"Why didn't you get shoes first?" he asked heatedly as he followed her onto the escalator.

"Because it's easier to buy shoes for an outfit than the other way around," she replied with a smile over her shoulder.

He scowled at her, but she just kicked the smile up a notch. She stepped off of the escalator a moment later, releasing the skirt she was holding up when it was safe to do so. After a quick look around, she found the shoe department and was off like a shot.

He tagged along with all the enthusiasm of someone headed toward the gallows. Once he reached the department, he was relieved to find that they at least had chairs. He plopped down into a seat and saw Mallory step off of the escalator.

She headed over to the handbags and started browsing. He would have wondered how bored she was if he hadn't seen the shopping bag she was carrying. With a sigh of defeat, he slouched down and tried to stay awake.

"How many shoes do you need?" he grumbled after an employee brought yet another pair of shoes for her to try on.

"I bought three outfits, so three pairs of shoes," she answered happily and he dropped his head back with a thunk.

"How much longer?" he growled some time later as he stared at the ceiling.

He never saw her and the sales girl exchange grins. The employee wisely made a break for it.

"I'm not sure," she replied as she picked up the mini dress and held them over a couple pairs of dress shoes. "Which shoes do you think look better with this dress?"

"Why are you asking me?" he groaned.

"Oh, should I ask her instead?" she inquired.

The tone of her voice immediately brought his head up. She wasn't happy. He looked in the direction she was pointing and cringed.

"Is that Mallory or Tanya?" she questioned.

"Mallory," he answered in defeat just before he frowned. "Wait, how did you know their names?"

"Canard told me," she replied while she put on one shoe of each of the pairs of shoes and then held the dress up to herself as she looked in the mirror.

"Canard!?" he exclaimed, shooting straight to his feet and not caring that several shoppers were now staring at him. "He's all right!?"

"He was when I left Puckworld," she responded. "At least he was before you blew up the portal."

"What?" he asked in a hushed voice. "How..."

"He was standing outside the circle of mages when we opened the portal," she stated softly. "If the explosion was as intense there as it was here, he could have been hurt."

He was horrified. His best friend may have been hurt, or worse, killed, because of his actions? He slowly sank back down into the chair. Numb with the thought that he may have killed his best friend.

"Wildwing, the mages would have helped him," she told him as she took the shoes off and put the dress away. "As upset as they were with him, they would not have left him if he was hurt."

"What if they were hurt from the explosion?" he quietly demanded.

"The most that would have happened to them is they would have been knocked on their tail feathers from the shock wave," she replied as she took a seat near him. "The magic protects us, no matter what gets thrown at us. That's why nothing you shot at me yesterday did any damage. If he was hurt, they would have helped."

"When will the other mages open another portal?" he questioned, not knowing if he really wanted the answer.

"They won't," she sighed as she sorted through the shoe boxes. "It takes at least forty-nine mages to open a portal like that."

"So?"

"In Drake DuCaine's time, mages numbered in the thousands," she quietly admitted. "Today, there are less than fifty."

"So, they're not going to come for you?" he asked, not sure if he was relieved or not.

She let out a snort.

"For The Mask, they would if they could," she stated bitterly. "They blame me for Canard getting it and they're still angry about it. They're really steamed since Canard broke his promise and we had to hunt him down. Getting him out of dimensional limbo was not my idea of fun. It was like trying to find a particular snowflake during a blizzard."

"But you did find him," he pressed.

"Took us over a year to do it," she grumbled.

"Are you sure he would have survived the blast?" he asked, needing confirmation.

"The chances are very good that he survived the blast," she replied as she got to her feet. "He wasn't in the circle of power. However, I can't be sure that something else didn't get him. The circle was created right under the Twin Beaks rock formations. If the explosion was strong enough, it might have caused an avalanche."

"You're not helping," he grumbled.

"Sorry, but you wanted to know," she responded with a shrug.

"You could have lied," he growled.

"No, I couldn't," she shot back. "Words have power. To lie is to give that lie power."

"So?"

"So there are some things that are worse than death," she snapped.

Before he could ask, she picked up the boxes with the shoes she had chosen. He watched in stunned silence as she marched over to the register to make her purchases. He wondered what could have triggered that reaction.

