(As of today, I am not taking any requests from readers. If you want to request a Halloween Ducktales or Darkwing Duck short story, please go to my AO3 page. Thanks.)

Title: Stolen Luck Part 1

Writing Prompt: A reader from AO3 wanted a story with Gladstone and Lena.

Word Count: Approx.

Gladstone had the same fond regards for his great-grandmother as she had for him. Essentially they both mutually detested each other. His parents insisted on going to the Nursing Home once a month, and Great-Grandmother was pleased—even eager—to talk to her grand-son and his wife. But as for Gladstone, she made some sort of comment on his behavior or how he looked or something else, and that was enough of a hint for Gladstone to leave her room, away from her raised hospital bed and creepy antique dolls that stared at him with glassy eyes to go wander around the rest of the building.

And there was plenty to do in the Nursing Home. Some kids might not think so, but Gladstone didn't mind it. Well, aside from the lingering smell of old people and whatever food they were eating that day. In fact, he liked it. In the common area, he could find a few of the more mobile residents watching TV or playing cards or doing a puzzle, and they always called for him to join them. Some constantly asked his name, age, and year in school, and he politely answered. He understood that memory was hard for some of them.

A few even called him by the wrong name, mistaking him for their son or grandson or someone else. It was a little sad, so Gladstone was especially polite, and he wasn't known for being a polite little boy.

But that day, he didn't go to the common area to see the regulars. Instead, as he was passing by some of the rooms, a voice called out to him.

"Hey. Hey, you. Kid. Get over here." The voice was quiet and raspy like a whistle that was rusting, but it was still strong and deep.

Gladstone stopped, glancing in. The room wasn't the same size as the others. It was huge, like four times the size of his great-grandmother's. It had all the same medical equipment as the other rooms, but it was filled with some of the most beautiful things Gladstone had ever seen. There were paintings on the walls and shelves lined with so many little statues that must have been made of real gold with gems inlaid in them. The man's hospital bed wasn't the cold-looking metal ones the others had, but large and grand, like something a millionaire would own. There was other furniture in the room, a large, leather couch, a nice recliner, lamps and a coffee table. There were other things, too; a large-screen TV, movies, a cappuccino maker, and stacks of leather-bound books.

The man was also different than the rest of the nursing home. Although he was just as old as the others, there was still a hint of youth about him as if something about him hadn't aged. He was dressed in a silk bathrobe and nice pants. His room didn't have that old-person, nursing home smell. Instead it stank of some sort of cologne and cigar smoke. The latter came from a fat stogie that the man was smoking while in bed.

"You shouldn't be smoking that. The nurses will get mad," Gladstone said.

"Not at me. They always let me smoke," the man said in his raspy voice.

"Aren't you afraid you'll get cancer?" Gladstone asked. It was all anyone talked about when it came to smoking. The thought of cancer was enough to make Gladstone not want to smoke, not that he was ever tempted since the smell was noxious.

"I'm one-hundred and ten years old," the old man said. "I don't care about cancer."

Gladstone was surprised then skeptical. The man didn't look old enough to be one-hundred and ten years old. But then again, Uncle Scrooge was supposed to be quite old himself and kept going on those adventures.

"Do you want to know the secret of getting to be this old?" the man said, leaning closer to Gladstone. He made a gesture for Gladstone to come closer, then he reached into his robe and pulled out a necklace that appeared to be made of a broken bone.

"Have you ever heard the phrase: Lucky Duck?" he asked Gladstone.

Gladstone nodded.

"And have you ever used the wishbone of a turkey after Thanksgiving and made a wish?" the old man asked.

Gladstone nodded again.

"Well, this is the larger piece of a broken wishbone of a duck. One of the luckiest ducks ever to have lived," the old man said with a smile.

Gladstone's eyes widened. "You mean a wild duck, right? The kind that we feed in the park and fly south for the winter."

The man's eyes turned steely. "No, not that kind of duck."

Gladstone gulped. He should have known. The bone was far too big to have belonged to a Thanksgiving turkey, much less a wild duck.

"Legend had it that when the luckiest duck in the world finally died, his body was dug up by two sorcerers who wanted to use the duck's luck. They took his wishbone and put a spell on it," the old man said. "Then they broke it in two. The one who held onto the larger piece of the wishbone made this necklace, which gives the wearer unending good luck. As for the other, the one who had the smaller piece, I don't know rightly what happened to him, but I heard he died of bad luck."

