"Oooooh." moaned Darkwing, raising one hand gingerly to rub his head. Even that tiny movement seemed to send knives of pain stabbing through his entire body. He felt as if he had been stomped on repeatedly, run over by a truck, and dropped off a cliff--all at the same time. "What hit me...?"
All around him was nothing but darkness, but he had a sensation of closed quarters. "Ow!" came a voice from his left, when he tried to move his arm.
"Gosalyn?" he asked. "Where are we?"
"Ugh...DW...is that you?" called Launchpad's voice, from somewhere underneath Darkwing's body, it seemed. "I...don't feel so good..."
"Where are we?" said Gosalyn's voice. She struggled to free herself from the tangle of bodies.
"WHEN are we is a better question," whined a scratchy voice. "And by the way, I COULD give us all some light to see by...if SOMEbody hadn't shorted me OUT..."
Finally, with a clanking sound, the hatch in the ceiling of the time-top--time-top, yeah, that was it, that's where they were, Darkwing now remembered--came open, as Megavolt leaned against it with all his strength. The light that rushed in was horribly painful, but the fresh air was welcome enough to almost make up for it. Eventually they managed to get themselves untangled, and, everybody finally standing on their OWN feet again rather than each others', they climbed out of the time-top in single file.
"Ugh...why do I feel like I did the morning after last year's New Year's Eve party...?" Darkwing muttered aloud, not really expecting an answer.
"Quacky...erp" Megavolt leaned against a wall for a moment and fought down a sudden urge to be sick, "Quacky always said that...time-travel without the proper calculations ahead of time...might have...adverse side-effects on people..."
"So...where ARE we then?" wondered Launchpad, taking his aviator's cap off and rubbing his head as if he could force the headache away by doing so. "I mean, uh, WHEN are we? And where too, of course."
Gosalyn, as is usually the case with youth, shook off the sickening effects of time-travel first. She wandered off, although a bit unsteadily, to explore the room they were in. "Hmmm..." She looked at the books and desks that were scattered all over the room--most of the desks in the middle of the room, around the radius of the time-top's space, had been smashed into kindling, but they were still recognisable as desks. It was clear that they had once been arranged into neat rows, but the sudden arrival of the time-top in the center of the room had violently put everything into a new arrangment. There was also a round electrical clock and several charts and diagrams on the walls. "Looks like a classroom to me--or what's LEFT of one."
Darkwing looked around at the room. "Why, you're right! This is St. Canard High School...I remember this class...Algebra 101, taught by Mrs. Ordinate...boy, was SHE ever a witch...er, no offense to Morgana." He stepped forward and absently touched a chart showing various forumlas on the wall. "This is...all very familiar..."
"I hate to interrupt this touching trip down Memory Lane," said Megavolt, "but shouldn't we be fixing the time-top, or something...?"
"Well, YOU'RE the mad inventor, YOU fix it!" countered Darkwing. He was reading the teacher's "answer book" on the desk--something he'd never dared to do when he was an actual student. The date of the most recent entry was Thursday, June 10, 1973. Why did that date bother him for some reason?
"Hey, I didn't build this thing, Quackerjack did!" protested Megavolt, but he disappeared inside the time-top for a few moments anyway. When he popped back out again, his face had an expression of intense relief. "PHEW. It's okay! It's all right! Nothing's broken!"
"That's great!" cried Launchpad, tying his hat back on. "That means we can go straight home again!"
"No, not the time-top, that's wrecked beyond all repair unless I can get several replacement parts from somewhere." Megavolt waved this aside as if it was of no consequence. "I mean, the light bulbs I rescued from the mall are still all right!"
"Oooh. Wouldn't want the poor widdle light bulbs to be hurt, that'd be teeeeerrrrible," Darkwing rolled his eyes sarcastically and drawled out the las word.
"Yeah, it would," said Megavolt, nodding earnestly.
Darkwing paused, went through several things in his mind that he COULD say next, and then, with a sigh, decided to let it drop. "Just don't STEAL the replacement parts or anything, Megsy," he said, still looking over the classroom. "Remember: we're in the past. If we cause too much commotion here, we may really mess up the timeline. And...well, I know we normally don't get along, but I think for now...we should call a truce? It's more important that we just get home. We can go back to beating each other silly, as usual, AFTERwards."
