A/N: To answer some questions ahead of time...the reason I have Morgana
teleporting herself in this chapter even though the four of them used a
portal in the last chapter is because I figure she probably wouldn't feel
comfortable transporting a group of people. Oh, and the song "How to
Handle a Woman" from Camelot inspired a little paragraph in this!
Anyway...hope you all enjoy! Thanks so much for reviewing!
-------
After seeing to it that Gosalyn arrived at the Muddlefoots', the remaining three ducks backtracked two blocks to Al's House of Amusement, a small, independent toy manufacturer, where they found Al preparing to close up shop for the evening. Darkwing managed to convinced the proprietor to allow them to stake out inside the store until the 'pilfering perpetrators pounced!'.
They waited in an uncomfortable silence, Launchpad making sure to steer as clear of the couple as he could. Neither of the temperamental two had spoken a word to one another since the tiff on the sidewalk, and the pilot had the feeling that Morgana had come along more out of a wish to spite Darkwing than a desire to see what Archie was up to. The minutes ticked by slowly; after about half an hour, Launchpad sat down at a nearby display table and started up a game of checkers against himself in the nearly-dark room. Soon afterwards, Darkwing joined him, leaving Morgana leaning against the wall with Eek and Squeak (who had emerged from the witch's hair) flapping around her head.
"A-HA! King me!" Darkwing announced after another twenty minutes of playing in near silence. By this time, Morgana had sat down on a stool behind the counter and begun doodling cobwebs in the corners of some paper lying there. Launchpad frowned, squinting at the board.
"Uh, DW, I'm pretty sure that was your own piece you just jumped..." he said, pointing to the game piece in question. Darkwing did a double take, then leaned down to squint at the board as well. Seeing that his sidekick was right, he frowned.
"Checkers is a stupid game, anyway," he grumbled, pushing his chair back from the table. He heard an exclamation of something between annoyance and disbelief come from Morgana's direction. "What!?" he asked, indignant.
"You think any game's stupid when you're not winning, Darkwing," she answered, not looking up from her doodling. He scowled.
"Look who's talking, miss 'Whiffleboy is a childish game because I can't understand it'," he retorted mockingly.
"Nooo, I said Whiffleboy is childish because you act like a two year old when you lose. I never said anything about not understanding it," she snapped back, rising from the stool to jab his shoulder with her finger.
"Same thing!" he replied, his tone almost taunting.
"It is not!"
"Is too!"
"Is not!"
"Is too!"
"Is—what am I DOING!?" Morgana finally exclaimed, shaking her head. "I am not going to stand here and argue with you over something so petty!"
"You always argue over something petty," he grumbled under his breath. Immediately, he realized he had stepped over the line; whether he was tipped off by the changed expression on Morgana's face or the sudden clap of thunder that shook the building was hard to say. He winced. "Um...I mean..."
"I think I know quite well what you mean, Darkwing," she snapped. "And I'm not going to stand here and listen to you any longer. Futhermore, I don't think there's even going to BE a robbery tonight. So much for your 'deductive reasoning'." There was a short silence, then she went on to announce, "I'm going home."
"Morg...honeywumpus..." he began, but before he could get any farther, his girlfriend disappeared into thin air. "I hate it when she does that!" he exclaimed, slamming his fedora down on the table and scattering the checkers in the process. Launchpad said nothing. "What does she want me to do, anyway? I mean, she can't expect me just to give in during every argument we have!"
"Well...maybe it wouldn't hurt to give in once in a while..." Launchpad began hesitantly.
"I don't know how to handle her!" the masked mallard continued, not listening to his sidekick. "I mean, I've tried flattering, pleading, threatening..." he trailed off. "Actually, she's the one who does the threatening," he corrected, then sighed. "I guess nobody knows how to handle a woman."
"Gee, DW...I haven't had all that much experience, but I remember Dad once told me that the best way to handle a woman isn't really that complicated." Launchpad replied, shrugging his shoulders. Darkwing frowned.
