Disclaimer; I don't own either Darkwing Duck or the Impossibles or their villains or other heroes. They are owned by Disney and Hanna Barbera, I don't own Impossi-Pup or any other original characters featured in this story. I also don't own the civilian names of the Impossibles or their character trait's, the SSHQ, where they work for as super heroes, or the name of the city they live in, in their own dimension, these are the brilliant creations of a terrific Fan Fiction writer and very Good Friend, who has graciously lent them to me for the enhancement of my story, Erin T. Aardvark has written many great stories about the Impossibles, as well as other HB cartoon classics, Highly recommended reading. I also wish to give a great deal of thanks to my Mentor and wonderful friend Irual, who's constant help in making these stories better with each chapter, is invaluable. I have added a few incidental characters and things and some locations myself.
The only thing gained is reviews, very important keeps me going, so….
Sit back, relax, read and review, please. Enjoy!
As the adventure continues…..
Chapter 19. Criminals, Calamitys and Crashes
While Darkwing and Launchpad flew off to try and catch Negaduck, the teen crime fighters The Impossibles, were just preparing to help by apprehending what looked like a giant toy robot, most likely a mechanical minion of Darkwing's criminal nemesis, Quackerjack.
The Impossibles noticed that in spite of it's huge size, the robot moved very quickly.
Fluey watched as the square head turned and twisted on the neck and as a flash of sparks traveled from one ball like sensor to the other and commented calmly, "If it's electric, I should be able to short it out."
Multi nodded as he piloted their jet in a large circle and tried to estimate the robot's grabbing range.
Seeing the spring like legs, Coiley commented. " Jumpin Juggernauts, It looks like this Quackerjack character, has stolen a page from my book."
As they watched, the robot's claw tore off the roof of the Armored Car like it was made out of tin and it's legs extended up and down like elevators to shake the guards out, as though it was emptying a can of tuna fish.
Realizing that the guards would be hurt, Multi hit the autopilot button and shouting "RALLY HO!" began to duplicate himself towards the guards, clinging desperately to each other and the side of the truck.
As he was quickly approaching the truck Multi saw, two black cases, (most likely containing two of the masks from the Museum, fall out and head toward the street below.)
Multi's duplicates made it easy enough to grab both of the frightened guards, but he missed the cases. But Multi was more concerned with saving two lives, before going after inanimate objects.
The twosome were so glad to have been caught, neither of them objected to the unusual appearance of their rescuers, considering they all looked exactly alike.
These heros were human, not dog-like or avian or mouse-like the way they were used to seeing. (Not many people in St. Canard outside of the secret organization S.H.U.S.H., had ever seen or even heard of humans, after all, Darkwing's contacts with Comet Guy, of the Planet Mertz, WAS Top Secret!)
Once the guards were safely belted into the Impossi-Jet's back seat, they promptly fainted as they saw Coilman, who shouted, "RALLY HO!" then sprang out of the jet, moments later landing on the ground, in an attempt to intercept and trip the robot, by tying it's legs together, using his own super springy limbs.
Fluidman quickly transformed into his half liquid state and shouting, "RALLY HO HO!" shot forward fearlessly into the fray and after catching the black cases, he quickly handed them off, to a couple of Multi's duplicates.
These combined actions actually distracted Quackerjack and MegaVolt from defending themselves as well as they might have, well, it also didn't help that they were fighting over the remote that controlled the robot, but…That wasn't unusual for these two.
Megs and Quacky weren't really paying attention, to what had gone on outside, they were safe inside the head of the robot, looking out a port hole like opening in the face, where a mouth would be. AND they were grabbing the remote back and forth in their squabble.
There were several places to sit built into the control room of the head of the robot, it had several buttons and two joysticks and the robot would react according to which part of the control was moved. It even had some loose toys, which were rattling around as the robot bounced up and down, while MegaVolt and Quackerjack continued their fight over the controller.
Of course from their view of the robot from the outside, Multi and Fluey saw that the robot had dropped the now empty armored car and began turning it's distructive actions to demolishing nearby buildings, acting for all the world, like a naughty little kid, throwing a fit after being told, 'NO!' But the scale of the destruction was pretty impressive none the less.
