aftermathfanfic

[aftermathfanfic]

so many of the "i only use chat gpt for ___" excuses are concerning because people use it in place of learning basic, valuable skills.

you don't need chat gpt to write professional sounding emails for you, there are many many guides on the internet and with a bit of practise you can learn to write them yourself. a very important skill for a professional to have, and some of the basic rules will carry over into irl conversations!

you don't need chat gpt to be a "more detailed search engine", because you're robbing yourself of the chance to learn how to find and filter information on the internet and evaluate the credibility of sources. which is a VITAL skill. plus, chat gpt is notorious for being wrong?

if you use it to write essays, you're taking away your ability to hone your research skills, your writing skills, your critical thinking skills. your ability to create persuasive arguments!

and for most of the other reasons people use chat gpt, there are non-ai websites for that! for maths, wolfram alpha. for figuring out what you can cook with the ingredients you have there's supercook and the like. for creating routines, there's about a million apps!

whatever you "only" use chatgpt for i promise there are better websites out there that you don't have to worry will produce complete bullshit???? and destroy the environment???

[aftermathfanfic]

Every time I report a bot another one appears and now they’re also posting stolen art fed through an Ai generator, the same one taken right off my deviantart

Fuck AI generating pictures, AI is not art, AI is garbage and theft and anyone who believes it is art can unfollow me right now because I will only speak more unkindly about AI from here on out

[aftermathfanfic]

Hi. Pretty much all my fanfiction and some of my fanart has been uploaded to Ai.

I'm typing with a lot of anger and hurt right now so pardon me if don''t make sense. I've been told of people seeing excerpts of my written work showing up in character chat bots before, specfically with my IZ work and Solar Lunacy, and more recently The Rehabilitation of Death (TROD) and I'm so tired.

I've put these images together very hastily and I didn't have the heart to add much more. I've blocked out the names for the sake of privacy for the creators of these, but allow me to be explicitly clear:

Do not upload my artwork or fan fiction to AI, including c.ai.

I DO NOT consent for my work to be uploaded to any AI databases, chat bots, artificial character chat rooms or similar.

Not only are you morally fucking over authors and artists, but you can put us into severe legal trouble as well. This is not negotiable. I will never be able to undo the damage this has done, even if these chat bots go down, my writing and the artwork is now uploaded to the database.

This has made me reconsider sharing my writing online more than any online discourse would have ever done. If you do this, please consider what damage and disrespect you are doing to us, and please block me if you're fine with it.

[aftermathfanfic]

Hi, all. There’s an animation rally going on in Burbank right now. I can’t be there physically so I’m sharing Dana Terrace’s statement on it.

Here is the poster with the details

fuck ai, stand with animation

[aftermathfanfic]

Here's the other thing I've been working on, in case anyone's interested!

FALLOUT: WITCHES OF THE WASTES

War. War never changes. The America of the 21st century was defined by war. War with rival nations, war with its neighbours, even war with itself. It ended the only way it could’ve possibly ended – in a barrage of atomic fire that reduced the world to cinders. Most of those who escaped the bombs perished in the nuclear fallout, while the rest were forced to rebuild from the ashes. But those wealthy or lucky enough managed to escape to enormous underground bunkers, called Vaults, where they would spend the rest of their lives safe from the perils of the wasteland. For one of these vault dwellers, life is about to change. Forced out of her Vault against her will, she will confront cruel raiders, mutated abominations and mad psychics as she tries to navigate her place in the wasteland. This is the story of Luz Noceda.

This is a new fanfic I've started writing! If the idea of inserting TOH characters into post-apocalyptic Connecticut, with a scoop of psychic mysticism and a sprinkling of 1950s retro-futurism, please check it out!

AO3 Link (currently restricted to registered users to protect it from a stupid AI bot that's trawling the site)

[aftermathfanfic]

So... not gonna lie, I've kinda been writing a different fanfic recently. I haven't worked on Aftermath for a while, and I'm not gonna lie... interest is starting to wane a bit.

