Duke Crocker (
betterthanaplan) wrote2024-05-01 11:35 am
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Aboard the OceaNyx, Wednesday afternoon
History said that the weirdness in town had probably abated by now, but Duke and his partners had quietly agreed to stay at sea a bit longer. Let things with them settle a bit more, before inviting Fandom chaos back in.
Unfortunately, Fandom chaos wasn't the only kind they had to worry about.
Duke had been feeling increasingly ill as the days went by, and by Wednesday morning, he heaved himself over to the wheel only to pretty much collapse into his seat, panting.
How could just existing be this draining??
[for those on the boat with him, and slow play. NFB due to distance.]
Unfortunately, Fandom chaos wasn't the only kind they had to worry about.
Duke had been feeling increasingly ill as the days went by, and by Wednesday morning, he heaved himself over to the wheel only to pretty much collapse into his seat, panting.
How could just existing be this draining??
[for those on the boat with him, and slow play. NFB due to distance.]
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She was bringing over a glass of fresh orange juice. Kind of grasping at things to do for him, anything that would make him feel even a little better.
"I've got juice, jaka."
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That wasn't quite it. He wasn't sure he could fit anything in him around the troubles beating against his insides.
Something warm and wet pressed itself out through his tear ducts. Something warm, wet, and red.
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Octavia's eyes went wide. "Duke, your eyes --"
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And now Lucifer was walking a whole lot faster, dropping to his knees in front of him. "Octavia? Do you have a tissue or something--?"
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And vanishing.
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(Again.)
"This happened at the lighthouse," she said, with a tremor in her voice. "Right before --"
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"I'm okay." He blinked. His head wasn't throbbing. The blood still on his face reabsorbed into his skin, but that didn't feel like anything. "I'm. . . ." He laughed a little. "I'm actually okay."
In fact he felt better than he had in days.
He looked at Lucifer.
"Wait, what color are my eyes?"
They were brown. But if Lucifer weren't Lucifer, he wouldn't be okay the moment his skin touched Duke's.
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At all.
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Lucifer ignored it. He tilted his head. "Brown," he said. "Just-- your usual colour."
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He flexed his hands. Looked around. Tried on a smile and aimed it at Octavia.
"I feel . . . fine."
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Or convincing. Take your pick.
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"I don't remember," he said. "I -- Jennifer fell. And I felt like I was -- choking or exploding or something. And then. I was on the beach and I was fine."
The pain had gone away. Like it had just now.
. . . And the stitching had started.
"Shit!" Duke flung himself back, out of Lucifer's hands, coming up short against the gunwale. "Shit shit shit I must have let out a trouble!"
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Of course, now it was a slightly different shade of concern she was turning towards Duke, at that reaction.
"Snogon, breathe."
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…It was likely they would have noticed by now if he was. Unless paranoia was the trigger.
“Okay, I’m officially freaking out.”
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"Hey, hey, we knew this would happen," she... lied. At no point had she managed to think quite this far when she'd worried about his deteriorating health. "We just need to figure it out."
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Look. Nix’s trouble made an impression, okay?
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But thanks for the extra nightmare fodder.
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Lucifer... approached Duke again, squinting at him. As if he could see something that way, if he tried.
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He’d been dying anyway. Duke wasn’t going to think about that.
“Mostly they’re more subtle than that.”
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She held out the glass of juice towards Duke, in silent offer. For lack of anything more useful to give.
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"So sorry my crisis isn't entertaining enough for you, Luce."
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"Guys, it's not the time."
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He was hurting them. He knew it. But he couldn't seem to stop.
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They were about to find out.
"Hey!" she snapped. "Stop."
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But now he was looking up at her instead, at least?
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"I just want us to figure this out," she said, a fraction softer now. "Odds are we'll be right here with a new, unknown trouble more than once, so... We need to figure out a way to find out what it is, and what we can do about it."
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"Maybe you can learn?" she offered. She really hoped he could, actually.
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He reached for her hand.
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And the second it did, it was as if an electric current rushed through her, only worse: a pain so intense it knocked the legs out from underneath her, sending her falling to the floor with a strangled noise.
Along with the glass of juice that she'd still been holding in her other hand a second ago.
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Well. That answered that.
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How this was going to make Duke feel.
"Found the trouble," she said, hoarse and weaker than she wanted to sound. Trying not to sound rattled.
And willing the wetness by her arm to be spilled juice instead of blood from some cut, because she had no idea what had happened to the glass, and could not feel any specific hurt through the full-body ache that lingered past the initial shock.
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His fingers had already settled on the arm she'd held the glass with, searching for any cuts or bruises.
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Of course, she didn't even realize how she was still half-panting from the shock.
On the bright side, while there was probably going to be some bruising, luckily there weren't any cuts.
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He walked to a cabinet to rifle around, to find a dustpan.
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He watched Octavia with a miserable smile.
“Sorry.”
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(She didn't look fine, but she made it upright.)
She shook her head, slowly and carefully, meeting Duke's gaze. "You didn't want this."
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He returned with a dustpan, kneeling down by her side to start sweeping up the shards. "So what do we know about this particular trouble?"
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No wonder Jordan was always so angry. So bitter.
“Jordan’s trouble,” he said softly. “She was like a human taser. Anyone she touched . . . hurt.”
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"That one sentient blood puddle didn't like it either," she added. It was the main thing she'd actually seen in person before, after all.
Until this time.
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Somehow, he still assumed this stuff all worked by the same rules.
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(Audrey had never figured out Nathan's trigger, either.)
"In the meantime . . . guess I'm not sleeping naked anymore."
There wasn't enough room on this boat for them to not share a bed. Not unless he decided to sleep on the deck.
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There was a lot of that about, wasn't there? Figuring things out.
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And Duke's trouble didn't seem to do anything to him.
He was not going to think about that too hard.
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(Lucifer was no longer vulnerable to him. Or was it just because this was a trouble and he wasn't vulnerable to those? Or Lucifer didn't trust him, which made sense, because Duke was a fuck up and maybe he shouldn't be trusted --)
"I can wear pajamas," he said. "I should -- get used to being covered. Just in case."
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She just didn't want anyone else to hurt right now.
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"Whatever you feel comfortable with," he said.
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Or possibly ever.
"Fuck, I want a drink."
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That was his area, not hers.
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"Right, I'll get the scotch," he said, tossed the contents of the dustpan in the trash, and walked towards the liquor cabinet.
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"I'm all the way over here, jaka," she murmured. (Where 'here' was 'on the floor'.) "It's okay."
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Duke stared down at his feet some more and hoped Lucifer would hurry up with that scotch.
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He handed Duke one glass without a word.
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Although she looked up just enough to watch Lucifer's hands, now.
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He took the glass and all but cuddled it. Every line of his body was screaming about holding himself as small and contained as possible.
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Then he poured himself three.
"It's all right," he said. "You can move them near me."
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She moved to finally get up. Slow, careful -- and decidedly not in Duke's direction. The last thing she needed right now was him flinching away from her.
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“I’m dealing.”
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Because Octavia was slipping away right now.
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“It’s a process.”
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They’d come out to have a good time and were feeling various levels of attacked right now!
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"And whose fault is that?" he said flatly.
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He downed the contents of his glass in order to suppress it. Poured himself another one. Downed that too.
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“Go ahead and yell. Might make you feel better.”
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Another pour.
"At this point it would just be needless repetition."
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Duke tossed back the rest of his scotch. The burn felt right in a way he didn’t want to look at too closely.
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Duke, you beautiful idiot.
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Or he’ll stick his hands in his armpits. It was symbolic and dumb, but it felt better right now.
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"That's what you want to do with the situation," he said. "She wants to do something else. You're not even considering it. That's the minute amount of control we are talking about here."
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“I’ve felt this trouble, Luce. It knocks people out. It could probably kill if I held onto someone long enough. Look what it did just because I reached for her. I don’t want to do that again.”
Duke was nothing if not stubborn. Sometimes that meant sticking to someone trying desperately to push him away. And sometimes it meant pushing away someone who wanted to stick to him.
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He set the glass down.
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Well. He really couldn’t hurt them with this trouble if they decided they hated him.
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He settled his hand on the top of the bottle, and - as Linda had taught him - counted to ten to see if he'd feel otherwise.
"I understand that this is hard, and you are likely feeling like hell," he said.
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He patted the bottle. He turned for the direction Octavia had gone off in.
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This was as close to letting them do that as he could get, just now.
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There was no real reason for the choice. It was just... Away. And probably not Duke's first choice of where to go to, which seemed important right now.
Even without looking up, she knew these particular footsteps weren't his.
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He didn't hesitate; he sat down next to her immediately.
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Funny how that didn't actually make her feel any better.
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She sighed, her voice going quieter. Still mild, though. "Feels like I'm being punished for getting hurt."
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He slid his arm around her shoulders. "I'm sure he doesn't mean it like that," he said. "Useless as that is to know."
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Then she leaned into it. Deliberately, as if she'd made a choice. "It still feels awful," she muttered.
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No, she knew it wasn't that. Of course she knew. She was just having a hard time finding a jokey tone.
(Maybe the urge to try anyway had rubbed off on her from Duke.)
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It would've been easier. It always had been.
She stayed quiet.
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Apparently.
"Because he thinks he's already doing it."
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And slid her hand over where she could put it on his knee.
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He put his hand on hers, exhaling loudly.
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And it wasn't even a joke.
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Leaned her head against his shoulder as best she could.
Willing herself to feel less awful in every way.
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It was likely just about as succesful.