i miss you a little all of the time

Summary: Goldie and Scrooge go to Oak Island.

Word count: 5416

Warnings: None

1973; Oak Island

They went a little while without talking again.

After their adventure in London, Scrooge stopped appearing in photos with so many different women. Instead, Goldie had the pleasure of seeing him and Bentina in photos several times, usually at very fancy events and frequently in London. Either he was doing a lot of missions with S.H.U.S.H. or they’d become good friends after working together.

Goldie threw another magazine in the garbage and rolled her eyes. Scrooge wasn’t going to start dating a thirty-year-old. She needed to stop letting herself get distracted and go back to what she really wanted to be doing: hunting for treasure!

After the discovery that she was being spied on and that S.H.U.S.H. had a surprisingly detailed file on her (which she stole, of course), Goldie slowly started to back away from the Blackjack Hotel franchise. She wasn’t like Scrooge, she didn’t want everyone to know her life and her business. In a fit of paranoia, Goldie even sold a majority of the properties she owned in the Yukon to locals or, if no one wanted it, to tourism companies. They were predicting a boom in Gold Rush tourism with the one hundred year anniversary coming up and Goldie had no reason to argue. She’d always keep her Blackjack, though. Always.

So without any business to do, her focus was entirely on treasure and adventure (and occasionally just traveling for fun, as someone her age was known to do). She’d been keeping an eye out for new information about sunken pirate ships or mysterious magical artifacts or anything that might need an adventurer to get their little hands on it. In February of 1973, Goldie picked up an Esquire magazine and excitedly read an article about something interesting:

Oak Island.

Off the coast of Nova Scotia, it was rumored to have millions of dollars worth of gold and treasure, though no one had ever found proof of that. Still, half a dozen men had died attempting to find and retrieve the treasure, so it was worth looking into.

Goldie thought about that particular part of Nova Scotia. Scrooge had business dealings in that area, if she remembered correctly. She didn’t have anything in that part of Canada except memories and ghosts.

She stared at the magazine article for a little bit and considered her options. She and Scrooge hadn’t seen much of each other since their tryst in London, but they weren’t on bad terms as far as she knew. It could be fun to go on an adventure with him again. She missed the thrill of working together and separately at the same time.

Goldie closed the magazine and looked at the cover, then looked at the telephone on the table next to her. She did have his home number memorized…but he was probably at work.

She sighed and picked up the phone. She had his work number memorized, too.

---

It’d been a little over a day since Scrooge got an unexpected call from Goldie O’Gilt.

She made him an offer he couldn’t refuse. Well, he could’ve refused it, but then he’d sit in his chair spending days and days thinking about the treasure he’d missed out on or the moments with Goldie he’d never get to have. So he couldn’t refuse it, not really. Spending time with her was a treasure in itself, though getting actual treasure was, of course, even better treasure.

Oak Island was certainly mysterious. He’d never heard of it before, but Goldie mentioned the magazine article and Scrooge immediately got himself a copy. Then he got some books on the subject. Then the phone numbers of some men who’d attempted to get the treasure themselves. He even made the effort of calling Ludwig to make sure the island wasn’t actually a front for their spy activities that needed to stay secret.

His conclusion was that the island was a true treasure trove - full of wonder and corpses and potentially millions of dollars worth of items and artifacts. He’d be a fool not to go, even if it was with Goldie.

(The woman he’d said he wanted to spend time with. But adventuring with her was always a risk. She was guaranteed to shove him into the water or leave him dangling from a vine or something equally annoying. But she was also guaranteed to make him smile and laugh and squeeze his hand when he grabbed hers. He was excited to see her again.)

The history and mystery around the island was bigger than the island itself. Explorers were focused on an area of the island called the Money Pit - a name that attracted Scrooge’s attention for obvious reasons - but from what he could tell, no one had found money in it yet.

In the late 1700’s, a group of boys discovered the pit and started digging into it, only to discover man-made structures that indicated someone had spent a lot of time and energy burying something as deep down as possible.

