prepared – but not really prepared - to deny or deflect or anything else he had to do.

Huey and Dewey exchanged an exasperated look. "Oh, for Pete's sake," Huey facepalmed, before correcting himself. "Er… not that Pete. You know what I'm talking about."

Dewey cut in, ever direct. "We know, Lou."

He looked at them, but didn't quite see them. His mind went blank. "K-know?"

"About you, genius! And Darkwing." Huey huffed. Louie couldn't read his expression, or maybe he simply couldn't read anything right now. "You're the guy in the stupid costume. The Masked Marauder."

"Masked Mallard," Louie corrected automatically, then kicked himself for the mistake. That was practically confirmation.

Huey's infuriatingly smug smile said it all. "See?" He echoed back to him, like this was a normal argument.

Perhaps he was supposed to snap something back. Tell Dewey he was jumping to conclusions, tell Huey he was nuts. Laugh about it. Be defensive. Something. But he couldn't.

They knew. He couldn't believe it, they knew. This whole evening, they really had been dropping hints, making him uncomfortable about his lies - on purpose, those rats! Typical brothers…

… but they knew. Like a wheel stuck in a rut, his brain refused to move on to anything else. Let Pete wreck the city for now. His secret was out, at least in the confines of this room.

"H-how long?" He managed to stammer out.

"We figured it out when you showed up before, with Darkwing." Dewey explained. "You weren't exactly keeping your cool."

Louie thought he had been perfectly cool – a dashing example of the roguish hero if the world had ever seen one! – but of course his brothers had seen right though it.

"And crashed into a perfectly good wall, let's not forget!" Huey "helpfully" added. Louie might have explained that it was necessary, that there wasn't time to find a place to land, but something about Huey's face told him he wasn't actually upset. At least, not about that. "But seriously, what do you think all that 'give our brother a message' stuff was about? Come on, Lou!"

Right. Uncle Panchito was going to be laughing at him for weeks. Quackaroonie, he was such an idiot!

"In my defense, I was kind of in denial about wanting to see you guys at that point," he said weakly – but then, because he really didn't want to have the conversation that their responses to that would lead to right now, he immediately switched gears before his brothers could say anything. "But sure. You guys know. Now what?"

"What do you mean, now what?" Said Huey, a trace amount of bitterness in his voice. "Haven't you been nearly getting yourself killed fighting these guys for – like – the last half of the year? Then go ahead!"

"I'm not leaving you two behind, so let's get that out of the way now," Louie said bluntly, so much so that Dewey and Huey were taken aback – not used to hearing their brother so intense. But Louie cast that aside – they wanted the Masked Mallard, they got the Masked Mallard. "But either way, I didn't exactly bring a sword with me. How would I even fight them like this?" He sighed and rested his head on the Mantis Boy statue. "Face it, bro. We're on our own on this. No weapons, no heroics."

"Not quite," Dewey replied. Louie looked up, confused, and found that both Dewey and Huey were smirking. "Since we're revealing secrets…"

Louie was left to stare, still lost, as Dewey ran to the back end of the office and threw away the clutter that was there – the baskets, the books, Louie actually had to dodge a beanbag chair before it hit him in the head – until there was just the bare wall left. Without anything blocking the view, he could see that were was something hidden there: a series of buttons, like a keypad implanted directly into the wall.

Grinning widely, Dewey quickly tapped in a sequence onto the pad. "This one uses your password too, so it should be fine…"

This didn't clear much up for Louie. "Wha… my password? Why?"

Dewey finished entering the code and took a step back. There was a mechanical hiss, and the wall began to separate. "After we realized what you were doing, we knew that if and when you ever told us…"

Huey nudged him hard on his side. "Which you didn't, you jerk." Louie frowned and slapped his hand away.

