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Blood.
The smell was strong. Heady. Lucifer inhaled deeply. It’d been a while since he’d smelled sinner blood.
He walked closer to the radio tower. It got stronger. Maybe that foolish deer had died to Adam–the thought made him smile, before guilt washed over him. Sure, he didn’t like Alastor, but wishing death on one of his daughter’s own friends? He felt disgusted with himself. How could he stoop so low?
It didn’t matter. He could hear agonized groans from inside.
Lucifer pushed the trap door open and clambered up, gripping the floor to pull himself up. He grimaced when he pulled his hand away after standing, finding it covered in blood.
Lucifer’s eyes scanned the premises. Radio equipment. A desk with claw marks dug in. A small, whimpering pile of pinkish-red, with two familiar ears poking out the top. Lucifer took a step, and they flicked towards him.
“Alastor? You still alive?” Lucifer took another step forward, testing the waters. Then another when he received no response.
He stood at Alastor’s side, close enough to see just how violently Alastor was trembling.
He made an attempt to roll over, to face the king of Hell. A groan of pain escaped him, more like warbled radio static than a human noise. Fitting, for someone who liked to think himself so different from his own kind.
Alastor’s eyes could barely focus. He’d managed a dramatic musical number before collapsing. His vision swam; so much red. Lucifer was mostly a soft glow of white. For once, he was grateful to see such a pure color. It made it easier to focus, it stood out. Lucifer truly did look like an angel.
Light filtered down through either a window or an open section of the ruined ceiling. It haloed his face. His eyes looked so soft. Something dragged behind Lucifer. Was it wings, or a weapon to finish him off?
He prayed it was the wings.
“Hey, stay with me.” Lucifer snapped his fingers in front of Alastor’s drifting gaze.
“You really are an angel…”
Lucifer scoffed at his rambling, but he could feel his face start glowing golden. Definitely wasn’t helping him appear anymore fearsome.
Lucifer ran a hand over Alastor’s abdomen.
Twitch. Hiss. Sigh.
He peeled the layers of clothing back, grimacing at the blood-soaked fabric. He felt bad for exposing Alastor–the man would, undoubtedly, attempt to throttle him in any other context, but Lucifer didn’t care. He couldn’t judge, and his goal was to heal him, not ogle at his body.
He placed his hand back over the wound.
Twitch. Hiss. Sigh.
“This may feel strange; please don’t fight.”
His hand started glowing softly. He inwardly cursed when he saw the wound healing slower than he would’ve liked. His powers were weaker due to practically no use in the last seven years, and they were rendered even slower by Adam’s fancy little guitar. Leave it to that dickwad to make his weapon overpowered.
Twitch. Hiss. Sigh.
Ah well. At least he was dead now.
Lucifer’s gaze drifted upwards to Alastor's face. Eyebrows knitted together, eyes tightly screwed shut, unwavering smile stretching painfully-stitches. At the corners.
There was pain in his expression, but not just from the wound. That smile was forced.
Lucifer’s other hand moved, releasing Alastor’s tight, sweaty hand–when had that happened?–up to the small green stitches on Alastor’s cheeks.
His eyes snapped open, radio dials spinning wildly. He attempted to sit up, a bugling noise leaving him, before he fell back with another screech of static.
Lucifer retracted his hand, but pushed Alastor’s abdomen firmly with the other. He’d gotten the message, and this was probably bad enough for the barely-conscious man. He didn’t need to embarrass him further.
He opted to slip his right hand back into Alastor’s grip and laced their fingers together.
“You’re doing great,” he assured, though he didn’t know if Alastor was listening.
Lucifer’s magic seeped deeper.
Twitch. Hiss. Sigh.
He could speed this up if he really wanted to. But it would drain Lucifer, which he didn’t need, and could potentially hurt Alastor (lies, complete lies–he knew it yet refused to admit it, even to himself. It was plausible enough that he could ignore it). He assumed “being slammed with angelic healing-magic” wasn’t a regular occurrence for Alastor.
It wasn’t like he was mentally exaggerating. It wasn’t like he was making up excuses. It wasn’t like he was refraining from using more of his power just to see Alastor like this for a moment longer.
Alastor looked peaceful. Almost innocent. He reminded Lucifer of himself when he first fell. Was this how he looked, disoriented, before the betrayal and shame settled in?
But that need for revenge, likely brewing in the back of Alastor’s mind, reminded him of Lilith.
The two weren’t so different, now that Lucifer thought about it, gazing down at him.
Both beautiful. Capable of causing so much pain, yet bringing so much joy. Able to empower others with their voices, and tear them down just the same. Terrified of being seen vulnerable, powerless, being out of control. And keeping a smile plastered on.
Lucifer glanced back down at the wound, feeling a twinge of pain in his heart.
The corners had slowly started knitting themselves together. That was good.
He felt a squeeze to his other hand. He tore his eyes away from the wound and forced himself to look back at Alastor's face.
The stitches were gone, smile not as stretched, eyebrows still furrowed, but eyes open and focusing on Lucifer's face.
“You still seem so much like an angel.”
Alastor’s voice was soft. The radio filter was quiet, and he’d dropped the transatlantic accent.
“You know what they say, looks are deceiving,” Lucifer answered, cracking a smile.
“Indeed. But you’re still so pure.” Alastor’s other hand rose up and rested on Lucifer’s cheek. He stroked his thumb over the red circle, pleased to find it was makeup.
“You could’ve killed me,” he added.
“Yes.”
“Why not?”
“I can’t do that to Charlie.”
“And?”
