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When he’s eleven he falls in love with Theo Robinson, the boy living down the street. Theo’s a year older and he has a discolored patch of feathers around his right eye, and even though he can do all the tricks on his bike that Launchpad is too clumsy to do, he thinks that Launchpad having a family of airshow pilots is “pretty wicked.”
Launchpad falls in love in the way children do, instantly and wholly, and without reservation.
He and Theo are at the park one day in summer, racing along the concrete paths cutting through the grass. Launchpad’s crashed his bike half a dozen times by now, and sports an impressive black eye, but the sun is shining and they’re both smiling and he thinks it’s the perfect moment to tell Theo how he feels. In the perfect sunlight, he watches the smile slide off Theo’s face like it’s something diseased on his visage.
“That’s gross,” Theo bites out. He shoves Launchpad, who trips over his bike, knocking both it and himself to the ground. He falls backward in a tangle of limbs and handlebars, and scrapes his elbows and palms bloody. When he looks up, it’s to see Theo’s receding figure, disappearing quickly on his bike.
Later, Launchpad will be forced to explain to his mother why he’s returned home in such a state. Birdie will clean the gravel out of her son’s cuts and hold a cold compress to his swollen eye and, unbeknownst to him, her heart will break over a son who loves too much for his own good.
“You have a big heart, sweetie,” Birdie will say, combing her fingers through his hair. “Anyone who doesn’t see that isn’t worth your time.”
But Launchpad finds that falling in love with someone is easier than falling out of it.
It won’t take him long to understand the reason Theo pushed him, or why he’s stopped talking to Launchpad and started talking at him. He hears the names other kids call him in the halls, and knows that Theo is the source. And the betrayal hurts more than anything else has him hurt in all his eleven years, making him wonder what’s wrong about telling someone you love them. That’s the same year Ripcord starts teaching Launchpad how to box; how to properly wrap his hands so he doesn’t break a finger and to never go looking for a fight. Birdie takes him with her on nearly every flight, and he experiences the feeling of pure freedom that comes from seeing above the clouds for the first time. He spends long hours watching Darkwing Duck with Loopy and building model planes, not knowing what any of the parts are called but knowing exactly where they’re supposed to go.
And a part of Launchpad never stops loving Theo. It diminishes none of Theo’s cruelty, the disgust in his eyes. But Launchpad remembers the good too, the sunshine and the smiles and the pounding of his heart as they raced. But it grows quieter, more distant as middle school comes and goes, until it becomes little more than a flicker of memory, of feeling. But Launchpad never forgets, neither his love or Theo’s reaction to it. If it’s meant to be a lesson, it’s one he hasn’t learned yet.
Launchpad falls in love twice more before he graduates high school.
The first is Gary Goose, who’s as awkward as he is devastatingly smart and wears glasses that are almost too big for his face. Launchpad wants to take him to prom but their school doesn’t allow it, so they sneak in halfway through instead. Things end between them when Gary graduates early with a full ride to a prestigious college on the other side of the country. Launchpad asks if they can stay in touch. Gary says goodbye with a firm handshake.
The second is Sabrina Crowley, who he meets in shop class and rebuilds a beautiful Thunderbird with. She’s spunky and snorts when she laughs and can do things with a rusty carburetor you have to see to believe. She’s the first person who isn’t family that he takes up in his Joyrider, and after he crashes in the lake she says, “I think we should see other people.”
He tells them he loves them, too. Sabrina says it back in the same careless way she says,“the fan belt needs replacing.” Gary doesn’t say it at all. Launchpad starts to wonder if it’s the telling that drives them away. If it (he) becomes too much.
Launchpad becomes a contract pilot after graduation, and leaves his small town behind for the wide, wide world. He fixes planes as often as he crashes them and he flies them faster than anyone else, so he’s rarely out of work for long. And Launchpad finds that although the work is pretty standard, the accompanying adventure is anything but. Kidnapped by ninjas in Macaw, set upon by sky pirates over Plain Awful. He discovers a hidden underwater city of merfolk when he takes a week off to go fishing, and gets confused for a double agent in Brussels. Everywhere he goes, he meets new people and he falls in love all over again.
His plane gets hijacked by ninjas who’re after the decorative katana he’s meant to be delivering (the swords turn out to be cursed, but that’s a whole other story). He meets Ziyi when her clan kidnaps him, thinking he still has the swords that the gang has already stolen.
Ziyi is beautiful and deadly in ways that are unfamiliar to him, but enchanting in their own right. Her clan is a peacekeeping one that seeks to hide the cursed katana from those that would do other’s harm, and this rival ninja clan definitely fits the bill.
