Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Lucifer knocked.

He’d had his doubts before he ever dared, but that didn’t stop the panic from rising up his throat the second his knuckles rapped against the wood, settling against it after a couple of taps. He waited, heart pounding out a private beat against the quiet of the corridor. The hotel was asleep around him, or close enough to it, the lights dimmed, the private upper hallway completely deserted, no staff or guests to be heard, nearby or otherwise.

All the better. Lucifer didn’t need anyone catching him standing outside that door. It would be humiliating.

However, the thought wasn’t enough to chase him off, and he knocked again—

The door opened on its own with a click.

“Ah!” Lucifer startled despite himself, then scowled faintly at the door for making him feel foolish. Of course it would: Irritating him had likely seeped into the very wood of this place. He sighed out the frustration—the tension—then rolled his shoulders, straightened the coat he’d magicked back onto his body in place of his evening comfy wear the moment he gave in to this mad impulse, and stepped forward… only to instantly pause.

A muted, green light and the musky scent of flowers and sulfur struck the king the moment he crossed the threshold, leaving him staring out into the fog of a wet bayou, there in the middle of the hotel. It was… exactly what he could imagine associating with that deer, but Lucifer had never set foot in that room before, had no idea such magic had been unleashed by another inside his hotel, having never dared to be so rude as to cross into his rival’s private space without permission, unlike someone.

…Alright, he had simply never been motivated to do so until recently, but the point stood.

“…Red guy?” Lucifer tried, dragging his eyes off of the bayou stretching out beyond the room to mind the space far closer to him. The room proper was a broken, half-invaded old parlor scene mixed with an office and bedroom all smushed together into one, warmly lit by the contrasting dim reds and golds of scattered floor lights and table lamps, shadows stretching long and deliberate across the walls from the spare sources of light. They illuminated a hodge-podge of furnishings within the room: An old wooden vanity covered in knick-knacks, a bed, a little table with two chairs right in front of the first trees of the bayou, an upright piano and door hovering in a spare bit of ‘surviving’ wall that must lead to a bathroom or closet or something, another bit of wall holding up a great fireplace blazing away with a spare, decrepit-looking chair in front of it, and there—a couple of bookcases behind an equally worn-in desk, tucked into the corner opposite the vanity.

That was where Alastor was. He was sitting at that desk, his back half-turned to the door, and Lucifer. Papers were spread in neat, meticulous piles of chaos before him, and the faint scratch of a pen was just audible over the chorus of frogs, and crickets, and the buzz of an unseen record player, crackling away over some quiet jazz song. It was all the perfect picture of a man comfortably at his work in his own space, and it remained solidly undisturbed even amid Lucifer’s invasion, Alastor’s eyes still on his papers as he spoke. “Good evening, Your Majesty,” he said pleasantly, as if the king had been expected. “Do come in.”

Lucifer opened his mouth to reply… and found he had nothing to say. Ultimately, he just shut it again and took a few more stubbornly at-ease steps into the room. The door quietly closed behind him as soon as he was out of its range. Lucifer didn’t mind it—chose not to—but there was no denying the humidity that hit the moment he was closed into that open-ended box with the sinner, still minding his papers over his guest. It left Lucifer hovering there uselessly, hands clasped behind his back, feeling like some petitioner in Alastor’s little court.

And it might have been enough to try Lucifer’s patience on sight, but there was no denying the way he hesitated, even after Alastor finally paused his writing and turned his head. He was… wearing glasses. Proper ones. “What can I do for you?”

That… was the question, wasn’t it? Lucifer had no idea how to answer that without sounding ridiculous. Or worse? Transparent. A strange concern given the madness he’d already given into by coming there, but—

“Well,” he started, only to clear his throat, and shuffle between one foot and the other. Rock back and forth on his heels when that didn’t soothe.

Alastor’s response was to arch a brow and finally turn to face him properly, clearly curious, and that was too much. Lucifer’s attempt to keep his composure, his pride, broke like a twig.

“I—uh.” He pulled off his hat, letting it fall to the side and disappear in a spark of light as he dragged a hand through his hair. Father, this was stupid. “I just… I don’t… need anything exactly. I just… didn’t want to be alone.”

The record scratched.

Lucifer gulped in the sudden silence, marked only by the faint sounds of false life in the bayou as he stared fixedly at a design in the rug beneath his feet. “I’m certainly used to it well enough!” He suddenly said, addressing the tight, high words to that same spot with a twitchy smile. “But it was getting a bit much tonight, and—well…”

“…I see.”

Lucifer was very much afraid he might. And so far, the deer had shown no sign of laughing in his face for such foolish confessions, such impulses as to come there with them, but Lucifer was bracing himself for it.

He didn’t know why he was doing this. He hadn’t planned out coming there past the knock. He hadn’t planned at all. He’d just… walked. His steps had carried him there before his pride could stop them, because he just… he didn’t want to stay alone with his thoughts. Nightmares, really. Not that they always came when he slept. Conscious or asleep, he would ‘wake’ with his chest tight, old, even ancient memories replaying themselves with fresh cruelty. Memories that would twist themselves into scorn for his failings, replays of regrets, fears of what may yet happen or repeat. And the present… It could be anything, really—even that smiling, antlered demon had taken to haunting him, no thanks to Alastor and this deal of theirs. Maybe that was why, when his workbench and crafting failed him and he finally cracked? He came there. To him. Against all logic.

Lucifer squeezed his eyes shut for half a second, then forced himself to look up. Face the silence.

He found Alastor watching him. Not mocking, not jeering, nor smeared with disbelief. Just… assessing.

The awkwardness slammed Lucifer all at once, making it hard to breathe. It’s… not like he wasn’t used to Alastor by now, in general. They had been around each other constantly since Mimzy’s club, dodging reporters from those Vees together, stamping out some reactionaries that came to attack after word got out and Alastor’s interview of him was broadcasted, fielding questions and concerns from Charlie… The shared spaces of the hotel were their shared spaces, and where they used to prod each other or avoid each other like the plague, they now hovered. Lingered a little longer before the inevitable bickering set back in. Righted the world into what it should be.

But it was never this. Never one of them standing in the other’s private rooms, admitting they—of all things—wanted company.

So, Lucifer waited. Waited for Alastor to inevitably smirk, or tease, or send him on his way. Or worse, ask questions Lucifer could not answer. Didn’t dare think about himself.

Instead, Alastor slowly nodded. Turned back to his papers, and waved blindly towards the fireplace. “Please,” he said. “Have a seat.”

Then he picked his pen back up.

Lucifer blinked. Once. Twice.

That… was it?

He should say something. The impulse was right there, borne on Lucifer’s eternal refusal to just obey… But in the end? Nothing occurred to him, and he turned, crossing the room on uncertain feet to claim that spare chair beside the fire. The cushion dipped beneath his weight, soft and unexpectedly comfortable, and Lucifer hopped back to sit with his hands folded in his lap, feet dangling, shoulders back.

He waited.

Minutes passed.

Alastor kept writing, not a glance in his direction.

Lucifer shifted. Crossed his legs. Uncrossed them. Stared at Alastor.

Nothing.

Surely, the questions would come. He might have expected concern if it were someone else. The Sins, perhaps, if he ever actually dared to share such troubles with them. Charlie, if he was lucky. But from Alastor? Surely curiosity. Prodding guesses like accusations. Maybe a smug, ‘So, what’s eating at you tonight, Majesty?’ if he was feeling particularly charitable. He feared it all… and yet, they all refused to come.

Finally, it became unbearable.

“So,” Lucifer said, disturbing the silence. “When were you planning to start?”

Alastor paused again, looked his way, genuine question tugging at his smile. “Start what?”

“You know.” Lucifer gestured vaguely at himself. “Asking me what's going on? I mean, like you're really going to let me get away with that. Just… let me wander in here and not prod me about why?”

A beat as Alastor stared at him.

Then he laughed.

Lucifer instantly ruffled at the sound, bracing himself, but it was a short bark of a sound, and when Alastor took off his glasses and smiled at him again, it wasn’t a sneer. At most, he looked mildly amused. “I don’t have time to interrogate you, Your Majesty. I need to finish these contract write-ups for thirty-seven souls I won off an overlord and mean to collect in the morning.”

“What? But… but you told me to—”

“You said you wished for company,” Alastor interrupted, tone relaxing as his laughter ebbed, leaving his expression soft. “I am providing it in the way that I can.” The words landed strangely. Gently. Like a truth Lucifer hadn’t realized was possible… Like he hadn’t realized he was allowed to have.

“Oh,” he said, very quietly.

Alastor’s smile curled, then he put his glasses back on and returned to his work, as if the matter were settled.

Lucifer imagined it was.

He watched Alastor for a while, something warm unfurling in his chest. Alastor seemed completely uncaring of his presence, unbothered by it, clearly absorbed by his writing. And Lucifer… He wasn’t let down by the failed promise of attention and conversation. If anything, he felt seen. Welcomed. The realization that Alastor had simply made space for him amid his evening—no demands, no expectations—settled deep and strange in the angel’s bones.

Touched, he realized. He was touched.

He swallowed hard.

Finally turning away, he considered the fire for a breath before reaching into the air and pulling out a sketchbook and charcoal. Flipping to a fresh page, he let his fingers hover over the blank paper, absorbing the textures beneath his fingers as he listened to the little crackles of the room around him, smelled jasmine—then began to sketch, the memories of stars that had long been molded into greater things coming to life on the page as he let that simple, unmarred memory breathe life without a thought.

Somewhere, the record scratched back to life, and he heard jazz amidst the quiet.

He smiled—just a twitch—and glanced up.

Alastor remained as he had been, but Lucifer thought he caught his ear twitch.

Lucifer returned his eyes to the page, breathing out the flutter of warmth that tried to rise again inside of him.

It didn’t mean anything, he told himself firmly. Wanting company… trusting Alastor for company didn’t mean anything more. Lucifer was just tired, that was all. And lonely. And grateful for a kindness, whatever its source. That was all.

When a quiet, mindless hum rose from the desk in the corner, Lucifer’s smile rose, lingered on his lips.

There was nothing wrong with a little company.

Chapter Text

Alastor walked through the front doors of the bustling Hazbin Hotel caught in the throes of its evening traffic, exhaustion nipping at his heels. Frustration hummed in his veins, boiling up like it might come out of his mouth like fire if he just unstitched his smile and let it out. He wanted to scream, but right there? In front of Charlie’s countless underfoot sinners? All he could do was smile and wonder why he didn’t just slip past the lot of them and go straight to his room. Why was he keeping a room there at all? What was he even doing anymore?

That urge to scream just grew when he locked eyes across the room with Vaggi, and the girl frowned, that determined little crease popping up over her nose as she made a beeline for him. “Alastor! Where have you been? We’ve got twenty-nine more guests registered this afternoon, and we need help expanding the kitchens and giving tours, I can’t just—”

The angel’s wordless growl when he melted into shadow just as she reached him was a balm that carried him across the room, up the main stairs, up the elevator shaft and out in the private top floor hallway. But it could only do so much, and with no one on hand to witness it, Alastor finally let the tension seep from his back, let his shoulders and smile sag as he sighed and pinched his nose, the feelings rising right back up where they had been.

Truly, why was he still doing this?

“Hey!”

Ah. Yes. Him.

Alastor lowered his hand and turned to look, and there—Lucifer stood just down the corridor, between Alastor and his bedroom door.

The king wasn’t doing anything in particular. No grand gestures, no dramatics, hat gone with that snake of his curled over a shoulder, jacket discarded, sleeves rolled up. He was just standing there, leaning a shoulder against the wall with his ankles crossed and the faint tension of someone who had been waiting, but wasn’t quite willing to admit it to himself.

But he responded quickly enough when their eyes met, righting himself to walk over with a confident presumption to his step. And it was no wonder: The old fronts and charades they used to play to excuse their daily run-ins had long since burnt away, leaving a relative openness to their intent to seek one another out, exchange some banter, some jab, sometimes something less barbed. It was nothing to approach the other now, expecting attention.

It was that very expectation that weighed heavy on Alastor as he watched the king approach, made his ears hang heavy on his head until it was something he could not bear without a word. “Not now,” he said, and instantly the king stopped, still a good few yards from Alastor’s side. “Not tonight, Your Majesty.”

Lucifer looked… shocked. As he should be—Alastor had made an art of welcoming the king, even if he never gave up the joy of prodding him, and this must be a startling departure from the norm. A suspicious one. One that might well undermine the very reason Alastor endured this place anymore. It was foolish for Alastor to push him away, no matter how he himself felt.

And yet, it felt even more foolish that he had not bitten out the words. That they had come out less like a warning or a demand than a plea. Even now, he could see Lucifer’s struck expression melting into one of concern, his sharp red eyes ticking over the sinner’s form, taking in whatever hints of distress Alastor had been unable to hide. It made his fur bristle.

“Oh, uh—sure. Yeah.” Lucifer gestured vaguely, hands fluttering before dropping back to his sides, one rising right back up to scratch anxiously at his snake’s head. “Yeah, sorry. Of course, I didn’t mean to…”

To what, he didn’t say. The little king hovered with his mouth caught open around a word for a breath, and then he was gone, stepping into a portal that opened even as he turned towards it, the bright gold of its light there and gone again so fast, one might have blinked and missed it.

And that was it. No argument. No teasing retort. Alastor was just alone, and properly this time.

The absence landed heavier than Alastor expected.

He stood there for a moment longer than necessary, listening to the relative silence of the hall around him. Then, once he was certain that he was alone? Truly unobserved, or at least as much as he could hope for?

He breathed.

Leaned a hand against the wall, eyes unfocused.

Ridiculous, really. To let such a simple moment unspool him like that. He prided himself on composure, on performance. On being on at all times. Yet here he was, drained. Exhausted.

And not in the usual way he knew so well, the satisfying weariness of a clean kill or well-executed broadcast, or even the cutting relish of walking away from a particularly sharp tongue-lashing, a single jab ahead of a frustrated opponent. Fatigue was nothing new to The Radio Demon’s daily existence, not in Hell nor the living world. Heaven knew—haha—he had known few days of rest in his time. You worked hard, you played hard: That was the only way Alastor knew, the only way he had lived since he first let go of his mother’s apron strings. And he was perfectly comfortable with that, thank you. No need to fix what wasn’t broken.

But it did wear on one, the daily grind he found himself in now. The hotel’s now proven success brought in so many guests. Too many, with too many voices and demands and foolish, disrespectful whims, all catered to by the fussy staff who expected Alastor to do the same.

And then there was increased scrutiny from the outside, more of those wretched cameras hovering about like sharks smelling blood in the water.

Alastor’s tired smile twisted at the thought.

Vox. Alastor had yet to spot the man himself, there at the hotel or the overlords’ palace. But he could sense him, feel the pressure at the back of his skull that always rose whenever Hell’s most irritating voyeur decided to focus his scattered attention on him. Alastor had crushed three hidden lenses before leaving that day for an overlords’ meeting and five establishment inspections. They had all likely been placed by more of Vox’s beloved spies among Charlie’s guests. Vox hadn’t even tried to be clever about it, and that was insulting.

What was he up to? Posturing? Provoking? Fishing for a reaction? If so, Alastor wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. Not directly. He just destroyed the cameras and went on his way.

But ignoring them could only work so long. Whether he’d recovered his body or not, Vox’s loathing was creeping back in, likely enflamed by the temporary loss of his revolting lover.

He hadn’t even tasted good.

And then there was the pincer attack of the lovely royal lovebirds, Vaggi and Charlie, the angel hounding his steps for ever more support in the hotel, the princess ever questioning what he and her father were doing… but he could handle them.

No, it wasn’t any of those familiar, orbiting challenges that truly troubled Alastor, even if they ate at his time and endurance. It was the slow drag of frustration as all his effort was poured knowingly and excruciatingly into ventures that were pointless, or never should have been necessary in the first place.

He had spent decades, nearly a century building up a reputation, an infrastructure of sweet, insulating terror around himself, and never had he felt the burn of its collapse like today, as he explored what he had been prohibited to touch since his ‘disappearance’ years ago. His countless contracts had been left to collect dust, his own businesses directly or indirectly owned had been neglected for too long, and he was little more than an urban legend to far too many in Hell, known but not feared. Even when he attended the overlords’ meeting that day, was met with curious looks for what he’d done to Valentino, what he and the king were up to? He was still just one of them. Not the monster that made their peers scream over the radio, the one that made half of them tremble when he walked into the room.

And Rosie… It was the first time he had seen her since he gained his freedom, since the cannon, and she just smiled at him.

It was one thing to gnash his teeth over his lost ‘empire’ while he was gone or pouring all his focus into the hotel at Rosie’s demand, but now that he was free to build it back up again, properly? Nothing had really changed. He would have to waste uncountable energy rebuilding what he had lost, all with the Vees and the other overlords breathing down his neck, and all the while he was there, at the hotel, held back by the staff’s expectations and Charlie’s inevitable outrage if he made any moves in the city to expedite his return to true power.

Was it really worth it? This… idea he got in his head about Lucifer? Yes, the man was clearly powerful—the most powerful being Alastor had ever come across, to be exact—and likely the only one Alastor could turn to if he truly wished for insulation from trouble at home or Heaven’s potential assaults… or worse… but, he was not a puppet Alastor could control, nor someone he could truly trick into doing his bidding. Not directly, in a way Alastor could rely on without focused effort. Lucifer was foolish to the extreme, but he knew better than to hand his reins to someone like Alastor. He had agreed to work with him, but he was as careful about his autonomy in their deal as Alastor himself was. All Alastor could really do was ingratiate himself to the man and prey upon his doubts, his devotion to his family to coax some benefit out of him.

But was that enough? Was enduring this and staying on Charlie’s good side and halving his efforts between the hotel and his own ambitions truly worth it?

Alastor sighed, forced himself to straighten up, and crossed the hall, heading for the sanctuary of his own quarters.

He was only inside his room for a couple of minutes—reclined at his desk, his bowtie already gone, collar open, glasses on, a cigarette lit in hand, a pile of hotel accounts and contracts glaring up at him as he took a drag, staring at them—when that light sparked again, and he glanced over with a numb mind to watch as the king stepped out into his room.

Lucifer was already talking, already moving in the time it took for the portal to solidify, its golden light tangling with the haze of the bayou’s fog as the backlit king tumbled across the room with quick feet and stumbling words. “Sorry, sorry, I shouldn’t have just—I know you said not tonight, and I’ll be gone in a second, I will, but—wow, I am terrible at listening when I panic.” The king let out a hiccupping little laugh as he closed the distance between himself and Alastor, coming to a stop right before the desk.

Alastor found himself at a loss, too confounded for true outrage or irritation, especially given the picture the king made. Lucifer’s jacket was still gone, sleeves still rolled, but now his hair was a little mussed as well, as if he’d been pacing or running his hands through it too many times.

And in his hands, he held a mug. One that steamed faintly with the scent of rich, bitter coffee, cutting clean through the usual decay and damp earth that marked Alastor’s room.

Alastor eyed the mug for a moment, then looked up again, eyed Lucifer’s anxious, strained smile, instead. “Your Majesty,” he said once he was sure his shock would not show, tone reflexively smooth, cigarette poised between two fingers just before his mouth. “I thought—”

There was a faint tap as a warm, solid weight settled on the wood of Alastor’s desk, set carefully down between two neat stacks of paper.

The mug. It was his mug. The one that said ‘Oh Deer’ that he hadn’t pulled out in months.

Lucifer’s hand lingered on the handle for a fraction of a second, just long enough to make the gesture deliberate. “There,” he said, straightening too fast, stepping back like he was wary to linger too long in Alastor’s reach. In his space. “I, uh… You looked like you could use it.”

Alastor stared. His confusion took a new turn, grinding uselessly in his head as his eyes tracked from the mug to Lucifer’s face.

The king forced a smile then. Not his usual sharp, smug thing, but something tight and uncertain. Something that spoke nothing of confidence, but something deeper. “Chin up, Donner,” Lucifer said, and it wasn’t teasing. Not really. There was too much nervous energy in it, too much earnestness shoved awkwardly into the would-be joke.

Alastor didn’t answer.

Lucifer was already backing away.

“I’ll, um. I’ll go,” he added quickly, pointing blindly behind him, at the portal he was even then tripping back into. “Just… yeah. Goodnight.”

And just like that, he was gone.

And Alastor kept staring.

For a long moment, his mind simply… did not engage. His mind, so adept at spinning plans and parsing motives, found itself truly and completely blank. He just sat there, his cigarette forgotten between his fingers, smoke blurring the edges of his vision as his eyes remained fixed on the offensively familiar object on his desk.

Steam rose in lazy spirals.

“…Huh.”

That was new.

A soft, incredulous laugh slipped out of him, stuttered and catching on his shock.

He had not asked for this.

He had not signaled for it, had not planned for it, had not maneuvered this into being in any way. He had been slipping tonight. Unfocused. Irritable enough to snap at the most valuable piece on his board. The one he had been carefully cultivating for so long with a steady drip of presence, charm, and reliability. Casual contact. Familiar banter. Unceasing support. All so carefully, so mindfully doled out, and yet Alastor could well have ruined it all with a single slip on his part. A sudden, sharp retraction of what he had so slowly offered out. For a random evening’s frustrations, Alastor could have so easily lost him.

Instead, Lucifer had come to him. With an apology.

And coffee.

A soft, genuine sound escaped Alastor before he could stop it. Something wordless, and amused, and—and warm in a way that had him shaking his head, ears flicking as if to dispel the thought. There was no point in being fond of the little king for walking himself back into a trap he might have slipped. Here Alastor had been faltering—his patience thin, his focus scattered, his careful performance slipping at the edges—and Lucifer had stepped in to soothe him. Proactive. Thoughtful. Caring.

The smirk came slowly, tugging at one corner of his mouth, faint at first, then settling into place as realization unfurled behind it. Satisfaction warmed Alastor’s chest, threading itself through the lingering fatigue with something almost like relief.

The king was doing Alastor’s work for him. How kind.

He propped his cigarette on a nearby ashtray and reached for the mug with a chuckle, still half-expecting some trick. Some hidden sting.

The ceramic was warm against his palm. Grounding.

Alastor lifted it, inhaled, paused only for a fraction of a second, then took a sip.

His eyes went wide.

Coffee indeed. Proper coffee, to be precise. Not that sweet stuff he knew the king preferred when he imbibed in the beans at all. Black. No sugar. No cream. Strong, dark, and sharp. Exactly how Alastor liked it.

His ears gave a flick, shoulders easing as the warmth spread, chasing the edge of his exhaustion away just enough to let him breathe.

