But nobody came

Lena awoke to the blurry noise of arguing, her head pounding and her throat aching vaguely. There was a moment of confusion when she felt the sensations- they were so much more intense then she was used to- before she remembered she was alive again.

First she felt a brief spark of joy and excitement, quickly followed by terror as the events following her great escape caught up to her. Shit. She got captured! By Scrooge McDuck’s buff elderly bodyguard no less! He was the one duck that she was supposed to avoid meeting! He had, like, a really good reason to want her dead!

Still, she stayed still and silent, willing her breath to remain calm even as she wanted to freak out- trying to remember how she had done it when Jeremy had snuck into her room way back when she was still in the system.

“-we weren’t going to chain her to anything-“That was the scary grandma, “-Don’t speak for th’ both of us Beakley, I for one think a good exorcism is perfectly-“Okay and that was McDuck, unfortunately voting to fucking exorcise her- “Hxwat?! Xheeze jhhust ah kkhid!” And that was…a muppet being sucked up a vacuum cleaner?? Seriously, who the hell spoke like that?! She could barely discern what he was saying at all, just that his sentence started with the word ‘what’. Maybe. Maybe-ish.

“Oh well may’be she looks like one, but she came from that hateful hag’s blasted bauble- a clear sign of malignant-“ The Scottish ducks weird old man blabbering came to an abrupt halt as ‘Beakley’ interrupted him mid-sentence.

“Quiet- she’s awake.” Lena’s eyes flashed open instantly and her heart nearly leapt out of her throat and onto the floor at the sight of the giant bodyguard lady looming menacingly overhead.

She flinched backwards, the side of her already sore head smooshing itself into a thankfully soft cushion. Wait- what kind of backwards cell was this, that there were pillows!

After a moment of silence that didn’t include violence of any kind, Lena hesitantly opened her eyes and took her surroundings in.

The reason her cell hadn’t felt like a cell was because it wasn’t one- she was half laid down on a couch. A COUCH. And not even some shitty creepy basement couch; in fact, it was kinda nice, if a little old. She also appeared to be in…a living room? Why were they interrogating her in a living room?? Sure, McDuck was rich, but surely he didn’t want to have to replace his nice furniture for no reason! Blood was kind of a bitch to get off fancy stuff like this.

There were three adult ducks surrounding her, Beakley and McDuck- which meant that the voice that sounded like a hamster squeaking with a bucket over its head was actually a person. A person wearing a sailor suit??

She was pretty sure she passed out because she couldn’t get enough air, not because she hit her head- but she was starting to have doubts that this wasn’t fueled by a concussion or some crazy hallucination. She wanted badly to pinch herself to prove that this was all real and that she hadn’t just finally snapped inside the amulet, but she didn’t want to risk any sudden movements.

They were all staring at her, Muppet-Duck with an oddly sad look, McDuck with a shrewd but incredibly hard to read gaze and Beakley almost with confusion.

“Might wanna’ move a couple a steps back there Bentina.” McDuck said with an incredibly unnerving sort of calm tone, and Beakley- or Bentina? Apparently? –reluctantly took a couple of steps backwards.

Lena didn’t know what they were doing or why, but she relaxed a bit, her breathing coming easier without an adult menacing her from far too close.

There were another couple of awkward moments of silence. The adults kept shooting each other these looks, somehow communicating a whole conversation without words. Lena shifted uncomfortably, noting with surprise that she was unrestrained. Technically, she could try for another panicked sprint out of this hell house, but she imagined it would end up with similar results.

“I suppose we should start with the basics. What is your name, your age, and your pronouns.” Beakley-Bentina asked voice strict and almost militaristic. Lena blinked, a bit surprised by this avenue of prying information from her. Her name never seemed to matter to most people who wanted something from her.

“Uhh-“ She started to speak, but had to pause immediately to cough into her sleeve, voice strained and painful. Maybe from disuse, but also probably because she’d screamed a bit when she was being captured.

To her great surprise and astonishment, Muppet-Voice the Sailor Duck had gotten up and filled a glass of water in the interim of her wheezing, and was offering it to her gently.  

She eyed it suspiciously for a moment, but decided she might as well drink it- if they wanted to kill her, they could have just snapped her neck while she was unconscious- poisoning her seemed a little silly.

She took the glass delicately; amazed internally at the feeling of the chill of the liquid through its container, of the way the water shook and reacted to her own movements. After a second of just admiring it, she tilted her head back and gulped the whole thing down- only a marginal improvement from her earlier tap guzzling from earlier, politeness wise.

When she was done she carefully sat the glass in her lap, hands idly feeling the smoothness of the object while she talked. Ah sensation, how she missed thee.

“I’m L-Lena. Annd I’m- mmy age is…uh, fifteen…ish?” Lena paused, mentally recounting her life. Yeah. Fifteen-ish. That sounded…plausible. “And ah, I don’t really…what’s a pronoun?” Beakley frowned at her response, and McDuck squinted, like he could see straight through her if he narrowed his eyes enough. Muppet-Voice the Sailor Duck smiled sadly at her and spoke- or at least she was pretty sure he was speaking.

“Ah thronown ish xhe whorrd usch thho rehffer thho shcomone. Ffhor exhampble, eye ghoh bhy hxhim ohr xhe, chwarrass Bhheklley ghohes bhy xhee or gher. Dhoezs thxact mhake shhense?”

Lena stared incomprehensibly. 

What?

Beakley slapped her own head in exasperation with a look of pure exhaustion that implied she was used to this sort of bizarre tomfoolery.

“A pronoun is what people call you. I go by she or her, Donald and Scrooge go by he or him.” The older duck explained tiredly. Lena nodded hesitantly- okay, yeah, that made sense. She wasn’t sure exactly what was going on, but maybe she got the basics now?

Muppet-Voice, or ‘Donald’ supposedly, threw up his arms sarcastically.

“Txhatss qwuat eye xhhaid!” He snapped- again, completely in gibberish. The other two didn’t so much as glance his way, either because they also had no idea what he was saying, or because whatever he said wasn’t worth a response. Possibly both.

“Oh. Well then she and her? I guess?” Lena responded, scratching the back of her neck nervously.

Beakley nodded, immediately settling back into a professional facial expression.

“I see. And how exactly did a duck your age end up in Magica De Spells cursed amulet?” She asked, raising her brow archly. Lena hunched, crossing her arms over her stomach protectively.

Should she just tell them? Who did she want to torture her less, these crazy people or Magica? Did she really-

Her frantic internal monologue was broken up by a crash above and the sound of surprised shouting.

“Magica De Spell?!” Someone who suspiciously sounded like Webby yelled from a location that seemed suspiciously like in the vents above them. Her outburst was followed by several accusing shouts of “Webby!!” at various levels of volume and anger.

All three of the adults were peering upward, looking equally pissed but in very different ways. Donald was practically as red as a tomato.

And that was before the part of the ceiling collapsed and four screaming and terribly guilty ducklings crashed to the ground.

There was a moment of explosive silence before everyone started screaming.