Rising with the sun is a habit gained from over half a lifetime spent sleeping under the open sky, face turned toward the opposite horizon but ultimately left unable to ignore the stinging brightness of a new day, soon to be filled with hard work and aching bones.
Scrooge hasn't beaten that habit yet, not in the fifty and some years since he's consistently had to sleep outside.
Most days he snaps awake instantly at even a hint of light shining through his bedrooms' curtains, the distant memory of a brisk winter chill in the air bringing him around within seconds. Sometimes, if he's feeling particularly selfish, he can hold out for a bit, doze for nearly twenty minutes before long engrained routine compels him to get up, get moving, get on with it all.
By Selene, he hates routine. Some days, the thought of going through the motions for the thousandth time in a row had been nearly more than he could bear.
A month ago, there'd been far too many of those days to count. Mornings where routine had become something to slowly despair in, rather than take comfort and pride in. He had built himself an empire to withstand the ages, yet it had seemed he would crumble in the face of the mundane far sooner than he ever thought possible.
But recently, that had changed.
The glowing dawn and steady awakening of the world was no longer something to dread, the terrible dullness of the last ten years abruptly filling with unexpected noise and color at a truly alarming rate. It was all new, a bit strange and anything but routine, so Scrooge can awaken and look forward to a new day of ridiculous shenanigans brought about by his family for the first time in a decade.
The sunrise was easier to wake up to, now.
So, when he woke up nearly an entire hour after it had risen, that was the first clue that something was wrong.
It's the quiet creak of the door opening that finally starts to rouse him from slumber, the scent of freshly brewed tea and the measured shuffle of Beakley's footsteps across the floor slowly bringing him closer to the living world.
Awareness, no matter how muted, brought with it a steady drumbeat to the inside of his skull in time with his heart. The dull pain only made consciousness even less pleasant than it usually was, and the groan Scrooge muffled into his pillow as he feebly turned his head and tried to chase oblivion was entirely juvenile.
"Sir?" In her thirty and some years working in the Manor, Beakley had only seen her employer still asleep so long after dawn a handful of times, and all of those times had been after he'd been bashed into unconsciousness by some monster the night before.
Beakley approached the bed a tad cautiously, trying not to be too concerned when the only response she received was another stubborn grumble. Honestly, Scrooge McDuck was ten years her senior and yet he could be more immature than the actual children in the mansion. It would be amusing if it weren't so irritating, or in this case, worrying. "Sir? Are you feeling alright?"
Grumbling in protest of being woken had long proven to be ineffectual in warding off anyone who wanted your attention, so Scrooge reluctantly decided to count his losses and blink himself into wakefulness.
The pounding in his head intensified when he opened his eyes and moved to sit up. He quickly halted his ascent, wincing as the pain dimmed back into a somewhat manageable ache. Grumbling a few choice words under his breath, Scrooge looked up and did a doubletake at his expectant housekeeper. "Beakley? You're certainly up early this morning."
The mild concern wrinkling Beakley's face only grew more pronounced as she set her tea tray onto a table. "Sir, it's nearly 7:30 in the morning. You've slept in for an hour and a half."
"What?!" Scrooge is halfway out of bed the second the words process, one hand pressed to his temple as the pain in his skull jackhammers along with his pulse. Only a steadying hand from his housekeeper kept him from falling over completely as he snatched desperately for both his phone on the nightstand and his robe hanging just out of reach.
Beakley drew her hand back from the unexpected dampness coating Scrooge's back as he fell back onto the bed, phone clutched in one hand and the other keeping him from sprawling backwards completely. As he heaved for breath over such a simple task, clumsily flipped open his phone and began typing madly on the keypad, Beakley grimaced and wiped the sweat off on her apron, appraising his state of exhausted disarray with new eyes.
"Sir-"
"Not now, Beakley. I need to make sure the trade meeting doesn't start without me; it's happening in thirty minutes, if I can just get Launchpad here fast enough I might only be a few minutes late-"
"Sir-"
"-he's always driven like a lunatic, he won't mind having to come in a rush-"
"Sir-"
"-what I was thinking, not setting an alarm for today of all days is beyond-!"