Launchpad offers to help get them back.
Ziyi, expression severe and sharp as she extols her clan’s long, bloody history, blinks. For a moment her features soften, and there is something delicate and wondering in her gaze.
“Are you certain?” she asks. “This is not your fight. You have a life, a job to get back to.”
She doesn’t question his fighting ability. She saw how well he held his own against her clan, outnumbered though he was.
Launchpad shrugs. “It’s not much of a life if I let bad guys get away with something that could hurt a lot of people.”
Ziyi smiles, the first of many she’ll grace him with. “An honorable sentiment, Mr. McQuack.”
“Call me Launchpad,” he replies warmly.
He stays with Ziyi and her clan for two months. Lives with them, trains with them, beats back other crime families who seek the katana with them. Ziyi is a born leader, and she amazes him at every turn. Launchpad always falls in love hard and fast, and she’s no exception—she smiles when he flirts with her, and when she beats him in their sparring sessions she grins so sharply that her canines catch the light. In between strategy meetings she’ll drag him into her room and they’ll continue their spar in a more intimate setting.
Their time together comes to an end when they reclaim the katana. Launchpad goes and lands himself in the hospital following the assault, though they came out victorious so he’s not too broken up about it. Ziyi comes to visit him, stealing in through the window in full kunoichi garb, and he knows this is the last he’ll see of her for a very long time.
“You’ve been an invaluable asset to my clan,” she murmurs, brushing his hair out of his eyes. She’s gentled since they first met, no less the leader but no longer as cold as she once was.
“Just what every guy wants to hear,” Launchpad says, and winces when he laughs. His brow is furrowed in pain when he looks back up at her, though only partly due to his injuries.
“I love you,” he says, because he wants her to know, and he has never been anything but honest.
Ziyi’s hand is warm against his cheek. “I am better for knowing you,” she says, and he knows that’s the best he’s going to get.
“If I’m ever in Macaw again,” he starts to say. He’s willing to stay, if she just asks.
“You know where to find me,” Ziyi finishes for him, and that’s that.
Launchpad finds he has poor luck when it comes to love.
He falls into it perhaps too easily, with people who care for him but not on the same level he cares for them. Over the next ten years he has a slew of significant others and a few more-than-friends-but-not-quite-theres. He meets them when they’re in dire straits more often than not, and he can’t help but help out in anyway he can, affections or not.
“I’m a better person for having known you,” they say, almost every time. But none of them stay, none of them ask him to stay, and Launchpad starts to wonder: why isn’t he getting better? What is he doing wrong to make them not want him around in the long term?
“You’re a bleeding heart, darling,” Feathers Galore tells him on one of their last nights together.
Launchpad is wearing a black three piece suit with no less than two dozen explosives, knives, and cameras tucked away inside it. They’re standing on a balcony overlooking a twinkling New Delhi, the night air clammy and almost stifling around them. Feathers has a flute of champagne hanging delicately from her fingers. Launchpad is nursing a club soda.
He’s going by Double-O-Duck right now, his S.H.U.S.H. assigned code name. Feathers is a F.O.W.L. double-agent. She will never get to learn his real name.
“Oh?” Launchpad replies, affecting a casual air. He leans against the balcony, resting one elbow on the stone. It’s a coalition of carefully calculated movements and gestures all meant to convey something to an agent’s target.
Feathers isn’t of the easily tricked sort. She saunters closer, all allure and deadly grace in a gilded wrapping, and the lights from the party going on inside the open doorway catch on the jewels hanging at her throat.
“You’re trying to make me one of the good guys,” she pouts, playing with his bow tie which is actually a hidden camera. Her accent is thick and sweet as honey.
“Not one of the good guys,” Launchpad corrects gently, taking her hand in his. “Just a good guy.”
Feathers rolls her eyes, and makes a show of fluttering a hand over her chest. “Oh, darling, you say some of the most romantic things. And what if I do become a ‘good guy’ as you say?”
Something like hope swoops low in Launchpad’s gut, against his better judgement. He sets his glass of club soda down on the stone balcony beside them, and wraps both of his hands around Feathers’.
“Well,” he says, “No more working for F.O.W.L. for one thing. Probably no more secret agent stuff at all. You could have a normal life, settle down someplace.”
Feathers snorts, taking a delicate sip of her champagne. “And what? Start a family?”
Launchpad’s inside grow a little cold. He loosens his grip around Feathers’ hand.
“If-if you want,” he says. His loss of composure frustrates him, and he clears his throat. “Some people do. In any case, you’re already on your way to being a good guy. Once this mission is over, you can say goodbye to F.O.W.L.”