"Your dad never had to deal with Morgana Macawber," he grumbled, then paused. "Erm...what did he tell you, anyway?"
"Well, Dad said the best way to handle a woman is just to love her. Y'know, just for who she is, even if she's wrong sometimes," Launchpad advised. Darkwing blinked, somewhat dumbfounded; he wasn't used to hearing philosophical ideas come out of the big duck's mouth. Not ones that made sense, anyway. "I guess apologizin' a little wouldn't hurt, either," the pilot added.
"I guess..." Darkwing said, a little doubtfully. He sighed, looking around the toy store. "Come on, LP...let's go get the Thunderquack and patrol a little. Morgana's right...I don't think there's going to be any robbery here tonight, after all."
"Okie dokie," Launchpad replied, glad to have something else to do. The two crimefighters headed out the front doors of the shop, making sure it was locked tight behind them.
"Maybe I really should go apologize to Morg while we're getting the plane..." Darkwing mused aloud as they walked. Launchpad didn't reply; even if he had, another sudden crack of thunder from above would have drowned out his reply. "Sheesh, you'd think she'd have gotten that out of her system by now..."
"Hey, DW, look!" Launchpad exclaimed as they were about to round the corner; out of the corner of his eye, the pilot had caught side of a shadowy figure standing in front of Al's House of Amusement.
"Aha! We've got 'em!" Darkwing immediately sprang into action, creeping back to the store among the shadows and alleyways, his gas gun drawn. By the time they got close enough to peer around the corner of the store, the figure had already gotten inside.
"I thought we locked the door," Launchpad whispered, gesturing to the front door, which was standing wide open with no apparent signs of a forced entry. Darkwing frowned.
"We did...hey, look! There's Archie!" he exclaimed in a hiss, pointing to the open doorway. Sure enough, the large, brown spider was busy spinning a web that spanned the entire entranceway, top to bottom. And he wasn't alone.
"Who's that?" Launchpad asked, indicating the second spider. As big as Archie, the spider's brown coat was peppered with grey, her lips were painted an almost gaudy shade of red...and a set of miniature pink hair rollers were on top of her head. As they watched, Archie must have bungled a piece of webbing, because the second spider grumbled at him in a slightly higher pitched tone than Archie used and started wagging her front foot at him, scolding.
"Gotta be his mom," Darkwing muttered. "Come on, let's see if we can't get a closer look inside."
The duo edged around the corner a bit farther until they could easily see inside the front windows without being noticed by the two spiders, who were lost in their own work. Darkwing blanched slightly at the image visible through the window. The only light was a faint green glow coming from an orb suspended in mid-air, and silhouetted in the glow was the shape of a too-familiar female figure.
"Morgana?" he whispered, brows knitting in confusion. The tight, floor- length dress, the upswept hairdo...
"DW, aren't you going to stop her?" Launchpad asked quietly, nudging the hero. Wordlessly, Darkwing pressed his hands to the glass, watching as the green orb glowed brighter; it was some form of portal, and it was getting bigger. The toys on the shelves began to fly into the portal, seemingly of their own accord. Once the store was empty, the spherical portal shrunk to the size of a marble, then swelled again until it was once more roughly the size of a beach ball. The same brand of morbid toys they had seen at the other robbed toy places began filling up the shelves until the whole place was restocked. Her back still slightly turned towards the front of the store, the sorceress shrunk the portal a second time and drew it towards her outstretched hand, where it floated for a moment above her palm before winking out of sight completely.
"DW, she's gonna get away!" Launchpad exclaimed...a little too loudly. The spiders in the doorway heard him, and immediately began to attract the attention of the witch inside. She looked to them, then snapped her head towards the doorway for an instant before disappearing in a quick flash of light. The spiders scuttled away down the sidewalk out of sight. Launchpad cringed a little. "Heh...whoops?"
"I don't' believe this," Darkwing announced, still looking dumbfounded as he finally turned away from the shop window. "I mean...Morgana's never outright lied to me before...sure, she's omitted the truth a little bit at times..."