"SIR!"
Scrooge startles sharply, not only at the volume of Beakley's voice, but also at the firm hand suddenly pressed firmly to his forehead, keeping him from attempting to rise and rush about his room like the frantic teenager he no longer is.
He would have something to say about this rather abrupt intrusion of his personal space – several very loud things, in fact – if the pain in his head hadn't spiked so hard he felt lightheaded, making him lean a little more into Beakley's palm if only to keep him from falling over himself.
He squinted through the pain to see his housekeeper's face go stubborn in that way that reminded him quite a bit of the woman's granddaughter right before something disastrous happened. "Beakley-" he started, but she's quick to cut him off before he can get going.
"You can't go in today, sir."
The interruption only makes his eyes fly open, any pain quickly pushed to the side when the McDuck temper flared high whenever anyone attempted to give him orders. "And why in God's name would I-?!"
"Sir, you have a fever-!"
"A fever?" Scrooge bats the restraining hand from his forehead, making a great show of rolling his eyes dramatically. "You think I've never gone in to work with a blasted fever before? I've slogged through freezing rain and rivers of mud, a little fever never stopped me then!"
Even in the middle of his rant, he could feel a familiar feeling settling over him; he barely has enough to raise his arm to muffle the sneeze into his elbow, once, twice, three times, all aggravating the ache in his head into a splitting pain that actually laid him out flat on his back. When the fit passed, he pried his eyes open to give Beakley's anxious 'I told you so' expression a feeble glare. "This proves nothing."
Beakley sighed softly through her nose, shaking her head as she stiffly turned to the tea tray she'd set aside to pour out a cup, casting a stern look over her shoulder at her still floored employer.
"I can go out and purchase some cold medicine later, but for now we have some basic aspirin that can at least make you a bit more comfortable. I'm going to get you some, you are going to drink this," she said, firmly setting the tea cup and saucer down within easy reach on the nightstand, "And you're going to lay down and rest. You're not a young man anymore, sir. You can't go running about while you're ill and expect everything to be fine."
It's sound logic, and all completely true, but no McDuck had ever laid claim to good sense when obstinate refusal was always an option.
Scrooge starts levering himself up again before Beakley's made it five steps away, and when she turns back to glare at him he glares right back with only the sideways slant of his mouth to suggest the headache is still making it hard to focus on anything.
"The negotiations for a huge deal in Cape Suzette are happening today, Beakley. I can't miss this meeting; three whole months will have been for nothing if I don't go in." He will not plead with her. He doesn't need to. She is his employee when all is said and done; she cannot stop him from doing something he feels must be done. He doesn't even need to argue with her, he could simply order her to have Launchpad bring the car around.
But even McDuck stubbornness will waver when it feels like the top of his skull is splitting open, leaving him squinting through one eye as he focuses on not falling over again.
Beakley is completely stern and unsympathetic in the face of his explanation, which is exactly what he hired her for in the first place. "I'll let your executives know you won't be coming in today. I'm sure they can figure everything else out for themselves, and if things go too poorly, I'm sure you can find a way to reschedule next week."
All completely, maddeningly true, and even as more protests rise to the tip of his tongue, another pulse of pain through his head has him accepting defeat before the words can leave his mouth.
Scrooge slowly lowers himself back to laying down as Beakley left the room, doing his best to breathe evenly and think about the softness of the comforter, the warmth of the sun peeking through the still drawn curtains, the smell of freshly made tea; anything to keep his mind off the potential business disaster he isn't able to prevent right now. He hasn't felt this helpless in quite a long while. He doesn't appreciate the feeling one bit.
Eventually, when his heartbeat is calmer and the ache subsequently a bit more bearable, Scrooge manages to sit up enough to sip the tea Beakley left. It's a bit cooler than he prefers, but it helps, even if only a little.
The meeting will go fine, he's sure – none of his executives were hired for their looks or their charming personalities. All three of them are savvy businessmen who know what they're doing, and have worked with Scrooge long enough to know exactly what he'd want out of the Cape Suzette deal, but…
Priorities. Right.