He drank again, slower this time, and wondered.

Lucifer Morningstar, King of Hell, had noticed how Alastor took his coffee.

How… silly.

Alastor set the mug down carefully, stared at it a long moment… and chuckled again. Chose to see it as something to laugh at.

But with that amusement—that warmth—fresh in his mind? He eyed the hotel accounts and contracts waiting for him beside the coffee, and turned away from them. Reached for an old, worn novel perched on a corner of the desk instead, abandoned there nearly a week ago in hopes of a quiet night that could be spared for it.

Tonight felt perfect.

Cracking it open to a bookmark, Alastor leaned back in his chair, reclaimed his cigarette, and picked up the mug with that same hand, taking a sip as he rediscovered his place on the page with a smile.

Perhaps, he thought just before losing himself to the fiction, this arrangement might prove worthwhile yet.

Chapter Text

“Oh, it’s unbelievable,” Alastor was saying, his voice bright and animated and incensed, words flying out of him like sparks off a wire. “Simply unbelievable the liberties some of these overlords think they can take these days. No coordination, no respect for precedent! Contracts and agreements signed between powers without sector approval, deals made without even a courtesy notice to the rest of us! Why, when I first arrived here in Hell—”

Lucifer sipped his cocoa, not saying a word.

They were in the staff-designated kitchen. The one Lucifer had just finished conjuring into existence last week at the request of Charlie’s girlfriend so that the kitchen staff newly hired by the Radio Demon—Recruited? Conscripted? Lucifer didn’t follow that sort of thing—could toil away in the brand-new main kitchen, undisturbed by the other staff taking breaks or going about their daily lives.

All for the best. That meant the only meals that might be disturbed that afternoon were theirs, and not the hotel guests. Undeserving as Lucifer thought the lot of them were—that snake’s surprising breakthrough notwithstanding—the king knew Charlie fretted over the lot of them. And hopefully she and her girlfriend and their various friends would be able to sneak a meal out of the main kitchen all the same.

They certainly wouldn’t be getting anything out of there the rest of the day. Not after Alastor manifested in the middle of the room just on the tail-end of lunch, looked around at the few faces still lingering, and told them all to get out. The kitchen was his for the rest of the day.

The cat-bat and bomb lady and the spider guy they had rescued from the tower all put up a fuss, but shadows popped up from under them, wrapped around their bodies, and carried them to the nearest window, tossing them outside amid a storm of protests and curses.

That one-eyed maid giggled and followed them out the window without any help from Alastor at all.

The fish in a lab coat followed as well once she was gone, though he at least had the sense to take the door.

Lucifer was the only one left after that. The only one who remained where he was, seated on the far side of the staff dining table where he had been chatting with his daughter earlier, before she was called away to handle some hotel business in the lobby. He’d intended to linger just long enough to finish his drink, but after that? Alastor storming in and staging a kitchen coup without ever apparently noticing Lucifer, missing him in his quiet corner? Lucifer stayed right where he was, reheating and refilling his drink with just a thought when it ran low or cold. He drank, and watched, and stayed quiet.

And listened.

And he quickly learned why Alastor was so quick to kick everyone out, so territorial about his space as he moved about the kitchen. The sinner muttered about clear space, no disruptions, no interference, then snapped his fingers, and a torso appeared on the counter.

Lucifer nearly spit up his drink and lost his lunch and portaled out right then and there, but one of Alastor’s countless radios—placed in the middle of the table sometime overnight the first night after Lucifer built the room—started to play just as Alastor pulled out a knife, and Lucifer found himself staring wide and unblinking into the radio’s speaker, the song and the demon’s muttering blessedly blocking out the worst of it. If he just didn’t look—

“There now!” was finally said, and Lucifer dared a glance out of the corner of his eye to see Alastor adding bits of cut up meat—ugh—to a great pot on the stove, already boiling. The king knew where that must have come from, but the body part he had first seen was blessedly gone, or at least unrecognizable amidst the cluster of bowls and casserole dishes that Alastor had lined up on the counter, all holding various unclear ingredients. And whatever else Alastor had cooking? It was masking the certain smell beneath a tide of spice and heat and something distinctly savory. If Lucifer tried not to think about the source, there was nothing disturbing about the sight anymore as Alastor wiped his hands on his apron, the cloth the same stark red as the usual coat he was missing, his sleeves rolled up to reveal scarred, greyed out forearms. “That should do well enough. Now for the jambalaya—”

Ah, that… couldn’t be made with just any meat, right?

Lucifer didn’t know, but he watched with a less disturbed stomach as Alastor moved about, muttering, “Lucky I found this at the market when I did. It will go handsomely with the spices I just had brought in by—”

Did… he mean the butchered sinner, or something else?

Didn’t matter, really. Alastor went right on talking, right on cooking, and Lucifer went right on watching, his earlier horror ebbing away until it thinned to nothing, washed out by the steady rhythm of Alastor’s words against the quiet backdrop of song. The sinner’s voice was a lively, sharp-edged buzz that settled into Lucifer’s head like white noise. He found himself sipping absently, eyes taking in the lines of Alastor’s form, tracking the way he moved, all sharp motion and rigid posture even here, yet open. Ears twitching, no tension to be found. Only a bright, restless agitation that spilled from the sinner’s mouth as sing-song complaints, passionate and giddy with their heat.

He was… mesmerizing.

Lucifer frowned, catching his own thought. Stared into his cocoa as a cold spike of self-awareness shot through his senses. He was… admiring the man. He was sitting there, tucked away in a corner, lurking over Alastor’s private afternoon that he clearly wished to spend alone. And, even if he were welcomed? Lucifer was… he was enjoying himself. Enjoying the rhythmic snap of Alastor’s voice, the efficient, almost graceful way those clawed hands busied themselves on the stove, the counter.

He enjoyed Alastor. It was undeniable.

Worse, it was not surprising. Not anymore.

“To think,” Alastor trilled, a fork or spoon or something clinking sharply against the metal bowl that had his attention. “I would be lectured by an overlord about fast food. Such a horrid approach to making one’s mark in the city! Slapping their names on greasy little boxes, churning out soggy meals faster than you can sin—”

Lucifer tried to tell himself it was all incidental. He was in that kitchen before Alastor was. He had been given no prompt to leave. He had nothing better to do right then. But the excuses were paper-thin. A blank, wordless shame settled in his gut, heavy as lead.

He knew what it meant to be so captivated. He had… he had been here before, unable to tear his eyes away from someone. A long, long time ago.

He should go.

“And the televisions!” Alastor continued, chopping something with brisk, irritated precision. Lucifer made no move to take advantage of his focus. “To trade the soul of the airwaves for the flickering, mindless rot of those blasted picture boxes! Truly, the wonders of radio are wasted on the modern sinner.”

Lucifer felt a smile tugging at his lips, despite himself. Alastor really was—

“Isn't that right, Your Majesty?”

Huh?

Lucifer refocused, stalling mid-mindless sip of his hot chocolate, and found Alastor staring right back at him.

He choked.

Hot chocolate ran down the wrong pipe in a traitorous rush, the magically reheated liquid scalding his throat. Lucifer squeezed his eyes shut against the pain, fighting a desperate, losing battle against his own lungs as he coughed and tried not to spit cocoa across the table or directly into Alastor’s expectant, unblinking face.

Alastor just watched.

“What?” Lucifer finally wheezed out, his face flushing with sharp heat as he wiped away a stray drop of chocolate from his mouth and a tear from his eye. “Sorry, what?”

Alastor’s smile twitched. He didn't look impressed.

Finally, he turned back to the stove, giving that large pot a forceful stir. “Honestly,” he muttered, and were his ears lowered? Why were they pinned to the back of his head like that? “At least listen to me if you are going to hover.”

“I—I was listening!" Lucifer protested, his voice cracking slightly. He sat up straighter, setting his mug aside on the table to turn in his seat to face Alastor properly. As directly as he could. “I just—I didn’t think you wanted me to answer!” Didn’t even think Alastor knew he was there, as… as stupid as that sounded, now that he thought about it.

“And why,” Alastor asked, his tone wry and light while his shadow lengthened ominously against the kitchen tiles, leering at Lucifer as its host glanced back at him over his shoulder, “Would I ask a question if I didn't expect an answer?”

“You've been asking questions to the air for like an hour now!” Lucifer snapped, gesturing wildly at the empty kitchen. “How was I supposed to know this one was actually directed at me?”

Alastor stopped stirring.

His shadow shuddered, then dissipated. 

He turned slowly, a sharp, predatory smile stretched across his face. The kind of smile that promised pain.

Something about it made the flush on Lucifer’s face fail to fade. Had him coming up short and wide-eyed.

And when Alastor took slow, pointed steps in his direction, his hands clasped calmly behind his back, and bent over Lucifer’s chair? It was all Lucifer could do to swallow.

Alastor smiled at him, right in his face, and cooed in a buzz of static, “Get out of my kitchen.”

Lucifer's heart skipped a beat.

Damn it.

Chapter Text

Alastor picked up the bottle Husk had just set on the counter, turning it slowly so the label faced the light. “Well now. This is new.”

Husk’s eyes narrowed. “Put that down.”

Alastor did, but only after savoring the pause, the twitch of Husk’s ear, the barely-there flare of irritation on his face. It was stifled again before the bottle even settled back down with a clink. “Relax, Husker,” Alastor said cheerfully. “I was simply curious. I’d recognize this distillery anywhere. Nasty little operation. Closed its doors… oh, several decades ago?”

“Yeah?” Husk snatched it up and slid it under the bar. “Guess Hell’s full of surprises.”

“Indeed,” Alastor agreed lightly, grin widening as he folded his hands together on the cleared counter. “Though surprises do still tend to require sources. Which makes me wonder… Have you expanded the hotel’s supply chain to better serve our expanded clientele? Or have I simply not been introduced to your latest… benefactor?”

Husk’s ear twitched again. “We’ve had help.”

Alastor’s smile sharpened. “Ah. Help. Such an interesting word. So vague. So flexible.” He leaned closer, voice dropping conspiratorially. “And this ‘help’ wouldn’t be one of the many new faces sleeping under our roof, would it?”

Husk’s frown deepened, frustration, then confusion at being caught shining through. “What’s that matter? They’re just some guest.”

“Oh, I’m sure.” Alastor leaned back slightly, humming as he studied the shelves. “A guest who knows where to find what one might call ‘hard-to-come-by stock’ if you were being generous. ‘Contraband’ if not. How fortuitous.”

“Don’t start,” Husk muttered.

“Start what?” Alastor asked innocently. “Inventory management? Hardly worth my attention, I assure you. I was merely admiring your initiative!” His eyes gleamed, smile very still. “Though I can’t help but ask, given your source? Doesn’t this little arrangement undermine the whole… redemption process?”

Husk—having just moved to pick up a crate—froze.

The crate hit the floor again with a dull thud.

Alastor watched the whole thing with interest. Watched Husk pause, breathe, choose.

His patience held.

It was such a sight, and really what drew Alastor’s interest to the bartender more than anything these days. Husk was so patient with him lately. As patient as Husk got, at least. And it took no more than a little consideration of timing and observation to know what had changed.

Angel Dust was back.

And while Alastor had heard rattling of the other long-term residents and staff struggling to get him to adjust, to feel at ease again under the hotel roof, there was no denying Husk was less dour these days, more reactive to prodding, yet less likely to scratch over it.

And he’d been particularly considerate towards the king and Alastor ever since, interacting more with the former, offering him drinks and an open seat more often, and generally allowing with Alastor.

It made Alastor ponder the possibilities of such a positive influence. Made him want to poke.

“People expect drinks,” Husk finally said. “It’s a bar.”

“Of course they do,” Alastor agreed, bright and as smooth as ever. “And you’re only meeting expectations. Still, one might wonder whether bending the rules for the sake of comfort sends the wrong message.”

Husk turned back to him, eyes sharp. “You suddenly care about the message we send?”

“Oh no,” Alastor laughed. “Not in the slightest. I care about you.” He tilted his head with a crack. “Specifically, whether you’re making exceptions because it’s convenient… or because you’re feeling unusually generous.”

Husk stared at him, openly searching for something. Ultimately huffed. “You’re enjoyin’ this.”

“Immensely! It’s so charming how much you let me get away with these days without showing your claws.”

Husk broke their gaze with a roll of his eyes, grabbed a glass, filled it up, and slid it across the bar Alastor’s way with a resigned flick of his wrist. “Drink and shut up.”

Alastor caught it with a pleased hum before it could slide by. “See? That’s what I mean. Leeway.”

The front door to the hotel opened before Husk could possibly reply, and a quick glance turned into a set one the moment Alastor saw it was not just another of the countless residents, but Vaggi, her face tight and flaming with far more agitation than her management role usually called for as she flew into the lobby.

“Alright, everyone, clear out!” She yelled, and a dozen heads—the heads of the newer guests Alastor had been slowly learning to just ignore as pesky white noise in his daily life—all turned her way, uncertainty and irritation and confusion marking them all. However, between Vaggi’s continuing no-nonsense chatter and the example of some of the more experienced guests, they were soon all making their grumbling way out of the hotel lobby, putting down drinks and shutting off that blasted television and collecting their things to head to the elevator or the stairs.

In a little over two minutes, the lobby was empty, save for the fallen angel, Husk, and Alastor himself.

So of course, Vaggi turned to them. “That means you two too, guys,” she had the gall to say, though to her credit, she did drop her tone, replacing the drill sergeant with a serious frown laced with obvious anxiety. “I’m sorry, but—okay, I won’t pretend I’ll explain later. But you really need to go.”

“What seems to be the trouble?” Alastor asked, not budging a breath from his usual stool, and Husk stalled in his own clear attempt to leave, turning to frown at Alastor right along with Vaggi as he went on smiling at the lady. “If it’s something having to do with the hotel, I would be neglecting in my duty if I did not stay and aid you.”

“Oh, like you ever try to—” Vaggi cut herself off, holding her head as she breathed deep in a clear effort to calm herself. To focus. “Look, I know it’s unusual. But they asked me to let them talk one-on-one on the way here, so I flew ahead to clear the way because I don’t think they’ll be done by the time they get here, and I really think they’d regret it if everyone just watches them coming through.”

Oh, now Alastor had to stay.

“But it’s their business what they have to say—”

“By ‘they’ I assume you mean—” Alastor began to interrupt, only to cut off himself when a familiar portal opened just a few feet away from the bar.

“I am very well aware that used to be our home, Charlie!” Lucifer. He was the first to step into the now-mostly-vacant lobby, his usual gaudy self with his hat and suit, but there was a red flashing in his eyes as he glared back at the tight-lipped daughter coming into the room behind him. “But it is our palace first and foremost. My palace! And I might have ceded control of it to your mother, but I still expect to know when my business is taking place there!” Lucifer’s voice was high, tight, and vibrating with an aggression that could rattle every light in the grand room. And yes, he may be dressed to his usual nines—almost pointedly so—but there was something haggard about his stance. The way he clutched his cane as he spoke. “The Hell Lords were sniffing around like dogs looking for a bone! If there is a gathering of that magnitude in my former home? I should be there! I am the King! I provide the... the gravitas!”

Alastor could have laughed at the Devil’s ruffled pride, pulled the whole room’s attention towards him with questions of where such kingly pride had been the last couple of years, but he was too transfixed by what was happening for such trivial prodding.

“Dad, please, I just went to represent the hotel, and what’s been happening with Heaven!” Charlie was power-walking to keep up with him, her face a mask of strained patience and growing desperation, the two emotions in open, painful conflict. “They’re getting restless—you know that—not understanding what’s been happening here this whole time, especially with the news just making everything up! It was just a report to avoid trouble, that’s all! Not some summit or council, just… just, sharing information! A visit!”

“A visit? With half the Ars Goetia loitering in the foyer?!” Lucifer spun on his heel to face her, and Alastor had a perfect view of the king’s outrage, his eyes sparking. “The sinners were always your mother’s, Charlie, but the business of the rest of the Pride ring, all the rings is mine! Always has been! That’s how we divided it! And as if I wasn’t the one who created—You can’t expect me to just stand by while the two of you go behind my back with my own people in my own dining room!”

“I wasn't going behind your back!” Charlie snapped, her own temper finally starting to crack. Her eyes were beginning to glow a faint, demonic red, her hands curled into trembling fists at her sides. “You can say it’s yours to handle, Dad, but you haven’t been there! Not for years! We were just—I was trying to protect you!”

“Protect me?!” Ah, would you look at that?! The king looked sincerely confused! What a sight. “From what, my own people? Are you saying the lords are trying to overthrow me? The Sins?”

“No, of course not!”

“Then what? Because the only people I overheard undermining me in that room when I walked in, Charlie, were my own family!” My, one would expect a true rage with such a claim, stark horns and spitting fire, but the king didn’t look like that at all. His anger had shifted to panic, a desperate, cloying thing as he dropped his cane—the thing disappearing in a flash of flame—and approached his daughter. Clutched at her arms. “Please, Charlie, what is this? Why wouldn’t you have called me for this? I know I haven’t been around much, but I heard what your mother was saying! I deserved to be there for that! I deserve to know why she would—”

“Because Mom said she doesn't want to see you!”

Silence. Still.

Alastor found himself not breathing.

It was as if the entire room had been crystalized, stuck in that moment, none daring to disturb it… until Charlie’s breath hitched, her hands flying to her mouth as her eyes went wide with crushing regret.

Lucifer didn't move. He didn't even blink. The aggressive heat that had been radiating off him just... vanished. As he slowly released his daughter, straightened his stance, his expression was just a hollow echo of what it had been, emptying out until there was nothing left at all.

“Dad,” Charlie whispered, her demonic powers all wiped from her face, her voice trembling as she reached out to catch the man pulling away, hand hovering just shy of grabbing his sleeve. “Dad, I didn't… I didn't mean to say it like that. I’m so sorry, I just didn’t know what to say, and—”

“But that's how she said it, isn't it?” Lucifer's voice was flat, devoid of its usual life. He didn't look at her. He just stared at a fixed point on the carpet, his hands hanging uselessly at his sides. "Exactly like that."

Charlie faltered, tears welling as she scrambled for footing. “No, I mean—she just needs time, I know it! And I shouldn’t have said anything, I never meant to—I’m sorry, I’m really sorry—”

Lucifer laughed. It was a short, broken thing that scraped across the room like glass on stone.

“Of course,” he murmured. “Time.”

Charlie visibly grappled for words, her face contorting beneath her tears as she scrambled for a way to fix this. To fix the truth.

She turned to Vaggi, who looked truly thunderstruck. Like she regretted clearing the way for this scene to begin with. But she also looked just as lost as her lady love.

Then she looked at over at the bar. Looked at Husk first, and Alastor didn’t know what the dear whiskered man did or said, but Charlie soon abandoned him to stare at Alastor, as if she was not surprised at all to find him there. As if she really, really wanted his help.

Odd, she truly expected him to help? To soothe his feelings?

Alastor broke their gaze to look at the king.

Lucifer didn’t seem to notice at all. He was stuck in his own head, his shoulders hunched, eyes vacant as he began to turn away. The king hadn’t raised a hand yet, but he was obviously going to portal away. Disappear to his room, or who knew where. Perhaps stay there for a good decade, or until the end of time.

That simply wouldn’t do.

“…Well now,” Alastor said, voice cutting through the heavy atmosphere with a crackle of static. He put down the drink he’d never touched, that he had effectively forgotten about in his hand that whole time. “Really, Charlie, there is no need for you to apologize for your mother’s appalling lack of taste.”

The king stopped.

Charlie gave a jolt, her eyes flashing with betrayal, and then indignation. “Alastor! Not helping!”

Yes, it was obvious why she would think so as Lucifer turned back around in a snap. The hollow look in his eyes was replaced in an instant by a burning, dangerous fury.

Alastor could hear glass shattering and claws scraping as Husk presumably ducked behind the counter.

Alastor remained right where he was.

Lucifer made a step towards the bar, his sharp teeth bared in a snarl, though he looked so blinded by rage that Alastor could not swear he actually saw him. “You… you tall, tacky asshole!” Ah, never mind. Definitely saw. “Don't you dare speak about—You… you think you can just—" But, slowly? He stopped. His outraged words ran into each other, stumbled, then faded into nothing until Lucifer was left just standing there, his rage faltering.

And Alastor’s smile shifted to satisfied, seeing meaning begin to set in.

The king… looked at Alastor. Then at Charlie. Then back to him, his mouth failing to close around some word, until he finally just traded it in for a simple, “Wait… what?”

Alastor gave him a short, beaming grin, appreciating how confoundment looked on the man, then shifted his focus back to Charlie. “Indeed,” Alastor continued smoothly, “If the queen chooses not to appreciate what she has, that is on her.” He gave a dismissive wave towards the king with a clawed hand, keeping his smile sharp, his composure set. “We will be perfectly happy to enjoy the King's company right here.” He picked up his glass again, offering a small, mocking toast to the air. “It would be a shame to waste such... gravitas... on an audience that doesn't appreciate it.”

The silence that followed was absolute.

Charlie’s mouth opened. Closed. Her own offence and confusion had melted into pure shock, and then hope as she turned. Looked desperately at her father.

Vaggi kept glaring at Alastor like he was a math problem that refused to add up.

Husk remained an unknown behind him.

Alastor for his part just leaned back against the bar, legs crossed and a free hand on his knee, his smile wide and fixed. He watched with clinical interest as reactions ping-ponged through the unmoored Devil: shock, blunted fury, confusion, disbelief, a softer sort of confusion, hurt, wonder? Something warmer? Confusion again. Fear? What an odd kaleidoscope!

And the whole time, Lucifer was staring directly at Alastor.

But finally? As his expression twisted into something agonized again? Vulnerable again? He turned away.

A portal of shimmering gold sparked to life right beside him, and he stepped through without a single word, the light snapping shut behind him.

It seemed to take the air out of the room with it.

Charlie stood frozen, her hand still half-extended toward the space where her father had been. But slowly? She turned her head toward Alastor. Looked at him with a knitted brow and her own mess of warring emotions clear on her face. But unlike her father, she settled on one, and embraced it: Gratitude. “Thank you,” she whispered, though it came out more like a question than a statement.

Alastor inclined his head and smiled as if it were nothing to make a fuss about. “Just speaking the truth, my dear.”

Charlie nodded, but continued staring at him like she couldn’t quite believe it. That she was scared to believe it.

Her glaring girlfriend peaking around her arm clearly didn’t believe it.