As Coilman's tactic took effect and the robot lost it's balance and fell to the pavement, the villains FINNALLY quit squabbling, noticed their precarious predicament and prepared for a fight.
As the red headed Impossible and his duplicates pulled apart the head of the robot, Quackerjack tried using his flamethrower teddy on Multi.
"Sizzling stereos, Lookout Multi!" shouted Fluey, as he took swift action and doused the flames.
Then MegaVolt supercharged several of Quackerjack's pairs of windup teeth, as well as one of his spinning tops and the Impossibles were forced back as the whirling top promptly unleashed it's ultra sharp blades and began to spin with lethal intent, while the mechanical teeth leaped and jumped trying to bite Coiley.
"Twistin Topers!, Watch out for those knives guys!" Shouted Multi as he narrowly avoided, getting sliced in half by quickly sidestepping out of the spinning top's way.
Multiman and Fluidman had to work together, to short circuit the dangerous toys and with Coiley's help soon had the gruesome twosome, captured and secured in the Impossi-Jet.
Looking in the distance, the trio of teen crime fighters could see a nasty air battle shaping up between Launchpad's Jet and the Yellow, Black and red nearly exact copy, of the Thunderquack, Darkwing had call it the Negaquack and the Impossibles had guessed that it was piloted by none other than that nefarious twin of Darkwing's, Negaduck himself.
Now that they had taken care of their own objective, having had several run ins with Negaduck and knowing that he was the most dangerous of the Fearsome five, Multi strongly suggested they to go right away to help Darkwing and Launchpad.
While the teenaged super heros The Impossibles wrapped up their fight with MegaVolt and Quackerjack, Darkwing and Launchpad were zooming after the Negaquack.
It was on the way to intercept the Mallard of Menace's jet, when Darkwing happened to sweep the ground with his binoculars and spotted the distinctive title wave M.O. of the Liquidator, sweeping a second armored car, into the waiting branches of several uprooted Oak trees.
Groaning in frustration, as he realized Negaduck had split up his gang and was attacking all the armored trucks at the same time, to be certain of capturing all of the six masks of the collection, Darkwing sighed and pulled on his purple helmet with the wide white stripe down the middle and wings on the sides, as he got onto the Ratcatcher.
Stowing his gray fedora, in a pocket of his cape he prepared to go after the two criminals, who were in turn going after the armored car after the two masks it held, from the museum exhibit.
Launchpad had seen Bushroot and Liquidator's antics, as he dodged behind one of the taller sky scrapers, in preparation for swooping in on Negaduck and he was all ready with the launch ramp.
Darkwing gave his sidekick a confident grin and said, "Be careful LP, The Thunderquack is Much better than Negaduck's plane and you ARE the best pilot I know, But Negaduck won't hesitate to fight dirty. I'll keep Bushy and Licky busy and try to save the armored car. Don't worry about me and don't take any unnecessary chances."
Launchpad, looked worried, after all Bushroot and Liquidator worked well together and taking on both super villain's by himself was a pretty tall order, even for DW, but he knew what Darkwing wanted him to say, so he replied, "Right-O DW!" And hit the toggle to lower the ramp and sent his friend, street side.
Darkwing made his patented dramatic entrance, from the jet and gunned the engine as he landed to take some of the gravitational stress off the Ratcatcher. Landing safely he skidded to a halt a few feet in front of the trees who were tearing into the armored car's door under the direction of their friend Bushroot.
Acting while the element of surprise was still his, he swiftly fired off, a canister of laughing gas at the mutant plant duck.
Granted, Bushroot was mostly plant, but he was an air breather and even though laughing gas wasn't the most effective weapon against this villain, it was the canister, that had been loaded first in the clip, so Darkwing had to make due with what he had.
Spinning the motorcycle in place, with a horrendous squealing of the tires and clouds of smoke, from burning rubber he took aim at the watery villain now bearing down on him, from what remained of the armored car.
Liquidator had been checking to see if the armored truck was the one carrying the gold masks and was disappointed to find only two in this truck, aside from the shaken security guards, who were taking advantage of this distraction, being provided by the Masked Mallard, to crawl a short distance away and radio for help.
They realized that their guns were no good against these super villains and they had orders to follow which included staying out of the way, since they were only supposed to escort the masks, not fight these dangerous criminals.