"Maybe she just couldn't give up bein' a criminal," Launchpad suggested, clapping a supportive hand on the hero's shoulder.
"Dark!" a voice called behind them, and they turned around. Morgana had appeared a few feet away and was floating towards them, her hands clasped anxiously. "Dark, I just went home, and I can't find Archie anywhere...the police finally gave up and left, and there were no signs of anyone else being in the house, but Archie's just gone! He didn't even leave a note!" She paused, realizing that the crimefighting duo was staring at her, slightly dumbfounded. "...what?"
"But...but..." Darkwing stuttered, looking from his girlfriend to the robbed toy store.
"We just saw you in there!" Launchpad finished for him. Morgana frowned.
"What? That's impossible! I've been at home searching the house for Archie!" she insisted. Neither of them looked convinced, and her frown deepened. "Now honestly, how could I be in two places at once?"
"You're the magic expert. You tell us," Darkwing grumbled, sounding a little hurt.
"Dark! Why won't you believe me?" she asked, equally hurt. He sighed.
"Because we SAW you, Morgana!" he replied, the paused. "Unless there's another shape shifting scoundrel in town trying to frame you..."
"Why don't we check out the security cameras, DW?" Launchpad asked.
"No, I have a better idea! We'll check out the security cameras!" Darkwing exclaimed triumphantly. Morgana and Launchpad exchanged glances, then shook their heads. "Launchpad! Go and get the Thunderquack and take it back to the tower. We'll meet you at home after we get the tape."
"What am I supposed to do about Archie?" Morgana asked as the pilot headed off down the sidewalk.
"Morg...I hate to break this to you, but we DID get a good look at the spiders who spun that, and one of them was definately Archie," Darkwing began gently. "Maybe he used one of the doorways to get out of the house..."
"He couldn't have gone through a portal...I locked them all before we left!" Morgana insisted.
"Did you lock the one we used after we'd gone through it?"
"...oops."
"Come on, let's get that tape," Darkwing said, then looked at the web in the doorway. "Erm...Morg, you mind getting rid of this? I'm all out of glue solvent."
Shrugging, the witch waved her hands, and the web promptly burst into flames. "Darn, that wasn't exactly what I was going for..." she muttered, watching as the burning silk fell away from the frame.
"Hey, it works," he said, shrugging. The two of them stepped inside, and Darkwing set to work getting the security tapes.
"Look at this!" Morgana called, picking a box up off the shelves. "'Death'! I haven't played this in years..."
"Got it!" Darkwing said, holding up the tape triumphantly. "Come on, Morg, let's go." He paused halfway to the door, getting no response from the witch. "Morg?" He looked back to see her standing in an aisle way, holding a box with a confused expression on her face. "What's wrong?"
"This doll..." she said, frowning. "It looks exactly like the one I had when I was a little girl..."
"Now do you understand why I suspected you?" he asked. "Whoever's planting these toys must be getting them from a company in Transylvania."
"No, not this one...I've never seen one like this in stores. Mine was handmade for me," she replied, a little distantly. He frowned and gently pulled the box out of her hands, setting it back on the shelf.
"Come on, we'll get to the bottom of all this once we watch the tape," he reassured.
-------------
After changing out of his Darkwing costume and picking Gosalyn up at the Muddlefoots, Drake put the tape in the VCR and rewound it a little ways.
"I'm gonna go make some popcorn!" Gosalyn called, bounding into the kitchen. Drake shrugged and pressed play on the tape.
"Shouldn't we wait for Launchpad to get back?" Morgana asked, sitting down on the couch.
"Naw...we'll probably have to watch this more than once to pick anything up from it," he replied, taking the seat beside her. After a moment of hesitation, he put his arm around her; he knew that if she was still mad, she'd probably singe him for that. Instead, she smiled a little and snuggled closer to him, then turned her attention to the television.