“Damn, Alastor.” Ah, there was Husk! Alastor glanced back to find the cat foisting himself off the floor with both elbows on the bar. “You got a death wish or something? I know he can’t do much directly, but still—”

“On the contrary, Husker!” Alastor crowed. “I find life most invigorating!”

And the dry look Husk shot him was but one of many.

“Now, if you will all excuse me,” he chirped, his voice a jaunty crackle as he hopped off his stool. “I believe I have some… inventory to attend to.”

“Oh, what the shi—”

Alastor shadowed away before Husk could finish his thought or the two ladies could protest.

And of course, he didn’t go to any inventory in the building, but up to the top floor, resolidifying just outside the king’s door. And there he stood—sidelined just a breath by the golden sign still plastered beside the thing, always good for a smile—contemplating the wood, and who presumably lay beyond it.

It was natural enough to defend Lucifer considering Alastor’s intents with the man, but that didn’t mean he knew how best to approach him now. It didn’t mean Alastor knew quite how he felt about the entire debacle, beyond a curiosity of the political shifts hinted by the family argument, and a satisfaction in others continuing to do Alastor’s work for him, pushing Lucifer away, leaving him ever more vulnerable to another willing to pluck him out of the air. By all accounts, this was a boon for Alastor.

And yet, when he finally stood still, no performance for others required? No people before him to play like strings? Alastor found he was quite… irked, actually. In a restless sort of way.

How odd.

Also completely pointless under the circumstances, so he stifled the out-of-place emotion and fixed his mind on what to do. All of this would have been for naught, after all, if Lucifer’s wheel of emotion had landed back on rage, and rage at him. Alastor had to be certain that his gamble had—

He lifted his head as the door opened without a single knock. Without Alastor even approaching it fully.

Lucifer stood there, his head bowed, gaze fixed on the floor near Alastor’s shoes. He had discarded his hat, and his blond hair was a mess where he’d clearly been running fingers through it. He didn’t look up.

He looked… small. And angry, in a brittle, restrained sort of way. Hurt radiating off him like a wave.

It was that which stayed Alastor’s tongue and his spinning thoughts. The idea that Lucifer would… show himself to Alastor in such a state, and willingly—

“You shouldn't have said that,” Lucifer said quietly, still not looking up. “About her. You don't… you don't know her.”

Ah. Well. So much for that.

Alastor’s smile dimmed by a fraction, though likely only he would know, feeling it happen. The rejection of his calculated ‘kindness’ stung with a sudden, unexpected sharpness that caught him off guard. Left him off kilter.

“I see,” he replied smoothly, voice light and measured, if lacking its usual theatrical flare. And he should say something else—he always had something else to say—but Alastor found nothing would come to his tongue.

And the king was already closing the door.

Yet, he stalled, already half-turned away, already half-hidden from sight again. Alastor saw Lucifer’s fingers tighten around the edge of the wood, charred knuckles whitening until they almost matched the pallor of his face. The door shuddered faintly in his grip, and then stilled as the king tilted his head to finally look at him.

His eyes were filled with tears that had not fallen, pained and tired, but they drank Alastor in, weighed him in a way that felt far too gentle. Too seeing.

Alastor couldn’t look away.

Finally, Lucifer broke their gaze, stared off at something or nothing within his own room, and muttered, “Thank you.”

The door closed with a soft, final click.

Alastor stood there.

A long beat passed.

Then another.

Slowly, his permanent smile curled into a real one. Not a satisfied, nor pleased one, but a baffled one. One marked by his confusion over what just happened. Of why he felt more off-balance than ever.

…Huh.

Chapter Text

Lucifer hated being close to it.

Not the danger. Not the shouting. Not even the fear, though it buzzed loud and sour in the air with an aftertaste that stuck to the tongue. No, he hated the blood. The red sort all the once-humans spilt. The spilling of it, the smell of it, the sharp, copper note that mixed so distinctly with the brimstone and fumes around them, made his jaw tighten. The way it splashed and clung and steamed against everything, thick and rarely just liquid alone there in Hell. It always fell from some sinner who just would not run, would not accept they were outmatched before it was too late.

It was crude. Vulgar. A testament to everything free will had wrought that Lucifer could never have imagined in his earnest, youthful days, and he kept his distance from the whole mess whenever he could.

And yet, he found himself witnessing bloodshed so often these days.

The alley he was in was narrow, choked with flickering signage and crumbling brick that was a staple of Pentagram, and Lucifer stood vigil just within its mouth, cane planted lightly against the ground, posture stiff but easy, despite the chaos unfolding right in front of him, only yards away.

He did not lift a hand. He did not need to. Alastor was doing the dirty work, as usual.

The Radio Demon moved through the space like the predator he was, steps light, precise, voice carrying with gleeful clarity as he spoke over the crackle of radios nowhere in sight. “Oh dear, oh dear,” he crooned, static lacing every syllable. “Did you truly think that would be enough?”

“Please,” his soon-to-be victim—a strange, barely humanoid thing that reminded Lucifer distinctly of a table lamp—blubbered away, shaking in the dirt, in the blood of his fallen minions. All red, of course, save on the spear dropped nearby, stolen apparently from some Carhone warehouse. That had a distinct shine of gold, courtesy of Lucifer and a quick, unexpected flesh wound the same victim managed to inflict before Alastor had him on the ground. A wound that had cost every other life in the alley moments ago.

The overlord had been ambitious. Sloppy, as Alastor put it. One of the newer sorts, fond of loud territory grabs, gaudy sigils, and too many underlings. Not enough sense. He’d thought himself clever, Alastor had said, rallying a handful of minor players and making a show of defiance where Lucifer’s name had been bandied about with laughter.

The fallen angel didn’t ask for specifics. It was easy enough to imagine the line of thought in the wake of the Vees’ efforts. His and Alastor’s own rise to the spotlight. His… wife’s? shared concerns.

Lucifer watched with detached eyes as Alastor raised one clawed hand.

“We can’t allow someone like you to run around again, causing problems,” Alastor said, lilting over each word—and then he stalled. Tilted his head back just a touch, towards Lucifer. Requesting without a word, or even a proper glance.

Lucifer sighed softly, more tired than anything, and flicked a finger his way.

That was all it took. Power flowed through Alastor—signified by the sudden sharp whiteness of the tips of his claws—and that was all the blessing he needed. Lucifer’s granting was his sanction.

Alastor’s shadows closed in.

The demon lunged.

There was a shattering like a hundred lightbulbs going out.

Lucifer turned his gaze away as the screams began, and his focus fell instead on one of the drone cameras stalking them, lurking just around the corner, but plainly in sight. He stared into the lens as he listened to what was happening.

He did not flinch. He did not intervene. He let the world—or at least anyone on the other side of that camera, watching on a screen—see it as Lucifer Morningstar, King of Hell, allowed this to occur. Stood as the face of authority behind this execution.

That was the arrangement.

When the sound finally died down, Lucifer exhaled through his nose, slow and controlled, and tapped his cane once against the pavement.

The shadows receded. Alastor slowly stood, his latest victim little more than a stain on the street at his feet as he wiped his mouth and straightened his coat with a sharp little roll of his shoulders.

“Messy business,” Alastor said cheerfully, turning to face the king with a wide grin highlighted by new red on his lips and teeth. “But necessary, wouldn’t you say?”

Lucifer glanced briefly toward the body, then away again, back towards the drone. “If you insist on handling it that way.”

Alastor’s smile widened. “Oh, I do.”

Lucifer huffed, but kept any of his usual commentary to himself. It wouldn’t do with eyes on them. He tapped his cane instead to help diffuse the tension inside him. Rolled his own neck. There was a faint sting in his leg, but nothing serious. That spear had barely touched him before Alastor intervened. “Third one this week,” he muttered. “They’re getting restless.”

“No more than usual,” Alastor replied lightly. “You have been away too long, Your Majesty. This is the norm now. It is a strange week in Hell when there isn’t some fool or another trying to disrupt order.”

Lucifer’s jaw tightened. Damn deer, trying to bait him now of all times. It was absolutely on purpose.

Rather than dignify that with a response, he opened a portal, gold light slicing clean through the alley’s gloom. He made certain it popped up between them and the drone. “Let’s go. I have no desire to linger here a second longer.”

Alastor gave no protest. Just grinned a little wider and stepped through with a flourish to his step.

Lucifer followed.

They emerged not in the lobby or any shared space of the hotel, but in Alastor’s room—by mutual, unspoken agreement. Both of them had long since tired of the questions that prompted, after all.

The portal snapped shut behind them, the bouncing echo of car horns and screams replaced by the lazy ease of croaking frogs as Lucifer’s boots settled into the damp carpet at the transition point of the Radio Demon’s room proper and the bayou, just behind him. He let his feet sink a little into the wet as he straightened his rumpled coat. “Well, that was… definitely a way to spend a Tuesday.”

“Was it? We shall have to experience it again tomorrow then, when it actually is Tuesday.”

“When it—oh, shut up.”

Alastor let out a chuckle that instantly drew Lucifer’s eye, despite himself and the glower he’d put on. The sinner was standing just a few feet away from him, hovering where he had stalled after stepping out of the portal himself. And where Lucifer was struggling to relax, to shed the tension of performance and what he had just seen now that he was in a place of—relative—safety? Alastor looked remarkably, and infuriatingly, unfazed. A few splatters of blood still stained his jaw and the red lapels of his coat, but his smile remained as sharp and glowing as ever.

And when he noticed Lucifer staring, that smile turned absolutely cutting, and Lucifer looked away, dodging his gaze.

“A spirited performance in any case, Your Majesty,” Alastor remarked, his voice buzzing with that familiar radio filter. “One would hardly think you wanted nothing to do with the show.”

“Like anyone with an ounce of sanity would,” Lucifer snapped, stomping away as pointedly as he could when there was a little squelch-squelch left in his wake with every step away from the portion of the room ‘underwater’. A sharp sting shot up his right leg every time he put weight on it—a little souvenir from that forgettable night light of an overlord, may he rest uneasy wherever double death sent you—but Lucifer just let the pain heat his voice. “Not that that has stopped anyone from presuming—”

“That was the idea, Sire.”

“I know!” He whirled back, pain lancing up his leg and through his heart in a rich cocktail as he grimaced at the demon watching him with those wide, seeing eyes of his. “I know everyone’s supposed to think that… but it was supposed to bring order to Pentagram, take something off Charlie’s plate and make it clear I did not just neglect Lilith’s city while she was gone.”

“Which you did!”

“But now—” Lucifer went on, ignoring the cheery little commentary as he continued railing with a wave of his arms. “My daughter thinks I’m bloodthirsty, the lords are all saying I’m neglecting the rest of Hell now—”

“How is that anything new?”

“—and Lilith just thinks I’m usurping her! Trying to replace her the second she’s back! And all just to play bounty hunter with some sinner that treats every execution like it’s a game!”

One of Alastor’s eyes twitched, obvious even in the dim light with the way they glowed red, and a radio crackled with a lost signal somewhere in the dark.

That was the only sign of his agitation, but it was enough to satisfy Lucifer, soothe his own ruffled feathers until he calmed into something quieter. Soggier. His hands dropped along with his shoulders, and he focused on the ever-burning flame in Alastor’s fireplace as he muttered, “She thinks I’m losing it, apparently,” sharing what Charlie herself had passed on when pressed enough by her father for answers. Explanations. “Stepping on toes I never would have on my own, making messes instead of fixing them. Thinks I’m letting you lead me around by the nose.”

“Are you?”

The complete sincerity, complete lack of mockery in that question made Lucifer’s heart stop.

Lucifer looked at him. Really looked at him. Alastor. The gray-green glow of the bayou cast him in a sickly, ethereal light, but it only highlighted the lines of his jaw and shoulders. The clean, controlled cut of his form, even marred by blood.

Seeing him like that, looking back at Lucifer, his permanent smile… there was that pull there. A draw to the sinner that was incessant, that Lucifer had been fighting not to acknowledge. That he could not shake.

Even as he turned away, he felt it like a rock in his stomach… a stomach that flipped as he took an impulsive step away from the gravitational pull of that deer, and the throb in his leg flared into a white-hot roar.

“Whoops—!” Before his knee buckling could land him on the floor, a firm, clawed hand caught him by the elbow, another pressing flat against the small of his back as he tipped back into the touch. “Careful now.”

The contact was electric. Paralyzing, sending an unwelcome jolt straight through Lucifer’s spine. He couldn’t move. Could do no more than suck in a breath as Alastor coaxed him upright again with just a touch, his ease in manipulating Lucifer’s weight dizzying, threatening his balance all over again.

“Looks like your leg is still bleeding,” Alastor observed, hovering so close that Lucifer had to tilt his head clean up to meet his eye. See the strange glint of feeling in the sinner’s, too stifled and contained to read by any mark. “We should see to that. You may be indestructible, Sire, but my carpet is not.”

Lucifer let out a weak, breathless laugh, his mind still a thousand miles away. On two hands still touching him. A face smiling down at him. “That’s your concern right now?” He kept shaking with the laugh that wouldn’t fully come out, leaving him more lightheaded than ever, and without thinking? He let his weight slump. Tilted until his brow met Alastor’s chest, knocking his hat loose without a care.

For one suspended, impossible moment, there was only warmth and proximity and the low hum of Alastor’s presence vibrating faintly through him, the scent of blood and sulfur and some faint cologne Lucifer couldn’t name filling his nose.

Alastor went very still.

Silence, broken only by the static of a radio rising into a low, distinct growl.

Lucifer’s stomach dropped.

He shot back, would have been across the room if not for the grip that had gone stiff on him, the angel’s eyes wide and stuck in horror. What am I doing? he thought, heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He, the King of Hell, damned for all eternity to watch billions of mortals prove his own folly, was leaning on one of those same sinners like—like—He knew how Alastor felt about—

He should go. Leave. He started to scramble back, hands still on him or not, his face burning a brilliant, shamed color. “I—I’m sorry.” And great, his mouth had started spilling! “I just—the leg, it’s just the leg—”

“Hush now,” Alastor interrupted. The tension didn't leave his frame, but he didn't push Lucifer away, nor release him to run. No, he reached up and patted the top of Lucifer’s golden head. Hard. The way one might pet a particularly rowdy dog. “There’s no need for a royal meltdown, Sire,” he said, his voice back to its usual jaunty, mocking lilt. “You’ve simply had a long day of playing pretend, and failed to walk away unscathed. It’s only natural for the elderly to require a bit of… support.”

The rapid beat of Lucifer’s heart shorted out as his eyebrows twitched. “Elderly?” He slapped the hand away, glaring up into a far too satisfied smirk. “I don’t get elderly, you overgrown taxidermy project. I am an eternal being.”

“Ah, yes. And how experienced and wise you must be, being here since antiquity.”

Lucifer huffed, tugging himself away from Alastor’s lingering hand and standing on his own two feet—pained as one might be—as he straightened his coat in an indignant silence… until he reprocessed that fact. That he had had to pull away from Alastor’s touch.

Alastor hadn't pulled away himself. Hadn’t recoiled from him. He was clearly put off by the unexpected touch, Lucifer knew by now how particular Alastor was about such things, but still he… accepted it anyway. Denied Lucifer’s retreat. Didn’t distance himself. Accepted him.

A small, traitorous spark of happiness flared in Lucifer’s chest.

Alastor accepted him.

Then reality set back in, and happiness turned to ash, replaced by a crushing sense of dread and shame. I can’t be happy about this, he told himself, his eyes straying back towards Alastor, but not daring to rise from the carpet. I can’t keep… indulging this. Alastor was a sinner, trustworthy as he may questionably be, and Lucifer was trying to glue the broken pieces of his marriage back together. He couldn’t be—why now of all—there was no way Alastor would ever—

“I should go,” Lucifer said, his voice cracking.

“So soon?” He dared a quick glance up, but turned his back the second he saw the curious, dissecting look Alastor was giving him. “I was just about to put on a record and see to that wound, if you needed it—”

“Goodnight, Alastor,” Lucifer choked out, snapping his fingers.

He was walking through a golden rift before it even had a chance to fully form, shutting it again behind him before any more hands or shadows or anything else would catch him.

He stalled in his own bedroom a heartbeat later, standing there for two, three seconds before collapsing face first into his bed amid a chorus of squeaks from disturbed ducks, and his own agonized groan.

Just down the hall, he left a sinner in his wake, staring at a portal that was no longer there, then at his own hand for a very, very long time.

Chapter Text

Alastor spent some moments in front of Lucifer’s door smoothing the lapels of his coat down as he contemplated the sign still hanging beside the entrance and the mixed messages the resident seemed so keen on sending these days, before straightening his back, bracing himself… and bypassing any knocking to fade into shadow and rematerialize just inside the room beyond.

“You’re late,” Lucifer chirped without looking up. Such a proper greeting, but the little king—drowning in yet another of his endless frumpy, fluffy pink sweaters—remained hunched over his atrocious workbench, set in front of the windows and opposite the equal eyesore of the bed, and just generally speaking, Alastor did not know where to set his eyes that wouldn’t threaten his breakfast rising back up. Honestly, the décor was a far better deterrent to Alastor’s presence in this place than some red flag of a ‘keep out’ sign. “I was expecting you eons ago.”

“How odd, given your little messenger pigeon smacked me in the head mere minutes ago,” Alastor countered dryly, allowing his shadows to conjure and set the offensive, rather generic little rubber duck in question in his palm. The thing had landed on his head up in his radio tower just moments ago indeed, mid-broadcast, and he could only imagine the way its squeaks had been picked up through the microphone. The very thought had him squeezing straight through the duck in one last, dramatic squeak before it disintegrated in a contained burst of green flame. “I dawdled only long enough to close my show properly… I do hope there is a good reason, by the way, that you felt the need to contact me in such a manner in the middle of it.”

“I’ve been busy!” And Alastor was very nearly disappointed, thinking his faux fowl murder had been wasted, but the king finally shot him a look, and the blistering betrayal behind his pout said he had registered it somehow, despite not looking. It soothed some of Alastor’s ire to see it. “And how was I supposed to know you were doing your radio thing?”

Energy crackled. His teeth clenched behind his smile. How indeed. It wasn’t as though Alastor stuck to a daily schedule that Lucifer might be aware of if he just tuned in now and then.

Not that Alastor expected him to.

He pulled back his lips in a widened grin that was more a sneer. “No, I suppose that would be beneath the notice of a king, wouldn’t it?”

Lucifer’s eyes narrowed, and he was so transparent: He clearly couldn’t decide if this was some sort of mockery, or a warning sign that he had fucked up quite royally. Too bad for him that it was both.

“However, seeing as you are so busy, Sire, perhaps I should return at another time?” Alastor said, turned his back to walk to the door again—and he grinned with… yes, he could admit it, rather petty satisfaction when a hand caught one of his elbows.

“Hupp—wait, wait—hold it!” It was the king, of course. He let go again when Alastor turned to face him, but he was still there, finally pried away from his beloved workbench to stand before Alastor in all his tiny, wooly glory, all because Alastor was about to leave.

The Radio Demon found he could spare some patience.

Lucifer stuffed both of his hands under his armpits, as though to keep himself from reaching out again, and glowered up at him without an ounce of shame or self-consciousness for the sight he made. “You’re not going anywhere. I’m not done with you yet.”

…He was very lucky Alastor had found some patience.

“Sit,” the king ordered, waving towards one of the chairs tucked into a corner of his room before plodding back to his workbench. “Or stand. Whatever. Just don’t flit off.”

Alastor eyed the pink-and-red heart-themed monstrosity that looked more like it belonged in some tacky Valentine’s themed restaurant dining room than a king’s bedroom, and waved his hand, using his shadows to transport over his own bedroom lounge chair into the room instead. If he was going to linger in that place, humoring Lucifer’s odd whims, he was at least going to be comfortable whilst doing so. “And to what, precisely, do I owe the honor of your fervent wish for my company?” he asked, sitting down and crossing his legs with a flair before resting his elbow on the arm of his chair, his cheek in his palm. “I assume your little ‘gift’ was not merely an effort to test the aerodynamic properties of rubber poultry, but you have yet to tell me why you called me here, particularly when you seem so determined to focus on your… work.”

“Oh, this is just for Maggie’s birthday,” Lucifer tossed over his shoulder, already picking up a soldering iron of all things, waving it in quite fascinating ways between actual uses of it as he spoke. He seemed to have magicked the tool silent somehow, so there was no expected crackle or hiss to mark the king’s words. “Charlie’s hosting some sort of party for her tomorrow, and Maggie—”

“That would be ‘Vaggi’.”

“Right, right,” Lucifer waved a hand dismissively, only to jolt when that same hand—still holding the soldering iron—gave off a little spark. He quickly returned his hands to the table. “Vaggi apparently likes cleaning and fighting and stuff, so I’ve been trying to throw something together for her before the party. Make her something she’d like!”

Alastor hummed in understanding, but his eyes narrowed with a growing frustration and suspicion of Lucifer’s continued evasions. Was it truly so difficult to just say what he wanted of him? Why Alastor was there?

He was contemplating what other angle he might take to prod a true reply from the man when Lucifer’s rapid, frantic movements began to slow, his posture dipping into something melancholic as his hands stilled on his unseen craft. “Charlie’s been… well, you know. She’s feeling bad. About me and her mother.”

Ah, perfect. This again.

“She feels caught in the middle of it all, poor kid. It’s not her fault, of course, but I can tell she’s been trying to… ‘make up’ for it in her way. Trying to make me feel included.”

By Alastor’s estimate all three Morningstars were handling their family troubles with the grace of a bull in a glass shop with oiled hooves, but that was one subject Alastor had learned circumspection about voicing his opinion. And really, who was he to comment about healthy family dynamics?

“So! I’m going to be a part of the girlfriend’s special day,” Lucifer continued, his voice regaining some of its forced cheer as he set aside the soldering iron in favor of a bottle of black paint. “And I can’t show up without bringing a gift, of course.”

“Of course,” Alastor echoed, and whether his sarcasm broke through the king’s fluffy brain, or he’d just finally gotten to the point? The sinner would never know. Either way, Lucifer stalled before breaking into his paint to shoot Alastor a little, bright-eyed smile full of question and wilting hope.

“And, well, I’m kinda handcuffed to this bench until I get something done, but I… wanted to see you?”

Alastor’s ears gave a sharp flick, but otherwise he held his tongue behind a tight smile.

It was becoming a rather tiresome pattern, Lucifer’s to-and-froing. One moment the little king would seek Alastor out, all starry eyed and smiling, seemingly happy at his side, and the next he would recoil and avoid him. Skirt shared spaces, cut conversations short, treat Alastor like some holy plague sent to strike him personally… And then the next Lucifer would be knocking on Alastor’s door again, all boyish eagerness barely contained in a tiny body, like he couldn’t stay away—all in one day sometimes!

