Chapter 2

Drake straightened his tie in the mirror by the front door, adjusting his collar and running his hands over the lapels on his jacket, smoothing them down and brushing bits of lint off of them. Ever since his accident, he'd taken extra care with his appearance, usually only going out in a tie, even if he was only going to visit Launchpad for the afternoon. I'm so slow crossing the street that if I get hit by a car, I want to leave a pretty corpse, Drake had reasoned to Jack when the boy had asked why his grandfather insisted on dressing up before leaving the house. In reality, his appearance was one of the few things Drake could still control. If he couldn't control his vision or how well he could walk, he could at least control how well-groomed he looked whenever he went out.

He locked the front door behind him and began to walk towards the outskirts of town where Launchpad ran a small pilot shop in a rarely visited old strip mall. Drake wasn't entirely sure why Launchpad had felt that their city needed something like a pilot shop, and the rest of the populace seemed to feel the same way, seeing as how most of the customers Launchpad ever got were the mere curious who were not looking to buy anything. Drake had to admire his friend's spirit; he knew it didn't matter one way or another to Launchpad if he didn't sell one thing all day. What mattered was having a place to go every day, and being in a place that was stockpiled with the tools of the trade Launchpad loved so well.

This made the pilot shop an excellent spot for Drake and LP to hang out together. The dusty shelves and empty parking lots made the shop seem like a secret only the two of them knew about.

The only reason Drake forced himself to walk was because he knew he would lose whatever ability he had to walk if he did not use that ability whenever possible, but he did normally stop and rest in a park about a block away from the shop. Knowing and respecting his physical limits had been an acquired skill, one his pride still struggled with on occasion. Drake arrived at the park and plopped down onto a park bench, sighing softly, and looking across the street at the police station. He knew every square inch of that building.

The police had never taken Drake seriously, even though he was often times the only person who could apprehend any criminal shrewder than a simple pickpocket. During his prime, this had infuriated Drake, both because he didn't feel he was getting his due (and, as his own best publicist, accolades were something he longed for) and also because it made the situation seem as though the supervillains of St. Canard were somehow unimportant to the city's police force. Imagine! Supervillains, who could and had blown up buildings, kidnapped citizens, held innocents hostage, stolen what must have amounted to millions of dollars over the decades, were considered beneath the police's attention. Supervillains were the outcasts, the freaks of society, always able to instill fear but never respect (and rarely knowing the difference between the two), and it was always Drake - always Darkwing - who had to reign them in, many times without a word of thanks.

Drake scowled as he sat on the park bench watching the pigeons peck at the ground. If it hadn't been for him, one - or all - of those villains would have been running the city right now. Name even one of them - Negaduck, Megavolt, Bushroot - and they could have been St. Canard's ruler if it hadn't been for Drake and Gosalyn. Gosalyn had given her life to prevent such an eventuality. Drake had given the better part of his ability to live a normal life. Who the hell were the police to say that super villains weren't important?

"They are lovely, aren't they?" a shrill voice chirped next to him, tearing him from his thoughts.

Drake looked to his right to find an over-sized, middle aged woman sitting next to him, giving him the sort of sickly sweet smile that told him he was in for an asinine conversation. "Pigeons? 'Lovely' probably wouldn't be the adjective I'd use to describe them," Drake answered flatly, turning his attention back to the birds.

The woman laughed airily, placing a plump hand to her heart. "Goodness, no! I meant the daffodils! They're certainly out in all their splendor today, aren't they?"

"I suppose," Drake grumbled, glancing at his watch.

"I do love daffodils. This park does such a wonderful job with the flowers. It's so uplifting. Of course, I'm sure you can remember a time before this was a park."

"As far as I know, it always has been."

"You mean it wasn't all farmland before? Or the site of some old general store, quaint but endearing-in-that-old-fasioney-way?"

Drake slowly turned to look at her, trying his best not to let his jaw hang agape. "Just how old do you think I am?"

"The elderly have so many wonderful stories to tell," the woman cooed, cocking her head to the side and looking at him rosily. She patted his hand. "They are our link with the past. It is so important to hear their tales."

"I'm not an old man, madam," Drake stated with as much dignity as he could muster before climbing to his feet somewhat clumsily, refusing to use his cane in front of the woman next to him. He winced slightly from the pain but stood straight nevertheless. "And if you'll excuse me, I have somewhere to be before I drop dead of old age," he said sarcastically in lieu of a goodbye. Drake snatched his cane from the back of the park bench but did not use it as he lumbered away slowly, clenching his jaw as hard as he could to keep his mind off the pain.