"Well....fun as it would be to zap your brains straight out of your ears...I don't want to be stuck here any more than you do, so I guess you got yourself a truce, Dipwing Dork. On one condition: If you EVER tell ANY of the other supervillians about this, I WILL barbecue you like a set of ribs." He climbed down to the floor. "Hey, how come nobody's here, if this is a school day?"
This was an astonishingly astute observation for someone as out of it as Megavolt, and Darkwing looked up in surprise. "Um...well, er..."
Gosalyn folded her arms across her chest and rolled her eyes. "Guys, look at the CLOCK, duh..."
It was 12:29 PM.
"Oh. Lunchtime. All the students are out of class, of course," said Darkwing, trying to sound as if he knew that all along, to mask the fact that it had never even occurred to him to look at the clock.
"Uh...DW, I don't think we have MUCH time before lunchtime ends..." warned Launchpad, running a finger along the inside of his flight jacket's collar, nervously. "Shouldn't we be trying to hide the time-machine?"
"Hide a 10-foot-tall thing painted like a circus tent?!" demanded Darkwing. It had not been a good day, and it promised to get even worse--but Launchpad still didn't actually deserve the nasty tone Darkwing was using. "Good idea, Launchpad! Any idea HOW?!"
Launchpad cast his eyes upwards and rubbed his chin a moment, as he always did when he was attempting deep thought, but whatever he might have said next was cut off by a new voice.
A rather familiar voice. "Aha! Random, total destruction of an innocent classroom! It could only be one thing--a CRIME has been committed here!"
Darkwing turned around to look into the eyes of what was definitely--minus about twenty years or so--his own face.

Drake Mallard, age 17, stared curiously at Darkwing Duck. There was something....ABOUT him, that he couldn't put his finger on..."Wearing a MASK, eh?" growled Drake, grabbing his older self by the collar and shaking him. "I don't TRUST people who wear masks...YOU must be the criminal who is trying to destroy our lovely school, one room at a time! And this! THIS strange device is obviously some unathorised machinery, probably STOLEN from the GOVERNMEN--"
"Out of my way, Drake the Dweeb, I wanna see this thing!" grumbled another voice that was also--unfortunately--all too familiar. "Anything that trashes the boring stupid Algebra class is fine by me." Hamm String, the enourmous captain of the football team, shoved his way through the crowd, literally stomping over Drake to get at the time-top. "How ugly. I suppose YOU built it?" He sneered and fingered Darkwing's purple cape derisively. "Little early for Halloween, ain't it?" He guffawed.
"We..this is...I'll have you know--" Darkwing stammered.
"We're visiting scientists from Duckburg University," said Megavolt, shoving his way forwards and taking charge before the bewildered Darkwing could do more than blink.
I guess Socket-Face here IS the right one to play this part, thought Darkwing to himself. After all, scientists are KNOWN for being weird and twitchy, and he definitely fits the bill...
"This is a...instant-teleportation device. We meant to park it outside the school, but there was, ahem, just a SMALL problem with the coordinates programming, nothing that can't be fixed I'm sure...We're going to be making an important presentation in front of the entire school tomorrow, but it's not ready yet. CAREFUL with that!!" he shrieked, his voice hitting a note two octaves higher than before, as he whapped Hamm String's pawing hands away from the top. "It's very delicate equipment! You wouldn't want it to explode, would ya?"
"Er...let's just leave, Hamm," said a whiny voice, and Hamm's girlfriend Prina Lott came up from behind the teenage pig, pulling on his sleeve. "I still haven't reserved the limo yet, and the prom is tomorrow night..."
Reluctantly, Hamm started to turn away. Then he turned back, pointing at Darkwing. "Okay, so you're scientists, but what's up with that costume?" he demanded.
Gosalyn, Launchpad, and Megavolt all exchanged glances.
"It's his way." said Gosalyn.
The younger Drake Mallard finally was able to stand back up again, with Hamm's weight off his back, but promptly walked into a wall, as he was still a bit dizzy. It just wasn't his day.