Dozens of men had dug into the Money Pit over the years, reaching well over one hundred feet down. Scrooge’s research was leaving him a bit concerned. Though he was smarter and tougher and sharper than the rest, he was also just one man (plus Goldie). If an entire company of men couldn’t find any real treasure - a few odd trinkets were found, but nothing of significant value - then how could he?

In the past ten years, though still no one found any treasure within the Money Pit, Scrooge found record of someone named Fred Nightjar finding ancient gold coins under a boulder in a different part of the island. The lucky man had found several large boulders in the shape of a cross, and the books Scrooge found referred to the path as Nightjar’s Cross.

A cross was too obvious. Too clean. And Nightjar found gold coins under one of the arms, not even in the center or at the top. But there were no coins under the other arm. So what could it mean?

He looked over all the research and all of his notes and came to a specific conclusion: Nightjar’s Cross was incomplete. There were more boulders - perhaps not all still in the spots they were originally - and whatever shape they really were would indicate the location of the real treasure.

Scrooge collected everything and shoved it all into a bag. Now was as good a time as any to prepare for his journey. He didn’t feel like waiting for Goldie, so he’d give her a call and tell her to meet him in Nova Scotia.

She didn’t pick up.

“Eh…Goldie, it’s Scrooge. I’ve decided to join ye on Oak Island, so…I’ll meet you at the Halifax Airport. As soon as ye can.”

Her trip would be a bit longer than his so Scrooge took a deep breath and decided to take his time. No need to rush. The last four men who rushed to Oak Island died in one of the pits and he was not about to meet the same fate.

He exited his office and tipped his hat at Duckworth who was dusting in the hall - Quackmore no longer worked upstairs since his age was catching up to him and his poor knees. Duckworth didn’t say anything, just nodded and quickly made his way towards the opposite direction of Scrooge’s bedroom.

Scrooge tilted his head at the unusual speed that Duckworth walked away from him and wondered what that was about.

As soon as he opened the door to his bedroom, he got his answer.

“...hello, Goldie.”

“Hey there, Scroogey. Ready to go?”

---

Near the end of their flight, Goldie and Scrooge had another terrible plane experience they could add to their never-ending list. This time, Scrooge’s plane flew headfirst into a bad storm, leaving them with frightening turbulence and holding onto one another for dear life.

The pilot suggested they land at the Saint John Airport instead of Halifax, to which Goldie immediately disagreed.

Scrooge glared at her, though his grip around her waist didn’t loosen at all. “Have ye lost your mind, O’Gilt?! Better to land and wait out the storm then die in a crash!”

Goldie shook her head aggressively, not wanting to visit a place that she hadn’t seen in over a century. “Stop being such a baby, Scrooge! It’s only a little storm!”

He frowned. “You’re holdin’ on to me like a lifeline, Goldie!” Scrooge looked over at his pilot. “Let’s land h-”

“No!” Goldie interrupted, squeezing him tighter. “Come on, Scrooge! Just…” She paused as some turbulence shook the two of them around for a moment. “...we’ll be fine. Just keep going.”

The strange calm in her voice made Scrooge all the more confused, but he ceded and ordered his pilot to keep going. They were so close to Halifax, he supposed there was no point in stopping now.

But still. He found Goldie’s reaction a bit confusing and tucked the information away for later use. Goldie didn’t want to land in Saint John. Bad memories with the town? Or maybe an ex or an old mark lived there, someone who swore they’d get their revenge on her someday.

They wouldn’t be the first.

---

The island was small and flat and swampy. Muddy. Lots of trees and rocks. The bridge normally taken to the island had recently collapsed. Flooding and erosion left a large ravine in the middle of the island.

All in all, Scrooge and Goldie weren’t having a great start to their journey. They had to rent a boat to get to Oak Island thanks to the bridge collapse (Goldie paid for it, only to stop Scrooge from whining), then they spent hours hiking through the trees only to find themselves against a body of water that wasn’t on any of their maps.

