Always Shall Be
Webby watched in horror as Magica disappeared in a flash of purple lightning and smog.
When the thick mists cleared, she spotted Lena lying face-down on the unforgiving stone floor.
Webby ran to her best friend in the whole world as fast as her legs would carry her.
"Lena…" she whispered, fearful that if her voice rose any higher, her friend's thin lifeline to mortality would be severed.
"Webby," Lena murmured back, as her eyes slowly rolled open. Though her voice was firm, it didn't match the dazed and unfocused look on the teen's face, especially with the way that her eyes were glassy.
The hopeful illusion finally broke when Lena tried to speak again, but instead gurgled up blood.
"No… you can't go!" said Webby tearfully, shaking her head in meek defiance of the inevitable, "Not you too…"
"Webby… thank you… for saving me…" the young teen breathed, shallow and delirious.
"I did nothing… you were the one who saved my family," the younger girl sighed, slowly accepting the coming end of an era.
"And I too, am now your family… your sister… you gave me that chance…" answered Lena softly, her voice straining more and more with the effort not to lose her life any more quicker, "I am sorry, only for the times that I have hurt you, and for the future ahead where I can't be with you anymore…"
"I hope you find peace in the afterlife, Lena," croaked Webby, barely keeping her own voice from breaking.
"Thanks to you, I will," responded Lena, struggling to keep her eyes open, but the light in them was fading fast.
Only seconds remained now.
"I need… your bracelet… my aunt made me take off the one you made… for me…"
Though confused and still in complete distress, Webby complied, taking off her own friendship bracelet and handing it to Lena.
The teen slipped the bracelet onto her right wrist. Then she spoke for the final time, her dimming voice carried by the cavernous structure of Magica's abandoned lair.
"I have been… and I always shall be… your friend…"
Her eyes closed, her body became still – but glowed blue just as the life left her.
Then after a blinding flash, Lena was gone.
And Webby was alone.
She didn't care when the ground beneath her started to shake violently.
She barely registered footsteps coming her way, and Dewey yelling over to her in panic.
"Mt Vesuvius is erupting! We have to go now, Webby!"
She still didn't respond, nor did she move from her slumped position.
In the end, Dewey had to take her arm and drag her to safety. Her mind focused just enough for her feet to keep pace with his, before eventually they got to the Sunchaser, and Launchpad took off. Just in time.
Webby told the story of Lena's sacrifice to her family. Scrooge gave an order to Launchpad to fly the plane for a triple flyover across Mt Vesuvius, staying clear of the ash cloud, in memoriam of the young teen who had given her life to save theirs.
Donald and Beakley told her repeatedly that Lena's death wasn't her fault. It never was.
"I know it isn't," replied Webby, "But that doesn't make it any less painful. She deserved better – a better chance, a better family, a better life…"
"Webbigail, my dear, you gave her that chance. That family. And that life," Beakley finished, firm in her experience of grieving death and moving on with the rest of life. She already had that experience with several fellow agents, one of whom was her own daughter, Margaret – Webby's mother.
Her son-in-law had also been killed alongside her daughter, necessitating Webby's transfer under her care. Despite the duckling resembling both parents, it would never fill the void in Beakley's heart. But still, that was life, and there were still other treasures to appreciate. One just had to make the choice to move on.
Webby held hands with the people closest to her as the plane began its banking turn over Mt Vesuvius.
One hand was holding Dewey's. The other, her grandmother's.
Scrooge took out a pair of emergency bagpipes that he said were kept on-board the plane for situations that required reverence. This was such a time.
Before he started playing, he mused about hoping that his skills hadn't gone rusty. It had been over ten years since he had last played the pipes in loving tribute to a deceased family member – the boys' mother.
Scrooge's fears turned out to be for naught. The tune of "Amazing Grace" came out strong, solemn, and without flaw or hesitance.
Webby sat on the floor of the plane's cargo bay, looking at the friendship bracelet on her wrist. A bracelet that had been shared between her, and the friend that she had treasured the most in her life.
Footsteps metallically echoing off the staircase leading to the cargo bay caught her attention. She spun around, but withheld the urge to strike a fighting pose. Though her martial skills were as sharp as ever, her aggressive tendencies had mellowed in the past few months. Besides, there was no one on the plane who would attack her.
The visitor turned out to be Huey.
"Dewey sent me to check up on you," he simply said, "He isn't the emotional type, and I think Lena's death was hard on him too. Though he didn't interact much with her like the rest of us did, they had a lot in common. He must know how you feel, but he can't relate it properly to you yet without sounding… desperate, might I say."
"I don't blame him," said Webby with a wilting sigh, "I can't cope much with this turn of events either. I don't really want to talk with anyone right now, but at the same time, someone has to know how I feel."
Webby paused for a moment, looking at Huey. His role as the big brother had never seemed this critical before.
"I suppose you wouldn't mind being a third wheel for support?" she queried the red triplet.
"I suppose I do not mind that at all. What do you need?" Huey responded.
"What is the silver lining in all of this?" Webby asked, still downcast but starting to accept the reality of the events that had occurred during the past few hours.
"About Lena? Well, I can only give you this advice from Uncle Donald," Huey took a moment before continuing, "Miss her, but don't grieve her. For she is free."
"Thanks, Huey. You can go now, if you'd like," Webby said, flashing the smallest of sad smiles.
Huey took the hint, nodded, and walked back up the staircase.
Webby turned to one of the cargo bay windows. The clouds were a dark grey blanket beneath her. But the sun, even as it started to set, was still high above the clouds.
The light coming in through the windows was a mixture of gold and pink. Pink, in memory of Lena.
Death would come for all living beings, eventually.
Life was like flying high in the sky, racing the sun. But it was merely just a moment in the span of the universe.
Death was the coming night, and the dark clouds that waited below, lying patiently at the end of all things, and awaiting the fall of those whose time had come.
But death was also a cleansing, and a new beginning. It was the end of all the bad, all the flaws, and all the errors.
And it was also the gateway to eternal life for the good.
And life was just that. Living a good existence as much as you could, culminating in a happy ever after, after death.
Lena had found hers.
And one day, Webby would too.
"I have been, and I always shall be, your friend."
"Yes. Now, and forevermore."
Based off the infamous climax of Wrath of Khan, and one of my many theories about how Lena's arc could end.