“And what?” Lucifer asked, puzzled.
Alastor raised his eyebrows.
“ And that’s not your only reason.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” the king snapped defensively.
“Yes you do. Is it because I remind you of her ?”
Lucifer retracted his hand from Alastor’s wound and was satisfied almost immediately with a cry of pain.
“I’m leaving that dumb little smile of yours alone, so how about you do the same for my motives?” he said before putting his hand back and relieving Alastor’s pain.
Alastor, begrudgingly, nodded.
“...I don’t like the silence.”
Lucifer began to hum softly. Alastor’s ear twitched and he rolled his eyes. He didn’t need the angel’s humming to be putting him to sleep; he needed answers. “Talk to me. What happened?”
“After you ran off, the fighting got more intense. The snake and Dazzle died, and Charlie and Maggie–” Alastor snorted at the mispronunciation “–sustained some injuries, but they’re fine. Oh, and that crazy little maid that climbs all over you? Yeah, she killed Adam.”
Alastor grinned. “Ah, Niffty never fails to disappoint. I’ll have to get her something special for such a feat. And the hotel, now that it’s just rubble?”
“Oh, we’re rebuilding it. Being a fallen angel has its perks,” Lucifer responded with a proud chuckle. “Charlie even made you a fancy-schmancy radio tower–isn’t that nice of her?”
“It is. I’ll have to thank her. So, she knew I survived?”
“No, but everyone kinda assumed you got cold hooves or fucked off to do your own thing.”
Alastor fake-gasped, doing his best attempt to appear offended. “ Me , the Radio Demon , getting cold feet? I’m insulted.”
Lucifer snorted and looked back to the wound. The deeper layers were healed, while the top layers were still pulling themselves together. He removed his hand.
“Alright, it’s looking pretty good, but I’m just going to bandage it since I don’t want to hurt you with too much angelic magic,” he lied. Alastor didn’t catch it though and merely nodded, likely due to the magic already nearly killing him. Alastor had no way of knowing the difference between types of angelic magic , Lucifer reasoned, so he was safe .
Besides, would it really be so bad to have an excuse to keep seeing him? To get closer to him? He sounded like a weirdo, but he stuck with it.
He snapped his fingers and some bandages appeared in his hand.
“Okay, I’m gonna have to take your shirt and jacket off.” He moved to unbutton the jacket, but Alastor put a hand out and stopped him, looking shy and almost ashamed.
“Promise you won’t say a word about my body.” His voice was timid, restless.
“Promise.” Lucifer smiled, the reassurance allowing Alastor to relax.
Lucifer quickly unbuttoned the torn jacket, then lifted the red shirt worn underneath, barely surprised to find a red bra underneath covering Alastor’s chest. How unfortunate to have to carry the weight of boobs, even in death.
“Do you wear anything but red?”
Alastor opened his mouth to protest.
“Don’t say black.”
He closed his mouth.
Lucifer began to bandage the wound. “So, you’re stuck with the fat sacks? I feel ya. How do you cope?”
“Pardon?” Alastor looked puzzled.
“Like, how do sinners deal with having tits when they don’t belong?”
“Well, my dear friend Rosie makes me these special things called binders that I wear when I’m not moving around a lot. They’re very cute. But what do you mean that you understand?”
“Ah. Well, all angels are “biologically female,” I guess is what you’d call it. Something about divine creation and all that, I dunno, I never paid much attention.”
“I see…” Alastor’s eyes seemed to sparkle. “So you are like me?”
“Yeah. Except I don’t wear boring bras.” He pulled his shirt down to reveal the top of a white bra with yellow ducks. “I’m awesome. You should try it sometime.”
Alastor growled a little. “I do have nice bras, they’re just expensive and I didn’t feel like ruining one today!”
“Uh-huh, sure, Mr. Boring Man.” Lucifer laughed as Alastor playfully bapped at him.
The two quickly calmed down and Alastor laid back to let Lucifer do his thing. Moving around while he was still in pain wasn’t the best of ideas, and his vision began to swim and turn hazy like it was earlier, though it wasn’t quite as bad.
Lucifer began to look ethereal and angelic, like he was going to sweep Alastor up in his arms and whisper “do not be afraid” into his ear until he fell asleep.
Though, it wasn’t ethereal in the way one might describe a woman, or the wonders of nature. No, it was ethereal in an incomprehensibly beautiful way, one that might cause a fool’s head to combust.
Alastor could picture it; chunks of the scalp flying, hair still attached, the shards of the skull flying like the spears of a hundred legions, meaty bits of brain splattering on the ground, and to top it all off, a lovely fountain of crimson blood spewing from the neck. Speaking of blood–
Alastor hadn’t realized how hard he was biting his lip. A small amount of blood trickled down, and he swiped it up with tongue, before groaning at a searing pain in his back and going right back to biting his lip. It wasn’t as useful a distraction from pain as imagining cinematic violence, but it worked well enough.
He’d been so distracted by said cinematic violence that he hadn’t realized Lucifer had finished and was buttoning his coat back up for him. How polite.
“Up,” the angel commanded, taking Alastor’s arms and pulling him until he managed to sit up. Then he helped him to stand, supporting his trembling body with his own small one.
“Let’s get you back to the hotel, big guy. You need all the rest you can get.”
Alastor nodded and allowed Lucifer to support him as they made their way back to the hotel. And as they walked, the two, silently but simultaneously, thought about how it wouldn’t be so bad to see each other as Alastor healed up, even if they were probably going to go right back to fighting over who was the better father. But that was okay; they could have some civility between them behind closed doors.