Chapter Text
Ash falls, souls suffer, Lucifer sulks. For a while, despair had at least kept boredom at bay. But it is impossible to keep up such a pitch of misery forever, even with no hope of joy ever again.
Time passes in Hell, much as it does when watching an empty baggage carousel at an airport, only without the hope of ever getting your precious belongings back or being released to new adventures.
Nothing here tastes good, everything smells sulphurous and there is no music – only the repulsive damp croaking of the lava toad colony that has moved in near the foot of his throne.
To pass the time, he visits the hell loops of some of the murder victims whose cases he helped to solve and tries to let them know that justice was done after their demise. It doesn’t seem to help any of them much, so he adds a few improvements to the loops where he can. There’s still soul-searing guilt, but at least there’s pancakes for breakfast.
However, breakfast reminds him too much of what he has lost, so he flies back to his high throne to dwell on the many morning meals he is missing out on.
***
“--cifer! LUCIFER!”
His thoughts are yanked back to the present by the frowning, spear-wielding angel hanging steadily in the ashy air before his throne, wings extended behind her.
“Remiel? What do you…”
“I bring glad tidings brother. Your vacation time has been approved.”
This seems like an odd overture after aeons of hostile silence between them. But Remiel is holding out a piece of official-looking paperwork, so Lucifer takes it. It glows with a soft divine light.
“Leave Request,” reads the heading, and it is covered in signatures. Amenadiel’s tops the list, then Linda, Azreal, Remiel and Maze. He skims past them to the name that makes his heart leap with hope. Chloe. She still thinks of him, perhaps still feels the way she claimed to on that last painful evening on Earth.
There are other names too, his human friends and his employees at Lux have all petitioned for his temporary release. A large red ink stamp at the bottom of the sheet proclaims the request “APPROVED”.
“Is this real?” he asks, then sighs. “As much as I want it, I still can’t leave Hell unguarded.”
“That is why I am here as your holiday cover,” says Remiel. “I volunteered.”
“But…”
“Brother, I know we haven’t seen eye to eye in a very long time. But I failed to protect Baby Charlie and you are sacrificing yourself here to save him and all of the humans. I believe you have earned the break and I will take on your burden for a while. So. Off you go.”
“All right,” he says, still struggling to believe in this. That his friends have not abandoned or forgotten him, that his long-estranged sister would freely offer to take his place for – he glances back at the paperwork – a whole two weeks.
And he is wasting precious seconds of it already.
“Thank you Remiel,” he says, unfurling his wings. “I’ll see you in a fortnight.”
In retrospect, a quick handover briefing at this point would have been wise. But he’s already tasting the glorious ash-free salt-laden traffic-polluted air of Los Angeles.
***
Having reached Earth, he hesitates.
Of course, he wants, above all other things, to see the detective, but he is hardly in a fit state to turn up at the precinct and sweep her off her feet. No – first he should shower away the horrors of Hell, put on a delicious clean suit and then arrive at her door with the finest flowers. Best foot forward and all that.
This is all true, but as he is uncomfortably aware, it is also an excuse to postpone the moment, to delay the risk of rejection, to feel hope for just a little while, even if it is edged with fear that makes his insides churn. Has it been long enough for her to change her mind? To find someone else? To give up on him for abandoning her? And if he can only offer these two weeks and nothing more, will she want that?
He needs help to bolster his flagging confidence. And there are other people he is keen to catch up with. Luckily, he can do both at once. He heads for Linda’s.
“Wonderful, you made it!” says Linda, reaching for a one-armed hug as she bounces Charlie on her hip with the other arm. The child is larger and more alert to his surroundings, but not much so.
“How long…”
“It’s been just a few weeks here,” Linda answers, leading him to the sitting area. “How long has it been for you?”
“Longer.”
Linda is quiet in response and Lucifer realises they have sat down in classic patient-and-therapist fashion, apart from the baby gurgling happily on his therapist’s lap. Is she waiting for him to talk about his time in Hell? It was hell, what more is there to say about it? He deflects by asking what he has missed in LA.
“Everyone’s well. There haven’t been any demons other than Maze around. Ella’s coping well with being in on the Angel Thing.”
“Ella knows? I saw she signed the paperwork but so did most of the Lux bar staff. Do they all know?”
“After you left, your sisters turned up to help out and apparently Ella’s known Azreal for years, just not the, er, Angel of Death bit. No one else knows and Dan is convinced that you work for MI-6 (long story, Amenadiel’s fault). Don’t worry about Ella, the only person more firmly on ‘Team Lucifer’ is Chloe.”
“And how is she?” He fails to hide the nervous wobble in the question.
“Single-minded, determined, sad. Chloe and Amenadiel have been pretty busy working on getting you back. May I ask, why did you come here rather than to her?”
Damn, is he so transparent? He tries the excuses he’d given to himself. “I could hardly show up at a crime scene looking like this.” He spreads his arms wide to show just how caked in infernal filth he is. “Oh – I’ve got ash on your furniture. Sorry doctor.”
Linda gives him an understanding look but doesn’t pursue it for now. “So, Lucifer,” she says instead. “Before you had to leave, I believe Amenadiel may have mentioned to you that we’d like you to have a formal role in Charlie’s life…”
“And I told him, you can’t have the Devil as a godparent. It’s literally right there in the service: ‘All the godparents mumble: I renounce Satan.’ I can hardly renounce myself, can I?”
“No,” agrees Linda. “And I would never ask you or any of our friends to do that. Which is why we’re having a non-religious naming ceremony next week. And we’d like you to be Charlie’s Oddparent.”
“Oddparent,” he laughs, touched that Linda has gone to such lengths to include him. “I like the sound of that. What would it entail?”
“Just… to be there for him. Someone he can turn to if he can’t turn to us. Someone he can run to when he hates us for making the sensible parenting decisions. Or if we make bad decisions. Someone to be his safety net…”
“…and catch him if he falls,” finishes Lucifer for her. “You’d do that for your son?”
“Of course. What kind of parent would I be if I didn’t want to protect my baby, from everything?” She indicates the bubblewrap still tied around the ceiling fan. “Including us. Will you do it?”
There’s a lump in his throat, stopping him from giving his answer. He nods instead. Come Hell, high water and any other peril he will makes sure Charlie never has to fall alone, as he did.
“Lucifer?” says Linda. “Those are happy tears, right?”
It’s more like happy ugly-crying, made all the worse by the fact that hell ash gets everywhere and is now apparently leaking out of him as disgusting gray hell-snot.
Of course, this is the point at which the detective bursts through the door.
“Lucifer! I came as soon as… Oh.” She looks crestfallen at the sight of him. He can’t blame her, this is not a good look. “Did you..? Did we get it wrong? We thought you’d want to come back.”
“Happy crying,” clarifies Linda, in an audible stage whisper.
“Really?” asks Chloe.
“There was a lot of love and hope in the room,” says Lucifer, still sniffling, but the embarrassing boo-hooing seems to be under control as he gets up to greet her. “I was going to come and see you as soon as I’d got myself cleaned up and presentable.”
This is certainly not how he had imagined their reunion, torturing himself over and over with the impossibility of it.
“No, no it’s better this way.” She’s holding him gently, her hands on his arms. Her eyes are shining. He’s never, ever, seen anything more beautiful.
“Dishevelled and covered in hell-snot is better how?”
She laughs. “Now I can see that you’re just as much as a mess as I’ve been while you’ve been gone. Now go and wash your face, because no matter how much I love you, I’m not kissing hell-snot.”