The tape was black and white, and a little fuzzy, but they could still clearly make out the glow of the portal and the shapely silhouette of the robber. "But...that's not me, I was at home..." Morgana murmured, frowning at the screen. They continued to watch in silence for a few moments, the only sound that of popcorn popping in the kitchen.
"Here's when you...I mean, when she heard us," Drake commented, pointing to the screen. The figure half-turned, and from the camera's angle, more of her face was visible than what Launchpad and Darkwing had seen from the window. Morgana's own face paled a little; seconds later, the figure on the tape disappeared, and Drake pressed the stop button on the remote.
"You've got to admit, honeywumpus...it DOES look a lot like you..." he began. "Of course, looking at the tape again, whoever that was had lighter hair...and, thinking back, I'm not really sure her dress was as red as yours..."
"It was purple," Morgana replied. Drake blinked.
"How can you tell? The tape was black and white...although now that you mention it, I guess it might have been purple..." he began slowly. The sorceress didn't seem to be listening, lost in her own thoughts.
"That would explain why Archie's mother is involved in this," Morgana said quietly, her hands resting limply in her lap.
"What? How?" he questioned, frowning.
"Because she was once a familiar to another member of my family. A long time ago," she replied cryptically, rising to float across the room to the bay window. The sky outside was still a grey-blue hue, and thunder rumbled low in the distance.
"Well? Who!? Spit it out!" Drake insisted, his patience was growing thin. He wanted this case solved, and he wanted it solved right away, before it caused any more problems between him and his girlfriend. Silent for a few long moments, Morgana crossed her arms over her chest and stared not at the clouds outside, but at her own reflection in the glass. The grey-blue sky seemed to somehow blend with the red of her dress, making it appear as a dark purple color in the glass. In the reflection, she looked a great deal like the woman Drake had seen robbing the toy store...and, suddenly, he realized that he had seen the image before, yet he couldn't quite place where. He moved to stand behind her, reaching up to place a hand on her shoulder and repeating, not quite so demandingly, "Who was Archie's mother a familiar to, Morg?"
His girlfriend moved her gaze from her own reflection to his, meeting the image of his eyes in the glass for a moment before looking back out at the sky once more.
"My mother."
-------
After seeing to it that Gosalyn arrived at the Muddlefoots', the remaining three ducks backtracked two blocks to Al's House of Amusement, a small, independent toy manufacturer, where they found Al preparing to close up shop for the evening. Darkwing managed to convinced the proprietor to allow them to stake out inside the store until the 'pilfering perpetrators pounced!'.
They waited in an uncomfortable silence, Launchpad making sure to steer as clear of the couple as he could. Neither of the temperamental two had spoken a word to one another since the tiff on the sidewalk, and the pilot had the feeling that Morgana had come along more out of a wish to spite Darkwing than a desire to see what Archie was up to. The minutes ticked by slowly; after about half an hour, Launchpad sat down at a nearby display table and started up a game of checkers against himself in the nearly-dark room. Soon afterwards, Darkwing joined him, leaving Morgana leaning against the wall with Eek and Squeak (who had emerged from the witch's hair) flapping around her head.
"A-HA! King me!" Darkwing announced after another twenty minutes of playing in near silence. By this time, Morgana had sat down on a stool behind the counter and begun doodling cobwebs in the corners of some paper lying there. Launchpad frowned, squinting at the board.
"Uh, DW, I'm pretty sure that was your own piece you just jumped..." he said, pointing to the game piece in question. Darkwing did a double take, then leaned down to squint at the board as well. Seeing that his sidekick was right, he frowned.
"Checkers is a stupid game, anyway," he grumbled, pushing his chair back from the table. He heard an exclamation of something between annoyance and disbelief come from Morgana's direction. "What!?" he asked, indignant.
"You think any game's stupid when you're not winning, Darkwing," she answered, not looking up from her doodling. He scowled.
"Look who's talking, miss 'Whiffleboy is a childish game because I can't understand it'," he retorted mockingly.
