Chapter Text
“Okay, Lucifer, let’s just calm down…” Linda said gently.
“Oh I’ll get to you in a minute, Doctor,” Lucifer said coldly. “Welcome to confessional, brother,” he told Michael sarcastically. “Believe it or not, you’re the person here that I’m /least/ upset with. At least you never pretended to care.” Lucifer ignored the exclamations of protest from everyone in the room, but kept half an eye on Maze’s knives, knowing that they would be coming his way soon enough. “As such, I have a proposal for you.”
“What kind of proposal?” Michael asked suspiciously.
“You want my life here, you can have it. That folder on the bar…I’ve signed over a few things for you. The club, this penthouse, all my residential properties in and around the city, and even my play account with a few hundred million dollars in it. You can have it all. Even my job at the precinct.”
“What’s the catch?” Michael asked with narrowed eyes.
“You agree to let me go. No more manipulations. No more twisting me up in knots. No more impersonation. You can be a Morningstar if you want. /Michael/ Morningstar. Just leave me out of it and leave me alone. Final offer. You have ten seconds to take it or leave it.”
“Luci, you can’t!” Amenadiel jumped in.
“Deal,” Michael said quickly before anyone could ruin it. Lucifer would never go back on a deal.
“Then go ahead and start signing,” Lucifer waved at him. “You’re more than welcome to watch the rest of the show if you like though.” He wasn’t at all surprised when Michael sat at the bar to do his signing. He always did love the drama.
“Okay, Lucifer, I know you’re hurting, but…”
“But what, Doctor? Is this were you tell me that I need to understand how other people feel and be patient with them? Where you tell me how awful a fright poor Chloe got and can I really blame her for attempted murder and emotional manipulation? Where you tell me that it’s okay for everyone to stomp on my feelings and I just have to learn to accept it?”
Linda gasped and covered her mouth, really thinking about his words and realizing that he was right. She had empathized with Chloe after what she’d done. She had told him all those things, even if she hadn’t meant them that way or realized what she was actually saying. “I understand…”
“You understand nothing,” Lucifer snapped. “But then why should I be surprised? You turned on me when you found out too. I was spiraling out of control, Doctor. I was /desperate/ for /help/. The detective had no empathy. She just threw me off the case and ordered me home. I was begging you to help me and you refused. You forced me to tell you the truth and then you turned on me for it. You left me to tear myself apart all alone. But just like I always do, I came back for more and let you spend the next two years telling me how I’m not worth it. That everyone else’s feelings are so much more important than mine. That I have to ‘let things go’ and like an idiot, I listened. Well no more.”
Amenadiel wrapped his arms around his crying girlfriend. “That’s enough, Luci.”
“No that’s not nearly enough,” Lucifer snapped. “But lets move on to you, shall we dear brother? You who spent millennia throwing me back in Hell every time I got the barest taste of freedom. Who conspired to get my wings stolen to manipulate me into taking them back, getting humans killed in the process. Who raised a human soul from Hell for the sole purpose of killing me, again getting humans killed, the second you realized that I was vulnerable. How you manipulated my therapist against me. How you worked with our mother to try and manipulate me into leaving my home and starting a civil war in heaven. How you decided that I was your /test/ and took that as carte blanche to try and run my life damn how I felt about it. How you ran off to the Silver City and left me holding a shit show the second you got your wings back. How you too consoled the poor attempted murderer after I found her plot. Because I’m the awful devil and she was so frightened of the person who’d saved her life, protected her, and died for her so many times. And finally…how you let me go back to Hell for millennia to protect /your/ son. And didn’t even have the decency to visit. To come down and say ‘Hey Luci. I got this for a while. Why don’t you go take a break for a few hours. Relax. Visit the nephew you sacrificed your entire life for.’ Or even just a simple, ‘Hey Luci. We haven’t forgotten about you. Thank you for enduring literal Hell for my son.’ Nothing. Until you need me. Michael had you by the balls and I was the only one who could help you, so /then/ you remember I exist.”
“And you’re not off the hook either, Mazikeen,” Lucifer told her, seeing that his brother was speechless. “You spent eons by my side and then turned on me at the drop of a hat as soon as I wanted something new. Wanted to be free. You gave my brother everything he needed to torture and manipulate me. Then you accused me of playing you like he did when you /offered/ to be my inside woman. I never asked you to and I wasn’t going to. You came to me and made the offer and then acted like I forced you into it. I have always supported whatever you wanted to do. When you left my service, when you wanted to be a bounty hunter, when you wanted to make your own life. I was your king. I could have easily taken your will away, but I didn’t. The /one/ time I refused to do something you wanted and take you back to Hell when it could have put the detective in danger, you turned on me /again/. You used all of my greatest fears and weaknesses to turn me in a total wreck. You worked with the first murderer in an attempt to destroy my life. You hate me for going back to Hell without you, but you’d been hung up on protecting Charlie since the day you found out Linda was pregnant. And if you really wanted to come, you could have asked Amenadiel to drop you off. But no, I’m the bad guy. As always.”
He turned to look at them all. “All of you, I would have done anything for. I /did/ do anything for. Every single one of you has come to me for help more than once and I’ve dropped everything to help you. I’ve /died/ for some of you. I’ve put my life, my livelihood, and my sanity on the line more times than I count anytime any of you needed me. And this is what I get in return? Where were all of you when I was falling apart after being forced to kill my brother? How many of you came to see if I was okay? If I needed anything? Where were you after I had to send my mother away? After I was forced to kill a human for the first time in my existence and then watch the woman I loved flee in terror? Where were you after she tried to murder me? Ah yes. That’s right. You were all consoling her over the terrible fright she got and making me the villain yet again.”
“I didn’t,” Maze said defensively.
“No, you didn’t. But you did forgive her rather quickly didn’t you?” Lucifer asked pointedly. “I suppose that was marginally better than standing aside while she ripped my heart to shreds, so thank you for that much. But you still weren’t there for me. None of you has /ever/ been there when I needed you. All I ever wanted was someone to care and yet no matter how many times you all proved that you didn’t…I still came back for more. But that’s over with now. I’ve reached my limit. My eyes have been well and truly opened and I’m done with you all.”
“Lucifer, please. We’re sorry. There has to be some way we can make it up to you,” Chloe sobbed.
“You can. Dry your crocodile tears and let me go. Let me try and find a life somewhere else. Try and find people who can actually care about me. And most importantly…never contact me again. Any of you.” He picked up his last box and walked out, put it in the trailer which he closed and locked, and got in his corvette and drove away. Michael could have the rest of his cars too. The only thing he left behind that hurt was the Aston, but he couldn’t drive two so he had to make a choice and the Corvette was the only thing that still held a real piece of his battered heart.