I meant to have had this chapter up two weeks ago but I'll admit I had some writers block, and I was constantly changing, adding, and removing things. Last week/this week was Exam week for school so that kept me busy too. It's a bit of a slow chapter, but is part of the calm before the storm ;) As a heads up, this story will get somewhat dark since we are dealing with one variation of a major mental disorder, so prepare yourselves. By the way, just want to point out that the triplets are 11 in this story, since I assume they are 10 in the show right?

Just to make it clear this story takes place around the time my other story does, meaning nothing since Della came back in the show is relevant. I haven't watched any of the newest episodes yet, will do so one of these days :D

I added a picture to the story! Drawn by me ;)

Thank you for all the new reviews, favorites and follows! I'm sure you've all read this before many times, but they really do motivate me to keep writing :D

Kit419: Thank you! ^.^ It really isn't Louie's fault, he just doesn't know that T-T

puppydogs68: Thanks! :D I haven't had the chance to read Louie depression stories but I also really enjoy reading depression stories!

ReeReeWithAngst: Haha I'm glad to be back! Thanks for your review! Sure! I'd be interested in that! feel free to PM me! ^.^

(I hope these responses to reviews/opening notes aren't annoying, I just find it a way to connect with my reviewers!)

Disclaimer: I don't own Ducktales!

Louie sat next to his great uncle, legs dangling off an uncomfortable plastic chair. He glanced slightly to the left, being greeted by the same wires, the same machines, the same sleeping Donald, the same uncomfortable silence. Scrooge had claimed the only stool in the room before the staff draged the "only chair they had left" into the room for him to sit. He refused at first, but gave in once he was left standing for 4 hours.

Two weeks had passed since Donald had been hospitalized. The attempt to lower the amount of toxins in his blood had been unsuccessful with the medications the hospital had, but what the medications had failed to do his body had made up for it. The doctor had been pleased to announce that Donald's body was fighting back well. The levels had been low by the end of the last week and were practically nonexistant the day before.

Scrooge had visited the hospital every day, staying the nights and only going back to his mansion to eat, claiming he didn't trust hospital cafeteria food other than their beverages. He usually visited alone, but he occasionally had one of the triplets with him. Hospital policy stated only 2 visitors in the room per patient at a time, and though the triplets could take turns entering the room while 2 waited in the waiting room, they prefered to have whole days to visit. Therefore, they took turns on who went which day. Today, it was Louie's turn.

They had been there for 8 hours. A nurse had drawn blood 5 hours prior to once again test for toxins in Donald's body. Nurses had walked in and out since then to perform small actions such as checking the IV, replacing the fluid bag, etc. Every time Scrooge had tried asking them when the test results would be available, they simply gave a vague response. Scrooge had been muttering in annoyance since then. Louie could only make out "never take this long", "stupid hospitals," and "ridiculous".

The green clad duckling looked down at his trembling hands, letting his mind run free in the unnerving silence. The last two weeks had been extremely horrible. The triplets had been unable to sleep without sharing the same bunk in the first week. They had cried together, talked together about their feelings and the situation. Huey and Dewey had bawled their eyes out, while Louie had only shed a few tears with them, only to lock himself in the bathroom immediately after and sob with the shower turned on. The guilt had meshed in with his already present anxiety and had just become one huge ball of extreme consternation, eating away at him so much that he didn't know what to do. In addition, a terrible headache had blossomed in his head accompanied with a large bruise from the head trauma. THankfully his feathers covered it up.

As the second week progressed things seemed to improve, at least for Louie's brothers. His brothers had turned to a somewhat positive outlook at things, despite continuing having various emotional moments, and decided it would be best to remain positive as much as possible in hopes that things would return to normal again. He could still sense their sadness despite their best efforts, but he didn't blame them. This was a difficult situation.

Louie's headache and bruise had improved greatly by the second week, but his emotional health declined. Sleep was much more difficult, and when he did manage to sleep for a few hours or so at night it would be plagued with nightmares. He slept during the day sometimes, passing out in the middle of doing tasks. Thankfully no one had witnessed this.

The duckling could physically see how the months of little sleep was affecting him. Someone with dark circles under the eyes, ruffled feathers, slightly bloodshot eyes, and an unfocused gaze would glance back at him each time he looked in the bathroom mirror.