"Nooo, I said Whiffleboy is childish because you act like a two year old when you lose. I never said anything about not understanding it," she snapped back, rising from the stool to jab his shoulder with her finger.
"Same thing!" he replied, his tone almost taunting.
"It is not!"
"Is too!"
"Is not!"
"Is too!"
"Is—what am I DOING!?" Morgana finally exclaimed, shaking her head. "I am not going to stand here and argue with you over something so petty!"
"You always argue over something petty," he grumbled under his breath. Immediately, he realized he had stepped over the line; whether he was tipped off by the changed expression on Morgana's face or the sudden clap of thunder that shook the building was hard to say. He winced. "Um...I mean..."
"I think I know quite well what you mean, Darkwing," she snapped. "And I'm not going to stand here and listen to you any longer. Futhermore, I don't think there's even going to BE a robbery tonight. So much for your 'deductive reasoning'." There was a short silence, then she went on to announce, "I'm going home."
"Morg...honeywumpus..." he began, but before he could get any farther, his girlfriend disappeared into thin air. "I hate it when she does that!" he exclaimed, slamming his fedora down on the table and scattering the checkers in the process. Launchpad said nothing. "What does she want me to do, anyway? I mean, she can't expect me just to give in during every argument we have!"
"Well...maybe it wouldn't hurt to give in once in a while..." Launchpad began hesitantly.
"I don't know how to handle her!" the masked mallard continued, not listening to his sidekick. "I mean, I've tried flattering, pleading, threatening..." he trailed off. "Actually, she's the one who does the threatening," he corrected, then sighed. "I guess nobody knows how to handle a woman."
"Gee, DW...I haven't had all that much experience, but I remember Dad once told me that the best way to handle a woman isn't really that complicated." Launchpad replied, shrugging his shoulders. Darkwing frowned.
"Your dad never had to deal with Morgana Macawber," he grumbled, then paused. "Erm...what did he tell you, anyway?"
"Well, Dad said the best way to handle a woman is just to love her. Y'know, just for who she is, even if she's wrong sometimes," Launchpad advised. Darkwing blinked, somewhat dumbfounded; he wasn't used to hearing philosophical ideas come out of the big duck's mouth. Not ones that made sense, anyway. "I guess apologizin' a little wouldn't hurt, either," the pilot added.
"I guess..." Darkwing said, a little doubtfully. He sighed, looking around the toy store. "Come on, LP...let's go get the Thunderquack and patrol a little. Morgana's right...I don't think there's going to be any robbery here tonight, after all."
"Okie dokie," Launchpad replied, glad to have something else to do. The two crimefighters headed out the front doors of the shop, making sure it was locked tight behind them.
"Maybe I really should go apologize to Morg while we're getting the plane..." Darkwing mused aloud as they walked. Launchpad didn't reply; even if he had, another sudden crack of thunder from above would have drowned out his reply. "Sheesh, you'd think she'd have gotten that out of her system by now..."
"Hey, DW, look!" Launchpad exclaimed as they were about to round the corner; out of the corner of his eye, the pilot had caught side of a shadowy figure standing in front of Al's House of Amusement.
"Aha! We've got 'em!" Darkwing immediately sprang into action, creeping back to the store among the shadows and alleyways, his gas gun drawn. By the time they got close enough to peer around the corner of the store, the figure had already gotten inside.
"I thought we locked the door," Launchpad whispered, gesturing to the front door, which was standing wide open with no apparent signs of a forced entry. Darkwing frowned.
"We did...hey, look! There's Archie!" he exclaimed in a hiss, pointing to the open doorway. Sure enough, the large, brown spider was busy spinning a web that spanned the entire entranceway, top to bottom. And he wasn't alone.
"Who's that?" Launchpad asked, indicating the second spider. As big as Archie, the spider's brown coat was peppered with grey, her lips were painted an almost gaudy shade of red...and a set of miniature pink hair rollers were on top of her head. As they watched, Archie must have bungled a piece of webbing, because the second spider grumbled at him in a slightly higher pitched tone than Archie used and started wagging her front foot at him, scolding.