Darkwing was nearly in time, to hit the Liquidator with his new binder capsules, a new addition to his crime fighting arsenal, developed especially for fighting this watery villain.
But, the Liquidator made holes in his body and they passed through him, to hit the sidewalk behind him in a poof, as the water soluble capsule hit, where the Liquidator had just pried open the back of the armored car, he had left some of himself, as a watery puddle, near the door.
Seeing the fairly large piles of semi solid residue, Liquidator cocked an eyebrow and demanded, "What's this? The Liquidator keeps up with all consumer trends and yet it appears, that a new product is being test marketed."
"Here's another FREE sample!" Darkwing growled, as he flipped a toggle on his gas gun and fired a freeze gas canister, at his watery foe, before leaping off the Ratcatcher, to wrap a rag over Bushroot's beak.
The plant duck was caught off guard and even though he could have used his telepathy to get the trees to fight for him, the chemicals on the rag made him so dizzy and disoriented, that the trees didn't know what to do as Bushroot's eyes rolled back in his head and snapped shut.
Using his cape Darkwing swiftly wrapped Bushroot up and nodded to the security guards, who crouched behind a sidewalk mailbox.
The rag, was soaked in a special blend of chloroform and diluted weed killer, that had been developed at S.H.U.S.H. labs, to calm the mutant plant duck, when he had his panic attacks, while in their custody and had been proven very effective in keeping Reggie's plant control, to a minimum as well.
Bushroot tended to remain in custody a lot longer than the other members of the Fearsome Five whenever he was apprehended, but the downside of this was his unique needs for sunlight and open air when he was incarcerated so he developed some health concerns and Dr. Bellum responded with a full regimen of physical treatments and special diet to help him adapt including this formula.
Reggie was actually one of the few criminals Darkwing had fought, that he tended to think of more as misguided and trapped by circumstance rather then actually being villainous by nature.
But that didn't make him any less of a challenge, it just meant that Bushroot was one of the few criminals that Darkwing spent the least amount of time pursuing and also if he thought about it, one of the few he would turn his back on without Launchpad there to back him up.
Darkwing knew these drugs, were a very temporary solution and even IF Launchpad were there to help, Liquidator was more dangerous at the moment.
Spinning to face his other foe, Darkwing saw that the freeze formula, was wearing off and the Liquidator had already thawed enough to surge forward, but he was still in a crystallized state and much slower and firmer that usual…except for his mouth.
As Darkwing leaped forward, hoping that his patented Double Flip Boom Boom Double Footed Web Kick, would temporarily shatter Liquidators form, but the watery dog slid sideways taunting his opponent.
"While tried and true products are always a guaranteed sale, new marketplace innovations dictate, that a change in marketing tactics and strategy, will increase your bottom line. AND today only, the Liquidator is offering to demonstrate, how outdated techniques contribute to failure, in more that just sales."
Darkwing did connect just as he hoped, unfortunately, his kick didn't have the result he had hoped for.
He ended up with his left foot, stuck in the Liquidator's chest. AND since Licky was the consistency of slush at the time, the main reason DW was trapped was because the Liquidator wanted to negate Darkwing's agility and grasp his enemy personally.
Fortunately for Darkwing, Liquidator maintained the chill of his current condition, instead of becoming boiling hot, which could seriously injure him.
Instead, the water dog grinned and his expression fill the flailing duck with a distinct feeling of foreboding.
Pulling Darkwing out of his chest, with a "POP" Liquidator whirled in place and flung the hapless crime fighter, head first into a nearby trash dumpster.
Happily for Darkwing, the dumpster was overstuffed, with trash bags, that served to cushion his landing, he was unhurt, but winded as the Liquidator started to retrieve the two cases, containing the Golden Masks.
Liquidator glanced up at the sound of a strange aircraft, moving above him to see what he could swear was an open air reddish-orange convertible CAR, with a stubby rear wing-like tail section and black fan tails, soaring powerfully along and from the looks of it, this strange apparition, was headed for Negaduck's position.
Liquidator knew the only way to turn a profit, was to close the deal and he intended, to fulfill his part of the contract to the letter. Keeping this in mind, he flowed over to the security guards, smiling broadly, as they fearfully backed away from Reggie's slumbering form.
