betterthanaplan | Still Haven, Maine, Friday Fandom time

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Still Haven, Maine, Friday Fandom time

So. Today had sucked. Even more than most days in this town did. Duke had a stab wound in his leg from a pen, and would likely be having nightmares about being possessed by a homicidal 20-something for the foreseeable future. Octavia had a gunshot wound in her arm, and had been locked, however briefly, in a vault. Lucifer had had to watch both of them be retraumatized, unknowing if he'd ever get either of them back whole.

But that was over now, at least. Time to reconnect, reassess, and figure out where to go from here.

[for those in the narrative, and likely slowplay. MMMMM, AFTERMATH]

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Lexie flopped back against the bar. Wade let out a startled shout.

Jennifer, coming in from upstairs, where she'd been making sure the apartment was ready for its new-old resident, let out a shriek and hurried forward.

"Octavia, oh my god!" She hurried over, eyeing the sling and the blood now on Lexie's face, and Duke and Lucifer outside the door, Duke held off the ground and writhing like a naughty kitten. "What's going on?! Let her go!"

"A man died because he stole me and shot you!" Duke yelled back.

Even as, yes, he writhed like a kitten.

(Garland Wuornos doing something not dissimilar was possibly where Gloria had gotten her nickname for Duke from.)

There was shouting happening around Octavia. It didn't really register.

She was already going for another punch, because someone had to pay. For everything.

"Woah woah woah!" Wade darted around the bar to pull her off, but Jennifer waved him away, noting the blood on Octavia's shirt.

Was Octavia troubled? Jennifer had no idea. She also didn't know if dried blood counted or how much it would take to set Wade off like Duke got sometimes, but she did know Duke did not want that happening to Wade.

So she was the one who wrapped her arms around Octavia's waist and yanked, trying to drag her off Lexie.

Outside, Lucifer was still holding on to a flailing kitten.

"We are going home, Duke," he snapped-- no, snarled, his upper lip curling up, his entire being so tired of attempting to fight the bloody justifications for her behavior that he was just going to stop bothering. "There's no role left for you to play here but someone's pawn. Everything else is you tilting at windmills until one topples over and kills you, you absolute bloody tit."

Edited 2022-04-01 23:44 (UTC)

Duke stiffened, even as he gave up on struggling.

"I'm not anyone's pawn," he ground out, low and dark.

He'd told Tyler to off himself. He'd been counting on his trouble kicking in. (And he'd, maybe a little, been too upset and tired to care anymore if it didn't.)

At least the arms registered. Somewhat. As someone trying to wrench her away from what she was doing.

It didn't entirely work, but it did force Octavia to let go of Audrey. But, sorry about the flaily elbows you were now getting, Jennifer. And sorry to everyone else about the banshee screech she let out when she was doing that.

"Jesus, what the hell?" Lexie asked, wiping blood from her lip with her finger. (She didn't look unused to having to do that.) "I told your boyfriend I was sorry already. He had an ax, okay? I didn't want to get hacked, sue me."

"Maybe just . . . go somewhere else," Wade suggested, staring at Octavia with wide eyes, even as he handed Lexie a napkin. Lexie took it and nodded, hurrying for the door.

Jennifer, on the other hand, just hung on to Octavia, burying her face in Octavia's shoulder. "It's okay it's okay it's okay it's okay," she said, barely even able to hear herself under Octavia's screech. "It's okay, they're okay, it's okay, it's okay. . . ."

She was pretty sure Octavia had finally just -- snapped. Which, having been crazy -- or thought she was -- she felt like she understood.

"Try having a conversation with me that isn't full of excuses," Lucifer had started.

And then Octavia had started screaming.

And then he was just walking, barely remembering to set Duke down before he rushed through the doors.

Duke's leg folded out from under him when Lucifer set him down and he just -- flopped down onto the decking.

Sat there, his hands on the back of his neck, his eyes on the water, and breathed.

Octavia was similarly starting to fold in on herself, now that the target of her fury was gone, and there was nothing left except a void.

(And Jennifer's voice.)

She stared into the middle distance in front of herself, seeing nothing.

At least the screaming had stopped.

"It's okay," Jennifer was still saying, softer now. "It's okay. You're all okay."

Wade decided his own absence was going to be likewise the better part of valor, and beat feet.

Lucifer cleared his throat as he came upon... that scene. He didn't even bother to look for Audrey. "We're going home," he told... mainly Jennifer, and he was aware of it. "You're welcome to come along, if you wish."

But someone would have to kidnap Octavia or Duke's bodies and shoot him again if they thought to stop him from flinging both his traumatized partners in his car and just going.

Edited 2022-04-02 00:15 (UTC)

"I think that's a good idea," Jennifer said, uncurling from around Octavia slowly. "I'm -- I want to stay. I was going to leave earlier, but -- I think I want to stay. I haven't done anything that felt useful in kind of a while, you know? And this has all been scary and -- and fucked up, but also . . . like I've been kinda useful."

She offered Lucifer a smile, then lowered her voice.

"Also Duke kissed me but he wasn't Duke and that was super weird. Please don't hold that against him?"

She didn't know why Octavia was hitting people, but she felt like it was a good idea to keep all the air clear between them all.

And then Octavia was alone again.

(No, she wasn't. But it felt like that, with Jennifer pulling away. Warmth only registering once it was gone.)

It felt like it took effort to stay on her feet. She did, though, even if there was a little sway to it. Her head hurt, her arm hurt, her bloodied hand hurt, and she felt it and didn't feel it at the same time.

"You're one of all of two people I've met on this trip who seems to have no designs for him at all," Lucifer said, his eyes darting to Jennifer one last time. "I'm just glad it wasn't anyone else."

But that was all the time he had for Jennifer. He stepped forward and tried to wrap his arm around Octavia's waist, to pull her into him, with him, towards the door. "We're going home."

He'd keep saying it until they were there.

Jennifer stepped back, smiling a little, and let them go.

Octavia allowed herself to be moved.

She didn't have anything else left.

So Lucifer moved her. Gently, making sure not to lift her off her feet, the way she could get-- complicated feelings about sometime.

"Duke?" he asked, as he stepped outside.

Duke thunked his head back against the wall and looked up.

"They need me," he said softly. He was too tired to fight harder than that.

"We need you, too."

Had Octavia spoken? She was pretty sure she hadn't meant to, would have claimed she hadn't even heard him, but there it was, hoarse and small and sad.

"Don't," Duke said, voice cracking on the word. "Please don't make me choose."

They were all tired.

The only difference with Lucifer was that tired and sad could make him stony and determined, instead of drained and quiet.

"We all have to choose sometime," he said. "And currently you have the luxury that your choices don't have to be permanent yet."

He stopped walking when he found himself in front of Duke.

"They can sort themselves out for now," he said. "You got them to the point where they could. Now get up, we're going home."

Duke stayed where he was for a long moment, eyes closed, trying to breathe around. . . . Something. The remains of Tyler, maybe, slowly dissolving down his throat.

If he left now, he’d be abandoning them. His brother. His first love. His . . . his best friend.

But maybe Lucifer was right. Maybe Duke didn’t have anything left to give.

He stood up slowly, favoring his leg. Lifted his chin towards Octavia.

“How much did she fuck up her stitches?”

Some best friend she was.

But Lucifer had no illusions about the future. Duke would see them coming back here eventually. They just needed to not-- be here right now.

"Some, but not too badly to travel, I don't think," he said, glancing at Octavia.

Still Haven, Maine, Friday Fandom time

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