Disclaimer: I duel you for Tin Man ownership – en gard!
Author's Note: Don't worry, the next chapter will pick up pretty much where this one leaves off, don't eat me! I have issues with this chapter but that never seems to matter as long a Quality Control doesn't. What do I know?
...
Azkadellia watched the horizon with sleepless eyes as the sky lightened ominously, harbinger of the rising of the first sun and the arrival of dawn. Officer Gulch was fated to meet with Lord Fastidium this sunrise in a duel of honour. Sitting on her bed, her knees tucked up under her chin and her arms wrapped tightly around them as she rocked slightly in agitation, Az searched her memory for the millionth time for some hint or fragment of conversation for how it had come to this. The cop never fought without reason but she was at a loss to discover what that reason might be. If only she'd been paying attention to the pompous lord's verbose monologue she'd know what had prompted the Othersider into this foolhardy, reckless, imprudent, unnecessary and preposterous course of action. Of all the impulsive, outlandish, insensible, thoughtless and stupid things to do, it would serve the oblivious idiot right if he died...
...he couldn't die could he? She didn't want him to die, it wasn't allowed! He could be as blind, bumbling, peculiar, ludicrous and absurd as he chose but he wasn't allowed to die, she wouldn't let him! Even before the thought was finished, the eldest princess was flying from her bed, her feet scrabbling for purchase as she scrambled for the door. Out in the hall Happy and Dawkins exchanged high fives and took off in pursuit as their charge brushed past and sprinted down the hallway towards her sister's chambers.
Dodging sharply to the left as she burst into the room, lest a startled Tin Man open fire, Azkadellia's anxiety doubled as no shot was forthcoming. If Cain wasn't shooting at early morning intruders it meant that he'd already left to perform his duty as second in bringing Gulch to the duel. No, no, no, no...
"Wagh!" was DG's startled and emphatic opinion of being shaken violently awake by her frantic sister. "Wha..wazzit. Az! Stop shaking me, what's wro... he didn't wake me!" Deeg growled as her brain finally joined the rest of her in wakefulness, "He is so dead."
"I don't want him to be dead!" the eldest princess shrieked hysterically, tugging violently on the youngest princess' arm.
"What?" the discombobulated Deeg uttered before finally getting a good look at her sister. "No, no, Az," she reassured hastily, "I mean Cain and all his honourable man stuff..." but Az was too busy pulling her towards the door to hear her.
"Raw should have Seen this coming," the Viewer muttered as he hit the floor not five minutes later. "Ow," he added as an afterthought while the princesses who'd unceremoniously dumped him out of bed proceeded to haul him out the door.
The combatants and their seconds were already in position when Azkadellia entered the courtyard with Raw and DG in tow. The eldest princess, who was scanning her Othersider anxiously, and the Palace Guards and Royal Protection Details jockeying for position in the windows above were both relieved to see that the duel had yet to commence, though for different reasons. She had to do something to stop this, she had to...
"This is an affair of honour," Lord Fastidium stated pompously, "it cannot in good principle be overset by outer contrivances nor should it be witnessed by uninvolved parties."
Oh yes it can, Az thought angrily, and it's not going to be witnessed at all because...
"Stuff it," advised DG before her sister had a chance to turn thought into action, "we're just here to watch not interfere."
What? No, we're not and yes we are! Try as she might, though, the eldest princess couldn't seem to get a word out; her tongue kept getting jumbled up in a knot of anger and fear.
"Doth not mine challenger have any judgements regarding this irregularity in protocol?" the lord demanded querulously, before the panicking princess could manage to get a word out.
Hey! Azkadellia shrieked mentally as she desperately tried to regain use of her voice.
"Whatever gave you the idea that I have any control over them?" Gulch pointed out.
Exactly, I'm the one with the Royal Decrees, now...
"Very well," Fastidium capitulated, "we shall proceed thus observed, but know this, depraved miscreant, I do not cross swords with you this day in any indication that your degenerate person be of the least worthy of the honour. I sully my dignified blade only in order that I may prevent future incursions of your contemptible presence unto the attendance of noble personages such as myself."
Sully! Why you insignificant, arrogant, soulless...
"If I die I hope my second shoots you," replied the policeman before drawing his sword.
YOU'RE NOT ALLOWED TO DIE!
"Easy, Az, easy," Deeg murmured into Azkadellia's ear as she wrapped a steadying arm around her sister, "It'll be okay, right Cain? Cain?" she repeated but the Tin Man's gaze was locked on the duelling pair as the first few parries showed just how outmatched the Othersider was. The eldest princess gasped as the policeman only just deflected the lord's sword away from his face. Not his face!
"We have to stop them," Az rasped in a whisper moments later as another slow parry left a tear in the cop's sleeve, coming that close to hurting his arm, his hand.
"Can't," Cain bit out shortly, not taking his eyes off of the beleaguered Gulch. For the first time since she'd been freed, Azkadellia spent a moment disliking the Tin Man.
"It's one of those masculine pride things," DG muttered bitterly, "you need a Y chromosome to understand."
"What's a – oh!" the eldest princess cried as her Othersider just barely twisted out of the way of another sword thrust.
"That's really not helping, Your Highness," Cain said tightly as the policeman's eyes flicked ever so briefly in their direction. "There was a reason I tried to leave you out of this," he growled at his wife.
"Oh really," the Crown Princess fired back, taking refuge from her worry in anger, "and why might that be?"
"Besides the fact that you are a distraction?" the Tin Man replied acerbically as another of Az's dismayed squeaks drew the guard commander's attention momentarily, "Because neither of you need to see him-"
Azkadellia choked suddenly.