Ignoring all this, hidden away at the back of the classroom, was a skinny teenaged rat boy dressed in clashing, badly-fitting clothes, with long, fluffy brown hair down to his shoulders. He didn't care about any of this stuff--although that big device was a bit interesting--he had his own pet project to work on. A demolished classroom was something happening to OTHER people; he was in his own little world. Whistling happily between his buck teeth, the boy went on hooking the electrical wires to his modified treadmill. He'd wait until after school was out for the day, put this thing in the science lab, where he likely wouldn't be disturbed, and then...watch out world, here comes a new scientific breakthrough! Carpet static WAS the wave of the future...and he'd prove it! Elmo Sputterspark absentmindedly rubbed the bruises from where he had been slammed into a locker earlier today--it had been the tenth time this week--and went back to work.

The quartet had managed to leave the school without too much incident--although Darkwing honestly worried, for several tense moments there, that Gosalyn would get them all LYNCHED for the way she kept constantly falling over and pounding the floor with laughter at everybody's hairstyles and fashions--and they were now walking through the park. Even Megavolt had been relatively well-behaved--only two light-bulbs from the school were hidden on his person. He had taken off the battery, socket, goggles, plug-hat and extension cord and left them inside the time-top, since he was out of power anyway, and he didn't stand out quite as badly now. He had even bought a long, loose, garish paisley t-shirt at a second-hand store (not because it was second hand and that's all he could find; he actually LIKED the shirt) and put it over his tight jumpsuit to make it (sort of) look as if he was wearing an ordinary shirt and pants ensemble--if you squinted and felt in a charitable mood, he could almost pass for normal.
At first, Darkwing was reluctant to leave the time-top inside the school, but Gosalyn pointed out that if the students thought it would explode if they touched it, they'd hardly be in a hurry to do anything to the time-machine. And Prina Lott had spread the rumour FAST, as only Prina Lott could. "Wow, something she's actually GOOD for", muttered Darkwing under his breath.
It was a hot, sunny summer day, the bees were buzzing in the flowers, and an opressive humidity settled over the town, making everything feel somehow slowed down and lazy...but Megavolt was still antsy. He danced back and forth from one foot to the other, full of nervous energy because....well, just because he was Megavolt, basically. "Guys...this is wrong...hanging out with good guys for such a long time at a stretch is really cramping my style...I gotta take a break! I know...I'll get the parts for the time-top. It might take a while. Don't wait up!" and he dashed off.
"Think he'll be back?" said Launchpad, looking after him.
"One can only HOPE," said Darkwing. "After all, he's stuck in the past too, if the time-top goes unrepaired."
"Of course, that's SANE people's thinking," said Gosalyn darkly.
"Come on, guys. Let's look for a hotel room or something. I've been on my feet for either 20 years, or at least several hours, and at any rate, I'm worn out." said Darkwing.

5:30 pm. Almost five hours, and Megavolt still hadn't returned--with the parts or without. Becoming more and more frustrated by the minute, Darkwing paced back and forth across their hotel room. Gosalyn looked up from the Star Duck (original series) re-run she was half-heartedly watching on an obscure UHF channel and put down her bowl of potato chips.
"Geez, they don't even have VCR's, talk about primitive", she glowered, standing up to fiddle with the rabbit-ears. "Dad, you're gonna wear a hole in the carpet. He'll get here, when he gets here."
"What if he can't find the hotel? What if he can't find our room? We signed in under fake names, remember! What if--"
"Uh, it occurs to me, DW," said Launchpad slowly, running his fingers through his bright red hair, "that if Megavolt got the parts...he wouldn't have to come to this hotel at all. He could just go right back to the school and start fixing the time-top right away."
They all looked at each other.
"TO THE SCHOOL!!" shouted Darkwing, leaping for the door. "Hurry!"

The halls of St. Canard High School were all done up in streamers and paper flowers for the prom the next evening, but with absolutely nobody around and no noise anywhere, the effect they conveyed was more spooky than festive. The paper streamers rustled slightly in the breeze of their passing, almost like ghosts. Funny, how a place that could be so ordinary during the school day, when it was full of people and you were SUPPOSED to be there, could become so, well...forbidden feeling, when you had to pick a lock to get in, Darkwing mused.
"I think the Algebra classroom is over here," he said quietly, thinking out loud. "Or was it over here? It's been a long time...I guess my memory isn't what it used to be..."
