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Someone is screaming.
Lucifer can’t tell who it is, but it makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. It’s been centuries since the cries of the damned had left him anything other than cold, which only fuels his growing sense that something is very, very wrong.
He groans as he pushes himself up from the ground. Little shocks of lightning leave trails of agony in their wake as they rush across his skin.
What the fuck happened? He remembers hauling himself out of the glass bowl-box thing that the TV-head demon had stuck him in, and that all of Pride seemed to be celebrating, even though it looked like massive swaths of the city had been reduced to rubble. Then the snake-sinner that Adam killed had been talking to them from a massive screen, only he was a Winner in Heaven now, and ho-ly shit, wasn’t that just a kick in the head? Charlie had been right all along.
Then there was a strange humming sound. Lucifer had turned his head towards it and found himself looking down the business end of a busted-up machine as it began to glow with a familiar golden-white light. There'd been a flash, and then the rest of his memories came in flickers.
The ozone-like smell of angelic power.
The stench of burnt flesh.
The screams.
“Alastor! Oh, my God, Alastor…!”
Charlie’s shrill cry cuts through the chaos, and suddenly, Lucifer doesn’t want to know what happened anymore. He wants to go back to the safety of his workshop and his ducks and never face whatever it was that made his daughter’s voice sound like that.
Instead, he staggers to her side.
A strange, detached sort of calm settles over Lucifer as he takes in the scene. It feels like he’s looking at a piece of contemporary “high art,” the meaning of which remains just beyond his grasp, rather than a sinner writhing in a growing pool of blood.
Alastor is in a bad way.
Very bad.
“Sera. Emily. Please. You have to help him!”
Charlie’s voice sounds miles away even though she is standing right beside him, begging the seraphim for help. Lucifer can’t hear if they answer, but he doesn’t need to. He knows they can’t help him, that their power would only hasten his inevitable end. Maybe that would be a kindness, though: the fact that Alastor isn’t already dead seems closer to a punishment than a miracle. Surely he won’t be denied the mercy of second death for much longer, not when his screams are already fading to hoarse moans.
After all, there is no way a sinner could survive contact with the most potent angelic power in all of Hell: his own.
“Dad.”
Lucifer hears his daughter, but finds that he can’t look away from the fresh wave of gore that sluices down Alastor's temples from the corners of his eyes.
Well, what’s left of them, anyway.
Something grabs his shoulders, and suddenly Lucifer finds himself looking into Charlie’s face. “Please,” she begs through the cracks in her tears, “please help him.”
Lucifer tries to get all the gears in his brain spinning. What could he do to help Alastor? He’d always thought he couldn’t do anything to sinners. He couldn’t hurt them, at least, and not for lack of trying.
“I…” Lucifer rubs his arm. “I don’t know…”
It’s been centuries since he’s healed anything more significant than one of Charlie’s scraped knees, and right now, the bones of Alastor’s forearm are winking at him through the missing chunks of muscle as the sinner struggles to push himself up from the ground. Lucifer barely manages to stumble forward in time to stop him from smashing his face against the ground once his strength fails. He tries to pull him into his arms, but it seems like the sinner has no intention of going quietly into the dark. He’s all teeth and claws as he struggles against Lucifer, snarling like a wounded beast.
“Fuck!” Lucifer curses as he nearly loses a finger to Alastor’s gnashing teeth. “Alastor! It’s—fuck—it’s just me! Stop! Fucking—Alastor, stop!”
The struggle ends quickly, but despite being the strongest being in Hell, Lucifer is still panting by the time he wrestles a spent and shaking Alastor halfway into his lap. He licks the sweat off his upper lip. “Okay. There we go. Let’s just… see what we’ve got here.”
The answer, Lucifer quickly realizes, is not much.
Alastor’s eyes are, for all intents and purposes, gone, and the wound on his chest leers at him from between the edges of his ruined shirt. Lucifer catches a whiff of the sweet foulness of rot and the tang of angelic power, and fuck, is this wound from Adam?
Lucifer narrowly manages to swallow back a sudden rush of bile. He can’t do this. Why the fuck is he even trying? He doesn’t even know if he can heal sinners. God knows he’s never had cause to try. For all he’s concerned, Alastor is just another failed creation who abused the gift Lucifer had tried to give mankind. He is just a shitty bellhop who made his days unbearable and who sometimes shared a drink with him on the nights when sleep didn’t come for either of them, who could make a piano sing so beautifully that it almost makes Lucifer jealous. He is—
Alastor’s trembling hand finds his wrist. “Lucifer?”
—dying.
Holy fuck, Alastor is dying.
“I’ve got you,” he murmurs as he calls on what remains of his power. “Just you and me, Bambi. We’ve got this. Just stay with me.”
Time trickles by like the sweat that plasters Lucifer’s hair to his forehead as he sends his power into Alastor’s body as fast as he can, trying to fix everything at once, but there’s just so much hurt, and everything feels like too little, too late. He doesn’t even know if he’s making any progress under all that blood.
It’s too much.
It’s not enough.
Alastor goes limp in his arms.
“No no no no.” Lucifer runs his words together as he maneuvers Alastor’s unresisting head into the crook of his arm. “Alastor! C’mon. Don’t do this.”
