okteiviakom | The Cape Rouge, Tuesday... Noon?

Lucifer was already there. He was worried, and perhaps a bit... careful, now, after her reaction to him over the weekend. (It hurt, more than a little.)

But she had come home clearly drunk last night, and she wasn't used to drinking.

So he was in the galley, juggling pans in a meatless fry-up. There was water, and there was juice, and there was a hangover cure.

So help him, he would be prepared.

The scent hit Octavia on the way. Maybe it had even already wafter into the bedroom and she just hadn't noticed over everything else? But she noticed it now.

She didn't really have the capacity to hesitate before coming into the galley right now, either. Just... padded in, still in her shorts and her giant t-shirt, because changing wasn't going to happen before she felt at least a few degrees more alive.

"Food or drink?" Lucifer asked, without looking away from his pans.

A pause.

"Painkiller?"

It was the softest and smallest Octavia had sounded since they'd come back.

Oh, Octavia.

"Of course," Lucifer said, fumbling around. He'd had those ready, too, but-- stupidly-- had assumed she'd already taken one.

He snagged a glass of water and a pill, and strode towards her. "Here you are."

That would've made sense, but... Octavia's capacity to think wasn't doing so hot right now. If it had been, maybe she would've been a little more hesitant about accepting help from him.

As it was, she held out her hands for them, just a little bit.

Lucifer handed both of them to her readily, searching her face for further hints as to how she was feeling.

"Come, take those, sit down," he said. "I'll make sure the blinds are down."

Octavia almost nodded, but felt right at the last second like that would actually be a bad idea. No sudden head movements.

Instead, she downed the pill with a big gulp of water.

She looked miserable and worn down. But at least she looked so in a softer, more approachable way than she had for the past day and a half?

Lucifer nodded, mainly to himself, and then turned and walked towards the booths to do as he'd said - take the blinds down, to block out more of the sunlight.

Octavia followed him slowly, cradling the glass of water with both hands. Careful about moving too quickly.

Including while sliding onto a seat in one of the booths.

"So you should get some grease in you as soon as you feel up to eating," Lucifer said, watching her ~~fretfully~~ sit down. "Eggs?"

"Sure."

Octavia didn't really have much in the way of opinions right now, so that... sounded as good as anything.

Lucifer nodded, and scurried back to the stove.

He returned with... rather more than just two neat sunny-side up eggs. Mushrooms, too, fried tempeh, tomatoes and toast with butter.

"Here you are," he said, setting it down in front of her. "And your fork and knife..."

"Mochof," Octavia murmured, and drank another gulp of water before carefully setting the glass down on the table.

The voice telling her this was all too good for her was thankfully a muted one, right now.

Another moment's pause. Then Lucifer bustled back, but not for long.

He sank down in the seat next to Octavia with a plate of eggs and toast.

Octavia had gotten as far as picking up a piece of toast. But now she... paused?

It wasn't quite freezing, just... Well, she stilled.

Another tendril of hurt coursed through him. Lucifer tried to ignore it. "... I'm sorry. I can leave."

What had happened that made her hate being near him this much?

Some sort of instinct took over.

Octavia shoved her arm underneath his, linking them. No, he couldn't leave. He shouldn't leave.

She could steal a moment.

Lucifer had already started to move, but now he-- stopped. Did he feel relief? He honestly wasn't sure.

But he sat down and stayed with it.

"Please don't go," Octavia said. Quietly.

A little weak.

"If that is what you would like," Lucifer said.

A little helpless.

Octavia's fingers curled slowly around his wrist.

"Don't go."

Simpler, this time.

"I won't," Lucifer said.

Leaned towards her, just a touch.

Octavia leaned to meet him.

It still felt faintly like a crime, but everything else was louder. She could get away with it.

"I'll be here as long as you want me to be, in fact," Lucifer murmured. "I'm not going to work tonight."

Octavia had to take a moment to put that together in her head.

"Right, it's Tuesday."

She hadn't seen her phone yet. There were going to be a couple of missed calls from Dr. Baker's office.

"Okay."

"Yes," Lucifer said, eyes still on her. "Tuesday. But there's no rush to do anything."

"I'm already late to my Tuesday, anyway," Octavia muttered, trying to rest her head against his shoulder.

She'd get to the eating in a moment.

"I think."

"Seems like a poor week to have a genuine Tuesday in," Lucifer said.

After a moment, he moved his head just so, so she would have her space to rest against.