Gosalyn, bored, wanderered down a side-corridor as her father's attention left her momentarily. She'd probably never have the chance to explore this place again, and a plain old school it may have been, but it was a school from the PAST. That automatically made it at least sort of interesting. It was awfully quiet though...she wished something was actually happening...
Wait. There were...noises, coming from behind a door up ahead. At first she thought it was just machinery--the boiler room or something--but then, putting her ear to the door, she thought she could make out the sound of somebody breathing.
"I'll bet it's a BURGLAR!" she whispered out loud, her imagination on fire. "I'll rush in, and FOIL the bad guy, and my name will be in all the papers! 'Heroic Mystery Girl Saves St. Canard High!' And...and since this is the past..." she paused for thought, "that means that I'll...I'll go down in the HISTORY books! I'll be able to find photos of me in them when I get home, I bet! Keeeeen gear! No need to tell Dad, I can handle this myself."
She tried the doorknob, gingerly. It was unlocked. Gosalyn flattened herself against the wall next to the door, grabbing the knob but not turning it in one hand--this required her to stand on tip-toes, as everything was built for an adult height--took a deep breath, and FLUNG the door open, lunging dramatically around the corner. "COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS....up?" She wound down as she realised that the situation was not quite what she had expected.
Rather than the dangerous, hardened criminal of her imaginings, busily stuffing valuables into a bulging sack or cackling as he hauled away a bag of money, it was merely the science lab, quiet and mostly deserted. Except for a mass of wires and cords all over the floor, all attached to a strange treadmill type device. A light bulb was attached to the wires at the other end. Gosalyn didn't know much about electrical equipment, but she KNEW that normal bulbs didn't glow quite that brightly-and they CERTAINLY didn't flicker and pulse and give off lots of heat as if they were about to explode or something. And on top of the treadmill was the only other soul currently in St. Canard High besides herself, Launchpad and her father--or at least, she supposed it was a person. It was hard to tell, since, for some odd reason, the top half of its body was completely covered with small pieces of paper. But she could see the legs pumping desperately below, and hear the laboured breathing. The treadmill was moving at a very fast pace--a pace that even an Olympic athlete would have some difficulty with, after a bit--and from the sound of it, this person was obviously NO athlete.
"What's going on here?" asked Gosalyn, curiously. This wasn't as good as foiling a bad guy, but it was still interesting. Something wrong was going on here--hey, even if she couldn't heroically stop a criminial, maybe she could still stop a crime!
The person was so exhausted, they didn't have ANY energy left for talking. It was obvious that they were only staying on their feet and keeping up with the treadmill because they HAD to--not out of choice.
Gosalyn came forward to look at the machine and found out WHY the person was being forced to run at this insane speed--their hands had been TAPED to the handlebar! "What the...?! Who DID this to you?!" she snapped, angrily. But deep inside, she was also kind of glad. This was definitely a crime, and she, Gosalyn Mallard, Superhero! was going to stop it before it got any worse. She could save a life! Perhaps she'd still get her photo in the paper. "I like gym class, but I never liked it THIS much...boy, they sure are MEAN to students back in the past..." she muttered under her breath. She started to untie the hands, but then thought better of it, and turned the speed down on the machine first.
Gratefully, the person slowed down from a sprint, to a run, to a jog, to a fast walk, to a slow walk, and the bits of paper started to fall off, revealing a skinny, teenaged rat-boy with long brown hair--which was singing around the edges. Then Gosalyn released him--the tape ripping the fur off his wrists as it came off, but that couldn't be helped. Weakly, he slumped to the floor directly behind the treadmill. Sparks leapt off his clothing occasionally and little bits of paper still kept floating over to him every now and then, but he brushed them away. The light bulb at the other end of the room started to cool down...but was so full of juice it would take a while to fully shut off.
"Now...who are you, and what's going on here?" said Gosalyn in her best Official Reporter Voice. The boy looked blearily up at her, and Gosalyn looked right into his face for the first time--and recognised him. He was twenty years younger and had a lot more hair and wasn't wearing the customary thick purple-tinted safety goggles in front of his eyes, but there was still no mistaking the fact that it was--would be, in the future...."MEGAVOLT!" she gasped without thinking.