No sense in suffering through a business meeting when his head already feels like it's met with a brick wall several times. Scrooge reminds himself of that every time he chances a glance at his phone and watches time tick by in silence, the lack of any phone calls as the meeting starts only serving to make him more anxious.
God, how did people even survive days off?
He's just managed to find a comfortable position where the light from the window isn't falling across his eyes and making stabbing pains run through his head when the muffled patter of multiple webbed feet running past his bedroom door becomes audible.
Scrooge stifles an amused grin at the thought of the kids' antics – their ridiculous and often excessive games had been strangely entertaining in the weeks since his nephews had moved in, despite Beakley's loud insistence on the contrary.
Normally, he'd go out and offer some tips on how they could ambush each other during one of their games, but the throbbing in his skull keeps him rooted in place.
And normally, their tomfoolery doesn't bother him no matter how out of hand it gets – unless something gets broken, of course – but the sudden loud thud outside along with the rising volume of four childish voices makes his eye twitch. They're not being any louder than usual, but his migraine seems to think otherwise. The stabbing pains intensify as one voice cries out, "That's not fair!" and when a subsequent scuffle seems to break out, Scrooge has to grit his teeth to keep several loud curses from escaping. Experience had taught him long ago that shouting when his head hurts this much would do no one any favors.
"Webby!" Beakley's call, sharp but much quieter than it normally would be, brings the muffled fight to a standstill, and Scrooge has never been so grateful to hear her so infuriated.
Hurried footsteps signal his housekeeper rounding up the children, and whatever tirade she bestows upon them is blessedly muffled enough to be virtually inaudible, leaving Scrooge to focus on stifling the sneeze he can feel slowly creeping up on him.
He succeeds (barely) just in time to hear the highly dramatic shout of "Is he dying?!" be immediately deafened by several exaggerated shushes, a light thump and a yelp that suggested that the triplet who had cried out had been summarily silenced by the ever-enthusiastic Webby. A good egg, that one. When he wasn't sniffling pathetically through a terribly stuffed nose and desperately ignoring what felt like his skull caving in, he'd have to remember to raise her allowance.
Scrooge squints one eye open (when had he closed them? It was getting hard to tell) at the sound of the door opening. Beakley enters, carrying a glass of water and some aspirin. Behind her, four tiny heads peek around the open door, several varying levels of concern and sheepishness on their faces.
"Any better?" Beakley asks, setting the water glass beside his room temperature tea to help him sit up.
Moving his face too much only makes the pain worse, so the best Scrooge can offer is a tired deadpan stare. "Aye, as long as I don't move, or blink, or breathe, or think, it almost feels like my brain isn't leaking out of my ears."
Beakley, while clearly unamused by his observation, is at least sympathetic enough to wince as she hands over the aspirin. "I'll be sure to get the heavy-duty medicine while I'm out, then." She tries to help him wash the pills down, but he snatches the water from her before she can do anything more than hold it; he isn't a toddler, he can manage a sip of water without dribbling all over himself. He pointedly ignores her reproachful look, though he at least hands the glass back without prompting once finished.
He also pretends not to notice her rolling her eyes before she asks, "Is there anything else I can get for you from the store, sir?"
He doesn't like the idea of wasting so much money on disposable items, but the thought of using his elbow every time he has to sneeze is not pleasant. "Handkerchiefs, perhaps. And cough drops, if there are any cheap ones." He hasn't coughed yet, but swallowing has been distinctly uncomfortable for his throat, and dealing with that on top of a migraine is just ridiculous.
Beakley nods, mentally preparing a shopping list before his eyes, before collecting the tray of now cold tea from his nightstand, leaving the half-full glass of water in its place and turning back to the door. Scrooge can see all four of the kids are still there, appearing far too anxious over a case of the common cold.
"Granny?" Webby asks timidly, shrinking a bit more behind the doorway now that she is the center of attention.
Scrooge has never seen her so nervous, not since she first moved into the manor seven years ago.
He doesn't like that expression on her face.
He also doesn't like the worried looks shared between his three nephews. Honestly, what had Beakley told them? He'd been in states worse than this plenty of times before.