"… either way," Dewey said, drawing their attention back to the big reveal. "We realized that when you came back… well… we would want to help you however we could. So…"

He let his words hang as the wall finished sliding open. There was a closet inside – just a small one, probably easy to hide on the floor plan. And on its far wall in a glass case was hanging a familiar ensemble: a long green coat and bandana, a utility belt, and a black suit with a green Msewn into it. Beside it, was a glimmering sword that shone like it was fresh off the forge.

It was, unmistakably, the Masked Mallard's uniform of choice.

Louie stepped up to it, slowly, as if it would disappear if he approached too fast. Behind him, he could hear Dewey continuing to explain – but he was only half listening.

"… the suit has a carbon fiber weave, like the ones SHUSH uses, and the coat is bulletproof. Don't get me wrong, the costume you have is great, but I'm pretty sure you just threw it together with whatever you had on hand. This is a total upgrade from top to bottom. And that's not even getting into the sword, which was a total pain in the-"

Louie didn't mean to cut him off, but the words just slipped out. "You… you did this for me?"

They both scoffed. "Didn't you hear what we said?" Huey grunted, though he was obviously just faking his usual standoffish demeanor – Louie could see the glint in his eyes, so much like Uncle Scrooge's in those rare generous moments. "You've always got a place here, with us."

Dewey nodded. "Always."

"No matter what it is you want to do." Huey conceded, but with an obvious smile. They had come a long way from his demanding arguments over what Louie wanted out of life. "This here closet is just big enough that when you need you can dip in for a quick change – plus we've got a few secret ways for you to-"

He didn't get to finish, because he too was cut off by his brother. Again, Louie didn't mean to. He just needed to hug his brothers that much.

Once they were all done embracing and sharing laughs at what they could've been doing had this all come out earlier, Huey pulled back – and Dewey did the same. They both gestured to the suit, eyes brimming with an eagerness to see it and their brother in action. "Well, aren't you going to put it on?" Huey said, as if it were a dare. "You've got pirates to kick to the curb. Somebody's gotta show that Darkwing guy how it's done."

But Louie hesitated. "Guys, I can't." They jolted, a bit hurt – after all the effort they put in - before he explained. "Even if I have the suit, that still doesn't change the fact that I'm not leaving you alone. The pirates specifically targeted you. They know the codes – I'm betting they swiped them last time they were here – and they want you out of the way. I can't let you guys be hurt. Or worse."

Huey blanched. "Worse?"

"Sure," Dewey explained, before Louie could. "They could turn us evil and have us use the company to take over the city. Or…" he started to laugh. "Turn us good and have us donate all of Uncle Scrooge's money." They all laughed at that one, and then Dewey put his mind to the problem. "If the problem is they've got control over our network – and subsequently SHUSH's, so that's doubly bad." He added, as an unnerving aside. "Then we should be able to regain control. But we'd need access to their network."

"Well, you're not gonna get it here." Louie concluded. "And if here is the only safe place you guys can be, then that's it."

Neither of them looked happy at an order like that. Huey bristled up, furious. "Did you really think we were going to stay here while the city was falling apart?" He shouted. "Since when do we ever do that? I think you've been playing the white knight too long!"

But Louie was not about to back on this, not on his brothers' safety. "You guys are way too recognizable, and there's an army of robot thingies out there who have a target on your heads!"

"They're called TeleConstructors!"

"Whatever!" Louie said, steaming. "Point is, unless you've got some way to disguise yourselves, you can't- wait…"

He stopped short, coming into an idea. One he was sure his boisterous brother would just love. "You didn't happen to make any spares of that costume, did you?"

The other two fell silent for a moment. Then just as he hoped, the idea sunk in. Dewey grinned, and Huey did the exact opposite.

"No. No! There's no way in the world that I'm doing that!"

Thirty minutes later, Louie was all suited up. He'd never admit it, but Dewey was right: he had kind of thrown his entire hero ensemble together in a rush, and though it was cool and serviceable there was just no comparison from one that was tailor made just for him. He would need at least a million "thanks yous" to square how grateful he was to his brothers for this. It was the best gift anyone had ever given him.

