Chapter Text
“Hello?”
“Hi, Cap.”
“Humphrey, where the bally hell are you?”
“Err… there’s been a slight change of plan.”
---
In theory, it would be relatively easy to get everyone to Scotland for Alison and Mike’s wedding. The newlyweds-to-be would travel up with Mike’s family a few days before to scope out the venue (a quaint little hotel in Dunbar situated right on the seafront). Then, three days before the big one, most of the gang would follow them up. Julian and Robin – the other two groomsmen besides Obi – would travel in one car with Robin making sure Julian doesn’t drive drunk and Kitty also there to make sure neither of them drive while high. Fanny would drive Mary and Annie, who don’t have a driver’s license between them, as well as Thomas. That left Humphrey, Pat, and the Captain. Pat had his Scouts on Friday evenings and neither Humphrey nor the Captain could get out of work, so the Captain had offered to drive them up the following day.
The thought of spending several hours in a car with two other people would normally make the Captain highly uncomfortable, but he’s become used to Humphrey and Pat. The three of them started hanging out separately from the rest of the group when Humphrey was going through his divorce and didn’t want to be alone but also didn’t want to be overwhelmed by the chaos that usually occurs when the twelve of them get together. More recently, they kept the practice up for Pat’s split from Carol. The other two have joked a few times that the Captain ought to get himself a failed marriage so that they can return the favour, but their grins have always been met with a sharp glare. Nevertheless, the Captain is comfortable around Humphrey and Pat, enough so that he can stomach a long car journey with them.
From what the Captain gathers from the group chat, all has gone to plan so far, so of course everything goes tits up as soon as they come into play.
The Captain arrives at Pat’s house ten minutes early and sends him a message.
Cap: I am outside.
Skipper: Still getting ready, do you want to come in for a cuppa?
Cap: No thank you, feel free to take your time.
Cap: Preferably no longer than eight minutes.
Skipper: Be out in five :)))
This house is a fairly recent development, quite small with no offroad parking, a dated living area downstairs and enough space upstairs for a tiny master bedroom and even tinier spare room for Daley when he stays over. Humphrey and the Captain had helped him find it, across town from the house Carol now lives in with Morris but closer to Scouts. The Captain would never say it out loud, especially not within earshot of Pat, but this house is miserable. It seems to suck the life out of anyone who sets foot in it, although that might be because of the black mould that the Captain suspects is hiding underneath the landlord’s bad paint job. It was a mistake to convince Pat to move here, but Humphrey had wanted to get him back on his feet as soon as possible, like he had done after his divorce. And, well, Pat seems to be holding up alright, which suggests that the space to breathe (even if he may or may not be breathing in mould spores) is doing him good.
Pat doesn’t own a car. At least, not anymore. He claims that he got rid of it for the sake of the environment, and he likes taking public transport anyway because then he gets to peoplewatch, but everyone knows that the real reason is that Carol has it. She really managed to screw poor Pat over in the divorce, keeping the house, the car, and most of the week with Daley. The Captain has no idea how she managed to achieve all that, especially considering what she did. If he weren’t such a gentleman, he would have some extremely choice words to say to her if he ever saw her.
The Captain is parked in the space right outside the house, so he notices the door open and Pat emerge from inside, smiling, straight away. He puts his suitcase in the boot carefully before sliding into the passenger seat. “Morning!” he exclaims.
The Captain hums. “The traffic reports currently don’t show any delays, which is good, but it’s still advantageous to be ahead of schedule.”
“You’re welcome,” Pat says with a smirk. “Although we still need to pick up Humphrey.”
“I’m not concerned about Humphrey,” the Captain replies, “he’s the most punctual man I know. Other than myself.”
“Hey.”
“You come a close third place.”
But as they arrive at the end of the driveway to Humphrey’s estate (yes, estate – he’s always so down to earth that it’s easy to forget how rich he is, knighthood and all), the Captain is surprised to find his car missing from outside his house. Pat apparently has the same thought, as he frowns. “Maybe he’s parked his car round the back,” he suggests, although the way he says it makes it sound more like a question than an answer.
The Captain brings the car to a halt and texts Humphrey that they are outside. Two minutes pass and he doesn’t receive a reply, nor does Humphrey appear from his house. “Where is he?” he mutters under his breath.
“We’re still… six minutes early,” Pat says. “He’s probably still getting ready.”
Six minutes pass and still no Humphrey. At this point, the Captain is very tempted to jump out of the car and start pacing out of stress. Pat glances at him with a sympathetic smile. “I’ll go and knock on the door, shall I?”
“Yes, good plan,” the Captain replies, and he watches Pat as he half-walks, half-jogs to the front door. A part of him is glad that Pat understands the Captain’s need for punctuality. After all, he knows that Pat is also a fan of sticking to a strict schedule. However, another part of him wants to curl up into a ball and hide so that Pat doesn’t have to witness how stressed he’s getting. He really ought to calm himself down. Humphrey’s just a few minutes late, it’s not the end of the world.
“Cap? I don’t think he’s home,” Pat calls from the door.
Okay, maybe it is the end of the world.
His distress must be clearly written on his face because Pat hurries back to the car. “It’s fine, I’m sure Humphrey has a good reason to be out. I’m going to call him, okay?”
