okteiviakom | To the Cape Rouge, Sunday

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To the Cape Rouge, Sunday

Jennifer had taken off for Baltimore. If anyone had asked Octavia about the why and how, maybe even the when of it, she wouldn't have been able to say. Something in her had shut down at the sight of the island, the knowledge that they were no longer in Haven, and she only had one single shred of focus left, and one single goal to go with it:

Just herding Duke across the island, to the port, to the Rouge, to deliver him to Lucifer.

She hadn't said a word the entire way over.

But when they finally stepped onto the dock, with the ship just up ahead, she was almost running.

[ooc: For the two! Follows this.]

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Duke watched Octavia go. He definitely should have felt something about her walking away, but more and more, he just felt empty.

He turned back to Lucifer.

“I’m not the one who gets killed.” Soft. Flat. “I’m the one who does the killing.”

He’d barely thought about Ben not for a few hours at least. There’d been too much else to think about than to worry about the man he’d essentially martyred.

Lucifer felt a real and violent urge to slap Duke upside the head for that comment. He refrained.

"You're the one who loses a little more of himself every bloody time anyone makes you use your trouble," he said flatly. "There's a limit to that, Duke!"

Duke was silent for a long moment.

"Yeah."

The stitching trouble probably wouldn't even work on Lucifer. But Duke wasn't about to risk it.

"I don't know any other way to handle it. Not that I can live with, after."

"Well, you're going to have to learn sometime, because otherwise the sacrifice you'll eventually be making is us," Lucifer snapped. "And-- do we even know the consequences of rearming your trouble? Are there unknowing Crockers out there who just got activated? Did you even think about it?"

Duke closed his eyes as Lucifer spoke. This was, he supposed, what it was like for people with 'normal' childhoods when they got reamed out by their parents.

"Apparently the troubles Crockers took didn't die. They're -- in me. Active."

Staring was going to be a theme, wasn't it?

"What?!"

Duke shrugged. Face turned to the ceiling, eyes still closed.

"All of them. The ones I took. The ones Wade did. Or my father. Or his father. Back to . . . whenever the fuck all this started." He took a long breath. "Pretty sure I've already used two."

Lucifer pinched the bridge of his nose.

He counted to ten.

He still wanted to throw a chair at something. (Not someone. At this point the universe itself had earned his ire.)

Duke stayed where he was, barely willing to breath while he waited for Lucifer's reaction. He was swaying faintly, but hadn't noticed yet.

Something pressed against his eyes from the inside, something hot and wet, and he honestly couldn't tell if it was blood or tears.

Outside, a lawn chair abruptly flung through the air, across the water, and landed in it with a loud splash.

Lucifer wouldn't be able to tell you if that was him or just a freak gust of wind.

"Which two?" he asked.

"Some . . . stitching thing," Duke said. He felt like he was in confession. "I think it's triggered by denial." Hence his sudden embracing of Lucifer's theory of ruthless honesty. "And -- I'm pretty sure I sucked the life out of a Haven beach earlier to bring Jennifer back from the dead."

Lucifer's hand slid up to his forehead. He gave himself another... one. Two. Three. Four. Five seconds.

He dropped it.

"Right," he said. "Well, you're not leaving my sight for the next while."

Something in Duke deflated. He let out a laugh that was at least half-sob.

"Not going to complain. Just -- I think Tavi needs you, too."

And even Lucifer couldn't be in two separate places at the same time.

"Well, then we'll just all need to stay reasonably close, won't we?" Lucifer said.

He took another moment to push down the last vestiges of his temper.

"You noble, self-sacrificing idiot," he said. "Come here."

And he'd try to tug Duke back into his arms.

Duke crumpled into him. There was that heat behind his eyes again. He really hoped it was tears.

"Octavia tried to volunteer," he said into Lucifer's shoulder. "I wouldn't let her. I thought -- Luce, anything would've been better than that."

"Why was any of this even on the table to begin with?" Lucifer asked, quieter, his arms hugging Duke tight.

"Gloria's grandson. That fucker William, he set the kid's trouble off early. Every time he cried, a handful of people would just. Drop dead." Duke hung on tight in return. "Kid's not more than a year old, Luce. And he has a body count. His dad -- Ben volunteered. How could I -- he was willing to die to save that kid, how could I do anything less?"

Whatever had been behind his eyes was sliding down his face now. Getting cold, not vanishing.

Tears. They were just tears.

Lucifer sighed. He pressed his face into Duke's neck. "You won't like what I have to say to that," he murmured.

Giving Duke a chance to opt out of further-- not scolding, but something.

Duke held still, save for the uncontrollable shudders that were running through his chest.

He wouldn't, no. But he'd probably deserve it.

Lucifer chewed on it a moment longer.

Then: "Sometimes children die."

Oh. Yeah, Duke really didn't like that.

He jerked upright, staring at Lucifer.

"You think we should have killed the kid."

"Can you look at the ramifications of what's happened and tell me you shouldn't have?" Lucifer asked, lifting an eyebrow. "One man is dead, your life is potentially ruined, and you're now a vat of potentially life-ruining, life-ending curses."

Duke really wanted to deny that.

Even more, though, he had no desire to see what would happen if the stitching trouble met a celestial.

"I couldn't have done it. And I wouldn't ask anyone else to either. There's a difference between 'children die' and 'kill the baby'."

"I can assure you your species had different ideas about that just a few centuries ago," Lucifer said. "And I am not saying this with any amount of glee; I would also not hurt a child under-- almost-- any circumstance."

He studied Duke's face.

"Even if you hadn't gotten all of this-- extra baggage along with it, I believe previous experience has shown us that making that choice condemns you to being maneuvered into situations where you have to murder people," he said. "How many adult lives are worth one infant?"

Duke squeezed his eyes shut.

"I don't want to be the kind of person who does that math."

But he had. He'd done it this weekend. And he'd done it last time, when Audrey had maneuvered him to kill Harry Nix.

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