Los Angeles, Saturday Night

[my_own_advocate]

"Could tie Tiernan to the anchor of one of his ships," Lucifer mused, pacing through his apartment. "Or a million paper cuts from his own hundred-dollar bills..." An idea bubbled up. "Oh, no, actually... I know a man who owns an emu farm. They're surprisingly bloodthirsty animals."

Eve took a big sip of her drink and sat up, frustrated. "Just pick a punishment and let's go. What's the hold-up?"


"All in good time, my darling. You know how satisfying delayed gratification is in bed, right?" he argued.

But Eve had been sitting there for an hour now, listening to him talk. "I think you're stalling," she said flatly.

The laugh that came out of Lucifer's throat was faintly strangled. "What?"

"Because of Chloe." Eve shifted in her seat, moving to face him, pulling her knees up a bit. "Look, I like Chloe. I do, she's great. But to be honest..." She heaved a great big sigh. "I think she's a bad influence on you."

Was this jealousy again? Lucifer groaned. "This has nothing to do with the Detective. It's just better when you punish them properly."

"Lucifer..." Eve said, sliding out of her chair. "I just want you to be the best version of yourself. You know?" She walked up to the piano and settled her hands on it. "That devil I met in the garden. I held myself back for so long and I can see you doing the same because of her." She smiled apologetically. "I just think she might be a little too involved in your life."

"That is preposterous," Lucifer started.

Ting.

The elevator doors slid open and revealed the diminutive form of Trixie Espinoza, carrying her school bag over her shoulder. "Hi Lucifer!" she said.

Eve leaned up, confused. "Who's this?"

Oh boy. "That is... the Detective's offspring," Lucifer said delicately.

Before the words were even out of his mouth, Trixie had rushed into the apartment. "There's a piano up here?!"

Lucifer's eyes went big. "Yes, but no, please--"

Trixie banged her fingers on the keys, beaming.

"--Don't touch that, I don't know where you've been!"

But the child was already gone, rushing into the library. "Look at all those books!"

"Yes, emphasis on the look--"

... and she stopped in front of a priceless sculpture from-- "Whoa, pony," she said, getting her grubby little child hands all over it.

"Be careful with that, that was a gift from Napoleon!" Lucifer yelled helplessly.

The little whirlwind made it to the couch, and snagged the-- oh, the collar. Oh dear. "Do you have a pet?" she asked happily.

"Erm, y-- no, not quite--"

"You have stairs to get to your bedroom!" Trixie stomped up the stairs, where she did a little ballerina spin. "...Like a princess!"

Lucifer rushed after her. "Like a what?! How dare you!"

"You have a hot tub on your balcony?" Trixie shrieked, before launching herself at the sofa. "This is the coolest place ever!"

"That's Italian leather!" Lucifer pointed at her with the-- oh, the collar was in that hand. He pulled it back. "Does your mother know you're here?"

At least that stopped the little hell-child in her tracks. "...Yes?"

Lucifer stared at her. "Well, what are you doing here?"

Trixie scooted a littler further to the front of the sofa. "I came here to make sure you're okay. My mom said you needed a friend." Her eyes fell on Eve, and narrowed to a familiar death glare. "But it looks like you already have one."

Eve waved. "Hi, I'm Eve."

Those tiny eyes narrowed further. "Sit down," she said. "I need to ask you some questions."

"...Okay, sounds like fun?" Eve tried, sinking into a chair. At the same time, the Detective's offspring got up and started circling the chair.

"Where do you live?"

"Here."

"Where are you from?"

"Far away. I came here for Lucifer."

"Keep the commentary to yourself, lady," Trixie snapped. More fiercely than Lucifer had known she was capable of, really. "Have you ever been married?"

"Yes, it didn't work out."

"How come?"

"We weren't right for each other."

"What do you do for work?"

"I don't. I pretty much just get to be me."

"Well, that's kind of cool," Trixie spat. "Favorite color?"

"Red. What's yours?"

"I'm asking the questions."

Lucifer, who had sat on the piano bench with a drink watching this twelve-year-old grill his ancient girlfriend for the past five minutes, sighed. "Would you excuse me whilst I do something less mind-numbingly boring, like... color-sort my suits?"

Trixie watched him get up and walk into the bedroom for a long moment. Then her eyes settled back on Eve. "Are you the kind of friend Lucifer needs right now?" she asked point-blank.

Ting.

It was a cliche, really, but everything went very fast after that: the elevator doors opened and Pony Boy and a friend of his stormed in, guns drawn; Eve pushed Trixie behind her to protect her; Lucifer's arm shot through the priceless stained glass window in his bedroom wall and grabbed one invader, hurling him away.

It startled the hell out of Pony Boy, that was for sure. He stumbled and fired blindly, leaving three holes in Lucifer's shirt and nothing else. Lucifer stalked towards him, all menace, and he tripped, staring up at him with big eyes. "What are you?"