I don't want to flat-out say that Aftermath's cancelled, but I think it's safe to say that we're going on hiatus on this one. I might write a more light-hearted Ducktales fic at some point, but I don't have any concrete plans.

[aftermathfanfic]

Why did “be critical of your media” turn into “find all its flaws and hate it” why did people become allergic to FUN

[aftermathfanfic]

...this is a thing?

Dear Fandom readers - an etiquette fail

AO3 is not goodreads. It is not the NYT bestseller list.

You paid no money to read these stories. They are, in fact, a labor of love, done on the off time in the off hours of people who are writing for the joy of writing and the joy of the story.

Your ratings are not appreciated. Not by other readers, who don't know you from adam. Not by fandom-savvy passerby.

And not, in fact, by the author. Who again: Wrote this for fun. In their spare time - around work, around family and friend commitments. Around the rest of their lives. Fandom clout almost never "pays off" in any monetary gains, in any form of physical or financial security.

So please stop "rating" us on something we do for joy.

Today, a fellow fanauthor shared this with me. It was not on any story of my own, but they understandably needed a moment to go "wtf" and process it all. With their permission, I now share this with you.

You won't find this comment on AO3 anymore, by the by.

I have... a lot of issues with this. First of all being something that would be a C-grade in any US school system is not a "Good Rating" for most folks, but many of my issues would be the same even in this commenter had rated this a 10/10.

It boils down to this:

Why are you grading us on something we all are here to do solely for fun and personal enjoyment? Why does it have to be good?

Why can't it just be a labor of love and of joy to be good enough for you, dear commenter?

Do I, as a fanauthor, want to write well? Sure! I do want to write good stories. But I didn't ask random readers to grade me on them. Not in bookmarks that I can easily check, and certainly not in my comments section. And I never will want them to. Every author I've talked to agrees. Is there someone out there who might want this? Sure. Most likely, even! The human experience and desires are broad and varied. But in my experience, if they do exist in Fandom, they're the vast minority. So please:

Don't.

[aftermathfanfic]

to the beautiful writers that might see this, ao3 is currently being scrapped by an AI company called RIVD. this isn't your usual AI text scrapping, they are specifically targeting ao3 to feed their own AI / "tech-orientes" fanfiction site

their "takedown form" demands that you give them your full legal name and address. they do not say what they're doing with your personal details. there's no proof that this form works

until ao3 comes out with a proper statement or manages to lock their scrapped, just lock your fics for registered users

[aftermathfanfic]

Hope you’re doing ok ❤️🙏

Yeah, I'm doin' alright! Just currently working on a different project at the moment. Thanks for asking!

[aftermathfanfic]

Dissertation on Fanfiction Bookbinding — Looking for participants!

Hi! My name is Marie Chevrier, I’m currently doing my postgraduate dissertation on fanfiction bookbinding, and I’m looking for people to talk to about it!

If you’ve ever taken a fanfic from somewhere online and turned it into a physical copy, either for yourself or as a gift, I’d love to know more. From printer paper stapled together to typesetting and painted edges, nothing is too simple or too complex — I’m interested in the whole process, what motivates readers or authors to bring the story to a different format, and how it’s one more way to interact with stories actively and creatively. This will be the final project of my MLitt in Folklore and Ethnology with the Elphinstone Institute (University of Aberdeen, Scotland).

What to Expect

To participate, you must be 18 or older and speak English. I’ll give you more details and answer any questions you might have via email, and will then set up individual video calls with participants (if you happen to be in North-East Scotland, we could also meet at an agreed public location). I’ll tell you more about the dissertation and explain how what you share will be used, which depends entirely on what you agree to, including if you would prefer your contribution to be credited or anonymised. I will ask you about your experience with fanfiction bookbinding and if you have some examples to show me, I would love to see them! Meetings will last approximately 45–90 minutes and take place in June 2024. You have the right to withdraw your participation at any time.

Contact Information

If you’d like to participate or have any questions, please send me an email at m.chevrier.23@abdn.ac.uk

To know more about the Elphinstone Institute, please visit https://www.abdn.ac.uk/elphinstone/

To know more about me, here's an intro post for you.