Feathers slips her hand out of Launchpad’s grasp. She turns to look out over the view, her champagne glass perfectly poised, but her shoulders hunch forward in a rare show of vulnerability.
“And if I were to stay?” she asks quietly.
Launchpad blinks, barks a short laugh. “What, as a double agent?”
When Feathers’ expression doesn’t change, Launchpad’s becomes stricken. “Feathers—Feathers, they'll kill you if they find out. You know that. This was only a one-off mission—”
“Don’t worry about me, darling,” Feathers says. She looks back at him with a smile that kindles something warm in his chest, warring with the panic that’s taken root there.
“Feathers,” he tries again.
“Don’t worry about me,” she says again, more firmly. Her eyes are ablaze with a kind of righteousness, a determination the likes of which he has never seen from her before.
“Working with you these last few weeks has made me realize how many lives I wronged while under F.O.W.L.’s wing. I have the chance now to make up for the things I have done, to help dismantle F.O.W.L. from the inside. And that’s all thanks to you, Double-O-Duck.”
Feathers drains the last of her champagne, and Launchpad is struck by the entropy, the inevitability of it all. She’s going to leave, and he may see her later tonight, or tomorrow, or even ten months from now, but he’s losing her in every way that counts.
“I’m leaving S.H.U.S.H. once this mission is over,” Launchpad says in a rush.
Feathers looks genuinely surprised, maybe for the first time that he’s seen.
“Darling,” she says, soft and conciliatory, like she already knows what he’s going to say next.
“Come with me,” he says anyway. “We can go anywhere, do whatever we want to do. We—you can have a normal life.”
Feathers moves closer, no sauntering or slinking but a simple series of steps, the facade between them torn down. She lays her hand against his chest, tracing the lines of his suit.
“Oh, darling,” she murmurs. “That bleeding heart of yours is going to get you into trouble one of these days.”
Launchpad wraps his hand around Feathers’, stilling its movement. He finds his tongue glued to the roof of his mouth as she looks up at him with wide, imploring green eyes.
“You have helped me realize how badly I was wasting my life,” she says. “You are a good man, and your goodness infects all of those around you,” her smile twists wryly for a moment, but Launchpad can scarcely draw breath, much less laugh. She is quick to sober.
“You deserve a good life,” she says, “and I don’t think you could have that with me.’
I love you, Launchpad means to say, as if to refute her statement.
“I—” is all he manages, before ruthlessly silencing himself. It wouldn’t help anything, he knows that now. If anything, it might make things worse.
“I’ll miss you, Feathers,” he says instead, after choking down all his other words. It feels like a pittance, this half-truth. But her smile shames the stolen diamonds at her throat.
“I know, my friend,” Feathers says. She slips her hand out from under his, smooth as silk, and steps through the open doorway behind them, disappearing into the throng of partygoers inside.
Launchpad’s big, bleeding heart doesn’t shrink, or stop hemorrhaging. If anything it bleeds more and he loves more —he just learns to...stop saying anything about it.
He and Feathers part ways. He leaves Double-O-Duck behind, just like he said he would. And Launchpad learns to guard his bleeding heart with congenial smiles and a friendly demeanor as a fortress. He won’t be the one to bare his heart first ever again.
Then Bentina “Agent 22” Beakley plucks him from a pool of S.H.U.S.H. retirees to work as Scrooge McDuck’s chauffeur and bodyguard for when she can’t be around. Scrooge doesn’t know about the second part.
He doesn’t know what to expect from working for the Richest Duck in the World—his experience as a contract pilot and later as Double-O-Duck have lent credence to the fact that most, if not all, CEOs are corrupt in some way, if not outright evil. But Launchpad trusts Beakley’s judgement, and takes the job. He's twenty-eight years old when he starts working for Scrooge McDuck. And it almost surprises him, how easy it is to start caring about him. Scrooge, who is silent for the first month of his employ, not out of haughtiness or disdain, but from the sheer numbness he’s buried himself in for the last eight years.
He’s been driving Scrooge to the Money Bin at four a.m. every day for a month and returning him to the mansion at ten p.m. for reasons Launchpad cannot fathom, and doesn’t ask to be explained. He and Scrooge never speak during these encounters, not after Scrooge’s less than committal reaction to their first meeting, as organized by Beakley. After so much time spent in silence, Launchpad knows better than to attempt at conversation now.
It is during one of these early mornings that, for the first time, Scrooge looks up from the newspaper he’s always reading (and he means always. Scrooge reads the same paper every time, leaves it in the limo assumingly for that express purpose) and meets Launchpad’s gaze in the rear view mirror.
“Who the blazes are you?” are Scrooge McDuck’s first words to him.