Sweat stings his eyes as he forces whatever is left of himself into Alastor’s failing body, and he realizes how little there is left to give. It feels like he’s being hollowed out. He’s never experienced anything like it in all his millennia of existence, but still he keeps pushing. He wonders if this is how mortals feel when they are dying. As his wings and horns burst from his body, he wonders if he can die. He sees someone grab his wrist, but he can’t feel it. He realizes he can’t feel anything: not hot blood seeping into his ruined trousers or Alastor’s dead weight.
The sky and the ground switch places. There’s a moment of darkness, and then Lucifer is panting up at a ceiling that takes him at least five seconds longer than it should to recognize. He covers his eyes with his hands, feeling sick and shivery, his freshly healed wounds throbbing in time with his thundering pulse. The fact that he, an eternal being who’s seldom known so much as a sniffle for nigh a thousand years (that one terrible bout of feather flu notwithstanding), is still not at one hundred percent even after nearly a week of almost nothing but bed rest, is… a lot. After all, the last time he’d sustained an injury that lasted more than a nanosecond was the Fall, and that’s not exactly a memory he is keen to revisit.
Not that the memory of Alastor actively dying in his arms is any better.
Taking one last deep breath, Lucifer begins to extricate himself from his tangled bed linens, growing more aware of how his pajamas cling to his rapidly cooling sweat. A hot shower sounds like bliss, but he’ll have to settle for some magical ablutions. He’s got an appointment at ten that he needs to keep—and then there's that little surprise for a certain someone he needs to deliver before that. With a snap of his fingers, he’s fresh as a daisy and dressed in his usual attire, minus his tailcoat and top hat. There isn't any need to get all dressed up in his own home, after all.
The click of his boots on the marble floor echoes up to the vaulted ceiling as he makes his way down the hall. God, if Alastor could see this, he’d definitely accuse Lucifer of compensating for something. He’d be one thousand percent correct, of course—and on multiple levels, too. Honestly, the palace had been far too big even when they were a family of three, but it was ridiculous now that it was essentially a bachelor pad.
Well, a bachelor pad-turned-convalescent home.
Husker had warned them that it would be too dangerous to keep Alastor at the hotel in his condition. All of Pride had seen him fall, and with the hotel overrun with sinners looking for a shot at redemption now that Sir Pentious’ heavenly broadcast had provided proof of concept, it would be far too easy for any wannabe overlord to sneak in and finish the job—and maybe take a shot at the King while he recovered from being an angelic battery.
The palace, it was decided, was the natural solution. The entire place was practically dripping with wards and spells to keep out anyone who wasn’t a member of the royal family, which effectively meant that it would just be Lucifer and Alastor.
The only problem with that plan, as Lucifer had been quick to point out, was that it would just be him and Alastor.
“Are you sure about this?” Lucifer had asked from his bed during their emergency “staff meeting” in his room, still wrapped in swaths of bandages. “Because unless that blast changed his personality, I’m pretty sure the guy still hates me. Hey, what if Niffty comes to the palace, too? He actually likes her, and I could adjust the spells so she could stay.”
“It’s too much of a risk after—” Vaggie cut herself off, looking uncomfortable.
“You can say it,” Husker said from his place leaning against the wall by the door. “After what happened with Angel. The last thing we need is someone spying on the boss.”
Lucifer looked to Charlie. “Honey, maybe you could—?”
Charlie shook her head.
“I’ve got to stay here, at the hotel,” she said, gently taking her father’s bandaged hands. “Please, Dad. I know you can do this. Please?”
Lucifer had caved immediately after that.
He stops outside one of the palace guest rooms and arranges his face in his sunniest smile, if only for his own benefit, and knocks a cheerful “shave and a haircut” on the door. He waits a moment even though he's learned by now not to expect a response and then lets himself in.
“Morning, Alastor!” Lucifer says as he closes the door behind him with what he hopes is an acceptable amount of cheeriness.
Alastor is exactly where he'd left him the night before, sitting in a wingback chair in the corner of the room with his IV pole standing sentinel by his side. The bed looks untouched, as does the plate of jambalaya he’d left him for dinner the night before. His ears pin back at Lucifer’s approach.
“How’d you sleep?” Lucifer asks.
“Fine.”
The shadows under the empty chasms of his eyes tell a different story. He looks like a consumptive from a Charles Dickens novel.
Lucifer clears his throat. “Do you want some coffee? Or, I could make some—”
“No.”
Lucifer had known that getting along with Alastor wasn’t going to be easy, but he hadn’t thought it would be this hard, either. And for the record, Lucifer had been more than prepared to cut him some major, major slack. Waking up to learn that you had no eyeballs left to speak of and that you were effectively under house arrest until your only chance of ever seeing again had recovered enough to try to pull off a literal miracle in Hell would have been a hard pill for anyone to swallow, let alone for someone with the personality of a wet cat.
But not even Alastor’s terse, one-word answers can get to him today. He’s got an ace up his sleeve this morning. He’s sure of it.
“I have a surprise for you,” Lucifer all but sings, unable to contain himself a moment longer.
A sliver of Alastor’s black gum makes an appearance beneath his curled upper lip. “Don’t.”
