Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The morning comes with a ravage of little wrongs.

Lucifer turns his head on the pillow, unusually rough against his cheek. The air is heavy with a musty grime that sticks to his skin and makes him reluctant to breathe in. When he opens his eyes, the floor is right there — dust-caked and filthy. The corner of a single mattress peeks into his periphery, patches of dried blood and other miscellaneous stains soaking the part where the sheet has pulled off it.

He’s wide awake in an instant.

The room is dreary. An overgrown banana palm slaps against the window outside — second or third floor, judging by the power lines bisecting the view through the net curtains. Damp strands of hair fall across Lucifer’s forehead. He pushes them back, and recoils instantly when his hand comes away with a sheen of grease like he hasn’t washed it in weeks.

“What…?”

“Hey, Bird-man’s still here!”

Lucifer jumps, turning towards the sound as he realizes he’s not alone. A second mattress against the opposite wall sits yellowed in a dust-filled gash of sunlight. A haphazard collection of tarnished cutlery and empty snack wrappers tumble down to collect in the valley where a woman sits, watching him. Her hair is a dry, broken mess, track marks like floating dead salmon cover her arms, and she’s got one foot squarely on an upturned yogurt lid.

He warily looks her up and down, and says, “I’m not usually susceptible to beer goggles, so I’m going to presume all we did together was drugs.”

Her only reply is an unhelpful, “pah!”, so Lucifer disregards her and inspects the rest of the room instead — but the peeling wallpaper, threadbare carpet, and mildewed ceiling look entirely unfamiliar.

“I’m not usually susceptible to lapses of memory, either,” he murmurs to himself, as unease settles in the pit of his stomach.

The night before had been ordinary. A perfectly standard Wednesday night — drinks and dancing at Lux, then an early bedtime of 2:30am. He hadn’t even had an overnight guest — not unheard of, these days. He also hadn’t left Lux. Lucifer never has trouble with his perfect recall, and that’s no different this morning. He distinctly remembers the delightful wank he’d enjoyed right before passing out comfortably in his smooth, clean sheets.

“Have you seen me before?” Lucifer asks the woman, sitting up on the dirty mattress across from hers. “Who are you?”

She leans forward, baring all seven loose, dull teeth in a grotesque version of a smile and announces, “I’m the fucking Queen of fucking England!”

“Right. No straight answers here, I see.” Lucifer primly wipes the spray that had reached him from beneath his eye, and pushes back the blanket.

It’s then that he realizes he’s dressed — a fact he’d already been vaguely aware of, in line behind the numerous other wrongs clamoring for his attention. But the clothing isn’t his. He kicks the blanket all the way off and looks down at himself. He’s in a chunky gray sweater with an ugly racing stripe emblazoned across the front, and itchy brown corduroys.

Lucifer wrenches the sweater off, flipping out the tag, and the unease grows into abject horror. “J Crew?” He swings his legs around and explodes off the mattress. “Who did this!?”

The moment he stands, hot daggers burst across his back and shoulders. The sweater falls to the ground as his fingers seize, and he curls in on himself against the sudden pain. Lucifer’s shoulder draws up tight against his ear, uncomfortably scrunched and awkward. But the stabbing pain subsides to a dull ache, so he doesn’t try to straighten it out again.

He’s gasping his frustration through gritted teeth when a blade of light catches his attention, glancing off the mirror in the adjoining bathroom. The surface of it is so dirty it barely shows a silhouette, brushed with vague details, but a silhouette is all he needs. It makes it easier, in fact, to look past his own recognizable features and notice instead the lopsided hunch of his posture and the way his hair lays limp against his forehead like a dripping tap. Lucifer lifts his hands, a dreadful understanding beginning to take shape.

They’re his.

But his ring is missing, and the nails are dirty, bitten ragged.

They are not his.

Lucifer barrels into the tiny ensuite, swiping his palm along the mirror to clear it as best he can. He looks like himself. Himself on his worst day, yes — but “worst case scenario Lucifer” has a name, and it’s not one he’s heard for a very, very long time.

He rolls his shoulders, and what explodes from his back are dark and broken things with twisted joints. They smack against the walls of the tiny ensuite, rattling the mirror and the small hanging pictures. In the cramped space, they bend back over him, splaying the feathers, already halfway mangled. Lucifer stares at himself from within a bramble of smoky, gray-black thorns.

“Oh…” he breathes, meeting the eyes which are not his eyes. He can tell from the way his rage builds but doesn’t ignite them. “Michael, you cheeky bastard.”

—

“Hey, Birdy-bro, you want some more Saltines?”

The man hunched over the kitchen table looks up as Lucifer tears down the staircase two at a time. The ground floor is a shambles, with kitchen drawers hanging open and trash littering the countertops. In the adjacent living room, the curtains are drawn and old cartoons play at low volume on an ancient television.

“Where is this?” Lucifer demands. “Where are we? Here, right now?”

