Chapter Text
“I already paid you!” Uncle Scrooge snapped, once Louie decided to tune back in to their rather one-sided argument. The richest duck in the world looked from Della to Donald, and finally to Louie, a frown clear upon his face, obviously switching gears once he noticed Louie’s attention. “Lad, Maeve said there was nothing to be frightened about.”
Louie opened his beak to argue, to scramble for excuses, for something that would make Scrooge understand - but Donald stomped in front of him and began angrily squawking at Scrooge instead. Della moved to Louie’s side and ushered him over to join Huey, Dewey, and Webby.
“Mom?” Louie asked, slowing down as he leaned back against her guiding hands, turning to watch the verbal spar between his uncles.
“I told you that you could change your mind anytime,” she said with a smile. A wan, thin upturn at the corners of her beak. “We’ll deal with Uncle Scrooge. Maybe they’ll give him a refund for - emotional troubles, or something.”
He stopped a bit away from the rest of the group. “I thought Uncle Donald wanted me to get rid of it too.”
Della didn’t respond, though he caught the weak smile turn into a frown as she stood up fully. She jutted out a hand, and then a finger, pointing at Gladstone, who finally entered the room enough to stand near the bundle of kids. “Take them to eat.”
“We just ate,” Dewey called plaintively, aiming a phone at the arguing adults.
“Then take them to a movie or something,” their mom corrected. “-and don’t lose any of them.”
“You got it, Dells,” Gladstone pointed finger guns at her and theatrically counted each of them before he held up four fingers. “Uh, but with what money?”
“Between you and Louie?” Della laughed, but it sounded more stressed than happy. “You’ll figure something out.”
With that, she turned and reentered the argument, immediately as loud as her brother, though much more comprehensible, as she carried on about choice mattering more than money.
Maeve stood off to the side, looking tired and fed up with the whole debacle, while Thea moved the coals about. When the younger cat noticed Louie looking, she grinned and gave him a pointed nod before turning back to her task.
The walk out of the building was quiet, at least in their group. There was plenty of noise still echoing down the hall from the famous McDuck temper, and the usual noises of people talking or plates clattering that could be heard through the walls of the apartment as they walked through.
Once outside, Gladstone pointed them in a random direction and dropped back a good ways, not following them until the group was half a block down the street. Louie thought this may have been purposeful, but when he glanced back, Gladstone was plucking something green off the sidewalk. Regardless, he was glad for the semi-privacy it offered, as the others crowded Louie once Gladstone was mostly out of earshot.
“I thought you wanted to get rid of your luck,” Webby said, grabbing onto and hanging off of his shoulder.
Louie shrugged, trying to play off his anxiousness as something - anything else. “I kind of don’t. Apparently kind of still wanting it might have made this whole thing not work.”
The girl nodded very seriously.
“But you can’t run off like that again,” Huey said seriously, butting past Webby to stumble along in front of him. “The Junior Woodchuck Guidebook says staying together is extremely important in a survival situation, adventure or not.”
“Look, okay, I get it,” Louie said sullenly. “My luck isn’t in the guidebook or anything, so-”
“It isn’t about luck,” Dewey interjected. “It’s super cool and everything, but you aren’t, uh. Huey, say something smart.”
“Oh!” Huey said, fumbling when Dewey waved at him. “You aren’t - relying on us.”
“You don’t have luck,” Louie said flatly.
“That’s never stopped us before!” Dewey argued. “It’s like cool Uncle Donald said, these ducks don't back down!”
“Yeah,” Webby jumped in front of him on the path and started walking backwards once Huey dropped back to his side, pushing Dewey to the back of the group because of the sidewalks width. “You never had any issue before you figured out you had luck. You can just go back to doing the same, but now it’s a little easier for things… not to go wrong… around you? Not that they usually do, but… yeah.”
Louie reached for an argument. He was sure more would come up later that he could bring up, but at the moment, the others were confirming that he had done the right thing, that they could work around his supernatural handicap. Or his supernatural support? “What about Lena? She freaked out when she saw it, before.”
“Oh, that?” Webby laughed. Dewey briefly stepped into the road to get around Huey. Then he grabbed her arm and wordlessly guided her around a fire hydrant as she continued to face Louie while walking. “Lena’s a lot better about that sort of thing now. She was kind of embarrassed about it, I think? But ever since Magica stopped messing with her dreams, she really hasn’t minded magic or luck or anything. We’re, uh, Violet and Lena and I, are doing a lot more magic stuff together, you know?”
“Well, I mean-”
“And she said your magic wasn’t even that cool! Then she called you a clown,” Webby went on in a rush, until Dewey pulled her out of the way of another pole in the middle of the road, and Gladstone, way in the back, called for them not to get any concussions.
Louie glanced up upon seeing a 5$ bill floating in the air. He reached slowly as he walked, only for Dewey to snatch it right before him.
“See?” He waved it. “Your luck helped me too!”
“I guess,” Louie sighed dramatically, despite feeling uplifted by their arguments.
Thinking of the adults, fighting in the cramped apartment made his stomach hurt a little, and made him wonder if he should have just tried it - but, no. Then Scrooge could blame the witches for it not working, and he might try finding another place. And Mom would keep giving him those looks, and Uncle Donald would side with Scrooge for his ‘safety’ because Louie had stopped talking the careful route.
“Okay,” Gladstone said, upon catching up with them where they stopped. He held a series of flyers of mysterious origin and waved them about above their heads. “It looks like there’s a movie theater nearby in case anybody wants to see…” The goose paused, squinting at something. Then he reached into a nearby bush and pulled out a wad of tickets. “Whatever this is for.”
Dewey and Webby raced forward to count up and dole out the tickets, cheering over the title.
Louie glanced at Gladstone, who tipped his hat to the kid before carrying on. He allowed himself a secret grin and fished out his phone to take a picture of the group in front of him to send to his mom.