Back and forth, again and again. It was exhausting to witness, let alone participate in.

Make up your mind, Alastor thought, then immediately dismissed the thought as pointless. Irrelevant.

Perhaps it was all simply par for the course when successfully charming an angel into wanting one’s company? It wasn’t like there were many sources Alastor could consult on the topic… but still, he rather wished the bird would settle, one way or another. Preferably on the welcoming side—for the sake of his ambitions, of course—but he could always work his way back into the king’s good graces if not. He just needed to know where he stood.

“And so, here I am,” Alastor said, leaving such frustrations unsaid as he waved towards the room around them with a flourish with the hand not under his chin. “In your… delightful room.”

Lucifer’s little smile pinched into a frown. He grabbed one of the countless ducks heaped beside him in a pile and tossed it at Alastor’s head.

Alastor swatted it away with a shadow, too focused on their conversation to be bothered with a more permanent end to the sacrifice. “But was that truly all you wished for, Sire? My company?”

Lucifer flinched, dodged his eye. Turned his back and refaced his work.

And there it was. The evasion. And before Lucifer could spiral any deeper into it, Alastor prodded him a little further with a guiding, “Was there truly nothing you intended to ask me? When you called me here?”

Lucifer unscrewed the cap on his paint and poured it into a cup, grabbing a couple more containers Alastor could not identify from his seat before— “Jazz.”

Alastor blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“Jazz,” Lucifer repeated, dropping everything and spinning around on his bench to sit like a child with his feet up, chin on his knees and eyes wide and coaxing as he stared back at Alastor. “What’s your take on it? The… modern stuff. The fusion. The—what do they call it? Bebop?”

Alastor’s smile tightened. “You brought me here,” he started slow, voice crackling with rising amusement. “Into your inner sanctum of… duck-smithing, to ask my opinion on syncopation?”

Lucifer’s eyes narrowed, just a fraction. “Weren’t you the one who brought it up earlier?”

That, at least, was unexpected enough to warrant a break in Alastor’s humor. He sifted through his memory, found no clear moment that justified the accusation, and settled instead on curiosity. “Earlier?” he asked mildly. “I don’t recall teetering on the brink of some heartfelt jazz confessional.”

“You were,” Lucifer insisted at once, already turning away and picking his paints back up with a sharp gusto that was definitely going to leave stains. “In the hall. Last night. After we came back from our latest run.”

Ah. That was right. They had come back from a rather quiet night of wrangling in a group of drug smugglers-turned-overlords (quite a feat of a sin when nearly anything could be bought alongside a malt at your corner restaurant) and chatted idly as they portalled into the hall, only for Lucifer to dodge Alastor’s offer of a nightcap to return to his room. Alastor had simply assumed he had fallen back into one of his ‘plague’ moods.

“I hadn’t meant to give you the cold shoulder,” Lucifer muttered from over his shoulder. “Or cut you off or anything. I just… you know, needed to finish this. But I’m listening now.”

Alastor stared, genuine surprise momentarily stalling any internal monologue. It was… truly not worth the fuss. He couldn’t even quite recall what he was saying last night. For all he knew, Lucifer was remembering it wrong. Mixing up music terms he had heard some other night in his long life and assigning them to Alastor.

But still, the invitation, the assurance behind it all was rather… unexpected.

“It could have waited, Your Majesty,” Alastor said, mostly for a lack of anything else logical to say. “I wouldn't want to distract you from such... vital work.”

Lucifer craned his neck as much as he could to look back without actually spinning around again, shooting Alastor a small, unguarded pout, with his bottom lip stuck out and wide, begging eyes that… that—since when did the king shoot anyone but Charlie that look? “Don't be like that. Talk to me. Please?”

Please?

Alastor stared back into that look, wondering what in Hell was…then ultimately broke their gaze himself, feeling his usual, carefully maintained composure falter, just a bit. The pout was effective in a way that made his internal static hiss with annoyance.

“Fine,” he allowed, forcibly relaxing back into his seat. “If you must know, I find the shift toward bebop to be a fascinating, if occasionally chaotic, evolution of the form. That does not mean I consider it a perfection on the genre, mind you, but there is no denying what makes it unique, that it prioritizes the soloist’s technical prowess over the ensemble’s—"

“Wait, wait,” Lucifer interrupted, and a side-glance showed he was still looking Alastor’s way, eyes alight, face scrunched in thought. “But what about the tempo? Doesn’t it feel a bit… rushed? Like everyone’s trying to finish the song before the rent’s due?”

“That is precisely the point, Your Majesty!” And Alastor found himself standing, his hands gesturing about as the topic took hold. “It’s about the frantic energy! It’s not supposed to be comfortable; it’s supposed to be alive! For it represents—”

He began to pace the floor, his shadows wordlessly sweeping a path through the debris of half-finished ducks that littered the floor, nudging them aside with no further harm intended than to free Alastor’s step and avoid any disruptive, irritating rubber squawks. All while he kept talking.

And Lucifer kept responding.

For several minutes, they went back and forth, Lucifer prodding with questions that were surprisingly astute, making Alastor wonder what exactly the King of Hell had chosen to consume on the topic over the years, presumably based on interest alone since there was no reason he should run into the subject organically while avoiding sinners.

And Alastor answered each question with a growing, animated heat. Spoke at length about call and response, about improvisation, about the necessity of listening as much as playing. About tension. He grew so caught up in the subject that he didn't even notice the king had turned back to his work and continued it amidst all their chatter until Lucifer let out a triumphant, “Aha!”

Alastor stalled, somewhere between bedroom door and that fowl bed, and watched as Lucifer bounced off of his bench and came right up to him, holding up his work with eyes bright with unmistakable pride. “The pièce de résistance, now complete!”

It was… a duck. Because of course it was.

And yet, there was no denying this one had a certain style, sporting a tiny, felt pork pie hat tilted just so, and a miniature brass saxophone held to its beak. Alastor could admire the detail put into it for at least a breath before arching a mocking brow at the king. “And this would be—”

“Wait, wait. Watch this,” Lucifer interrupted, and he shifted the bird to one hand, holding it up—while the other sought Alastor, fingers resting as sudden warm points on Alastor’s forearm in a touch that did not grab or hold on. Just settled there.

Alastor eyed the king, so intent on his duck, but didn’t say anything. The gesture was far more of interest to him than the actual contact.

Then a song played, and his gaze shifted to the duck as well.

A crisp, perfect jazz riff—one Alastor recognized instantly—echoed through the workshop as the little duck danced back and forth on the king’s palm.

“It’s not just one song,” Lucifer explained, his eyes bright with a creative fervor as he transferred the duck to Alastor’s own numb hand, looking between the playing toy and Alastor’s face in obvious search for his reaction. “I added in bits from all those records I’ve heard you play in your room. It can even prioritize and play through the ones you like best if you want it to. If you tap its tail twice, it’ll keep playing until you tell it to stop.”

Alastor stared, caught somewhere between appreciation and the far, far more dangerous question of why.

When he glanced up, he found Lucifer grinning at him, expectant and vulnerable, and for once in a rare, rare blue moon, the Radio Demon found his sharp tongue failing him. He looked at the duck, then at the angel who produced it. Produced this duck… for him. Alastor.

…He wasn't keen to pop the bubble. Not yet.

“It’s remarkable,” Alastor said at last, because it was true.

Lucifer’s grin widened, his chest puffing out. “Good! I knew you’d like it!”

“Indeed.” But that comment just proved that Alastor’s suspicions were true, and he tilted his head, his smile returning to its usual needle-sharpness as he looked fondly down on the king. “However… I must ask. How, exactly, is this a present for Vaggi?”

The silence that followed was absolute, save for the duck’s fading saxophone solo.

Lucifer looked thunderstruck. His eyes darted to the duck, then back to Alastor. Another beat of silence, then—

“Shit!” Lucifer hissed, spinning around and scrambling back to his workbench. “I forgot the—Where did I put her duck? I was almost done with—And the spear! And the—the eye patch! Damnit, I got distracted!”

Alastor watched the King of Hell descend into a flurry of panicked magic with a slow curling smile, feeling like—finally—something made sense again in his world.

“Predictable,” Alastor murmured, sharing a look with his now giggling shadow. He himself just grinned the wider, but after a beat? He shot the duck left behind with him a considering look… and tipped his hand, letting it fall off his palm.

It melted into the ground on impact, into the hands of his shadow, who slunk off across the room and out under Lucifer’s bedroom door.

And Alastor remained behind, smiling a silent, warm vigil on Lucifer’s frantic back while, down the hall? His shadow gently set a little duck on Alastor’s vanity, just across from his favorite liquor, and below a mirror crowned in roaches.

Chapter Text

The lounge was quieter than it had any right to be.

Not the hollow, echoing quiet of abandonment—the hotel was never truly silent anymore—but a softened one, cushioned by distance and sleep and the slow settling of a building that had finally, mercifully, run out of voices for the night.

Save for at least two.

The lights in the lounge were low, dimmed to a warm amber that cast long shadows across the floor, cast by the few lamps remaining on out of stubbornness or habit. The nearby bar still gleamed faintly from where the cat-bat-guy had wiped down the counter before calling it a night with a muttered complaint about “royal weirdos” and “not getting paid enough for this.” Then he’d retreated, leaving a half-empty bottle of top-shelf rye behind on the counter before disappearing down the hall with his coat slung over one shoulder.

Alastor’s shadow had swiped up the fine alcohol before the cat could rethink his generosity and come back for it.

Not long after, the rye gleamed like gold in Lucifer’s glass as he shared a drink with his company, sitting opposite him on the horseshoe-shaped sofa that took up much of the room. But Lucifer played with the liquid more than he consumed it, shifting his tumbler to catch the light here and there as he sat, legs crossed, still dressed to the nines for an outing that never happened. The only shift from the norm was the abandonment of his dear snake, still nearby, but coiled comfortably around the base of one of the endless vintage radios that littered the hotel, this one affixed to a table placed between Lucifer and his company.

Lucifer eyed his happy familiar with mild disapproval. “Traitor,” he muttered under his breath.

His snake flicked its tongue lazily in and out as if in answer before tangling itself a little tighter around the twigs and leaves decorating the old radio. It didn’t even twitch when the speaker bled a bit of static, echoing the rhythm of Alastor’s own chuckle.

Lucifer shifted his glower to the man himself.

Across from him, Alastor sat with that usual terrifyingly perfect posture, his clawed fingers loosely wrapped around a glass of his own that he raised in a lazy salute to the king before taking another sip.

“You’re being remarkably quiet tonight,” Lucifer noted, his voice lacking its usual theatrical bite. He swirled his drink again, listening with half an ear to the ice rattling around as he spoke. “Usually, you have at least three insults lined up for my fashion choices by this hour.”

Alastor’s smile widened, though the way it hit his eyes was oddly biting. “I find I am in a rather celebratory mood tonight, Your Majesty, and it has left me rather… content, I suppose. Forgive me if I’ve neglected to sharpen my tongue at your expense for a few moments.”

Lucifer squinted at him, his brow furrowing. “Celebratory? Last I heard, our little ‘errand’ to dismantle your freshest overlord target was cancelled because someone got their first in a surprise turf war.” He huffed, a small flame flickering from his nostrils. “Not that I was exactly looking forward to the show, but I tore myself away from my latest soap and got dressed up and everything.”

“How tragic.”

“But seriously,” Lucifer insisted, setting aside his drink on the table—after conjuring up a coaster, of course. He was a gentleman, after all. “Why are you in such a good mood, Bambi?”

“Because, I have every reason to be!” Alastor’s smile widened, teeth gleaming like polished ivory stained with age. “The Vees have finally—and quite pathetically, I might add—learned the art of compromise.”

Lucifer’s mood soured instantly, the warmth of the lounge fading into a chill instantly. “Those assholes? I thought that Val guy just got back.”

“Yes indeed! From his little… sabbatical, shall we say?” Alastor chuckled, looking far too pleased with himself. “It seems temporary death can do wonders for one’s perspective.”

“And the Box guy?” Lucifer’s gut twisted just thinking of that man, the tricks he played on him, what he put him through, what that tv had said about Alastor the last time he saw him— “I thought he’d rather short-circuit his own brain than give you a thing.”

“He would, I imagine! But Velvette managed to take the reins of their little alliance with her two cohorts incapacitated, as it were, and she is far more sensible to work with.”

Lucifer gave a snort, but bit back any urge to differ. More importantly? “Okay, but what did you do with her? With them?”

“Simple!” Alastor chirped. “I struck a deal! A ceasefire, this afternoon. On behalf of the hotel and your family.”

The word registered a heartbeat too late.

“A WHAT?” Lucifer’s voice cracked like a whip, its echo bouncing off the walls with a force to shake the window. He stood up, his eyes flashing a dangerous, demonic red with barely restrained fury. “You promised them protection from me? From my daughter?! Who do you think you are, negotiating behind my back like that?!”

Alastor winced theatrically at the sight and sound but simply gestured for Lucifer to sit, his movements slow and deliberate. “Do calm down, Majesty. You’ll wake dear Niffty. She likes to sleep on the stairs at times, to catch the bugs.”

Lucifer’s hands clenched into fists at his sides as he spit out, undeterred, “You cut a deal with them without telling me.”

“I am telling you!”

Lucifer pinched the point between his eyes, flames sizzling out when he huffed, “Alastor.”

“Yes, Majesty?”

“You do not get to make deals involving my family without consulting me. That was part of our agreement!”

“Not exactly, Sire,” Alastor corrected, eyes gleaming in a way that made Lucifer regret for the ten-thousandth time he could not punch his face in. “I agreed I would make no deals on your family’s behalf that would harm them. This is in fact the opposite.”

Lucifer shot him a sharp look, eyes narrowing. “…Go on.”

Alastor leaned forward, elbows on his knees, voice dropping just enough to feel conspiratorial. “The terms are simple. I won’t come after them—and I will shield them from the Morningstars.”

Lucifer’s breath hitched.

“The Morningstars,” Alastor continued smoothly, “Being, of course, you, your wife, and your daughter. The royal family. In exchange—”

Lucifer’s composure snapped again. “You promised them protection from us?” he barked. “Are you insane?!”

“A hotly debated topic, that one!”

“You—”

“Conditional protection,” Alastor switched up, belatedly correcting him with an easy calm. “And only from direct action.”

Lucifer’s temper flared, heat prickling along his skin. “You had no right—What makes you think you even could—”

“And they,” Alastor cut in sharply, his tone suddenly firm, “Are all three forbidden from harming me, you, the hotel, your family, or any of its residents, either directly or through their subordinates.”

Lucifer faltered, his fury tripped by the unexpected words. “Harming,” he repeated slowly.

“Indeed.”

Lucifer scowled at him, but searching now for reassurance, not more reasons for rage. “You trust them to honor that? That one I think would do about anything to get a shot at you, at least.”

“Almost certainly, but I was quite thorough in what constitutes ‘harm’ in our deal. Practically any form of harm would qualify. Physical, magical, contractual… reputational.”

Lucifer squinted. “Reputational?”

“Slander,” Alastor explained, eyes glinting, smile widening. “Misrepresentation. Lies and propaganda.”

Lucifer sank back into his chair without quite realizing he’d moved.

The room seemed to tilt, just slightly.

“They’ll have to be very creative,” Alastor went on, “If they wish to spread any more nonsense about us, your queen, or dear Charlie and her passion project.”

Lucifer leaned back. He stared down at his hands, fingers flexing unconsciously as he let the idea of it all sink in. The anger had already drained out of him in a slow, uneven wave, and now in its wake left something heavier.

He hadn’t realized how tightly he’d been bracing against that particular threat—how the thought of Vox’s screens had gnawed at him in the back of his mind. He hadn’t known everything that tv head had been saying about Charlie. He’d avoided the reality of his city too much then. But he knew enough thanks to Maggie, and things he had heard afterwards. Knew there had been lies. Mockery. Twisted narratives designed to turn public sentiment into a weapon. His daughter and… and Alastor, abused as spectacles for that box’s whims and pleasure.

The idea of that sinner being forced to shut up…

And Alastor had made that happen. Had tied his own hands—if only conditionally—to protect them. Not just Alastor himself, but all of them. Him. Lilith. The hotel. Charlie.

Again.

…It felt like his heart was twisting inside his chest.

Lucifer breathed out, and reached for his glass, his shoulders low. “…That,” he admitted quietly, “Is… not nothing.”

“I should hope not, after the effort I put into it!”

Lucifer let out a snort, then lifted his gaze to meet Alastor’s. “I still don’t love it,” he said honestly. “They’re slippery. All three of them. Even the lady.”

“I would never suggest otherwise,” Alastor replied. “I’m not an idiot.”

Lucifer felt a smile stretch. Bit back a laugh. He picked up his glass again, took a measured sip, then let it rest against his knee. “…Thank you,” he said, the words slipping out before he could overthink them. “Seriously. I… I appreciate it.”

Alastor blinked.

The radio static in the room hummed into a high, questioning pitch, and for a fraction of a second, the Radio Demon looked genuinely astonished.

Then, his usual smile clicked back into place, and he waved a dismissive hand. “Think nothing of it. It is only right that I took care of it. Charlie and the hotel are under my protection, after all.”

The warmth in Lucifer’s chest turned instantly into a prickly, defensive heat. “Your protection?” he snapped, outrage and guilt and anxiety and—and affection all tangling up inside of him to hear Alastor say it like that. “Now wait just a minute! Since when is my daughter’s safety your prerogative?"

Alastor tilted his head, his grin filled with amusement. “I’ve been here the whole time, haven’t I? While you were… where were you, exactly? Making ducks, I believe?”

That—that stung. Stung in a way that was new and Lucifer refused to acknowledge. Not then, with this old chestnut back in their mouths.

“I believe I have proven my intent, Sire. My investment in your daughter’s welfare is well established.”

“Investment?” Lucifer snorted, leaning in. “Don’t give me that. I know why you came here.” Alastor had had to give up that little secret in his efforts to convince Lucifer into their deal, and Lucifer imagined he wouldn’t have divulged it even then, if it were not an ‘expired’ vulnerability, so to speak. Expired save for being a great point for Lucifer right then! “You had to help. You didn't walk through those doors out of the goodness of your sinner heart, or even out of ‘boredom’ as you put it! So don’t go and play the devoted patron card with me!” Never mind how Lucifer himself had given Alastor that credit himself multiple times, if only inside his head. When it suited him.

Alastor set his drink aside. The movement was slow, deliberate. He shifted his weight, putting an elbow on his knee and resting his chin in his hand, looking at Lucifer with an intensity that made the King’s heart stutter.

If looks could kill… Well, no. In Alastor’s case, it looked more like he wanted to eat him.

Which was a very unproductive thought.

Not the point.

“Why did you stay?” Lucifer said, the words bleeding out of him as a release of pressure. A mindless effort to escape from whatever that look on Alastor’s face meant.

Alastor considered Lucifer for a long, lingering moment, not speaking immediately. The tension thrummed through the room like a live wire, and the way Alastor tilted his head—predatory, inquisitive—made Lucifer feel like a specimen under a microscope.

Finally, Alastor gave a slight, nonchalant shrug, his ears flicking back. “I suppose,” he began, his voice buzzing with a relaxed filter, “I have simply grown accustomed to the crew. Much as I might resent their… colorful eccentricities at times.” He gestured vaguely with a clawed hand toward the door, clearly referencing the occupants at large.

Lucifer didn't buy it for a second. He leaned in, his own expression hardening. “Don’t give me that. Why did you stay, Alastor? Seriously. It can't be that simple, right? You were free. You must resent being sent here against your will. Being forced to sacrifice this whole time. You could have been rid of all this. Vanished the moment you got loose, stopped playing bellhop.”

Alastor didn’t rise to the bait of that word. He hesitated.

Just a breath. Just long enough for Lucifer to notice.

The sinner set his glass aside and shifted, resting an elbow on his knee, chin propped in his hand. His gaze fixed on Lucifer, intent and unwavering. “Charlie,” he said at last. “To a degree.” His eyes never left Lucifer’s. “And you.”

Lucifer’s heart gave a hard, painful thud.

“You are the most compelling being in all of Hell, Majesty,” Alastor continued, voice smooth and earnest in a way that made Lucifer’s skin prickle, eyes glowing as they remained fixed on him. “In power, nature, and capability. Why would I not be interested in you?”

Lucifer couldn’t breathe.

Every instinct screamed trap. Manipulation. A hand closing around his throat disguised as admiration.

And yet—

To be looked at like that. Spoken to like that. By Alastor, of all beings—Alastor, who had somehow burrowed his way into Lucifer’s thoughts, into the quiet spaces he had long since boarded up and thought collapsed from neglect.

There was a frantic beating behind his ribs as he looked into Alastor’s eyes and saw... what? Admiration? Or just the hunger of a predator who had finally found a challenge worthy of his time? The fact that Lucifer even had to question it meant he should be running, and yet—

“I can’t… I don’t do anything,” Lucifer stammered, trying to find his footing. “You know that. My hands are tied. I can’t interfere with the souls. I can’t do anything to stop any of them without you.” Father, what was he saying? “I’m… not powerful, Alastor. Not at all. Just a figurehead with a broken crown.” He should be tearing his own wings off for saying such things to him, what was he doing—

And all Alastor gave him in return was a small, knowing little hum, as calm as could be. “Your capacity for damage may be stifled,” he said. “But your utility is undeniable.” He leaned further into his knee, his eyes narrowing with a sharp, intellectual hunger.  A want to know. “Tell me, what even are the limits of your powers, truly? Have they always been like this? So... whimsical?”

Lucifer let out a dry, melodic huff of a laugh, his eyes straying toward the radio. His own halo, looking up at him from the eyes of what it had become. “There were no rubber ducks to summon at the dawn of time, Alastor,” he said, his voice dipping into a melancholic register. “I didn’t start out conjuring trinkets. I created.” His voice softened, distant with memory. “I shaped.”

He heard Alastor shift. “Go on, then.” Lucifer looked. Found Alastor looking back at him, his eyes unblinking. Inviting. Fixed on Lucifer as if he were the only thing in the world worth seeing.

Lucifer bit his lip. Looked back down into his glass. Saw a reflection of a version of himself he hadn't thought about in eons. “Stars,” he whispered. “I made stars.”

And he lifted his hand. Let the alcohol evaporate into nothing, and the glass float. Turn in the dim light to catch every spark and reflect it back.

“I would decide how long they would live, how they would fit into the sky, how bright they would burn.”