Sweeping the cloth away from his cohort's bill, the former Bud Flood, splashed some of the cold water from his hand over Bushroot, to wash off any chemical residue and clear his nares.
Just as the mutant plant duck was coming to his senses and his trees were beginning to stir also, who should show back up, but Darkwing.
He was dirty and panting from having to climb out of the dumpster, but he was still a dangerous threat to the two villain's scheme.
He was determined to foil these felonious felons, Darkwing braced himself and fired another series of his water soluable capsules, filled with the super absorbent powder, at the
Liquidator and this time two of them hit their target.
Liquidator staggered as his hands and arms became sluggish and almost Jell-o like. The former Bud Flood looked at himself in surprise and realized that the stuff in his opponents capsules, had absorbed as much of him as they could.
Avoiding the rest of the capsules, the Liquidator snarled, "Liquidator Brand Villainy, is never off the shelf, It's always customized for every occasion."
With that, he flexed his now much more solid arms and punched Darkwing in the bill, unfortunately for the Liquidator, his arms were now, much heavier and he had trouble, keeping them on his torso, since the rest of him, was still fully watery.
Darkwing fell onto Bushroot and kept his head, in spite of the ringing in his ears.
He hadn't taken the full brunt of the blow, but it had still been pretty severe.
He felt Bushroot begin to stir and flailed trying to anticipate the criminals reactions, Darkwing accidentally hit Reggie on the head with his gas gun, cold conking the plant duck, knocking him out before leaping back into the fight, as he took some super absorbent shammys out of his jacket and twisted out of the way as a spout of water surged towards him….
Launchpad dove from the upper atmosphere and fired one of his laser cannons in a concentrated burst at the Negaquack, hoping to penetrate the outer armor and scramble it's electrical system. He knew Negaduck was an experienced pilot, but, unlike Launchpad, he hadn't built his plane.
Negaduck had instead coerced the "Criminal Twin to this universes Hero organization, which was located in the negaverse, S.H.U.S.H.(the Secret, Harmful, Underground, Surveillance, Headquarters) into providing him with his air transport, after taking control of most of the continent back in his universe.
Once he had discovered what he referred to as the Normal-verse, Negaduck had brought the jet over, along with his initial stocks of weapons and other technology.
Unlike the rest of his equipment though, Negs hadn't changed his plane, for a less conspicuous one, after he had begun his criminal activities here.
Launchpad had secretly wanted to compare his "Baby" to it's Negaverse twin, ever since he had seen it. HOWEVER, every time Negaduck had been captured, the hiding place of his jet, had been low on the list of things to find out.
This being the case, Launchpad was caught a little off guard, as the yellow, red and black plane spun in mid air and yawed to the left avoiding about ¾ of the laser arrays.
With a excited yell, Launchpad pull right and spun in the opposite direction, almost like one of the choreographed stunts he had preformed in the McQuack Family Flyer's Air Show.
Of course, no one in the air show ever shot at him, which made a HUGE difference.
Twisting in his seat he toggled a catch and a second set of controls popped out of the Thunderquack's dashboard just above the instrument panel. Hitting one of the switches, Launchpad sent the jet into a steep climb before dropping his magnetized, electrified net over the Negaquack.
The net, was attached to the bottom of LP's jet with a detachable cable that spun out behind the net like a spider's safety cable, Negaduck cursed onboard his plane, as the net unrepentantly settled over his jet and caught on the bill ramp, keeping the missile launcher shut and fouling his laser guns, so he couldn't fire them.
With a grim sneer, Negaduck flicked a glance out the canopy and growled, "THAT is a new trick. BUT then SO is THIS…."
As Negaduck tried to deploy his belly guns and twisted the joystick of his plane in hopes of fouling the Thunderquack's jets in the cable, Launchpad switched on the electricity, hoping to disable the plane below.
At the exact same time, Negaduck hit a switch on his own dashboard that sent a surge of power to secondary generator.
Using the power from that, he activated his special cloaking device hoping to interfere with the Thunderquack's net and free his plane.
Unfortunately the two systems interactions, had an effect he hadn't anticipated.
Both jets lit with a glow of bright light, as the net and cable connecting them, shook with strain and both jet's shut down and began to fall from the sky.
