Disclaimer: I don't own Ducktales!

Title: Skinned Knees

Summary: Louie's never felt like he was a particularly brave duck, and almost giving himself over to a cursed mummy exemplifies that- at least, it does if you ask him. Not everyone feels the same way.

Warnings: Spoilers for The Living Mummies of Toth-Ra!

...

It doesn't really sink in until they're flying home. He's mostly relieved during the post-adventure meal, eating like it's going out of style and handing out promises he isn't sure he'll ever keep. He loves Webby, sure, but someone could've asked for a handful of his feathers and he probably would've indulged them. Once his better sensibilities kick in... Well, they'll just have to see.

Scrooge seems to almost hover on the flight back, seating Webby and Louie both in the front of the plane so they're never out of his sight. Louie takes the window seat against his better judgement, making sure to never actually glance outside for fear of motion sickness. He smushes his face against the cool metal wall so it seems like he's napping; they're all always tired after an adventure, save for their Great Uncle, who seems to gain rather than lose energy from death-defying acts. His fingertips barely brush each other in his hoodie pockets, and he can feel them shaking.

He wants Uncle Donald to come and hug him as they touch down, but it's pitch black out, and while Uncle Donald would never spurn any of his nephews, it doesn't seem fair to wake him from an otherwise peaceful slumber with tales of their threatened demise. That, and if he went alone that would be really suspect, and he's really not up to that right now.

It sinks in on the flight, but it doesn't really register until he's halfway through the huge front door, half-stumbling over his own webbed feet. The knowledge of it has him swaying just a bit, but Beakley is there with a hand to his shoulder, and he plays it off as tripping on the rug.

Webby saw.

She probably couldn't hear him, so high up, but she saw, and there's no way she didn't put two and two together. Webby's smart. She read the walls. She saw and she didn't mention it to anyone.

At least, not yet.

Louie's chin touches his hoodie as his shoulders rise up. His face felt like it was on fire. Mortified, ashamed, scared- he wasn't exactly sure what it was he was feeling, but there was a lot of it, and none of it was good. What if she tells Scrooge? He thinks, feeling his heart harden and slither down into his midsection. He could probably reach back and put it in his pocket, getting pocket lint all over. What if she tells Uncle Donald? Somehow, that's even worse.

He grapples with an excuse for all of this, something that will put him at ease, and finds something relatively safe- she was fairly far away. Webby had been up near Toth-Ra's throne. He must've been a green speck in her vision, compared to the pharaoh. Not to mention, he added mentally, that she'd been so excited to see a cursed mummy. Maybe he got away with it after all. Maybe no one actually saw anything, and he's in the clear.

Maybes never do seem to apply with Webby. Louie's throat feels hollow and dry as he remembers that, but he pretends it doesn't bother him. If he asks and she doesn't recall, all it'll do is put him in deeper trouble. It's an exercise in futility.

Maybe, if he never says anything, she won't either.

Back when they lived on the houseboat, there had been a division of chores between the three of them. Louie had, in his typical fashion, grabbed the easier tasks- loading the dishwasher, sweeping the floor, and sewing up rips and tears. Sewing was always his favorite, and it must have shown, as Huey and Dewey both leave adventure-weary shirts at his feet (metaphorically speaking, of course- Huey always folds and neatly places them on his bed). Louie wonders what he'd be doing if he was serving Toth-Ra while he works. Would he be sewing bandages? Farming? Guarding? It'd suck, whatever it was, and the mere idea of it sent chills down his spine.

He almost didn't come home tonight.

"Ugh," Louie said to himself, though his mind was far away. He held up his brother's signature blue shirt to the lamp by his bed, revealing a tear the size of a feather. "Seriously, Dewey? What did you do?"

One might think slipping into the giant hallway of a giant mansion would be a piece of cake, but Louie has always felt anxious when it came to sneaking around the manor, moreso than when they were living on the houseboat. That's probably because Uncle Donald isn't nearly as scary as the force of nature that is Bentina Beakley. He isn't even sure if she sleeps or not, which only makes his quiet footsteps all the more harrowing.

His best chance of finding something to patch the hole with is the main living room. Dewey is notoriously messy, and could very well have left something on the cushions. A quick search yields nothing, which isn't very surprising, but Louie had hoped the aforementioned cleaning woman might decide their messes weren't her responsibility and leave it as it was. Silly, but worth a try.

"What're you doing?"

Louie let out a shriek and whirled around, tripping onto the couch. Webby watches him patiently, arms behind her back, and the part of him not freaking out whispers about irony- sewing to forget a problem and the problem comes to find him sewing.

