Purse Snatchers from Space
By Sharan McQuack, Launchpad's wife.
It as a busy day in Duckburg. Launchpad and I were flying around in seperate planes. I was flying cargo, as per usual. Launchpad was flying Mr. McDuck back and forth. Then, we saw them. A whole bunch of UFO filled the skies. They swooped down out of no place, first all together, then they split up.
Then, they started stealing people's purses. Or wallets. People tried to stop them. However, the UFOS flew off too fast. A few morons actually HUNG ON to the UFO's as they flew off. They were lucky, they received a mild electric shock that caused them to let go before they were high enough to get killed or seriously hurt when they fell.
I must admit I just stared at them and did nothing but fly my plane. I was so shocked and surprised it was all I could do not to let it distract me from flying the plane. But you know Launchpad, he had to do something to try and stop them.
Launchpad tried to cut them off, prevent them from stealing more stuff.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" screamed Mr. McDuck.
"They're heading towards the Money Bin, Boss. Remember what the LAST bunch of aliens did with your Money Bin?" Launchpad replied. (1)
"STOP THEM!" Mr. McDuck backtracked.
Launchpad tried, but...
"Can't in this thing. Too slow. Doesn't fly high enough. I'll land next to that hanger." Launchpad replied. "I going to have to ask you to keep your beak shut about it's contents."
Launchpad landed the plane. And opened up a very well-locked hanger.
"So this is where you keep the Thunderquack? I thought it was in St. Canard with DW." Mr. McDuck inquired.
"DW has use of a copy. Bruno flies it for DW. DW thinks he's me. But Bruno isn't using my Social Security number and Bruno uses a middle name. I don't have a middle name. So it's like we just have the same first and last name. Big deal." Launchpad replied. (2)
I landed my plane as soon as possible. I came running up to my Launchpad, to wish him luck.
"Would you like to come?" Launchpad kindly offered..
"Why do we two pilots for ONE plane?' Mr. McDuck thundered.
Then Launchpad rolled back a partition I had not noticed before, revealing another skyclipper just like the Thunderquack, only a normal silver grey plane color.
"I was thinking of naming it Silver Girl, but it's yours..." Launchpad began.
"Silver Girl! Perfect!" I said.
I like "Bridge Over Trouble Waters" by two nice Jewish boys from Queens. (3)
I kissed my Launchpad.
"Just how long have you been working on this?" I asked.'
"Not long. I wanted to surprise you." Launchpad replied.
"You certainly did that! It's a wonderful unbirthday present!" I replied.
"Let's get's going! Before those aliens steal my money from my Money Bin." Mr. McDuck.
However, the aliens seemed to have no interest in the Money Bin itself. They continued to steal purses and wallets. They also stole armored cars! Sort of. They would lower grabbers from their UFO's, grab the armored car. Then later would lower the armored car with it's guards still on it...but all the money bags were gone.
Mr. McDuck nearly attacked the UFOs single handled when he saw that. Mr. McDuck owned the banks that used those armored cars.. Launchpad had to grab him.
"Mr, McDee! You may be a duck, but you can't fly by yourself!" screamed Launchpad as he collared (grabbed him by the collar) Mr. McDuck before he could fall out.
We were soon in pursuit of the alien purse snatchers. But we had only two skyclippers and the aliens thieves had dozens, if not hundreds of ships. If we chased one, it would fly quickly towards the others and mingle with them until we were no longer sure which ship was which. We could not attack one ship without the others ganging up on us.
Then, we saw a whole bunch of other ships and for a second, we thought we were toast.
'WHAT? More skyclippers? I only built two!" Launchpad asked.
"Hi, son! Did you forget you sold the design of your skyclippers to those former astromutts?' Ripcord asked, as he flew by in a blue skyclipper.
'You mean they built more ALREADY? Yeah, guess they did." Launchpad said.
We saw the skyclippers were piloted by the former astronauts and the Flying McQuacks.
I was ALREADY enjoying myself. Launchpad is a trouble magnet. Team him up with ANOTHER trouble magnet, like Mr. Mc Duck for instance and ANYTHING is likely to happen.
Now, can you imagine a WHOLE FAMILY of trouble magnets coming together? Because that's what the Flying McQuack are, a whole family of trouble magnets. Add LAUNCHPAD, who normally flies his own path to the mix and things are REALLY going to get interesting.
Since my life was duller than dishwashing before Launchpad came into it, I love every minute of this. Being a McQuack even by marriage is FUN. My life used to be so blame cushy I thought I was going to die of boredom. Reading was my only escape from dull.
Then, Launchpad came into my life and I suddenly had all the excitement and adventure I ever wanted. Beats being "safe" any day of the week. Especially since safety is an illusion. I was no safer before I met and married Launchpad then I am now, it just seemed safer. I had been as snug as a bug in the rug, but I somehow knew about the existence of vacuum cleaners.
And I preferred getting out of my illusion of safety. The astronauts and the Flying McQuacks (including ME) surrounded the Purse Snatchers. Until the Purse Snatchers opened hatches in their space ships and dropped all the purses and wallets they had stolen..
All the purses and wallets dropping out of the sky above us blinded us. The Purse Snatchers took advantage of our momentary blindness and confusion to break formation and fly off every which way.
So we went to gather up the purses and wallets to see if we could return them to their rightful owners.
However, the purses and wallets were totally empty. Which was weird. Not only was the money and the credit cards gone, but all the other stuff people keep in their wallets or purses. Now, I suppose a few guys might keep nothing but money and credit cards in their wallets. But all the womens' purses were empty, too. No lipstick, no make up, no photos, no nothing.
"The purse snatchers must of stolen everything from the wallet and purses. But why?" I asked.