“What the hell are we supposed to do now?” Scrooge grumbled, packing his map away. “We could swim across, but we willnae be able to swim back with the treasure.”

Goldie hummed in thought and looked all around them. Though the water didn’t look treacherous, Scrooge was right, they wouldn’t be able to get any significant treasure back through. And they wouldn’t be able to go back to their boat and bring it around without wasting another five hours.

She happened to glance upwards and immediately grabbed Scrooge’s arm to get his attention. “Look up there!” she said, pointing to the north.

Scrooge followed her finger and was surprised to see a simple rope bridge connecting two trees on either side of the water. “I guess we’re not the only ones lookin’ for gold.”

Goldie was already starting to climb the tree when Scrooge realized what was happening. “Are you daft-?! Goldie! That could be a trap!”

She rolled her eyes and continued to climb. “Why would someone put a trap here? Just stop being paranoid and climb, sourdough!”

Scrooge grumbled and checked the branches he was climbing several times before putting his body weight on them, while Goldie was recklessly rushing ahead and in only a minute found herself at the beginning of the simple rope bridge.

She tugged and shook the bridge several times and at several angles before finally daring to put her weight on it.

Scrooge, who just happened to reach her level of the tree at that exact moment, held his breath in anticipation of seeing his partner fall. He squeezed his eyes shut, but a second passed without the sound of screaming and a splash, so he opened up one eye to see Goldie balancing carefully as she walked across.

He watched her for a bit, just enjoying the reminder of how skilled she was. Not that crossing a bridge was the most difficult challenge, but, well. He liked to watch her walk, he supposed.

After she made it across and shot him a flirty wink, Scrooge huffed and followed after, testing the rope despite watching Goldie cross just a moment earlier. He was tough, but not without caution.

“How’re we supposed to get any treasure back over that?” Scrooge grumbled as he dropped from the tree on the other side of the water.

Goldie shrugged. “I guess we’ll just…” She stopped suddenly and smirked, then elbowed Scrooge in the chest. “...cross that bridge when we come to it!”

He glared at her even as she giggled. “That’s entirely unhelpful.”

She rolled her eyes and grabbed a map out of her bag, marking where the little rope bridge was. “Alright, the Money Pit is about two miles that way,” Goldie said, pointing east. “Then we can figure out what all these other suckers have been doing wrong.”

As she started to walk away, Scrooge grabbed her wrist to stop her. “Wait, Goldie.”

“What?”

“I did some studyin’ before I agreed to come out here and I have a theory.”

Goldie stepped closer to him and tilted her head to the side cutely. “Alright, let’s hear it.”

He opened his own bag and pulled out some notes, knowing he’d have to show Goldie his evidence or she wouldn’t believe him. “The only real treasure found on this island was over here,” he said, pointing to a site not far from where they were currently. “The Money Pit has had some odd little items…but I believe they’re just a red herrin’.”

Goldie followed his finger on the map, instantly curious. “I’m listening.”

“Explorers have dug well over a hundred feet into that pit and found next to nothin’. But a few gold coins were found under a large boulder over…here,” he said, pointing again. “This and a few other boulders were named Nightjar’s Cross after the man who found ‘em first.”

“So you think the real treasure is somewhere within the cross?”

“Not quite.” Scrooge was feeling very smart at that moment, Goldie’s interest in his words making him all the more confident. “I dinnae think it’s a cross at all.”

Goldie poked his map and ran along the lines he’d made. “Looks like a cross to me.”

“I think it’s unfinished,” Scrooge said confidently. “Nightjar probably thought it’d be a cross since most of the explorers here were Christian, but I think he stopped lookin’ too soon.”

She nodded thoughtfully. “So you want us to look for more boulders to see if there’s gold coins or something under them, mark them on the map, and then see what shape it makes to determine where the real treasure is?”

Scrooge rolled up his map. “That about sums it up.”

Goldie hummed in thought for a moment, looking at the area around them. They’d be hunting pretty aimlessly for several hours, but, well…it wasn’t like she had anything else to do.

“Let’s go, then!”

