Luke's, Thursday

[betterthanaplan]

The kitchen staff, apparently dismayed at their lack of claws this week, were dancing back and forth sideways, fencing each other with wooden spoons and clacking their entirely human fingers at each other.

"How the hell do you people still have jobs?" Duke wondered.

"You can't fire us in a way that matters," Ali said. And was clacked over the head with Greg's spoon.

"You know what? I'm just going to leave you to it."

Duke walked totally casually back out of the kitchen, definitely not bracing as he went to get whacked with a spoon.

Today's specials
CATCH OF THE DAY!
Crawfish etouffee

Luke's was open and OCD free.

Comments

[okteiviakom]

Octavia showed up around lunch time, for the first time in what felt like (and was) a long time.

She was carrying a small paper bag, from a book store.

"Ha yun, jaka."

[betterthanaplan]

"Tavi!" Duke looked up from the pile of paperwork that he was wishing would somehow manage to finish itself. "How's it going?"

It had been ages since their last Luke's lunch.

[okteiviakom]

Oh, that was something Octavia hadn't realized she'd missed. The way his face brightened up when she walked in.

"Good," she said, then lifted the bag a little, demonstratively, as she came closer. "I shopped."

[betterthanaplan]

"Oh yeah?" Duke cleared a space for her by dumping some of his paperwork on the bench beside him (and as a result, onto the floor). "Let's see what you got."

[okteiviakom]

Octavia glanced at the papers fluttering to the floor with a faintly amused look, but slid in to take up the offered space, digging the main contents of her bag out where she could set them on the table.

"Couple of books."

On top, there was a drink recipe book on mocktails. And underneath it... A paperback copy of Ovid's Metamorphoses.

[betterthanaplan]

"Mocktails and Greek tragedy," Duke said with a chuckle. "I should have guessed."

[okteiviakom]

"It's not just Greek," Octavia pointed out, softer than any of this seemed to call for in any obvious way.

[betterthanaplan]

"It's not?" Duke reached for the book to flip through it. ". . . Is it Roman, too?"

[okteiviakom]

"Ovid's Roman," Octavia confirmed with a tiny nod, watching his hands. "He retells Greek myth, but it's... about how the world was created, and what happened next, the history of the world all the way to Julius Caesar dying."

[betterthanaplan]

"Huh." Duke looked at the book again. "Sounds like a fun read."

Well, for a woman who grew up on Greek mythology, anyway.

[okteiviakom]

Octavia reached a hand out for it.

"I must've read this like... two dozen times." Oh, yeah, this wasn't a new book for her. "At least."

[betterthanaplan]

"An old favorite, huh?" Duke said, smiling. "Maybe you should read it to me sometime."

[okteiviakom]

Octavia wasn't smiling. "'I intend to speak of forms changed into new entities'," she murmured, before paging through the book.

Wondering whether she could still find the passage she'd read more times than anything else. Even the opening she'd quoted just now.

[alwaysonguard]

Dwight decided that he was tired of frozen dinners and had closed up the shop for a bit to grab something for lunch. For whatever reason, he found himself walking into Luke's.

He had forgotten that Duke and the others were back in town now, that was until he saw Duke standing there.

"Hey there, Duke" he said simply as he sat down.

[betterthanaplan]

By the way Duke hesitated, face blank, for just a moment upon seeing him likely broadcasted the fact that he'd forgotten there was a Dwight in town here at all.

"Squatch," he said, cool but friendly, when the moment had passed. "How you been?"

[alwaysonguard]

Yeah the blank stare and awkward silence wasn't doing much to reassure him at that moment.

"Doing alright.... heard you were back in town," he said simply. "Getting used to the island again easy enough?"

[betterthanaplan]

Duke shrugged easily. The moment couldn't be taken back, but that didn't mean he had to repeat it.

"Yeah. It's home, you know?"

He hadn't had a lot of that before Fandom.

"Hear things blew up a time or two while we were gone."

[alwaysonguard]

"Oh that is an understatement.." Dwight said with a slight laugh. "The island sure has a wide range of surprises it likes to pull... getting stuck in a hole for three weeks, being randomly teleported around the island... seeing Lizzie again...." Dwight's voice trailed off for a moment and he shook his head. "Yeah, its been... interesting, to say the least."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke's eyebrows climbed a fraction with each item on the list.

"Wait. You saw your dead daughter?"

Duke had never been around for that particular event.

[alwaysonguard]

"Yeah... evidently it's something the island does now and then. For a weekend a lot of us had someone we lost... someone who died... come back. And not as a ghost or anything like the Resurrection Trouble. Lizzie was real, as real as the day before she died."

Dwight fell silent a moment as he remembered that time with her.

"It was... quite the double edged sword in many ways..." he said with a sad smile. "I'm still not 100% sure how I feel about it."

[betterthanaplan]

Huh. This Dwight had gone through a resurrection trouble. But didn't know about Duke's own trouble. Interesting.

"I was about to say," he said instead, "that kind of sounds awful."

He'd certainly be torn about the resurrection of, say, Evi. (Or his dad, though he tended to believe that his feelings towards the man were simple resentment, these days.)

[alwaysonguard]

Knowing about the Troubles, when you know they are real and not just some stories made up to scare kids, often serves as warning for what ones to be on the lookout for.

"It was a mixed blessing. I mean, it got two more days with her than I ever thought I would... but having to lose her again. Yeah, it's a hard one to balance out. Thankfully it only seems to be someone who wants to come back and see you so... no worries about the old man making an appearance or anything at least."

[betterthanaplan]

"Well. There's a small mercy." Duke shook his head. "So sorry to have missed out on that shitshow." The irony in his tone was thick, yes. "And what was that about a hole?"

[alwaysonguard]

"Oh THAT was an adventure..." Dwight said sarcastically. "I don't even think I was here a month before that mess started. Basically the condensed version of the story is abut a third of the town and a lot of people, myself included, ended up stuck in a big hole/cave like thing. These holes would roam around town sucking up people and places and basically anything that would fit inside."

Dwight glanced at Duke, seeing the well expected look on his face, and shook his head as he continued.

"I ended up down there three weeks before we finally got out. Had quite the collection of places too- Hannibal's mansion was down there as was the bowling alley, the ice cream shop, the music store, and several other places. Think we had somewhere around 20 people or more down there too by the end."

Dwight sighed and gave a short laugh. "This island has a very twisted idea of what a fun time is... though I will admit no one got hurt and everything ended up MOSTLY the same when it was all said and done."

[betterthanaplan]

Was the well expected look one of well-worn bemusement?

"And, uh. How exactly did you all end up back on the surface?"