HIs energy dwindled, so he would just cry in his shared room when his brothers were not there. Or at night.

Unfortunately, his uncle Scrooge had walked in on him crying in their room once. Apparently he had been too loud and he had had no choice but to express the overwhelming anxiety. He actually felt relieved when he started to blurt everything out of his beak and wondered why he had been scared to share with his family how he felt. But just as he finished voicing his guilt about being responsible for placing his uncle in the hospital and was about to get into all his other worries, he had recieved a stern cane to the back of the head along with a viscious tounge lashing from his uncle, who was "making it clear" that none of this had been his fault and that he "never wanted to talk about that again." Dumbstruck, Louie had wished he hadn't opened his beak. He hadn't blamed Scrooge for lashing out though, since he must have been feeling the worst out of all of them.

But this made Louie realize he made the best decision to keep his emotions of guilt and anxiety away from his family from the start. It was only a bother. And really, his problems didn't matter anyways.

His eyes began to tear up but he blinked them away quickly before his uncle could see. He didn't want a repeat of what had happened, and didn't doubt the idea that he would recieve an earfull if the elder duck caught him crying.

Rubbing his exhausted eyes, he turned to look at the simple clock located on the wall. An internal part of him wished he would be at home just lying in bed. Yes, he would start to think many unpleasant thoughts, but at least it would be better than losing his mind there in front of others.

Louie sighed. He shouldn't be thinking about going home when his uncle was here at the hospital. He needed to be there for him. Looking back at the comatose Donald, he pondered over how much he just wanted to pull all the wires connected to him like a machine and shake his uncle vigorously until he woke up. But according to the doctor, that's not how these things worked.

Why couldn't it just have been him in the hospital bed? Maybe being trapped in a comatose body would bring relief to all the thoughts that plagued his mind day and night.

The duckling found himself pinching his fingers slightly, a habit that had recently developed since the night Donald was hospitalized. It didn't hurt much, but the more he thought about things, the harder he would unconsciously pinch himself. He had never pinched himself hard enough to form a bruise, though.

A vibration went off in his hoodie pocket, startling him a little. Pulling his phone out, he noticed a message from Haley. The anxiousness vanished just slightly as a smile tugged at the corners of his beak.

Recieving a response from her always helped quell his anxiety a little. Just a little.

He was glad when she had responded in the middle of the past week, or else his anxiety would have been through the roof. He had had no contact with her for over a week and had recieved her message just as he had headed to the bathroom to cry for what had felt as the thousandth time. She had apologized for her absence, claiming she had a sudden visit to the mountains and the reception was practically non-existent. Louie had been slightly hurt that she had not told him she was going there so that he wouldn't have had to add her lack of communication to his growing list of worries. It wasn't her fault though.

They had videochatted for the entire day to catch up on everything. He had explained the situation to her, even breaking down slightly once he got to the part of Donald being in a coma. Thankfully his brothers had already said hi to her earlier and had better things to do at that moment than listen to their entire conversation.

Louie had felt much better after speaking with her. It was nice to be able to have conversations about worries with someone that was not family. Sure there was Webby, but she didn't count because she was practically family. She was bound to tell his brothers, and he didn't want that.

Unfortunately after the day of the video call she went back to "ignoring him", as Louie liked to call it, though he knew that wasn't necessarily true. He still messaged her during her lack of responsiveness anyways to let her know he was to visit his uncle in the hospital for lab results since she really liked Donald and wanted to be updated on his situation. This is what she had responded to.

'Ok! Let me know what the results say! I really hope he wakes up soon too. He needs to be awake when I go visit you or I'm gonna kick his butt and make him wake up!' Her message read. Louie laughed softlyHer good mood is what he needed. He didn't think he could handle talking with another sad person. His brothers had practically radiated sadness the entire 2 weeks. That was more than enough.

He couldn't help but wonder though if talking about his emotions with Haley was bothersome for her.

Pushing that thought to the side for now, he replied with: 'I'll let you know. Still waiting for the results and I'm dying of boredom.' He thought a bit more, and in regards to her third sentence, put: 'When are you coming to visit btw? Me and my brother's 12th bday is coming up and it would be fun if you could come. Won't be doing anything big, just the family. We could use some company too.'

