The Cape Rouge, Later Friday Afternoon

[okteiviakom]

Octavia had urged Lucifer to fly Duke back to the boat. Something about safety, and security, and a defendable spot that was closed off and sort of separate from the rest of the island --

So in one word: control. Which Octavia was grasping for, had been grasping for from just about the second she'd laid eyes on Mara at Selkie Peak. Something she'd thought she'd had, with the portal idea, only to immediately find out how wrong she'd been.

Making Lucifer get Duke home as soon as possible had been another flaily attempt at it.

Of course, as Octavia had come to realize very soon after, it meant she'd had to let both of them out of her sight. She didn't know if Duke had come to yet. Didn't know anything, except that this was the fastest she'd ever crossed the island, trying to race an angel back to port.

Her heart was thumping like thunder in her ears and her lungs ached when she burst onto, then into the Cape Rouge.

And yet: "Lucifer! Is he still out?"

[ooc: For the two modded with permission! Follows this. Note to squirrels: That Octavia and Lucifer got Duke back to the boat is fine for broadcast, everything else NFB pls and thank you!]

Comments

[my_own_advocate]

Lucifer leaned back to let Duke pass, but he squinted. "That feels like a trap."

[okteiviakom]

Octavia crossed her arms, although really what she was doing was tucking her hands away. Like maybe they shouldn't be trusted.

"A trap?"

[betterthanaplan]

Oh boy did Duke understand that feeling.

“I was the trap,” he pointed out. “This is . . . the trap’s aftermath.”

[my_own_advocate]

"'It can't be worse'," Lucifer muttered. "It feels like a trap, still. One last mess waiting to bite us all in the arse."

[okteiviakom]

"Mostly me," Octavia muttered, only half out loud. The next part was clearer, louder. "Do we have any other option than just waiting to see what it is?"

[betterthanaplan]

"Well I could kill you and absorb your trouble," Duke said dryly. "But personally, I'd rather avoid doing that."

[my_own_advocate]

"Yes, let's keep the murder to a minimum," Lucifer said, harried. "The 'minimum' being 'hoping she wound up in the middle of a volcano'."

[okteiviakom]

The look Octavia darted Duke's way at that particular dry quip was... not great.

But she didn't say anything about it. Instead, she said, softly, "I need air." And turned to head back up on deck. It wasn't untrue, either: she could really use a moment to try and regroup.

Maybe pack a few things away.

[betterthanaplan]

They were all running too tense.

Duke watched her go without trying to follow.

"This . . . really never stops sucking, does it."

[my_own_advocate]

"It had better or I may have to murder everyone and then myself," Lucifer muttered to the ceiling.

Burying all of those issues was not working as well as it had just last week.

[betterthanaplan]

"There was a second there," Duke said. "Just -- a tiny second. Where everything seemed like it was going to be okay."

[my_own_advocate]

"Well, we're not going to have more of a second until we burn bloody Haven down to the ground."

Sorry. Lucifer would not be playing the role of the optimistic partner today.

[betterthanaplan]

"That would require going back to Haven," Duke pointed out. "Also, there's still one or two people there that Tavi and I like."

Gloria, mainly. Duke wasn't going to pretend that Octavia liked Nathan.

[my_own_advocate]

"I don't care."

Octavia had been the only bloody thing Haven hadn't touched. And now...

[betterthanaplan]

“Well I do!” Duke said, not realizing he was going to shout until he was doing it. “Gloria has never been anything but good to either of us. Even after I killed her son.”

[my_own_advocate]

Funny. Lucifer thought the shouting would hit him worse than it did.

"Yes, there's always something else, isn't there?" he said.

[betterthanaplan]

“Yeah, Luce, there is. I care about people, okay? And I’m tired of feeling like I have to apologize for that!”

[my_own_advocate]

"You care about Haven," Lucifer said flatly. He desperately tried to summon his anger, but hit a resigned, fatalistic exhaustion instead. "You care about eating Haven's bloody sins. You cared your way into a trap that nearly blew up all over Fandom and may now ruin Octavia's life. But that doesn't matter, does it? Because at least you cared."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke’s eyes burned and for a moment he wondered what color they were. If his tears would be black and float through the air; little slicks of oily pollution.

He destroyed everything he touched.

“Fuck you, Lucifer.”

[my_own_advocate]

"This is why I don't tell you what I need," Lucifer said. Tired. Ignoring that 'fuck you'. "I can do that and lose you, or I can keep my mouth shut and hope there'll still be something of you left tomorrow, or next week, or next month."

[betterthanaplan]

“Then why are you still here?” Duke demanded, his voice choked. “If all I do is fuck up with my messy caring? I ruined Octavia’s life, right? After daring to hope I hadn’t lost one of my best friends to that fucking psycho.” He was crying in earnest now, almost hoping his eyes were black. That maybe he could purge the awful feeling in his chest; could see the poison that infected him come pouring out.

He missed the numb fugue of the last several months.

“But I lost her anyway. And I still care. So if that’s a problem for you then fucking leave.”

[my_own_advocate]

Something squeezed in Lucifer's throat. The wild urge to do just that, get up and walk out and never come back, twisted up within it.

"I'm still here because I keep hoping if I hold on long enough, one day this will be over," he said. "That this isn't a desperate race to the bottom. Because I love you and I do not want you to be alone."

But it had been years of this, and every day eroded something inside of him.

[betterthanaplan]

And so Lucifer got the same question Octavia had, years ago after the volcano. Though this time, voiced on a sob, it came out more desperate than lost.

"Why?"

Why did they love him, of all people? Him, who came from a bloodline that had been toxic for generations. Who'd been damned by the narrative the moment his old babysitter had told him about his death.

And if they did, why didn't the people who'd been meant to love him, the first 35 years of his life?

[my_own_advocate]

It wasn't the first time Duke had asked him something like it. Every time, Lucifer had produced-- lists and lists and lists of reasons.

"I just do," he said. "And I can't just-- switch it off."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke swiped his hand over his eyes, smearing tears into his cheeks.

“Then why do you think I can?”