Louie was sitting where Scrooge had left him, sulking. The one time he wanted to join in on the action and he got told he had to stay out. Talk about irony.
But, Louie supposed, his great-uncle had a point. There wasn't much the green triplet could do while he was unsteady on his feet: he was certain that if he tried to stand, he would end up falling over. The best thing Louie could do was take a supervising role and point out anything the others might miss.
Several shadows appeared before him. Blinking, Louie looked up. Standing in front of him were his brothers and Webby, each with a gentle smile on their face. The youngest triplet stared at them, unsure of what to do or say.
"May we join you?" Huey asked.
"Sure," Louie replied slowly. "Taking a break?"
"Something like that," Dewey said as he and the others sat down. "Mom and Uncle Donald have finished with the north wall so they told us to get some sleep. We thought we might camp out with you."
"I appreciate the company. It was getting lonely over here," Louie said, smiling a little.
"How's the dizziness?" Webby asked.
"Not great. Don't think it would be a good idea for me to stand up."
"You're already dizzy?" Huey exclaimed in alarm. "You've skipped the headache?"
"Actually, I didn't. The world is spinning and my head hurts."
"That's really not good. We've got to find that antidote ASAP or you're done for."
"Thanks, Huey. I had no idea," Louie said sardonically. He looked at Webby. "Can we talk about something other than my impending doom for a minute?"
"Sure. What would you like to discuss instead?" Webby asked gently.
"Literally anything else," Louie told her.
"We can certainly Dewey that," Dewey said conversationally, leaning back onto his hands. Louie rolled his eyes at the old pun. "How are May and June, Webby? Are they adjusting well to life with Uncle Donald and Daisy?"
"They are. They really enjoyed that trip around the world that they took," Webby replied. "They didn't get to see much beyond F.O.W.L.'s headquarters so it was a real treat for them."
"I'm surprised they didn't follow us on this adventure if they had fun on that voyage," Huey remarked.
"To be fair, they only came back a few days ago after being gone for all those months. They were pretty tired so they decided to stay with Daisy until we return home," Webby told him.
"Makes sense. I'm surprised Uncle Donald had the energy to follow us all the way out here: he usually crashes after a mere trip to the supermarket," Dewey said.
"Donald is an adventurer at heart. He would never miss out on something as exciting as an abandoned temple."
"Now he wouldn't. The Uncle Donald we grew up with would have fainted at the idea of wandering in the middle of a jungle to find said abandoned temple."
"I still find that hard to believe…"
Louie smiled as he watched his brothers try to convince Webby that Donald had avoided adventure like the plague for the majority of their lives. This was the distraction that he needed: no talk of poisons, antidotes, symptoms, and possible death. Listening to the others talk about every day topics brought a sense of normalcy to the green triplet – it was a shame it couldn't last forever.
"Say, why don't we all play some Legends of Legend Quest when all of this is over?" Huey suggested hopefully.
"I'm in! I think it'll be fun," Webby agreed.
"You're still into that game after Lena accidentally brought it to life? We almost died the last time we played it!" Dewey exclaimed.
"That was your fault, remember? You're the one who wished for the game to be real!" Webby reminded him, frowning.
"If you don't mind, I won't bother playing. I'll have had enough adventure for a while after this," Louie said, jumping in as Dewey opened his mouth to argue.
"You're sure?" Webby asked.
"Positive. I'll just go lie in bed and never come out."
"Aw, don't talk like that. You won't be able to resist the call of adventure for long."
"Watch me."
"If Louie won't play we can always ask May and June if they want to join us. Maybe even give Violet and Lena a call," Huey said.
"Yes! With everyone under the same roof, we can have the best sleepover ever!" Webby exclaimed excitedly.
"If it doesn't involve going through each other's dreams again, I'm in," Dewey said. "I don't think I could handle seeing Huey's definition of 'tall, distinguished, mature oldest sibling' one more time."
"I've told you that I'm not good at imagination stuff!" Huey cried defensively. "My dream was no worse than Louie's dream of being even lazier."
"Oh, no. Leave me out of this," Louie said. "My dream didn't lead to anyone losing control of their insanely long limbs."
"Don't make me hurt you."
"Whatever you do to him won't be worse than what's already been done, Huey."
"What did I say about discussing this poison thing, Dewey?"
"Sorry, Louie."
"What are you kids doing?"
All four children looked up. Della stood before them, a hand on her hip.
"I thought your uncle and I told you to get some sleep?" she said, tapping her mechanical foot.
"We're just talking about what we'll do when we're home and other random things," Huey said. "Louie wanted a distraction so we're giving him one."
Della softened. "Well, in that case, I can't be mad," she said. She motioned at Webby to make some room and sat down next to Louie, wrapping an arm around him. "How are you holding up, honey?"
"As well as anyone could in this situation, I guess," Louie replied, leaning against his mother.
"You're being so brave. I remember the time I got hurt while going around Ithaquack: I'm usually pretty tough but on that day I cried all the way back to the plane because the pain was so terrible," Della said.
"What happened?" Dewey asked.
"Selene, Storkules, and I were climbing the mountain as part of a game we were playing, which was basically who could reach the temple at the top first. We weren't going up the side of the mountain with the buildings and the greenery, mind you, but the rocky side –"
"Why not just run up the slope?" Huey interrupted, raising an eyebrow. "And how did you realistically expect to win against Storkules?"