She returned a short time later and started to get her things together. Once her purchases were put away, she begun to clean up the mess she had made with trying on so many shoes. An employee came over and shooed them away. He actually sighed with relief when she picked up her bags. The nightmare was over!

"Oooh, purses," she cooed excitedly and headed towards the handbags.

"No!" he nearly shouted and jumped in front of her. "Absolutely not!"

The glowing eyed glare he was awarded made him take a step back.

"You are free to leave at any time," she snarled.

"I'm not letting you out of my sight until I have the mask back" he snapped back.

"Like that's going to happen," she snorted before brushing past him and heading toward her new target. "In case you missed this not so fine point, it was never yours to begin with."

Discontentedly, he followed her and saw Mallory quickly make herself scarce out of the corner of his eye.

"You might as well have her keep you company," she stated as she made her way through the racks. "It's not like she's fooling anyone."

He hated that she was right. Feeling a bit peeved, he headed off in the direction Mallory had taken and found her hiding in the linens. He stayed where he could keep an eye on Ducky and waved Mallory over. She was hesitant at first, but he was insistent.

"You're going to blow my cover," she hissed from behind a wall of shelves.

"She's already spotted you," he grumbled.

"How?" she demanded.

"Mallory, we're alien ducks," he reminded her. "We don't exactly blend in."

"What's the plan now?" she inquired, a bit put out that she was spotted by the blue beak.

"We wait for her to finish shopping and then get her back to The Pond," he answered.

"Are you nuts?" she questioned heatedly. "Do you have any idea of the damage she could do?"

"Do you?" he asked.

"What!?"

"What do we know she is capable of?" he asked quietly. "She was able to disarm us and fling Grin around like a sack of feathers. She made me answer her question whether I wanted to or not. She can dry herself in a matter of seconds. She's pretty much indestructible. She can't tell lies, but she can detect them."

"So she says," she scoffed.

"She got pretty upset when I suggested that it was ok to lie," he replied and then sighed. "I don't know. Do we take her to The Pond where she could possibly damage our base of operations? Or do we let her wander free doing who knows what?"

"Darned if we do and darned if we don't," she grumbled.

He nodded and sighed again. This wasn't going to be an easy decision one way or another. Once more, he was feeling his inadequacy as team captain.

"She's so caught up with her shopping we could leave and she wouldn't even notice," he muttered.

"Don't be so sure of that," she replied. "She keeps checking the mirrors to see if we're still here."

"Where's Duke?" he asked finally.

"Outside, watching the doors from the rooftop," she answered.

"Good, we'll keep him in reserve," he replied.

It took what felt like forever for Ducky to finally make her selections and buy the handbags. They followed her out of the department and down the escalator. He was heading towards the exit when he realized she was heading elsewhere.

"Where are you going now?" he demanded when he caught up with her.

"Someplace even Drake DuCaine would hesitate going," she replied cheerfully.

"Where's tha-What!? NO! No way!"

"Oh, for Pete's sake, go get a cup of coffee or something," Mallory told him. "I'll keep an eye on her."

He didn't argue with her, but beat a very hasty retreat out of there.

"If he left any faster, he would have left skid marks on the floor," Ducky chuckled.

"Just hurry up and get what you need so we can go," Mallory demanded and suddenly found herself beak to beak with a less than pleased blue beak.

"I will take as long as I like," Ducky nearly snarled. "I might be done in ten minutes or I might be here until they close tonight. Either way, I will leave when I am good and ready. And not you nor Wildwing nor any of your merry band of misfits will change that."

With that, Ducky turned on her heel and marched into the lingerie department. Mallory glared after her. She wasn't sure if she was more upset by her inability to get the blue beak to do what she wanted or the fact that she just realized the other duck was taller than her.

With a sigh, she took another bite of her frozen yogurt. They had both been hanging back ever since the lingerie department incident. She wouldn't mind them hanging around too much if they'd actually talk to her like a normal person. She thought she had been making headway with Wildwing, but that all changed when Mallory joined the party. So much for that bright idea.

It would almost be comical if it wasn't so frustrating. Her first trip to a mall in over a year and she had her own personal black clouds following her around. Most of the bad vibes were coming from Mallory but Wildwing seemed to be feeding off of them. It had gotten to the point where humans were giving them a wide berth.