“Aw, c’mon, Al. I think you’re really going to like this one.”
Lucifer pointedly ignores the growl rumbling in Alastor’s throat and, just a few minutes later, Lucifer practically beams as the first mellow strains of I’m Gettin' Sentimental Over You echo from the sound horn of a Victrola. An actual antique, Earth-made, honest-to-God Victrola. Sure, it had cost him a pretty penny, but the royal coffers had just been collecting dust, and Ozzie had made sure he’d gotten a good—
“Turn that off at once,” Alastor hisses.
Lucifer nearly drops the dust jacket. “What? I thought you liked Tommy Dorsey!”
Alastor’s ears pin back as he grips the arms of his chair so hard the wood creaks ominously. “I said, turn it off.”
Lucifer hesitates. “Alastor, buddy. You’ve been sitting in silence for days. C’mon, let’s just listen to some music, okay? I’ve got a bunch of other records if you’re not in the mood for Tommy Dorsey. I’ve got Gershwin, Charlie Parker—”
“Turn. It. Off.”
“Fine! Don’t blow a fuse. Jeez.” Lucifer carefully lifts the needle from the record and switches off the turntable before banishing the machine altogether. He huffs a laugh to cover the sting of yet another failure. “You’re a real killjoy, you know that? See if I ever try to do anything nice for you again.”
Alastor tilts his head to that side in that arch, bitchy way of his. “Is that a promise?”
Lucifer grits his teeth so hard that he swears he hears a molar crack. Better that than say something he’s bound to regret. “Look, Al—”
“One would require functioning eyes for that, sire.”
Lucifer runs a hand down his face. He honestly considers just leaving the room, but it’s almost time for their 10 AM check-up with Belphegor, and he has to be there to open the portal.
“Okay, okay. No more surprises. I promise.”
Not that he has any ideas left at this point. Lucifer has made every effort to make Alastor’s time in confinement as pleasant as possible. He really has. But every single gesture of goodwill and—dare he say it—kindness has only made Alastor double down on being the biggest asshole in all of Hell. He’s made it abundantly clear that he has no interest in small talk of any kind or in being read to from books or even the daily paper. He flat-out rejected the idea of having a television brought into the room, although that really wasn’t much of a surprise. A stroll in the palace’s inner garden was also a big no. But Lucifer had been certain that Victrola would be a hit. Alastor loves music and anything from his time, so listening to the Sentimental Gentleman of Swing on vinyl should have been just the thing to cheer him up!
He just hopes that Bel’s checkup ends with some good news for a change. God knows they could both use it.
He pulls his phone out of his pocket and checks the time. Three minutes left. He rocks back and forth on the balls of his feet.
“...you sure you don’t want a coffee?”
“Yes!”
“Okay! Alright! No coffee, got it.”
Lucifer opens the portal two minutes early just to give himself something to do.
“Is everything alright?” Belphegor asks when she shuffles in at ten on the dot. For the Sin of Sloth, she’s surprisingly punctual.
“Hey, Bel,” Lucifer greets with perhaps a little bit too much enthusiasm, drawing out the vowels just for the satisfaction of watching Alastor’s ears pin to his head. He knows it’s childish, but he’s still smarting over the whole Victrola failure. “We’re just peachy.”
“Alastor? How are you feeling?” She sets her bag down by his chair and takes out a fresh IV bag of unholy water and painkillers.
“Fine,” says Alastor, face pointedly turned away from both of them.
Belphegor raises an eyebrow at Lucifer, but Lucifer just shakes his head. Letting the matter drop, she pulls a pair of latex gloves on her topmost set of hands and turns to Alastor. “I’d like to examine you now, if that’s alright.”
Lucifer turns away to give Alastor some privacy, but he still hears the little hitches of breath and muffled groans of pain that slip out. God, Lucifer hopes that Bel is being generous with the painkillers. Considering how much this all sucked for him, he can’t even imagine how much pain Alastor would be in without them.
“Still no signs of natural regeneration in your angelic injuries, but the wound on your forearm is healing nicely,” Belphegor announces a few minutes later as she strips off her gloves. “Still, I’d like to keep you on the unholy water drip for at least another day as a precaution.”
“Yes, my Lady,” Alastor replies.
“Alright, then.” She turns to Lucifer and opens all three of her eyes wide. “Let’s begin your check-up, Lucifer.”
Even after a week, he’s still not completely used to the itchiness that comes with being looked at in multiple diagnostic spectrums all at once. It’s a cool trick, but it’s a little uncomfortable knowing that Charlie’s godmother can definitely tell if he has any spinach left over from yesterday’s dinner still stuck in his teeth just by looking at him.
“Excellent,” Belphegor announces, eyelids lowering into her normal sleepy expression. “Your injuries have healed nicely, and there seems to have been no lasting damage. How are you feeling in terms of your power?”
“Better,” Lucifer says. “I think it’s pretty much back to normal?”
“You might find that you tire more easily if you expend a great deal at once, but this should also improve with time. I think it would be wise to wait a little longer before attempting his eyes, but I think you can try healing Alastor’s chest wound if you’re feeling up to it.”
Lucifer’s face lights up. “Holy shit, really? That’s great! Al, did you hear that? I can try fixing you!”