If for any reason you don’t wish to participate but still have comments/suggestions/resources/musings you’d like to send my way, please do!

[aftermathfanfic]

[aftermathfanfic]

Don’t mind me, just putting together some new brotps.

Because that’s what DuckTales is for me. It’s the show of a thousand brotps.

So Dewey and Webby are well established as quite the dynamic duo. Between working together to solve the mystery of Della’s disappearance and bonding over their shared love of danger, they definitely developed one of the closest and cutest friendships in the family.

But now that Webby is a kinda-sorta triplet, where does that leave May and June? Which boys would they bond with most?

Let’s start with June because she’s small and cute and I know they’re all identical so they’re all small and cute but this baby you guys!!! TT.TT

I mentioned in this other post how each of the clones had their own specific wants and goals. Almost all the lines about wanting to discover their purpose were given to May (with the exception of one line in the storage room scene), while all the lines about family were given to June (again, with one exception in the storage room).

With F.O.W.L. defeated and Donald as their new guardian, I think June will settle in… well, easier than May will. She longed for family, and closeness, and love, and now she has that.

She seems like such a little cuddle bug. She readily displays physical affection and instantly smiles when someone does the same with her. I can imagine her being the sort to curl up at Donald’s side during family movie nights, or if she gets hurt, find hugs to be the most comforting thing.

And I imagine this baby bean will get (mildly) hurt a lot at first. I mean, this kid was just created. She doesn’t know anything. She doesn’t know waffle irons are hot. She doesn’t know bees sting. She doesn’t know hand sanitizer doubles as paper cut finder.

She’s going to need someone to teach her how to be safe, and someone who can comfort her like Donald would when she gets hurt if Donald isn’t there.

Hmmm now who do we know who can…

Huey, you’re hired. Welcome to my new brotp.

Huey and June are both very family-oriented, and I imagine their relationship will have some strong big-brother-little-sister vibes. He’s got the heart of a caretaker just like his uncle Donald, and little June is going to need a lot of care.

She’s been abused and traumatized, and because she was artificially aged, she acts younger than Webby and the boys. And like I said, she knows next to nothing about the world, and could really use a Woodchuck’s expertise in matters of safety. So Huey and June are a new brotp of mine.

Now as for May…

Her whole thing was about finding out why she was created, and when she did find out why, her dream became a nightmare.

Her whole life - short as it’s been - has been about striving to earn Heron and Bradford’s praise, and in the end, she realized she could never get it, because to them, she was only a means to an end. She was disposable in their eyes. And Gyro certainly didn’t help with his comment about how replaceable clones are.

She had no goal at this point - no more purpose - what a miserable thing to feel at such a young age. But like most young people who feel useless, her journey didn’t end there.

But I think May is going to have a harder time letting people love her than June. Finding out why she was created could leave her feeling cynical. She might wonder a lot about what her purpose is now, and struggle to find out what she’s good at and how she fits into this family.

And we all know who’s struggled with those things in the past.

(I was going to use a more relevant gif but this floof is too important.)

Anyway, Louie went from feeling like he wasn’t good at any aspects of adventuring, to finding out he was good at something and then believing he was only good at that one thing, to realizing he has a few talents that he can use for the benefit of his family. He’s definitely struggled in the past with feeling like he didn’t fit in, and he’s wondered how he could possibly be an asset. 

I can’t think of anyone better to help May discover how she fits in, especially since one of Louie’s uncovered talents is motivational speaking.

Let’s just hope he doesn’t teach her to lie, steal, and manipulate like he taught Webby. lol XD

Angle-spotting Louie will be able to find out May’s strengths and weaknesses, and use those discoveries for her benefit. I wish we could get a Season 4 to explore what her strengths are, but alas, these will forever be speculations. 

OOH unless they make a movie or something! That would be fantastic. *fingers crossed*

[aftermathfanfic]

He slowly approached her, sitting down beside her. They sat in silence, neither of them wanting to talk about the last adventure. Truthfully, Dewey didn’t really know how to talk about it. This wasn’t just inter-family drama and misunderstanding, it was… failure. Dewey didn’t know how else to describe it. It felt like they had failed.