"Gotta be his mom," Darkwing muttered. "Come on, let's see if we can't get a closer look inside."
The duo edged around the corner a bit farther until they could easily see inside the front windows without being noticed by the two spiders, who were lost in their own work. Darkwing blanched slightly at the image visible through the window. The only light was a faint green glow coming from an orb suspended in mid-air, and silhouetted in the glow was the shape of a too-familiar female figure.
"Morgana?" he whispered, brows knitting in confusion. The tight, floor- length dress, the upswept hairdo...
"DW, aren't you going to stop her?" Launchpad asked quietly, nudging the hero. Wordlessly, Darkwing pressed his hands to the glass, watching as the green orb glowed brighter; it was some form of portal, and it was getting bigger. The toys on the shelves began to fly into the portal, seemingly of their own accord. Once the store was empty, the spherical portal shrunk to the size of a marble, then swelled again until it was once more roughly the size of a beach ball. The same brand of morbid toys they had seen at the other robbed toy places began filling up the shelves until the whole place was restocked. Her back still slightly turned towards the front of the store, the sorceress shrunk the portal a second time and drew it towards her outstretched hand, where it floated for a moment above her palm before winking out of sight completely.
"DW, she's gonna get away!" Launchpad exclaimed...a little too loudly. The spiders in the doorway heard him, and immediately began to attract the attention of the witch inside. She looked to them, then snapped her head towards the doorway for an instant before disappearing in a quick flash of light. The spiders scuttled away down the sidewalk out of sight. Launchpad cringed a little. "Heh...whoops?"
"I don't' believe this," Darkwing announced, still looking dumbfounded as he finally turned away from the shop window. "I mean...Morgana's never outright lied to me before...sure, she's omitted the truth a little bit at times..."
"Maybe she just couldn't give up bein' a criminal," Launchpad suggested, clapping a supportive hand on the hero's shoulder.
"Dark!" a voice called behind them, and they turned around. Morgana had appeared a few feet away and was floating towards them, her hands clasped anxiously. "Dark, I just went home, and I can't find Archie anywhere...the police finally gave up and left, and there were no signs of anyone else being in the house, but Archie's just gone! He didn't even leave a note!" She paused, realizing that the crimefighting duo was staring at her, slightly dumbfounded. "...what?"
"But...but..." Darkwing stuttered, looking from his girlfriend to the robbed toy store.
"We just saw you in there!" Launchpad finished for him. Morgana frowned.
"What? That's impossible! I've been at home searching the house for Archie!" she insisted. Neither of them looked convinced, and her frown deepened. "Now honestly, how could I be in two places at once?"
"You're the magic expert. You tell us," Darkwing grumbled, sounding a little hurt.
"Dark! Why won't you believe me?" she asked, equally hurt. He sighed.
"Because we SAW you, Morgana!" he replied, the paused. "Unless there's another shape shifting scoundrel in town trying to frame you..."
"Why don't we check out the security cameras, DW?" Launchpad asked.
"No, I have a better idea! We'll check out the security cameras!" Darkwing exclaimed triumphantly. Morgana and Launchpad exchanged glances, then shook their heads. "Launchpad! Go and get the Thunderquack and take it back to the tower. We'll meet you at home after we get the tape."
"What am I supposed to do about Archie?" Morgana asked as the pilot headed off down the sidewalk.
"Morg...I hate to break this to you, but we DID get a good look at the spiders who spun that, and one of them was definately Archie," Darkwing began gently. "Maybe he used one of the doorways to get out of the house..."
"He couldn't have gone through a portal...I locked them all before we left!" Morgana insisted.
"Did you lock the one we used after we'd gone through it?"
"...oops."
"Come on, let's get that tape," Darkwing said, then looked at the web in the doorway. "Erm...Morg, you mind getting rid of this? I'm all out of glue solvent."