Octavia gave a very small hum of agreement, and leaned a little further against him.

With every part.

Lucifer slid his arm out of hers and wrapped it around her shoulders instead.

There was just a little bit of alarm in Octavia's posture for a second, but then she got what he was actually doing.

And settled into it even heavier.

Hopefully this was doing something to dispel the idea she hated him.

There was finally a sense of relief in Lucifer's body. A... relaxing.

"Are we all right now?" he asked softly.

Octavia took a slow, deep breath.

And let it out.

And whispered, "No." And then, "But it's not because of you. It was never because of you."

Lucifer looked down at her plate. "Then why?"

Somehow, Octavia's voice managed to go even smaller.

"Because of what I didn't do."

What she didn't do? The confusion was clear on Lucifer's face. "What does that mean?"

Octavia wasn't looking anywhere near his face, but it was plain enough in his voice, too.

"I couldn't keep him safe. I couldn't -- save him."

From all of it. Any of it.

There was-- a bit of a pause, there. As Lucifer thought about Sunday. As Lucifer thought about arguing with Duke on Sunday.

"Sometimes with Duke, I think," he said slowly, "That you can't save someone who doesn't want to be saved."

"I tried to change his mind."

And by now she wished she'd forced it.

"It should've been me."

Lucifer's response was as sharp as it was immediate. "Absolutely not," he said. "It is not your job to destroy yourself just because he refuses to stop destroying himself."

Edited 2024-04-24 09:45 (UTC)

It startled Octavia into getting her head off his shoulder.

Though enough not to still say (even if it was in a mutter), "Parts he's destroying now I've already destroyed in myself."

"Incorrect," Lucifer said, with an especially certain confidence. "You have been rebuilding yourself, Octavia. Nor do you have remaining ties to places that want to draw you further into the darkness. You are living for tomorrow. He is not. And as someone who will be here the tomorrow after tomorrow, I would very much prefer you don't sacrifice that on the altar of Duke's fatalism."

That should have felt like absolution.

It just felt like he wasn't getting it.

And Octavia was staring at nothing again.

Lucifer sighed. "What is it?" he said. "Do you want me to flagellate you over this?"

Do you need to hear that you failed and you're terrible because you won't get that from the other two? came floating back to her as if through a fog.

She drew a deep breath.

Lucifer raised his eyebrows, looking at her.

Octavia picked up her glass of water.

She didn't have an answer for him. But she looked... terrified, somehow.

"Octavia, if you've failed Duke, then so have I," Lucifer said, after another moment. It was clear there was no answer forthcoming from her. "Since I can't get it through his dense skull that he should have acted otherwise. Short of locking him up every time Haven comes 'round the corner, after which he'll probably refuse to speak to us, there's very little we can do."

"I failed you," Octavia said, somewhere in the middle of that. Barely more than a breath, against the edge of the glass she wasn't actually taking a sip from. "You, Lucifer."

"No," Lucifer said. "He failed us."

Oh, he thought. He was still angry after all.

That was one way to get Octavia to actually look at him. The terrified note was still there, but now there was confusion, too.

"What?" she asked, weakly.

"How many times have we asked him not to give in to whatever madness Haven asked of him?" Lucifer asked. "How many arguments? How many desperate--" he waved a hand, "--wild goose chases through Maine because we had to solve some issue that didn't need to be an issue if he didn't believe, on some level, that it's his job to save the world? To save people who don't deserve saving? How many times has he forced us to make the choice to give him up?"

Edited 2024-04-24 11:29 (UTC)

This seemed wrong. All of this seemed wrong, like Lucifer was angry at the wrong person.

Guess her guilt wasn't ready to listen to reason.

Octavia stared at him, helpless.

"And now he has you feeling guilty," Lucifer said, a little sad, a lot exasperated, "because you couldn't convince him not to be a hero. That's madness, Octavia."

"I could've done something," Octavia whispered. Patently untrue, of course, but it felt true to her.

Wasn't that the lesson of the bunker? If she just gave enough of herself away, something else would be spared?

"The only thing anyone could have done was either knock him out, or kill the bloody infant, or both," Lucifer said. "Which he would have resented, and he would probably run off and get himself even further into Haven's clutches."

He shook his head. "You did what you could," he said. "We just don't have any control here. That's the bloody terror of it, isn't it? It's all in his hands, and he's just happily flushing it down the toilet."

The expression on Octavia's face was beginning to distort, to twist.

Into something pained.

