The Deck of the Cape Rouge, Sunday Noon-ish

[my_own_advocate]

If there was such a thing as 'critical limit of things to process', Lucifer had hit it sometime yesterday. He had a child, apparently, and his partners doing their best to accomodate her while struggling not to fall apart, and he was still trying to figure out how on Earth it could even happen to him.

So he'd decided to do better today. To try and entertain her, and make sure she knew he wasn't-- that he wouldn't just drop her on someone else and ignore her.

"How about we play some music?" he'd asked. And Aurora had gotten a look on her face.

They'd wound up on the deck, him with a guitar, her with Duke's ukelele that she had insisted on getting and he couldn't stop her from getting because she knew exactly where it was.

It had been nice. Oddly enough.

But now he had retreated to the back portion of the deck with his coffee. Rory was perched on the railing of the ship, looking out over the coast of Fandom, and... still playing that damned ukulele.

[[ open for boat dwellers and passers-by alike! ]]

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[my_own_advocate]

Lucifer rolled his eyes as he sat down. "Doubtful."

[swisflapa]

Rory gave a tiny shrug.

"Well, maybe not sick," she said. "Sorry I'm not living up to my full potential of not playing the right ancient songs, anyway."

She gave his arm a little bump with hers.

[my_own_advocate]

"Oh, she'd prefer Jane's Addiction, I asusme," Lucifer said, nudging her back. Gingerly.

[betterthanaplan]

Duke frowned, finally processing that bit.

“You’re — were you born in Octavia’s universe?”

That was the only explanation he could think of for the need to pull “ crazy dimensional space-time shit”.

[swisflapa]

Oh, Dad.

"Ocean Size," Rory agreed, leaning into the nudge a little. "For one." She gave a little snort. "I think she was singing that to me before I was even born."

[swisflapa]

Dammit.

Rory opened her mouth. Closed it. Sighed. "Yeah," she said. "Talk about a really bad case of portal napping timing."

[betterthanaplan]

"Jesus," Duke said softly. "You really are used to us being hot messes."

That was actually not the point she'd been trying to make here, Duke.

[swisflapa]

Rory snorted softly.

"There were a couple of hiccups," she said. "But for most of my life, all of you have been pretty stable and happy, actually. After dad got you all there, apparently the post-napping period was actually, like. Healing. After a whole fuckton of bullshit."

In a different way than Duke was likely to take from that, but. Well. Spoilers.

[betterthanaplan]

"Huh." Duke leaned his head back again and finally thought to take a drink of his iced tea. "I can't decide if that's reassuring or not."

[swisflapa]

"It should be," Rory said, shrugging. "I mean, sure, I spent the first few years of my life in a weird future universe. Then we came home to the Rouge. You guys still have a lot of shit to get through until you get to me, don't get me wrong, but..."

She shrugged, finally sliding the ukelele out from under her shoulder. "It's going to stop some day."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke didn't notice the uke, still too busy looking off into space and sipping his iced tea. He let out a soft little huff.

"You know, me and Luce argue about that sometimes. Whether anything can really go on forever. I've kind of lived my whole life on the premise everything stops some day."

[swisflapa]

Rory put the instrument down in front of them. She didn't call much attention to it. "Yeah, well, your perception of that stuff gets kind of funny when you're a celestial," she said. "I mean, I'm going to straight-up stop aging in a couple of years, which is wild."

[my_own_advocate]

"Mm, I bet she did," Lucifer said, a small smile sneaking onto his face. "Very quietly, and very seriously."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke bobbed his head. "True. Though . . . as someone who nearly died of old age before I was even, like, 35, let me just say it has its benefits."

[swisflapa]

"I'm not complaining. It's just weird," Rory said, and she reached up to poke her cheek. "Like am I gonna stay chubby-cheeked forever or am I going to grow out of it before it hits, you know?"

[swisflapa]

The small smile was met with tiny smirk.

"It's like you know her or something, Dad," she teased.

[my_own_advocate]

"Biblically, even," Lucifer agreed, because he was still-- him. "She's always been good at that sort of thing, though. I suppose."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke looked back at her, finally.

"You look beautiful, kiddo. You don't need to worry about growing out of anything."

[swisflapa]

"Of course you think that," Rory complained.

(Because he still sounded exactly like her dad.)

[betterthanaplan]

"Nah," Duke said, giving her a small smile. "I'm the young, messed up version of your dad, remember? No dad-goggles. You're just gorgeous."

He finally noticed the ukulele. "What's that doing here?"

[swisflapa]

"I spent some time playing with Skaifaya outside," Rory said idly. "Thought you might like having it back. So you don't get bored processing in here."

[swisflapa]

"Kinda her thing," Rory agreed, choosing to bless him with the lack of a 'gross, Dad'. "You never sang any Jane's Addiction to me."

[betterthanaplan]

“You play,” Duke said, faintly awed. “Do you . . . wanna play for me?”

[swisflapa]

Oh. Wow.

That got a real smile.

"I mean, sure, I guess," Rory said, to cover for how quickly she reached for the uke. "Got any requests?"

[betterthanaplan]

Duke started to shake his head, then stopped.

“Play . . . your favorite.”