If they hadn’t, that girl would still be alive.

~~~

Chanda waited in the agriculture plot of Quackmore Public, leaning against the shed wall with her hands in her pockets. Classes had just started, if she remembered the school’s timetable correctly, and there was nobody around. Not yet.

Her eyes scanned the bushels and bushes of the plot, an amateur farm about four yards across either side. Still, Chanda felt a pang of envy at it – her school certainly didn’t have anything like this.

Finally, she spotted her target, entering in through the back gate of the plot. He was a large pig boy, only a couple of years older than her, dressed in a green polo and brown shorts. His gaze was down at his phone as he walked through the plot, only looking up to notice her when he was a few feet away.

Once he did, he froze.

“Oh, God.” He muttered, taking a step back from her.

“Hey, Rhind.” Chanda greeted him. She cocked her head at him. “How’s the hand?”

The pig moved his right hand behind him, almost subconsciously. “…Fine.” Rhind replied warily. He watched her suspiciously. “…What do you want?”

Chanda was silent for a moment. She watched the older boy stew in his nervousness for a bit longer, then remarked, “I heard you were dealing again.”

“…I share a blunt or two with friends, sure. What of it?”

“Did Drake give that to you?”

“Oh, come… what, did he send you?” Rhind groaned, taking another step back. “I don’t work with you guys anymore, give me a break!”

Chanda almost cursed. Rhind wasn’t working for Doofus. He wouldn’t know anything about the statuette, or anything about his operations.

But he might know something else, she quickly realised. Deciding to play into his anxiety, Chanda stepped off the wall and approached him, asking in a low voice, “Why would he have sent me, Rhind?”

“You tell me! You’ve met the guy, anything can set him off!”

Chanda took another step forward. “Maybe he’s concerned about where you’re getting your goods from.”

“What? Wh-what do you mean?” Rhind spluttered as he stumbled backwards.

“His stash, idiot. He seems to think that’s where you’re getting your stuff.”

“Aw, come- You think I’m dumb enough to steal from that creep? He’s the one constantly spying on people, he should know it wasn’t me!”

“What wasn’t you?”

“Whatever it is you’re coming to me for!”

Chanda got right up in his face, cornering him against a row of overgrown tomato bushes. “…A couple pounds of our stuff went missing.” She lied, making herself sound as threatening as possible. “You sure you don’t know anything about that?”

“I don’t even know where he keeps his stash!” Rhind argued. “How would I steal from it?”

“You could’ve found out. You might have asked one of the other guys, cut him into it.”

“None of the other guys know where it is either! We only ever got it directly from him, he knows that!”

Chanda narrowed her eyes at him, letting him stand there, sweating nervously. After a moment, she backed down, realising he was telling the truth. Rhind breathed a sigh of relief as she let him relax a little.

“You don’t know anyone else who could have stolen it?” She questioned him, hoping to get a name out of him at least.

Unfortunately, Rhind shook his head. “No-one would be crazy enough.” He told her. “Not after what happened to Ryan.”

“Ryan?”

“…Ryan Goodfeather? The guy who got beat up by a bunch of Beagle Boys?”

Chanda vaguely remembered hearing something about that. She hadn’t paid much attention at the time, though. “What about him?” She asked.

Now Rhind was looking suspicious. “The kids who jumped him worked for Doofus, didn’t they?”

Chanda stared at him. “…Where’d you hear that?” She demanded.

“Ryan said so. He tried to steal something from Doofus, so he sic’d those guys on him. What, you didn’t hear about that?”

Chanda didn’t answer, staring into the middle distance.

“Right… you weren’t at the hospital. Too busy with your mom, or whatever.” He snorted, sounding amused. “Doofus never told you that he was in with the biggest gang in Duckburg?”

“…He probably didn’t want to scare me off.” Chanda muttered.

“Yeah, no kidding. I mean, a bunch of us quit when he heard that. No amount of money is worth working for those guys.” He folded his arms, shrugging. “I mean, it’s not that surprising if you think about it. The guy’s in the same crowd as Glomgold, Beaks… all those psychos.”

“No. It isn’t.”

Rhind looked down at her. “You want my advice? You should look at keeping your distance from that stuff too.” He suggested. “I know your mom’s important and all, but Doofus is in the middle of the Duckburg crazies. It’s dangerous shit.”

Chanda glared back up at him. “I didn’t ask for your advice.” She shot back. “And don’t go telling anyone about that Beagle Boy stuff. Like you said, dangerous shit.”

“…Sure. Whatever.” Rhind shrugged again. “So… can I go now?”

Chanda sighed reluctantly, then jerked her head towards the school proper. Rhind quickly took the hint, jogging away from her without looking back.

Chanda sighed, walking back to the shed and leaning against it. That hadn’t been a complete waste. Rhind might not have known where Doofus’s stash was, but it sounded like this Goodfeather guy did, or at least knew how to steal from him. She just needed to find him, pay him a visit, and find out what he knew. Still, this stuff about the Beagle Boys…