---

Goldie was dirty and sweaty and tired. Her hair was a mess, her clothes looked terrible, there was mud and swamp gunk in her bottomless bag which meant she’d be accidentally sticking her hand in mud for months to come…maybe even years.

“I found two more spots,” she grumbled as she took in Scrooge’s pristine appearance. What the hell?! “Here…and here.” Goldie pointed to spots on the map as she spoke.

Scrooge circled her spots with a marker and then circled two more. “And I found two spots over here and…here.”

He held the map away from them so they could look at the dots they’d outlined, seeing if they made some sort of familiar shape. There were four in a straight line and three on each side - all parallel to each other. Clearly it was an intentional shape, but…

“I have no idea what I’m looking at here,” Goldie mumbled, not embarrassed by her ignorance since she assumed Scrooge was the same.

Instead, she was greeted by a confident smirk on his face that made her angry (and a little turned on.) “No? You’re sure?”

Goldie glared at him and then glared down at the map again. She was sure, but now she didn’t want to admit to it. If Scrooge could see something, then there was no reason she couldn’t find it, too!

He stayed silent while she looked for another minute, but then his patience timed out. “It’s a Tree of Life, Goldie.”

She blinked repeatedly at the image then up at Scrooge. “Huh?”

“It’s, uh…” Scrooge stumbled over his words for a second, not expecting to have to explain the concept. “From Judaism. Kabbalah?”

“Oh.” Goldie stood up straight and looked at the map again. “Alright. I…I’ll admit I don’t know much about that. So what does that do for us?”

“Well…each spot on the Tree of Life is a sephira, and each of them have a different meaning.” He pulled out a book from his backpack. “I thought we might find something like this, so I came prepared.”

Goldie grabbed the book out of his hand and quickly found the page that explained all the different sephira. “Alright, alright. So the treasure that was found before us was under…Wisdom, Crown, Understanding…Compassion, Foundation, Kingdom. Now we found…Strength, Glory, Love, and Victory. So what?”

Scrooge glared at her and then grabbed the book back. “Well…I’m not sure if we found Compassion. I think that spot is Knowledge,” Scrooge said, flipping to the next page. “Which I would’ve thought would have the treasure underneath.”

“What about Glory? That sounds like treasure.”

“Hmmm…” Scrooge rubbed a hand under his beak. “It’s worth a shot…but we cannae just go digging under each spot. There must be a way to figure it out.”

Goldie sighed and leaned harder on her shovel for a moment, then stood up straight again and tossed her shovel in the air so she could catch it again dramatically. “Well since you’re such an expert on Kabbalism, keep using that little brain of yours while I somehow manage to get even sweatier.”

He glanced up at her and smirked at her appearance. “I’ll dig with ye, Goldie. Hard work helps me think.”

“Of course it does.”

---

“I can’t do this anymore!”

Scrooge didn’t have a moment to say something snarky before Goldie’s shovel whizzed by his head and smacked into a tree behind him. “Tired already?”

“It’s been hours, you old windbag!” Goldie screeched, moving her arms around wildly. “The sun’s going down soon and all we’ve done is dig some giant holes with nothing inside but mud and worms!”

She continued to complain for a minute while Scrooge took a deep breath and considered what she was saying. There really wasn’t much point in continuing to dig after the sun went down, especially since they didn’t have any lights stronger than a flashlight in their bags. And unlike earlier, he was now just as dirty and sweaty as Goldie…and boy, did he stink.

“What do ye suggest, then?” he said finally, interrupting her tirade. “Ye want to camp for the night?”

Goldie stared at him with her arms crossed and didn’t move for a second before responding with a quick, “Yes.” She then pointed behind her. “But first I need some clean water.”

She huffed off towards the north and Scrooge grabbed their shovels and bags before following her. It’d be safer for them to camp near clean water instead of the swampy muck they’d been wading through for the past few hours.