The magic came just as naturally, the glass shattering in a contained explosion, only for the pieces to float where they were. Burst into starbursts, tiny lights that were little more than sparklers in their size, but so, so much more in their detail. Miniature, swirling galaxies floating over Lucifer’s head. They gave off no heat, only a soft, ethereal glow that turned the dim glow of the room into shades of gold and silver.

“I spent eons on a single constellation,” Lucifer murmured, his eyes distant as he watched the ‘stars’ dance. “Just to see if the light would reach the other side of the void. Spent far too much time imagining what sort of worlds might orbit them one day, and begged to be allowed to make them real.”

It felt like opening a wound he had spent millennia trying to cauterize, speaking of it, but once he started, he couldn’t stop.

And when he finally looked to Alastor? He found him watching him with rapt, unblinking eyes. Not the stars, him. And there was no mockery in his expression. Only a quiet, profound stillness, as if he were afraid that speaking would break some spell.

But when they locked eyes, Alastor granted him a single, quiet word. “Lovely.”

Lucifer felt a lump form in his throat.

He knew, deep down, that this might be another trap. Another way for Alastor to stitch himself into Lucifer’s life until he was indispensable.

But he didn’t care. Right then, he didn’t care.

When he finally returned to his room, hours later, after the guests started to wake? After spilling more and more of himself out for Alastor to see? He sat on the edge of his bed, his snake brushing its little head under his chin as tears burned hot on his face. Tears that, for the first time in a very long time, were not born of misery or loss, or endless rejection.

All he felt as they fell was relief.

Chapter Text

“Really, Your Majesty,” Alastor remarked, his voice a smooth, radio-filtered purr that cut through the sounds of screams and breaking glass surrounding him with ease. “You could at least pretend to enjoy the show. It's quite a lovely afternoon for a culling!” He didn’t even look at the sinner he’d just impaled on a shadow-tendril, keeping his gaze fixed on the King of Hell.

“I told you,” Lucifer scowled, continuing to pace the nearby sidewalk with an expression that suggested he’d rather be anywhere else. Preferably somewhere with fewer bloodstained cobblestones. “We need to keep it under control.”

Ah, but that was exactly what Alastor was doing! The street in that sector of Pentagram City was currently a symphony of screeching metal and wet, rhythmic thuds as Alastor’s shadows made short work of the latest local upstart’s workforce.

“I know the ringleader of these guys targeted some of the hotel guests,” Lucifer allowed, eyeing another Alastor was currently pinning twenty feet up in the air with another of his shadows. “But Charlie is already on my case about the damage you caused last time. I don’t need another confrontation about ‘brutalizing’ the citizens.”

“That is merely the signature of a job well done!” Alastor chirped, leaning jauntily on his staff as an entire squad of lackeys raced at his back, only to disappear into the pavement as more shadows swallowed them up. Alastor’s smile sharpened as those particular screams died out, the static in the air thickening. “Presentation is everything, Your Majesty. Cutting off his smear campaigns was a net positive, but now that Vox cannot report on our actions beyond the facts, we need to make those facts as telling as possible. Especially if he decides to go silent altogether and we need to rely on word of mouth and my broadcasts alone!”

“You just like the screaming,” Lucifer muttered.

“A pleasant side effect!” Alastor allowed, his smile widening. “But truly, where is the joy in a harvest if one doesn't take the time to appreciate the crop?"

“The ‘crop’ is currently getting blood on my boots,” Lucifer snapped, stepping over a puddle of the stuff to get closer to the Radio Demon. “Can we just go? I have a hot bath that’s calling my—”

Alastor’s smile thinned.

Something was off.

And when he noticed, Lucifer noticed. The King sobered instantly. “What is it?”

Alastor didn’t answer at first. His gaze slid upward, senses narrowing, filtering out the noise.

Then, there. The sudden, sharp whistle of something moving too fast. A—

Alastor’s eyes widened, his ears giving a violent, involuntary flick just before he moved. He didn’t think. He just lunged, his hand catching the collar of Lucifer’s coat and hauling the smaller man to the side with a force that made the king yelp. “What are you—”

Hiss-crack!

They both froze, and Alastor sneered at the new, tiny hole glittering and then sizzling in the ground at the foot of the nearest half-collapsed building.

“Was that—angelic steel?” Lucifer asked, his voice hitting a high note in his shock.

“A bullet of it, yes,” Alastor hissed. And if he hadn’t suspected that? Hadn’t accounted for it and done something to block it instead of evade? It would have gone through anything in its path like acid. One or both of them would be dead. Or, whatever Lucifer was capable of experiencing besides death.

“How the shit would anyone get their hands on that out here?!”

Alastor didn't answer immediately. He stepped in front of Lucifer as well as he could guess, then looked, following the line of the shot from the ground, to where Lucifer’s head had been just a moment ago, and on upwards—

“What are you doing?!” Lucifer snapped, breaking Alastor’s concentration as he attempted to push past the sinner. “Are you trying to play meat shield? We should just go.”

“That will not stand,” Alastor snapped right back, not even looking at him. His neck creaked as his head tilted at an unnatural angle, tracking a glint of metal three stories up. “Angelic steel is one thing, but a long-range firearm of that caliber? That weapon was designed to kill things far more durable than a sinner, and is not something one finds in the bargain bin at Cannibal Town. And they dared to point it at you. If we do not trace the source now—”

“Fine! But can’t we just—”

Another whistle.

PAIN.

White-hot pain tore through Alastor’s shoulder, molten lava through muscle and bone, and he dropped his staff, the feedback of it hitting the ground screeching through his head right alongside the pain as a bullet lodged in him, and no, he just fixed that thing—

“Alastor?”

Lucifer’s voice was somewhere over his head. Alastor had hit the ground. The world was just red and gray. Lucifer sounded so small.

And then he didn’t.

“ALASTOR!”

The King was over him, hands hovering over—over the wound, presumably. There was smoke. Alastor was smoking, charred flesh burning, and Lucifer’s face was a blur, but he was still clearly horrified.

He should be running.

“That’s… quite a sting,” Alastor managed, his permanent smile twitching into an agonized grimace, words hissed between teeth and sparks. He choked on them. On the laugh he tried to give.

The sound did something to the king. The shock in his eyes, it curdled into something else. Something dangerous.

Rage.

“They shot you,” Lucifer said, voice low and shaking. “They shot you.”

Alastor laughed weakly. Felt his eyes burn with it. He couldn’t care. “I doubt… that was the intent.”

Lucifer did not respond.

He stood.

The air warped, pressure building until Alastor felt the ground crack beneath his back.

Lucifer was facing the rooftops, his teeth gritted to show how they had grown.

“They aimed for me,” Lucifer whispered, his voice vibrating with a frequency that made Alastor’s blood boil. Made him gasp for breath. “They hit you.”

Alastor blinked, flabbergasted even through the pain. He had never seen the king like this before. Only the distant, false mimicry through the obstruction of curtains, at Vox’s presentation. That had been nothing but a paper dragon.

This was an inferno.

His eyes glowed red, and then a sun-hot white. Horns had appeared above his head. A flame. Wings of white and blood blocked the light of the Pride sky from Alastor’s face.

For one terrifying, electric moment, Alastor forgot the king’s limitations. Thought Lucifer might forget himself and erase the sector from existence.

Instead, Lucifer turned back to him, jaw clenched so tightly Alastor could hear it, in his head, over the blood. “I... I can't,” he snarled, blood coming from his hands. His claws, in his palms? “My hands are tied. I can't smite them myself. I can't.”

You should run, Alastor thought, too dazed to utter the words. Too close to lost to wonder at his own thoughts. You should go.

Lucifer’s face came closer, the angel bent over Alastor, his face a mask of divine fury and something like—heartbreak? "But I can do this."

He grabbed Alastor’s good shoulder. Alastor could see it, though he was too numb to feel it.

Then he did. Power, flooding him like a tidal wave. Intoxicating, a limitless reservoir of celestial energy that turned his blood into liquid fire.

Was he… glowing?

The pain in his shoulder didn't vanish. This new burn, it could not do something like heal, Alastor could feel it. But it was an adrenaline shot straight to the soul, making his spine arch, his eyes burn and spin, his breath gasp out, filled him to the brim with power, with delight, a need to consume.

His own impulse, surely. His own whims merely magnified—

“Kill them.”

Alastor stilled. Stared up in shock through a suddenly cleared mind and buzzing veins.

Lucifer leaned in closer, his eyes burning hellfire into Alastor’s. His voice made his skin shudder. “Murder every last one of them. Leave nothing but ash.”

Alastor stared, genuine shock flickering through his mind like lightning.

Then he smiled.

“With pleasure.”

There was a frantic pounding on the door.

It made Alastor jolt, then grimace as pain throbbed a punishing beat through his body. He felt sick.

“Dad?!”

Of course.

Lucifer—to Alastor’s numbed shock—let out a hiss through his teeth that perfectly mirrored the Radio Demon’s own frustration.

“Dad, the news is going crazy! They’re saying you and Alastor just leveled half of the industrial district! That they saw angelic—They’re calling it a massacre! Even the Vees not being able to spin this isn’t—Dad!”

“Stay here,” Lucifer said, his words clipped and hard, as they had been ever since that shot. And yes, Alastor’s usual impulse to snap back, bite the hand that dared order him about was there, but it was a frayed, flickering thing, manifesting as little more than a tired stare the king didn’t even notice, too busy removing his hand from Alastor’s shoulder and turning away.

He didn’t even bother wiping his hands before marching across his bedroom and pulling open the door. But when the princess tried to burst inside, Lucifer stuck out an arm, blocking her path. “Not now, Charlie.”

“Dad, you can’t just ask me to wait! Everyone is asking what—” The princess froze. Stopped trying to push past as her eyes landed on Alastor, sitting on the edge of her father’s bed. Her eyes went wide, and Alastor didn’t think a Morningstar could blanch with their faces already so white, but would wonders ever cease? “Oh. Oh, that… Alastor—”

Alastor supposed he couldn’t blame her for her shock. The last time she would have seen of him, through those cameras that were certainly watching, catching everything outside? He was as titanic as he had ever been, dragging his massive body through the streets and letting his shadows creep into every building and crevice to drag out culprits and bystanders alike to be delivered to his mouth screaming. Now though, with Lucifer’s power gone and the adrenaline drained from his body, he was as small as he had ever been, a pathetic sight with his bloodied coat on the floor, body hunched, shirt ripped, soaked mess over the mangled remains of his still simmering shoulder.

All the same, he made a point to smile and give a little wave with the arm he could still move. “Hello, dear.”

“Oh my god, Alastor,” she wheezed, and it really was endearing how quickly the girl gave up her warpath at the sight of blood. “What happened, why are you—Are you okay?!”

Lucifer stepped into her line of sight, his tone still that one as he snapped, “He’ll be fine. You can go.”

“Dad, I just want—”

“Charlie.”

Charlie fell silent. Stared in shock at her father.

Alastor found himself doing the same.

“Go,” Lucifer insisted. “Now.” He didn’t wait for her to argue. He turned her with a touch that was—from where Alastor sat at least—surprisingly light, but Charlie stumbled out the door under his guidance without another peep. Whether she would have recovered from her shock and protested more, Alastor would never know: Lucifer shut the door before she would have the chance, locking it with a snap of fingers that echoed like a gunshot.

And Alastor just watched, his smile frozen in its usual sharp rictus, his ears pinned flat against his skull. To see the King stand up to his own daughter, push his jealously-guarded pride and joy out the door for Alastor’s sake—

Lucifer exhaled slowly, the tension bleeding from his frame until he was back to the tiny man Alastor knew well, in presence as well as size. When he turned to face Alastor again, whatever steel had been in his spine moments ago had softened into something closer to regret.

“I’m sorry about that,” he said. “She means well.”

Alastor let out a low chuckle, static crackling faintly beneath the sound. “Oh, I gathered as much.” His eyes glinted, even as he felt a dizzy strain pulling at his smile. “Still, that was quite the display of resolve.”

Lucifer grimaced. “I didn’t enjoy it.”

“No,” Alastor agreed lightly. “I imagine you didn’t. But I did.”

And he could claim so. There was a sweet satisfaction in the display, after all, even if it came packaged with an almost unnerving shock, and an… uncomfortable feeling Alastor could not quite place, and thus chose to ignore.

Lucifer shook his head once, dismissing the comment with a rare restraint, and retraced his steps to the bed. Light gathered around his hands as his attention returned to Alastor’s shoulder.

“Hold still.”

“As if I’m in any position to flee,” Alastor murmured, then shut his eyes to accept the sting of contact and the balm that he knew followed. Warmth spread through torn muscle and scorched bone, Lucifer’s magic slowly but surely knitting what angelic steel had ruined. Alastor hissed softly—not from pain, exactly, but the sheer sensation of divine power coursing through him without any intent to burn him like it naturally should. It was like when Lucifer granted him his power, but deeper. More invasive.

“I’ve been thinking about that weapon.” Alastor opened his eyes again and found the king frowning at his work as he spoke quietly. “You can’t get something like that just anywhere.”

“No, you can’t,” Alastor agreed, his smile turning wry. “There’s no telling how they procured the weapon—I couldn’t linger long enough to question any of my snacks without risking bleeding out first—but the original source was undoubtedly Carmilla Carmine.”

“Who?”

“One of the lead overlords in the city. She is the weapons dealer who designed the lovely box Vox put you into.”

Ah, it was a wonder Lucifer didn’t squeeze Alastor’s shoulder with how suddenly and sharply he tensed. How he clenched his teeth. “Perhaps it really has been too long since I personally involved myself in city politics. I might have to correct that in the case of this ‘Carmine’.”

Alastor smiled in satisfaction at the expected anger, the pleasant way it played over the king’s voice. He almost regretted having to douse the fire himself. “I believe your daughter and Vaggi are quite fond of that particular overlord.”

“I don’t care.”

Alastor stilled, his smile ebbing.

“She provided a weapon that almost killed... a weapon that shouldn't be on the streets. I'll deal with her.”

Alastor felt a genuine spark of awe at the cold fire of those words. This was not the bumbling, duck-making king he’d been manipulating for months. This was a man with a grudge and the power of the heavens in his veins. A grudge borne from what had happened to him… He couldn’t be sure what to blame for his dizziness at that moment.

Whatever the source, he sobered quickly when he noticed Lucifer’s brow furrow, felt his magic begin to ebb away. “This is taking too long,” Lucifer grumbled, frustration clear in his voice. “The damage is deeper than I thought. I need more direct contact.”

Alastor instantly stiffened, a sharp hiss tearing from his throat as he recoiled away, threading the pain it caused into his voice. “That is quite unnecessary, Sire.”

Lucifer froze, his hands still in the air. And they stayed there, right where they were, as his eyes ticked up to Alastor’s face, still hard, his jaw set. “It is necessary. You can’t let this fester.”

He was insisting, and yet, he did not move. He waited, and you could cut the tension with a knife as the pair stared at each other… and Alastor slowly processed that wait.

Lucifer had stopped. He insisted, but he did not press. Did not push past Alastor’s rejection. The king looked hellbent on convincing him to acquiesce, but… would he force it, if Alastor refused to consent?

The Radio Demon was shocked to find he didn’t think so.

As off-balancing and unfounded as that belief was, it unraveled Alastor’s rage. Left him merely stiff and prickly as he relaxed back into his ‘seat’ on the bed.

And still, Lucifer just stared. “…Is that a ‘yes’?”

“Just make it quick.”

Lucifer’s shoulders eased by the barest degree, a release so subtle Alastor might have missed it if he hadn’t been watching too closely. Then the little king gave a gulp and eyed the buttons of Alastor’s shirt as though they were some puzzle he didn’t know how to tackle, and—oh, if the holy bird started getting cold feet now—

Alastor was almost relieved himself when the king found his nerve again and just went to it.

Lucifer only got through half the buttons before stopping, sucking in a breath so harshly, it sounded like a whistle. Alastor eyed the frozen man curiously, but a quick follow of Lucifer’s wide-eyed line of sight revealed—Ah. Alastor forgot about that.

“Problem?” he asked all the same, just to be difficult.

Lucifer didn’t answer him right away, however, one of his hands rising to not-touch what caught his eye with a delicate finger. “When did you get this?” he whispered, never tearing his eyes off the open gash on Alastor’s chest, still oozing pus and blood between glowing green thread. “When did this happen,” he said again, voice growing tighter by the word. “Alastor.”

The use of his name snapped Alastor’s attention back fully. He frowned faintly, contemplating this latest curveball in the king’s manner. “Some months ago.”

Lucifer lifted his head slowly, and locking eyes with the angel? It was an admittedly intense experience. “Months.”

“Yes.”

“…Adam.”

It wasn’t a question.

Alastor smiled, but said nothing, uninterested in confirming the claim.

It was apparently enough, however, for Lucifer swore, sharp and furious, enough so that Alastor felt his brow shoot up. Golden light flared as a pair of suture scissors appeared in the king’s hand, gleaming and precise.

“What are you doing?” Alastor snapped, a spike of alarm cutting through him as Lucifer leaned in close.

“Fixing this,” Lucifer growled, his glower still pinned on Alastor’s chest. “You’ve been walking around with a divine-infected wound in your chest for how long?”

“You talk as though you didn’t taunt me with my loss against the man yourself.”

Lucifer’s only response to that was a deeper grimace.

“I managed,” Alastor tried instead, only to fall into a smiling scowl of his own when the king finally made to come at him with those scissors. Alastor instantly leant back, trying to catch Lucifer’s wrist while a shadow sprouted from his back—making his head swim with the manifestation—to steal the offending tool. “Stop that!”

A duck popped up to sacrifice itself to the shadow’s grab while Lucifer—he slapped Alastor’s hand. Just slapped it! The shock of it froze Alastor still long enough for that blasted royal to get a steadying hand on his waist and cut the first thread. “Sit. Still,” Lucifer commanded. “And don’t bite me.”

Ah, look at the little king using some common sense and intuition! He managed to guess exactly what Alastor was about to do next! Too bad their little deal didn’t give him blanket power to order Alastor around or deter him—

“You’re an idiot,” Lucifer went on without any seeming awareness of, nor care for the certain fate he was building for himself, grumbling away while cutting away at Alastor’s crude-but-efficient stitches. “A complete and utter egomaniacal idiot. You’re lucky this didn’t rot you from the inside out!”

Alastor grinned. With teeth. Eyes pinned on the exposed section of Lucifer’s throat. “I survived.”

“Barely.”

“Oh? If I was so close to death, how did it take you a direct visual to even notice the trouble? I have been going along just fine, thank you.”

“You’re infuriating.”

“As I’ve heard.”

Lucifer let out a low hiss so quiet, it was barely audible, and Alastor had to tense himself to avoid a painful shudder of laughter.

And then he was just still, shocked into relaxing as the last stitches were cut—an almost negligible pain, against the backdrop of his still throbbing shoulder—and the faint shift of metal marked the scissors disappearing, and then there was a hand. Lucifer’s other hand on his chest, and a soft glow of gold as heat poured into the wound. Not the burning, invasive force of angelic steel, but something cleansing. Purging. Corrective.

Right. Lucifer was… healing him. Without prompting. Against Alastor’s protests, in fact, as the sinner had—to his own belated embarrassment—rather lost sight of what he was about to gain amid his disdain for Lucifer’s assertive boundary pushing. And even if Alastor had paused to consider it, he would have been wary. There was no way such support would be offered for free, after all. There were always strings attached. Always a cost.

And yet, nothing. Lucifer had extracted no favors for this, struck no deal. He had simply done it as soon as he knew of the wound. Just as he had shepherded Alastor into accepting help with his shoulder as soon as his rampage was through. Defended the demon like a wounded animal in his den when his own daughter came knocking.

He was… so angry when Alastor was shot.

And there were practical explanations to be had, certainly. Reasons Alastor could fall back on comfortably to explain Lucifer’s behavior. But the way Lucifer had just insisted on giving him this healing piled onto all the rest of it left Alastor… uncertain. Sapped the rage and irritation from him for Lucifer’s audacity and insults until he was left quiet and still under the devil’s touch.

Slowly, Lucifer’s magic knit together flesh that had been split and stubborn and infected for nearly half a year. The ache Alastor had grown so accustomed to was gone, just like that. He hadn’t even realized how much of his awareness it had come to occupy until it was no longer there.

How… easy it was for him. Lucifer could effectively blink and erase what plagued Alastor’s life. Like it was nothing to him.

“I’m sorry.” Alastor’s thoughts stalled, the frustration and resentment building up inside of him brought to a standstill as he stared at the king. Any anger Lucifer had just been displaying was wiped from sight, leaving behind a wilting angel, glowering at the parts of Alastor that remained marred with something sad in his gaze. Something raw. “For being useless.”

“Useless?” Alastor’s eyes went wide, scoured Lucifer’s face looking for sense. “You are actively healing my wounds at this moment.”

“Not what I meant,” Lucifer dismissed, his frown growing deeper as his fingers twitched against Alastor’s chest and waist, clearly wanting to form fists, but fighting the urge. “I hate that I couldn’t do anything myself. That I had to just watch—even tell you to throw yourself into the fire, already hurt.”

“Unless you wish to explore some ‘divine intervention’ options, there is no point in fretting over your inability to ‘smite’ the sinners yourself,” Alastor said, unmoved as Lucifer flinched in the face of the harsh reminder. He took no particular pleasure in hurting the king, just satisfaction in refusing to turn from the truth of it. And there was a… care to be found in his tone as he went on, even if it was no more than the care of testing the soreness of a bruise. “This is our arrangement, Majesty. I provide the performance, you the power to perform.”

“Well, I don’t want that arrangement!”

Alastor’s mind snapped to a sickening, frozen stop. His permanent smile remained in place, but beneath it, a cold spike of genuine alarm was lancing through him,

So. This was it, then.

He had always known this moment could come. Either of them could break their deal at will, after all, and though Alastor had yet to feel that telltale crack of a chain at his wrist—a cuff of gold and green that would find its perfect match on Lucifer’s wrist just before both shattered—it could come at any moment. That was one of the stipulations they had agreed upon, after all, when this all began. A mutual ‘get out of jail free’ card, as the king put it. A fine escape clause that Alastor could use to his own advantage, certainly, but could also spell doom for all he had worked so hard to build up these last few months.

It was why he made certain what he built was not on the foundation of Lucifer alone.

That precaution did not protect him from dread, however.

