You're Red With Denial.
Entry 01.11.26
Launchpad finally gets his soulmate thread, which leads to Webby and Huey fighting over why it’s going up into the sky. (G)
Read on AO3 // Masterpost
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Huey Duck liked to think of himself as a sponge for knowledge. He soaks up everything he knows and spits it out with his own ideas. The more he reads, the more he’ll have to say.
So, he sits in the TV room to actively read through his Junior Woodchuck Guidebook. Despite having read it ten times, there was always something to be discovered, and there was always something for him to annotate. The best way to spend an afternoon; nothing else matters but him and books.
“Uh, hey, Huey?” Launchpad says, entering the young duckling’s space on the couch.
Huey’s eye twitched as his hand slipped, and his pen traveled off the words.
Great. Interruptions.
Ugh, fine. He can handle Launchpad’s presence while reading. Who knows, maybe he’ll be a good attempt to multi-task.
Huey acknowledged him while barely looking up from his book. He desperately tried to ignore the smudge on his page. “Hey, Launchpad.”
The pilot was fiddling with his hands. Huey barely caught it out of the corner of his eye.
Weird. Huey made note of it before attempting to return to reading.
However, Launchpad seemed to have the mind to start a conversation instead. “Soooo, soulmate threads, huh? Pretty interesting, right?”
Like a firework, Huey burst up from his seat. The duckling tossed his Junior Woodchuck Guidebook onto his head before bouncing on the couch in excitement and forgot his irritation towards him.
“They’re incredible! I mean, imagine a thread that leads you to your predetermined person. It just makes everything so easy! But, then they’re full of such mystery. There’s so many types of scientists going into it: psychologists, physicists, metaphysicists, astro—”
“That’s cool! But, what can you tell me about them?”
Huey pauses, turning his head in deep thought.
He thinks carefully through his theories, definitions, and every fact and fiction he knows. Content with his formulation, he pulls out his Junior Woodchuck Guidebook as a safety net. He gives Launchpad a huge smile before beginning his spiel.
“Soulmate threads… are a tricky thing. It’s actually kind of baffling. They never seemed to have a pattern on when and where they would show up. And, there seems to be only two theories scientists can agree on. One appearing means you’ll meet yours soon; however, it also means they are the furthest they’ll ever be.”
Huey pauses in the middle of his infodump, remembering he had an audience, and that audiences tend to get bored after a while. Especially when they have Launchpad’s attention span.
But, he’s surprised to find the pilot watching Huey with child-like wonder and curiosity clear in his open bill. It gave him the courage to keep going. Being enamored with the concept helps, and Launchpad’s general interest in something he loves helps.
“I’d do anything to study at least one! They’re so hard to come by. Not even Scrooge has one! And, his soulmate is obviously going to be Goldie.”
“You don’t have one?”
“Well, I… I’m a pretty young duck. If my soulmate is going to show up, it’ll be—”
“Soulmate threads?!” An excitable shout rang through the room.
Launchpad and Huey swiveled their heads to find Webby bouncing on her feet.
Huey found Webby Vanderquack to be akin to a fountain when it came to knowledge. Unlike his caution in sharing wisdom, the other young scholar of the household seemed to spew whatever she knew unprompted and without fear. Sometimes, to Huey’s detriment, it was more imaginative speculation than hard fact.
Harsh, but come on, her theories aren’t always based in science– at least, his definition of it.
Where he found reliance in natural science: the scientists, those who found the objective truth, Webby looked to the social aspect: the storytellers, the ones who live it.
She ran in, landing in the spot next to Huey, and she began to gush without wasting another second.
“Oh, I love this topic! Did you know that the red string originated in China, but so many different cultures have their own version! The Greeks believed that Zeus split the original humans into two! We used to be these two headed, four armed and four legged things! Isn’t that horrifying!”
In the middle of her question, Huey tried to regain his thoughts.
Launchpad blinked, “Uh, yes?”
“I know right! And, now we're left to search for our other half. Anyway, lots of cross-cultural studies on the appearance of the ties led to theories that they appear depending on a person’s background! None will be the same, but some groups will have more similarities than others! It’s strange, isn’t it? Since the red string has become so popularized in America, most studies on soulmate ties in Americans come out to be the red string— despite being, you know, a Chinese symbol.”
“Actually, Webby, soulmate ties are invisible to the naked eye. What people are actually seeing is electromagnetic frequencies.”
Launchpad spoke up, “You know, I—” Only to be interrupted by Webby.
“Then hoooooow do you explain the stories? Red strings? Birthmarks? Wings?”
“The brain is just filling in the gaps. Real soulmate ties are invisible; you just feel the magnetism.”