The story intrigued Gladstone. As far as made-up stories, it wasn't bad. But he couldn't help his eyes from straying to the wish bone necklace, wondering if it could be true.

"How did you get it?" Gladstone asked.

"I stole it," the old man said, looking somber.

"Stole it?"

"Yeah. You see, my partner and I, we were archeologists," the old man said. "You see, that sorcerer, he had great luck. But then a rival sorcerer stole the wishbone from him, wanting the good luck. Not long after, he died a horrible death. Then the sorcerer who stole the necklace got the good luck, but it was stolen from him and soon after died a horrible death. This happened for years and years until finally someone died of natural causes and the necklace was buried with him.

"Then my partner and I dug him up, somewhere in Mesopotamia," the old man reminiscence. "We'll we called ourselves archeologists, but sometimes, we kept what we found. And my partner decided to keep the necklace after reading a journal of the history of the necklace. Pretty soon, he was getting lucky with a lot of things. He won every contest he entered. He gambled and never lost a single coin. Every horse he bet on crossed the finish line first. He found money on the streets.

"And I'll admit, that made me jealous. After all, we both found it at the same time. So I stole it away from him."

Gladstone could tell where this story was going. "And he died a horrible death."

"Not really. He did break his leg, though," the old man said with a laugh.

Gladstone frowned, feeling as if the old man was making a fool of him. "Why didn't the necklace kill him?"

"So, I have a theory," the old man said. "When a person wears the necklace, good luck is attracted to them and it keeps bad luck at bay. But the bad luck is like a rubber band around your wrist. If you only pull the rubber band a little bit, it's not going to hurt you. But if you stretch it as far as it goes and releases, it's going to hurt like Hell. Well, my partner only had the necklace for a couple of months, not enough time for the bad luck to build up to kill him.

"My partner knew I had stolen it from him and demanded it back. I suppose I could have run away because I was now getting a lot of good luck, but he was still my partner and I like to keep things square. So we made a bargain: he would have the wishbone for one week and me the next. That way the bad luck could only hurt us a little.

"After a while, my partner and I noticed that even though we only wore the necklace a week at a time, the bad luck blowback was getting more and more dangerous. At first it was just little things like sitting on a tack or losing our wallets, then it got worse and worse. My partner was afraid of what would happen if he kept passing the wishbone back and forth, he would regret it. So he gave me the wishbone entirely to me."

"I bet you've been awfully afraid of losing the necklace or having it stolen," Gladstone said.

"You bet!" the old man exclaimed.

"Well, if you're so lucky, why are you here? You look as if you could take care of yourself," Gladstone said. He wouldn't want to live in a nursing home.

"Well, the necklace can't protect me from everything. My relatives said I was too old to live by myself. And this place isn't so bad, as long as I get my own way," the old man said, sitting back and chuckling. "But, it does get a little lonely. I don't get any visitors. I've seen you here many times. You talk to a lot of the folks here."

"My great-grandmother doesn't like me. So I find other people to talk to," Gladstone said with a shrug. "It's better than being bored or listening to Great-Grandmother."

The old man laughed. "You're a good boy. I can tell. So I'm going to give you something."

Gladstone thought that the old man was going to give him some quarter or candies. The most someone ever gave him was a two-dollar bill, which wasn't a common denomination and he still had it because he thought it was cool. But his eyes widened as the old man reached around his neck and took off the wishbone necklace, holding it out with two fingers.

"You're giving it to me?" Gladstone asked in disbelief. He only half-believed in the story, and his belief was dropping even more as the necklace was being offered to him. If the necklace was as lucky as the old man said, he would never give it up. And especially with many decades of bad luck hanging over his head.

"Yes. Take it. It's yours," the old man said.

"Aren't you afraid of the bad luck?" Gladstone asked, trying to make it sound snarky but he was feeling a little worried.

"I've lived long enough," the old man said with a twinkle in his eye. "It's time to pass the luck on to someone else."

Gladstone reached out for the necklace, thinking that he would take it just to appease the old man then dump it in the trash. The old man probably had dementia or Alzheimer's or something, and the necklace was just junk. Who knows, maybe he gave weird necklaces to all the kids who came into his room. When Gladstone wrapped his hand around the necklace, the old man grabbed him, holding him tight.