Their birthday was to come in a few weeks. They had wanted a huge party for their 12th birthday berfore everything happened, but Scrooge had shut down the idea, claiming it was his home and had the right to do so. The children had reluctantly agreed. Now with Donald in the hospital, they didn't think they would want a huge party, even if he did wake up before their birthday rolled around. They had discussed whether they should still celebrate their birthday if Donald was in the hospital, and agreed they would at least have cake and sing happy birthday with Scrooge, Webby, and Beakley to avoid making their birthday so melancholy.

There was no response after 10 minutes and Louie sighed, placing his phone back in his pocket. She was going to be missing in action for who knew how long again. He noticed a recent trend that if he replied almost immediately to her she would reply back. He agreed immediate replies were desparate but if he took even 5 minutes to reply she would stop replying for some reason.

Scrooge exhaled heavily and stood up to stretch, bones cracking loudly causing Louie to wince. "Well lad," He said, looking at Louie, "I'll be right back ta grab some coffee. Do ya want something?"

Louie shook his head and silently watched his uncle exit the room. He sighed and fidgited in his seat uncomfortably, the silence being overcome by his thoughts again. The pinching was becoming gradually stronger...

"Where's your uncle Scrooge?" Came a voice to his right. He jumped and gave a small yelp. It was the goose doctor. He seemed to have found the jump and the yelp slightly funny, a smirk plastered on his aged face.

"He, uh...went to go get coffee," He replied meekly.

"He might be a while..." The doctor mumbled, sitting on the stool Scrooge had vacated. "Well, I had come to deliver some slightly good news, hope it helps some."

Louie turned towards the old goose quickly with a hopeful expression. Seeing this, the doctor smiled and fixed his glasses. "Guess I can tell you then, since I do have to go attend others and don't have much time to wait. The good news is that the labs checking for any trace of venom came back negative. He is no longer poisoned."

The duckling felt his face fall slightly after hearing these words. Yes it was great news, but he had already known his uncle was fighting back the poison and there was little to none the day before, thus making the news somewhat disappointing. He was hoping the news would be related to Donald waking up.

"Oh..." He muttered in response. "Um, yeah. That's...that's great to hear..." He noticed the doctor raise an eyebrow at his response and added, "I mean really! That really is great news! It's just...I was hoping it was something related to him waking up or something..."

"Yeah that's...the other thing I wanted to discuss with your great uncle. I have to go speak with another family right now but when he comes back, please notify one of the nurses so they can come get me so I can speak with him privately-"

"N-no wait!" The duckling burted out and grabbed on to the white coat of the doctor as he had stood up. Geez talk about desparate, he thought. "You can tell me. I want to know too."

The doctor examined him, considering his options before sighing and sitting back down on the stool. "Alright. I'll give you a brief rundown of what is going on but I'll still need to speak with your great uncle since I need his approval for something. Well. Just like I said the first time you were here, we wanted to see if he would wake up once all the toxin was gone from his body. Now it is. If it was just the poison in his system keeping him in this state, then he may wake up in the next few days. But because we are not sure if this is the case, don't get your hopes up.

"The night you all showed up after the plane crash we performed this 'test' which checks things like your verbal and motor responses, on all of you. Your family scored high numbers, meaning there was little to no brain damage. You scored slightly lower than your family, but still a good score to indicate no major brain damage and also a great score to get after having a 'skull shattering blow to the head on the window', per Scrooge. We were only unable to do the test on your Uncle Donald, since he was already unconscious and so we couldn't test for neurological damage in that way. THese tests are usually an estimate of how the outcome of a coma will be. But we did perform a CT head scan to look for injuries to the brain, either caused by the poison or by the crash. We didn't find evidence of neurological injury. There was also no sign of brain inflammation. Doesn't mean there isn't any though. I want to do another scan called an MRI to look into detail for any injuries. That's the other part of the reason I want to speak to your great Uncle. In order to do the scan, we need approval from Donald's insurance, but it was declined. Perhaps your Uncle Scrooge could provide the payment necessary to complete the scan just as he did for the CT."