“That sounds more made up than mine!”
“Well, actually—” Huey didn’t think twice before interrupting Launchpad again.
“Well, excuse me, but it’s pure science! Besides, you don’t have a soulmate tie, what could you know?”
“Uh, neither do you, Huey. And, I’ve read all the stories and myths!”
“Stories won’t cut it. Only hard evidence!”
“Hm, maybe we find someone with a tie, then we can ask them.” Webby replied, losing her argumentative tone.
Huey gasped, now excited, “Or study them!”
“I can help with that!” Launchpad blurted out, trying to enter the argument.
Huey looked at him.
He seemed nervous. His hands were fiddling around, and his smile was more mousey, forgiving. Odd. Really weird. Wait– Did he just say—
“You have a soulmate thread?!” Webby exclaimed before Huey had the chance to finish his thought.
She was always able to get the jump before him. Huey frowned, but quickly relaxed his expression.
“Is… that's why you were asking me about them?”
“Well, yeah! I thought you seemed to know a lot about other things, so maybe you’d know something. And turns out, I was right!”
Huey felt his ego grow ten times at the sound of Launchpad’s confidence in him. The suddenness at the confession made Huey lose his need to be right and adjusted into curiosity.
Simultaneously, he watched as Webby never lost her unsettled wonder. The girl was practically vibrating with excitement! Both ducklings were excitable in their individual ways, but asked the same questions.
They traded their speaking turns as if they were never fighting 2 minutes ago.
“Wait, but when did this happen?”
“How did you find out?”
“What does it look like?”
Launchpad looked excited, gaining energy from the two high-strung ducklings. “It’s not that big of a story. But, I was heading back to the mansion with Mr. McD after picking him up from the Money Bin when this… feeling hit it. Like being hit with lightning!”
Huey looked at Webby with a smug look, since he was proven right, but he dropped it when he noticed she wasn’t paying him any mind.
Instead, she was staring at Launchpad like he was painting a masterpiece, or performing the most glorious music known to man. Her eyes were bright, shining…
No, glowing with wonder.
It nearly took Huey out of it as an odd feeling sunk into his stomach. It reminded him of guilt, and he wondered why he ever tried to downplay any of her ideas. All she wanted was to be a scholar like him, and he was: dismissing anything she said. In actuality, she was a better scientist than him: an open minded and humble servant to knowledge.
Feeling overwhelmed, Huey looked back at Launchpad, who never stopped telling his tale. Suddenly, Huey felt less than excited to learn about his experience with gaining a soulmate mark. Still, he listened.
“I was in the middle of an intersection when I saw it, a red thread tied around my finger.”
He showed his pinky finger as if the ducklings would be able to see it. And yet, Webby ran up to him, prodding and messing with his hand. Oddly, Huey felt a little better seeing her excitement at the confirmation of her theory.
But then, she whipped her head around to face him, still holding Launchpad’s hand up in the air, and the Junior Woodchuck’s soul nearly jumped out of his body.
“Huey!” She continued to smile, “You gotta see this!”
Without another word, she tugged Huey’s hand, which immediately felt numb. Like everything Webby, the moment was fast paced and over in a second, but Huey felt the warmth of her hand linger on his.
Huh. That was… Weird.
He brushed it off as quickly as he could, remembering Launchpad’s hand. The pilot continued to hold it out for the ducklings while telling his story, not minding the observations the two will-be scientists were making.
His hands— still warm— met the pilot’s pinky.
Despite the lack of physical evidence, Huey felt it.
Indescribable, but his brain couldn’t help trying to fill in the gaps. An unknown feeling cannot escape Huey’s need for security.
It was a pull. A sudden force needing to branch out, but containing itself to a small presence— residing in only Launchpad’s finger. Huey felt a light pressure as his hand prodded the strange occurrence, like two magnets repelling each other. A fuzzy, smooth pressure that kept them apart from Launchpad.
However, with enough force, Huey’s finger booped Launchpad’s before the gravity repelled them again.
It was like magnetism.
He stares in wonder before Webby’s voice breaks his trance.
“You were right, Huey.” She smiles before turning to Launchpad, “That’s just… incredible!”
But, Huey’s still stuck on her comment, quietly forgetting about the discovery before him. He watches the scene again in morbid curiosity, refusing to move again. Otherwise, his brain might implode from another word spoken to him.
“… So I hope they’re on a plane or this’ll get really weird.”
Wait. What?
Huey snapped himself out of it— ignoring how his line of sight was on Webby— and turned to Launchpad. The two were staring right back at him, and Huey shut his bill at once.
He said that aloud. Dread and embarrassment slapped him in the face, pulling towards him like… magnets.