Alastor’s only answer is silence.
“Al? I said I can—”
“I heard you,” he snaps through a crooked smile. His hands tighten on the arms of the chair, and his ears pin so hard against his head that they almost disappear. “I don’t want you to.”
Lucifer blinks. He knows every language ever uttered by man, but he has absolutely no idea what Alastor is saying right now. “What?”
Alastor’s throat works around a swallow. “It will not be necessary. Not today, thank you.”
Lucifer looks to Belphegor for help, but she looks just as bewildered as he feels. “This is what we’ve been waiting for—for me to get strong enough to heal you. Why don’t you want to do this?”
Alastor bristles. “What I do or don’t do is my prerogative. I don’t owe you an explanation.”
It takes Lucifer a full five seconds to pick his jaw up off the floor after that one.
“I’m sorry, Bel, but would you excuse us for today?” he asks, opening a portal for her. Belphegor sighs, but gathers her things. Alastor’s life isn’t in immediate danger, and if Lucifer is keen to try and talk some sense into her recalcitrant patient, then she’s more than happy to let him try.
“I’ll be back tomorrow,” she says on her way out.
Lucifer waits until she and the portal are gone before rounding on the Radio Demon. “Alastor, what the actual fuck?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Don’t play dumb. Why don’t you want me to heal you?”
“I would like to explore other options.”
“Other—do you even hear yourself right now? There are no other options. You heard Bel. You’re not healing.”
“There is no proof that this will even work.”
“Sure. Okay, fine, I’ll give you that point. But the fact that your chest is still being held closed by stitches, like, what, four months later, is proof that you’re not going to get better on your own. If you just let me—”
Lucifer takes a step forward, and Alastor growls at the sound of his approach. “Don’t you dare touch me.”
“Al, buddy, pal, work with me here a second. I know that you don’t like me, okay? And I get that there’s no guarantee that I can heal you, but I did manage to keep you alive, plus you're gonna be stuck with me in this palace until we at least try, so just… help me understand what’s going on here. Please?”
Alastor’s smile twists and flattens as he wrestles with whatever it is that’s in his mind before he finally opens his mouth.
“I want to take a bath.”
Lucifer blinks. “What?”
“I want. To take. A bath.”
Lucifer’s head drops forward in defeat. Then again, maybe a bath is actually a good idea. Lucifer knows first-hand how a good, hot shower can help untangle messy thoughts and feelings. Considering Alastor’s been enduring Bel’s sponge baths for the better part of a week, maybe a little tub time is just what Alastor needs to actually start talking.
“Okay, Bambi,” Lucifer says, rolling up his sleeves. “Let’s get you into the tub, then. Be nice, and maybe I’ll let you borrow one of my rubber ducks.”
“That will not be necessary.”
Lucifer sighs. “Fine. No ducks for you, then. Spoilsport.”
“I meant that I will not be requiring your assistance.”
“Excuse me?”
“I believe you heard me just fine. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”
“Whoa, hold on!” Lucifer rushes over as Alastor rises from the chair. “If you don’t want me helping you, then we can call Bel back instead.”
“As if I would ever let a woman see me in a state of undress,” Alastor scoffs. His balance is shaky, but his legs hold. He gropes for his IV pole, missing it by a few inches.
“You are being absolutely ridiculous. She is a doctor, for fuck’s sake. She’s seen a hell of a lot worse than your bare ass, I promise you. Just let me—”
“Absolutely not. I am more than capable of bathing myself.”
“The hell you are!” Lucifer feels the back of his neck getting hot. “You're gonna break your neck, and I really don’t want to add one more thing to the list of parts of you that I need to fix. Al, you’re—you can’t see, and you’re barely strong enough to—”
A screech of microphone feedback bounces off the wall the moment Lucifer grabs Alastor by the wrist. Alastor’s neck cracks at an unnatural angle, and Lucifer can imagine the radio dials that should have been staring back at him.
“Let. Me. Go.”
That fucking does it. Lucifer may have once been an angel, but he was never a saint.
“You know what? Fine. Sure. Mr. Big Bad Radio Demon’s got it all figured out. Doesn’t need any help from anybody. Go ahead and knock yourself out, buddy. I’m done being your goddamn keeper.”
Lucifer's first order of business upon portalling himself back to his own room is to throw himself on his bed and scream into a giant duck plushie. What the fuck is that guy’s problem? Why does he insist on being such an incalcitrant asshole now when they are right on the cusp of hopefully getting him healed?
What is Lucifer missing?
Because that’s the issue here, and he knows it. Alastor is a prideful asshole, sure, but he’s not stupid. He’d never do anything that wasn’t in his own self-interest, but what the fuck does he have to gain from biting the hand that wants to help him?
Lucifer rolls off the duck with a groan, already regretting his little outburst. Not that Alastor didn’t deserve a good dressing down—being injured didn’t give him carte blanche to be unreasonable—but it definitely hasn’t done anything to improve their strained relationship. Lucifer probably shouldn’t have left him alone, either, especially when something was clearly not right. He wondered how his attempts at bathing were going.