The doctor tapped him on the shoulder twice and stood up. "Hang in there kid. We will keep close contact with your Uncle Scrooge and will notify him of every change, even the smallest of changes. Don't forget to notify the nurses when he gets back."

With that, he left. Louie just stared at the floor, digesting the information. Pretty much what the doctor said was that there were no changes in his unconscious state, which could be because of lasting effects from the poison or because of the crash. They couldn't do some sort of test on his uncle, and even though they found nothing with a CT scan, they wanted Scrooge's money to do another scan with a fancy name.

He sighed and leaned his head back against the ugly white wall his equally ugly chair was propped against, listening to the various beeps coming from the machines connected to his uncle. Unconsciously, he began picking at his fingers again. His eyes traveled to the peaceful face of Donald, making him feel more miserable. THat should be me, he couldn't help but think, pinching his left index finger hard with his right hand.

It hurt.

"What do you mean you're leaving?!"

"Well, granny just thought it would be a good idea for the two of us to go on a small vacation...that's all," Webby told the triplets nonchalantly and shrugged. They were standing near the main entrance door that led to the front yard. Webby was geared up with luggage from head to toe, an overly large sized pack on her back, and two more bags on the ground by her sides. Ms. Beakley had already said goodbye to Scrooge and the children and had gone outside to pack her own bags in the car.

Dewey had been the one to have shouted in disbelief that one of his best friends was leaving on vacation. "With all that?" He continued, pointing at all her luggage. "Are you going away for an entire year?!"

Webby laughed. "Of course not silly! We are only leaving for about 4 weeks to the other side of the world. Not sure where though. Granny just likes to be prepared for anything and everything. Plus I have this bag full of my gadgets," She motioned towards the fat pink bag on her right.

"That is not a small vacation..." Huey decided to comment, watching the pink bad sadly tip over on the ground and spill out her night vision goggles. "I really don't think you'll need all those things-"

A car horn sounded and Webby squealed. "Ooh that's my cue to go!" She quickly gave each of the boys a brief hug, slightly longer for Dewey, and started to run out of the door before coming to a sudden stop. "OHIALMOSTFORGOT!" She blurted out and did a 180 so fast she almost tipped over from how ridiculously overpacked her back was. Running back to the triplets, she pulled out 3 wrapped gifts and gave one to each child according to their favorite color and the color of the wrappings. "I got you all preeeesents! Since I won't be here for your birthdays. I felt really bad that I wont be here and so did granny, but we had planned this trip for a long time and this time of year is perfect. Hope you guys like it! I'll be calling so we can keep in touch and you guys update me about everything!" The girl then turned towards the door, slightly smacking Louie with the loose straps of her backpack. "AND KEEP YOUR CHIN UP! IT'S ALL GOING TO BE FINE!" She added before rusing out the door. It closed behind her, shutting out the last of the light from the setting sun.

The lights in the mansion turned on automatically as twilight approached.

The triplets continued to wave goodbye even moments after she had left. Dewey did a fake sniff and cried out, "I miss her already. All she left behind was her memoir..." He raised the blue gift above him as if holding up something valuable.

Huey snorted. "Stop being so dramatic. Your girlfriend will be back in a month." Louie couldn't help but smile slightly at this. The blue duckling scoffed.

"We have been over this so many times. She is not my girlfriend. She is simply a girl, that is my friend."

"That's what they all say." He noticed Dewey opened his beak to say something but spoke before he could. "So, do you guys wanna open these up now or wait until our birthday?"

"OOH OOH! Now! Please. Please!" Came Dewey's voice. Louie noticed Huey had turned to look at him expectantly, and Dewey was leaning around Huey, a huge smile on his face while nodding slowly at him.

"I don't know? Umm, maybe until our birthday?" He shrugged, ignoring the disappointed look on the middle triplet's face. He mainly said that because he just felt like retreating back into the room at that moment. He didn't hang out with Webby as much as Dewey did, but he definately hung out with her more than Huey. Seeing her leave just made him feel slightly empty inside, saddening him a bit and draining the last of his energy.

He sighed and looked down at his gift, unable to look towards the direction of his older brothers any longer. Even Huey had seemed slightly saddened by his response. They really needed a moment of happiness, even if just a little. Maybe it would even give him a spark of energy. He was just about ready to fall over. Rethinking his response, he shrugged and said, "Actually, let's just open it now."