He was happily surprised to see that in the two minute delay between her finding some clean water and him finding her, Goldie had stripped down to nothing and was washing both herself and her clothes. Without even realizing it, Scrooge stood there for a minute and watched her. Nothing about her body was unfamiliar to him, but there was something unique about seeing her in a more…vulnerable position. Her guard was up so often.

“Are you going to join me or not?” Goldie said suddenly, though she hadn’t turned around to look at him.

Scrooge tossed the tools and bags to the ground and started taking off his own clothes. He had no reason to not join her, after all. And though he hadn’t figured out a clue to find the treasure yet, he could get back to thinking in twenty minutes.

…maybe thirty.

---

---

Goldie woke up the next morning feeling groggy and achy and gross. She didn’t really want to wake up, but it wasn’t exactly better for her to keep laying on the ground under a shitty blanket. She rolled over and reached out for Scrooge so she could use him for warmth (or maybe he could help her wake up faster), but all her hand hit was the grass.

She opened her eyes and sat up, looking all around to find him. No Scrooge anywhere.

The irony wasn’t lost on her. Goldie wondered if the uncomfortable, hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach at that moment was what Scrooge felt every time she disappeared in the middle of the night.

(Would she stop doing it, though? Probably not. But it was interesting to be in his shoes for once. Did not feel great.)

She quickly got dressed and pulled back her hair - though she was able to wash the mud out of it, she hadn’t packed shampoo and it was still ratted and messy and ugh she was going to need a professional to help her with that mess when they got back to civilization. Maybe she’d go all out and give herself a spa day.

Goldie grabbed her bag and started walking towards the spots they hadn’t dug in yet. Though it was possible Scrooge dug up the treasure, grabbed it, and left without her…she didn’t think he would. He was Scrooge McDuck, after all, not Goldie O’Gilt.

After a few minutes of walking, she heard familiar grunting to the east and walked over to find Scrooge ten feet down a giant hole under the sephira he’d labeled ‘compassion.’

“How’s it going, cowboy?”

He grunted again. “Fine. Get enough beauty sleep?”

Goldie raised an eyebrow. “Sure. And how long have you been awake?”

“The sun came up an hour ago, so I’ve been up since then,” Scrooge grumbled. “I’m not goin’ to waste perfectly good sunlight for another hour of sleep!”

Goldie sat on the dirt above the giant hole Scrooge was digging and leaned back onto her hands. “So why are you checking this one?”

Scrooge grumbled incoherently.

She leaned forward and looked at the top of his head. “What was that?”

“I dinnae know! I just…augh!” Scrooge stabbed his shovel into the wall in front of him. “I cannae figure out the pattern! It should’ve been Glory or Knowledge!”

Goldie sighed and leaned back again. So they were still at square one. Well, maybe square three or four, since Scrooge had gotten them away from the deadly Money Pit. But back to where they were last night. She noticed Scrooge’s bag sitting next to her and grabbed the map they’d drawn on, staring at it as if she’d have some kind of revelation.

“The names of the sephira come from Hebrew, right?”

“Mhmm,” Scrooge grumbled, though she could hear he was back to digging.

“Isn’t Hebrew one of those languages that’s a little weird to translate?” Goldie commented absentmindedly. “Like…they could translate to a few similar things in English?”

Scrooge grumbled again in response.

“Alright, fine.” Goldie reached into her bottomless purse and pulled out a Hebrew-to-English guidebook - she had one of these for every language she was unfamiliar with and thought she might run into. Scrooge was digging under what they were calling ‘compassion’ but was actually called Tiferet - and the translation defined it as closer to ‘balance of justice’ than ‘compassion.’ That was way off.

Without saying anything to Scrooge, she started looking up all the Hebrew to see if anything stood out to her when she had a second definition.

Chesed, the sephira that they’d been calling ‘love’, was the only one that really caught her eye. It could refer to desire, but it could also refer to the mercy of God. The word also had associations with charity.

“Scrooge.”

“Hm?”

“I think we should try Love.”

He was silent for a minute and then suddenly stuck his head out of the hole, staring at her inquisitively. “Did ye, um…what did ye say?”