It was probably fine. Alastor was a grown man and an overlord. He could handle taking a bath by himself, even if he were blind. There was no reason to worry. It wasn’t like he’d go back to the room later and find bits of Bambi brain all over the bathroom.
Ooh, that’s a fun bit of alliteration.
Bits of Bambi brain all over the bathroom.
…fuck.
Lucifer nearly breaks his own neck as he stumbles into Alastor’s room before the portal is fully open, nearly crashing into the wreckage of what once was Alastor’s chair. The gashes in the upholstery were clearly made by claws, but all that’s left of their owner is the bent IV pole lying on the floor and the bloody needle beside it.
Okay, fuck. That’s… not great.
The hiss of the shower filters in through the bathroom door, and Lucifer holds his breath. Maybe the whole washing up thing was going to work out okay. Hell, he'd love for that to be the case. Maybe that’s all Alastor had needed: a chance to blow off a little steam and get a win after taking so many losses.
Lucifer still clings to that hope even when he hears what sounds like some bottles being knocked to the ground.
But the sound of metal striking porcelain, followed by a heavy thud?
That has Lucifer nearly tearing the door off its hinges in his haste to open it.
“Alastor!”
Alastor’s head jerks up off the floor in the direction of his voice before he redoubles his efforts to untangle himself from the shower curtain. “Get out.”
Lucifer winces as one of Alastor’s claws cuts through the curtain and straight into his own flesh. The blood mixes with the water from the showerhead, which has presumably been knocked cockeyed by the downed shower rod. “Oh, jeez, Al. Hang on, let me—”
“Don’t touch me!” Alastor seethes among the fallen toiletries. “Do you enjoy this, sire? Seeing me brought low? Blind. Weak. Reduced to cowering in a gilded cage, helpless but for your mercy like some crippled beast. This must be terribly entertaining for you!”
“I don’t—Alastor, it’s not—”
“I don’t need you, you or your poisoned kindness!” Alastor pushes himself up to sit, his lower half still trapped by the curtain. A needle appears between his fingers, and Lucifer watches with horror as he tries to thread it with a strand of glowing green magic that is a perfect match for the stitches appearing on his body. Fuck, they’re everywhere. Lucifer spots no less than half a dozen just on the parts of Alastor he can see, and that’s not even counting the terrible ones keeping his trembling lips pulled back into a rictus grin.
“I refuse to be anyone’s fucking pet again,” he says as the thread misses the eye of the needle again and again. “Not now. I’ll fix this. I won’t wear a chain again, not even yours. I won’t!”
Lucifer takes a step forward, and Alastor jerks at the sound as though he’d forgotten he wasn’t alone, dropping the needle onto the floor.
“Get out!” he all but sobs, feeling the floor around him for the needle. His hand brushes against a bottle of shampoo.
“Al, I swear, I just want to help you.”
“Get out, damn you.”
“Al, I just—!”
“Get out!”
The bottle doesn’t even come close to hitting him, but Lucifer still flinches. It strikes the wall behind him and bursts on impact, filling the air with the scent of apples. Alastor’s hand hovers in the air. He’s breathing far too fast.
“...Lucifer? Lucif—!”
Lucifer wraps his arms around Alastor before his voice can finish climbing to that unfamiliar fourth from where it usually sits. He feels Alastor shaking. Hell, he feels a little shaky himself: the memories of the last time he called him by his name still reek of blood.
“I’m here. I’m right here. It’s okay.”
Alastor opens his mouth, but all that comes out are terrible wheezing sounds.
“It’s okay,” Lucifer soothes as they kneel together in the cold water on the floor. With a blink, he frees Alastor from his vinyl prison in favor of a plush bath towel. “I’m here. Just try to breathe, okay?”
Alastor shakes his head, caught between pushing Lucifer away and pulling him closer. “Can’t. Can’t breathe!”
“You can. You’re alright. I promise,” Lucifer soothes, but it’s quickly apparent that Alastor isn’t going to be able to box-breathe his way out of this if the ominous glow of those stitches is any indication. He needs to do something before Alastor’s panic attack turns into a full-blown eldritch crash out. Fortunately for him, Lucifer has centuries of experience dealing with the particular flavor of Hell. He just hopes that he’s about to do the right thing. Christ, he’d even pray if he thought that anyone would listen.
“Upsy-daisy, Bambi,” he says, gathering Alastor into his arms. It’s no easy task. Alastor might weigh next to nothing (a concern that Lucifer will be addressing post-crisis), but he’s all lank-limbed and shaking hard enough to come apart at the seams—no pun intended.
“Do you feel hot or cold?”
Alastor presses his forehead against the top of Lucifer’s head. A thin whine whistles in his throat.
“I know. I know this sucks, but you’ve gotta help me help you.
Alastor’s fingers twist into the back of his shirt. “C-cold.”
“Good. That’s great, Alastor. You’re doing great. Just hold on a little bit more.”
Lucifer uses his power to nudge the shower head back into position and make sure it’s running nice and hot before sitting down at the far end of the tub, fully clothed, with Alastor in his lap.
“Shh,” he soothes when Alastor jerks at the feeling of the shower spray against his back, dimming the lights to a gentle glow. “You’re okay. You’re having a panic attack. It’s okay.”