It had been another two weeks since Louie and Scrooge recieved the news that Donald was poison free. Scrooge had announced this to the rest of the family, leaving out any other details that Louie had spoken with the doctor. The MRI had shown no physical lesions on the brain, meaning no major trauma from the crash. His brothers had cheered and actually became more like their old selves again. The positivity was rather contageous, and Louie found himself feeling somewhat better than he had in several months. Unfortunately for Louie, the positivity meant his brothers felt like doing their favorite activities again and they tried to drag him everywhere to do things together. He had to put his best effort to enjoy the activities, because despite feeling better, his energy continued to dwindle.

For now though, he could run on energy reserves just for the sake of seeing his elder triplet brothers smile.

Dewey lit up like a lightbulb and tore open his gift. Blue wrapping paper littered the entire floor. Huey had not agreed verbally to open the gifts at that moment, but upon seeing the giddy smile on his face Louie could tell he had been hoping to open it right then and there. Huey tore apart the red wrapping paper in a much more civilized manner than Dewey. Louie stared down at his unopened gift, admittedly some excitement blossoming in his chest. He had just finished stripping away the thin paper that concealed a medium white rectangular box when he heard Dewey's shout of glee.

"THE NEW VR HEADSET?! THAT'S AWESOME! Where did she get the money for this?!" he questioned excitedly. He opened the box to make sure it wasn't a prank and had clothes inside the box instead, and gave another shout upon seeing it was the real deal. It was a pretty cool gift, Louie had to admit. He was glad his brother got what he had been asking for since it had come out 5 months prior, though was certain Beakley had been the one to pay for it. Dewey immediately ran towards the "gaming room", as they liked to call it since it was a medium sized room with one huge screen TV with their gaming system plugged in, to try out his new gaming device.

Next to him, Huey did a fangirl squeal upon seeing his gift was some sort of collection of books. Louie never quite heard the name of the books since Huey was babbling too much, but he heard something about how it was rare to find those publications, and immediately retired to their room (picking up the trash before leaving) to start reading. He didn't feel like asking about the books, or else his brother would start rambling in too much detail and would make him more exhausted than he already was. Either way, he was happy for him too.

Turning back to his gift, he gently opened a flap on the box and slid out another rectangular box, this one that was about 7 inches in length. His heart began to race in excitement as he opened up that box as well. It revealed a 6 inch rectangular thin device with a glassy smooth surface.

A new phone.

Not just any new phone. THE newest phone in the market, released only a week ago.

Beak agape, he delicately pulled it out of the box and stroked the side. He had not expected such a gift. As long as he could remember they had never gotten new gifts they wanted. Not even from Scrooge, as he claimed new technology costed too much money. He had gotten his current phone when it had already been outdated and was not as expensive. It was now 5 years old.

For the first time in a long time a true grin started to spread over his facial features. How could Webby have gotten them such gifts like this? She had gone shopping the entire day the middle of the past week, most likely for these gifts since she rarely went shopping, and he suspected it was to brighten these gloomy days.

Making a mental note to thank her later, he went to the nearest wall outlet and began charging his new device. In the meantime, he pulled out his current phone and opened his internet browser, curious as to how much the value of the new phone was. Pulling up the tabs from the internet, he noticed he hadn't closed what he had searched the last time he had been on the internet.

'How do People Come Out of Comas?' read the frontmost tab.

The second: 'Can I do anything to help someone get out of a Coma?'

Third: 'Why Coma's?'

'Is there a cure for a coma?'

'How to get rid of guilt'

'My uncle is in a coma'

'coma'

'What happens when a person is in a coma?'

'Can people hear in a coma?'

'How long can you be in a coma?'

'signs someone in a coma is waking up'

'what if someone in a coma doesn't wake up?'

'Why do people go in a coma?'

'I don't think my uncle will wake up from a coma'

Just like if someone had flipped a switch on him, his smile faded. He was reminded of the difficult situation he had momentarily forgotten about. A foreign mix of sadness and slight anger began to creep up in his chest.