Scrooge tries to muster a smile, or at least an expression that isn't a grimace. "It's nothing to worry about, Webby darlin'. Beakley's just being a bit paranoid about a headache is all," he reassures them, trying not to twitch as Beakley snorted beside him.
"A headache that laid you out flat on your back," she muttered to herself, luckily closer to Scrooge than the kids rather than vice versa, so hopefully they didn't hear that. Hopefully. It was hard to tell how loud voices were when his ears started ringing like that.
Luckily, Beakley seems to sense his distress before he can say anything, because she marches to the door, tea tray balanced on one hip as she waves the kids out with her free hand. "You can play on the other side of the manor for today, children. Let Mr. McDuck have his rest. Sir," she says over her shoulder, casting him a knowing look that reminds him very much of his late mother, "I expect you to stay in bed and sleep if possible. I'll be back in a few hours with something light for lunch. If you're not here when I arrive…"
She leaves the threat hanging. He hates it when she does that.
Then the kids and Beakley are gone, the door gently thumps shut, and he is left with sunlight shining cheerfully through the curtains and cloud soft blankets that certainly didn't feel this uncomfortably warm yesterday.
He dozes in fits and starts, always pulled away from the sweet relief of oblivion by even the slightest hint of discomfort: the blankets are kicked off in a fit of frustration, but in less than ten minutes they're back on when he figures slowly baking is preferable to freezing to death. A sneeze is muffled into his elbow. His throat finally becomes so parched that he drains everything left in his water glass and is still left wanting more. The sun's path across the sky finally brings its light directly into his eyes, and he's forced to turn on his side. Another sneeze hits him just as he was on the edge of complete unconsciousness, and the curses that escape his mouth would have made even foul-tempered Hortense blush.
Eventually, Scrooge simply lays in agony, staring at the canopy above his head and contemplating everything awful in the world because even though thinking hurts there's literally nothing left for him to do with sleep evading him like this.
To think, in his youth, he might've once been able to keep working in this condition, keep facing forward through such torment. He can scarcely imagine it now.
Amidst the haze of fever and exhaustion, the click of the door opening again is an abrupt reminder that the outside world exists and isn't completely full of suffering.
Scrooge has to blink several times before he can muster up the energy to lift his head and see who his latest visitor is, and by then a rather loudly whispered argument is already reaching him.
"-said to let him rest!" says a voice he dimly recognizes as Webby. She sounds absolutely furious, which is both gratifying and amusing. "He doesn't like people going into his room-!"
"Yeah, but he's supposed to be sleeping, right?" Louie reasons, ever the negotiator.
"We just want to make sure he's okay!" Huey says brightly, seemingly unaware of the worry shadowing his tone. "We told you; a quick peek, in and out, and he'll never know! It's no problem!"
"Except if he wakes up," Dewey points out, ever helpful.
The opening is too good to pass up; Scrooge levers himself upright, smirking at the four petrified faces that greet him.
"Too late, I've been awake the whole time." He looks between Webby and his nephews, finally managing to raise both eyebrows without grimacing for the first time this morning. "How long have all of you been standing out there daring each other to open the door?"
All four of them flush brilliant shades of red, and by some small mercy his laughter only causes a dull pain instead of stabbing torment.
Huey, always far braver than he first appears, is the first to enter his bedroom properly, walking all the way up to the foot of the bed, wringing his hands and smiling a bit too widely. "How are ya feeling, Uncle Scrooge? Better after your nap?"
"Haven't slept a wink since you left," Scrooge admits flatly. Honesty was always the best policy.
Except when it makes his nephew's face fall like that. Perhaps he could've said that a bit better.
From the doorway, Louie looks completely scandalized. "What?! It's been, like, three hours!" He, Dewey and Webby edge into the room, clustering around the crestfallen Huey like responsible little bookends.
Scrooge honestly can't help the look of utter disbelief on his face, because what.
"Have you been standing around out there this whole time?! Beakley said it was alright for you to play in other parts of the manor, didn't she? Kids your age shouldn't be inside on a day like this!" He actually had no idea what the weather was like outside aside from 'ten times brighter than Flintheart Glomgold', but that was beside the point.
The awkward shuffling at the foot of his bed only becomes more pronounced.