"Where's the fun in that?" Della replied with a casual shrug. "Storkules had agreed to tone his strength down for us in order to make it a fair race. Anyway, we were about halfway up the mountain when Zeus caught us. Rock climbing was apparently something that jerk didn't agree with so he began to order us to scale back down. There's no arguing with Zeus so we did as we were told.
"But I guess we weren't going fast enough for his liking and he wound up trying to smite us. One bolt narrowly missed me and the surprise of it caused me to lose my grip, sending me tumbling down the mountain. I pretty much bounced off every jagged surface I landed on, giving me a record-breaking amount of cuts and bruises along the way. Storkules managed to catch me but not before I hit this nasty piece of rock and broke my arm. The pain was unlike anything I ever experienced and no matter how hard I tried I just couldn't stop crying from it. Uncle Scrooge was furious."
"With you?" Webby asked.
"A little bit with me, but mostly with Zeus. The best way to trigger Scrooge McDuck's ire is to put his family in danger. They had the biggest argument Donald and I ever saw our uncle partake in and then we were ushered into the plane. Uncle Scrooge brought me to the nearest hospital and we didn't return to Ithaquack for over a year after that."
"Whoa…" Dewey said, wide-eyed. "I'm glad things turned out okay in the end. What convinced Uncle Scrooge to finally bring you guys back to Ithaquack?"
"Donald and I stole the plane and flew ourselves there," Della said simply.
"What?" the children chorused in shock.
"Yeah, it was great," Della said dreamily. "We were only a few years older than you guys and it was the first time we were truly out on our own. Donald wasn't so sure about the idea at first but when he got that first taste of freedom he didn't want to look back. I flew the airplane while he kept an eye on the radars."
"Uncle Scrooge must have been so mad when he found out," Louie remarked.
"Words cannot describe the tongue-lashing we got afterwards. We knew we were going to get it the second we saw that borrowed cargo plane land on the island. It was all worth it, though."
"Wait, he chased after you? He didn't wait for you to come home?" Huey said.
"And when has Uncle Scrooge ever waited for something he could get right away? Besides, we were two teenagers who flew a plane for the first time: we could have crashed and needed help for all he knew. He couldn't afford to wait and see if we were coming back," Della replied.
"How did Uncle Scrooge know where you were?" Webby said.
"We had been badgering him for months to bring us back to Ithaquack. Uncle Scrooge isn't stupid: he put two and two together."
"I'm surprised Uncle Donald wanted to return. He never seems to enjoy Storkules's company that much," Louie said.
"Donald does like Storkules, just not the constant invasion of his personal space. That's a concept Storkules never really understood," Della told him. "They are good friends despite the evidence to the contrary."
"Flying a plane by yourself to Ithaquack. Now that's an adventure," Dewey said wistfully.
"One you're not embarking on. It was dangerous what we did and I don't want you copying us," Della said firmly. Dewey crossed his arms and pouted.
"Granny would have been proud of you there, Della. There was a time you would have encouraged us to do something like that," Webby noted.
"What can I say? I'm learning the dos and don'ts of parenthood," Della said, smiling. "Speaking of which, it's my job as the mother to tell you that it's time for you to get some sleep."
"Aw, do we have to?" Dewey whined.
"Yes, you do. We'll wake you up when it's time for us grownups to take a nap."
"How are we going to sleep? This floor isn't the most comfortable thing in the world," Louie pointed out.
"We've got to work with what we've got. You can use the blanket as a mattress and the backpacks as pillows," Della said.
"Looks like we don't have much of a choice, guys. Let's grab that blanket and those backpacks," Webby said.
Louie watched as the others got up and fetched their stuff. Perhaps it was a good thing that Della was ordering them to get some sleep: the dizziness was starting to overpower him. As much as he was enjoying his mother's story, the green triplet wasn't sure if he would have been able to keep his eyes open much longer. Hopefully the vertigo would disappear after some proper rest.
His brothers and Webby returned with Della in tow. Della placed the blanket on the floor, smoothing it out before letting Huey, Dewey, and Webby put the backpacks on top of it. Louie crawled over to the blanket and laid down, Huey and Dewey taking a spot on either side of him while Webby lay on Dewey's other side. Della leaned down and gave them each a kiss.
"Sweet dreams, kids. We'll wake you up in a couple hours, okay?" she said quietly.
They nodded. With one last smile, Della moved back to the other side of the chamber. Louie glanced at either side of him and saw that his brothers' eyes were still open. He assumed Webby's were as well.
"Think we'll ever get to sleep?" Dewey whispered.
"I hope so. I didn't want to say anything earlier, but I'm tired," Huey replied.
"We need to try. We won't be able to get much more work done if we're walking around like zombies," Webby added, causing Dewey to snicker. A quiet "Ow!" told Louie that Webby had given Dewey a sharp nudge.
"And we won't get any sleep if we keep talking," Louie said. "So why don't we pipe down and close our eyes?"
"Fine," Huey said. "Goodnight, everyone."
"Goodnight," Dewey and Webby whispered in unison.
Once silence had fallen between them, Louie closed his eyes, succumbing to sleep almost immediately. It was said that things always looked better after a night's rest: it may not be a full night's slumber that they were getting, but Louie prayed that some progress would have been made by the time they woke up.