"-get slashed across the chest like that," he finished as the distracted Gulch was too slow in leaping back from Lord Fastidium's downward stroke. Ripped fabric showed a long, if shallow gash starting almost in the hollow of the Othersider's left shoulder and ending midway down the right side of his ribcage. "Oh," Cain added, mildly impressed as the cop, seemingly more enraged than injured by the wound, wielded his sword like a club and actually managed to push his opponent back.
The eldest princess was already in motion.
"Az," the Tin Man grunted, diving forward to intercept her as she dashed forward to intercede, "You can't...calm down, he's doing fine...dammit," he swore as the fight turned against Gulch once more. "Deeg," Cain growled, making Azkadellia's world blur as he spun desperately about to catch his wife in his semi-free arm as she, too, leapt forward to aid the struggling policeman. In the end he only managed to contain the anxious princesses because Fastidium's second stepped in to lend a hand. The young lord had a hard time of it: Az and Deeg might try not to hurt the Tin Man but they had no such compunction about the erstwhile swimmer of garden ponds.
No! Azkadellia cried internally as she watched the grappling duellers overbalance and tumble haphazardly to the ground, their swords flying harmlessly from their outstretched hands. No, no, no, she wailed as Lord Fastidium managed to come out on top, dagger in hand and pressed firmly against the Othersider's throat. No, I was mad at him and he hasn't had the chance to do something stupid yet so I'll forgive him. The eldest princess clawed desperately at the arms holding her. Distantly she heard Cain curse and say something but she just couldn't understand...
"Dost thou yield?" Lord Fastidium demanded of his seemingly vanquished foe.
Yes, yield, Az begged, please yield, as long as you live...what's that? she wondered as the cop pulled the oddest little canister free of his belt. Lord Fastidium shrieked and leapt away, hands clawing at his eyes, as Gulch sprayed a strange greyish vapour directly into his face.
The eldest princess couldn't believe her eyes as the policeman rose swiftly, knocked the lord down and introduced him to the sound of click, spouting some strange nonsense about rights all the while. Which was all well and good but Fastidium hadn't submitted and as long as he didn't submit Gulch was still in danger, and if he was going to pound the lord into the ground like that couldn't he do it a bit harder? Unconsciousness counted as submission and he was refusing to submit otherwise. If he didn't submit soon she was going to...
"I yield!" shrieked the lord, trying to hide his eyes in the dirt as the Othersider threatened him with the strange vapours again. Az didn't approve of vapours in general, but just this once was fine because he was going to be okay, and...and...she couldn't breathe and...the world fuzzed a little as her knees gave way beneath her.
"She's fine," Deeg was saying when the world sorted itself back out again, "She's just relieved is all."
But she was not fine, the eldest princess thought as she clutched her head and gasped for breath yet still found the strength to glare at her sister. Gulch could have died. And she'd been mad at him, she hadn't talked him for weeks, not really, and she'd missed him. She was so glad he was okay and what the storms had the fight been about anyway? What if he'd never had the chance to fix things? She hadn't been that mad at him, really she hadn't, and it was fine now because he was fine and...and she was so darned angry.
"You, what the hell did you think you were doing?" Princess Azkadellia demanded pushing herself awkwardly to her feet. Under the circumstances a lack of dignified grace was perfectly acceptable because she needed to give him a piece of her mind and he was bleeding. "Do you have any idea what you put me through?" she demanded, desperately trying to keep her voice from wobbling as if she was on the verge of tears, because she wasn't. "You could have died! What in the Realm were you fighting about anyhow? And don't even try to claim you were drunk because I know very well that you weren't, Sneezy says you haven't touched the storm-ridden stuff since the last time you were arrested. And even if you were drunk that would be no reason to get yourself into situations where you might die. Royal Decree: you are not allowed to die! Are you listening to me?" she all but snarled as she realized Gulch seemed to be in the midst of a bewildered statue impression moment. "This," Az declared, "is how you end up in trouble all the time, you fail to notice-"
"That's enough," the Othersider cut her off abruptly.
"W-what?" the eldest princess stuttered at the unexpected interruption. Her chief bodyguard, the soul of chivalry, had rarely crossed her in anything, and almost never on purpose. Was he angry?
"I said enough," the cop reiterated, "I've had my fill of this, it's time to end it once and for all. Come on," he said, grabbing her wrist and pulling her towards the palace.
"W-where are we going?" Azkadellia asked in sudden fear. Had she...had she gone too far?
"To see Ahamo," he replied still striding forward.
"Why?" she hesitantly inquired. He never willingly sought daddy out. I've had my fill of this. Wait...no, please no. What if he'd finally had enough of all that the O.Z. had – that she'd – thrown at him? What if he wanted to be returned to the Otherside? The Consort would be more than willing to arrange it. No, no, no...
"We are getting married," Gulch stated.
Already panicking by this point, this response was not anywhere on her list of expected replies. "What?" she exclaimed, thrown by the drastic shift in thought.
"Just what I said," the cop said urbanely, "We. Are. Getting. Married."
"B-but..." the eldest princess stuttered, still trying to make the mental transition from fear to potential hope. And what was he doing using small words and short sentences on her for?
"Look Azkadellia," Officer Gulch said stopping and turning around suddenly to face her, "either we continue to do a DG-Tin Man-esque dance around each other for the next two years or so, or we can get married in the nearish future and I can have the hope of surviving that long. Nearish future, not tomorrow," he stated clearly.
"But you never asked me," Az protested stupidly. What the caves was she arguing for?
"Neither did you," Gulch rebutted irrefutably before leading her forward once more.
"Daddy's probably still in his chambers right now, where are you going?" she asked as he set off in the opposite direction. He called me by my name, she thought giddily as her brain desperately tried to catch up with the situation.
"To the kitchen to get a beer," her Othersider replied, "I have a feeling Ahamo's going to need it."