But that would have to wait until Huey finished up. He was still in the "Mallard Cave" – as Dewey insisted on calling it, much to Huey's annoyance – fitting into his own costume.

Dewey had already put one on, and he too seemed to be enjoying the experience. He made the obligatory "wow! It feels like it was made for me!" joke upon showing it off how he looked, and spent a minute hopping around to "test the tensile strength" – not that either of them believed him. While they had several costumes, they had only been able to get one sword commissioned – Louie let Dewey borrow it for now, so he could further "test its weight" with a few spin moves.

Huey, meanwhile, had to be shoved into the closet kicking and screaming – or at least with very loud complaint. Now both of the others were just standing outside, waiting for him to finish already.

Patience in a fight was one thing – Louie was learning that – but this was another altogether. "You've got to be done by now, Hue!" He groaned. "Just come out!"

"I'm not doing it!" Came the grouse from inside. "This whole thing is stupid!"

Louie and Dewey shared an exasperated look, knowing that soon he would accept they had no choice and get on with it. For now, they had to just wait it out. They stood their together for a couple minutes more, mostly silent - Louie was preparing the patronizing look he would give Huey when he came back.

Then Dewey suddenly spoke up. "So…" Louie turned to him. "Why didn't you tell us?"

Louie winced. He had hoped he could sidestep this conversation. "Huh?" He said quickly, pretending to be flustered. "I didn't hear you. I think the suit squeaks a little when I-"

"Lou…"

He sighed. There would be no avoiding it, it seemed. "I meant to. I really did. That's why I came! I wanted to catch up, and get back together and…" Find out if you guys still wanted me around, he finished in his head. No way was he saying that in reality.

"You could've at least called us, so we knew you were alright. Even if you didn't tell."

"I was scared, okay?" He said curtly. Dewey watched him, patiently waiting for him to continue. "I thought, 'what if when I left I totally messed up, and we weren't brothers any more?'"

Dewey looked shocked, beneath the Mallard's mask. It wasn't so good at hiding emotions. "We would never, Lou!"

But Louie waved off the reassurance. "That was hardly it. 'What if I come back, and they've just left me behind?' 'What if I couldn't join up with the family without just messing up again?' 'Is there even a place for me there?' Every time." He deflated, feeling Dewey's eyes staring into him with concern. "I knew I should've told you. Like I said, I've known for ages that I should make up with Uncle Scrooge, that you guys were right about moving on and being better. I knew I should've at least spoken to you. But I… I…"

"You didn't want to face up to it, and it got easier to just cut yourself off." Huey was back – looking impressive in green, as yet another copy of the Masked Mallard. He had managed to slip out of the Mallard Cave while Louie was distracted, so Louie didn't even get a chance to get a first jab at him, not that it seemed to matter right now. "Especially once this happened. I can understand why, who would want to broadcast waltzing around in this travesty." He said, picking at the coat with disgust.

Dewey smiled cheekily at him. "It looks great on you, bro."

Huey rolled his eyes. "It doesn't, and to hell with you for even suggesting it." He turned to Louie. "And we get it, Lou. We've all screwed up before, and I guess the hardest step is trying. That's what Uncle Donald would say, I think." He paused, a bit uncomfortable with being so open. "We're just happy to have you now."

"Thanks," Louie said gratefully, before breaking off the awkward tension with a devious smirk. "And don't worry, I'm sure it comes in red."

"Ugh," Huey spared him a single glower, and then it was down to business. "So, what now, 'hero?'"

At that, Louie snapped into action. Huey was right: no more games – it was time to put Louie Duck away and bring the Masked Mallard out. His brothers were both looking at him for guidance – for the first time he could remember – and he would not fail them.