"Oh," she says, catching sight of Dewey's shirt. "Are you fixing that? I got some string in my room if you need it."

"I got string," he reassures between heaving breaths. "I need a patch."

"I've got those too," she offered. "Got some old washcloths in the back."

"Why would you have those?"

Webby shrugged. "Why not? You never know when you're gonna need to handle something that ruins fabric."

Louie is tempted to repeat the question- because, seriously, what does Webby get up to in her free time that might require disposable fabric?- but instead clamps his beak shut, desperate to worm out of this. He thought Webby would at least have the dignity to let him get his feet under before she cornered him. There's a difference between courage and brashness, Webbigail. And what would she even have to say about it? Too little, too late, try again next time? "I should get to bed."

"You're already up," she pointed out, tilting her head slightly to the side.

"I can't argue that," he admitted, then wished he didn't when Webby helped him off the couch and waved a hand for him to follow. What could he say to that? 'No, I'm trying to avoid you?' Not a good plan. Unsatisfied and feeling a bit silly, he followed.

No one came upon them as they made their way down the halls of the manor. Webby trailed her index and middle finger along the walls with a level of familiarity Louie hadn't allowed the place to give him quite yet as they went. It wasn't that late- not really- and though everything felt silent, he wondered just how silent it really was. Webby knew the building better than she knew herself, and she knew ways that would circumvent any interruption, and Louie was a bit concerned that was why no one came around the corner to spot them. One of the windows they passed revealed the houseboat floating in the pool, covered in a blanket of darkness and good intentions, and he felt bad for an entirely different reason.

Louie can count on his fingers the amount of times he's been in Webby's room. It's not that the place is off-limits- to his knowledge, it's not- but Webby only ever really used the place to sleep, and it's weird to go into someone else's room for no reason. The walls are lined with books of all shapes and sizes, most of which look thick and old. A ladder leads up to where she sleeps, a place Louie has never had any interest in going. It's probably just a bed and bed stand up there, if that. Maybe she just has a mattress. Various planes and other flying vehicles hang from the ceiling, along with stars, moons, and hearts. The air reeked of old paper and craft glue.

There are exactly two chairs; an office chair and an armchair, flanked by a tea set. Webby removes a teddy bear almost double her size from the latter and motioned for Louie to settle in before heading off to her drawers to find something for a patch.

"I was never any good at sewing," she said as she dug around, voice slightly muffled. "I mean, I'm decent, but I'm better at stitching wounds than I am clothes. One time, I fell out a window and got a cut on my arm, and I fixed it up all by myself. Told granny the mansion was cold and wore long sleeves until my feathers grew over it. I'm pretty sure she didn't buy it, but she didn't know the whole story, either." Webby paused, then added: "I've still got the scar. It's pretty neat."

"Are you telling me," Louie replied slowly and deliberately, "that you decided to play surgeon with your body one day?"

"Basically?" It sounded like a question, like she didn't understand why he was asking.

"Why?"

Webby straightened, a pile of various blue fabrics in hand. "To see if I could, I guess."

Louie sorts through them as Webby flops into the office chair, thudding against the desk behind her. He finds one that's relatively the same shade and gets to cutting while she scooches closer, chin propped on the back rest, idly curious. The bear stares at them both with its button eyes. Sewing is something Louie enjoys for the fact that he can just sit and do it, but it's not very fun when you're in an silent room with someone watching.

Just say it already, he thinks, daring her. Call me a moron and a coward. You saw me bow down. You saw me throw away my pride and bow to a dead pharaoh. It just doesn't get worse than that. What if Toth-Ra had accepted? Then what? He could've commanded me to kill all of you. You know that. We've all got the critical thinking skills to reach that conclusion. And you wanna know the sad thing? I'm not sure how I would've reacted if he had.

"You know," Webby says instead, and Louie is beginning to wonder if she's mocking him at this point. "I could teach you how to read hieroglyphs, if you want. That way, if we ever get split up in an evil pyramid again, we'll all know what not to do."

"Why?" he asks; he's asking about a lot of things, really. "Why me?"

She shrugged. "I was gonna ask Huey and Dewey too, but I found you first."

She didn't see, he realized suddenly. There was no doubting the sincerity in her voice. Or, if she did, she didn't care. You really are a monumental moron, Louie. An overthinking, overzealous, undertrained moron.

Webby's chin popped up off the chair. "Hey, are you okay?"

Louie glances down. His hands are shaking again, swerving the needle left and right like a snake's head, stiff and ready to strike. He drops said needle. His first instinct is to put his hands in his hoodie pockets again, and manages to succeed with one, but Webby grabs the other.

