A/n: No ownership, only story.

And the Rest is History

37

Vampires in Duckburg

It was nighttime. The sound of gunfire rang through the air, echoing off the exterior wall of the warehouse. The fight was outside a small unmarked side door under the light of the nearby street post. Scrooge McDuck in his red outfit and top hat, Mrs Beakley in her usual grey, the shining white metal of Gizmoduck and two security guards in uniforms were fending off four vampires.

As Beakley risked using the crossbow, a vampire grabbed her. Scrooge landed the stake and the vampire disintegrated, leaving Mrs Beakley standing free in a cloud of dust. She raised the crossbow and let fly a bolt making another dust cloud just behind him.
"Crikey, Moe!"
"Leg it!"

Another gun shot. Scrooge spun around watching the last two vampires zipping out of sight. Gizmoduck gave chase. "Ach."

"Darn!" Mrs Beakley gritted having raised her reloaded crossbow to see nothing in her sights. "They took off too fast."
"I swear I winged that guy!" One of the guards exclaimed.
"It doona take 'em long to heal." Scrooge grumbled, "Cowards."
Mrs Beakley cleared her throat and dusted herself off.
Scrooge stared into the distance the way they'd disappeared. "So they've gone to ground and we won't hear of them for another three nights."

Mrs Beakley sighed. "Most unsatisfactory."

Gizmoduck shortly returned, apologetic. "Sorry sir. Their heat signatures have stopped registering."
"At least you can see them when they attack now, Gizmoduck. I'm calling that progress. We'll leave you to hold the fort," Scrooge directed. "Mrs Beakley and I will try to dig up information on where these 'Busy Signals' came from."

"Um, 'Busy Signal', sir?" Gizmoduck frowned at him. "That sounds rather..."
"S.H.U.S.H. identifies four types of vampire," Mrs Beakley explained, "and these two bear the classic behavioural characteristics of the 'Busy Signal' variety. They're not Hotheads since they ran; they're not Loners; and Lurkers don't attack out in the open."

"In which case they're up to something to do with what's in this warehouse." Scrooge finished. "Mrs Beakley and I will go home and try to figure out what that is. Then we can try heading them off tomorrow night rather than wait three days while they get their number up again."
"Very good sir. Can I offer you two a lift?"
"I'd rather walk to try to clear my lungs." Mrs Beakley refused. "It's a very dusty job."
"Thank you, Gizmoduck." Scrooge smiled at him, "Keep scanning for those heat signatures and we'll see you again tomorrow night."

"Yes sir."

Mrs Beakley and Scrooge McDuck made their way home.

"I think we can't deny the fact now." Mrs Beakley stated, "They must have established a nest here somewhere."
Scrooge felt grim. "Aye, it's too many nights now."
"They drifted in easy enough; you'd think they'd 'drift off'." Beakley uttered in mild annoyance.
"What a sight seeing 'em scarper like that. The moment they realised they were losing they turned tail."
"Yes," Beakley agreed, "It's very distinctive behaviour. We certainly don't have to keep counting our shadows for this lot."
"Nor bushes..."

There was silence between them for several house lengths.

"Are you still checking?" She asked presently.
"Aye." He confessed. "I cannae help it."
"Then let us be 'paranoid' together." She concluded with a lark.

They walked their way back to the McDuck Manor in bitter-sweet victory.

"Next time we need to focus our attack on those two." Scrooge muttered taking up the steps. "They're the instigators."
"From Swinston, judging by their accents."
"Aye. Let's see if we can track 'em back."

By the porch's light, the pair did one last count of their shadows before opening the door and stepping inside.

Webby in her pink dress, hair clip and grey sweater came racing down the stairs and straight into Mrs Beakley's arms for a hug. "All clear, Grammy." She reported.
Mrs Beakley smiled down at her granddaughter before looking up to Scrooge. "Some hot chocolate, I think is in order. Sir?"
Scrooge nodded with a smile, "Aye, sounds grand. I'll be in the study looking into this."