"Right." He said – instinctively, he deepened his voice some, added a bit of dramatic flair. The other two gaped at the sudden change. "If we're going to tap into their network we need to get onto that airship. It's too much distance between us and Panchito – if he's even still…" He faltered, but it wouldn't do to worry right now. "Which stinks, because I'm about fifty percent sure he and Kit had a salvaged biplane stashed somewhere off shore that they haven't told me about…"

Huey raised his hand. "Who the heck is Kit?"

"Later," was all the Masked Mallard would say on that. "Fact is, without that option we're stuck without an obvious means forward. Hitting the streets would be suicide: only us and one sword against what we have to assume a whole city of evilized civilians, plus a whole sky full of hostile robots. Not the best odds we've got."

"Well, I wouldn't say that's our only option," Dewey spoke up, that mysterious lilt coming to his voice again. "There is another way."

The Mallard pinched his beak – once was amazing, twice was a little bit of a time sink. "Something else? Next time, could you put all your dramatic reveals together?"

Dewey had the grace to look sheepish, but of course Huey didn't care. "You thought after all the effort we made to hide a secret Masked Mallard changing room in here, we'd just have you walk out the front door?" He walked into the closet and pounded on a random wall. There was an audible ding, and then a voice suspicious like Huey's said "NEXT STOP, SECRET HELIPAD!" Huey gave off a self-satisfied smile. "Boom."

Dewey rushed to join Huey inside the changing room, Louie right behind. "An elevator? To a helipad?" He marveled, as the wall closed shut in front of them. "You guys never do anything halfway, do you?"

"You know we don't, bro." Dewey said proudly. "Now, let's punt these scurvy thieves out of St. Canard."

The Mallard – Louie – nodded. With these two by his side, it felt like he could do anything. "As Darkwing would say, 'let's get dangerous!'"

Huey pulled a face. "Don't ever say that again."

"The Masked Mallard can make no such promise..."

On The Audobon Bay Shore,

While this was going on, unlike most of the city Panchito was having a grand old time. It was a nice evening, a fair bit of solitude, he had a plate of good food – Mama Gonzales' homemade Enmolada recipe could never disappoint - and a fine shoreline in front of him. Though he was more of a landlubber in the end, the choice to adventure on the seas was one this rooster had never had to regret for a moment.

It was nice to take a minute to relax and collect yourself. No matter how crazy the world got, good spirits were just an essential. The Caballeros knew that – well, the Caballeros that weren't Donald, anyway – and it was a philosophy he tried hard to instill in everyone he met. Not that it always worked.

He let loose an unflattering burp – good thing nobody was around to be offended – and wiped his beak on a handkerchief. Still, that seemed like a good sign that enough was enough, so he pushed his plate away and leaned back, instead using his brand new toothpick to get a bit of cheese out from one of those hard to reach places.

It was a nice toothpick, and he rather liked it. He got it only a few minutes before – salvaged from the smoldering remains of one of the insane robots that tried to attack his boat not long ago. None of his attackers were doing too well, the poor things, but only one of them broke in just the right way for the perfect tooth picking piece to snap off. And that felt like a grand silver lining.

Although, he supposed that those weren't the only robots flying around doing misdeeds, so perhaps he should call it a victory yet. He could see them from the deck, zooming here and there blasting at the ground – no doubt aiming at other people besides himself. He heard from the radio that the victims were being left with the strangest dispositions. Some nasty, some pretty nice all things considered – which explained why Senor Martinez had become so ornery after getting hit by one of them. He'd had to lock his faithful steed in the galley! To think one could spend a while lifetime pitching hay to build character – or whatever the big city equivalent was – only to lose it all in a few seconds.

Obviously something had to be done, but Panchito was no dummy. He could take on a few robots when they went after him and he had the home field advantage, but wandering around the city would just get him zapped. He could see the pirates' ship up ahead, Kit's notes and stratagems fresh in his mind, but since he had no way to get up there he could hardly take advantage of them now. Much as he disliked it, he would have to wait for an opportunity.