The Impossi-jet was loaded with the two security guards, Quackerjack, MegaVolt and the Impossibles, (minus Skittles, who had stayed behind to play with the children, Shawn, FG and Danalleah ) and so, was a touch slower than usual, as it powered it's way across the sky above St. Canard.
It wasn't bad though, as the flying car moved through the sky, Multi dropped a little lower, as they flew over St. Canard, The Impossibles were debating what to do with their prisoners and the guards, as well as the masks they were guarding.
It wouldn't be right to endanger the guards in the coming fight and from what Darkwing had said and the fight's last night, the Impossibles knew that the crooks they had in custody, were actually very dangerous and would try escaping, if they got the chance.
A building they were passing looked like a Hospital and painted on the roof was an H inside of a circle.
Now admittedly this WAS the symbol for helipad in their human world, but it had slipped Multi's mind for a moment that they were in another universe and the symbol might mean something else.
That being the case, Multi decided it would be best place to leave their prisoners and the security guards out of the coming air battle.
Quickly landing and unloading everyone from the Impossi-jet, the Impossibles hurriedly checked the restraints on their prisoners and prepared to leave them and the security guards on the helipad and take off to help Darkwing and Launchpad.
One of the guards objected fearfully, "Hey wait a minute, You guys just can't leave us here alone with them, we aren't S.H.U.S.H, Agents!"
The second guard had also regained consciousness.
The teen crime fighters, were confused at the negative reaction of the first security guard, to being left in charge of the prisoners.
Multi didn't know much about what this S.H.U.S.H. Agency actually was, that the guard was talking about, only what Gos had said after she had first met Big D, about it being like their own SSHQ, but still, most security personnel The Impossibles had dealt with, were perfectly capable handling this type of situation.
Then the other guard chimed in, "If those two do manage to get loose, there are hundreds of innocent sick people and doctors and nurses who will be at risk, if you leave us here without any protection."
Multi, Coiley and Fluey were thinking about their options and also concentrating on watching the air conflict in the distance, when dire circumstances met their eyes, as they spotted two jets now connected by a thin cable.
As they watched they realized that Launchpad's Thunderquack and Negaduck's Negaquack were literally FALLING out of the sky.
" HO-LY HORIFIC! Look at THAT!" shouted Coiley who was the first to find his voice after seeing such a shocking sight.
The Jet's were falling fast and as they watched the hatch of the Negaquack opened, but the pilot couldn't eject because the net connected to the line coming from the other jet had fouled the hatch release.
Having no time to loose and realizing the only way to solve the serious problem they were now facing, placating these security guys and saving the occupants of the jets now plummeting Earthward, Fluey quickly made the only decision possible.
"I'll stay here and watch over these people, (Fluey volunteered) the electrical toys, that whacked out duck in the jester costume and the electric rat…they're no match against my water powers….You two Go and SAVE THEM!"
The other two nodded and shouted "Rally Ho!" as they leaped quickly into the Impossi-jet and zoomed full speed towards the impending disaster.
As Multiman and Coilman were rushing to the rescue, Darkwing was just sealing Liquidator into one of his neighbor Herb Muddlefoot's best selling Quackerware containers.
He was using the large salad bowl with a slightly convex lid that Herb had touted as a way to keep anything from fruit to veggies fresher longer, thanks to Herb's unrelenting interest in converting Drake Mallard into a Quackerware salesman, or at the very least, owner of one everything he had in stock, Darkwing had a large supply of such containers and finally he had found one good use for the plastic ware, to safely corral the Liquidator.
Not even the Quackerware's patented airtight seal would contain this watery villain indefinitely, BUT he was stuck for a least a day or so, UNLESS someone pushed the bubble on the bottom of the bowl and released him.
Darkwing glanced up as he heard the powerful roar of the Impossi-jet's engine and saw the unique reddish-orange vehicle streak by overhead.
Realizing that the Impossibles were most likely headed to join in with Launchpad, fighting Negaduck and knowing just how ruthless and determined his arch foe could be, Darkwing decided he had better get his feathered tail in gear and try to lend a hand.
The Impossibles WERE experienced crime fighters, BUT, they didn't have his experience fighting Negaduck.