“Woah,” the guy chuckles. “You are freaking out!”

He stops chuckling when Lucifer drags him out of the chair by his shirt.

“Yes, indeed I am,” he snarls into the guy’s face, ignoring the twinge in his shoulder. “So answer the bloody question or I’ll give you ample reason to join me.”

“West Adams!” he yelps, and Lucifer releases him. “Jeez, buddy. My God, relax. Have a Saltine. Hey, did you fuck with that guy yet?”

“Oh, believe me, I’m about to,” Lucifer growls, and wrenches open the front door.

The morning sun hits his face, blinding him for a moment after the gloom of indoors. He raises his hand, shading his eyes from the glare, bristling at the betrayal. Light had never offended his senses before.

When he slams the front door behind him, the house shakes. It’s a boxy pink duplex, crumbling at the edges, and it stands like an infected gum against the bright blue sky.

“Hey! Bird-fuck!” The woman from upstairs leans out the window. “Do a fuckin’ flap!

“Not this morning, your Majesty,” Lucifer calls, trotting away from the house in search of a car to steal.

The plan in his mind is simple — get back to Lux, burn these disgusting corduroys, get himself looking as much like himself as possible, then find Michael and hurl him into the surface of the sun. Lucifer prowls the pavement like a wild animal, like a bird of prey hunting a jaguar — or a Mercedes, he’s not picky. But the road is virtually empty. In fact, when he finally finds a vehicle, it’s the only one parked on the entire street. Lucifer stands across from it and narrows his eyes.

“Fine.” He releases a slow breath through his nose, staring down the Nissan Cube sitting against the curb like a giant juice box. “I’ll walk.”

—

Lucifer enters Lux through the underground parking. The soles of his feet are filthy, the bottoms of Michael’s corduroys are beginning to fray, and he’d sooner spend an intimate night with a porcupine than allow anyone to see him in this condition. The Corvette gleams like a sleeping beast in its parking spot as Lucifer trudges past it.

He’s already inside the elevator with the doors closing before he realizes there’s something not quite right about that.

At the top, the chime rings out into an empty space. The penthouse is quiet. Silent. But Michael is a snake, and snakes are adept at hiding.

“Knock knock,” he calls out, taking a few slow steps forward. “Anyone home? The car’s still in the parking lot. You do realize you’re supposed to flee the scene of a crime, don’t you?”

A light breeze wafts through his sheer curtains. Los Angeles rumbles beyond.

Lucifer moves through the penthouse, checking details against memory. The glass he was drinking from last night still sits on its coaster atop the piano. The jacket he’d worn down to Lux is tossed over the back of the sofa, just where he’d left it. But in the bedroom, the bed is made. Lucifer stares at the neatly stacked pillows and the crisp turn-down of the bedspread. His phone rests square on the nightstand, face down, untouched.

In the bathroom, the last whispers of condensation cling to the glass and the mirror. Moisture from a recent long, hot shower lingers in the air, with the bathmat drying over the heated towel rack. His closet, too, is neatly kept — the only sign that someone had been there is the gap between hangers where a suit and shirt has been removed.

“Sky blue and walnut?” Lucifer murmurs in disgust once he realizes which pieces are missing. “Oh Michael, you fool.”

After a second sweep of the upper and lower floor, Lucifer satisfies himself that Michael’s gone, and taken his body with him. The car keys are still in the dish at the side of his bar when he comes back up the stairs. “Lazy git probably doesn’t know how to drive, anyway.”

And then he’s left standing at a loss in the center of his living room. The comforts of home do not extend to his flesh and bone. He wanders towards the piano, spreading his fingers into an E minor chord, noting the lack of muscle memory. He places each finger like a beginner, then leans into the keys. The chord rings out — sounding as it should, but feeling out of place.

Back in the bathroom, he strips off the dirty trousers, itching with the need to see if he can make a passable Lucifer from Michael’s appearance. He turns the shower to hot, haunted by the specter of his own hand doing the very same just hours before.

Lucifer scrubs, finding his way around the planes and contours just as easily as if they were his own. He puts his head under the spray, working shampoo into his hair, finally finding a difference — the strands feel thinner. His own had been too, once upon a time. The climate in Hell makes everything coarse.

When he wipes down the mirror, the sight makes him grimace. He’s Schrodinger’s twin — neither fully Michael nor himself. The most obvious fix makes him nauseous in anticipation, but he grips the stone edge of the vanity and forces his shoulder down to lie straight with the other. A bark of pain cracks against the walls of the bathroom, but Lucifer watches as Michael’s appearance all but vanishes, so he holds it there.

The hair manages just fine with a bit of product, and he blows volume into it with the hairdryer. Michael’s eyes are unused to eyeliner, and they water when the pencil makes contact. Lucifer tilts his head back in frustration, waiting for them to clear.