“Uh,” Launchpad says. He blows past a stop sign and the limo is almost t-boned by a semi. “Launchpad McQuack, sir. Mrs. B hired me as your driver? She, uh, she actually introduced us when I started a month ago.”
“Huh,” Scrooge replies, scrutinizing Launchpad through narrowed eyes as if to detect the lie in his words through sight alone. “I thought Beakley was the one driving me.”
“No, uh, that was me. Sir.”
“Well that explains all the crashing,” Scrooge mutters. Louder, he says, “and enough of that ‘sir’ business.”
“Yes, si—yes, Mr. McDuck.”
Scrooge doesn’t speak again for the remainder of the drive to the Money Bin, burying his head in the newspaper he’s read at least two dozen times by now, and Launchpad thinks that's that. So ends his interaction with the richest duck in the world. But when Launchpad arrives at the Bin to pick him up later that night, Scrooge greets him for the first time.
“McQuack,” he mutters, not sparing Launchpad a glance as he steps into the backseat, and Launchpad nearly catches his fingers in the limo door.
After that, things don’t change right away, but they do change.
Until the end of the second month, Scrooge continues to have early mornings and late nights at the Money Bin. On week five he tells Launchpad that he’s been doing binventory, and on week six he elaborates on what that means.
“Binventory,” Scrooge mutters, like it’s a dirty word, just after four on a Wednesday morning. The scent of his nutmeg tea, which Beakley packs in a thermos he routinely scowls at, fills the limo.
“We fell behind for a bit, so it’s more intensive than usual, and requires that I be there the whole time,” Scrooge says, “I...lost a great deal of-of capital some years ago, and we’ve yet to earn it back. In the meantime, I need to count every cent we have.”
There’s pain in Scrooge’s voice, hidden just below the surface. Launchpad knows as well as anyone that Scrooge McDuck stopped adventuring “some years ago” for reasons unknown. He starts to wonder if it has something to do with his big, empty house on the lonely hill overlooking town, always apart from the rest of the world.
But then Scrooge starts to let him in. To trust him.
On the night that binventory is finally completed, Scrooge falls asleep on the way back to the mansion. Despite the long hours he’s been keeping, it’s the only time that Scrooge actually succumbs to his exhaustion. It’s a humbling act, especially by a man whose sheer quantity of enemies rivals the amount of gold in his bin. He’s still sleeping by the time Launchpad pulls up to the mansion driveway, and he clambers out of the limo and opens the back door.
When awake, Scrooge is almost larger than life, with his accent and sharp tone and sheer presence. He’s a little like Launchpad’s mother that way, so fierce that her size seems secondary. But while Birdie’s ferocity is fueled by passion, Scrooge’s is a desperate, forced sort, like someone struggling to stay afloat and convince the worried onlookers that he isn't drowning.
Scrooge looks small and old in the backseat of the limousine, his head lolling to the side and beak slightly open in sleep. And despite the worry niggling at the back of his mind, Launchpad is still touched by this show of trust. He may have girded his heart as best he could, but fondness for the miser has already taken root, and isn’t likely to go anywhere. At the very least, Launchpad is safe in the knowledge that he won’t ever say as much to Scrooge and subsequently bring it all to an end.
He wakes up Scrooge by gently shaking his shoulder. “Hey, Mr. McDee. This is your stop.”
Scrooge stiffens briefly, but just as quickly the tension bleeds out of him. He groans, leaning forward and rubbing his eyes.
‘What did you call me?” he asks, voice rough with sleep.
For a second Launchpad doesn’t understand what he means. But clarity rushes in, and Launchpad could kick himself.
“Sorry, Mr. McDuck,” he says quickly, stepping away from the door so Scrooge can climb out. “Slip of the tongue. Won’t happen again.”
Scrooge flaps a hand in the air, brow furrowed. He paws around for his cane with his free hand. “No, no, don’t bother,” he grumbles, and he still sounds half-asleep. He unearths his cane with a triumphant sound and heaves himself out of the limo. He stops beside the open door to crack his back.
“Come inside for a cuppa?" he says. "Knowing Beakley, she’s already got the kettle on.”
“Cup of what?”
Scrooge chuckles, looking lighter than Launchpad’s ever seen him. “Tea, Launchpad. Or coffee, though it’s a mite late for that.”
“Oh.” Launchpad closes the door of the limo, nearly tripping on the way. “Thanks, Mr—Mr. McDee, but…”
A sense of panic that Launchpad barely understands seizes in his chest like vise. It’s an overture of friendship, a miracle coming from Scrooge. Time was, Launchpad would’ve accepted it without second a thought. But New Delhi lingers on the forefront of his mind, as does Macaw, and Nautilus, and Sweden, all of his friends and almost-more-than’s, and the last thing Launchpad wants to do is add Scrooge or Beakley or sneaky little Webbigail to an ever growing list.
“...but it’s already pretty late. I should be getting home,” Launchpad says, after a minute pause.
Scrooge frowns, but not at him. Just in general, maybe. “Do you live far, Launchpad?”
Launchpad makes a so-so gesture with his hand. He lives closer to St. Canard than not, which says everything you need to know about the quality of the neighborhood. With his S.H.U.S.H. stipend, even in retirement, he could’ve afforded somewhere nicer. But Launchpad is loathe to touch that money and ends up donating most of it.
In any event, Scrooge bids him goodnight and Launchpad speeds off on his motorcycle (it’s not the Ratcatcher, but it’s also not not the Ratcatcher) and he thinks that’s that.
But then Beakley asks him to join her and Webby for tea and biscuits whenever he arrives at the mansion in the morning, and Scrooge keeps giving more than one-word responses on their drives and Launchpad’s fondness for them grows, as he knew it would. It’s a dangerous game, caring for people who need you for a skill, and Launchpad has always been terrible at playing. His only defense is not letting them know how much they get to him—that’s what always spelled doom for his past relationships. Now he’ll love them from afar, and maybe it won’t hurt as much when he eventually loses them.
Then, four months into his employ, Scrooge chucks all of Launchpad’s carefully laid plans in the garbage disposal by inviting him to move into the mansion.
“We’ve more than enough room,” Scrooge says one morning when Launchpad comes over for coffee, which has somehow become commonplace too (in spite of the name, neither of them actually drinks coffee. As always, it’s nutmeg tea for Scrooge and chocolate milk for Launchpad).
Scrooge doesn’t look at Launchpad when he makes the offer, affecting a faux casual tone that only comes out when he’s done something kind but doesn't want to draw attention to it.
“You can have your pick, of course,” Scrooge goes on, needlessly stirring his tea. “Except for the locked room on the third floor—we’ve got a yokai trapped in there, don’t ask. Or the two rooms to the left of the stairs. They both open into another dimension for some reason or other. And Webbigail thinks she saw a ghost in the East Wing, so it’s likely best to steer clear of there for now. But other than that, you can have whichever room you like.”
Launchpad should say no. Thank you but no, I’m trying really hard not to get attached because I have a bad habit of loving and losing people, and I’m trying to break that streak.
But as always, his bleeding heart gets the better of him. Loathe as he is to admit it, he’s been lonely in his tiny apartment. Seeing Scrooge and Beakley and Webby every morning is like a breath of fresh air after feeling like he’s been trapped in an airtight bunker overnight.
Scrooge is inviting him to stay, albeit indirectly. What Scrooge is offering, the possibility of friends, of family, within arms reach no one else has ever offered him before. Launchpad couldn’t say no, even if he knows he should.
But even as he concedes, he makes one last-ditch attempt at keeping some sort of barrier between them—one last attempt at self-preservation.
So Launchpad moves into the garage, and he thinks that’s the extent of it. Nothing else could possibly happen to make him sink further, to make him start to feel more dependent on the people he’s began to tentatively think of as family.
Of course, he never could’ve expected Scrooge’s long-lost family to come back into his life. Or that Scrooge even had a long-lost family.
Launchpad has been Scrooge’s driver for two years now, the longest he’s worked anywhere, as anything, ever. It’s become a part of him, something intrinsic and important because it’s something only he can do, and Launchpad is ever one to earn his keep. But with Huey, Dewey, and Louie reawakening Scrooge’s love of adventure, Launchpad goes from just being a pilot to being Scrooge McDuck’s Pilot too, desperate not to be left behind.
He’s gotten used to the everyday weirdness that follows Scrooge around; fending off the frequent attacks by the Beagle Boys and Glomgold and the occasional pixie infestation. But Scrooge doesn’t do anything by halves, least of all adventuring, and soon there are living mummies and mystical Druid realms and Greek gods, and Launchpad can feel himself falling by the wayside even before the whole mess with B.U.D.D.Y.
It’s a wake up call, the acrid sting of failure that comes from losing the race against a robot, the conversation with Fenton on the hood of the limo. Launchpad is in so deep that he fears being replaced, yet at the same time knows its inevitability. Who is he, compared to a brilliant scientist, or a robotic superhero, or Scrooge’s own flesh and blood family? How much longer can he keep this up?
Scrooge congratulates him on earning his driver’s license, and Launchpad thinks of the hours he spent practicing, going against his very nature by not crashing, all to impress him. Scrooge, a man who’s seen cities rise and fall and regularly converses with deities; like a driver's license would get him to stop and stare.
