I’m sure you’ve seen the letter that the Sand Witch sent out to pretty much everyone in the world, ranting about ‘The War Between The Ducks And The Witches’, and ending with ‘You might as well give up now. Mr. Q. Wherever you are, just turn yourself in!’.

That might sound scary to most people, but to Mr. Quackers it just made him smile. He knew that there was not really a ‘war’, and Mr. Q didn’t plan to give himself up to anyone—especially not to a witch with a shiny new grill in her back garden!

I’m sure you already know this, but just in case you need a reminder, here’s how most bullies work: they like to make a lot of fuss and noise. Most of them seem to believe that just by making a lot of fuss and noise they’ll scare people into doing whatever they want them to do. Sadly, quite a few people let them get away with it. Mr. Quackers was not like ‘quite a few people’, though. He knew that giving bullies whatever they want just trains them to become more bully-ish bullies.

Mr. Quackers knew that a calm, quiet smile was usually the best way to respond to fuss and noise, no matter who was doing the fussing and noising. Smiles are almost always a wonderfully calming influence.

So, after he read the Sand Witch’s letter, Mr. Quackers just smiled and went back to enjoying time with his friends.

Mr. Quackers and the Sea Witch

Mr. Quackers was really enjoying his time in Oosah (which he now knew was spelled ‘USA’, and was not a word that one pronounced ‘Oosah’, but an abbreviation that one could use just by saying the letters). The only thing he didn’t enjoy in the USA was that he had to avoid water as much a possible.

He wasn’t afraid of the Sand Witch, of course, but the more he thought about the Sea Witch being involved in her sister’s ‘war against ducks’, the more he thought it would be wise to avoid watery places. The Sea Witch was quite powerful in any water-related situation, and Mr. Quackers knew that she had many sea creatures who reported to her.

If the Sea Witch wanted to know about something happening on the other side of the world, she would just ask one of her spies (mostly fish), and the information she wanted would come back to her faster than you can imagine. Oceans cover most of the earth’s surface, and there are so many creatures under the waves that all they needed to do was to pass along her question and then pass back the answer. Most of them hardly even had to move very far to do this.

Mr. Quackers didn’t want any information about where he was or what he was doing (or about his friends) to reach the witches, so he avoided going anywhere near water.

As you might imagine, though, it’s very hard for a duck to avoid water. That’s like you trying to avoid swimming, or ice cream! Or like me trying to avoid telling stories. Water is just a part of their nature, and you can’t expect them to stay away from it for very long.

Mr. Quackers decided one day that he just had to visit some water—just for a teeny, tiny, little swim. He decided to take a short trip to somewhere wet.

He probably should have done this by visiting one of Texas' many lakes, but he was in the mood for swimming in salty water, so he decided to visit someplace on the Gulf, like Houston or Galveston.

He left his magic gems hidden in a safe place and flew off to the shore. His plan was to get some salty splashing and swimming in and be back later that same day. His friends would hardly notice that he had been gone!

He arrived at the shore and found a quiet spot where he could swim without anyone recognizing him.

Unfortunately, a little fish did recognize him, and darted off to send word—through all of the fish loyal to the Sea Witch—that Mr. Quackers had been spotted in Texas, near a certain spot along the shore.

Faster than underwater lightning (which is not a real thing), word came back from the Sea Witch that all the fish in the area should do whatever they could to keep Mr. Quackers there until she arrived—which would be in about six minutes. She planned to capture him (with much joy and loud, wicked, triumphant laughter) and bring him straight to her sister, the Sand Witch.

Mr. Quackers didn’t know about any of this, of course. He splashed around and swam and did that cute thing that ducks do when they put their head under the water to find a nibble of something to eat and their tail-end goes straight up in the air and wiggles around while they try to grab a bite. He hadn’t even seen any fish (tiny or otherwise) nearby, so he didn’t think he had anything to worry about.

If he had stayed there splashing around for another six minutes, he probably would have been captured (with much joy and loud, wicked, triumphant laughter), taken to the Sand Witch, and grilled. But he did not stay there splashing around for another six minutes. Not even three minutes. Not even one…

Mr. Quackers froze in place when he felt a strange sensation on one of his duck feet. Something had gently grabbed his foot under the water! It wasn’t the kind of grab that a lot of sea creatures do—the kind of grab that means ‘A-ha! I’m going to eat you!’, but it was more of a…gentle tug. It was the kind of polite grab that means ‘I need your attention for a moment, if you please’.

Mr. Quackers took a peek under the water and found himself beak-to-arm with a lovely orange starfish.

Most humans don’t know this, but starfish are kind of the ‘double-agents’ of the undersea world. They have ‘fish’ right there in their name, so everyone assumes that they follow the Sea Witch and do whatever she says, like most fish do. However, starfish are not fish at all! They are echinoderms—specifically the kind of echinoderms known as asteroids. (Starfish are not the kind of asteroids that hurtle through space, but they do have the same name for some reason.)

This isn’t a nature documentary, though, so if you want to learn more about echinoderms (and you should learn more about them, because they are quite fascinating creatures), you must figure out how to do that on your own.

As I was saying, starfish are often thought of as friends of the Sea Witch, but in reality they only pretend to be on her side. They often go unnoticed in underwater circles. That helps them to function as ‘secret agents’ of the seas. In their case, secret double-agents, which means that they seem to be working for one side when they are really working for the opposite side.

The starfish who tugged on Mr. Quackers' foot was named Shshlshimshlsh. His name is not pronounceable by humans, so we’ll just say that his name was ‘Shushy’.

Shushy told Mr. Q all about what the little fish had done, and he suggested that Mr. Q leave the area in fewer than six minutes.

Mr. Quackers thanked him for the warning, and flapped out of the water as quickly as he could. Before flying off, though, he went back to the water and stuck his head in. Shushy was still there.

“I thought you were leaving,” Shushy said slowly. (All starfish talk very slowly. They also move slowly. They are very relaxed creatures. Not as relaxed as sloths, but close.)

“I am,” Quackers assured him, “but if you could do me a favor and get the word out that the little fish was mistaken, and that I am probably much further down the coast—possibly somewhere near Mexico—that would give me more of a chance to get away. Think you can do that?”

“Good idea,” Shushy slowly agreed. “Everyone knows how sloppy fish are with their details. Easy.”

Mr. Quackers thanked Shushy and flapped away back to his friends' house as fast as he could. Beneath the waves, Shushy started complaining to anyone who would listen about how silly and wrong that little fish was if he thought he had seen a duck in this part of the Gulf.

“Everyone knows what a duck looks like,” Shushy said. “But apparently that little fish has never seen one. Or maybe he saw one, but far, far south of here. Maybe off the coast of Mexico.”

By the time the Sea Witch finished her journey, hundreds of fish along her path had told her not to go to the original spot, but that she needed to look much further south. When she did, she didn’t find any ducks at all off the coast of Mexico. She angrily asked some of the local fish if they had seen any ducks in the area.

“No podemos entenderle,” a local fish said. “¿Por qué no habla con normalidad? ¿Que le pasa?”

The Sea Witch didn’t know what language they were using, but I speak it pretty well, so I can tell you that they said, “We can’t understand you. Why don’t you speak normally? What’s wrong with you?”

After several frustrating minutes of trying to communicate with the local fish, the Sea Witch gave up and went back to her side of the world.

As for Mr. Quackers, he went back to his friends' house in North Texas and promised himself that he would stay away from water from now on—or at least until he knew it was absolutely safe.