Lucifer sank down in front of him and grabbed his wrist, feeling the bones grind under his grip. Satisfying. He yanked the gun out of Pony Boy's hand and flung it away.

Kept squeezing until the man started screaming. "Tiernan sent you, didn't he?"

"Yes!"

Ting.

He really needed to PUT A LOCK ON THAT BLOODY ELEVATOR.

Dan burst into the room, followed by Chloe and a uniformed cop. "Where is she?" he yelled, fear writ all over his face. "Where's Trixie?!"

"She's safe," Lucifer growled, pointing over his shoulder. "Through there."

Not that he needed to tell them. The little nuisance lurched out of Eve's grasp and threw herself at both of her parents. They were a huddle of clinging human for a while.

Lucifer stood up.

---

As cops poured into his apartment to take in Pony Boy and his accomplice, Lucifer retreated to the balcony. Chloe, who had spent long minutes consoling her child, joined him there eventually.

They put their arms on the railing and stared out into the night.

Lucifer broke the silence first. "I hope you know I would... I would do anything to protect that little urchin," he said quietly. That would never change, regardless of their relationship.

"I know."

The Detective took a deep breath.

"I also know what you're thinking of doing to Tiernan. Especially now."

Well, there was no point in lying about it even if he was predisposed to such a thing.

"And you, detective," he said, looking at her. "Don't you want to punish him? He almost killed your child."

"Of course I do," she said, exhaling. "But I'm gonna do it by following the rules... because..." She looked at him. "I believe in right and wrong and... and deep down I think that... you do too. You're the devil. But you're also an angel."

Lucifer thought of a million failed attempts to explain to Seivarden why she couldn't see his wings. He swallowed. "I'm not sure that I am an angel anymore," he admitted quietly.

He'd been avoiding the whole question, back at Fandom. You could do that sort of thing there. Nobody knew any better. Nobody - bar Seivarden's clumsy attempts - even dared to ask.

"What do you mean?" the Detective said, frowning.

"After I killed Pierce, when my devil face returned, I never checked to see if my wings were still there," Lucifer admitted slowly. "I still haven't. Afraid that they're gone. For good reason."

The Detective nodded.

"Well, you know... I think you should look," she said. "Maybe you'll be surprised what you find."

The cops behind them signalled they were done, and the Detective pulled away from the railing and walked back to join her child. Soon, they filtered out of the apartment, and Lucifer, exhausted, asked Eve to give him some space.

"Okay," she said, before she left. "You know, I only want you to be happy..."

Left to himself in the quiet of his apartment at last, Lucifer stared at the Los Angeles skyline for a long while. Thinking about home, and who he was here, about Fandom, and who he was there. About Eve, and the Detective, and all of it.

Slowly, he let his wings unfurl, sliding them out of the deepest core of himself.

He didn't need to look to see they were-- wrong.

---

An hour later, he marched Jacob Tiernan into the station, cowed but unharmed.

"As a concerned citizen, I felt it was my civic duty to bring him in, so he can properly face the punishment he deserves," he said. He did a fine job of repressing his body's urge to tremble, he felt. Just... keeping it together.

"Why?" the Detective asked him, as a uniform marched off with the man.

He knew what she was asking: he could have hurt Tiernan badly if he'd wanted to. He also knew he didn't want to answer. And so, as he so often did, he talked around it.

"Something made me realize I might have gone a bit too far recently," he said.

In everything, really.

"Hopefully it's not too late."

"You looked, didn't you?" she asked, and he knew what she was thinking there, too: that he had reached inside himself and found fluffy, glowy angel feathers, some nugget of deepseated goodness.

He felt nauseous.

"I did," he said. And fled.

---

When he got home to his empty apartment, he curled up in the sofa. A trembling wracked his body this time, now unleashed, and for a moment all he could do was lay there in a ball, staring into nothing.

He was a monster. A monster. They were right. Everything he'd done. Just in the past few weeks, months alone.

Look at him.

Lucifer's fingers were clumsy on his phone, texting blindly to the one person he could think to reach out to in this moment. But it was night there, he knew. She was probably asleep.

Only minutes later did he remember he had someone else, around here.

It took Linda far too long to arrive. All the while, he just laid there, overthinking all his bloody screw-ups of the past thousands of years, letting them whirl around his head you are evil; you are wrong--

Linda let out a soft gasp on her way in.

"I was afraid they might have gone. I was afraid what that might mean. What that might say about me. But earlier this evening I looked," he choked out. Couldn't look at her.

Managed to force himself to sit up.

"I saw them. It was bad. It was really bad."

He felt them unfurl again, in all their nasty, ugly monstrousness. Another shiver wracked his body. "Why are they still like this?" he whispered.

"I don't want to be a monster."

[[ and part 2 of 2. taken from Lucifer 4x07, 'Devil Is as Devil Does'. TW for depression/self-loathing under the cut. ]]