Edited 2024-04-24 13:45 (UTC)

And Lucifer saw it, and it cut through his tirade.

He sighed. Reached for a drink.

Octavia hunched a little. It was the best attempt at curling into a ball currently at her disposal.

At least she also managed to take another sip of water?

Lucifer blew out a breath.

"I'm sorry, darling," he said.

He reached out to put his hand on hers. "It's the screaming into the void that feels the worst. To me, at least."

Octavia said nothing. Couldn't find the proper response, or... any.

But she put the water down so she could cover his hand with that one. Make them that much more intertwined.

Lucifer squeezed her hand.

He fell silent.

So did Octavia.

Maybe she needed more time before she could properly talk about any of it. But at least she'd fixed whatever erroneous horrible thing he'd thought about her, even if she hadn't been able to convince to see the correct one.

Duke himself had mostly been dealing so far by sleeping. Or working on routine boat maintenance. Or swimming.

He was coming back from the latter just now, having woken up rattled after a quiet nightmare early that morning. Nothing he could remember the details of, just -- something that left him feeling unwell.

Or, uh. That might be the building pressure of troubles making him feel that way. Not that he had any clue what to do about that, except just kind of -- deal with it and keeping going.

"Water's nice," he announced to no one in particular. "Cold. But nice."

"Well, it is April," Lucifer said, eyes on his stove.

He cracked an egg into a pan.

"In the south."

Excuse you, Duke, this was technically the Mid-Atlantic.

He swallowed back against a flip of his stomach at the smell of the food (though he probably did need to eat something) and went to pour himself some -- water. Instead.

Booze wouldn't help how he was feeling right now, he reminded himself. Not that he knew of anything else that would.

(The cold water had. Or, well, it'd distracted him from what was rapidly turning into pain in his guts, at least.)

"This isn't the south," Lucifer said, with a touch of LA-ite offense in his voice. "Do you want eggs?"

He glanced towards Duke. "There's juice, as well."

Duke . . . did not want eggs, no.

"Toast?" That would probably be okay. It was part of the whole BRAT diet theory, right?

(Even on that single syllable, his voice was still thin and dry as paper. It might turn out to be a permanent change, if he kept feeling this awful all the time.)

Lucifer leaned over for the toaster and lifted two neatly toasted squares out of it. "Of course," he said, rummaging around for a plate while the egg cooked.

Plate, toast, and a square of butter were thrust out towards Duke a moment later.

Duke huffed a soft laugh. "Thanks, babe." He took the plate and leaned in to kiss Lucifer on the cheek.

Well. At least Duke didn't hate him after the past weekend. That was somewhat of a relief.

"Hangover, as well?" he asked.

"What?" Duke blinked at him as he went to sit down. "Oh. No."

He'd need to explain sooner or later, he knew. But -- he'd rather nibble some toast first.

"Right," Lucifer said slowly. "No coffee, either?"

"Water's fine for now. Thanks, though."

"Well, everything else will be here for you if you get peckish," Lucifer said, glancing back towards the stove. "You do need to eat something."

"I know." Duke lifted a piece of toast. "I'm on it."

He took a nice big bite even. Which . . . he might be chewing for a little while.

Lucifer sighed.

He wandered back to turn the stove off for a moment.

Duke chewed, watching him move.

Wished he was doing better at pretending to be normal, for Lucifer's sake.

Lucifer honestly preferred whatever Duke was doing over what was going on with Octavia. At least Duke didn't make him feel as if he was a leper.

He grabbed a glass of juice from the counter and walked back to him. "Mind if I join you?"

Octavia was not great at expressing herself in ways that her prone-to-self-blame partners interpreted correctly.

"Nah." He offered Lucifer a small smile. "I'll, uh. Try not to drip on your suit."

"Don't worry. I didn't put on one of the genuinely nice ones today," Lucifer said. (As if Duke would be able to tell the difference.) "Figure the club is a wash for now."

He slid into the seat.

"You don't feel like you need to escape us yet?" Duke teased softly.

He was glad of it, anyway. He would have followed Lucifer in, and then felt extremely awkward not drinking or talking much.

"Rather the opposite," Lucifer said, looking up at him. "I was half-inclined to drag Octavia back from the Nest myself."

"I . . . suspect she's done drinking for a bit."

He really hoped she was.

"I can't believe I'm saying this, but I hope so," Lucifer said. "She's miserable enough as it is."

"Yeah." Duke heaved a sigh and took another bite of toast. "This weekend was fucked. I don't know how to help her."