"Hey," she said softly. "It's okay to be scared, you know."

He bit the edge of his beak, glancing at his lap. He hoped Dewey hadn't gotten too hurt when he got that tear- or ever, really. "Maybe... Maybe I oughta stop coming along on adventures," he broached finally, not entirely sure how he felt about the idea. "I mean, I was always in it for the money, and that's one of Scrooge's big no-no's for adventuring, so... And I've never really had the stomach for it, either."

Webby got a weird look on her face. It wasn't something Louie could quite put his finger on. There was confusion and laughter and a smidgen of personal uncertainty, amongst other things. She let go of his hand. "Louie, you told a guy shoving a spear in your face you were his manager."

Louie found he didn't have a proper response to that, and shrugged accordingly. "I'm good for small stuff, but I always chicken out at the end."

"He had a spear," she repeated dubiously. "And was pointing it at your face."

"Well, you were telling him how to kill us properly!"

"That's irreverent to the topic." Webby leaned back, grabbing onto the back of her chair so she didn't fall over. "Look. If I have to die, I wanna die in a way that's gonna make people talk. I don't want a bunch of old fuddy-duddies at my funeral, talking about how I passed in my sleep and yadda yadda. I want people getting drunk and telling wild stories of my life. I want Duckburg to hear about how I bit the dust and wonder if I actually bit the dust or if I transcended into another realm. Also," she added. "I always kinda wanted to get a viking funeral. Granted, minus the part about forcing my wife to burn with me."

"I'd rather not die at all," Louie said, and that was all he really had on the topic. Death seemed like something far away, even when it was really close. Incomprehensible. "You saw me, didn't you? With Toth-Ra?"

She shifted her weight forward, inching the chair a bit closer unintentionally. "What, that bit with the sword? Yeah, I saw."

"I was giving up, Webby," he answered flatly. "I tried to pledge my loyalty to him."

"Oh," Webby said, and that was all she really had on the topic. "Okay."

"Okay? Just okay?"

She reached out and patted his shoulder. "I'm glad you're not serving an undead pharaoh. Even though that does sound really cool when I say it out loud."

"That's not the point!" Louie cried, jerking his shoulder away. He glared at her like she'd pinched him. "I chickened out, Webby, okay? I tried to save my own skin by any means necessary."

"That's understandable. Losing your skin doesn't sound pleasant."

"You think getting tossed into a spike pit is a fun way to die."

"Hey, no one ever said dying as an adventurer was gonna be painless."

Louie hesitantly pulled his hands out of his hoodie pockets. They weren't shaking nearly as hard. "I'm a coward. I tried to pledge my allegiance to some dude with bandages on him. And what if he said 'sure'? I'd be stuck in some crummy pyramid right now."

"You don't honestly think Mr. McDuck would ditch you in a pyramid, do you?" she asked, baffled. "Because he wouldn't."

He shrugged helplessly. Most of him wanted to say that he knew that Scrooge wouldn't leave him, but there was also the part of him that reminded him (with good reason) of exactly how bad it would look for his Great Uncle to lead a revolution to find him and Webby, only to find out that he'd surrendered the moment an actual danger showed up. Louie tried to picture his reaction, and found he couldn't. That's the problem with new people. Too many variables. He still had a lot of probing to do, and he didn't think a giant mummy god creature would make for a good first test. "Can we agree not to tell him? I mean, that only makes sense, right?"

"It doesn't not make sense," she half-agreed, "but I really don't see the issue. No one got hurt. You were scared and you didn't want to die. That's only logical. I'd have done the same."

"You would've punched Toth-Ra in the face."

"I take it back. I totally would've punched him in the face." Her face lit up at the thought, but retained its earlier seriousness. "But you're not me. And you're not Mr. McDuck. You shouldn't be ashamed of yourself for wanting to survive a scary situation."

"I hate you," Louie decided. "Stop making sense. I wanna sulk."

"You can sulk while you sew, novice pyramid crawler." She punched his shoulder in an attempt at being companionable, and Louie took in a sharp breath to avoid whimpering. Webby slipped off her office chair. "I'll go get us somethin' to drink."

Author's Note: Originally, Scrooge was gonna find Louie sewing, but this fit better methinks. =)

So, yeah, how 'bout that new episode of Ducktales. Memes aside, there's nothing like a child offering himself up for eternal servitude to get the writer's bug going.

Webby's room design is canon, btw. I just looked off the screenshot I took of it from The Great Dime Chase.

-Mandaree1