"Oi, you!" Came a not-so far off voice. Panchito looked up from his empty plate to find a posse of eyepatch'ed, snarling, spitting roughnecks standing by the docks. Clearly, a bunch of Air Pirates. The lead one stepped up, hatchet in hand and pointed at the rooster's neck. "Let's have wha'ever valuables ya got, nice an' easy! 'les you wanna join in the plunder, o' course!"

These guys were clearly new. They didn't recognize him! That was lucky. It seemed he wouldn't have to wait long for that opportunity after all.

"Plunder?" He jumped abruptly to his feet, bringing the table and everything on it crashing to the ground. "Adelante! My pockets're dry and I'm lookin' to cash in! Let's take this city by its flabby undercarriage!"

It was the best "I wanna be a pirate" speech he could come with on the fly, and for extra oomph, he even added a "yar!" to the end of it. Really, it was probably the "yar" that got them to believe it. At least, that's the way the story would be told in every bar and party Panchito chanced upon for years to come.

"Another recruit!" The lead pirate whooped in celebration. "This tron stuff is great! We'll have 'nough men to stomp the Calisotan coastguard to dust pretty soon!" He gladly gestured for Panchito to join the group – and how could he resist an invitation like that? "C'mon, we'll get ya back to the ship and all fitted up!"

Panchito laughed his wild and daring best – they thought it was because of the call to piracy, but really it just pure dumb luck. Back to the ship, exactly where he wanted to go.

Good spirits never led him astray, that was for sure. So he cavorted away with the pirates, singing air shanties along with the rest of them and having a grand time – none of them suspecting a thing.

He just had to remember to get back in time to let Senor Martinez out for a while, lest the contrary old horse make a mess of his ship while he was out adventuring. A finer stallion you'd never meet, but he was not good with enclosed spaces…

Aboard the Thunderquack,

"Hey, I'm at the rendezvous point. Where are you guys? Don't tell me you got tronned."

Techno's communication was understandably annoyed, and neither Darkwing nor Lauchpad could really blame him for it – what with them all being in a very tense situation. But they had problems of their own to deal with.

Launchpad, at least, was very prompt. "Sorry about that Tech," he said apologetically, though not without a lot of tension. He swerved the Thunderquack to the side, and put it into a rolling dive. "We got a little held up."

"SHUSH is fighting the Air Pirates," Darkwing explained, shakily gripping his seat with his eyes trained on the outside.

"Oh. That's good, right?"

"Not even a little bit."

Bullets were flying everywhere. Everything from the regular, ordinarily deadly kind, to the crazy superspy kind, zapping electricity and acid and all sorts of unknown but clearly unhealthy materials in every direction. Yet the armies of pirates pirates were firing back what seemed like twice as hard – with their usual fare and unusual flair: biplanes in the air, old-fashioned bazookas exploding every half second.

The TeleConstructors were useless at this point, which meant the pirates were forced to roll out the heavy artillery. And just Darkwing's luck, the Thunderquack was stuck in the middle. For the first time, Darkwing regretted flying around in a ship shaped like his own head – the moment they appeared on the scene, half of each side broke off and aimed for them instead.

"SHUSH is fighting for dominance, not justice!" Darkwing ranted back, as the Thunderquack barely avoided what would have been an explosively bad hit. "In the state they're in, they would rather see the city burn than let the Air Pirates take over!"

"Oh." Techno paused. "Then I can see why that might be a problem."

"You think?"

NegaGosalyn frowned disapprovingly at the sheer pandaemonium around them. "They really should stop. Somebody could get hurt."

Launchpad chuckled sympathetically, and pitched the plane again. "I.. uh… think that's the idea, NegaGos…"

Down on the ground, Navis was standing dramatically atop SHUSH central as bits and pieces of the building were systematically shot off around her. She brandished her own gun in one hand – a handgun straight out of the Derek Blunt movies that was taking out planes with a single shot – and a megaphone in another, and hadn't stopped talking trash the entire fight.

"You punks were morons if you thought SHUSH would kickback to you what should be ours!" She bellowed into the air, followed by a string of curses and insults that only served to piss of the pirates even more – which only made the Thunderquack's predicament worse in turn.

"I can't believe I'm saying this," Darkwing hissed. "But I miss the old Navis."

"She's not so bad," NegaCrimson added in, earning an annoyed sigh from Darkwing.

At the same time, while their moods were taking a downturn the plane was not doing so hot either. The dashboard diagnostic screen was brightly blinking a message about chassis damage, which didn't help Darkwing's dispositions much. "It stinks, but there's no much we can do here. We have to let them fight it out." He had to conclude eventually. "Pull us out of here, LP!"

But Launchpad didn't leave the area – he pulled back some but kept a holding pattern, evasive maneuvers and all. Darkwing wouldn't like it, but he couldn't leave just yet. "Just… just a few more minutes, DW!"

"Launchpad, we can't-!"

A loud BANG interrupted them, and the controls wrested out of Launchpad's grip as something struck solidly into the engine. "We're hit!" He grabbed onto the yoke and pulled with all his might, just before the plane would have taken a tailspin into a nearby skyscraper. No crash for now, but they weren't out of the woods yet.

He did a quick checklist of the damage, before – finally, in Darkwing's opinion – doing what he should have done all along, lifting off out of firing range. Or out of SHUSH's range, at least. "She's in trouble, but she'll still fly. What hit us?"

"LP… I don't think you'll like the answer."

Darkwing pointed down to the top of the SHUSH building, where beside Navis a familiar figure stood holding a sniper rifle: Agent Mia. Launchpad's heart sunk – he knew what to expect, but much like Darkwing had he had held out hope she had managed to escape. No such luck.

On the ground, Mia pumped her fist – basking in her efficient brutality. Her director's approval was guaranteed. "I got them, Director Navis!" She proudly hefted the rifle over her shoulder. "A shame that I'm out of ammo!"

"Then find someone to restock you!" Screeched the director, pointing nebulously into the veritable army of agents getting mowed down every few seconds. "If we can capture Darkwing and bring him around to our way of thinking, our victory is assured!"

"Yes, Director!" Mia saluted, and ran to replenish herself.

Seeing her run around at the beck and call of the evil-consumed army was all that Launchpad needed to see. Without a word, he took the yoke and sped the Thunderquack far away from the battle ground – and didn't speak again until they were several blocks away, far from the bullets and explosions.

Every ounce of confidence seemed to be sink out of him. His grip tightened on the Thunderquack's yoke, but the rest of him deflated. "It's really just us, isn't it, DW?" He said quietly.

"I'm starting to think so," Darkwing replied, echoing his sidekick's tired bearing. "Crimson systematically went after everyone we would think to call. Everyone else is either running or already hit."

NegaCrimson hopped out of her seat and threw her arms around the two of them, pulling them into a tight and most unwelcome hug. "Don't lose heart! I'm sure there's someone out there who can help!" She cooed, ignoring the vicious squirming going on under her arms.

"NegaCrimson, don't-"

The plane tipped towards the ground as Launchpad was yanked away from the yoke. He reached to try and right them before they smashed into the ground (at least, in an unsafe way), but getting out of NegaCrimson's loving hold was proving difficult.

"NegaCrimson, seriously. We need to-"

"Launchpad? Launchpad, are you there!"

NegaGosalyn stopped hugging, giving Launchpad the opportunity to jerk free and level the plane.

He breathed a sigh of relief, then remembered what had distracted her in the first place. "Wait, is that Techno?"

Darkwing frowned. "No… it's not. Sounds like…" His eyes widened. "The Masked Mallard!"

"See what I mean?" NegaCrimson said brightly, as Darkwing gently pushed her back in her seat. Launchpad, meanwhile, tried to catch a stronger radio connection.

"Hey! Hello! Masked Mallard?" He said loudly, fiddling with the cockpit dials. "Good to hear you're okay!" He stopped short. "Unless you're not okay, and this is a trick."