As he switched on his headset and switched out his gray fedora for his purple safety helmet, Darkwing felt his heart nearly stop at the frantic chatter he heard, coming through the radio connection between Launchpad and Multiman.
Steeling himself, he revved up the Ratcatcher and zoomed off, as if he was being chased by some of Morgana's ghostly cohorts, a grim look on his beak, panic in his heart for Launchpad's safety and a frightened look in his eyes.
The security guards from the armored car Liquidator and Bushroot were attempting to rob, stood for a moment waiting, as a S.H.U.S.H. van, presumably trying to be inconspicuous since it was decorated to appear as though it were diaper delivery service, pulled up followed by two SCPD squad cars.
Darkwing had radioed S.H.U.S.H. to let Director Hooter know about where to pick up Bushroot and Liquidator and he had secured the Mutant Plant Duck in a special bag, he had carried in the Ratcatcher that Dr. Bellum had given him as a way to safely subdue Bushroot without injuring him, or allowing him the chance to grow his way out of more conventional restraints and had then taken off, before either of the guards could say anything to him or object about being left with the defeated villains.
High above St. Canard in the Thunderquack, Launchpad, knew that his only chance to avoid killing himself and Negaduck outright, was to restart the Thunderquack and try for a controlled crash, which was actually something he was very good at.
By controlling the end of their decent, he could at least try to avoid crushing the jet beneath him, he was none too anxious to abandon his "Baby" either and was frantically working to restart the jet's engines when through his head set he heard, "LAUNCHPAD, LAUNCHPAD, COME IN, COME IN….ABANDUNE SHIP!!!!" it was Multi coming in over the radio connection.
He shook his head resolutely and answered back, "I can't abandon MY BABY! I'll get her going!"
Launchpad spared a tiny quick glance out through the windshield and downward and nervously swallowed, as he realized that Negaduck was trapped in his own plane.
Although the ejection charges had blown off the hatch in the Negaquack's cockpit, the net had caught the panel and twisted from the momentum of the explosion causing the Negaquack to spin and twist further ensnaring it as it fell.
For a second he even thought he could see Negaduck pressed against the windshield pounding on the clear glass with the butt of his gun.
Knowing he didn't want to be the cause of anyone, not even Negaduck dieing and still feeling confident in his plane, he added, "I can't leave even Negaduck to die! I'll get things going again Mark, don't worry, the Thunderquack hasn't let me down yet!"
Before Multi could offer any more argument, he heard the distinctive click sound over the radio, meaning that Launchpad had switched his receiver over to a different channel.
Multi was frantic, as was Coiley, who said, "Get us as close as you can and I'll try to free Negaduck, so Launchpad can eject!"
As the Impossi-jet closed the distance between them and the falling jets and when they were close enough, Coiley compressed his legs, let go and shot out of the Impossi-jet at high speed toward the falling planes, shouting "RALLY HO!"
As he approached the jets, he landed on the Negaquack's duck bill-like fuselage and started banging on the canopy, using the extreme strength in his coil arms, trying to smash the glass so he could grab Negaduck.
For his part Negaduck had almost immediately understood what happened when ejecting the hatch failed and had triggered the release on his seat belt, to begin trying to break the windshield.
Meanwhile Multiman was trying desperately to raise Launchpad on the radio since they were running out of airspace fast and it was his frantic pleas that had alerted Darkwing to the severity of the situation taking place, causing him to jam the gas peddle of the Ratcatcher down, racing to the scene as fast as he could.
When Coiley appeared Negaduck wasted no time gaping at the interloper, instead, he spun the handgun around and yelled at Coiley, "Be smart and MOVE, I'm breaking the canopy Do-gooder!"
Snarling in defiance of the messy, painful and most likely eminent death that he could see rushing up at them, Negaduck fired point blank at the windshield just beside Coiley who saw what was about to happen uttered, "Holy Handguns!" as he dodged to the side.
Negaduck had fired all seven bullets in the clip in a tiny pattern through the wrong side of the shatterproof glass.
Missing Coilman entirely and weakening the glass. The tiny holes provided enough give in the glass that it couldn't stand up to Coiley's powerful blows.
He was sprinkled with tiny shards of glass but being enveloped in his super costume Coiley was completely protected, including the hood and mask over his head and face.
Not having a personal communicator he couldn't contact Multi up in the Impossi-jet, but he did try yelling above the wind. Stretching out his coiled arms, Coilman reached in through the shattered glass, wrapped his arms tightly around Negaduck pinning the Masked Mallard of Menace, so he couldn't draw any more weapons and shouting again desperately hoping his team mate would hear, "I've got him Multi, I'm coming up! Tell Launchpad to eject!"
Using his tightly coiled legs, Coiley bounced up towards the Impossi-jet, Multi had been watching intently and seeing Coiley spring upward maneuvered quickly to catch him and the struggling villain in his arms.
Knowing that his team mate probably hadn't heard him, as he landed in the middle section of the jet, Coiley repeated, "Try Contacting Launchpad and tell him to eject, Now!"
The ground was coming up fast and as Multi was trying to raise Launchpad over the radio, suddenly Darkwing's voice broke into his transmission and Ordered, "LAUNCHPAD EGECT! The Impossibles HAVE Negaduck!"
The avian pilot was still trying to get the jet's engine to fire up.
The proximity alarm was sounding as was his emergency beacon warning Launchpad that his altitude was now too low to safely use the seat ejector but he didn't tell Darkwing that.
Knowing it was their only chance to save their avian friend, Multi had managed to swing under the Thunderquack.
Coiley realized as Multi had, that Launchpad had run out of time to safely eject, he started to release Negaduck to try go to Launchpad's rescue, but he remembered Negaduck's gun and couldn't risk the villain trying to harm his team mate, Multi had the nose of the powerful streamline jet under the Thunderquack's fuselage and the powerful engine whined in protest as the weight and mass of the two jets dragged all three vehicles toward their doom.
Darkwing's voice came over Launchpad's headset this time, as well as the Impossibles radio channel again, only this time it was much more demanding as he said, LP, EJECT…NOW!"
Muttering to himself Launchpad now hit the release on the net sending the Negaquack plummeting to the ground, Multi struggled to compensate for the suddenly lighter load, as the Thunderquack shot straight up from the momentum it gained as the Impossi-jet twisted and slid sideways smashing it's broad wing into the Thunderquack's stabilizer fin, breaking it off.
Launchpad pulled his ejection lever and the canopy blew off as his emergency thruster ignited sending him just clear of the now tumbling wreck of his jet.
The Impossibles reacted as the now damaged Impossi-jet wobbled out of control.
Multi hit the autopilot and duplicated himself, grabbing Coiley who kept a tight hold of Negaduck and they bailed out of the jet.
Multi's duplicates carried them safely towards the ground and Coiley, who trusted his team mate implicitly, looked up anxiously and was relieved to see Launchpad's parachute carrying him safely down as well.
Just as the Negaquack and Thunderquack hit, a contingent of emergency vehicles converged on the crash sight, to contain the blaze caused by the planes.
The Impossi-jet still shook and wobbled and it hit the ground with a terrible crunching sound, it WAS in a lot better shape than either of the other planes, since it hadn't caught on fire, however, the smoke and steam that came out from under the hood had both Impossibles thinking, 'Well, Mike's not going to be a happy camper about this!'
Their friend and the head mechanic of SSHQ, always reacted unhappily when the boys wreaked their car AND they really dreaded being face to face with Mike, knowing they were going to have a tough time explaining what had happened.
Seeing a crowd of Human like animals including birds, dogs and foxes made the two teens a little uncomfortable, until they saw Darkwing followed by large dark brown bear in a gray suit, as well as short owl-like fellow, coming out of the gathering crowd, who seemed to radiate calm, authority and who by his cool demeanor, reminded them both, of Big D.
Darkwing explained that this was Director James Gander Hooter, introducing him formally to Multiman and Coilman, as well as introducing the human teen super heroes to his Boss.
Darkwing and the other two Impossibles were relieved to know that Fluidman was fine and that the other members of the Fearsome five had all been taken into custody.
Officially of course, it would be best if they were discrete, but as far as S.H.U.S.H. was concerned, the Impossibles and their group were special guests of a foreign sister agency, until they could return home.
Darkwing and his team had already vouched for them and their invaluable assistance in capturing three members of the Fearsome Five, had already proven their worth, so they didn't need to worry.