"What....?" murmured the boy, vaguely. "No...I'm sure I didn't create anywhere near THAT much electricity....that much....(pant) would've killed me and probably...incinerated me to boot...I generated...a pretty...(gasp) good amount, though..." A strange note of pride entered his voice at this last statement, and he struggled to pull himself into a sitting position. "I don't know...who you are...but I think...you may have saved my life," he finally caught his breath, but his face was still horribly pale underneath his short beige fur. Somewhat shakily holding out his right hand, he said, "Elmo Sputterspark...at your service." and brushed a piece of paper off his long nose.
Gosalyn held out her own hand...then, noticing the sparks that were leaping off of his body, thought better of it and just nodded politely instead. "Gosalyn Mallard", she answered, not thinking to disguise her name in time. "So, what's..." she waved vaguely around to indicate the entire room, "this, all about?"
Elmo took a deep breath. "Well, this machine is my latest science project--I wanted to prove that static electricity can be used to power a light bulb, and, if that, then it could be used to do all kinds of useful work."
Gosalyn snorted. "What's the big deal about that? EVERYBODY knows that electricity powers light bulbs! Duh!"
Elmo shook his head--slowly, as if he was afraid it might fall off. "No...that's current electricity...the kind that flows. STATIC electricity is different..it's everywhere, and it's easily generated by living things...such as when you walk on a carpet while wearing socks and then touch a metal doorknob, and you get a shock. Tons of electricity is wasted in those little shocks, by everybody, every day. If only it could be harnessed somehow, well....well, it wouldn't go to waste, anymore, and we wouldn't need as many generators and things."
Gosalyn tried to absorb all of this. She was quickly becoming comfortable talking to Elmo, as if he was just any other kid, and finding it easy to forget he was a future supervillian. "So, that's why the treadmill has a carpet on it. I just thought that was to make it softer so it doesn't hurt your feet so much when you excercise. Why were you tied to the thing, though? And why were you going so FAST?"
A glimmer of hot, ferocious, animal RAGE passed through Elmo's eyes for a moment, so fierce that it startled Gosalyn and made her take an involuntary step backwards. "Hamm String," growled Elmo Sputterspark, clenching his fists and shaking with fury. A small, bright arc of current leapt off his finger and Gosalyn flinched, suddenly and forcibly reminded of just WHO she was talking to--and was all alone with, in a closed down building...but, no more electricity followed. "HE did this...that...that...." he said a word that normally meek little science geeks didn't even know--"he's always been a bully, but this time he's gone too far! Slamming me into a locker or a trash can every day is one thing, but this....THIS...!" Elmo took several deep breaths in an attempt to get himself back under control. "He...he turned the speed way up, tied my hands to the bar, and, LAUGHING, he and his horrible girlfriend just...LEFT me here! I've been doing this since 4:00 PM, unable to stop or slow down...and the electricity kept building and building...it was interesting from a scientific point of view, but, frankly, it was starting to scare me."
"Well, we'll get him back later," said Gosalyn. "For one thing, we'll turn him in to the police. He could have KILLED you; what he did can't possibly be legal! For now, however, we have to find my dad, whereever he went...and we have to get you to the hospital."
"No...I'm tired but I'm fine, really..." Elmo struggled to his feet, leaning against the wall for support. "I'll be okay if I can just...get some...rest...." and he pitched over face-first in a dead faint.
Gosalyn wasted no time. "DAD!!" she yelled out into the corridor. "LAUNCHPAD!! OVER HERE! WE NEED HELP!"
She also couldn't help but notice--with a shudder--that the spot of carpet where he had been lying before was slightly scorched.

Darkwing and Launchpad, meanwhile, had found the wrecked Algebra classroom, still stuffed full of time-top--and clanking sounds coming from within said device, as Megavolt, indeed, was already busy repairing the time machine, or at least trying to. "The gig is up, Megsy!" yelled Darkwing, tumbling and rolling dramatically (and totally unnecessarily, but, hey, he had an image to keep up) into the remains of the room. "You're not taking off in that thing without US, bucko!"
"What?" came a muffled voice from inside the time-top, and Megavolt's head, now properly re-adorned with plug-hat, poppped out of the hatch. "Leave without you? Whoah, what a great idea! I never thought of that!"
Darkwing smacked himself upside the head. "Me and my big beak..."