His gaze flicked over Lucifer’s face, his posture, the faint tension in his shoulders. He catalogued details automatically even as his mind scrambled for answers. Was this anger? Regret? Had he overplayed his hand at last? Pushed too far? Been too sharp? Asked too much? Let his mask slip in some small, fatal way? He didn’t know.

Lucifer was still touching him.

That registered belatedly—the warmth still at Alastor’s chest, spreading in slow waves through his body as torn flesh and cleansed sinew merged back together. Angelic power humming straight to his bones with an intimacy Alastor could not name, that came too easily to his senses.

Then it stopped.

Lucifer stepped back, his hands leaving Alastor abruptly as if he had been burned, and Alastor felt the loss instantly. No pain—no, that was gone—but the lack, for lack of a better word. An absence that made his throat tight and he watched as Lucifer held his hands close to his chest, one clutching the wrist of the other.

Lucifer exhaled, shaky. “I don’t… want this arrangement,” he repeated, his voice different from earlier, its sharp edges worn down to something raw and unguarded. He stepped back again, putting more distance between them, his eyes wide and vibrating with an emotion Alastor couldn’t name as he stared over Alastor’s shoulder, like he couldn’t even look at him. “Not like this. I don’t want to just stand there, doing nothing. Again.”

Alastor’s breath caught, his ear twitching. Hope and an odd, blind-stumbling apprehension filled his gut.

Lucifer’s grip on his wrist visibly tightened, his knuckles whitening to a harsh gray. “I know what we agreed to. I know you can handle yourself. But—” He broke off, breath catching, jaw clenching until the rest inevitably fell out of him, shuddering bleak with surrender. “I don’t…want to watch you get hurt.”

Silence fell. Heavy. Charged.

Alastor stared.

Not assessing, not calculating—simply staring, as the meaning of Lucifer’s words sank in with slow, undeniable certainty.

Oh.

Oh.

Realization came with a sickening lurch of understanding, and this… this was not what Alastor had prepared for. His attempts—careful, calculated, endlessly rehearsed—to ingratiate himself to the King of Hell had not merely succeeded. They had gone too far. He had intended to hook a helpful fish, and he had caught a whale. Or perhaps a shark. Something with weight and teeth. Something that could drag him under with it.

And all he could see was Vox. His old face. The one from that horrid, awful moment of comprehension when Alastor realized the game had changed into something untenable. Something that made him want to lash out and laugh with venom and run.

But there was no urge to run. Not this time.

Just fear.

A still, anxious fear that made him want to be careful. Whispered of ice beneath his feet and a frozen death.

He didn’t want to run: He was afraid to move.

“I would,” Alastor began, half-blind, slow as he fought to keep his composure. Strained to control the static in his voice and weigh his words. “…not appreciate someone fighting my battles for me, Majesty. Not even you.”

Lucifer flinched. His frown deepened, but the disquiet growing was clearly pointed inward, not towards Alastor, and he coaxed the angel’s attention back to him by continuing to speak.

“But I do appreciate this,” he said, motioning towards his injured shoulder with the hand of his good arm. The mark on his chest that was nothing more than a fresh-skinned scar, where moments ago it bled like Adam had struck him yesterday. “I… appreciate what you are doing for me,” he admitted, the words falling like uncertain rain from his tongue. “You give me the strength to manage more than I could ever hope to do alone, and I… am glad of your support.”

Lucifer stared at him.

Was that too much? Alastor wondered, his breath caught, chest tight. Not enough? He was not good at this sort of thing. Hated the exposure of such sincere thoughts, even in the pursuit of the practical. It made the possibility of dismissal sting in a way it never would have otherwise.

But their chain remained steady on his wrist, unseen but felt, and slowly Lucifer’s silence took shape, his eyes widening, his expression looking struck in an oddly not-violent way. He looked like he didn’t know what to say either.

Eventually, the little king ducked his head, dodged the eyes of the sinner seated before him and stepped close again, his hand returning to Alastor’s skin—to the shoulder he had intended to heal from the start, but detoured away from since Alastor’s shirt came off.

Wordlessly, he began to heal him again.

And wordlessly, Alastor watched, the tension inside of him slowly unfurling as he sensed its mate inside Lucifer, alive and buzzing, clear in the distraction in the king’s eyes as he worked. Alastor’s words had gotten to him. Lucifer didn’t know what to make of them. He was shaken by what they meant to him.

And Alastor felt the oddest sense of sympathy for Lucifer’s plight, even as the edges of his own nerves pricked with new awareness, and a quiet dread. Not of what he felt certain the king felt—that could easily be turned to Alastor’s advantage, unwieldy though he knew such things to be—but what that awareness prompted in Alastor. When he saw Lucifer like that, with that thought in his head? It left Alastor… oddly wary to prod.

Ha. Perhaps he was going soft in his old age.

Chapter Text

Lucifer decided somewhere around the third hour and fourth sketch page that he was bored out of his skull.

He let out a looongsuffering sigh, tapping his heel against the backrest of the plush armchair he was sitting in upside down. He arched his neck against the front of the seat to better look across—up across—the room. From that inverted vantage point, Alastor’s chamber looked more nonsensical than ever. The murky swamp that took up the less-controlled parts of the floor had become a rotting, cloudy sky, and Alastor looked like a crimson bat clinging to a mahogany perch where he hunched over his desk, all angles and stillness and quiet menace, presumably prompted by frustration at some calculations or wording or the like.

Lucifer envied Alastor the struggle. He himself may not have patience for such things, but he was sure Alastor would have to admit the angel was the more tragic of the pair of them right then: If the two of them shared anything after all, it was an abhorrence for boredom.

To combat the suffocating crawl of the minutes, Lucifer hummed a low, vibrating note, first just for the music, then for far more, carrying the tune until the chair beneath him began to glow gold. With a lazy flicker of magic, it peeled itself off the floor and drifted upward—or downward, again from Lucifer’s perspective—rotating until he was floating level with the top of the bookshelf behind Alastor.

And that was it. There was no purpose for the move. No goal. He was just floating… and Alastor hadn’t noticed. Or was ignoring him.

Rude.

Lucifer shifted his weight, making the springs of the chair give a faint, synchronized squeak that echoed in the quiet room as he reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. The screen lit his face with pale, artificial light as his thumb hovered over the messaging app, searching for a notification dot that hadn't appeared in years. Not from her. Not since Lilith finally ‘came home’. Not in any of the many years prior, when she was gone. Not for some time before, either.

…Not that there were phones of this sort around before, when she was actually speaking to him outside of family meetings and interventions. But still, he knew now that she received every call and message he sent. Ignored them all.

It should have been freeing knowing that, if only in the cruelest way, but Lucifer still found himself staring at a blank lock screen now and again, caught in a long-ingrained, useless habit. A self-cruel one he didn’t need to keep enabling. There was no one he expected or wanted a message from now: He still wasn’t ready to answer the Sins, Charlie was a daily, accessible face in his life for the first time ever, even amid her shared disapproval of his behavior recently, and—well. Lucifer knew Alastor had a phone, but he thought Hell might just combust if he exchanged something as mundane as a text convo with the guy. Better that they keep seeking each other out directly, and Lucifer just milk Alastor’s allowance of his presence in his chambers when the urge to prod the sinner grew too strong.

It was such an urge that had brought him there to that room that afternoon, but Alastor had insisted Lucifer not disturb his work if he hovered: A compromise Lucifer had accepted multiple times before, but he was really coming to regret it that night.

Booooooooored—

With a sharp, decisive flick of his wrist, he shoved the device back into his pocket.

The chair drifted back down, landing with a soft thud.

Across the room, the upside-down Alastor folded the paper he was just writing on, held it up in the air, and gave a satisfied hum as it burst into green flames. Then he spun his own chair to face another pile of papers on his desk with a sharp flourish. All minor gestures, but telling to any who knew: The careful stiffness that had been plaguing the sinner since their last extermination was gone, the hesitation prompted by the ache even Lucifer’s healing could not remove smoothed away with time. A recent recovery, and one that hung in Lucifer’s mind as he watched Alastor pick up his pen, sign some contract, continue his work… fall back into it. His attention, once again, elsewhere.

Lucifer harrumphed, then looked away when that too drew nothing from the deer. He lifted his hands and began to wiggle his fingers, casting flickering shadows across the floor by the glow of the fireplace. Between his magic and the natural skill of his hands, he formed a crude shadow-duck, making its beak snap at a shadow-butterfly that actively flew about.

Then, almost immediately, something else moved. A much larger, jagged shadow swept into the space, looming over the little duck with its claws elongated and teeth bared, the antlers upon its head clear and unmistakable. Lucifer’s breath hitched, but instead of tearing the duck apart, the familiar shadow-beast tilted its head and began to mimic the duck’s movements, its terrifying maw opening and closing in a silent, mocking ‘quack’.

Lucifer’s eyes went wide, then lit up. He moved his fingers faster, making the duck do a little dance over the patters of the rug under his chair.

The shadow-beast followed suit, leaping and twirling in a grotesque but oddly playful pantomime that left Lucifer snickering. A glance up at the certain source of this unexpected playmate showed that Alastor remained hunched over his work, posture rigid, ostensibly ignoring the theater taking place across his room.

But Lucifer saw the way one of those deer ears twitched toward the sound of another of his suppressed giggles.

Eventually, the shadow-beast retreated, melting back into its master’s proper echo against the bookshelves behind the desk. And Lucifer let him go, satisfied in some innate, wordless way as he righted himself in the chair and got comfortable. Picking up the sketchbook he had dropped on the floor a while ago, when it last lost his interest, he began to draw once more. But it was not his usual ducks or stars that took form this time. It was a still life, charcoal tracing the sharp line of a red-clad shoulder, the way a tuft of hair curled near a deer-like ear.

The decision was impulsive, thoughtless, and when Lucifer caught up to himself halfway through shading the lid of an eye? He felt a flush creep up his neck, and quickly flipped the sketchbook over, annoyed at himself when he realized how detailed his work had gotten, how long he had stared to catch those details. Was there any chance at all that hadn’t been noticed?

“Hey, uh... Alastor? Buddy? Pal?” Lucifer said at last, his voice cracking slightly from disuse. He cleared his throat and tried again, determined to break the silence and get out of his own head. “You know, normal people take breaks. Like, actual breaks where you don’t pass the ‘responsibility’ of them onto a shadow?”

Alastor didn't look up. He flipped a page with a neat motion and adjusted his glasses with a pointed air. “I am deeply offended by the implication that I am normal,” he replied, perfectly pleasant. “And even more offended by the suggestion I would walk away from a job undone.”

“Uuuuuhhh, don’t you dodge work all the time? That’s what Valerie says anyway.”

No response.

Lucifer huffed, rolling his eyes and dragging his charcoal too hard across the page until it snapped with a soft crack. Damnit, he wasn’t even drawing anything— “Seriously? You’ve been at it for hours.”

“I believe I was quite clear about what I would be doing this afternoon.”

“But I’ve sketched three separate designs for a robotic duck that can dispense hot cocoa, and I’m losing my mind.”

“Mmm,” Alastor hummed, his pen never stalling. “And yet, the work remains. If you are truly so dissatisfied, Your Majesty, you can always seek entertainment and company elsewhere. Or, perhaps you could make yourself useful? I believe our dear Charlie is currently occupied with Vaggi and the reorganization of the laundry facilities.”

Lucifer slumped back. He didn't want to talk with Charlie about the laundry. It would inevitably lead to way more serious questions, and he was dodging those thoughts as much as he was dodging his own reflection. What he needed was a distraction. A petty, small-minded, wonderful distraction.

…Hmm.

Lucifer let his sketchbook float in the air as he flicked his wrist towards one of Alastor’s vintage radios—specifically, the one just beside the sinner on his desk.

The raucous, high-pitched squeeze of an accordion filled the room as a loud, aggressive, and unapologetically cheerful polka started to play.

Alastor’s pen stopped.

His ears gave a sharp, violent flick toward the radio.

His shadow stretched across the wall and bookshelves in a sudden rush, reaching the radio to smack it with a sharp clack as the dial spun.

The music switched instantly with a soft, smooth tune.

Lucifer grinned, eyes dancing. Not only had he gotten Alastor’s attention, but he had just changed the music, not shut it off. That invitation was too much to ignore.

He flicked his hand again, sending out a spark of gold as he reached not just for another channel, but a specific song. A heartbeat, and the room filled with a synthesized voice: ‘A duck walked up to a lemonade stand and he said to the man, running the stand—

The radio screeched with an ear-splitting static before the first line could even finish before shutting off completely.

Lucifer ducked as a certain sharp fountain pen stabbed the back of his chair right where his face had just been.

“Do you wish to remain in this room unmolested?” Alastor hissed from behind a jeering smile aimed directly at Lucifer, eyes sparking, voice crackling with a heavy layer of radio static. Even his shadow had come back out to play, spreading out across the floor so its teeth and hands were ‘surrounding’ Lucifer upon the floor, the whole room shuddering with an essence of sudden, sharp malice.

And Lucifer snickered, his shoulders shaking as he leered a grin back at the sinner. “Whoa there, Bambi! Don't go threatening me a good time, haha!”

The room grew very quiet.

Slowly, Alastor sat back in his chair, his gaze dimming to a searching point. He was barely smiling. “What?”

Lucifer’s grin… slowly curdled, his triumph and self-satisfaction dying as he processed the baffled deer. Realizing what he'd said and, more importantly, who he'd said it to? A bright, glowing blush crept up his neck, staining his cheeks with heat. “Oh! Uh… haha, sorry! Nothing!” he stammered, grabbing his sketchbook back out of the air and holding it up to his face, waving a hand dismissively around its shield. “Just a stupid joke! Forget I said anything! I'm not even here! Really, just a part of the furniture! Ignore me!”

“I was attempting to,” Alastor snapped, and Lucifer flinched, even the retraction of Alastor’s shadow doing little to take the sting out of the clearly irritated words.

Oof, okay, he thought, trying and failing to smother the sense of rejection he felt. Tough crowd.

He lowered his sketch and returned his focus to it without lifting his eyes or face, his charcoal moving in agitated, frantic strokes across the page. He felt like Alastor was staring at him now, though he knew that was not likely: The guy clearly wanted him gone, though even knowing that, Lucifer couldn’t bring himself to leave. How pathetic was that?

Ugh, I'm totally regretting this, Lucifer thought, his heart hammering a bruised rhythm. I should have stayed in my room. Why am I still here? This is awkward. This is so awkward.

He sighed, dusting off a bit of excess dust from the page, then slowly looked up—reluctant, but in need of a model—only to gasp. Stop breathing.

Alastor was right beside him.

“HOLY—!” Lucifer jumped, his wings nearly manifesting and pushing him out of the chair from the shock. It took a little magic for him to avoid a humiliating spill, and he held his hand to his heart as he glowered up at Alastor. “Don't do that! You're like a creepy, red-suited ninja, you know that?! What is wrong with you?”

But Alastor wasn't listening, or looking at Lucifer and his indignant face. He was looking down at the floor.

Lucifer followed his gaze, and found his sketchbook.

Lucifer’s heart plummeted into his stomach. Panic, cold and sharp, flooded him. He was sketching him. He had just spent the last hour meticulously drawing the curve of Alastor's jaw, the sharp points of his little antlers, the way his eyes looked when he was focused. And the results were all right there, staring up at them in black-and-white.

Oh, Father—

Was Alastor going to make fun of him? Laugh at him? Treat this as a joke? As leverage?? Or, worse—was he uncomfortable with it? Would he realize how much time Lucifer spent just watching him? The possibility turned Lucifer’s dread to nausea in a second.

And Alastor just kept staring, giving the drawing a long, inscrutable look. He leaned down, closer, his shadow falling over the page. Then, he looked at Lucifer, scrutinizing him even longer, until Lucifer felt exposed, snippy, and desperately anxious. Why was he looking at him like that?

“What? What is it?” Lucifer snapped, his voice a bit too high, a little squeak falling out. “Take a picture and it’ll last longer, huh?!” He bent over and swiped up the book, was tempted to just toss the whole thing into a portal or into the fireplace, but— “It’s just a sketch, okay?! I was bored, I told you! My brain was melting! It’s just an artistic study! Completely academic!”

And Alastor… started nodding? What the fuck?! Was… was Lucifer actually being convincing?! There was no way. He was mocking him, wasn’t he?! That son of a—

“Your proportions are off.”

Lucifer blinked, his panic and despair and defensive outrage flatlining into… “What?”

“Your figure proportions,” Alastor clarified, calm as can be, pointing a clawed finger at the page in Lucifer’s hands. “I am quite a bit taller than that.”

“O-oh… uh, excuse me?” Lucifer scoffed, relief and indignation tangling together in a queasy mess he covered with disbelief. He sat up straighter, clutching the sketchbook to his chest. “I'm sorry, did the Radio Demon suddenly become a master of the fine arts?”

“It does not take a master to notice your mistakes. Merely eyes.”

“You loom, okay? It’s an artistic choice to represent your overbearing, ‘I’m-too-cool-for-everyone’ personality,” Lucifer said, dropping into a low, mocking tone with a matching gesture before resuming his comfortable, familiar glare. “It’s called symbolism. Look it up.”

“I tower,” Alastor corrected, his own eyes gleaming with clear amusement that—should only be irritating. Nothing else. Definitely didn’t prompt anything else. “And my shoulders are broader. You’ve made me look quite spindly, Your Majesty. It's almost insulting. One might think you weren't paying attention.”

“They are not broader!” Lucifer squinted, leaning in to defend his work, his face inches from Alastor's. “I’ve spent the last three hours looking at you! I think I’d know how wide your shoulders are! I have eyes, Alastor! Very good, kingly eyes! They're excellent at measuring tacky red suits!”

Alastor’s grin sharpened, the man behind it appearing almost… fond?

No. That was dangerous thinking. Definitely not thinking that… And wait, what did Lucifer even just say to him?! That was—

There were fingers in Lucifer’s hair. Claws delicately pricking his scalp as Alastor ruffled his hair. Gave it a quick, teasing tug. “Keep telling yourself that, dearie.”

Lucifer’s brain had truly and completely shut down. Static flooded his thoughts—and not the radio sort—and for a second, the room ceased to exist. The touch was grounding and electric all at once, and he didn’t pull away. Because he couldn’t. His brain simply stalled, eyes wide, heart slamming against his ribs.

Alastor’s fingers lingered for a heartbeat and a lifetime before withdrawing.

“Now,” Alastor said lightly, conjuring his red coat back onto his frame with a flourish of shadow—wait, when had he even taken it off? Was it always off? That wasn’t right, how did Lucifer lose such track of— “You have disrupted my work quite enough for one evening, I believe. I find I can no longer focus on these contracts with you loitering about and making a mockery of my anatomy.”

—Lucifer’s gut dropped out of its nauseous storm into a pit.

He smoothed his hair with trembling, overly-rough fingers, his face still burning, but now with shame and disappointment and not other things. “Fine! Great! I’ll just leave then! I have plenty of… kingly things to do! Yeah! Important things to oversee! Make! I don't need to stay here and have my art critiqued by a tacky loudspeaker who thinks he’s seven feet tall! I'm going to go create a new being that actually respects my vision! Maybe a seven foot duck that I can drop on—”

“Pity,” Alastor interrupted, turning for the door without even waiting to hear Lucifer’s grand idea-turned-threat! The king might well have tossed something at him for the affront—what exactly he hadn’t yet decided—but the deer paused at the threshold, his head turned partially back to catch Lucifer’s eye in his periphery. “I was going to say,” he started, and instantly Lucifer’s threats and thoughts stilled. There was a sudden, heavy tension in the air. Not the anxious, confused sort from before, but something heavy, and expectant. Oddly… shared? “As an apology for your artistic insults, you should come dancing with me.”

…

“W…what?” Lucifer couldn’t process. He just stared. “We should… dancing? Like, moving-to-music dancing?”

“Is there another type?” Alastor grinned. Laughed at him. Lucifer couldn’t breathe enough to snap about it. “Dancing, at Mimzy’s? She’s been hounding me for another visit. To see you again as well. And I find I am in need of a proper venue to expend this restless energy you provoked.” Alastor’s grin went wide, his teeth gleaming in the dim light. “So? Are you game?”

The moment stretched, thick and electric. Lucifer stared at Alastor’s back, at the way his head was only half-turned, tiny antlers casting long, jagged shadows against the wall.

He shouldn’t. That same sense of self-preservation Alastor’s intent attention always prompted in Lucifer was screeching a code red. Whether due to Alastor’s intentions, or his own inane weakness for the sinner, Lucifer didn’t know. Likely both.

He looked at the sketchbook in his lap, at the charcoal-smudged version of the man by the door, then back at the real thing. Listened to those alarm bells ring, felt his chest tightening with that familiar, dangerous pull. The one that always preceded terrible, wonderful decisions.

“Yeah!” Lucifer blurted, far too quickly and far too loud. He tossed the sketchbook onto the floor with a reckless flourish. “Yeah, I’m totally game! Absolutely! I could use some... music that isn’t jazz or—well, okay, it's a jazz club, but whatever! I'm coming! Just try to stop me!”

Alastor turned fully back to him, his grin radiant and genuinely bright, a flash of yellowed teeth in the dim swamp light that should have been alarming. It made Lucifer’s heart beat fast. “Splendid!”

Then Alastor turned to leave for true, and Lucifer—after a belated beat—scrambled out of the chair, frantically snapping his fingers as he did. A shimmer of gold light, and his pink sweater dissolved, replaced by his usual suit, signature top hat materializing with a jaunty tilt, snake included.

There. Like he was going to give that deer any more ammunition to humiliate him that night. Let no one say he showed up looking like a shut-in next to that deer, dressed to the nines.

Adjusting his cuffs, Lucifer followed Alastor out the door, trying to look like a dignified monarch instead of a man who was very, very glad he hadn't stayed in his room today, with his heart drumming a frantic beat against his ribs and a knot of nerves and something else in his chest. Something that felt dangerously like hope.

I am so, so doomed.

But hey, if he was going to dance himself into catastrophe? At least there was a chance Alastor might let him lead?

Chapter Text

The lobby of the Hazbin Hotel was certainly a lively place these days, one must admit, and far from boring so long as the individuals filling it every afternoon weren’t predictable in their manner. Alastor still made quite the habit of haunting the place when he was less stressed or occupied by his day’s work, particularly when his more favored forms of entertainment were exhausted or busy, or otherwise unavailable.

The absence of one such ‘entertainment’ was what brought him downstairs that very afternoon, in fact. Left him standing at the base of the main stairs. To any observer, he was merely a familiar—if unnerving—fixture of the room, his perpetual grin fixed and bright, his eyes half-lidded in a mask of polite boredom as he leaned with practiced nonchalance against his cane.