It feels like a tipping point when he wraps Scrooge in a bear hug, the most vulnerable he’s ever allowed himself to be after, you’re not going to replace me? The life he’s known for two years is changing, and he has to change with it or be left behind.
(Later, Launchpad will remember the surge of adrenaline, the exhilaration singing in his veins as he planted his Darkwing bobblehead on the dash where it belonged, when he forgot about the race and all notions of proving himself and just got dangerous)
( He’ll remember how right it felt, but not know what to do about it. Not yet)
Lying isn’t in Launchpad’s nature. He’s the antithesis of deception. Even as Double-O-Duck, a literal spy, his attempts at selling a cover story ended in fist fights more often than not. Instead, he specializes in half-truths, white lies, given that he has enough preparation.
I’m everybody’s friend, he says, but you’re my family, which he doesn’t.
He creates distance between them, has done so from the start; turning down invitations to tea, choosing the garage when they insisted he move in. He tries not to insert himself into their lives more than his job demands, and when they’re not adventuring he usually lets them be.
But at the same time, Launchpad struggles against the urge to cling to his family and never let go, this tentative home he’s found for himself. With a grandiose Scrooge and silently (and not so silently) judgemental Beakley, and Donald with a flaring temper fit to take down walls. The kids make it especially hard.
He’s always had a soft spot for kids. Whether it’s babysitting Loopy or buying golgappe for the street kids that follow him when he’s in New Delhi, who, secret agent or no, somehow invariably know how to find him whenever he’s back in the city. At the time, it made him think fondly of the future he envisioned for himself, of raising a kid of his own with a partner who would wait up for him when he gets home late.
Launchpad guards that dream still, tucked away save for long, somber nights when sleep is out of reach.
Now though, Launchpad (mostly) fakes the effects of ice fever to keep an eye on Louie, alone at the base of the Neverrest. He accepts the role of troop leader when the others quit so that Huey won’t miss out on the cookout he’s been looking forward to for weeks. He starts a game of sneak attack with Webby where she only gets points if she catches him by surprise (safe to say he’s been tackled from atop bookshelves, behind air vents, and on one memorable occasion, the trunk of the limo). He buys Dewey burgers and fries and they watch Darkwing Duck on slow days.
It’s too much and not enough all at once, as likely to change as it is to slip between his fingers.
“I love you” falls from his beak with ease for years, sometimes tripping on the words in his haste to get them out. Not since before Feathers has he known that same ease, when grief and fear choked him, stifling the words. He loses the people he loves, simple as that.
He’s too afraid to say it now. Though to be fair, they don’t say it either.
And then two words, more powerful than any magic, any curse or complicated machine:
Della Duck.
And the tentative balance Launchpad has known tips to one side, and begins to collapse.
He’s been demoted (unofficially) from Scrooge McDuck’s Driver and Pilot to just his driver when he meets Drake Mallard.
Launchpad goes to the signing not out of any hope of actually meeting Jim Starling (there’s always a next time!) but as a way to distract himself from the shifting status quo his life has become. He wakes up most mornings half expecting to be fired, or to open the door to the limo and find Della Duck inside, demanding to know what he thinks he’s doing, trying to replace her.
To say he feels a little lost would be an understatement.
But the day rapidly turns into a whirlwind and Drake, not Della or even Jim, ends up in the eye of the storm.
Launchpad faints on him (twice), breaks into his trailer, and attacks him. They play with Drake’s action figures and Drake trusts him enough to tell him the story of his difficult childhood, the role Darkwing had in his life.
Drake, who is brilliant and kind, and has a breathtaking right hook. Whose determination practically shines off of him, piercing through the anxious haze that’s been dogging Launchpad for weeks.
“I kept getting up,” Drake says, and Launchpad thinks it’s time he did the same.
He watches the rise and fall of Darkwing Duck in a single afternoon, and his world begins to right itself.
“So,” Drake says, “are you thinking of sticking around?”
They’re on a rooftop in St. Canard, a brisk breeze following on the tail of dusk. Cranes and evidence of construction still litter the city, though it’s nothing compared to the state Duckburg’s in, the only proof of the Moonlanders’ failed invasion two weeks prior.
The Thunderquack sits beside them, taking up most of the roof, and it gleams in the light of the fading sun, practically like new after Launchpad’s latest repairs. It’s why he’s meeting Drake now. Well, it’s one of the reasons.
Launchpad sticks his hands in the pockets of his jacket, for want of something to do with them. He tends to feel ungainly and awkward around Drake, too tall and hands too big, and he’s never sure what to do with his limbs.