"But, fun as that would be, I don't want my arch-enemy running around loose in history where he could mess up the timeline. So, no, I'm not gonna do THAT. I was just trying to get this thing fixed as quickly as possible...I figured you'd come back here pretty soon anyway...." he shrugged and went back to work.
"Well...uh..." Darkwing was temporarily at a loss for what to say, but rallied magnificently. "You, uh...you better not have stolen any of those parts, Mister!"
"No, I didn't, 'Mommy'," came Megavolt's sarcastic tones from inside the machine. "I bought them fair and square with my credit card. So it won't even be created for another 17 years, big deal..." A loud clank. A muffled curse. "Uh, guys, be quiet out there, this is delicate work. I gotta concentrate." Megavolt ran his fingers through what was left of his hair, making it stand up even worse than it already did, and stared at the blurring control panel. He usually had a hard time concentrating on one thing for an extended time anyway, but this was...different. Why was his vision going all blurry? Was it exhaustion? No, he was used to going without sleep for days at a time and he had shaken off the last lingering effects of the "time-travel hangover" hours ago. But no matter what the cause, he felt...weak. And strangely DIZZY. He felt as if he just couldn't bring things into focus...not his thoughts, or what he was physically seeing either...
"I must be more tired than I thought," he muttered to himself, wiping a greasy rag across his forehead, which really just transferred the dirt from the rag onto his head, rather than cleaning him at all. "Maybe I'll feel better if I recharge...wonder where the nearest fuse-box is, anyway...?" He went to climb out, but somehow couldn't find the strength, and just leaned against the wall of the cockpit, breathing.
"dad!" came a faint voice from somewhere down the corridor. "launchpad! over here! we need help!"
"Gosalyn?" said Darkwing, straining to tell which direction the voice was coming from. "Where are you? I'm coming!"
"'We' need help?" wondered Launchpad quietly, and followed along behind. It didn't even occur to him to stay and guard the time machine and Megavolt...but as it turned out, there wasn't much danger likely from that particular supervillian's quarter.
"I'm in here, Dad," came Gosalyn's voice, louder this time. "And this poor guy needs to get to the hospital! Hurry, Dad! Bring Launchpad, so he can carry 'im!" She paused for thought for a moment. "Oh, and by the way: Launchpad? Make sure, absolutely SURE, you don't touch him with anything METAL! It's very important!"
"Hospital?" wondered Darkwing. "Has there been an accident or something? And what's with the 'metal' thing...?" He found the open doorway.
"I got him, DW" said Launchpad, striding on ahead and coming back out of the room with a skinny, long-haired rat boy flooped across one brawny shoulder. "Man, this poor kid looks like he's been through....absolutely EVERYTHING. And then some." Gosalyn followed him out of the room, looking strangely subdued.
Darkwing leaned forward to look at the boy. He was...oddly familiar. But no time for that now; he was a do-gooder, and obviously the good that needed to be done right now was to get this injured citizen some competent medical care. The boy's face was as white as a sheet and clammy, and his clothes were sizzling and sparking. In fact...Launchpad's hair was starting to stand on end too, just from being near the kid! Darkwing took a step away from them-just to be on the safe side, you understand. "Yes...the hospital. Let's tell Megavolt where to find us first, though." They walked through the school. "WE'LL BE AT THE ST. CANARD HOSPITAL, MEGAVOLT!" he yelled through the open doorway of the Algebra class.
"Okay," gasped Megavolt, and it took nearly all his energy to say it loudly enough to be heard. What was WRONG with him...?

"Yes, you were right in bringing him here," said the doctor, a tall, slender, attractive duck woman of around 30 with straight brown hair who looked rather harried--as was to be expected for anybody who had just finished working two whole shifts straight through, and gotten to bed only two hours earlier. But she was handling the situation with aplomb, considering. "It seems he's suffering from the effects of an extremely large electrical shock...but not in the, well, the normal WAY that it usually happens. A lightning bolt or similar passes right through you and then is gone, it does whatever damage it is going to do and that's it, but this...it's like...the electricity is somehow CONTAINED in him. It's very odd. It's dissipating slowly on its own, but we need to find a way to get it out of him quickly--and SAFELY, without it zapping through his heart and killing him--or through his _brain_ and causing permanent brain-damage. I don't know how...maybe he'll be all right if we leave him alone and watch him carefully...?"
