betterthanaplan | Haven, Maine, over the weekend

The last time Octavia had been to Haven, she'd gotten arrested and Gloria had had to go yell at the Chief of police.

The last time Duke had been to Haven, he'd gotten arrested and Gloria had had to go yell at the Chief of police.

They could both be forgiven for being a little nervous pulling into the harbor now, even without the "let's go meet our mutual therapist in person" part of the deal.

[for one! NFB due to distance]

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From:

betterthanaplan

"I'll go get a nice, filthy rag," Duke said, giving Nathan another glare before he turned and walked away, his back ramrod straight, his shoulders pulled in tight.

He didn't like leaving Octavia with Nathan alone. But he also needed to be away from Nathan's goading words and -- more importantly -- the blood still slowly dripping down his chin.

Thrown into a wall. Choked. Blood running down a chin. His trouble going off.

This was all just -- a lot to deal with.

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia already knew she was going to be having another round of nightmares, and none of this had even happened to her.

(This time.)

She watched Duke walk away, and then locked everything down again, crossing her arms.

From:

seaoftroubles

"You're just like he is, aren't you," Nathan hissed with a giggle. "You feed on people."

[I'M NOT SORRY]

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia turned to look at him, her gaze ice cold. Her voice was no warmer, and all edge.

"And don't you forget it."

From:

betterthanaplan

Duke came back, carrying a nice, greasy rag from his tool box. He glanced from Octavia to Nathan and back.

"I see you two are bonding." He held the rag out to Octavia. "Do the honors?"

"You're going to eat him alive," Nathan said, panting through his teeth again. "Good."

From:

okteiviakom

Nice going, trouble. Octavia might've been a little nicer without that last comment.

But now she grabbed the rag, and yanked Nathan's head back, and stuffed the rag in his mouth with very little care for anything except shutting him up and not actually suffocating him in the process.

From:

betterthanaplan

Nathan growled at her, then started rocking back and forth against the chains again.

"Audrey owes us so much for this one," said Duke.

From:

okteiviakom

He would not hear any disagreeing from Octavia, no.

"As soon as this is done, can we just... go?"

From:

betterthanaplan

Duke sighed and nodded. "Yes. Absolutely."

He'd be back in a couple weeks for Bill and Geoff's opening, but he wasn't going to drag Octavia along with him if she didn't want to deal with all of this again.

The flush drained out of Nathan's face and he stopped rocking, blinking and shaking his head like a dog shaking off some water. He looked up at Duke, then around, frown deepening with every moment.

"Well. At least that didn't take a whole hour."

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia looked down at Nathan.

"Are you back?" she asked. She didn't want the gag to be removed only for him to start spewing more goading.

From:

seaoftroubles

Nathan scowled at her, saying something muffled through the rag. He tugged -- gently this time -- on the chains, the frown growing ever deeper.

"You got hit by a trouble," Duke told him. "We're your babysitters."

Nathan's response to that was still muffled, but pretty easy to translate anyway.

"Yeah. Same to you, buddy."

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia looked like she wanted to roll her eyes, but didn't.

"You realize you're not getting free until you play nice, right?"

From:

betterthanaplan

"We hold him to that and he'll be tied here forever," Duke said. "Which normally wouldn't be a problem, but it is pretty close to my boat."

Nathan muttered into the gag again and went relatively limp, clearly doing his best to 'play nice'.

"Better ungag him at least," Duke said with a sigh. "I need Audrey's number so I can tell her to come fetch."

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia's bar for niceness from Nathan was set to him not being openly hostile for about ten seconds, so that had been met, now.

So she removed the rag, yes.

From:

seaoftroubles

"Where's Audrey?" Nathan asked, embarrassed and annoyed, but not quite his full belligerent self. "Did she go after Lilly on her own?"

Duke rolled his eyes. "Does it look like we have that information, Nathan? She wasn't exactly long on details."

From:

okteiviakom

"Don't even know who Lilly is," Octavia agreed. "But she said she thought she knew who gave you this bout of crazy before she dumped you on us, so..."

From:

seaoftroubles

Nathan paled slightly and looked down at himself. His mouth tasted like grease and blood. And it hadn't slipped his notice that Duke was bleeding.

"What did I do?"

Duke shrugged. "Threw punches, called me names. The usual."

From:

okteiviakom

"Nothing to feel too guilty about," Octavia rasped in agreement.

It was probably the nicest thing she was likely to say to Nathan in a long time.

From:

betterthanaplan

Duke waggled his phone. "What's Audrey's number? I'll call her to come fetch you."

Nathan scowled. "Unchain me. I'll call her myself."

"Nope. Not letting you go until the lady with the taser is back. What's her number?"

"Audrey tased me?"

"Yeah, see, you didn't stop choking me when Octavia smashed a board over your head, so I'm just going to play it safe."

"I choked --" Nathan cut off with a long, deep sigh. "Mr. Crocker. I encourage you to file a complaint and press charges."

Duke dropped his head with a sigh of his own. "Not my style, Nathan."

From:

okteiviakom

"Just give him the damn number," Octavia grumbled, "so we can get on with it."

From:

betterthanaplan

Nathan narrowed his eyes at her, then looked back at Duke and rattled off the number. Duke dialed, pacing away a few steps as it rang.

"Audrey. Hey. Sleeping Beauty woke up. Please come get him so Octavia and I can move on with our lives."

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia stayed where she was, looking off towards the water.

Nathan wasn't getting any more of her attention than he absolutely had to get.

From:

betterthanaplan

". . . Yeah," Duke said, shooting her a look. "I might know where that boat is. But I want to know what's going on."

Nathan shot him a suspicious glare.

"Because I'm a concerned citizen, Audrey. And this trouble tried to kill me, so I'd like to know if I need to be looking over my shoulder."

And if someone might come along wanting him to kill to stop it.

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia met his look with a resigned one of her own.

It didn't sound like this was over for them just yet.

From:

betterthanaplan

Duke mouthed an apology at her.

This was what you got when you dated a compulsive fixer.

"I'll take you there. We can leave Nathan chained to the docks, I'm sure he'll be fine." He grinned at Audrey's response. "Ugh, fine. If you insist. But if he attacks again. . . ."

He was enjoying teasing Audrey. Which made for two cops now whose presence he might actually enjoy.

What was even happening to him?