“Around St. Canard?” Launchpad asks. He remembers a little distantly that he has to pick up José and Panchito from the airport in the morning.
Drake is in full Darkwing garb, but he lacks the confidence that usually accompanies it. He rubs the back of his neck, and very carefully doesn’t look at Launchpad.
“No,” Drake says. “Well, uh, actually yes, technically. Staying in St. Canard would be a part of that. But I was thinking more along the lines of-of me. Of sticking around with me, I mean!”
There are two high points of crimson in Drake’s cheeks only partly covered by his mask. He fiddles with the brim of his hat, as if to hide his face.
Launchpad knows he probably isn’t faring much better. He’s stiffened, shoulders dropping in surprise and his hands, aching to touch the blush on Drake’s cheeks, have curled into tight fists in his pockets.
With me, Launchpad’s brain can’t seem to stop repeating unhelpfully. With me.
“With you?” Launchpad’s traitorous beak says.
“Yeah,” Drake says, finally meeting Launchpad’s gaze with a hopeful expression that seizes the air in Launchpad’s lungs. “I can’t fly the Thunderquack half as well as you can, after all!”
The high, tight feeling in Launchpad’s chest turns chillingly to lead, and falls somewhere near the soles of his feet.
“Oh,” he manages. Tries not to sound as disappointed, as crushed, as he feels. Drake’s a superhero, he reasons. Of course he would want to keep someone of Launchpad’s skills around. It makes sense. It just doesn’t make the bitter taste at the back of his throat lessen any.
“So,” Launchpad says a little more steadily, “you...you need a sidekick?”
Drake’s expression, having grown more panicked the longer Launchpad’s silence stretched, breaks now in a relieved smile and he laughs. It’s a nice laugh, if tinged in an edge of hysteria.
“Sideki—no, definitely not. I need a sidekick about as much as I need Gizmoduck’s help.” He steps into the space between them, sending Launchpad’s heart ratcheting up into his throat. Drake holds out his hand, expression hopeful and wry. “Besides, you’re not exactly sidekick material, are you? Partner?”
“I love you,” Drake pulls back to say, his beak inches from Launchpad’s in the aftermath of their kiss.
It’s dark in Drake’s living room, but even the gloom can’t hide Launchpad’s expression of perfect shock. His hands, gripping fistfuls of the back of Drake’s shirt, tremble. His voice is just as uneven.
“You—what?” Launchpad stammers. His mind feels utterly blank.
Drake leans back a little bit more, taking in the incredulous look on Launchpad’s face and the sheen of tears in his eyes that catches the light from the kitchen.
Brow furrowing in concern, Drake’s hands move Launchpad’s arms to cup his cheeks. Launchpad won’t look at him, turning his head to the side and blinking hard in a futile attempt at dispelling all evidence of his tears.
“Launchpad,” Drake says softly. He nudges Launchpad’s face in the hopes of getting Launchpad to face him once more. “If it’s too much—”
“No!” Launchpad says at once, a little too loudly. He grips one of the hands Drake has on his cheek, stricken. “No,” he murmurs. He tugs Drake’s hand down, taking in the sight of Drake’s fingers clasped over his own. Launchpad swallows, and tears spring to his eyes in the wake of a relief so intense it nearly leaves him breathless.
“I-I love you too,” he whispers, heart hammering, like the words are bombs poised on his beak, like they’ll raze everything he holds dear the moment they make landfall.
But Drake’s smile is a beautiful, slow growing thing, and his laugh comes out as a brief, delighted huff.
“Good,” he rambles. “Great. Awesome. Other synonyms.”
With his free hand, Launchpad reaches up to cradle Drake’s cheek. Drake falls silent when Launchpad presses his thumb against the corner of his beak.
Launchpad’s throat clicks when he swallows again, and this time he’s the one to lean forward and initiate the kiss. Drake hums against his beak, reaching up to card his fingers through Launchpad’s hair. Launchpad’s hands move back to Drake’s waist.
Launchpad can’t remember a moment he’s felt happier, glowing like the sun’s shining from under his feathers. He pulls back enough to say, with growing confidence, “I love you, Drake. I’ve-I’ve loved you for a while, and I should’ve said something sooner—”
Drake drags him close once more, and all thought immediately flies from his head. Neither of them speaks for some time, but it’s enough. It’s more than enough.
It’s perfect.
“I’m home!” Launchpad calls. He’s juggling three laden grocery bags, so he pushes the front door closed with his foot.
From inside the kitchen, where he can hear the sink running, Drake replies, “Hey, honey!”