MEANWHILE...Gizmoduck was frustrated. All this chaos was going on and he was stuck guarding the Money Bin. And the aliens didn't even seem interested in the Money bin.
()() They must think it's an ordinary building. If they realize it contains money, they'll be after it. I have to stay at my post.()() Giz thought.
Giz double checked his gizmos, searching for something he could use against the aliens that would not (a) attract attention to the Money bin or (b) kill the aliens. After all, the aliens had not tried to kill anybody, about all they did was steal. Besides, if he killed one, that might start a war of Earth vs. where-ever- the- came- from. Then, he remembered his flashlight beam. It was a very powerful beam of light, not heat. He bounced a beam off of Duckburg Pond. It TEMPORARALLY blinded the aliens.
It appeared as if the beam came from Duckburg Pond. A few minutes later, the alien ships hovered over Duckburg Pond wondering where the beam came from. Giz sniggered and bounced a second beam off of one of those hideously ugly all glass buildings. Again, the beam temporally blinded some aliens.
Again, the effected aliens soon hovered over the building, confused. Twice more, Giz bounced two beams off of two other glass monstrousities, twice more the aliens hovered over the buildings before the color of all the alien space ships changed. They were no longer silver grey but red or green. This was apparently a sunblock, the beams no longer effected them.
Elsewhere, Mr. McDuck was arranging for law enforcement agents to "accidently" leave purses and wallets full of counterfeit money "unguarded". They were hoping to catch the aliens in the act, but the aliens were too fast and too sneaky. They managed to steal the purses and wallets anyway. BUT, all these wallets and purses had tiny cell phones in them. Mr. McDuck, via the cell phones, asked the aliens what they wanted. Why were they stealing?
And via the cell phones, could hear the aliens chatter in their native tongue. They obliviously didn't understand a word he said. Frustrated, Mr. McDuck followed suit by yelling at them in Scottish. (4) Where's Lt. Uhura when you need her? (5)
Duckblur was also frustrated. Duckblur was using Giz's old copter helmet. Giz didn't need it anymore, he has his jet pack now. So Giz gave Duckblur his old helmet. The aliens soon realized all they had to do to ditch her was fly their space ships high up to where there is no air.
Duckblur couldn't follow them there. But the minute the aliens swooped down to steal something, she was on their tails immediately.
Duckblur tried something she had never dared try before. Duckblur aimed her Time powers at whatever they were trying to steal. Duckblur had to be VERY careful NOT to hit the alien, for the affected item withered to dust, aged thousands of years in a second or two. (6) Now, the aliens were frustrated.
Then, when Duckblur did this to a purse, something was left intact. A small gold ring with a small diamond in it. It must have been nearly pure gold, gold does not rust or corrode. And if diamonds don't quite last forever, they certainly last a long time. This interested the aliens.
They tried to talk to Duckblur. Duckblur didn't understand a word they said.
'Wait a minute." Duckblur said.
And she went to fetch a translating device that could "listen" to languages and translate them. Normally, it would take forever for it to even begin to understand, let alone translate, a totally alien language. But with Duckblur around to speed up time (which she can normally do without aging things), forever took less than five minutes.
Soon, Duckblur talked English, which the device translated into whatever, the alien talked whatever which the device translated into English. But even when the aliens could understand her, they didn't have to listen to her. And they wouldn't listen.
Somewhere in Ireland, King Brian, king of the Leprechauns was worried. What if these aliens found about the Golden Caverns? They'd be sure to try and steal it's gold. Would the booby traps prevent ALIENS from stealing the gold?. King Brian decided to take preventive measures.
The Leprechauns secret weapon, the rainbow cannon, was rolled to the surface. For the first time in uncounted ages, it was fired. A rainbow of tiny magic charms headed up towards the alien ships. (7) The alien ships found themselves surrounded by rainbow colored magic rings. Their ships could no longer move, but were stuck, supported by the rings. The ships did not fall, not even the ships within Earth's gravity field, but they wouldn't go anyplace.
It's amazing how quickly beings who wouldn't listen do so once they know you can stop them dead in their tracks. The aliens soon surrendered. Now that they understood and spoke English, they explained they didn't understand money.
They don't have money. They never invented the concept. They stole purses and wallets to try and figure out why we so highly value something seemingly worthless. They thought maybe it was the other stuff in purses or wallets that we valued most. Once they learned English, they learned otherwise- but they didn't understand why we like money.
We let Mr. McDuck TRY to explain money to beings who eat "grass" wear clothes made of "leaves" and from a planet where metal is common.
LATER, Mr. McDuck asked King Brain why he helped us surface folk.
"Well , I couldn't let a fellow Irishman down on St. Patrick's Day, now could I?" King Brian replied.
"You mean Launchpad." Mr. McDuck sniffed.
"President O'Bama, too." King Brian replied.
The End.
(1) See "Money to Burn".
(2) I am uncertain when Bruno took Launchpad's place as "sidekick". (The sooner the better. If Launchpad had never worked for that costumed clown "all that's missing is the floppy shoes and the bozo nose" it would be just ducky by ME.)
(3)I'm a nice Jewish girl, born in Manhattan, raised in Queens , then moved to the Bronx at nine. And of course I know the group's name is "Simon and Garfunkle".
(4) Actually, I THINK it's called Gaelic, which, I think, is different from Irish Gaelic. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong about that.
(5) Lt. Uhura does a lot more than just answer the phones. She has to speak all the languages of all the aliens they met. Vulcan, Klingon, Romanian, etc. and learn the langages of new aliens they meet. Multiple answering the phones at the UN by a zillion and you get the picture.
(6) ATTENTION GIZMODUCK; make note to self, stay on Duckblur's good side.
(7) So I swiped this idea from an ad for Lucky Charms. So I'm shameless.