"You need to decide quickly. You either keep it for a short time then get rid of it, or you keep it forever. You hear?" the old man said.

Gladstone nodded solemnly to the old man, who then let him go. The way that the old man was looking at him and how he talked, it was starting to scare Gladstone. Once he was free, he ran out of the room, just wanting to get away from the crazy guy. He barely stopped before barreling into Margie, an old woman who had met several times, who was ambling down the hallway.

"Oh, aren't you a handsome, young man," Margie said, taking Gladstone's arm. "Will you come play cards with me?"

"Uh, sure," Gladstone said, still holding the necklace. He put it in his pocket.

In the common area, Gladstone played cards with Margie, and he found that no matter what game they played, he won every time. Not that Margie minded.

"When a young man wins so many times, he deserves a reward," Margie said, taking out her purse.

She said this every time and would give Gladstone caramel sucking candies, which he didn't mind although a bit too sweet for him, so he said "Thank you" and held out his hand politely. Instead of candies, she handed over a crisp twenty-dollar bill.

"What? This is too much," Gladstone said.

"Oh, you keep it. You're such a nice young man. Just don't let your luck spoil you," Margie said.

"Uh…" Gladstone said, not quite believing things. Never had he been given so much money, not even by his own parents or relatives. But what made him nervous was Margie mentioning luck. "I think I should go find my parents now. Thank you, Ma'm."

"Such a good boy," Margie said again and prepared her pack of cards to play solitaire.

As Gladstone headed to his great-grandmother's room, he pulled out the necklace and took a look at it. The wishbone had a gold chain attached to both ends of the bone through small holes drilled in it and galvanized with metal. The broken end where it was split apart looked to have been sanded so it wouldn't poke anyone. The bone wasn't white but different shades of grayish brown as it aged, and it was covered in a shiny resin that gave it a jewelry feel to it. But despite the work done on it, it was still ugly.

Gladstone put it on, glad to see that it hung very low on his neck and that his shirt and stiff collar covered it up. With a deep breath, he stepped into his great-grandmother's room. This would be the real test to see if the necklace was what the old man said it was.

"Um…Mama. Can we go home, please?" he said quietly, trying to be as polite as possible.

"How rude," Great-Grandmother said so soon after Gladstone said. "You're parents are visiting with me. Don't interrupt them."

Gladstone's mother smile wanly and whispered to her husband. "It is almost dinner time." She started to stand up.

"Now, you sit back down," Great-Grandmother ordered crisply. "Don't go rushing off because the child is a little bored. In my day, children were seen and not heard, that is if they were seen at all. We never got in the way of the adults, and your son can stand to wait a little longer." She cast a disapproving stare at Gladstone that made him wither away a little.

Gladstone looked down at his feet. Stupid necklace. So much for it being lucky.

But then the walls began to shake and the floor trembled behind them. The shelves vibrated and the medical equipment on wheels rolled slightly.

"Earthquake," Gladstone's father said, pulling his wife and son closer to him.

Great-Grandmother clutch the blankets on her medical bed, her eyes wide and mouth open. "Oh, my babies. My babies. They're going to fall."

The antique dolls were dancing, wiggling back and forth with the shelves, but they were moving from sitting position to lying down, dangling from shelves.

Gladstone didn't really do anything. He never intended to. He just so happened to be near one of the shelves when a doll dropped in his lap. He was so surprised that he moved back, and another doll dropped on him. He instinctually held onto them, and watched in surprise as one by one the dolls flew into his embrace. It was even more surprising that their porcelain faces, arms and legs never once cracked against each other.

When the earthquake ended, the entire shelf of dolls were in his grasp, and he could barely see above the mountain of curly hair and lacy dresses.

"It's over," Gladstone's father said. "Is everyone fine? Anyone hurt? Grandmother?"

"My babies," Great-Grandmother said, her hand to her breast. "Boy…Gladstone. Bring them here."

Gladstone carefully walked to his Great-Grandmother, not moving his arms at all. He waited patiently as the adults removed them from his arms one-by-one until they were all safe on the bed.

"They're all safe," Great-Grandmother said aghast. "Not a single one is chipped. And thanks to you, my dear boy." She patted his head and kissed his cheek.

