Duck Blind
The vampire opened his mind, wanting, willing to connect with his leafy companion. "Oh, you're so shy!" He cooed. "Just relax; it'll be eas-."
"Darkwing!"
The thunderous dark feminine voice came crashing in on his senses. "Let go of Bushroot this instant!"
"Yipe!" Darkwing recoiled from his feast and Bushroot stumbled back.
Darkwing snatched his cloak up to hide his beak. He turned to face his intruder and found himself seeing red. Blood red. Then he blinked and realised it was only the colour of her dress. The heart-stopper dress moulded along those long legs up and around the woman's hourglass figure. The way she stood she was clearly a lady and he felt his insides jolt as his gaze finally met hers. There was something in those green irises that just made her ... perfect.
Then he blinked again and it was now that he noticed the white streaks in her hair. 'She isn't old enough to be going grey ...' He mused. 'Of course, what a fool I am!' His heart rate slowed. 'Oh, she really is perfect. Except for one teensy little problem ...'
"Overspend our resources, did we, miss witch?" His voice came out in bitter disappointment. "I hope it was for a good cause."
"What? Oh." She raised her hands to her hair for a moment. "Of course it was, Dark."
"Oh, yes? What sort of spell-casting was it? Fire and brimstone? Demon banishment? Oo, I know, you rescued an entire populace from a big scary dragon." He noticed his timid hybrid plant friend back away from them into the depths of the tower but there was nothing Darkwing could do about it.
"Erm, n-not quite, it was, uh a little more ... personal."
"Oh, I get it. You were passionate about something."
"Darkwing, you have no idea what ..." She narrowed her eyes at him. "Are you judging me?"
"Oh, no, not at all, miss witch. Passionate people are so flavoursome." He licked his beak as the thought of tasting her flashed across his mind and then he froze. 'No! I can't forget about Gosalyn!' He felt himself torn. 'This is one very dangerous ... painfully attractive witch.' The vampire reminded himself, even now feeling a compulsion to move closer to the woman in red. 'Judging by the look in her ... very beautiful eyes ... she wants me for the next time she 'gets passionate' about something and I've got to stay alive for Gosalyn's sake!'
He frowned sadly at the lethal beauty in red. "I'd really love to stay and let you suck the life out of me, miss witch, but the guilty must remain to take responsibility for their past actions."
"Guilty?"
He turned into a bat and flew up and out of the window above.
"Dark ... Dark, wait!"
'So that's the witch the S.H.U.S.H. people are after?'
The vampire flew across town and found an old building covered with ivy. He landed on a gargoyle and hooked his feet to the underside of the statue's overhanging wing.
The image of the red witch filled his mind and wouldn't leave. 'No wonder she got that shot in last time.' He sighed as he folded his wings tightly around him.
And now she had encroached on his lair. The game of cat and mouse with her had become very serious indeed.
The smell of death woke the vampire up. He climbed up over the gargoyle's wing and blinked at the last embers of the setting sun. He sniffed, figuring out where the scent of freshly spilt blood was coming from. There was a murderer down below in the courtyard and this knowledge made him quite ravenous.
"There's the last one." The tall blood-tainted dog handed a jar over to the diminutive mouse.
The vampire stretched his wings and circled down. Once he reached the grass of the courtyard he shifted into shadow. The witch from the tower was not here. The mouse looking at the eerie contents of the jar was a different person altogether.
"Now we'll finally be able to-."
Something inside the vampire bubbled up and he spoke up from the shadows, interrupting their exchange. "And so I've found my murderer and my witch all at the same time!"
In a flash, the killer duo bolted in opposite directions. 'Good, I didn't want to take on a witch.' The vampire glided after the murderer rather than the mouse holding the jar. 'But so that means I've got two witches after me. Why me? There are plenty of other vampires in a city this big.
Anyway; this is the guy in Director Hooter's pictures.' The murderer bolted inside the building and the vampire drifted after him.
In the lobby of the building a strange person stood, blocking the vampire's quarry from escaping up the stairs.
"Boy, talk about your dedicated students; coming in to study when everybody else has long gone home. What are you studying? A medical degree with a major in Sociopathology?"
"W-study? What? No! You've got to help me, mister!" The murderer gasped for breath "... Darkwing Duck is ... w-... he's after me!"
"Yeah, like I didn't notice." The rat droned.
The vampire waited patiently behind the dog. Here, like the plant-duck was another strange creature that he sensed would be a tasty morsel.
"I'm really sorry I have to do this." The rat pulled a cylinder shaped object from his utility belt. Darkwing Duck checked it with a sonar call but couldn't see any firing mechanism to the thing.
"A torch? What kinda lame joke is this?" The murderer snapped angrily at him.
The rat continued, staring straight at Darkwing. "Oh, the tragic irony for us to reconcile our differences only to end up here at a final showdown in the lobby of the St Canard university science block a scarce few days later." The rat sniffed. "Actually," the rodent said in a suddenly chirpier voice, "it is kinda fitting."
"Get a life. Get out of my way." The murderer growled at him.
"Really, is that what you want?" The rat pointed directly at Darkwing and the murderer turned.
"Where? I don't see anything."
"We-ell, how good are you at maths? Can you count how many shadows you've got?"
The dog looked down at his feet. "Oh, no! Help me!" He screamed, ran towards the rat and tried to hide behind his skinny form.
"Oh, get off me and shut up!" The rat grizzled at the killer clinging to his back. He pointed his finger backwards at the dog and a bolt of electricity passed between them.
With that the dog yelped and sprawled unconscious on the floor.
Darkwing's dinner was ruined.
"You know what you are, rat? You're a spoilsport!" Darkwing was fuming.
"Wow!" The rat voiced in shock. "I don't believe you're telling me that! They really fried your brain good!"
Darkwing reformed out of shadow and snarled at him. "I don't know how you found me or even just who you think you are, but that was a ... big ... mistake, rat."
"That's not the mistake, D." The rat sobbed, raising the 'torch' device. "This is the mistake!"
Darkwing heard a quiet click and everything went white.