She shoved her hands deep into her jacket pockets, swallowing hard. Fighting high school bullies was one thing. Fighting the Beagle Boys was entirely another.

She felt her phone buzz in her pocket. She took it out and held it up, looking at who was calling her.

Green Dickhead, it read.

Chanda frowned, then answered it. “Hey.” She murmured into the phone.

“Did you tell anyone?”

“What?”

“Did you tell anyone?” Louie repeated aggressively.

“Oh, well, hello to you too.” Chanda muttered.

“Just give me a straight answer!” Louie hissed.

“No, I haven’t told anyone!” Chanda snapped. “How fucking stupid do you think I am?”

“Really? Because Doofus knows!”

“…What?”

“He knows! He called me last night to collect on my side of our ‘bargain’, and he knew that we were trying to get back at him! He’s known-!”

Chanda shut her eyes tight, letting her hand fall loosely to her side. He already knew. They’d failed before they even started. Frustratedly, she punched the shed wall behind her, gritting her teeth and holding back a string of curses. Reluctantly, she brought the phone back up to her ear.

“…or if he’s just… fuckin’ psychic, but he knew!” Louie rambled as she returned to the call. “And I know that I haven’t told anyone, so… like, you haven’t accidentally let it sleep to anyone who could’ve told him? Anyone at all?”

“No. Nobody.” Chanda replied. “He must’ve had someone spying on us back at the bus stop.”

“Not possible. We were alone back there. He had to have heard from someone, or-” He cut off briefly, then continued “-or he’s gone to the Karmic Court, and they’ve told him-!”

“Calm down.” Chanda told him forcefully. “You’re panicking.”

“If you had been through the crap that this asshole has put me through, then you’d be panicking too!” Louie snarled.

“Just focus!” Chanda commanded him. “Look… what did he say to you? Is your deal with him off?”

Louie scoffed. “Deal. Sure. Let’s call it that.” He sighed. “No… I managed to talk him into giving me an extra week. But whatever we do to get out of this, it has to be before then! Because if we give him time to prepare, then we’re screwed!”

“Okay.” Chanda said evenly. “So… what does this change for our plan?”

That seemed to give Louie pause. “…Nothing, I guess.” He admitted.

“Then stop panicking. All this means is that we need to be more careful.”

“Right… yeah.”

Chanda frowned. He sounded pained for some reason. “You alright?” She asked.

“Yeah, yeah. Just pulled something during while I was out adventuring. You know how it is.” Louie replied. “Or… I guess you wouldn’t. Whatever. Did you manage to catch any info on your end?”

“…Kind of. The guy I told you about, he doesn’t know anything. But he let slip someone who might.”

“Another one of his dealers?”

“Yeah. He tried to steal something from Doofus and got himself beat up for it. Chances are good that he was stealing from Doofus’s stash.”

“Perfect. Get a location from him, and whatever we find, we use it as leverage.”

“Assuming that he hasn’t moved it somewhere else.”

“That sounds like negative thinking to me.” Louie remarked. Chanda could hear the smirk in his voice. “You gotta be positive when it comes to planning, trust me.”

“…He… also told me something else.” Chanda added after a moment’s hesitation.

“What?”

“He said that Doofus gets his drugs from the Beagle Boys.”

“…What?”

“Apparently they’re the ones who jumped the second guy.”

“Oh my God, that’s great!” Louie said excitedly.

“…How?” Chanda asked worriedly.

“Gang connections? That’s excellent blackmail material! If we find proof of that, give it over to the cops, we could shut his operation for good! He’d be powerless!”

“He could easily tell the cops that he was being coerced by them!” Chanda argued.

“Won’t matter. Either way, he loses the drugs. He can’t exactly frame me for dealing if he’s got nothing to frame me with, can he?”

“I- okay, can- can you picture something for me?” Chanda said anxiously. “Let’s say we do that. And let’s say it shuts him down. He’s going to be pissed at us, right? He’s going to be pissed at me!”

“So?”

“He knows my mother’s name, dickhead!” Chanda snarled. “He knows where I live! He’ll tell the Beagle Boys, they’ll blame me, and they’ll come after my mother!”

“If he gets caught, the Beagle Boys aren’t going to give a crap what he says.” Louie rebutted. “But, fine. After we bring Doofus down, I can make sure your family’s safe. I know some people.” When Chanda didn’t respond, he added, “He’ll try to get back at you no matter how we go about this, Chanda.”

Chanda sighed, replying reluctantly, “Fine… what’s your next move, then? That Bosman guy, right?”

“Not anymore.” Louie replied. “He was bit a gamble anyway, and we don’t have time to be taking chances. But his brother – well, adopted brother – he technically works for my uncle. If anyone knows anything about Doofus’s operations, it’ll be him.”

“…Alright.” Chanda replied. “Let me know what you find out.”

“Yeah, you too. Be seeing you.”

Chanda put her phone back in her pocket, hanging up. She sighed, looking around to see if anyone could see her, then turned to leave the agriculture plot.

~~~

Whenever Webby got upset when they were younger, Dewey would be able to find Webby hiding in the mansion’s ventilation system, tucked away where nobody would find her except him. He always knew where she was hiding, and he always knew how to comfort her. He vividly remembered one time where he managed to make her laugh, her giggling reverberating off the steel walls of the vent duct and all across the house.

They were too big to hide in the vents now, obviously. She got stuck in a vent shaft when she was thirteen, and neither of them had attempted to crawl back in ever since. It had taken Dewey a while to figure out the new spot she would go when she wanted to be alone.

Alarmingly, she had chosen the roof.

That was where he found her now. He pushed up the rooftop trapdoor to find her sitting on the west wing roof, watching the sun setting on the horizon. Her back was turned to him.

He slowly approached her, sitting down beside her. They sat in silence, neither of them wanting to talk about the last adventure. Truthfully, Dewey didn’t really know how to talk about it. This wasn’t just inter-family drama and misunderstanding, it was… failure. Dewey didn’t know how else to describe it. It felt like they had failed.

If they hadn’t, that girl would still be alive.

“…Do…” Webby started to say, her voice tight. “…Do you think she had a sister?”

Dewey looked at her. Her eyes were red. She looked like she hadn’t slept at all last night.

He turned back to the sunset. “…I dunno.” He mumbled. He hadn’t seen the girl’s family. He knew that Scrooge had contacted the local authorities when they had emerged from the dungeon, but beyond that, he was in the dark.

Webby pulled her knees up to her chest. “I… I feel awful about it, but… I don’t remember her name.” She choked out. She looked at Dewey, almost begging him with her next question. “…Do you remember…?”

“Filomena.” Dewey replied, staring down at the city below them. “Her name was Filomena.”

Webby wiped her eyes, mumbling, “We- we should do something. To remember her.”

“Like what?”

“…I dunno. Just… something.”

“…We could send her family something.” Dewey suggested. “Or do something for them.”

“…Yeah.” Webby nodded. “Yeah… something from all of us.”

Dewey twiddled his thumbs, not sure how to transition to the topic he came up here to talk about. “Um… listen, Huey told us something that happened while we were gone, um… apparently he was, like, interrogated by this FBI agent about something…”

Webby looked up at him. “What?” She gasped in disbelief.

“Yeah, but Huey thinks that he was just trying to use him to get at Uncle Scrooge, or some-”

“What? What does- why?”

“I dunno. I dunno. The whole thing’s weird.”

Webby stared at him, beak agape. She turned to stare off at the horizon, stunned into silence.

“We, uh… told May and June.” Dewey added. “Well, Huey’s told them, and-”

“We saved the world!” Webby cried, throwing her hands up in a sudden burst of anger. “We beat Magica! Lunaris! F.O.W.L.! Who is this guy to treat us like criminals?”

“…Yeah. Yeah, it’s messed up.”

“My dad hasn’t done anything wrong!” Webby declared furiously. “Nothing! Whoever this agent is, he can go to hell!”

Dewey flinched. Webby didn’t swear often, and he knew to be careful whenever she did. He let her seethe quietly for a few moments before he said, “…The adults haven’t told us yet. But they’ll probably tell us that we’ll need to be careful, or that we need to lay low, or something. And with everything that happened at Galinha, they’ll also tell us…”

“…That we’re gonna stop adventuring again.” Webby finished for him.

“…Yeah. At least until they figure out what’s going on.”

“Great.” Webby muttered miserably.

“…Well, we won’t be going to school this week, at least.” Dewey added, trying to sound positive. “That’s something, right?”

“…Yeah. It’s something.”

Dewey could tell it hadn’t made her any happier.

~~~

Dinner was silent for the most part. They ate stew and mashed potatoes, with half the family on one side, half on the other, and Scrooge at the head. Neither Louie nor June were at the table, still recovering from their injuries, and though they were the only ones absent, the table still felt empty without them.

Towards the end of dinner, Scrooge cleared his throat, directing everyone’s attention to him. “Everyone, listen…” He sighed, a weary expression on his face. “I know there’s enough on our consciences as it is, but… something happened while we were away.”

“The FBI thing.” May spoke up, sullenly mixing her stew with her potato. “Huey told us.”

Scrooge didn’t look surprised. “Aye… and I know the man who accosted him. This ‘Agent Nickel’, he barged into my office the day after we got back from those Phoenician ruins. I didn’t think much of him at the time, but it seems he was more persistent than I thought.”

Huey frowned. “What did he ask you about?”

“About the cloak we nabbed from those two bull-headed gods. Thought it was some kind of weapon.” Scrooge replied, taking another sip of his stew. “Then he made some allusions that he knew about the Other Bin, spat out some half-baked threats, and went on his way.”

“Allusions mean that he knows the Other Bin exists, but he can’t prove it.” Mrs Beakley interjected, her stew half-finished. “We need to ensure that we keep it that way.”

“Why do they even care?” Dewey questioned, his beak half-full of food. “Isn’t the stuff in the Other Bin, like, super dangerous?”

“Ha! That’s exactly why they care!” Della laughed sardonically. Twirling her spoon in the air as she talked, she ranted, “They think we’re sitting on a stockpile of magic superweapons, and they want all that for themselves! It’s all these guys care about!”

“I thought all these particular guys cared about was taking down mob bosses.” Donald remarked confusedly.

“Eh, they all report to the same bigwigs.” Della countered dismissively.

“More importantly, what they want is control.” Scrooge spoke up. “Ever since I first made a name for myself, I’ve had to put up with pretentious politicians and lecherous legislators, all after the same thing! My fortune, my treasures, and in the past thirty years, my land! My ownership of the land Duckburg sits on means that it’s free from the nonsense thrown around by the government, and those gerrymanderers over in Washington know it!”

He slammed his fist into the table, his voice becoming a growl. “This desperate grab at the Other Bin is just their latest attempt to whittle me down! They’ll use it to prop up some- some trumped-up charge against me and from there, they’ll move to rip Duckburg out from under us!”

Daisy put a spoonful of stew into her beak mournfully. “Funny.” She remarked. “You’d think they’d have a bit more gratitude towards the family that saved the world.”

“Bah!” Scrooge leant over his food as he said viciously, “These people don’t know the meanin’ of gratitude!”

Up until this point, Webby had been staring silently down at her bowl of untouched stew, her expression flat and unhappy. At Scrooge’s words, however, she straightened up, and turned to look at him, fierce determination in her eyes. “What do we do?” She asked.

Scrooge leant back, taking a long exhale. “Nothin’. They’re waitin’ for us to give them an excuse to seize the Other Bin. If we don’t do anythin’ reckless, they’ll never get that excuse, and eventually, they’ll have to move on.” He looked at her and added regretfully, “Which means, unfortunately… we’ll have to take a break from adventurin’ for a while.”

The answer wasn’t unexpected for any of them. But Webby still argued, “We can’t just wait for them to give up!”

“This is the federal government we’re up against.” Beakley told her sternly. “These aren’t foes we can fight in a grand climatic battle.”

“Why not? That’s how we defeated FOWL!”

“FOWL didn’t have the entire United States government behind it.” Daisy pointed out. “We have to deal with this the same way we deal with the media – keep our heads down, don’t do anything controversial, and don’t talk about anything they can use against us.”

“Which sucks. We know it sucks.” Della told them. “But it’s temporary.”

Webby didn’t reply. The frustration on her face was palpable.

“…My friends texted me a few hours ago.” Huey said in a quiet voice, prompting everyone to turn to him. “They want to know why I wasn’t at school today.”

“Oh…” Donald murmured sympathetically.

“I haven’t answered them yet.” Huey added. “I don’t really know what to tell them…”

Scrooge looked around at the other adults, and sighed regretfully. “…You can’t tell them what happened in Portugal, lad. Not with this FBI nonsense…”

“Then what do I tell them?” Huey asked desperately. “They’ll know if I lie to them, I-!”

“Just tell them that Louie and June got injured in the last adventure, and we’re just staying with them while they’re recovering.” Daisy told him. “You don’t have to be specific about it. If they press you, just tell them you’re not comfortable talking about it.”

“…Alright.” Huey agreed reluctantly. “It still feels dishonest.”

Dewey looked down at his food, staring into the mixture of meat and potato as he came to a realisation – he hadn’t gone to baseball practice today.

The first practice with Trent Bosman.

He didn’t mention it during dinner, playing it as cool as he could, but once he was back in his room, he grabbed his phone and immediately went to his messages. He wouldn’t have missed this training session for the world, and his friends knew that. His absence alone would have told them something was wrong.

Sure enough, the first message he saw on his phone was from Pete, the team’s best catcher: Hey man, it read. How come you weren’t at school today? You sick?

Dewey hesitated, then began to type out his response.

[aftermathfanfic]

(Suddenly sits bolt upright after a two-month power nap)

mmm, yes, fanfinction

(Goes back to sleep)

[aftermathfanfic]

:3

[aftermathfanfic]

Update

Alright, SO. I know it's been a month. So I'm gonna jot down some reasons for why the next chapter is taking so long.

Lack of Inspiration: Dunno what else to call it. I haven't been super into Ducktales recently, at least not the way I was when I first started writing Aftermath. I'll eventually come back around, though. It's a cycle, like most of my other interests.

D&D: I think I've mentioned this before, but one of my major hobbies is playing D&D with my friends, specifically as the DM. I'm currently in the process of preparing a new campaign, so that's been taking up a lot of my creative energy recently.

Video Game: I'm creating a video game with my friends! It's just a small RPG Maker game, but even that requires a decent bit of planning and development time. So that's also been using the creative bits of my brain.

None of this is to say that Aftermath is cancelled. Like I keep saying, I fully intend to finish Aftermath. But it is gonna take a while. I'll try to get a more rigorous schedule that'll have me writing more often, but I don't think I can make any timeline promises at the moment.