That was the most surprising thing of that day. Great-Grandmother didn't call anyone "dear" but less gave them a kiss. And that wasn't the end of things. She reached into her bedside table, took out a box that require a key to open—he knew she kept her money locked in the box to prevent the nurses from stealing it, as if they ever would—and gave him a twenty-dollar bill

"Grandmother…that's very generous," Gladstone's father said, just as surprised as Gladstone.

"This is not spoiling the child," Great-Grandmother said in her no-nonsense tone. "He did a good thing, and children should be rewarded for services."

"Thank you," Gladstone said, putting the money next to its brother in his pocket. He was feeling very rich. However he did feel a bit guilty. After all, he didn't do anything. He just so happened to be right under the shelves during the earthquake.

They visited with Great-Grandmother for a while longer, the nurses rushing about in the hallways as they checked up on all their patients, sticking their head in to make sure nothing was broken or anyone hurt. And after a while, Great-Grandmother excused them with a smile and a wave, looking much different from the old woman they usually visited.

"Can we have an earthquake every time we visit?" Gladstone's father whispered in the hallway.

"Hush, dear," Gladstone's mother said but she was smiling. "Let's just hope that this fine spirit of hers lasts. And it's all thanks to you Gladstone, sweetie. You were very brave during the earthquake."

Gladstone soaked in the praise as they walked down the hall. But they all stopped as a pair of EMTs pushed a rolling gurney out of one of the patient's rooms, a black body bag right on top.

"Oh, go ahead, folks," one EMT said, spotting the family.

"Oh, my," Gladstone's mother gasped, hand to her mouth. "How unfortunate."

"Was it the earthquake?" Gladstone's father asked the EMT.

"He had a heart attack, probably from the stress of the earthquake," the other EMT said.

As they passed by, Gladstone's parents tried to hide Gladstone from the view, but as they passed, he caught a glimpse of the room beyond the EMTs.

It belonged to the old man who gave him the necklace.

Gladstone put a hand to his chest, feeling the necklace against his feathers under his shirt. He believed now. So he had to make a decision. Was he going to get rid of the necklace, pass it on to someone else or perhaps bury it before the bad luck built up too much? Or was he going to keep it?

Twenty five years later…

Gladstone stepped out of the beach house at the edge of Duckburg, feeling refreshed and wonderful. He always felt refreshed and wonderful no matter where he slept. He once had stayed the night in a jail cell and had slept peacefully there—why he was in the jail cell, he had no idea, but it turned out to be lucky since he had overheard where a pair of thieves had hid their loot and earned a reward when he turned the information over to the police.

He didn't own the beach house. A man at the airport—a complete stranger—had rented the beach house for the week and he had been called in on an emergency at work. It was non-refundable. And Gladstone had talked to him for five minutes, five polite, lucky minutes, and the man called the rental agency and had everything transferred to Gladstone. What are the odds? With Gladstone, always in his favor.

A week in a beach house.

Gladstone was the type who went where the wind takes him, having never needed job or permanent home. All his basic needs were taken care of, and since he never kept anything that he picked up for very long, never collected souvenirs or anything other than memories, he could easily live anywhere in the world. Whenever he ended up in Duckburg, he always tend to crash at his Uncle Scrooge's place, but once in a while, he'd win a free hotel room or something like that.

This time, it was a beach house, which so happened to coincide with some of the most beautiful weather he had ever seen in Duckburg.

He was so lucky.

As he walked down the boardwalk to the eateries on the wharf, he tested his inner self to see what he was in the mood for. Pancakes? Parfait? Pastries? Maybe something more exotic. He had to decide, otherwise his luck wouldn't know where he wanted to go. Or maybe it would just send him some money so he could decide later.

As he searched the ground for the usual twenty dollars, he patted the front of his shirt which was his usual habit. The necklace that he always kept hidden under his shirt was always a comfort to him, although it didn't look like the same necklace he was given as a child. Instead of a gold chain, he had replaced it with silver since gold was eye-catching, and after seeing so much of the color from his Uncle Scrooge, he thought it was a little gaudy. Besides, silver looked better with green. As for the bone, he couldn't stand seeing it as it was and worried that someone would think him macabre for wearing something like that, so he had it plated in silver as well. It was a strange looking necklace, that's for sure, but at least it didn't look as if he were wearing ancient body parts.