"No, we're just fine."

"So can we get past the whole 'who's evil' thing right away?"

They all stared at the radio in surprise. Neither of those were the Mallard's voice, or at least the tone he tried to project. But they were still vaguely familiar.

"Wait a minute…" Launchpad's smile – albeit confused - slowly returned to his face. "Is that Dewey and Huey Duck I hear?"

Darkwing's grin was a lot sharper – realizing that Louie must have done what he had encouraged him to do, and reached out to his brothers.

Launchpad was a little slower to realize. "You guys are an odd trio, huh? Did you rescue them or something?"

"Or something." Dewey's voice, this time. "We know, Launchpad."

"And we have concerns about you guys luring our brother into a life of crimefighting."

"It wasn't their idea, Huey. Now let me talk!"

Surprisingly the other two quieted down, allowing the Masked Mallard to continue. There was a lot of tremor in his voice, as if dealing with something strenuous, but he came in determined and clear.

"Look, we're gonna need some help here. We're up in a helicopter, heading to the Air Pirates' ship-"

"What, are you nuts?" Darkwing shouted. "Get down here and regroup!"

"We might have to, provided we get a save or two." There was the worrying sound of an explosion in the background. "But look, before you do – just in case we get shot down – there's something you have to know. The pirates… they've seriously expanded their reach."

"We're on our way, don't worry!" Launchpad said, already turning the Thunderquack upwards towards the airship. Darkwing quickly used his own communicator to sent Techno a message on the side, telling him that plans were changing, and changing fast. "But what do you mean?"

"It's not just the airship we know and hate up here. There's another one."

Everyone stopped, and shared an alarmed look. Even NegaCrimson briefly broke out of her charmed daze to gasp dramatically.

"I said they've got an entirely new ship!"

On the Pirates' Entirely New Ship,

The Crimson Marauder calmly watched an array of a dozen screens, all keyed into news reports, security cameras, and feedback from the drones flying about the city doing her… well, she would never call it "good work," but it was right by her. This city hadn't known what hit it, and it was glorious.

"Welcome to my world, St. Canard!" she said, to no one in particular – the room was empty, save for her. She played with her pigtails, a habit she hadn't done since she was a kid, enjoying the mayhem before her with unmistakable pride. "It's a wonderland of thrills and chills, full of mixed up monsters who don't know up from down, and I'm gonna love living in it."

She laughed wildly, confident that no one would interrupt her moment of triumph. She had this whole shiny new – well, less shiny and used, tiny and ramshackle – ship to herself, minus a few irritating guests who wouldn't be bothering her. She had perfect access to the network up here, and all the time in the world to make use of it. From the screens, she could see everything, like every tv show she ever wanted on the air at once.

On one screen, Air Pirates vs SHUSH while civilians run from the fallout like bystanders in a monster movie – no need for her to meddle there. On another, she saw Rowe running through the streets, no doubt intending to get back to his band of half-measure crooks – but all it was going to take was a whim and a single TeleConstructor to make that more interesting, so she let that be. And on a third screen, some idiots in a helicopter were actually trying to approach Air Pirates HQ all by their lonesome - they didn't even have any weapons!

She looked away from the other footage and focused all her attention on the last one, a lopsided glee coming over her. It should be fun for a few moments to watch a few morons get shot down…

Suddenly, there was a banging on the door of her private chamber.

"Marauder!" It was Extra, and she sounded pretty cheesed off. "Open up, I've got words for you!"

Oh, was it time for the third act double cross already? A prime time for a textbook villain moment! Crimson turned away from the screen and schooled her face into an ambivalent smile, before opening the door.

Extra marched in, and immediately got into Crimson's face. "What is going on? You didn't mention anything about this!"

Crimson raised an eyebrow. "This?"