A red-haired blur rockets through the kitchen doors almost before Drake’s finished speaking, coalescing into a little girl just before she crashes into Launchpad's legs with enough force to nearly send him bowling over.
Gosalyn beams up at him through messy bangs. “Hey, Launchdad. Did you bring me something?”
Launchpad maneuvers the grocery bags in such a way that he frees up a hand to hug Gosalyn against his side. “Sure did, kiddo,” he replies, “all the vitamins and vegetables you could ever eat.”
“Ew,” Gosalyn says, with feeling.
“Honestly, Gos, he went to Duckburg not the moon,” Drake chides as he enters the living room. He’s smiling, even as he rolls his eyes.
“Maybe next time,” Launchpad says, watching Drake approach with a naked fondness undaunted by familiarity.
“Not on my watch,” Drake retorts, stopping in front of Launchpad. He doesn’t need to prompt Launchpad to lean down for a brief, chaste kiss that’s no less adoring for its brevity. Drake, standing on his toes to better reach Launchpad, falls back onto his heels. He takes two of the three grocery bags from Launchpad before he can argue, and starts to head back to the kitchen.
“How was game night?” Drake asks over his shoulder.
“It was fun,” Launchpad starts to say, albeit distractedly. When he tries to follow Drake, he finds himself dragging Gosalyn, who offers him a sunny smile even as she refuses to budge from his side.
Launchpad’s response is to simply scoop her into his arms, his lone grocery bag swinging. Gosalyn squeals in delight, but it soon turns into an affronted squawk when he tosses her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
“Charades got a little heated when Donald and Della couldn’t agree on what the Sleepless Dragon looked like,” Launchpad goes on like he’d never been interrupted, “and I’m pretty sure Gyro was using Lil’ Bulb to cheat at cards. But it was great! You and Gos oughta come next time. I think she’d give Mr. McDee a run for his money.”
“Where is our daughter, anyway?” Drake says with exaggerated concern as he sets the bags down on the kitchen counter. “It’s her turn to put the groceries away.”
“You know, I have no idea!” Launchpad replies, even as Gosalyn starts pounding on his back, snorting with laughter.
“I’m right here, you big losers! Put me down!”
“Well, I guess she isn’t here,” Drake says, “that means we can kiss and whisper sweet nothings to each other, huh, Launchpad?”
“I guess so, DW.”
“Gross!” Gosalyn cries, “Dads, no! Don’t you dare!”
Drake gasps, looking around Launchpad’s back. “There you are, young lady!”
“Why’re you hanging out back there, kiddo?” Launchpad asks, setting Gosalyn down on her feet.
She crosses her arms with an impressive scowl. “Haha,” she deadpans. “You two are the worst.”
“Would the worst dad get you your favorite ice cream?” Launchpad replies, unearthing the carton from one of the bags on the counter.
Gosalyn gasps, immediately dispelling with her annoyed facade. “Did I say worst? I meant best.”
“Hey,” Drake says, in mock affront. “Aren’t we forgetting someone?”
Gosalyn rolls her eyes, looking so much like Drake in that moment Launchpad has to fight the urge not to laugh. “ Fine . You’re both the best. Can I have my ice cream now?”
“Get a bowl and spoon first, so you’re not eating straight out of the—”
“Sure!” Launchpad replies, handing Gosalyn the entire cartoon.
She’s fished out a spoon from the silverware drawer almost before Drake can blink, and races back out into the living room with a “Thanks, Dad!” thrown over her shoulder.
“Why don’t you put a movie on, Gos?” Launchpad calls after her. “Nothing scary!”
She yells something unintelligible but affirmative, probably speaking around a ridiculously large spoonful of ice cream.
Drake snorts, shaking his head in disbelief. “You spoil her too much,” he says, too warmly for it to be a genuine recrimination.
Launchpad’s smile is tinged with embarrassment as he shrugs. “I’m not that bad.”
Drake reaches out to squeeze Launchpad’s arm. “Not bad at all,” he replies.
He moves to put the groceries away, but Launchpad has covered his hand with his own. Before Drake can say anything, Launchpad has gently tugged him into his arms, enveloping Drake in the sort of tight hug that always helps ground him.
Drake’s arms come up to wrap around Launchpad’s back, pressing gently. Launchpad gets these pangs every so often, a certain shakiness that comes and goes with little warning. He’s found that the best thing for them is to hold Drake close and just breathe.
After a long moment, Drake quietly asks, “Everything okay?”
From the living room, Gosalyn yells, “Hurry up, Carnage & Massacre III is just starting!”
Launchpad is only ever honest.
“Everything’s perfect,” he replies. And then, just because he can, he says, “I love you.”