Disclaimer: I don't own Ducktales!

Title: Pulling a Louie

Summary: After Louie gets hurt in an attempt to nab more cash, Scrooge forces him to shadow him at work, and the two begin to realize they're a lot more alike then they might prefer.

...

"Louie!" Scrooge whispered-yelled, waving his cane as if to hook it in the duckling's hoodie and drag him back to his side. "Get back here at once! The whole place could go down!"

Louie wasn't one for heights. But he was even less one for letting good money go down the drain, and he knew, as well as the other kids knew, that his great-uncle would never let him edge this far on a tiny little rock ledge towards a solid gold ball if he wasn't sure he would be safe. Or maybe Scrooge had a fear of heights too. He'd rather not consider that little theory. "Are you kiddin'?" He pointed at his quarry. "Do you know how many zeroes is on that dohickey?"

"Do ya' know how many broken bones that fall'll give ya'?"

Louie waved him off, then almost regretted it when he pitched forward. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. I can't hear you over the cha-ching!"

"I'll cha-ching your head!" Huey hissed, shaking his fist at the boy. "Louis Quackmore Duck if you know what's good for you you'll carefully maneuver your stupid little webbed feet back over here!"

"Wow, Hue," Dewey said, eyebrows raised. "Didja sleep okay last night? 'Cause you sound cranky."

"Our little brother is scaling a ledge for a yellow soccerball, Dew. Of course I'm cranky!"

Louie stuck his tongue out at him, wiggling his fingers, thumb to his nose. "You'll thank me for this when we're rolling in dough."

It was Dewey's turn to try; though, deep down, the boy really wanted to join his brother on the ledge. The only reason he refrained was because he wasn't sure it would be able to hold both their weights. "Come'on, dude. Even Webby agreed we shouldn't go over there."

Webby wrinkled her nose. "I said we shouldn't do it without proper equipment."

"Which he isn't."

"Right. But when has Louie ever listened to rules before?"

Louie sent her finger guns, almost completely across. "Glad to see you're picking up what I'm laying down, Webs."

"I didn't mean it as a compliment." She went to move forward and follow him, relying on her skills to see her back again, preferably with a handful of his hoodie, but Scrooge put a hand on her shoulder. Webby froze almost instantly, unwilling to provoke his ire during such a high stakes moment.

The old duck fumed as his youngest great-nephew let out a tiny laugh, finally stepping out onto the small rock circle that held the golden ball's pedestal. "When I said I wanted him to be more adventurous," he muttered to himself. "I didnae mean this."

Louie let out a triumphant cackle as he took the golden ball from its pedestal, giving it a quick wipe-down with his hoodie sleeve to clear it of dust. He waggled his eyebrows at the reflection, smile wide enough to hurt. "Well, well, beautiful. You and I have a date with destiny. No worries. I'm open to an open relationship."

Before he could turn around and start back, the pedestal sunk down into the pillar. An unwelcome crumbling sound shook the floor under his feet. Louie squinted at his feet, then the ceiling, a frown settling onto his features. "What is this? A tasteless Indiana Jones parody? Hasn't the world had enough of those things?"

"Louie!" Scrooge called, for the umpteenth time.

"Alright, alright, I'm coming-"

One louder, more scraping sound echoed through the chamber, and a large boulder tipped out of a hole in the ceiling, taking the ledge- and Louie- with it.

"What do you mean it got crushed?" Louie wailed as the doctor stuck a band-aid on his arm. "That ball was the love of my life!"

Scrooge jabbed him in the belly with his cane. "It was almost the end of yer life, lad!"

"Sir," the doctor said, sounding very bored with the whole thing. "Please don't do that."

The boy threw up his hands. "Not even close! I had cartoon physics on my side!" His lip trembled dramatically. "But what about my darling? Oh, why must the beautiful be smashed to smithereens?"

"Because there's a wee little thing called karma," the old duck replied. "I think that twisted ankle proves that."

Louie's face soured a bit at that, but he didn't seem all that perturbed. "So I gotta walk with a cane for a bit. So what? People will think I'm copying you, and adults think kids who bow to their whims are cute."

Scrooge opened his mouth to argue, but before he could the hospital door opened and the other children came running inside. Huey and Dewey tackled their brother in a hug, then Webby, who knocked the tackle-hug-pile over. Louie let out a little 'oomph!'

"Sirs and madam," the doctor repeated, sounding no more enthused than he had prior. "Please get off the patient."

"Dude." Dewey slapped his arm. "It's my job to go careening off things. Not your's."

"Believe me, Dewford, you can keep it. There is no competition from me."

Huey huffed and jabbed him in the side. "Honestly, Louie, I expect better from you. You're usually smarter than this."

Louie shrugged, rolling his eyes. "Eh, what can I say? The bank of Louie was running low."

"Mr. Duck is gonna kill you for almost dying," Webby told him, then pursed her lips. "Actually, that's hypocritical. He's probably gonna ground you, though."

"I might just kill 'im anyway." Scrooge set his hands on his hips, hoping that he came across as someone not to cross. "Laddie, if yer that worried about yer money, why not get a paper route?"

Louie raised a single eyebrow. "Because my poor, fallen darling of a cash machine would pay me more in one somewhat dangerous stunt than an entire lifetime of chucking newspapers ever would? Also, I have terrible aim."

"But mostly because you hate work," Dewey added, giving him a look.

"I mean, you're not wrong. I just wanted to sound more reasonable."

Scrooge felt tempted to rip his whiskers out. He could respect, in a distant sort of way, the duckling's unwillingness to want to work at his age, but he didn't understand how it all added up in the boy's head. A job was hard work, true, but hard work surely trumped dying, didn't it? Louie had always been fairly cautious about the risks he took on adventures. Not as much as Huey, but the older duck's money was always on Dewey. Dewey was always the one trying to get himself killed. It's why he didn't notice Louie until it was too late.

He took in a deep breath and put a stranglehold on his cane. Fine, then. He was an adult. He could work with this. "If ya' don't realize why this is such a big deal," he sighed. "I guess I'll just have to teach ya'."

Louie stiffened, eyes wide. "I think I'd rather have the grounding, if it's all the same to you."

"Oh, ye'll get that too." He tapped him on the head with the very tip of his cane. "Startin' tomorrow, yer gonna be at my hip until that bandage comes off. Maybe I'll teach ya' more about work ethics while I'm at it."

"Sir," the doctor warned, as Louie dropped his head onto the pillow and groaned. "Does anyone around here know how to properly treat a hurt individual, or do I need to kick all of you out?"

"It might be best if you did, yeah," Dewey said, nodding to himself. "Also, if you would be so kind as to point us to the cafeteria, that'd be great."

Author's Note: I won't lie, ya'll, I just really want to write some Louie-Scrooge bonding, so here's the setup that allows for that to happen. =)

-Mandaree1