#au meta.

[toxikku]

So with the release of Friendship Hates Magic, have you thought more into the fate of Gladstone in your Switched!AU?

Yeah, actually! :0

Can 100% confirm that he got shadow-realm-ed in Season 1, and Webby, Violet and Lena wound up saving him.

Not much to say about Webby; her role in the story doesn’t change all that much. She’s constantly been going to the library to try find a way to save Gladdy, with Lena tagging alone who’s rather pessimistic about it. Not to mention she’s a little uneasy about that stuff, being, y’know - a shadow and all.

Then they meet Violet. Lena at first obviously expresses a lot of distrust towards Violet like in the OG, because her tactics remind her a little too much of what Gladstone was trying to do before he saved them (and obviously, she’s still kind of not okay over any of that). Also, it involves Scrooge’s amulet so? Pretty much every right to distrust her, but as Webby sort of manages to sway her otherwise.

Then there’s Gladdy; poor, poor Gladdy. Even to begin with, he’s in a rough spot because he’s NEVER been in the shadow realm before. Kind of terrifying, don’t you think? And watching your friends/fam live life without you is something else entirely. I think I’ve decided he’s Webby’s shadow (I had a hard time deciding between her and Lena because different emotional circumstances - also shadows stick together but can a shadow have a shadow? Maybe that logic wouldn’t apply here. Idk aaaa).

He’s all for being rescued, but like Lena, there is a hint of suspicion there, which gradually builds up and he’s like: “ummm yknow Lena’s right pls listen to her”. As for the shadow manifestations, I think they’re Gladdy on account of wanting to keep the kids out of danger (if him standing up for them in various parts of Season 1 has anything to go off). Thanks to Webby and co. and the friendship bracelet, they bring him back.

[toxikku]

Duckpprentice idea dump; 1:

Thhhiiis is mostly world building stuff, so apologies for Louie not being so frequent in it aaaa.

Jim being in the room when Launchpad suggests to Drake that he could do this for real; to their knowledge, Darkwing Duck is a fictional character still.

Jim sweating profusely while hearing this because 1. Being Darkwing is HIS JOB. IT IS LITERALLY HIS JOB. THIS DRAKE GUY TAKING HIS JO-- 2. He can’t say ANYTHING about it without revealing he’s actually DW.

Drake asking for Jim’s blessing and no matter how hard he tries, Jim can’t worm his way out of it without giving anything away.

Drake Mallard is a Darkwing Duck now. Darnnit.

Jim and Drake meeting on the job in their respective Darkwing outfits; Drake is touched because he thinks he inspired a fan and Jim is absolutely LIVID. HE IS DARKWING DUCK, FOOL!

This is crack more than anything but if more people kept getting inspired to dress up and pose as DW, it would frustrate him so much.

“WHAT? I’M AN OUTFIT NOW?” “I mean your show did have merchandise, Dad - “ “Nooot now, Gosalyn.”

Gizmoduck appeared near mid season 1; since his appearance, crime waves went down and he was handling a lot by himself.

This massively affected Jim’s payroll from SHUSH, and over the course of the seasons, it affected his and Gosalyn’s finance budget. Drake becoming a hero did little to help this problem as there were more heroes on the street (also Fenton had help, yay).

Jim not making a lot of money; normally, it wouldn’t concern him because he finds ways around it, but he has Gosalyn to think about. He’s trying to find a part-time job on top of everything else. And when things get dire, he can’t help but wonder if Gosalyn would be better off at the orphanage than with him because he feels he can’t care for her.

In which Louie Duck looks him dead in the eye like: “are you kidding me. are you actually kidding me. do you know how much you mean to her? how much she means to you?” + he spent so long growing up without a mom; he couldn’t imagine growing up with with a dad then suddenly losing them. Doesn’t WANT to imagine, if you think about Dadnald.

This eventually leads to a compromise with the other heroes; considering they all work the main neighbourhood, their solution is to band together so everyone gets paid equally and they still save the day. It’s not as much, but it’s more than they were initially (at least with Jim). This leads to the creation of... wait for it... waaaaaaaait for it...

THE JUSTICE DUCKS?

SUPER COOL HERO TEAM THAT SAVES DUCKBURG!

Leads to those 10/10 interactions with Scrooge, probs. Gotta’ love those.

Two Darkwings being in one hero group is seriously confusing.

“Darkwing?” “Yes?/Yes? ... oh./HEY!”

“What if we call you Darkwing A and Darkwing B?” “... that’s stupid. ANYWAY I’M A”

Drake taking on a new name to avoid confusion, possibly? He certainly wouldn’t take the OG title from Jim.

Jim feeling like Drake is stealing his bit, as an ominous mirror to The Duck Knight Returns. These two are constantly bickering, although that’s more from Jim’s side if anything. They (or rather Jim) need to figure themselves out.

Conflict with Gizmoduck; Fenton does eventually confront Jim about his behaviour and bitterness towards him as he can’t for the life in him understand it, and they’re meant to be a team. They can’t be a team with all this squabbling.

Jim snapping and mentioning how Gizmoduck had been sapping all the herowork (and Drake too but he’s not gonna say that rn), and his income to take care of his daughter. He wouldnt even be in this mess if it weren’t for that.

Fenton being like: “...oh, snap, that makes sense. Heck. HECK.”

Fenton trying to fix it by seeing if Scrooge can do anything about it.

[toxikku]

So I was talking to a friend of mine and we were talking about the Duckpprentice AU, specifically how the Duck Knight Returns goes since Jim doesn’t... you know, turn evil bc he has Gosalyn with him. And so far we’ve got -

Negaduck (from le Negaverse; man even OG Jim is a possibility) infiltrating the dimension and impersonating Jim for the episode. The real Jim is off somewhere else (or just out of the way), unbeknownst to the kids, giving Negs creative freedom.

Gos and Louie hang around him unknowing to this, but get extremely suspicious - this guy’s also just... trying to mess up Jim’s life as well as Drake’s (because loooool, who’s this Darkwing wannabe? You wanna’ be Darkwing? Get everything that comes with it, buddy).

Drake, with the help of the kids, manages to save Launchpad and Negaduck disappears in the explosion as the episode happens.

Jim just happens to walk in after everybody thought he straight up went crazy and died, like ‘s’up, heard you were making a DW movie’.

Everyone is just so confused? How is he here and acting like everything’s okay and that he didn’t just try to kill everyone? Not to mention everything is so jarring because their hero turned against them. Although there’s relief, there’s mostly suspicion - and Jim of course hasn’t the foggiest what they’re accusing him of.

From then on, everyone is wary of him and doesn’t really trust him because he’d been acting like that all day; this could be just a lie to cover up what he did (even if he did have an alibi. Is that even to be trusted?).

Additionally, Negaduck just randomly inserting himself into Jim’s life to impersonate him when he’s not able to back himself up, making everyone distrust him more and more.

This ultimately just makes a rift between him and the people he cares about which makes everything vulnerable as heck. : ‘D

This is what’s down so far, anyway; aaa. I do love it.