"Not the whole time," Dewey mutters, crossing his arms petulantly. Della's son, for sure.
Scrooge regards the quartet in complete flabbergasted silence for a solid minute. He hasn't seen any of them hold still and stay silent for longer than twenty seconds at a time, and they'd been quiet outside his door for nearly three hours? Were they really that jumpy?
"I'm not about to collapse, kids. Why would y-?"
"We were worried about you, Uncle Scrooge. You looked like crap this morning. Still do." Only Louie was ever so blunt. He shrugs his shoulders, unrepentant in the face of Scrooge's scowl. "Just because no one else is saying it doesn't make it not true."
Webbigail, always so quick to please, grins sheepishly at him as she clamps a hand on Louie and Dewey's shoulders and begins bodily dragging them backwards. "We're so sorry, Uncle Scrooge! We just wanted to see how you were doing before leaving you to your nap! We won't bother you again, I swear!"
Going back to staring blankly at the walls and ceiling in absolute silence sounds absolutely awful, actually.
"Ah, wait dear!" It comes out a bit louder than he means it to and he clamps his beak shut, but not before it makes Webby freeze in her tracks and the boys all turn back to him, nervous for a completely different reason now.
They all stare at each other for a moment, at a loss for words.
Then Huey, with all the empathy and understanding Matilda had once had, smiles wide and asks, "Do you like to read, Uncle Scrooge?"
The question is so out of left field it throws him for a loop. "Sorry?"
"Do you have any favorite books?" Huey clarifies, twiddling his fingers as his brothers and Webby watch him, wide-eyed. "If you're having trouble sleeping and your headache makes it hard to read, I could read a few chapters of your favorite book with you, if you want."
Now that is unexpected. "That's quite kind of you, lad, but you don't have to-"
"It's just-" here Huey flushes again, gaze darting to the ground and finger-twiddling picking up speed, "I usually do that when we're sick and Uncle Donald is working late, to help us sleep, you know? I know it'd be kind of weird for me to do that for you, but I figured, you know, since you can't sleep and all-" here his voice drops into embarrassed mumbling, and Dewey and Louie both look seconds away from either laughing or hugging their ridiculous brother. Webby beats them to the punch, wrapping her arms around him with a giggle.
(Scrooge is struck hard with a memory, faded and indistinct, of Matilda tugging on his sleeve, clutching their sleepy little sister to her side, "One more chapter, Scroogey, she's almost asleep!)
Scrooge rolls his eyes at their blatant display of affection, leans back against his pillows with a groan. "There are plenty of more valuable things you could be doing with your time than wasting it with me," he can't help but point out, but before he's even finished he knows it's a futile effort. These are McDuck kids, through and through; their stubbornness would win out on principle.
And then Louie has to go and say, "How could time spent with you ever be a waste, Uncle Scrooge?"
And suddenly Scrooge has to start blinking rapidly, lest the rest of his dignity be stripped away by a group of children.
There's not much more to say, after that.
The children clamber up onto his bed as Huey sneaks over to the bookshelf to make the selection, Dewey and Louie still seated near the foot while Webby inches a bit closer, sitting crisscross next to Scrooge's knees, eyes absolutely sparkling.
When Huey returns with a mischievous grin and plops down right next to Scrooge, he takes one look at the cover of the book the boy selected, and gives him the most deadpan stare he's ever given anyone. "Really."
Huey shrugs, grin twisting with amusement. "What? It was up there!"
A joke from Mrs. Beakley, no doubt. He can't say he disapproves when the other kids' faces light up as Huey opens to the first page and starts to read the time-honored words,
"Marley was dead, to begin with."
A/N: AND BEHOLD, IT IS DONE!
Sweet Lord, that took far longer than it should have! I started this story last week when I got sick and had to stay home from work for a day. I gave poor Scrooge all my symptoms, then felt bad and let him have family bonding time instead of constant unending suffering like me. I only had the time and energy to finish this now, an entire week later. Yikes. Well, that is one way to end an eight-month writing hiatus, I suppose. Hope you liked it! See ya later!
~Persephone
P.S. the opening line of the book Huey's reading is from Charles Dickons' "A Christmas Carol"