He didn't even know how to help himself.

"Did anything happen to her?" Lucifer asked. "Or was it just the bearing witness to everything that was happening to you bit?"

Duke shrugged. “Witnessing, I guess. She took it personally.”

"Obviously. I wasn't even there and I take it personally," said Lucifer, just in case Duke hadn't noticed.

Duke nodded. No need to rehash the argument now.

“We got separated for a bit. Not — not really sure how. We were down in this cavern, getting rid of William. . . . Then Dwight and I were in a beach. I don’t know, maybe something happened then she didn’t mention.”

Lucifer sighed.

"Have I mentioned recently that I hate Haven, and the entire state of Maine by association?"

"Be nice if it was wiped off the map, huh," Duke said.

Honey, if only you knew.

"Sometimes I unironically feel that way, yes."

"Well." Duke tilted his head against Lucifer's. "Thank you for your restraint, then."

Every now and then they had to acknowledge that Lucifer absolutely had the power to do just that.

Lucifer sighed.

"I take violence against you very personally," he murmured.

Duke knew that, but it felt worth repeating.

"I know," Duke assured him. (He wasn't going to argue the semantics of 'violence', though part of him wanted to.) "And I love you. For that and everything else."

Lucifer turned his head. He pressed a kiss against Duke's forehead.

He was still incredibly angry. He was just... learning something about feeling two very strong emotions at the same time.

And Duke . . . was getting used to people being able to feel two strong emotions about him at the same time.

(Maybe if folks growing up had been better at showing them, he might have learned that much earlier.)

"I wish I could say we -- I was done with it all. But." Duke stopped, swallowing against the taste of copper in the back of his mouth. "I don't think Haven will ever be 'done' with me. Not until. . . ."

Until the thing all three of them were working so hard to avoid.

Lucifer was... quiet.

"You know how I feel about that," he said, after the silence had dragged on too long. "No point on wasting more words on it."

"Yeah." Duke swallowed again. He felt so sick. Anxiety and troubles blending into a tornado in his belly. "I'm scared, Luce."

It broke his heart to hear that from Duke, of all people.

"I know, love," Lucifer said quietly. He stuck to his promise - no pointing out that Duke could have opted out at any point until this weekend, and chose not to. "But you're here now. Safe, for the moment."

He slid his arm around Duke. "We're going to keep it that way for as long as we can," he said. "And we're boarding ourselves up in the pillow room for the rest of the week."

Duke loved the sound of that. But, trying to stick to his new personal rule of realism:

“It might not be safe,” he said softly. “There’s so much I don’t know about how all the troubles in me work. If I hurt Tavi. . . .”

Lucifer sighed. "If something seems about to go amiss, come to me," he murmured. "I can handle a few troubles."

"If nothing else, we know you can take me out," Duke agreed. That wasn't what Lucifer meant, he knew, but it was what he was counting on anyway.

Lucifer eyed him. "Let's not immediately jump to fatalism on all fronts, shall we?"

"I mean, we've proven that it's hard for the trouble to keep going if the troubled person is unconscious." Duke shrugged. "Hopefully that'd work on, like, the stitching thing, too."

"What is the stitching thing?" Lucifer said, frowning.

Duke shuddered faintly. "People who, uh. I guess told me things I didn't want to hear? They'd get their -- faces. Sewn shut. Like between one blink and the next, their eyes or their mouth or their ears would have these ugly black stitches on them."

Lucifer pulled a face. "Well, that seems unnecessarily visceral."

"Yeah, it's . . . pretty horrifically hardcore."

"I promise to knock you out if anyone gets... stitched," Lucifer said.

"Thank you," Duke said. "And I . . . will be doing my best to just. Accept reality as it is."

And so his ability to accept and express natural human emotions began to narrow.

Lucifer sighed. "Now that just sounds depressing."

... Right, they'd talked about buying her a wetsuit, too. Felt like it had been months ago.

Octavia was still feeling a little woozy. She still trailed towards him, a little. "Good."

Duke flicked her a faintly strained smile. Strained by how he was feeling, not by anything she had done.

Not that he was about to mention feeling like shit unless or until they asked him directly.

(At least he wasn't coughing up blood.)

"How was your night?"

Had the drinking helped?

"I don't remember," Octavia murmured. It was true for some details, at least? Maybe not for everything. "Hurts now, though."

Duke hummed and nodded. Sipped his glass of water.

(See? He definitely shouldn't start drinking again now.)