The Captain nods and decides that maybe he can indulge in a little pacing. He grabs his cane from the back seat and walks up and down the length of the car while Pat leans against the bonnet with his phone to his ear. “Any luck?”
“It’s still ringing… oh, no. Voicemail.” Pat grimaces.
The Captain lets out a shaky breath and tries to calm his nerves. “I don’t believe this,” he mutters. “This isn’t one of your silly little meetings, this is Alison and Michael’s wedding!” He winces as soon as he says it. Lord knows Pat doesn’t deserve him losing his temper at him for something that isn’t his fault. “Now we’ll hit traffic at the Dartford crossing, the A1 will be busy, and we won’t reach Scotland until after midnight!”
“Alright, Cinderella,” Pat snorts. “Wait, hang on, did you just say the Dartford crossing? Why are we going that way?”
“Because I have already compared the routes, and the anticlockwise route is half an hour quicker.”
“But the anticlockwise route has the Dartford crossing, which is always chocka. Plus, the clockwise route has Cobham services.”
The Captain scowls and draws himself up to his full height, the grip on his cane tightening. “We are not wasting time stopping at a service station less than an hour from here. Additionally, there will no doubt be queues for Heathrow, as well as Luton if we take the M1. And that’s not even considering how busy the junction between the M25 and the M1 will be. As the driver, I am making an executive decision on our route.”
Pat wrinkles his nose, which tells the Captain that he’s getting rather worked up over this. “You’re not the only one doing the driving here, mate.” That is true. Thanks to his knee injury, he can only drive for around three hours at a time before he starts getting uncomfortable, so he had planned to split the driving between the three of them. But that’s not important right now.
“Well, I own the car!” the Captain says triumphantly. “Therefore, I have final say and I say we are taking the anticlockwise route.”
Pat opens his mouth to reply, or possibly call the Captain a wazzock, when the Captain’s phone rings. The screen displays an unflattering picture of Humphrey from last year’s Christmas party, and the Captain presses the ‘accept’ button so quickly that he almost drops the phone on the gravel.
“Hello?” he says, just in case the person on the other end of the line isn’t Humphrey and is in fact a kind stranger who found Humphrey’s phone on his dead body after he’d been brutally murdered in the street and called the first number in his contacts to inform them of Humphrey’s tragic end.
“Hi, Cap,” says a very much alive Humphrey on the other end of the line.
“Humphrey, where the bally hell are you?”
Humphrey takes a moment to reply. “Err… there’s been a slight change of plan.”
“I’m not going!” someone cries nearby on Humphrey’s line, someone with a familiar voice.
“Yes, you are!” Humphrey says firmly. “Sorry, we’ve been having a situation over here.”
“‘Over here’? What is your location? Because it definitely isn’t your house,” the Captain snaps.
Humphrey sighs. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry I’m not there and you’re running, what, ten minutes behind schedule? But here’s the thing. I got a message from Fanny last night that Thomas didn’t show up to hers yesterday, and when she swung by his house he refused to come out. He doesn’t want to go to the wedding – something about losing the love of his life forever, I dunno – so I’ve gone over to try and convince him to come.”
“Oh, for…” Trust Thorne to put a spanner in the works. The Captain thinks for a moment. “Alright, we will drive over and pick you up in fifteen.” At least Thomas’ house is en route to the motorway. He really would rather not spend the journey in the poet’s company, but in times of crisis one must be prepared to make sacrifices. Pat raises an eyebrow at him, and the Captain gestures in a way that he hopes Pat can interpret as ‘I’ll tell you in a moment’.
“Ooh, I think this might take a bit longer than fifteen minutes,” Humphrey says.
“I told you, I’m not going. And I’m certainly not going in the Captain’s car,” he can hear Thomas exclaim, and he rolls his eyes. The bally nerve.
“Look, why don’t you two go on ahead? I’ve got my car with me, and like I said, this might take a while. You may as well get a head start on the traffic. I’ll just meet you in Scotland with the rest of the gang.”
The Captain blinks, suddenly feeling a knot of anxiety tighten in his stomach. “Are… are you sure?”
“Yes!” Humphrey replies. “You guys won’t kill each other, right?”
“… Right.” No promises, considering the argument that they had just been having.
“What’s going on?” Pat whispers, but the Captain waves him away.
“You’ll be fine, Cap,” Humphrey says, almost as if he can read the Captain’s thoughts.
“No, I’m not concerned about Patrick and myself, I’m more worried about you. Are you sure you can handle several hours in a confined space with Thomas Thorne?”
Humphrey chuckles. “I’ll have to drag him into my car first. But I will get it done. I’ll have him bound and sedated if I have to.”
The Captain hears a gasp on the other end. “You will do nothing of the sort, sir!” Thomas says.
“Alright, I should go,” Humphrey says. “Good luck.”
“You too,” the Captain replies. “See you in Scotland.”
“See you in Scotland.”
Pat starts asking questions before the Captain even hangs up. “What was that? Where’s Humphrey? What was he saying about Thomas? Is he still coming with us?”
“Humphrey is driving Thomas up because he got cold feet about Alison’s wedding,” the Captain replies, opening the car door and sitting down.
“Thomas?”
“Yes. Something about losing the love of his life forever. His words, not mine. Well, actually, they were technically Humphrey’s words.”
Pat frowns. “So… he’s not coming with us?”
“No,” the Captain sighs. “I’m afraid we are on our own.”