A flash of green caught his eye and he bent down.

"Nice, twenty dollars," Gladstone said, picking up the crisp bill. Now he was set for the morning.

Just as he saw a pretty, little café that met his fancy, a person turned right into him and they ran into each other, shoulder to shoulder. It was only a slight bump, but it was enough to knock Gladstone to the ground.

"Ow," Gladstone said, feeling the pain of his tail cushioning his fall. He expected an apology and a welcomed hand to help him up, but instead he saw a man in a gray hoodie hurrying away. "Hey! What's the big idea?" he shouted. Grumbling, he stood up and brushed himself off, finding a tear in his new jacket. "You've got to be kidding me. Rassa frassa jerk no good—" He stopped himself. "Oh, no. Now I'm sounding like Donald."

It was a strange occurrence for something like this to happen to him. His lucky charm couldn't exactly change people, but usually something that seemed like bad luck would lead him to good luck. In the meantime, all he wanted was a bagel and a cup of coffee.

As he stumbled into the café, he said found almost every table filled and the noise level barely low enough that he heard from the hostess up front that it would be a fifteen minute wait. It ended up being thirty, and when he was finally seated, the table wasn't wiped down and he stepped in a wad of gum.

"What can I get you?" a curt waitress asked.

Gladstone didn't have to look at the menu. "Coffee and a bagel."

"We only have pumpernickel right now," the waitress said.

Gladstone blanched. He hated pumpernickel. "Toast then. Wheat bread," Gladstone said with a sigh.

He then waited much longer than it should have taken to make toast, and when it finally came, the toast was cold, had too much butter and was not wheat bread. As for the coffee, it wasn't spectacular like he was used to, and the waitress didn't bring any creamers for him. After he tried to flag down the waitress several times, he gave up, scarfed down his sub-par breakfast and went to the cash register to pay for the meal.

"Here and the rest is tip," Gladstone said, handing over the bill he had picked up. Not that she deserved such a gracious gratuity, he thought.

The hostess snorted and muttered, "Lousy tipper. Go figure."

"Huh, what was that?" Gladstone asked.

"Nothing," the hostess said with a shake of her head.

Gladstone frowned. "If I'm not mistaken, I did hand you a twenty-dollar bill, right?"

The hostess shook her head. "No, you gave me a five. It barely covers your meal, sir." She gave him a judgmental look.

A five? No, that couldn't be possible. He always picked up twenty-dollar bills.

"I'm sorry. My mistake," Gladstone said, reaching for his wallet. He was certain he would have several wayward twenties that he had picked up on his journeys. His hands came up empty after searching his pockets. His senses dropped to the floor.

His wallet was gone.

"No. No, where is it?" he said, searching his jacket and every pocket, coming up empty again.

"Where is what, sir?" the hostess asked, looking irritated.

"My wallet. It's gone," Gladstone said.

The hostess had a look on her face as if she had heard that line before.

"No, it's really gone," Gladstone said. "I've lost it. I lost my wallet. This never happens to me."

"Sure," the hostess said, her beaks pressed in a thin line. "If you lost it here, it hasn't been turned in, but you can check back later."

Gladstone realized that the waitress couldn't grasp just how terrible of a thing for him to lose his wallet. But then he remembered the guy bumping into him, that had knocked him to the boardwalk and left in a hurry without an apology. The guy must have been a pickpocket.

Gladstone fumed as he stormed out of the café. This shouldn't have happened to him. Bad things don't happen to Gladstone Gander. He had never been robbed before. He never was ignored like this before. And he never had such an unpleasant morning, not since that old man had given him his lucky charm.

He automatically raised his hand to feel the outline of the jewelry under his shirt, but as his fingertips traced just under his collar bone, he felt nothing but his own body and feathers. He pulled back his jacket and shirt collar, looking down, expecting it to be askew or something, for there to be a reason why he didn't feel it.

But it was worse than he thought. The necklace was gone.

And so was his luck.

(Author's notes: This story in no ways reflects any Gladstone Gander cannon information or my own headcannon. It was just something that I came up with and I just went ahead with it. I know it's very similar to the episode with the Phantom Blot, but I'm going with a different angle that I hope will sound great.)