“It’s not,” Alastor wheezes through chattering teeth. “I’m sorry. I—”
“Just breathe with me. You’re fine.”
Lucifer models slow, calm breaths until Alastor’s hitching gasps gradually steady and lengthen.
“There you go,” Lucifer whispers, running his thumb over the soft, short hairs at the nape of his neck. “There you go. Just like that.”
Alastor sags against him, breathing deep and heavy against his neck, and just like that, the green stitches fade out of sight. Lucifer feels like he’s just tipped his head back against the tub to catch his own breath when Alastor stirs and tries to pull away.
“Hey, hey,” Lucifer whispers, tightening his hold on him ever so slightly. “Give yourself a minute. You just went on a hell of a ride there.”
Alastor’s ears pin back for just a moment before he forces them back up. “I would prefer it if you just got on with it.”
Lucifer isn’t surprised at all when he sounds a little out of it. He can still feel tremors running under his skin like an electrical current. Hell, maybe he really did blow a fuse. “I’m not even going to pretend that I know what you’re talking about.”
“Surely you don’t intend to let such insolence go unpunished.”
“You weren’t insolent. You were overwhelmed. I’m not going to punish you for that. I am gonna make you talk about it, though. Was gonna wait until you’d rested up a little more, but you’ll probably just worry yourself into another tizzy.”
Alastor’s lips pull back over his teeth. “So you mean to mock me, then?”
“For what? Having a panic attack? Buddy, do you have any idea who you’re talking to? As if I had any right to throw stones about panic attacks. But to answer your question, no, I absolutely have no intention of mocking you about this. Any of this. And in case it wasn’t clear, seeing you like this abso-fucking-lutely not entertaining. Not in the slightest.”
Alastor’s sneer fades, but Lucifer can practically feel him wrestling with what he’s said, turning each word over and over again, looking for the trap he’s sure is hidden there. He slowly pats his back. “Breathe, Al.”
“Why would you help me?”
“Maybe for the same reason you call me by my name when you're scared?”
Alastor’s smile goes crooked, and his ears finally press down against his head. Lucifer notices, however, that the stag does not try to pull away—and that he looks pretty cute with that shade of pink dusted across the bridge of his nose.
“You are mocking me.”
“I’m not. I swear to my Father I’m not. I don’t want to mock you or put you on a chain or in a cage or anything like that.”
“Then what do you want in return for this?”
“Nothing. No offense, but I have nothing to gain from making deals with sinners.”
“Then you lack imagination. I need something that only you can provide. Only a fool would not use that as leverage.”
“I’ll amend my title, then. Lucifer Morningstar: Prince of the Pit and King of the Fools.”
Alastor scoffs. He flicks his ears, sending water flying. “I had no idea the devil was so kind-hearted.”
Lucifer can tell that he means it as an insult, but he doesn’t take the bait. Debating whether he is or isn’t won’t change anything, and it certainly won’t ease any suspicions that all of this is an elaborate trap. Lucifer feels like he is trying to lure an injured deer out from the cold, one that has learned the hard way that the most delicious food often lies at the center of the hunter’s snare.
“How about we make a deal, then?”
That certainly gets Alastor’s attention. He can practically feel his heart jump from his chest into his throat.
“What kind of deal?” he asks, his polished showman’s drawl almost covering his fear.
Almost.
“You let me help you in exchange for having an occasional drink with me after everyone else has gone to bed.”
Alastor gapes at him. “You cannot be serious.”
“I’ll shake on it and everything.”
“You are attempting to orchestrate a miracle in Hell on my behalf, and all you want in return is my company and alcohol?”
“Good alcohol. None of that moonshine stuff you had in the twenties.”
Lucifer wonders if Alastor knows that his ears practically broadcast the progression of his thoughts. They run through suspicion, triumph, doubt, and curiosity before settling into confusion.
“I don’t understand you,” he said at last.
Lucifer laughs softly. “You should probably consider yourself lucky.” He clears his throat as his horns appear on his head, flame and all. “I, Lucifer Morningstar, first beloved of God, hereby agree to attempt to heal the sinner Alastor in exchange for his joining me at the hotel bar when the mood strikes him.” He pauses. “Is it a deal?”
As Alastor’s hand slid into his own, Lucifer prayed that he’d be able to live up to his name and bring the light back into Alastor’s world.
“Deal.”
Lucifer knows exactly who’s at his bedroom door when he hears a knock late at night, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a surprise to see Alastor.
“Hey, Al. Everything okay?”
“Yes, I—” Alastor’s ears droop slightly. “My apologies. Did I wake you?”
“No, no. I was just doing a little light reading before bed,” Lucifer answers. Weighing in at nearly four pounds as a paperback, there is absolutely nothing light about The Human Eye: Structure and Function lying open on his desk. Lucifer steps aside. “C’mon in. Maybe you can quiz me about the parts of the lacrimal system.”
“While that sounds like an awfully good time, alas, I have not been able to master Braille in a week,” Alastor replies as he enters cane-first, tapping his way towards his usual chair. He’s already doing quite well at navigating the palace with his cane—except for that incident in the service hallway which both of them agreed they’d never speak about.
“How about I just implant the information right in your brain, then?” Lucifer teases.