He smiled sheepishly.
Oh, phooey, what has gotten into him?
Launchpad, ever the saintly pilot, just smiled and repeated the last part of the story. “Well, I followed the thread’s trail and it led upward! I crashed after that, but I was thinking ‘I hope they’re on a plane or this’ll be weird.’ Not that I’m, you know, against my soulmate being weird. I’d be fine if they were alien. I’ve dated a mermaid, were-duck, talking cloud of energy, a clone of—”
“Sorry, it is going up or was going up?”
The distinction didn’t look too important to Launchpad or Webby.
In fact, Huey probably should’ve been more interested in the amount of mythical partners Launchpad had before. But, something about Launchpad having a partner in space didn’t sit right with him.
Did he have proof? No. Webby might laugh at that, and Huey wasn’t wanting to hear an “I told you so! You don’t need written proof for everything!” from the object of his conflicted… emotions?
Whatever.
This was the perfect distraction.
Launchpad blinked before his eyes trailed from his hand to the wall to the ceiling. Huey craned his head, following along.
The pilot snapped his attention back to the ducklings with a large smile. “Yep! Still going!”
Huey’s eyes widened. There’s no possible way…
He’s definitely rambling at this point. If he was a computer, he would be rebooting, glitching, and a bright blue screen would be present on his face. Because…
“A soulmate in space is just absurd! How and why would the universe pick two people so far away?”
Webby rolled her eyes, “Isn’t gravity a constant? Massive celestial bodies gravitate towards each other all the time, how is this example different?”
“Because soulmates are a micro-level of this. This is just… too much of a stretch. We’re examples, 1:1 ratios, of this gravitational occurrence. The distance Launchpad is proposing is extreme, mind-bendingly extreme.”
“Most soulmate stories are.”
“They are fiction, meant to romanticize scientific occurrence, Webby. You cannot possibly believe this nonsense.”
But then, she glares at him. It’s a dark stare. Like with all things Webby, Huey is terrified.
She speaks slowly, with every ounce of intentful fury she can muster. “You’re just afraid you’ll be wrong.”
Huey glares back after staring at her for a moment with surprise. He scowls, grinding his bill. “I am not.”
“Prove it.”
“I will.”
With not a second to waste, he grabs Launchpad’s hand— ignoring the pressure repelling him— and marches out of the room to the outside.
He releases Launchpad, which sends the pilot into a dizzy state. The pilot just looks up. His eyes trail to the moon.
Huey feels his stomach drop.
Dread. Dread. Dread.
If he could blue-screen again, he would.
If he had circuits, they would be fried.
“They’re up there.” Launchpad smiles. “Hey, Soulmate!”
He shouts, startling Huey from his spiral.
“It’s me, Launchpad! I hope you can hear me!”
And, cue Launchpad shouting into the sky for a solid minute. Huey knows, he’s certain, that Launchpad’s soulmate will not hear him.
Huey ghosts his fingers over his wrist. Maybe… maybe they can feel it? His eyebrows furrow as he fights the scoff itching in his throat. This is absurd.
But, his hand feels suddenly warm. Without looking up, he knows Webby is staring at him. He looks up anyway, finding Webby giving him a forgiving smile.
“Huey.” She says firmly. “Look at him.”
He does. And, Launchpad’s over the moon: metaphorically and kinda literally. He’s so sweet and hopeful, and…
Fine, Huey’s beginning to feel bad about trying to shatter his happiness for the sake of knowledge. There, Webby, are you happy?
“No.”
Huey looks back at her, and he thinks he should just tape his bill shut whenever she’s around.
But, she sighs.
“Why can’t you let things be?”
Because you’re right.
I’m scared. I’m terrified of the unknown.
And, I’m scared that maybe Launchpad’s soulmate isn’t an alien. Maybe they’ll be someone I’ve been wanting to find all my life instead.
Because who else would be up there?
But, then we’ll go on a pointless quest— like you and Dewey did— and then, I’ll be wrong. Launchpad will have his weirdly, cosmic space soulmate, and I’ll have nothing all over again except science and tall-tales.
But, Webby’s hand is warm on his wrist, and she’s looking at him as though she’s figured it out with a single look. Huey doesn’t discount the idea this time.
Nothing is said: just two ducklings listening to the exuberant ramblings of an enamored pilot.
Quietly, Huey searches for his guidebook. He flips to the soulmark page. And, like the sponge he is, he pushes Webby’s hand away so he can write. He sighs, letting go of his bated breath, before throwing the book onto his head again.
“Because everything needs reasoning.”
He doesn’t need to look at her to know he’s wrong on this one.
