“Bad Boys”

Duke relished the few times in his life where he actually attained some peace and quiet. Since coming to Earth, he’d fought dictatorial lizards, crazed whack-jobs, and doctors who definitely ignored their oaths. Not to mention, until a few months ago, his nephew was attached to the overlord who had taken over his planet. Thus, when he actually found the Main Room completely empty, he plopped down in the middle of the couch and let out a relieved sigh.

Finally, he could relax. Everything—or most of it—was all right in Duke’s world.

*Thwak!*

“Ouch!”

Duke was more embarrassed than annoyed when the rubber band slammed into the side of his head. Having learned to fight under the tutelage of Demetrius Ping, Duke knew how to feel when he was alone or not and more imperatively, how to deflect an attack, whether it be sword, fist, or rubber band.

Yet, his nephew someone pegged him with one.

“Okay, kid. You want to play?” Duke stood up on the couch and looked behind its spine, remote in hand to chuck. “I’ll play.”

Only—there was no one there, leaving Duke to wonder what just happened. If the door opened, he would have heard it. Tanya gave the place that awesome swoosh noise, but it hadn’t opened…had it?

And he couldn’t have imagined the attack…right? Ah well. Duke once more fell back onto the couch, though he couldn’t relax as well as he had.

Three minutes passed.

*Thwack!*

This time, Duke was ready, pulling out his saber and activating it just in time to cut the rubber band before it hit the back of his head again. He leapt upon the coffee table, yet the movement didn’t allow him to catch his attacker. However, now he knew he had been hit, and thus, he crept about the room to find the perpetrator.

“You want to play hid and go seek, Dive? Fine by me.” Duke’s voice sounded icy, lost of mirth but full of blood thirst—or as much as he had for the son of his sister. “Come out, come out wherever you are.”

He peeked under the end tables, then even behind the bookcase. Nothing, but oh, the closet! Making sure not to let his footsteps sound against the ground, he inched forward and ripped open the door.

“Ah ha!”

Nothing.

Duke’s blade touched the floor, though he still held the hilt, and he glanced about. Where was that boy?

He left the room, no longer able to relax, but he knew—somewhere—Nosedive Flashblade loomed.

*^*^*
“What?” Nosedive, with half of a pancake stuffed in his beak, asked innocently.

The former thief narrowed his eyes, then looked away. “Nothing.”

“Then stop sending me death glares. I didn’t do it!”

“Ah ha! Then you fess up!” Yes! One for the uncle.

Or not. Nosedive snorted and shook his head. “I just figured if you’re giving me that look, then you must have thought I’d done something. Whatever it was, though, I didn’t do it! It was Canard.”

“Oh, don’t drag me into this,” the older drake responded from the opposite side of the table. “I like my head where it is.”

“Sure, be a wuss.”

“I might be wuss,” Canard said with a dip of his orange juice carton, “but I still have my head.”

Nosedive sent him an angered glare, then diverted it to Duke. “Fine. Blame the kid for whatever happened to you, but all I have to say is: guilt by age.”

Then, clinging his fork to his plate, he stormed from the room.

Duke felt a pang of guilt, but was he supposed to think? Since the rubber band incident, he found worms in his boots, branches on his bed, and feathers actually clogged in his shower—peach feathers. Only Tanya and Mallory had those other than Nosedive, and why would either of them want to get into his room?

*^*^*

Duke was like Santa Claus to Nosedive. The uncle knew when he was sleeping, knew when he was awake, knew if he was bad or good; that didn’t mean the teen would good for goodness sake. In fact, he was just the opposite.

Duke left the kid alone for a moment to get a bowl of popcorn for a movie—oh, and his pillow to rest on—and found his room a mess.

“NOSEDIVE!”

The teen peeked over the spine of the couch when Duke reentered the Main Room, his eyes relaying all his fear. “I didn’t do it! I didn’t do it! I didn’t do it!”

Duke didn’t care. Activating his sword, he came about the couch and tapped the boy on the shoulder. “Get up. Now.”

When Nosedive, instead, attempted to the flee by hopping over the back, Duke snatched him by his hoodie and tugged the boy back. Then, his sword securely under the boy’s beak, the uncle simply said, “We’re going to see your brother.”

“About what? I didn’t do anything!” Nosedive whined as Duke dragged him by his hood all the way to the hanger, where currently Tanya, Canard and Wildwing worked on the vehicles. There, he slammed the boy down on his knees just before Wildwing’s creeper, causing the older brother to slide out from underneath the Migrator.

Wiping his wrench on the dirtied work suit, he arched an eyebrow at his baby brother, then Duke. “Okay, what’d he do now?”

“Nothing! Stars! He won’t believe me!”

Duke deactivated his sword, then put a finger out with each point. “First, he flicked me with rubber bands. Then, he messed my room with worms, honey, and feathers. Now, he completely trashed it! He’s your brother. You deal with it.”

“And you’re his uncle. Don’t you think you could?” Wildwing asked in all honesty, then once more swished underneath the Migrator.

“But you searched for him! Isn’t this something up your alley?”

“And you were supposed to raise him. Wouldn’t that make it up yours?” When Duke hesitated for a moment, Wildwing sighed loudly. “Did you just ask him if he did it, Duke?”

“He said he didn’t.”

“Uh, because I didn’t,” Nosedive interjected.

Wildwing let out a prolonged sigh, then unrolled from under the Migrator. Grabbing his brother’s cheeks and ignoring Nosedive’s sputtered protests, he looked deep into his baby brother’s eyes. “Did you do it?”

“Of course not!”

Wildwing let Nosedive go, then slid under the Migrator again. “He didn’t do it. Look else where.”

Nosedive stuck out his tongue at Duke. “See? Told you!”

“Wait! That’s it?” Duke argued. “You just look into his eyes, and you believe him?”

Duke heard the mental shrug in his older nephew’s voice. “He has this look in his eyes when he’s lying, and it’s not there. You have the wrong drake, Duke.”

Duke scowled and completely ignored Nosedive, so he didn’t have to see the teen’s gloating face, then stormed off to his room. He trusted Wildwing’s opinion, and if Wing said the kid didn’t do it, then the kid didn’t do it.

But then who did?

When the door to his room opened, he searched for clues, anything the perpetrator left behind. He threw his books, his weapons, even the puck he received from Mallory—then found the strands of red hair.

Mallory. Mallory had wrecked his room. But why?

*^*^*

“Okay, what’d I do to you?”

The red-haired duck didn’t seem at all surprised by Duke’s sudden question or entrance into the kitchen, but then again, out of the ducks, she seemed to always know when he came in or out. “It would help if I knew what you were talking about.”

Duke stepped away from the doorway he’d been leaning against and watched her closely as she poured milk into her coffee. “Why did you wreck my room and prank me for the last week or so?”

Her spiteful cringe was too faked to be true. “Uh, did you think that it may have been Nosedive?”

“Wildwing says he didn’t do it, so he didn’t do it. And I found this in my room.” He lifted up her red hair, and she shrugged.

“So, he planted my hair there. Big deal.”

When she turned around, Duke snatched her hand, realizing the stand-offish attitude. “Seriously, Mal,” he asked softly, tenderly, his fingers brushing the feathers on the back her graceful hand, “why?”

Under the touch, she glanced back to him with tears in her eyes, then slapped him across the face. “I saw you with that blond at the signing the other day. You practically invited her to-to…well, y’know!”

“What?” Holding his cheek, shocked and demoralized, he somehow found the strength to laugh. “Are you serious? You were jealous?”

“I wasn’t jealous!” she shouted back. “But…I thought we had an agreement or at least an understanding if not a commitment.”

“When?” he demanded, lunging forward to grab her hand and when she tried to pull away, pulled her against him. “Between the war, between life—”

“So that one night after you told me about Dive—that was just—” She freed a hand and went to slap him again, only for Duke to catch it.

“No, Stars, no, but we don’t know how long we’re be here, and if we ever go back…” He adverted his eyes, afraid to see the truth within hers. “I thought maybe you would want someone more honorable and trustworthy, like Wildwing or Canard.”

This time, her hand cupped his cheek, stopping the hurt and drawing her beak toward his, “Are you kidding?” she whispered. “I’ve always gone for the bad boys, Outlaw.”

*^*^*
As soon as the hanger door shut, Wildwing rolled out from underneath the creeper and glared at Nosedive. “Okay, why’d you do it?”

Nosedive accepted the rag from his brother and wiped the oil as best he could from his feathers. “Aunt Mallory was pissed at him. I thought I’d smooth things over. Hey, you need any help?”

It was a little over five minutes later when Nosedive laid next to his brother on his own creeper that Wildwing gagged.

“Aunt?!”

The End