“If you had such an ability, why not use it on yourself and remove the burden of studying?”
“....okay, yeah, good point,”
Alastor chuckles as his cane taps the chair. Guiding himself with his hands, he carefully takes a seat. “I’ve been known to make one from time to time.”
“So,” Lucifer says, crossing to sit opposite Alastor on his bed, “what’s up, Bambi?”
“Oh, nothing. Just… wanted to see how you were getting along. Tomorrow is the big day, after all!”
“Yeah.” Lucifer plays with his hands in his lap. “Tell me about it.”
“What’s this?” Alastor asks, leaning hard into his radio host shtick. “Could it possibly be that the King of Hell is nervous?”
“You bet your white-tailed ass I’m nervous. How could I not be nervous? Yeah, sure, we’ve been following Bel’s protocol and all systems are as go as they’re gonna get, but, fuck. These are your eyes, Alastor.”
Lucifer takes a deep breath. Fallen or not, Lucifer is still an angel, and the nature of his power is anathema to Alastor’s. Asking his body to house an angelically grown organ permanently was an order of magnitude more difficult than enduring an angelic healing for a few hours—and that’s assuming that Lucifer can even make a pair of eyes that are compatible with Alastor’s body. To mitigate the risk of rejection, Bel had them follow a protocol based on the immunosuppressant regimen mortals used before undergoing an organ transplant. They’d spent a week doing what Lucifer referred to as “magic playdates” where Lucifer exposed gradually higher levels of his power to Alastor’s. It had been rough going at first. Alastor’s power, a smart and wild thing, did not take kindly to the angelic intruder. In time, however, they’d reached a truce, then a kind of understanding, and finally Belphegor had greenlit the procedure.
Lucifer can only hope that it will be enough. Hell, he’d even pray if he thought anyone would listen.
“I apologize,” Alastor says, and Lucifer wonders how long he’s been silent, lost in his own thoughts. “I shouldn’t have—”
“No, no. Sorry, I got lost in there for a minute. You’re fine. We’ll be fine.” Lucifer takes another deep breath. “And if it doesn’t work, we’ll figure something else out. I swear.”
Alastor cocks his head to the side. “Like what?”
“I don’t know. Something. Maybe you could, I don’t know, do that thing that bats do and just scream at things.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You know what I’m talking about. The thing where they scream at things in the dark and then the sound waves bounce back so they know where the things are.”
“...ecolocation?”
Lucifer beams. “Yeah! That!”
The angle of Alastor’s raised eyebrow is sharp enough to kill a man. “Are you mocking me?”
“Wha—no! No, no, no, I’m serious. You’re the Radio Demon, right? You could maybe learn to use sound waves to “see” stuff— combine it with that whole melt-into-the-shadows thing you do, because I bet you don’t, like, see normally when you do that.”
Alastor gapes, visibly struggling to find the words to reply. “Lucifer Morningstar, that is—”
Just when Lucifer is certain that he is about to be torn apart by the lion’s teeth, Alastor softens into a lamb. “That is actually an intriguing idea. Yes, perhaps I could, if I found the right frequency…”
Lucifer smiles. “See? We’ll figure something out.”
“I actually came here to ask you something,” Alastor says, breaking the companionable silence that had fallen between them. “Something… quite selfish, really.”
“More so than demanding fresh venison with every meal?” Lucifer says, but Alastor’s pensive demeanor doesn’t change.
“Yes. Even more selfish than that, I imagine.”
“What is it?”
Alastor straightens his back and raises his face. “I want to try now. Please.”
When the penny finally drops for Lucifer, it does so with the force of a gunshot.
“Oh! You want to—and now? Like, now now? As in right now? Um, I mean, I really did want to review the lacrimal system one more time—”
“You’ve read that book cover to cover at least three times in as many days. I find it impossible to imagine that you haven’t already memorized it.”
“Okay, I—okay. I’m not saying no here, but… wouldn’t you feel better waiting for Bel to be here? Just in case something goes wrong? I mean… God, Al, what if I hurt you?”
“You can’t, remember? You can’t do more harm than what’s been done. The worst outcome is that it doesn’t work. But if that’s to be the case—if I truly won’t see again—then I’d much rather there not be an audience, even if it’s only Lady Belphegor.” Alastor swallows hard. “I just… I’d prefer it if it were just you.”
And just like that, Lucifer forgets how to breathe.
“Okay,” he says softly, and the look of relief on Alastor’s face that follows assures him he’s making the right decision. “Okay. Would you mind getting on the bed? It might take a while, so I’d like you to be comfortable. I also, um, need to get pretty close so, could I… would you mind if I straddled your waist?”
Alastor’s cheeks flush a charming shade of pink. “You may do whatever you need to.”
They get situated with little fuss and fanfare, and Lucifer’s heart beats a little faster as he feels the immensity of what he is about to attempt.
“Promise me that you’ll tell me if it hurts, or if you start to feel sick, or anything, okay?”
“Alright.”
“You promise?”
“Yes, yes. I promise.” A beat. “Go on, then, dear.”
Lucifer places his hands on either side of Alastor’s head, leans forward, and presses his lips against Alastor’s brow.
“Fiat lux,” he whispers against his skin.