In reality, his ears were pricked, catching every frantic whisper coming from the nearby bar.

“It’s an intervention, I’m tellin’ ya,” Angel Dust was saying, leaning his many elbows on the mahogany counter as he muttered to his company. “Charlie’s probably over there playin' the ‘I just want us to be a family’ card while the big lady grills the king for... well, everything he’s been doin' lately.”

"Making ducks and hanging around assholes?" Husk grumbled, though his eyes flickered briefly toward Alastor.

Alastor found some gratification in how quickly he looked away again when he flashed him a widening of his smile.

“Not really seeing what the fuss is all about,” Cherri Bomb decided to toss in, certainly sounding the least concerned of the group between her distracted tone and unbothered volume. “Sure, it’ll be tense when they come back, but haven’t they been having these kinds of ‘interventions’ off and on for months now? It’s nothing new.”

“Nah, Cherri. This is different,” Angel Dust insisted, tossing a concern-eyed glance over his shoulder at Vaggi. The angel was currently pacing a furrow into the carpet, her single eye darting toward the front doors every few seconds. “I don’t know what’s up, but Charlie looked real anxious this time when she left, in an ‘already too late’ kinda way. Like she was runnin’ to a burnt-down house with a fire extinguisher, that kinda vibe?”

“Shit,” was Cherri Bomb’s thoughtful commentary, and as Vaggi turned on the group, telling them something about not assuming things and generally attempting some form of damage control, Alastor tuned her and the lot of them out, falling back into his own thoughts. He didn't need to participate or even really listen any longer to understand the gravity of the situation. Whatever the unknown details involved, if Lilith was involved, Lucifer would return impacted, one way or another.

Alastor felt a tug of something at the thought. Not concern, he told himself, but certainly interest. A gardener’s wariness of disturbance of its crop, and latent satisfaction in its growth. He was the one behind what Lucifer was ‘doing’ lately, after all. The one who had coaxed the king out of his workshop, to fill his empty hours with talk and music and the blood of a good show.

And if the queen had some issue with that? Well. Alastor would be tempted to laugh in the face of anyone who suggested he was the origin of strife in the Morningstar family, happy as he would be to claim credit. To say he had disturbed still waters was to not pay attention to what had been happening for the last near-decade. Alastor needed no insider insight to know that. No, this family drama was in the making long before he came along, and Lucifer’s good regard would have been far harder to earn if the queen had not left the Radio Demon such fertile grounds to begin with.

But no, there was no need to correct his company’s impression of him and his influence on the king. Alastor enjoyed the implication he was a puppet-master in this dynamic, when the reality was far more complex than that, a far more delicate dance of mutual benefit and careful cultivation. There was no plan here to trap the king, to cut Lucifer’s strings and leave him hanging. Not unless it proved called for, that is. It would be foolish to grow too comfortable in this arrangement, of course, especially when the king’s interest in him was growing more… volatile, difficult to predict. But the fact remained Lucifer was a fountain of potential as endless as his own power. Why would Alastor throw that away over some quaint plan to break up the royal family? For what?

No, the only reason Alastor was wary of the queen, of Charlie to a certain extent, was their own influence on the king. It… would be better in so many ways if Lilith was not a factor. Not that Alastor could imagine doing anything about it—the queen’s own powers remained something of a modern mystery, and even if they weren’t, any scheme Alastor might ponder to remove her from the equation had far too high a risk of backfiring on him spectacularly, it was simply not worth the risk—but it would be foolish in the extreme to discount the mother and daughter’s combined capability to throw a wrench into anything Alastor built with the shared man in their lives. They were the ones Lucifer cared about most, after all. The motivation that brought him to Alastor’s side in the first place. The daughter he would do anything for, and the wife he had been bound to longer than the pyramids had stood in the sands. Alastor knew that. Could not forget that.

He didn’t care to dwell on it, and he was pulled mercifully from his musings by a small, frantic weight hitting his shin. A glance down revealed Niffty, her single eye wide and shimmering with a manic intensity. “I found a new kind of bug in the pantry! It has too many legs and it screams when I poke it! Do you want to see? Do you?”

Alastor’s expression softened. “I apologize, but not just now. I’m quite occupied with the ‘bugs’ currently whispering in the lobby. It seems our most esteemed residents have landed themselves in a bit of a mess.”

“A mess?!” she whispered loudly, pulling out and clutching her needle like a dagger. “Is there really going to be a mess, Alastor? A big, royal mess?”

Alastor chuckled, the sound coming out as a series of sharp, mechanical clicks. He reached down and patted the little maid on the head. “Patience, my dear. When royals collide, there is always a mess. Though I suspect this one will be far ‘quieter’ than you’d be hoping for.”

“I’ll get the bleach ready just in case!” she chirped before scurrying off to stab a stray dust bunny under a sofa. Alastor smiled after her indulgently.

Then suddenly, the air in the lobby changed. A rift of shimmering gold tore open right in the midst of the crowd, blinding and sudden, prompting everyone present to stop mid-step, mid-sentence.

Lucifer stepped through.

Alastor’s attention was instantly on him, just like everyone else’s, but where so many held their breath in alarm or bated dread, he was instantly scanning the angel for answers. Details. The most jarring and obvious being the lack of a princess at his side—never mind a queen—and just how… composed Lucifer was. He wasn't stumbling or frantic as he often was after stepping through his portal. He was calm. Impeccably, terrifyingly calm. It made Alastor think distinctly of the eye of a hurricane, and his usual static was completely muted against the dead quiet of the room as they all stared.

Lucifer didn't acknowledge the crowd of guests around him, nor the staff’s gaping stares. He remained utterly silent, his eyes fixed on a point somewhere beyond the walls of the hotel, his mouth set in a line so thin it looked like a scar. He didn't look at Vaggi, who took a tentative step forward, didn’t acknowledge Angel Dust’s awkward little wave. He just lingered a breath… then walked, moving like a sleepwalker, his boots clicking with an eerie, hollow rhythm against the marble as the sinners all parted around him like a sea.

Then, just as he reached the stairs, within steps from Alastor? He looked up.

His eyes met Alastor’s.

For a heartbeat, the crowded lobby disappeared. There was only the two of them, the King of Hell and the Radio Demon. Except not, for in that one instant, that gaze was not one of a commanding king, nor an untouchable divine. The mask cracked, and the look Lucifer shot Alastor was a plea.

Then he walked on, and was gone, up the stairs before any of them could process it, even as the king’s steps echoed a slow beat in his wake.

Silence returned.

“Well!” Alastor chirped, breaking it with nary a thought with his bright, crackling voice. He reached up to adjust his monocle, playing his tension into a show of nonchalance as he smiled at no one in particular. “If you’ll excuse me, I believe I have some... overdue maintenance to attend to. Try not to burn down the building in my absence.”

Then, not waiting to see if anyone heard his words or made a reply, he dissolved into the floor, his shadow racing up the walls and disappearing into the ceiling.

When he resolidified as himself in the middle of the king’s private chambers, he found the room dim, the usual clutter of rubber ducks and half-finished projects cast in long, dramatic shadows. Lucifer himself was standing by the window, his back to the door—to Alastor—as he stared out at the red skyline of the Pride Ring. He cut quite the sharp figure there, his hands folded behind his back, the crimson light catching in the white of his suit.

“Your Majesty,” Alastor said, his tone light, testing the waters for the king’s amenability to being prodded. “That was certainly quite the entrance. I must say, the ‘brooding monarch’ look is a bit cliché, but you do wear it with a certain... tragic flair.”

Lucifer said nothing. Didn’t even twitch at the usual backhanded compliment.

Alastor stretched his fingers, spreading and closing them again around the head of his staff, tapping for want of something to do. Some safe movement to make as he tried again, risking a little further. “Would it be presumptuous of me to assume this little trip had something to do with our excursions out into the city? Does the Queen continue to find them less than savory?”

Again, Lucifer didn’t speak. He didn’t turn. He just shook his head slowly.

…Was that meant to mean Lilith had voiced more protests to their deal, or was this meeting not to do with Alastor at all?

His smile dipped with the uncertainty of it. This was not what he had expected when he followed. Perhaps more of the king’s melancholy, certainly, but usually his wilting was more…theatrical than this. And ideally, Alastor would have found Lucifer wroth, ready for an argument, or perhaps a fiery rant about Lilith’s coldness or Charlie’s meddling. Alastor could easily play the sympathetic ear or goading enabler, the knowing confidant who understood the king’s struggles if he was just given the lead. This silence was just… wrong.

“Sire? Is there something I can assist you with? Or were you simply hoping for a witness to your brooding?” Alastor tried, wondering if he should just leave if he was again met with silence. Lucifer had certainly called out to him, wanted him to come there, but perhaps the king had changed his mind? Fallen to the whim of a capricious monarch and decided Alastor’s ear was not worth his words after all?

But no. Finally, the king moved.

He moved towards his bed, keeping his gaze firmly fixed on the floor the whole way, and just before he sat down, he raised a hand. His usual formal suit vanished in a spark of soft flames, replaced by a soft, worn red sweater and simple trousers. Instantly, he looked smaller somehow, sitting there on the edge of his bed. Smaller than Alastor had ever seen him. Older too, despite his childish garb.

The little king sat on his bed, his hands limp upon his knees… then he finally looked up. Met Alastor’s gaze. The only emotion the Radio Demon could read in that tired face was exhaustion, even as Lucifer gestured towards the bed beside him, his wish as clear as day.

Alastor froze. Felt a rush of rare, chilled uncertainty. What is this? he thought. This was not… part of their norm. None of this was, but this… Proximity between them was always incidental, perhaps manufactured at times, but not prompted. And why now? Why here? What of the rage or damage Alastor assumed the king inflicted by prompted this?

But to ask was to likely never know, so though he hesitated, Alastor still bent. Let his staff dissipate into shadow and crossed the room, footsteps silent on the carpet, until he stood before the king. Lingered there, hovering over him and his silent, pleading eyes before finally claiming the spot Lucifer indicated, at his side on the edge of the bed.

There was silence for a long moment, Lucifer still mute and Alastor playing at ease, both staring out of the opposite window over the king’s little workbench.

Then, Lucifer reached for him.

Alastor instantly tensed, his mind flashing to a bar long since decimated and shut down, palms and claws pressing themselves insidiously into his shoulders—a cloying touch and saccharine words, too sweet—but Lucifer’s hand only touched his. Grasped his fingers tight, firm and yes, cloying in their own way, but desperately so, squeezing tight before guiding Alastor’s hand into his space. Onto the king’s thigh, lacing their fingers together.

Oh, Alastor thought, the static in his mind hissing to a spike that threatened to spill out where Lucifer would hear it as he felt that tiny hand pinning his own to warm, covered flesh, every point of contact like pinpricks on his skin.

What is this? Where is this going? What does Lucifer want?

Alastor… He had been rolling with the king’s increasingly transparent attraction to him, milking the attention, the lingering looks, the occasional spontaneous touch, the way Lucifer would seek his company and validation. Alastor had… tried to make some use of it all, yes. But he hadn’t thought Lucifer would actually act on these feelings of his! Not now. Not when the angel was still so clearly obsessed with his absent queen.

Was he… to be some—replacement? A placeholder for the hole Lilith refused to fill? A passing little something on the side to spite her?

No. That wasn’t Lucifer. Even amid his panic, Alastor knew that. Lucifer was a creature of singular, agonizing devotion. If he was seeking what Alastor thought he was from him, it would be a full-blown affair. A one-way trajectory of momentum. Something Alastor couldn't simply fumble his way through and discard again when Lucifer was satisfied.

Alastor’s eyes darted to their joined hands, Lucifer’s clinging, his own as limp as the dead. He had grown accustomed to the king’s touch in small doses—a hand on his arm, the proximity of a dance, a little body leaning towards his own as though Alastor produced his own gravitational pull—but this was different. This implied so much more. A commitment of the physical and sentimental sort that Alastor was not at all confident he could sustain.

If I balk now, will it all fall apart? he wondered, his gaze blurring on the king’s soot-colored knuckles, all partially covered by his own claws. Can I do this? Is it even worth it? If I… It should be a given it would be a trial, but I have no idea what I—

“Sorry.”

The word was a mere tremor, a whisper nearly lost to the quiet. Alastor was not even quite certain he had heard it, and he stared at the king, with his unblinking focus on the window. His stricken expression.

“I’m sorry,” Lucifer repeated, his voice cracking like parched earth.

Alastor felt a crackle of pressure in his chest, crawling up and then sputtering out, leaving him hollow with surprise. Was this… not as he had feared?

“For what, Sire?” Alastor asked, his words layered in a smooth, artificial calm that left his natural voice almost lost to static. “You’ve done nothing.” He forced his smile wider. His tone lighter still. “Truly, your penchant for the dramatic is reaching new, rather impressive heights.”

He expected a retort. A crack in the angel’s melancholy as he turned to far more familiar, pleasant irritation. Or perhaps, if Alastor was unlucky? A sullen wilting or a little glare before Lucifer dug himself deeper into his silence. Or, if he was truly unlucky? More of—whatever prompted this handholding. Any of it was possible.

Then, the King of Hell broke.

His shoulders gave a sharp heave, and he covered his mouth with his free hand just as a sound—a wet, hitching sob came keening out of his throat.

And Alastor was, for perhaps the first time in his afterlife, completely and utterly lost.

His ears pinned back against his skull as Lucifer clearly tried and failed to stifle his cries, the ugly little sounds tumbling out between his fingers one after another as hot tears fell down the bare portions of his cheeks, his eyes squeezed shut, head ducked like he didn’t want to be seen like that. But he had called Alastor to him. Had not let go of him.

Why? Why would Lucifer show Alastor this? This weakness? He had seen the king angry, shaken, defeated, melancholic, emotional, even wounded, but this— Why would Lucifer expose such vulnerability to him? He knew what Alastor was, and to show a predator your throat was suicide. So why would he? Had Alastor’s manipulations truly broken down the king’s walls that thoroughly?

It should have been satisfying. Validating.

It was terrifying.

He wanted to retreat. Alastor didn’t know how to handle this. He was completely frozen as he watched the king shake, his own fingers twitching in Lucifer’s ever-tightening grip. He should leave. He should shadow out of there and let the king rot in his own misery—whatever Alastor would have to say would surely make things worse—yet he remained, chained in place by those trembling fingers.

But just sitting there, watching ate at him, too. Ate at Alastor until he couldn’t stand it.

He wrenched his hand loose.

Lucifer instantly flinched away from him, cradled his abandoned hand against his chest as he twisted and cowered back, and it gave Alastor a quick, blistering glimpse of his exposed face, his glistening cheeks and the kicked, wounded light in his eyes—then Alastor erased the sight himself by pulling the angel to him.

Lucifer tensed, as stiff as Alastor himself was as he wrapped the king in his arms.

The silence that followed burned, but it was all he could do. The only thing that occurred to Alastor, an impulse borne from the cobwebbed memories of a blistering kitchen and a soft smile and kind arms. The only form of comfort he had ever accepted with any grace. And he could never replicate it, but when simply watching become more excruciating than acting… what else was he to do?

He braced himself for the king to balk—Alastor still did not understand what motivated the angel to do this, to turn to him, what he wanted from him—but after a few, unbearable heartbeats, there was a weight on Alastor’s chest, pressure tight around his waist, warmth against his back as Lucifer buried himself in Alastor’s arms and clung tight.

The result was a breathless tension that left Alastor reeling—Lucifer was wrinkling his coat—but he locked his muscles against the impulse to bolt. At least Lucifer did not move about much or push for more. No, he just…trembled. Shook against him, his brow pressed to Alastor’s lapel the only point of true stillness.

Alastor absorbed that sensation, the grief clear in every shiver, every hitch of breath leaking out, every sob as the weeping wracked the angel anew…and felt a strange, hissing heat rising in his throat.

Alastor didn't ask again what had happened at the palace. He didn't need to. Lucifer’s pain outlined the shape of it quite clearly, as plain as any sketch. He had been rejected. Again. Somehow. The details were unclear, but while Alastor suspected Charlie was not much help in the matter, he had seen enough of her conflict and anxiety not to hurt her father to know she would not intend this. And if it had been some accident, she would have surely torn through the hotel by now in a desperate bid to reach her father and right this wrong.

No… no, there was only one person who could be behind this. One person who could bring God’s once favored son—this wondrous creature—to his knees like this. And it wasn’t frustration Alastor felt when he thought of her. Nor quite anger. It was something deeper. Something sharp and territorial.

He is mine, a voice hissed in the back of Alastor’s mind, sounding remarkably like his own radio filter. He belongs at this hotel. He belongs on my board, at my side. How dare she attempt to break him like this?

The thought made him squeeze a little tighter.

Eventually, Lucifer’s tremors subsided, and he wilted against Alastor’s form, pressing even more of his weight into him. The heat of it was stifling, but Alastor was too distracted by his amazement to truly mind: The king was… asleep? It was impossible. They were still sitting up, as much as Alastor was solely to thank for that at this stage, and the very idea that Lucifer would allow himself to fall asleep on him—

But when Alastor quietly spoke his title? The king just curled closer, tucking his head under Alastor’s chin—making the sinner’s ears twitch with denied recoil—and sighing against his chest.

…Truly, how did this happen?

He did not dare move for some time—there was no way Lucifer had truly fallen asleep that quickly—but the king going still as well allowed the tension to slowly slip out of Alastor’s bones, the points of contact between them becoming fixed points he could slowly accustom to, so much so it left room for his mind to function properly again. Marvel at what had transpired. Process the fact that his initial fears were apparently groundless. Lucifer had simply wanted comfort.

How foolish, he thought as he looked down at the king, popping his neck and tilting his body to get as close a look as he could at the face below him, one cheek still firmly pressed against Alastor’s chest. For a being as ancient as Lucifer to trust a predator like Alastor with this kind of proximity? It was practically an invitation to disaster.

…He did seem peaceful, at least. Free of the scrunched-up, pained expression that had made him look like a bleached raisin.

Alastor took it in, rather transfixed…and found one of his hands leaving the king’s back.

“You really are so foolish,” Alastor whispered, his words barely a crackle in the quiet room as his claws hooked in the strands of gold closest to Lucifer’s tear-stained face and drew them back. “To trust me this much. To show me this… You should not make it so easy.”

He truly made it all so easy.

And his hair was soft. Surprisingly cool to the touch.

Lucifer’s eyes opened. Stared right into his.

Alastor froze, hyperaware of the hair tangled around his fingers. He had kept combing through it without a thought, and now…

…Lucifer didn’t balk. He didn’t pull away. He just stared at Alastor with a struck, uncomprehending sort of wonder. Like he was some marvel he had never expected to encounter. His mouth opened like he meant to comment on it—meant to say something, and… in the end, he just shut it again.

He blinked a couple of times, kept taking Alastor in…and ultimately shut his eyes. Breathed out a lifetime’s worth of tension and tucked himself back against Alastor’s chest.

And all the while, Alastor just stared, his fingers still in Lucifer’s hair. Not moving a muscle.

Chapter Text

Lucifer was beginning to think he might like the humidity.

It was a ridiculous thought, especially when he’d spent the better part of his earlier visits to Alastor’s bayou-infested hotel room complaining about the damp. But tonight the thick, floral-heavy air felt less like a weight and more like a nice, comfy blanket. It felt cozy. Right.

The king was currently enjoying that weight and heat sprawled out near the fireplace across a new addition to the room: a low-slung, velvet chaise longue of deep crimson that Alastor had likely manifested just to discourage the king from treating his old armchair like a jungle gym. If so, Lucifer wasn’t complaining. The thing was comfortable, and he got enough passing amusement from the grimace Alastor made when Lucifer conjured a plush duck pillow to lean his hip into. He pressed into both the pillow and the cushions with luxuriant ease, his limbs feeling heavy and loose in a way they rarely did, his eyes half-shut… even if his heart continued to beat a rapid, private beat as he watched his sole company.

The usual crickets and frogs were buzzing and croaking in the distance, and the fire crackled in the hearth beside him, but it was the soft jazz humming from another corner that caught Lucifer’s ear, produced not by the usual radio, but by the same sinner he had his eyes on. The Radio Demon was sitting at his piano, a study in sharp angles and deliberate grace, back straight, posture perfect as his fingers danced across the keys with a liquid precision Lucifer found himself mesmerized by. That brought a newly familiar, treacherous tightening to his chest.

The music itself was a soft, wandering thing. Some old jazz piece Lucifer didn’t recognize, full of shifting rhythms and elegant trills, but lighter and less ‘plucky’ than Alastor’s usual fare. A nice match to Alastor’s softer touch that evening—relatively speaking. He’d been generally less acidic and prodding of late, and Lucifer wondered if the sinner simply shared the devil’s want for a kind fall of an evening, or if Alastor was trying to placate Lucifer in some quiet, indirect way. If so—and if not—it was still nice. The whole atmosphere was a cool compress against the fever of a week he had had, dragged into damage control after quiet damage control meeting with his sweetly worried daughter, after his last…he hoped his last fight with Lilith.

There shouldn’t be a need for another now, right?

He breathed out the question, willing the tension and weight of it to leave his bones, for the pain to not rise back up like a tide, and returned his focus pointedly to Alastor. In particular, his playing. Lucifer found himself watching the movement of Alastor’s hands, the long, elegant fingers and claws playing so cruelly well over the keys. Those hands were capable of so much, Lucifer knew. True cruelty and gore. Violence both vicious and playful. Persuasion and charm. Beauty. Tenderness.

Lucifer’s gaze lingered on those fingers, and suddenly his mind wasn't in the present anymore, but trapped in the memory of those same hands… one firm on his elbow, the other pressing flat against the small of his back to catch him before he fell.

Both on his back, keeping him still as he trembled.

One in his hair, little pinpricks of reality prompting him to open his eyes and look up, and—

“You’re playing that awfully well,” Lucifer remarked, breaking the silence, his voice to his relief not cracking nor too high. Just slightly breathless, and that was easy enough to smile over.

Alastor didn't turn to see how strained or not that smile was. He kept playing, still turned to the piano, but Lucifer caught the corners of his mouth twitching upward out of his baseline smile. “Practice, Your Majesty. A good century of it, regular and steady. It’s a wonderful way to drown out the less… melodious aspects of life.”

Lucifer let out a long, heavy breath, the anxiety of his spinning thoughts fading away as he focused on the music. On Alastor’s hands again. “Beautiful, really,” he insisted, dragging his eyes reluctantly back up to a half-obscured profile. “Though, maybe a bit… stiff?”