As he passed by the TV room, Scrooge heard the sound of the TV blaring; a swashbuckling adventure in full swing. Della was in there with the boys, yelling excitedly at the screen with them.

While his computer booted up, Scrooge looked at his phone for the number to call to get to Swinston Police Department. Scrooge lodged the enquiry over the phone with Swinston's night watch operator and settled to looking through the town's public records and news articles at his desk.

Mrs Beakley came in with the tray bearing three mugs. Webby followed and played with the globe in the corner for a moment.

"Swinston's a long way away," Webby observed.

"Funny thing with vampires." Scrooge frowned, turning off his screen. "The more carnage they make the more travelling they've got to do."
"Oh, that's bad!" Webby understood. "Why Duckburg, though? Why not a big city to make it harder for us to track them? There'd be a stack of warehouses in St Canard. No way we'd even stand a chance at stopping them stealing the stuff they want."
"Duckburg is roughly the same size as Swinston, Webby." Mrs Beakley compared as she handed Scrooge his hot chocolate.

"The feel of the familiar." Scrooge considered that. "We're all creatures of habit."
"And we deal with them according to those habits." Mrs Beakley added in a firm tone, "I would say we should be able to give a description to the Swinston police and see about their names and their criminal profiles."
"Aye." Scrooge agreed, "Already called them. We should get an answer back in the morning."

"Busy Signals are pretty rare." Webby considered. "What are they busy 'doing' I wonder?"
Scrooge tapped the phone on his desk. "I've given Swinston police department's night shift people a description of the two. Whatever they were doing before they got turned into vampires is what they'll be trying to do now."

Webby sat down in a spare sitting chair with her hot chocolate. "Vampires are so much cooler in books."
Scrooge raised an eyebrow at Webby as he sipped his drink, "Oh?"
"Like, there was this one vampire; he sucked up all the spare life energy around him and whammed it really hard at the other guy he was fighting. The whole story he barely even bit anyone." She shrugged, "If I was going to be a vampire, I'd want to be 'that' guy."
Scrooge stared at her, "Aye, Webby, that's a very powerful vampire for sure. How did they beat him in that story?"
"Oh, they didn't." She shrugged lightly. "He won."
Scrooge glanced at Mrs Beakley in the other sitting chair, drinking her own hot chocolate. He looked back to Webby. "That's certainly something to think about... right before bed..."
"At least it puts our real problems in perspective." Mrs Beakley returned. "We certainly aren't dealing with anything of epic proportions in Duckburg. We have two vampires trying to break into a warehouse full of farming machinery."
"True." McDuck agreed, still feeling a might disconcerted by Webby's overpowered vampire story.

"Thank you, Mrs Beakley, it's a very nice hot chocolate." He at last stated.
"There's not much more we can do tonight." Mrs Beakley noted. "Hopefully Swinston PD will have something back to us in the morning."

"Aye..."

Scrooge was still caught, trying to imagine the scene he'd just been told of. "Wouldn't you rather a story with a happy ending, Webby?"
Webby blinked, "It was happy. Sort of." She frowned, "There's not a whole lot of non-fiction in the vampire category... It's mostly just romance."

Scrooge widened his eyes and slowly shook his head. "I doona wanna know about any of that, lass."
"Speaking as a ten year old," Webby declared, "Neither do I. That's why I always ask the librarian first."

They finished their drinks.

"Off to bed now, Webby." Mrs Beakley prompted.
"Good night, young Webbigail." Scrooge smiled at her as Webby put her mug on the tray. "You did a splendid job on lookout tonight, lass; thank you."
Webby beamed at him, "Oh, heh. No worries, Mr McDuck! Goodnight." She trotted out.

Mrs Beakley looked at him as she put the mugs on the tray, "Sir, S.H.U.S.H. has never encountered a vampire of that sort of caliber. In every case the vampire drank blood. Vampires don't suck on 'life energy'. It's simple fiction."

"Doona worry about me, Bentina." He gave her a smile. "Get yourself some rest."
"Well, one can't say I didn't try." She took the tray. "Good night, sir."

Scrooge sat back in his chair, his brow furrowed in thought.