A discussion he had had earlier in the past week with the doctor during his visit to the hospital suddenly resurfaced. He had wanted to know if there was anything he could do to help his Uncle. The doctor said sometimes some family members liked to talk with the comatose patient, making them feel perhaps the unconscious person could hear them and come back sooner. No studies proved this worked, but whether it did or not, most patients came out of the coma in less than 4 weeks. And he tried it out. He tried with all his heart to speak to his uncle and hope his words would reach him. He cried at him, telling him how much they missed him and how much he needed him. He made several promises he was certain he would regret later in exchange that Donald wake up. The nurses would give him looks of sympathy or of pity.

The 4 week mark had come since Donald had been comatose with no noticeable changes. It was at this point that during Louie's visit with Scrooge to the hospital, the doctor requested to speak with Scrooge privately. Louie had wanted to be part of the discussion too but the doctor shot down his request with a shake of his head and the two elder avians had exited the room silently over to the next empty room. Thinking they were out of earshot they begun speaking quietly, unknowing that the younger duck had moved near the door to listen to the discussion. Louie had eavesdropped as the doctor revealed he believed the toxin had some long term effects affecting something that Louie hadn't been able to understand clearly, but that it had likely affected his consciousness.

It was 70% likely Donald would never wake up.

That sentence had scared Louie.

It had scared him so much that he had willed his mind to forget completely because he couldn't believe that was the truth. Only now it resurfaced in what was supposed to have been a happy moment.

He didn't deserve this happy moment. He didn't deserve the gift Webby had gotten for him. The duckling disconnected the charging phone and placed it neatly back in its original box. He looked at his reflection in his own phone, feeling suddenly angry with the face that stared back at him.

I DON'T DESERVE IT!

In rage, he tossed his own phone towards the rugged stairs, which made a muffled shattering sound upon contact. He internally cringed at the sound, knowing he had just broken it. But it wasn't satisfying enough to cease the bubbling anger inside of him. He didn't understand why he was feeling so angry, but he knew he needed to do something.

It's your fault... His mind shouted at him.

IT'S YOUR FAULT!

SLAP!

He gasped and stared in surprise at his stinging right arm, and brought his left hand up to his equally stinging right cheek.

Had he just slapped himself?

You deserve that.

Yes, he deserved that. Not only for putting Donald in what could most likely be his death bed, but also for everything else he had done. Everything that had ever gone wrong was his fault, he was certain.

No, it wasn't.

A small voice cried out in the back of his mind to remind him he wasn't to blame for everything that happened. He shut his eyes and shook his head vigorously. Pinpricks of tears welled in the corner of his eyes.

Yes, it was. All his fears he had been dealing with for the last couple of months were because he knew he kept messing up, and it was only about time before something big happened.

He was pinching his fingers again. It wasn't enough.

SLAP!

Another self-inflicted slap went across his other cheek. It stung. He flinched as his left hand raised for a third slap across the cheek, but fell back down against his side when he felt the last of his anger dissipate. He was left panting against the wall next to the outlet, arms slack. It was enough for now.

Low hiccups escaped his beak as he trembled pathetically.

He was scared again. He hadn't wanted to slap himself, neither did the small voice. But the anger and the urge to do so had propelled him to do it. He had NEEDED to do that, right?

It was 7:00pm. He knew by hearing the ugly grandfather clock chime weakly seven times. He wanted to go to bed so badly and sleep, knowing if he didn't seize the opportunity of sudden exhaustion he would have another sleepless night. But he was so exhausted to climb up the stairs. Slumping over like a potato sack, he let his head hit the carpeted floor. He glanced at where his phone laid, the face of his phone stareing back at him, blacked out and cracked beyond repair. He was going to have to use Webby's gift, whether he deserved it or not so as to not raise suspicion of what happened to his phone.

He didn't have the energy to go up the stairs, and instead fell into an uncomfortable slumber on the hard carpeted ground.

I'm not a medical professional so I apologize for any incorrect information!

For any Webby lovers, she isn't gone definately from this story! Just temporary, she will be back.

As I mentioned in the opening notes, this story will get darker. I will put a warning before the chapters to let you guys know something dark may happen just to prepare you readers!

To play it safe, I will say the next chapter will be up within the next 2 weeks instead of next week! I have somewhat of an idea of what to write already, unlike for this chapter haha. Take care!