Goldie rolled her eyes and stood up, brushing dirt off her pants. “Love, sourdough! The translation is variable and I think it’s worth checking out.”

She was already walking towards it and Scrooge scrambled back up to follow her. It wasn’t like he had any better ideas, and the digging he’d done for the past hour was getting him nowhere.

---

The two ducks sat at the bottom of a giant hole - a small treasure chest sitting in between them. The lid was open, and inside the chest there were a lot of small coins. Different colors, shapes, and varieties, but unmistakably coins.

“Curse me kilts, this is barely a thousand pounds!”

“Well…” Goldie was leaning against the dirt wall, not even caring about her hair anymore. “This was probably a lot of money when they buried it here.”

Scrooge sighed deeply and picked up one of the coins. “I mean…the coins are old. Definitely worth more than their original value.”

“This treasure hunt has ended up more like an…archeological dig,” Goldie complained. “We can try to sell these, but mostly it’ll just be museums that want them.”

“That’s true.”

Goldie picked at dirt on her pants and hummed softly. “I have a fun idea.”

“Hm?” Scrooge asked, looking up at her.

“We should fill in all these holes as well as we can and make it look like no one ever found anything here,” she said with a smirk. “We could’ve come across these old coins anywhere, no need to ruin the treasure tourism of this lovely little island, right?”

Scrooge laughed and rolled his eyes. “I suppose there’s no reason not to clean up our mess, eh, O’Gilt?”

---

The old chest and all the coins were small enough to fit into Scrooge’s bag - though Goldie still suggested her own magical, bottomless bag because it’d be easier. They argued about it while they walked, until they once again reached the insecure bridge that brought them to their treasure in the first place.

Goldie climbed up first, Scrooge following after.

Unlike the first time, Goldie just started walking across without checking the stability of the bridge. Scrooge watched her nervously as the ropes shook quite a bit. “Will ye at least pretend to be careful, O’Gilt?! You’re givin’ me a heart attack!”

Goldie laughed, already halfway across. “Come on, sourdough, at your age you could have a heart attack no matter what I do.”

He glared and started onto the bridge with her, though their combined weight led to a noticeable dip in the ropes. But she was being annoying, so Scrooge didn’t really care at that particular moment.

Goldie, however, did. “Hey! Go back until I’m all the way across!”

“Oh what, now you’re worried about the bridge?” Scrooge said mockingly. “It’s fine, Goldie, just keep movin’!”

Goldie rushed to the other side and then looked back to see Scrooge about halfway across. She then looked down at the distance between the bridge and the swampy water below. It wouldn’t really hurt him to fall, just get him gross and wet and maybe bruise his butt. And his ego could definitely use a bruise at that moment! So she pulled a Swiss Army Knife out of her bag and started slicing away at the ropes.

“Wh…” Scrooge’s voice echoed. “What the hell are you doin’, O’Gilt?!”

“What’s it look like?”

The bridge started shaking more as he rushed towards her. “You devious she-devil, dinnae you dare-”

The rope bridge snapped as Goldie made one final slice, sticking out her tongue happily as she watched the nervous look on Scrooge’s face. That’s what he deserved for not listening to her! Plus it’d be pretty funny to see him fall.

However, as the bridge started to go down, Scrooge was close enough to the end that he quickly jumped into the air and used his kerchief to safely pin himself to a tree branch. Goldie, distracted by his efforts, took an absentminded step forward where the bridge was supposed to be, and suddenly found herself falling with it.

She screeched and reached out to grab the main rope, but the bridge was longer than it was tall, so a few seconds later she found herself completely soaked and muddy in the water below.

As she lifted her head out of the water and shook out her ears, all she could hear was Scrooge’s tenacious laughter. It was never-ending and she was pissed. She was humiliated. This was all Scrooge’s fault. Definitely absolutely through no fault of her own did this happen.

He’d already made it back down to the ground when she climbed out of the water near him.

“How’s your own medicine taste, Goldie?”

She wiped some mud off her face and glared at him. “Y’know what, Scroogey? I think you need a hug.”