Octavia wouldn't recommend it.

(It had felt good in the moment. But the price seemed high and the effects were... short-lived, at best.)

She nodded back, just watching him. Movement stalled, for now.

He wasn't doing anything interesting. Just drinking his water.

The paleness could be explained by the cold water that still dripped a little from his hair?

It could. And right now Octavia wasn't managing to worry about it, but... Maybe later she'd make some unfortunate connections.

She just watched.

Maybe in a second she'd realize it was awkward or weird or something.

Duke flicked a glance down at his wetsuit. Did he have seaweed on him or something?

"You look good," Octavia muttered, almost like she'd been caught, "in the suit."

That earned her a little smile.

"Almost as good as being naked."

He smiled.

She moved, finally, closer. Feeling awkward and weird about it (see, there it was), but still moving to where she could gently and gingerly lean against his side.

Duke held still to let her.

"Not too cold?" he checked. "I'm still pretty wet."

"I don't care."

With the way that she was feeling, the cool was actually pretty nice. She hesitated only for a second before sliding her arm around his waist.

Duke held still another moment, then leaned into her a little in return. Nibbling on his toast with his free hand.

He was worried about her. But she was here. He'd take that.

Funny, the feeling was mutual.

Octavia was holding nothing, and that meant that after a little more hesitation, she could slide her other arm around him, too, and just hold him.

Soaking up the cold.

Duke wasn't going to object. He rubbed slow circles on her back while working his way slowly through his toast.

So Octavia just closed her eyes and breathed him in.

Well, him and the ocean. Maybe even mostly the ocean.

He smelled a certain amount like ocean all the time. Now, it was just . . . fresher than it had been in a bit.

(Under that was something . . . different. Metallic. Not blood, just -- odd.)

Octavia was getting something like that, but she didn't know what it was, and that made it easy to ignore. Let it just be an unfamiliar part of the ocean scent.

"Are we still going to buy me a suit?" she murmured, after a while. It felt absurd to even think about doing normal things again, but...

Guess the hangover made her more willing to indulge the absurd.

"As long as you still want one," Duke said. "Whenever you're ready."

"I do," Octavia murmured. "Just not today."

Absolutely no one had thought of getting one today, and she knew it.

"Not today," Duke agreed with feeling. "Today is for . . . well, not doing that."

He couldn't think of anything he wanted to do right now other than just sit here like this, honestly.

"Yeah," Octavia murmured in agreement, "I don't know if today is for anything."

Except her trying to crawl back to both of them, by the look of it.

Duke would take it. Happily.

"Maybe today is for doing as little as possible."

"Already been unconscious for most of it," Octavia said, quietly. "Guess that's a head start."

Both of them were also taking a bazillion years to eat anything, which also had to count for something.

And all Duke was eating was toast!

"Definitely a good start. Maybe I'll head for the sauna next. Or the pillow room."

"Either would probably be good for you."

Maybe for slightly different reasons, but both good.

"Not for you?" Duke asked, peering down at her.

It took a moment, but Octavia looked up at him, eventually.

"I don't think heat's gonna work out with the hangover."

Duke hummed a little as he nodded.

"Pillows, though."

"Those are different."

"We should do that, then."

Octavia watched his face, just for a moment.

Then she said, softly, "Okay."

She wasn't in the mood to deny him anything.

"Okay," Duke said. He pushed a lock of wet hair out of his face. "I might shower first though."

He was starting to notice how cold he was, yes.

"Probably a good idea," Octavia murmured with a tiny nod.

Paused, hesitated.

"You want company?"

"If you think it would be okay for your hangover," Duke said, "I would love company."

"I promise I'll bow out if I start feeling faint or something."

She could at least pretend to know how to look after herself?

"Good." Duke kissed her forehead. "Ai hod yu in, gona."

"Ai hod yu in seintaim," Octavia murmured. "Otaim."

"Even when I'm acting really stupid?" Duke checked.

"Otaim," Octavia just repeated, with more... weight.

And she didn't use that word lightly to begin with.

"Otaim," Duke agreed softly. "Mochof."

"Yu laik ai deimeika," Octavia murmured, nuzzling his neck. "Ai flapkrasha."

Always.

Duke let out a soft sigh. A little bit too much like a sob for his preferences. He didn't trust his voice to respond, so he buried his face in her hair instead.

That was fine. Octavia would just keep clinging to him.

Maybe eventually they'd even remember about the shower again.

The Cape Rouge, Tuesday... Noon?

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject