okteiviakom | The Deck of the Cape Rouge, Late Wednesday Morning

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The Deck of the Cape Rouge, Late Wednesday Morning

As far as Octavia was concerned, it was a perfectly normal day. She'd woken up, had breakfast, and had just now rolled out her mat on a nice spot on the deck and was getting started on a little bit of yoga to get the day going.

Or, at least she had been: there was a rustling that seemed to be coming closer along the docks, catching her attention.

She squinted towards the approaching form. "What the... ?"

[ooc: For those two guys who aren't going to like this.]

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“Tavi!”

Was Duke grabbing one of his many guns and running out onto the deck explanation enough for you, Luce? Because right now that was the only one you were getting.

At least there was no one on the boat to watch Lucifer go white as a sheet. Not that it mattered. He rushed up the stairs and out the door. "Octavia? Duke? What's-- oh my."

The hyena - if the giant hulking thing actually qualified as one - growled at the civet.

And then towards Duke and Lucifer, for good measure, all gnashing teeth and obvious ill temper.

Duke wasn't entirely sure what had happened. Octavia had jumped in front of the porgs. The civet had jumped at Octavia. Then there was this hyena thing.

And Octavia had vanished.

He swung his aim from the civet to the hyena and back to the civet and didn't fire at anything because he had no idea where his snogon was and he was not about to risk hurting her somehow.

"Octavia?!" he asked, distress evident in his voice -- and his face, and the way his gun shook in his hand. "Fuck, please tell me you're in there!"

And then--

Lucifer got the full picture. "Duke, get back," he snapped, pushing forward in front of him. "And don't shoot anything."

The civet appeared to think all of this was too much commotion, the tasty porgs had gone into hiding - and also possibly it found the hyena intimidating.

It took off, though not before doing some damage to the gangplank along the way.

The humans were making noise, though. The hyena crept closer.

Duke wasn't going to shoot anything, Lucifer, don't worry. He wasn't entirely lowering his gun yet, though, because he was still freaking out, and having the gun at hand and half-raised was helping with that.

He was happy to let you take point with the giant hyena thing, though.

"Tavi?" he said again, softer this time.

More of a plea.

"Octavia, will you please calm down," Lucifer said slowly, arms spread placatingly. A pause. "...That is her, isn't it? Or are we just assuming?"

He hadn't a clue.

"That's our -- very best guess," Duke said. "So don't kill her. It. And hopefully she won't kill us."

None of their pleading or placating seemed to be inspiring any sort of reaction, least of all recognition. The hyena just growled at them again.

And then pounced at them - or, well, at Lucifer.

It was very claw-forward.

"Octavi--" Lucifer started.

The world suddenly flipped upside down, and pain flooded into his system, along with the taste of something odd and metallic. He stared up at the sky, or mangled fur, and blinked, confused.

Why did his chest hurt?

"Octavia," he tried.

It came out as a gurgle.

Oh shit oh shit oh shit --

Duke's first instinct was to grab for Lucifer, try to staunch the bleeding. Duke's first instinct was trash because one drop of that blood on him and his trouble would kick in and get overwhelmed and he'd be out like a light, and this thing that might or might not be Octavia would be able to rip through them both like they were tissue paper and --

All that went through his head in the amount of time it took him to jerk his hand to the left and fire three shots into the deck of his own boat, hoping the noise and explosion would drive the beast -- and its now blood-soaked claws -- back far enough to buy him the distance he needed to figure out an alternate game plan that wouldn't get all three of them killed.

The hyena startled off to the side in the opposite direction, making a giggle-like noise as it went.

But it didn't go far. Not at all. Better think fast, Duke.

Oh don't worry, narrative, Duke was absolutely doing so. As soon as he confirmed the thing was moving away even a little, he lunged backwards, grabbing the pipe he'd propped the galley door open with, and swinging it up at the hyena thing's jaw.

If it turned out this was in fact Octavia, he'd apologize profusely later. And maybe invest in a taser. Or like. A tranquilizer gun. (Or several, and stash them all over the boat alongside his regular guns, and some cattle prods, maybe load some of the regular guns with rubber bullets too? And something that could take down Lucifer if he ended up going evil for some reason? Something nonviolent of course and this wasn't the time for this particular thought spiral right now, Duke, refocus, your boyfriend is BLEEDING. . . .)

Still bleeding. Lucifer had sort of forgotten about the whole 'able to hurt me' bit, what with neither of his partners really feeling a drive to stab or maul or otherwise wound him in recent years.

He spat up a bit of blood, and felt the first inkling of something beginning to knit together.

Tried to sit up.

Laid back down.

What...?

The hyena stumbled backwards with the hit, and snarled as it tried to take a swipe at Duke.

Thankfully, it was just a little too far, and its vision was blurry.

The pipe hit had clearly done something. So Duke hit it again.

And would keep hitting it as much as he needed to to get it to stop swinging at them.

Lucifer spat another mouthful of blood onto the deck. "This is beginning to be unpleasant," he muttered, or tried to.

But he had a hand on the deck now, and he was pushing himself up.

What a coincidence: Octavia was going down!

Of course it was really the hyena, first, getting that one last fateful impact from the pipe and stumbling over. Then, it was Octavia thumping against the deck.

Looking completely fine, but very much unconscious.

And there was Duke, dropping the pipe. And the gun.

And staring wide-eyed at his unconscious snogon on the deck, and his boyfriend's blood on the deck, and the bullet holes in the deck, and working very very hard on not hyperventilating over all of it.

He swallowed thickly. (Can't hyperventilate if you're not breathing?) "Well. That answers the 'is it actually Octavia' question, anyway."

He was maybe going to be sick.

"Yes," Lucifer panted. He'd managed to stretch himself upright. "I'll just. Bring her in. Shall I?"

"Is she bleeding?" Duke asked. He flicked his gaze over to Lucifer himself before going back to cycling through the other points of interest again. "If not I can do it. I should do it. You're --"

He gestured helplessly at the rips and blood that wouldn't magically go away even as the injuries did.

"If she's not bleeding I can help."

"I'm still stronger than you, darling, and you look like you need a stiff drink and some time counting the tiles in the sauna," Lucifer grunted.

Just a few steps. And there he was. Lifting her up. Carefully.

Duke wanted to insist. Would insist, would physically take Octavia from him -- but he couldn't get close, because Lucifer was covered in blood.

The deck was covered in blood.

And Duke was useless when there was blood around.

He shoved his hand into his hair, squeezing his eyes shut, and nodded.

"Make sure she's okay. And if she wakes up before I'm -- tell her I'm sorry."

Lucifer made a-- moderately frustrated noise. "Duke, I am going straight into the bathroom and I'm making sure she's clean," he said. "You can tell her you're sorry yourself in about ten minutes or so. Let's not make this any bigger than it already is."

At least it felt like the big gaping chest wound had healed.

He turned around, Octavia in his arms. "Now go on ahead to the bedroom. I don't want to risk bleeding on anything on my way in."

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