"Static", whispered Elmo from his bed, where he lay on a rubber sheet in order to help dampen the voltage he was still carrying. The doctor leaned closer to hear. "Static electricity. Not a current. Is what caused this. That's why. It's just sitting there. It was able. To build and build and build. Without moving or going anywhere."
"Static electricity?!" snorted the doctor, disbelievingly. "You mean like when you get zapped by a metal doorknob after walking on a carpeted floor? There's no way THAT little bit of shock could possibly build up to THESE levels! It was just barely short of lethal, from the looks of your test results. I think perhaps your memory of the last several hours was muddled a bit by the shock. Just lie still and rest as much as possible, Mr. Sputterspark." She turned away before he could protest. "And you three, you are by way of being his...?"
"Friends." said Gosalyn. Darkwing turned to look at her, but then thought better of it. "Yes, that's right, Dr...." he read the nametag she had crookedly fixed to her lapel in a hurry, "Phyllis O. Dendron. We're his friends."
"After all, if we weren't his friends," Launchpad pointed out, practically, "would we have been checking up on him at a school, hours after it let out for the day?"
Stifling a yawn, Dr. Dendron stood up, stretching. "Oh, geez...first I work the night shift right after the day shift, and when I get home, my little girl Rhoda just HAD to show me this science documentary on TV, and now...this. I don't think I've had a proper night's sleep in about a week...I'm gonna go get everybody a good cup of coffee, I think we'd ALL be better for it. He should be all right without supervision for a few minutes anyway, but push the beeper if anything goes wrong and a nurse will be with you shortly." Yawning, she staggered out the door.
Darkwing finally had the chance to take a close look at the kid. "Sputterspark, Sputterspark...that name is familiar..." he looked into Elmo's sleepy eyes..and gasped. "MEGAVOLT!"
"No, it was nowhere near that amount, why does everybody keep saying that..?" murmured Elmo in a half-sleeping tone, and passed out again.
"Wait a minute..." said Darkwing, pacing the floor of the small room, which always helped him think. "I think...I think I'm putting some clues together here. The date...it's June 10, 1973--the day before that prom, when Megavolt first attacked! And around the same time, Elmo Sputterspark disappeared...at the time, I never connected them as being the same person, but now we DO know...but...what's still missing...is exactly HOW he became Megavolt in the first place..."
"Well, I think that being strapped to a static-electricity-generating-machine..whatchamacallit...thingie, for hours and hours and hours, might do it!" said Gosalyn, with more force than she intended.
"Yeah, that'd do it all right," said Darkwing. "But nobody would do such a horrible thing as tie somebody to a machine like that.." he balked as his memory dredged up some simply dreadful personal memories of his own high school experience, "er...would they?"
"Hamm String would!" said Gosalyn, angrily. "He did just that--he forced poor Elmo here to keep running and keep building up more and more power, for a long time! It's lucky he didn't die!"
"Wow, yeah." said Launchpad, cheerfully. "And really lucky you were there, Gosalyn. I mean, whoah, it could've been a lot worse, like the doctor said! It could have stopped his heart, or..."
"Or...fried his....brain..." Darkwing cut in, each word coming out slowly as the shocking realisation dawned. "Oh, my, GOD!! Gosalyn! This is...this is IT! This IS how he became Megavolt! A huge, strange accident involving electricity...happening to Elmo Sputterspark...on the day right before the night Megavolt first attacked! It's GOTTA be! This is it! We've solved the mystery! We've put the missing pieces together!" He did a few little dance steps in the air, from glee.
"Only, now, it's gonna be the almost-accident that DIDN'T create Megavolt", Gosalyn pointed out. "Because he's hurt, but he's gonna be okay, and his brain is definitely still here. Don't let him get started on that boring science junk, he'll talk your ear off."
"Yeah..." Darkwing considered this for a moment, then smiled. "Now, I normally don't condone your wandering off without me in a strange building, young lady, but this time, I gotta admit...ya did good, kid!" He leaned forwards and touseled Gosalyn's already-messy red hair. "You stopped one of the worst supervillians St. Canard has ever seen from even forming, and you've made the city that much safer of a place to live!"
"Whoo! Way to go, Gos!" said Launchpad, punching his fist in the air.