Scrooge let out a small squeak before running away. Goldie took that as a challenge and started to chase him - the mud falling off of her as she ran.

She chased him for several miles - occasionally yelling that he was about to get the wettest hug of his life - but by the time they made it back to Scrooge’s little boat, Goldie was practically dry. Still dirty, still gross, but her hug attack wouldn’t be very effective.

Still, as he started to toss their things onto the boat, Goldie came up behind him and wrapped her arms all the way around - leaving muddy stains on his clothes. Scrooge groaned, but didn’t try to fight her off. What would be the point?

After that, Goldie blew him a kiss and dove into the clean water.

“You cannae wait ‘til we get back to civilization for that?” Scrooge called after her, feeling impatient.

She emerged from the water looking much cleaner and happier. “I had to at least get the mud out of my hair. You’ve probably forgotten what it’s like to have something on your head to clean, but it’s a lot of work, sourdough.”

Scrooge rolled his eyes, but was entranced briefly by a shimmering coming from the tip of Goldie’s head. He stepped closer to her and touched her hair - not bothering to try and run his fingers through all the knots.

Goldie raised an inquisitive eyebrow at him, though she also blushed at the unexpected intimate contact. “What’s wrong?”

He chuckled. “You’ve got some silver hair comin’ in, Goldie.”

“Wait, what?!” Goldie shouted, shoving him away. She grabbed a compact mirror out of her bag and looked at herself, feeling even more embarrassed and annoyed than she was before. “Argh! You probably think this is hilarious, don’t you?”

Scrooge shrugged. He didn’t want to tell her that Goldie with silver hair reminded him of the adventure they went on twenty years earlier when her older self came out of a time portal to save them. Through all their fights and break-ups and awkwardness, he could never forget that moment. The moment that told him that Goldie was going to be a part of his life for a long time still. And that they were going to be alive for quite a while. As of 1973, she showed no interest in letting herself go gray, so he had a feeling it’d be a few more decades, at least.

“I think you look nice in any color, dear,” he finally said as he started to climb into the boat. “But yes, yes I do.”

Goldie blushed the tiniest bit at his comment - annoyed, but…flattered. And she was annoyed at herself for being flattered. She followed him into the boat and squeezed her hair out over the water, trying to salvage as much of it as possible. She was not excited for the haircut she’d be needing soon.

One of her silver hairs found its way in front of her eyes and Goldie grabbed it between two fingers as Scrooge started the motor that would take them back to Nova Scotia. She thought about Scrooge’s compliment and thought about her silver-haired future self they’d met in Cambodia.

She yanked the silver hair off her head and tossed it into the water.

REAL HISTORY FACTS:
- Esquire magazine did actually publish an article about Oak Island in 1973
- Literally everything I wrote here about Oak Island is true I did so much research on this stupid island which definitely irl has no treasure on it
- "Fred Nightjar" is a reference to Fred Nolan, an Oak Island treasure hunter. "Nolan's Cross" is a real thing you can google it
- Yeah four men died looking for treasure on Oak Island and it's very sad. Like the first two guys suffocated and the second two guys were trying to rescue the first two guys and then also suffocated
- In 1971, the bridge connecting Oak Island to land was destroyed! New bridge wasn't ready until '75
- There has never been a large ravine in the middle of the island. I had to make it work because the DuckTales writers decided to have Scrooge and Goldie's Oak Island adventure involve something that is literally impossible to happen on the actual island but it's FINE
- Scrooge's theory is my own theory based on a couple different theories I read online. Really I think there's no treasure on Oak Island and if there IS treasure somewhere, it's on a completely different island while the clues were left on Oak Island as a trick but I DIGRESS
- Everything written about the Kabbalah Tree of Life is real and heavily researched because there are so many different versions of the exact same thing lol

DUCK FRANCHISE REFERENCES:
- (Just my headcanon) Vaguely referenced earlier in this fic and maybe other fics of mine, Goldie was born and raised in St John which is not far from Oak Island