Let there be light.
Golden light floods into Lucifer's palms and fills the poor, empty hollows of Alastor’s eyes, and the world around him grows hazy as his sight follows after. He feels Alastor’s magic rise to greet him, but more like an old friend than an adversary.
Please, Lucifer begs as that magic curls around his own. Please help me do this.
Lucifer imagines all the structures he’s spent the past week committing to memory and wills them into existence, lovingly drawing every capillary, every rod and cone. Thousands upon thousands of fibers, each no thicker than spider silk, branch backward toward what remained of Alastor’s optic nerve-like roots searching for fertile ground.
Alastor’s magic reaches forward with gossamer threads of its own and, like shy lovers touching for the first time, they begin to weave together.
Alastor’s hand tightens on the sheets.
“Am I hurting you?” Lucifer asks, surprised by the rasp in his voice.
“N-no,” Alastor replies even as his lungs work like bellows. “Keep going.”
Their power meets again and again until Lucifer has lost track of where he ends and Alastor begins. He feels weightless, yet aware that his physical form is straining from exertion. He knows there is pain, but he doesn’t feel it—at least not now.
His consciousness splits, half tied with Alastor and the miracle of creation and half drifting in a place he only sees in dreams and never quite remembers upon waking. A voice, both familiar and foreign, echoes across the chasm. And shall thou be this man’s keeper?
Lucifer does not hesitate.
Yes.
Alastor’s back arches as new retinas unfurl at the back of the eye. “Lucifer!”
“I’m here.” Lucifer sweeps his thumb beneath Alastor’s eyes. “You’re okay. I’ve got you. Just hold on.”
At last, the corneas slide into place, and the connection between them vanishes. Lucifer collapses forward and trembles with Alastor on the sweat-soaked sheets. He clings to him, overwhelmed by the immensity of what he’d just experienced, and Alastor returns the embrace.
Lucifer stirs first, pushing himself up on shaking arms. Alastor’s eyes are shut tight. “You okay?”
Alastor nods, panting.
“Open your eyes,” Lucifer whispers, brushing the sweat-damp hair from his forehead.
The stag’s long lashes tremble against his cheek, and then Lucifer’s breath catches in his throat as he finds himself looking down into two beautiful eyes of celestial gold.
Two beautiful, vacant eyes.
Lucifer watches, heart in his throat, as Alastor’s brow creases as his eyes move over the ceiling, looking but seeing nothing.
He doesn’t even realize he’s holding Alastor’s hand until he squeezes back.
Alastor blinks again, but this time, his pupils contract in the soft light of the bedroom. Alastor gasps, and then his eyes are darting across Lucifer’s face as though he would perish if a single feature went untouched by his gaze.
“Hi,” Lucifer whispers through his stupid grin.
“I can see.” A tear slips down from the corner of his eye. “I—”
Lucifer realizes belatedly that pulling Mr. “Mind-the-five-foot-rule himself” into a bear hug while sitting astride him might not be the best plan, but Alastor has wrapped him in an iron grip of his own before he can shift away.
“Thank you,” Alastor whispers fiercely against his temple. “Oh, thank you, Lucifer.”
Lucifer squeezes his eyes shut against a wave of breathless, dizzy relief. He wants to say something, but his lips won’t move. Everything around him begins to feel strangely insubstantial, blurring together like watercolors in the rain, until Lucifer’s eyes flutter open to reveal a familiar ceiling and a well-loved duck plush wrapped up in his arms instead of a trembling sinner.
Of course. That miracle had long since become a memory, one Lucifer finds himself revisiting from time to time on the nights when his sleep is peaceful. Sometimes it’s still hard to believe they managed to pull off an actual miracle in Hell, so much so that his heart skips a beat every now and then when Alastor looks at him with those gorgeous eyes of liquid gold…
…even if they are rolling at him.
“Really, darling, you were supposed to be up ages ago,” Alastor grouses as he enters the bedroom, a mug in each hand. “Come now. Rise and shine, my morning star. I’ve made coffee.”
“Light ’n sweet?” Lucifer mumbles as he works on getting all the gears in his brain fired up.
“If you’re asking if I desecrated the coffee to your liking, then yes.”
Lucifer chuckles. “You’re supposed to say, ‘just like you.’”
“Should I ever wake and find myself devoid of sense, I will—what is it? Why are you looking at me like that?”
Normally, Alastor’s coffee would have been more than sufficient temptation to pull him from bed, but the linens around him are just so soft and clean, and he wants nothing more than to hold Alastor again like he had that night.
Lucifer reaches for him. “Come back to me.”
“The coffee will get cold,” Alastor protests, but Lucifer knows by the tilt of his ears and his crooked smile that he’s won.
“I can warm it back up. Please?” he asks anyway.
Alastor mutters something about slugabed monarchs, but climbs back into bed all the same, and the two quickly settle against each other like two halves of the same whole.
Lucifer gazes into Alastor’s eyes and sighs. “Beautiful.”
“Still admiring your handiwork after all this time?” Alastor asks, unable but to nip at the hand that feeds him.
“No. Just you.”
Alastor blushes. “You’re impossible, you know that? Whatever am I to do with you, you silly little king?”
“Keep me.”