There were days when he thought he'd almost made peace with the cane that had become like an extra appendage to him, and other days when he managed to convince himself, for a few minutes at a time, that he was Drake Mallard, goddammit, and he didn't need a stupid cane. This stubbornness could keep him going until spots appeared before his eyes and his hands became sweaty; he knew the next thing that would happen would be his legs giving way beneath him, and before that happened he normally swallowed his pride and allowed himself the use of the cane. All things considered, it was better than collapsing in a painful heap on the sidewalk.

A small jingle from the bell above the door alerted LP to someone's presence in his shop. Looking up, he found his oldest friend smiling back at him. Without a word, LP grabbed a cold beer from the small fridge behind the counter, popped the lid off, and held it out for Drake. Drake took it gratefully and carefully lowered himself into a chair beside the one LP always used.

"The idiots are on parade today," Drake observed as he took a swig from the bottle. "Of course, when aren't they?"

"People in the park again, eh?" LP responded knowingly, sliding into his own chair beside Drake. "You shouldn't take it so hard, DW. They aren't trying to be rude."

Drake had always wished he could be the hopeless optimist that his friend was and gave him a small smile. "They do a pretty good impression of it, then," Drake said. He turned to LP. "I don't look like an old man to you, do I?"

"If you're an old man, what would that make me?" LP answered rhetorically with a shrug.

"That doesn't really make me feel much better," Drake said with a sigh as he took another sip. "Trying to keep up with Jack is hard enough without feeling like I'm ancient."

LP glanced nervously at the calendar by the desk and fiddled clumsily with his hands. "I'm glad you came today, DW. I was wondering if you'd feel up to it."

Drake followed his friend's line of sight and caught the date. He swallowed hard. "I can't act like this day doesn't exist, LP. I can't ignore it. It wouldn't be fair to anyone, especially Gosalyn and Thad."

LP had noticed there were greeting cards for every occasion. Births, deaths, birthdays, anniversaries - he'd even seen one once for reincarnations. But he'd never seen one for coping with the ten year anniversary of your daughter's death. He placed a hand on DW's shoulder, knowing that his friend didn't like affection, but sensing that, perhaps this once, it would be all right.

"I'm real sorry, DW. That's all. Just real sorry. I know you miss her."

"Don't you?"

"We all do, DW."

"I still dream about her," Drake said so softly that LP almost didn't catch it. Drake's eyes could have bored holes into the glass bottle he was holding, his expression stormy and far away. "She comes to me in my dreams and tells me things. That's not normal, is it?"

"I don't know," LP answered honestly.

Drake found that, despite all of his protestations about getting older, no matter how hard mentally he tried to fight it, he could feel age begin to conquer him, a little at a time. This didn't worry him as much as frighten him. Alone at night, as he lay in bed staring up at the ceiling when sleep wouldn't come, he wondered why the thought of death scared him so much more than it used to when he stared it in the face on a regular basis. Perhaps it was because he'd very nearly lost his life. Perhaps it was because he'd watched his daughter lose hers. But deep down, he knew that wasn't it; it was much deeper and more complicated than that. His purpose in this life had not yet been completed. His duties were not done. And yet, his body had begun to fail him, betray him, and deny his demands of it. When he needed his strength, his agility, his finesse the most, would he be able to do whatever it was he had to do? Would he meet death before he'd accomplished everything he needed to do in this life?

The thought, when it came to him, would keep him up all night.

Drake shook himself from his thoughts. No one would understand it if he tried to explain it, and there was no sense in worrying the few people he had left to care about in his life. "Sorry, LP. Sometimes my thoughts get the best of me."

"No worries, DW," LP said in what he hoped was a cheerful voice. Over the last ten years, he'd watched his best friend transform into someone he almost didn't recognize; preoccupied with his memories, angry about things he couldn't change, and some sort of deep-ridden guilt about Gosalyn and her husband's death that LP didn't quite understand and which Drake refused to explain. "Today of all days, you're allowed to let your thoughts get the better of you, right?"

Drake gave his old friend a warm smile. "Maybe. Let's have another drink, shall we?"

Just as Launchpad opened the refrigerator to get another round, an explosion so near and so powerful that it shook the walls and floors nearly threw both of them out of their chairs.