It’s worse, in a way. Like he’s dressing up as himself for Halloween. It looks right, but it isn’t, and he thinks he’d almost prefer to be unrecognizable — swapped into the body of a dog or, even better, a busty porn star. He could handle living temporarily as someone else. But the uncanny dissonance of being a cheap knock-off of his own familiar image is far too unsettling.

“How do you do? Lucifer Morningstar,” he tries, greeting his reflection in the mirror. The sound is perfect. He looks as he should, or close enough. But all he can think of is that this voice should not be on these lips. His shoulder burns and twitches with the need to cramp, his tongue wants to flatten and take his accent with it. When he looks at himself, he sees himself — but it isn’t. His very body is a lie, and it makes him feel ill.

Lucifer slips blasphemously into black, white, and red. His uniform should not be worn by this body but he’ll allow it for the remedy of fine fabric against his skin. For the guilty breath of relief when he threads his cufflinks in the closet mirror and his eyes supply that everything’s fine. He can imagine it is, just for now. Just until he finds Michael and forces them back to their rightful places. Perhaps it’ll keep him from going mad in the interim.

With a pair of ice tongs, he carries the crumpled corduroys to the trash, content to bid them good riddance. He flips up the lid, but then he stops.

Inside the fresh white bin liner are three items he doesn’t recognize — a length of twine, an amber-colored pill bottle, and a blood-soaked rag.

Lucifer stares at them, trying to piece them together in some way that makes sense. None of them are his. The pill bottle could be, he has a drawer full of ones just like it. But this one’s old and scuffed. His get burned through far too quickly to accumulate so much as a scratch.

Uneasily, he lets the lid fall closed, taking advice from his inner Miss Lopez to not disturb the scene, and gets a new bag for the trousers.

—

The precinct is running at a lazy Thursday afternoon crawl when Lucifer arrives, blowing down the steps like a tornado. The pain in his shoulder has settled into a constant, irritating bother, but he refuses to succumb to the hunch his spine is begging for. It’s late enough in the day that the sun is starting to glare in through the large windows, but thankfully, not so late that he’s missed the Detective. She sits at her desk, copying something from a case file.

“Detective.” He arrives at her desk breathless, making her jump. “Thank goodness I caught you. Now, before you say anything, just first let me explain.”

Chloe’s pen pauses on the orange Post-it note. “Uh… okay. Go ahead.”

Lucifer steadies himself, taking a deep breath and squaring his shoulders, then cultivates the most winning smile Michael’s wretched face can manage.

“It’s me,” he announces. “Lucifer.”

Chloe narrows her eyes, nodding, waiting for more. When seconds pass and no more comes, she clears her throat and goes back to her scrawl of notes. “Okay. Thanks for the update.”

“I know this must be quite confusing, downright horrifying—” He leans forward, palms on the desk. It’s a position his back rejects and he snatches himself upright again with a gasp of pain.

“Are you…” Chloe studies him out the corner of her eye, looking like she isn’t quite sure whether she’s supposed to laugh or take him seriously. “...okay?”

“No, I am not the least bit okay, Detective,” he grits. “I may never be okay again.”

“What’s wrong?”

Lucifer snatches a chair from the desk behind him and sits opposite her, dropping down so they’re eye to eye. “I’ve been the victim of a soul exchange.”

Chloe scrunches her nose. “A what?”

Air hisses between Lucifer’s teeth in an impatient sigh. “A soul exchange. It’s quite self explanatory, you simply take one—”

“Lucifer,” she stops him. “I might need a bit of context for this one.”

“Well, I believe your human media has referred to it on occasion as a ‘body swap’,” Lucifer hedges, grimacing as he says it. “But it’s a fair bit more nuanced than that, especially in my case—”

“Oh!” Chloe chuckles, turning back to the pile of old sticky notes she’d been pulling off her monitor and folding them for the trash. “Okay, I’ll play. So, you’ve been body-swapped, huh?”

So far so good.

“Yes,” Lucifer says.

“Okay.” Chloe bins the stack then leans forward, wrapping her hands around her elbows. “So, you’re not Lucifer?”

“No, I am Lucifer.”

“But…” Chloe squints. “Wait. I don’t get it.”

“It’s very simple.” Lucifer gestures at himself. “I, Lucifer Morningstar, have been placed inside the body of another, and now my body is off Dad knows where and it’s imperative that I find it.”

“Um…” Chloe’s eyes wander, eventually landing back on him. “I think I found it.”

“Already?”

She points straight at him. Lucifer sighs in frustration.

“You can’t be serious, Detective. This?” He gestures up and down himself. “No — this repulsive fly-filled crust is most certainly not my body. Dashing from a distance, I grant you, but the details completely give it away. I mean, the nails alone—”

“Alright.” Chloe holds up a hand. “Uh… fine. Who did you get body-swapped with, then?”

Lucifer darkens, sinking in the chair. “My twin brother.”

Chloe snorts. “Well, I guess it’s not that big of a problem, then, right?” