fandomtownies | Luke's, Thursday

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Luke's, Thursday

Duke had made it to the diner today with only minimal fuss. Meaning he'd only been dragged into one snow drift and holly bush, respectively.

The mistletoe was unimpressed.

"You call that a roux?! You're pathetic!"

In a swift move based as much on luck and fury as it was on skill, Duke whipped out a paring knife and pinned the mistletoe to the wall above the stove. Then left it there to wriggle and scream in impotent rage.

"I think it's a fine roux," Greg said, patting Duke on the shoulder.

"Yeah, yeah," Duke grumbled. "Just make sure it doesn't burn while I finish prepping the lobsters, would you?"

Today's specials
Catch of the day!
Lobster mac and cheese

Luke's was open.

[no OCD, and a slow play warning for at least the morning, as I deal with some final move stuff]

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Octavia showed up sometime past lunchtime, snow and bits of ice still melting onto her armor. She was carrying her sword - which she'd collected from the Rouge after he'd left for the diner - and had a grim look on her face.

"Ha yun. Everything okay here?"

God but it was good to see her with her sword again. Duke smiled up at her.

“Doing fine. Thanks for checking in.”

In the kitchen, the mistletoe screamed something insulting about Duke’s mother. It was true, so he didn’t bother arguing.

Octavia's gaze flicked only briefly towards the kitchen. But, the mistletoe was the least of today's problems. "Need food," she said, as her eyes returned to Duke. "I'll take whatever the special is."

She hadn't read the board. It didn't exactly matter, right now.

"Coming right up," Duke said, and signaled for Greg to dish up some of the mac and cheese. "How's it going out there?"

She was pretty much in full-blown shark mode here, wasn't she.

Her shoulders were rigid, her expression was stony, and her voice was flat.

He wasn't wrong, no.

"Mostly pointless," Octavia rasped. She'd been in this town enough in her life to know fighting these invasions was never actually the thing that did the trick. "But they keep coming, so..."

So she kept striking them down.

"Uh huh," Duke said. "Well. At least you're remembering to eat this time." Greg hurried over with the plate, and after a quick glance between the two of them, handed it to Duke to pass along, rather than trying to do it himself. "You want to sit for a minute while you eat?"

"Sure."

So, eating and resting, too. It was progress! Kind of. Octavia moved for the nearest table, and set her sword down on the next chair over.

She didn't have the scabbard with her at all, which... May have said something about her expectations for the day.

"See you picked that up," Duke said, nodding to the sword as he set the mac and cheese in front of her. "Have any trouble finding it?"

He couldn't quite remember where he'd stashed it on the Rouge, honestly.

"Not particularly," Octavia said, reaching for her fork.

Regardless of how little she'd seemed to want to do with the sword until now, she didn't actually let herself lose track of where her weapons were.

"Sorry about visiting when you weren't there."

(She felt a pang of something at the realization that that was something she felt like apologizing for. But right now, she found the hurt easy to ignore.)

"Don't worry about it," Duke said. It still felt like it was her home, too, even if she had moved out. "You're welcome any time. I hope you know that."

Octavia made a non-committal little noise, and shoved a forkful of mac and cheese into her mouth.

Everything seemed a little far away, right now.

Yeah, Duke was gathering that. So while he kind of desperately wanted to ask if she'd thought about what they'd talked about earlier in the week, he bit his lip and held off. It wasn't the time.

Instead he sat back and watched her eat, and wondered what was going through her mind when she got like this.

Strategy, violence. Old memories.

A lot of the things she'd been trying to put behind her over the past six months.

Octavia kept eating. It seemed almost a little mechanical, like she was doing it because it was the thing to do.

Duke was just happy she was doing it, and not protesting that she didn't have time to eat while there were things to kill.

"Taken down a lot of stuff, today?"

"I haven't been keeping count," Octavia rasped, her eyes on the plate, "but yes. Been out since this morning."

They were in the afternoon now. That was more than enough time to deal with a lot of festive pests.

"Is it, uh. Getting any worse out there?" Duke asked.

Seriously, she was hard to talk to like this. He missed his usual, slightly more expressive Tavi.

"Not that I can tell."

It was... debatable, whether she would actually be able to tell.

"Well good," Duke said, giving more credit to her potential observational skills like this than the narrative did. "'Cause those light strings are vicious enough as it is."

Octavia ate another few mouthfuls in silence.

Then she said, "You should probably still stay indoors as much as you can."

"You mean I shouldn't go rushing out with an ax to take on the creepy angels and deadly candy?" Duke said, amused. "Good note."

"Yeah," Octavia replied, absolutely serious. She looked up. "You should stay safe."

Was that something cracking through her shark fugue? Yeah, it was.

"I can handle myself, you know," Duke said, more amused than angry. "There's a piece of mistletoe impaled on the wall of my kitchen to prove it."

The mistletoe was still screaming about Duke's parentage. It was basically white noise by now.

Most of everything was that to Octavia right now.

But she was looking him in the eye.

"Still."

"You worry about me," Duke said. "You and . . . way too many other people."

What was the point of any of Octavia's fighting if anything happened to him?

Her gaze dropped again. The food on her plate was already half gone.

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