Director Hooter Smiled kindly and added that Morgana Macabre, being a founding member of The Justice Ducks, a super hero team lead by Darkwing, was also an auxiliary member of S.H.U.S.H. which meant they would have help, to take care of the daily details, while S.H.U.S.H.'s best scientists helped young Honker, recreate his portal technology and repaired their machine to take The Impossibles home.
Handing each of the teens a small ID card, he nodded to them and said, "Keep those on your person at all times and stay close to Darkwing."
He nodded to Darkwing and then spoke for a few minutes to Launchpad who was barely holding back tears, as he saw the extent of the damage to his "Baby."
Fluey rushed up from one of the sedans and grabbed his team mates in a group hug, as Darkwing anxiously rushed over to Launchpad.
Launchpad, was staring at what was left of his jet and it's negaverse twin, looking lost and unhappy, while the medical team tried to make sure he wasn't seriously hurt.
Multi and the other Impossibles sighed, getting back to their dimension now, was going to be a real challenge.
Seeing that they and their avian friends had escaped serious injury and were in fact relatively unhurt, Fluey, Coiley and Multi, let out the collective breath they were holding and then all of them grimaced, telling the girls what had happened was going to be tricky.
"Thanks Mark, you and Calvin saved my life! Too bad we couldn't save the Thunderquack." Launchpad said, rubbing the sore spot on his shoulder.
The adrenaline from the near disaster was wearing off and his whole right side was now one big ache.
His harness that had kept him in the ejector seat had twisted slightly when a small piece of debris had struck the bottom of his chair and he was feeling the strain from the extra G forces since his parachute landing hadn't been his best.
"Your welcome Launchpad, after all, you and Darkwing saved me from Professor Stretch and The Spinner and I'm just happy your alright. Sorry about your jet, but You should get your shoulder looked at!" Multi replied.
"Well, out side of loosing the Thunderquack and your car needing repaires, I think we did pretty well considering we did save the masks and captured the Fearsome Five!" commented Darkwing.
Looking back at the pile of molten metal, Darkwing sympathetically patted his sidekick's shoulder, (the uninjured one) saying, "Don't worry LP, once we are able to get the Impossibles and the girls back where they belong, The Thunderquack will be our first priority."
First Agent Grizzlikof, had taken immediate custody of Negaduck and taken him to the Super Villain Prison for processing, the other four members of the gang had been escorted there a little earlier and as word was leaked through the grapevine, (literally, a grapevine had told Bushroot about Negaduck's capture, after the plant duck had recovered from the chemical cocktail Darkwing had used on him) so all of them were eagerly waiting for their Boss to arrive.
Meanwhile Darkwing, Launchpad, (after the S.H.U.S.H. medics had taken care of him) had left with their Trans-dimensional guests, aboard the only working piece of transportation left to them, the Ratcatcher, leaving J. Gander and his agents to cleanup the wreckage of the jets and transport them as well as the Impossi-Mobile, to The garage at HQ for safe keeping.
They headed back to Macabre Manor, Darkwing driving, Multi sitting behind him, with Launchpad and Coiley in the side car and Fluey half transformed into his liquid state, flying alongside the motorcycle. This sight suceeded in stopping traffic as they raced through the middle of town.
Most St. Canardians had never seen such an unusual sight as these super hero humans, as well as Darkwing and his sidekick. The heros meantime were busy trying to think of a way to minimize the drama, when they had to recound their recent battles, with the Fearsome Five.
Darkwing didn't want to get his daughter or anyone else all upset again, after what had happened already, with the museum, as well as the potion incident, so he suggested that they pretty much play down the parts where the situation, had gotten perilous, the less said about anything life threatening the better.
The only thing they would have trouble with, was explaining the loss of the Thunderquack and why the Impossi-Mobile was itself, in pretty bad shape, although to be honest, there weren't too many times when the Impossibles were fighting crime, when they didn't get their car wrecked in some way or other.
As they arrived, at the main gate to Morgana's house, Darkwing was saying to the others. "We have to play it cool, so we don't get everyone upset." They parked the Ratcatcher and headed for the front door......
End of chapter 19.
Authors notes, *latin term, meaning the Nose, Nostrils, or nasal passages.*