Alastor’s pointed ears gave a sharp little flick in his direction. “‘Stiff?’”

“Yeah! You know, just a little… safe,” Lucifer pushed, feeling a spark of that old, addictive mischief. “Well enough for a moment or two, but you’ve been playing for a while now! Why not mix things up?”

Finally, the music stopped. The fire and the frogs rose back up to fill the silence, but still Alastor didn't turn around, his fingers lingering on the ivory keys of the old upright he favored. “And what, pray tell,” he asked, his voice carrying that familiar, underlying crackle of a radio signal. “Would meet your exacting standards for an evening’s entertainment, Your Majesty? I was under the impression that the King of Hell preferred the grand and the theatrical.”

“I do! Exactly!” Lucifer hopped off his seat, his movements a bit too energetic as he tried to shake off the lingering vulnerability of the previous moment. He paced a short arc in front of the fireplace with its grim green glow. “I want something fun. Something… I don’t know, lively. Maybe a little scandalous?”

For a breath, Alastor went very still. Then he swiveled on his bench and arched a brow directly at the king. His expression was soundly unimpressed. “Scandalous? I am a professional, Majesty. I do not play ‘scandalous’ ditties for the amusement of bored royalty.”

Lucifer stopped his pacing. “Come on, don’t play the saint with me.” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively at the deer. Felt the sparks of his own shock and dismay and rode them to feel the thrill of it. “I’ve seen what you do and where you like to hang out. I know there must be something tucked away in that dusty radio-head of yours that isn't suitable for an old Victorian parlor.”

Alastor let out a snort to say what he thought of that accusation. Shot Lucifer a look that said he knew perfectly well Lucifer didn’t believe a word of it either. “I wasn’t aware you had a taste for the tawdry, Sire.”

“Oh, don’t give me that. I’m the King of Hell. I invented the word.”

The look he received for that was—again—unconvinced. And unimpressed.

Lucifer offered a wide, prodding grin in return. The kind that had let him get away with sin time and time again, and usually earned little more than an eye roll from this particular crowd. He was still willing to try. “Come on, Al—please? Just one song? I swear I won’t tell!”

…Alastor’s smile dropped to near gone, his gaze going sharp and unblinking on Lucifer’s face, and the angel was uncertain for one, horrid moment if he had pushed too far, or really pushed too far.

…Then Alastor sighed a long, dramatic sigh on a brief burst of static, shutting his eyes as he reached up to adjust his monocle. “You are a most demanding guest,” he lamented, though the way he said it had the tension falling out of Lucifer’s shoulders, not building up. “Very well, if you insist. But you must promise me something, Sire.”

Lucifer’s eyes went wide, and if the little badly hidden layer of indulgence in the sinner’s voice made his heart skip a beat—well, that was just his business, wasn’t it? “…Anything. Within reason. And maybe out of it.”

There—there was Alastor’s proper smile, twitching back into place. “Do not,” Alastor began, his eyes narrowing into glowing red slits, voice dropping into a lazy drawl that sent a shiver down Lucifer’s spine. “Tell a soul about this. If I hear even a whisper of this outside this room, I shall ensure your entire rubber duck collection meets a very watery end.”

The nerve of the man. Lucifer was smiling like a fool as he mimed locking his lips. “Cross my heart and hope to—well, you know.”

Alastor turned back to his instrument with a pointed harrumph that did nothing to Lucifer’s grin. Then he adjusted his posture, put his claws back to the keys, and fell directly into a jaunty, almost irreverent tune. It was bouncy, cheeky, and distinctly theatrical.

Then Alastor sang to match. “I got it from Agnes! She got it from Jim! We all agree—”

Lucifer’s jaw didn't just drop. It practically hit the rug. He stared for all of four bars without a single peep or breath.

Then he started to giggle.

Then he covered his mouth as a proper laugh fell out of him.

Then he was doubling over, clutching his stomach as laughter gasped and wheezed out of him and Alastor went right along breezing through the absurd and thinly-veiled lyrics with a steady voice and straight face like it was nothing.

The Radio Demon, singing a song for the King of Hell about that.

What was the world coming to?

“Alastor!” Lucifer managed to choke out between fits of giggles, and he could have sworn he saw Alastor glance over his shoulder at him between verses with a distinctly wicked glint in his eye. “I—is that—what do you mean—?”

Alastor didn't stop, his fingers dancing over the keys with a playful lightness. By the time he reached the final, triumphant chord, Lucifer was on his knees, still holding his stomach as he laughed so hard no sound came out, just small, pathetic puffs of air.

“I had no idea you were even capable of a joke so… off-color!” Lucifer wheezed, wiping a tear from the corner of his eye. “Damn, Alastor, that was… I didn't think you had it in you!”

Alastor scoffed, though the sound was unmistakably good-natured. “It is hardly my ‘cup of tea,’ I assure you. A bit modern for my tastes. Certainly lacking in true musical depth. However, I can respect the wit, and it has a certain… bite to it that I find tolerable in small doses.”

“Tolerable? Alastor, that was the most human thing I’ve ever seen you do!” Lucifer teased, his face still flushed from laughter as he grinned up at the sinner, not even bothering to pick himself up off the floor. “Where did you even learn that?” 

…Alastor’s smile shrank a little.

Lucifer’s own grin curdled, caught before it fully fell, suspended in confusion as he wondered what he had said.

But his trepidation remained stuck in limbo as Alastor gave no further indication of concern. He simply stood, rolling his shoulders and smoothing his coat with an air of reclaimed dignity. “As I said, it is certainly not of my time. A one-time concession done merely to please your whims.” Certainly not the most reassuring of responses, but after he was done, Alastor looked at Lucifer. Really looked at him, the defensive little smirk he had taken on softening into something not quite a smirk, nor a sneer. It was… fond?

Lucifer swallowed.

Alastor’s grin twitched, his ears flicking back. “Let us not get carried away, Your Majesty.”

What was that supposed to—

The fire in the hearth crackled and spit, making the shadows dance as the green flame suddenly danced as if in a wind, and when Lucifer blinked past the effect, he just caught sight of Alastor’s odd shadow zooming away, leaving its source to ‘solidify’ on the piano bench with a crackle of static and a happy little wiggle.

Lucifer stared at it until a clawed hand filled his vision.

“Since you seem so determined to ruin a perfectly peaceful evening,” Alastor said, his voice dropping into a smooth, inviting purr, “Perhaps you’d care to put that nervous energy to better use?”

Lucifer blinked, his heart doing a frantic little somersault. He looked at the hand, then up at Alastor’s glowing red eyes.

Behind him, the sinner’s shadow began to play all on its own, bursting into a song that wasn’t just swing, but electric. A modern tune in homage to the old style that Lucifer actually knew well, limited only by the sole instrumentation of the piano.

Alastor continued to stare down at him, a challenge—no, an invitation in his smile.

The surprise lasted only a second before Lucifer’s delight burst into a laugh. “Oh, you want to dance, do you?” he asked, leering happily up at his waiting demon. “Fine. But if we’re doing this, we’re doing it right.” Then Lucifer snapped his fingers, and in a spark of gold light, three miniature, puppet-like versions of himself appeared on top of the bookcases and the vanity. They each clutched tiny brass instruments, and at once they put them to use by blasting a loud accompaniment to the shadow’s piano.

Alastor shot them a side-eye and arched brow, but otherwise did not comment.

Lucifer soon stole his attention back by grabbing his hand.

The room filled with the full, brassy sound of a big band, the music vibrating through the floorboards as Alastor pulled Lucifer to his feet, and into a dance. And they danced like they hadn’t at Mimzy’s club, the last time or the first. Those dances had been a performance, competitive displays of skill or mindful obeisances to the formal style of whatever dance the rest of the crowd was following. This was improvised and messy and just fun. No worries about which dance form they were in from moment to moment, or how to do it.

They just danced.

It almost made up for that last time at Mimzy’s, when the lady herself stole Lucifer’s partner out from under him—something about ‘can’t hog him to ya’self all night, Sire’ or some such hogwash—and it had taken two whole songs for Lucifer to think up a little localized rainfall of gin in the bar area to distract the owner long enough to sneak by and claim Alastor’s attention back for himself.

Now there was no one there to jump in, no one to interrupt as Lucifer spun Alastor across the wet floor and Alastor practically threw him in return, made the angel laugh and break out his wings—likely making for a silly sight with him in his fuzziest sweater—to catch himself and evade the demon’s attempts to snatch him in an impromptu waltz, coaxing him into an off-beat synchronized dance with the horns instead.

And Alastor—he acted put out about it, but he was grinning when he finally managed to pull him back in, matched Lucifer laugh for laugh as they fell into a rhythm together, there in his odd little room, and it was fun. For those few minutes, everything fell away. Nothing existed except the soggy floor, the music, and the man smiling back at him, his hand in his.

Then it stopped.

Crickets filled Lucifer’s ear as he gasped for breath, still arched back over Alastor’s arm, his own hand clutching the sinner’s lapel, both of their other hands clasped together. Alastor was short of breath too, and they were both smiling, wide and easy, eyes locked in a lingering look that seemed to stretch on forever as one frog and then another joined the chorus of the silence around them.

Lucifer wondered dizzily if they were real, or just a glamour for atmosphere.

He wondered at what made Alastor’s eyes burn that specific shade of quiet red, and why it was happening then.

Wondered if Alastor would ever—

“Well!” Alastor said, his smile spreading, voice returning to its usual jaunty pitch as he righted Lucifer and stepped back. He let go of Lucifer’s hand with a wry, almost dismissive flick of his wrist. “That was fun.”

Lucifer felt the sudden absence of the warmth like a physical blow. He stumbled back half a step, flustered… then let out an awkward laugh. “Yeah. Yeah! Totally fun.” He cleared his throat. Clutched his abandoned hand to his chest and frantic beating heart and turned back to the chaise, retreating to its safety. “Great cardio. We should… do that again sometime! In another century or two.” Stop talking. “Or, you know, tomorrow. That would be fine too, haha!” He needed to stop talking.

Alastor gave a noncommittal little hum, and when Lucifer sat down and dared a little peek back up, he found Alastor crossing the room with long strides, straightening his bowtie before coming to a stop beside his piano. Pressing one fist against the small of his back, he bent forward and made a shooing motion at his shadow. The thing managed to pull off a very clear pout between its silhouetted expression and movements and sudden, alarming growth, but then it retreated into Alastor’s actual shadow without another complaint, freeing the sinner himself to sit down with a prim flourish and reclaim the ivories.

He rolled into the instantly recognizable ‘Pine Apple Rag’.

Lucifer listened… and quickly relaxed, the tension that had built up within him eroding away.

Alastor didn’t do ragtime often. It was no more of ‘his time’ than that Agnes song was, just in the other direction. But he did know it, mentioned at some point he had grown up with the tunes, and he broke them out when he was feeling particularly nostalgic. And relaxed. And happy.

Lucifer beamed at the thought, relieved by this little bit of evidence Alastor’s abrupt break from him wasn’t a sign of distress, or rejection. Alastor had enjoyed their dance too, in some sense.

Then Lucifer’s smile ebbed, weighed down by the wonder that he knew that. Lucifer had been lingering about Alastor so much, for so long… he had keyed into something as subtle as the mood reflected in Alastor's choice of music.

…

He leaned back against the cushions of the chaise, picked up his pillow and hugged it. Let his gaze follow the movement of Alastor’s fingers. Again. Watched the way Alastor’s ears flicked in time with the music, the way his shoulders lost that defensive hunch of his.

…Being near Alastor was… incredible. It really was. He was. He was so present. So oddly dependable. That should be an oxymoron given how chaotic a creature he was, the extremes he was willing to go to, how clearly set he was on being terrifying and inscrutable and frustrating to those around him. But he was. Despite the barbs and the power plays, Alastor had been... there. He’d looked after Charlie in his own twisted way, looked after Lucifer in countless more. In ways that—Lucifer knew—he wasn’t even comfortable with.

Lucifer had been in no state of mind to consider it at the time, but he saw in retrospect how much he had put Alastor on the spot, turning to him when he was so upset about Lilith. About failing. Alastor was just there when he had come home to the hotel, and he had needed him, and… and Alastor had come. He’d let him lean on him. He’d held him. Even when Alastor clearly felt as comfortable about it as anyone would be cuddling a tarantula, he’d held on.

And yet… even when Alastor acted like he hated hugging him at the time, Lucifer had caught him doing more when Alastor thought he wouldn’t know. Caught him touching him like… like he cared.

He cares about me, Lucifer thought, the realization settling in his chest like a warm coal. At least a little.

And if he didn’t? If it was all just part of Alastor’s schemes, like Lucifer had feared from the start? Then Alastor was the most remarkable player Lucifer had ever encountered. Because, not only would that mean he had tricked him… he’d won so thoroughly that Lucifer didn’t care anymore. Or he did—very much so—but it didn’t matter, because it was… worth the risk. Alastor was worth the risk.

Even their deal… There was no reason for it now. Lilith was never going to approve. Was never going to take him back. And Charlie—she didn’t see any of this as protection. She just saw the people she wanted to save getting hurt. Even if it was making the hotel safer, protecting them, she didn’t want this. She had made that clear.

But still, Lucifer didn’t call it off. Hadn’t told Alastor about any of this.

Because he didn’t want it to end. He didn’t want to lose him.

Because he loved him.

And it was…no shock, to think of it. He had been fearing the draw Alastor had on him for months. Had seen the pattern within himself as far back as—what? Their first dance? He had seen enough to be scared of what being near Alastor made him feel.

And he had still done it. Still allowed himself to be pulled in. Whatever Alastor intended, whatever he felt about him, or didn’t, Lucifer had allowed this to happen.

The most dangerous, manipulative, irritating, charming sinner Lucifer had ever met, and he had gone and fallen in love with him.

And he wasn’t even sorry. Couldn’t make himself be sorry. All he could do was stare at the man playing another ragtime song in the middle of the night for an audience of one, the green firelight bleeding black into the red of his coat and hair. Listen to the mindless little hum-along Alastor was humming as he played, his voice and static nearly lost beneath the notes, but still there.

Lucifer wanted to reach out. Grab the hem of that coat. Those hands. Ask if any of this was real for Alastor too. Say things that may or may not get him laughed at, or send his sinner scurrying off to the winds.

Lucifer sat, and wanted, and hugged his pillow and bit his lip and pulled at his own fingers until—

He looked down. Stared at what had suddenly grabbed his attention. Bit his lip again… and breathed out. Felt the tension holding him still drain out.

He stood up. “Hey, Alastor? I’ll—uh, be right back. Just need to go do something.”

Alastor offered another vague little hum in answer, sacrificing only his left hand for a quick wave as he continued playing. “I will be here when you get back.”

Lucifer imagined he would be.

Lucifer didn’t bother with a portal, using the couple of minutes it took to walk to his room the traditional way to let what he was considering sink in, settle as a certainty before he ever got to his door and slipped inside his unlit chamber. He didn’t bother with any lights. He moved across the dark room on sure feet…until he was about halfway across the room. Then he turned. Looked up at a portrait he couldn’t make out properly in the dark, but would know forever by heart, even if he was blinded tomorrow and never saw it again.

His family. Him, his little girl, and his wife. One of his favorite portraits of them, where they looked really, really happy, taken maybe a couple of centuries back. He couldn’t remember exactly when, or where it was taken or what they were doing. Back then, happy days were the given, not the exception, and they all blurred together like drops in the ocean.

He… couldn’t really say when that had changed. He might like to think it was eight years ago, that it was his handling of the exorcisms that tore everything apart. Then maybe it could be something Lucifer could fix. One mistake, however big, he could face. He could spend the rest of eternity trying to make it right, if only there was a hope of redemption.

But there wasn’t. Like his first sin—the first sin—this… ending, was a given. Set in stone by far more years of erosion than he wished to admit to, and the hard fact that no love could be saved, be made into more than a feeling, if it was held by only one.

Lilith had walked away long ago. Had made that perfectly clear in a way that… may have been a kindness, now that Lucifer faced it. Now that he was here, and… the only thing holding him back, making him feel guilty about what he felt, was himself.

He stared at that portrait, let the reality it showed sink in as true, but gone… And looked down at his hands.

At his ring.

…He reached for it. Slid the plain golden band off his finger.

It was heavier than he remembered, sitting in his palm. It had not been anywhere but his finger in eons, and it felt like there should be some mark there, where it had been. Some proof that what had been for so long had just been abandoned.

There was nothing. Just the same charred black skin as the rest of his hand.

He didn’t feel like he would expect either. No guilt, no crippling sadness, no breathless relief. Just… a faint weightlessness. But only a little.

In the end, it was just a ring.

He clutched it close all the same, just for a moment, before turning to the bookshelf behind his bed and conjuring up a little box of applewood, just for it, carved with a mindless array of apples and music notes and trees and crowns and fire and keys—the marks of their beginning and end. Lucifer kissed the ring once, telling himself it was goodbye, then shut the gold inside on a cushion of purple velvet.

He lingered with his hand on the lid just a moment, then turned his back and walked out of the room, shutting the door behind him.

“Sorry about that,” he remarked, letting the door shut behind him with a quiet tap of the latch, closing himself in with the heat and the smell of rotting flowers and Alastor.

“Think nothing of it, Sire,” Alastor said back just as casually, still playing away at… was that the same tune Lucifer had left to him playing? Had he truly been that quick? “I am perfectly capable of entertaining myself for a few minutes. Not that you were exactly ‘entertaining’ when you left, thrilling as your company may be.”

Lucifer gave a snort, considered tossing back a retort of his own, or tossing himself into the challenge of being ‘entertaining’ enough for the sinner in whatever capacity would make him eat those words, or just pressing Alastor to stop with the titles already, but… He didn’t do any of that. Especially the last. He had already stated his opinion on that months ago, and if Alastor wanted to maintain that distance? That was his prerogative… Lucifer couldn’t force it. Accepting his own feelings for the man didn’t entitle him to anything.

But as Lucifer crossed the rug, he caught Alastor tossing him a passing look. Just a quick one—scarcely more than a flicker of red—but Lucifer was very conscious of it. Of who was looking at him. Alastor rarely missed anything, after all.

But Lucifer kept going anyways. He would notice sooner or later, after all. Everyone would, whether it was tonight or in a day or a week, it was inevitable. And he made himself comfortable with that back on the velvet chaise Alastor had provided him with near the fire, reclaiming his duck pillow as he settled in, hugging it between his lap and chin and shutting his eyes, letting the old ragtime tune wash over him…

Alastor stopped playing.

Lucifer opened his eyes.

The Radio Demon sat remarkably still, his back a rigid line of crimson. His hands, usually so fluid and restless, were hovering just over the ivory keys.

His gaze was fixed pointedly on Lucifer’s bare hand, currently clutching a plush duck.

And Lucifer watched, holding his breath, but—not hiding it. Not doing anything. He just let Alastor look.

The silence stretched, marked only by some wood cracking in the hearth. A frog croaked once as well.

Finally, Alastor turned back to the piano. Started playing again.

Lucifer bit his lip. Found he… honestly didn’t mind. Didn’t feel disappointed, nor relieved by the lack of comment. The need to explain himself. There was just a knowing there, heavy with weight. Alastor knew.

…And if Lucifer wasn’t mistaken, that odd pause there in his newest song was the first mistake he had heard in Alastor’s playing all night.

He played with the idea of it, true or not, and just watched, letting the ease sink into him. Usually, he would busy himself in some way while Alastor worked or played in this room. Sketch something or conjure some new flock or fiddle with whatever trinket caught his eye or imagination. But there was no urge to do so now. Maybe a distant thought that he should play with Alastor one day—a proper duet, without the aggressive theatrics and friction that colored the day they’d met. That would be nice… but he couldn’t be bothered to ask just then. His eyes were too tired. The lids too heavy. And the newest song Alastor had picked was soft, and dragged his mind into idle places.

…

The fire was warm.

…

When he opened his eyes again, the light from it was nearly gone. All that was left was a low, emerald glow amid a bed of ash, and Lucifer stared into it a long time before reality sank in.

Time had passed.

And, despite the lack of fire, and the damp air in the room, Lucifer was… still warm.

There was a weight on his shoulders.

He turned over against it, and realize in the turn that he had been lying down, that he had been curled around his pillow on his side, and—there was a blanket on him. A soft, heavy green thing that had been nowhere in sight last time he sat down.

He’d fallen asleep.

In Alastor’s room.

Right in front of him.

An embarrassing thing to discover, certainly, but it was difficult to care much through the fog of sleep. It was hard enough to sit up, to blink the stars from his eyes and look about, get his bearings and find his host. Presumably Alastor would be in one of his many corners.

But he wasn’t at the piano. It was silent, the lid shut.

The desk was a no-go as well. His papers had all been put away, the tabletop cleared of everything but writing supplies and some book in the corner—no hope of telling what from there, in the dark.

Lucifer considered he might just be gone, or—for one wary, braced second—that he might have missed him in his chair right in front of him, watching him sleep. But in the end, neither possibility proved true when Lucifer’s gaze finally fell on one piece of furniture he took starkly for granted, tucked away in the corner and never touched as it was in front of him.

Alastor’s bed.

With Alastor in it.

He was right there, a narrow silhouette beneath the covers, clear in the dying firelight, gleaming off the monocle set aside on the nightstand beside him. His face was bare, and peaceful, and just beneath the sounds of the fire and the bayou, there was the faintest sound of static coming and going. Like a radio snoring.

Lucifer listened, stared, and was caught, a sharp sting of understanding making his chest ache. He had fallen asleep. Alastor had found him asleep, and not woken him up. Hadn’t mocked him, or even moved him, or disappeared to find his rest elsewhere in privacy, leaving Lucifer alone in the dark. He had found him, tucked him in, and just gone to bed himself. Allowed himself to sleep with Lucifer right there, in the room with him.

It was so simple, but it made it hard to breathe, thinking of it. To think that Alastor would trust him that far—

Lucifer finally managed to force air in through his nose, filled up his lungs, and held his breath, smiling ridiculously through the burn in his eyes and cheeks. Clutched his pillow tight and buried his nose in the blanket wrapped around him and breathed deep.

It smelled like the bayou.

Lucifer let it sink deeper into his brain, settle there… and laid back down. He didn’t go back to his room. Didn’t return to the room he had settled his heart in some hours ago, with the sign on its door forbidding Alastor entry. He stayed right where he was, curled on his side, clutching a pillow as he stared into the shadows around Alastor’s bed, wondering, longing… savoring. Letting the warmth of the room and the moment wash over him until his eyes naturally shut again, and he fell back asleep.