"Guys..." Gosalyn rolled her eyes, embarrassed, and pulled away from her adoptive father. "Hey, what's that sound?" There was a strange scratching/tapping noise, coming from the window. Darkwing strode over to it and lifted the latch.
"Megavolt!" he said, as he saw the face of the supervillian, who was calmly standing outside, waiting to be let in. "Why don't you come in through the door, like normal people? Oh, wait, I forgot who I was talking to..." He stood back as the yellow-clad rat climbed in through the window--they were only on the first floor. "Er..." he began, and then paused uncomfortably. "I hate to say this, Megsy, but...you definitely look like you've seen better days. In fact, you look as if you've seen better CENTURIES."
"Tell me about it," gasped the electrical rat, who seemed to be in pain, but why, nobody could tell. "I just wanted....to tell you...the time-top's fixed." He collapsed on a small folding chair as his knees buckled.
"WAIT a minute!" said Gosalyn, looking from the bed, where the young Elmo Sputterspark was still recovering from an almost brain-damaging--but not QUITE--electrical shock, and then over to the corner, where Megavolt, his alter ego that resulted from that shock--or, rather, the worse one, the one that HADN'T happened--was sitting with his head in his hands, and then back again. "HOW can BOTH of you be here at the same time?! I...I..." she rounded on Megavolt. "I...de-created you! Or something!"
"Ooohhh...." moaned Megavolt weakly. "That wasn't a very nice thing to do. Is that why I feel like I've been dumped into the bay and eaten by a shark...?"
Just then, Dr. Dendron came back in with the coffee. "Oh, hello," she said to Megavolt, noticing him in the corner. "You must be Elmo's father? I can see the family resemblance, it's quite strong. I would have gotten you a cup of coffee too had I known you were here..." She handed out the cups of steaming coffee to everybody--including Gosalyn, being too frazzled to remember that eleven-year-olds aren't supposed to drink coffee at all. Gos quickly took a sip before the doctor could remember..and burned her tongue.
"Anyway," Dr. Dendron was continuing, "You'll be glad to know that your son is going to be all right. He's hurt, but fortunately the electricity didn't do any permanent damage, and....er, are you all right, sir?" She saw the pallor of his face and the fact that he was crumpled over. "Here, I'll just take your temperature--EEEK!!" She gasped, frightened beyond all belief. When she went to raise his head up, her hand passed...right THROUGH him!
This was too much for the good doctor, on top of everything else. "I REALLY need to get some rest, before I become one of my own patients..." she murmured, backing hurriedly out of the room.
The others saw it now, too--Megavolt wasn't just pale, he was actually translucent! And fading more and more with every passing second.
"I get it!" whispered Gosalyn. "He's being erased from existence! Whoah, just like in a science-fiction movie! Funny, though, I never thought it would...well...hurt, to be erased...I feel like I'm at a funeral or something."
"Yeah..." said Launchpad, wiping away a tear, as Megavolt got fainter and fainter. "This is gonna sound weird, but, ya know what? I'm gonna miss ol' Megavolt. I really am. Life just won't be the same without him."
"Of course it won't be the same! It'll be a lot better!" said Darkwing. "We won't have an enemy ripping up the town anymore; we'll have normal, healthy, Elmo Sputterspark--a harmless, friendly citizen. One less supervillian to worry about; won't that be great, Launchpad?"
He paused. "Er...Launchpad?"
The burly redheaded duck had completely, suddenly, and without warning--disappeared.
"What's going ON around here?!" demanded Darkwing. "This is all turning into a dream...a nightmare...worse than that, some cheesy late-night flick! Gosalyn, be a good girl, tell me that I DIDN'T just see Launchpad disapp--" he broke off. His eyes knew perfectly well what they were seeing, but his brain refused to recognise it. "GOSALYN!!!" he cried, lunging towards her. His precious little girl! She was fading, too! She was already half-translucent--he could see the shape of the hospital bed and the shelves behind her--through her! He reached for her, trying to take her into his arms, but he felt nothing. It was like trying to hold smoke.
"Dad...?" came her voice, sounding as if it was from very far away. "What's happening? Don't leave me, Dad..." and then nothing. Darkwing Duck was left holding empty air.
And then he wasn't even Darkwing Duck anymore.