Extra swelled with rage, her face turning an amusing red color. "Yes, 'this!' I was fine when you said we were going after Glomgold! We'd drive him crazy, rob him, and hit Darkwing and friends too to keep them from stopping us! That's what you said!"

That did sound like the kind of this lie Crimson would tell, though really it was Plumis' own fault for falling for it. Bad guys could be so predictable with their fixations, much to their own detriment. Poor Extra was just in denial about how weak her commitment to the villainy thing really was. "Since when did the plan change to armies of these robots attacking innocent people? That's not what I signed up for." She screeched, more desperate than she really should have been in Crimson's opinion. Plus, it was hurting her ears.

But then, she had planned for this. "Taking out Glomgold was just a part of a bigger plan, obviously," Crimson replied, laying on the velvet in her voice. "Don't blame me because you were too into payback to pay attention."

"'Pay attention' my tailfeathers!" Extra insisted, her fury only rising. "The city's going to hell in a handbasket! I just wanted revenge, not… not this! I jumped ship from a good thing thanks to you!"

"I know, I know." Crimson put her hands on Extra's shoulders, with a nice reassuring voice as she pushed her a little… right into the right place… "But I know how to fix it. Just stand right there."

To her credit, Extra remained skeptical. Probably due to her reporter's instinct. "What, I'm supposed to believe you're going to shut the whole thing down just because I asked you to?"

Crimson rolled her eyes, and took an obvious step back. "Course not. I just need you to stand there." She pulled a controller from her coat, and pressed one of the buttons on it.

Extra had a moment to realize what was about to happen, before the floor below her disappeared and she plummeted down through the ship.

Sauntering up to the hole in the floor, Crimson enjoyed the moment – basking in the wind shear as it flew up from the outside, as if it were an afternoon breeze. "You know what? Trap doors are awesome. More bad guys should use them." She looked down through the hole, and spotted the tiny shape falling through the empty sky. "'Thanks for the help, loser!"

Another press of the button closed the hole, and with it Extra's part in this scheme. She hardly needed her help now that the whole system was set up and under her control – which meant she could probably get rid of the Dark Avenger too… but that one could wait. She could just imagine the look on Darkwing's face when he found out she was dropping people from 20,000 feet up!

But that would come later. She looked back to the screens, but the helicopter was already gone from the camera. A shame – she would've loved to see them go down. But perhaps that was a sign she should focus on other things.

Perhaps she should go check on the mechanisms in the main room, to ensure one last time that they were ready for operation. It was nearly showtime, and it simply wouldn't do to be caught with a badly kept house tonight.

Not when she had such important company coming…

Author's Note: We've reached the beginning of the end, now. Everything is coming to a head. Crimson's stake is revealed, and - if only for this moment - it's her world, not Darkwing's that our heroes have to navigate through. Let the fun begin.

Obnoxiously Good! NegaGosalyn is something I've been looking forward to write for a while. It takes her out of the final battle some, but it's such a great contrast - and a nice way to reference her origins. Likewise, at least as something I've been looking forward to, the Duck brothers' reunion. It's interesting how, the more I wrote this, the more the three of them took traits from several incarnations - the basic personalities of Quack Pack, catchphrases from the later content, and references to everything I could think of that fit. Something kind of similar happened with Extra: originally she was just a character I came up with to fill space on Fearsome Five, but then she ended up with a full backstory and - as the story went on - landed into a vital, if small, position in the final story. Funny how that happens.

Random trivia: the song Gosalyn sings on the radio is "Sometimes I'm Happy," a tune from the 20's that got me thinking about this story randomly (or vice versa) while I was writing this, so in it went. Also see if you can spot the classic Ducktales reference.

In any case, the city is going insane at an alarming rate, and the heroes are running out of places to turn. There's no place to go but up: towards the final battle. Can they keep St. Canard from tearing themselves apart? Will they survive the pirates' final gambit? And more importantly... can they get out of there in one piece, and save Gosalyn in the process? Find out next time, as Let's Get Chaotic concludes!