Shrugging, the witch waved her hands, and the web promptly burst into flames. "Darn, that wasn't exactly what I was going for..." she muttered, watching as the burning silk fell away from the frame.
"Hey, it works," he said, shrugging. The two of them stepped inside, and Darkwing set to work getting the security tapes.
"Look at this!" Morgana called, picking a box up off the shelves. "'Death'! I haven't played this in years..."
"Got it!" Darkwing said, holding up the tape triumphantly. "Come on, Morg, let's go." He paused halfway to the door, getting no response from the witch. "Morg?" He looked back to see her standing in an aisle way, holding a box with a confused expression on her face. "What's wrong?"
"This doll..." she said, frowning. "It looks exactly like the one I had when I was a little girl..."
"Now do you understand why I suspected you?" he asked. "Whoever's planting these toys must be getting them from a company in Transylvania."
"No, not this one...I've never seen one like this in stores. Mine was handmade for me," she replied, a little distantly. He frowned and gently pulled the box out of her hands, setting it back on the shelf.
"Come on, we'll get to the bottom of all this once we watch the tape," he reassured.
-------------
After changing out of his Darkwing costume and picking Gosalyn up at the Muddlefoots, Drake put the tape in the VCR and rewound it a little ways.
"I'm gonna go make some popcorn!" Gosalyn called, bounding into the kitchen. Drake shrugged and pressed play on the tape.
"Shouldn't we wait for Launchpad to get back?" Morgana asked, sitting down on the couch.
"Naw...we'll probably have to watch this more than once to pick anything up from it," he replied, taking the seat beside her. After a moment of hesitation, he put his arm around her; he knew that if she was still mad, she'd probably singe him for that. Instead, she smiled a little and snuggled closer to him, then turned her attention to the television.
The tape was black and white, and a little fuzzy, but they could still clearly make out the glow of the portal and the shapely silhouette of the robber. "But...that's not me, I was at home..." Morgana murmured, frowning at the screen. They continued to watch in silence for a few moments, the only sound that of popcorn popping in the kitchen.
"Here's when you...I mean, when she heard us," Drake commented, pointing to the screen. The figure half-turned, and from the camera's angle, more of her face was visible than what Launchpad and Darkwing had seen from the window. Morgana's own face paled a little; seconds later, the figure on the tape disappeared, and Drake pressed the stop button on the remote.
"You've got to admit, honeywumpus...it DOES look a lot like you..." he began. "Of course, looking at the tape again, whoever that was had lighter hair...and, thinking back, I'm not really sure her dress was as red as yours..."
"It was purple," Morgana replied. Drake blinked.
"How can you tell? The tape was black and white...although now that you mention it, I guess it might have been purple..." he began slowly. The sorceress didn't seem to be listening, lost in her own thoughts.
"That would explain why Archie's mother is involved in this," Morgana said quietly, her hands resting limply in her lap.
"What? How?" he questioned, frowning.
"Because she was once a familiar to another member of my family. A long time ago," she replied cryptically, rising to float across the room to the bay window. The sky outside was still a grey-blue hue, and thunder rumbled low in the distance.
"Well? Who!? Spit it out!" Drake insisted, his patience was growing thin. He wanted this case solved, and he wanted it solved right away, before it caused any more problems between him and his girlfriend. Silent for a few long moments, Morgana crossed her arms over her chest and stared not at the clouds outside, but at her own reflection in the glass. The grey-blue sky seemed to somehow blend with the red of her dress, making it appear as a dark purple color in the glass. In the reflection, she looked a great deal like the woman Drake had seen robbing the toy store...and, suddenly, he realized that he had seen the image before, yet he couldn't quite place where. He moved to stand behind her, reaching up to place a hand on her shoulder and repeating, not quite so demandingly, "Who was Archie's mother a familiar to, Morg?"
His girlfriend moved her gaze from her own reflection to his, meeting the image of his eyes in the glass for a moment before looking back out at the sky once more.
"My mother."