Well, then I suppose I'd better not leave it up to Lady Fortune, hmm?

[He crouches down so that he's on her level while he's talking to her. While predilection may have been a bit much, he knows that there are a bunch of words of intermediate difficulty he can use that she no longer has any problem with, given how long they've been on the crew together.]

A predilection is a fondness or preference for something, and an obligation refers to duty or responsibility.