After the department store, she had stopped at a shop that sold maps and gotten several of the area. She needed them so she could navigate this strange new world. Boy, did that ruffle their feathers. Did they really expect her to be dependent on them in learning this new place?

There was the stop at a beauty supply store for basic toiletries. At least they hadn't followed her in there, but she couldn't hide in there forever. She had been tempted to ask to use the back door. However it was obvious that the employees were Mighty Duck fans and there was no point in trying to disillusion their hero worship.

She took another bite and enjoyed the frozen treat. They refused to sit with her, but instead were seated at the table behind her. She could practically feel their glares burning holes in the back of her new shirt. Maybe she shouldn't have changed out of her dress since spider silk was fire proof. However, the jeans, t-shirt and running shoes were so much more comfortable and easier to move around in that it was worth taking the chance.

She still had a few things to do, but the snack stop had been to fortify her. She had seen a store on the mall map that she was nearly desperate to get to. She had every intention of spending as much time as possible in there. If that didn't get rid of her gloomy shadows, she would have to get drastic.

They sat in silence, watching her eat. They hadn't said anything to each other in a while. There was no need to.

They could wait. Sooner or later she would realize she had nowhere to go but with them. So they just followed along.

Patience wasn't Mallory's strong suit, but she hadn't shot the mage yet. That was good, right? Though he was beginning to wonder if it might speed things up a bit.

He was starting to feel the effect of not enough sleep. The large coffee he had instead of the frozen yogurt was helping a little bit. He was glad he wasn't dealing with the mage alone anymore.

Fortunately, Duke was still undiscovered. He had the good sense to stay up on the rooftops as much as possible. He was Wildwing's ace in the hole should things go south. Hopefully, it wouldn't be necessary. Hopefully.

Finally, the mage got up and threw her garbage away. She picked up her things and headed out. They followed her, not two steps behind and he refused to acknowledge the way her jeans hugged her legs and-other places.

She casually strolled through the mall, looking at the display windows. She would occasionally stop and take a longer look if something interesting caught her attention. However, a minute later she would start walking again and they would follow.

With no warning or any indication she was the least bit interested in the store, she headed into a shop.

"A music store?" Mallory asked in surprise. "What does she need in there?"

"I don't know and I don't care," he growled as he marched in after her.

He found her looking at a rack of CDs. He grabbed her arm and started to drag her toward the exit. He managed to get three steps to the door before a shock strong enough to make his entire wing go numb caused him to let her go. He spun around and came face to face with an angry mage. Maybe it was the lack of sleep or the caffeine overload or maybe he had just taken leave of his senses, but he didn't back down.

"Why are you in here?" he demanded.

"I like music," she snapped.

"This can wait," he started.

"Then leave if you don't want to be here," she retorted. "I'm not stopping you."

"Give me the mask and I'll gladly leave you alone," he softly snarled.

"Are you deaf or were you dropped on your head as a duckling?" she questioned angrily. "You are not getting The Mask. You can follow me around, threaten me, shoot me or beg me until your feathers turn gray and all fall out, but it won't change one thing. You. Are. Not. Getting. The. Mask. Back."

He reached for her again and her eyes started to glow blue.

"Leave," she quietly ordered.

As if his feet had a mind of their own, he found himself walking outside. It wasn't until he was a good ten feet out the door before he could stop. Belatedly, he realized that maybe trying to force her to go where she didn't want to wasn't going to work. He had to remember that the glowing eyes were a dead giveaway that she was about to do something with her powers.

"What happened?" Mallory asked.

"She made me leave," he growled as he stomped over to a nearby bench under a nice shade tree.

"How'd she do that?" she questioned while she followed him.

"She did that glowing eye thing and now I'm out here," he grumbled as he sat down.

"So now what?" she inquired.

"Now we wait her out," he said as he activated his communicator. "Duke, what have you got?"

"There are only two doors, front and back," Duke answered.

"Good," Wildwing stated with satisfaction. "I want you to watch the back door. Mallory and I will stand guard on the front."

"Will do," Duke replied before disconnecting.

"So now we wait?" she asked.

"Now we wait," he confirmed. "She can't stay in there forever."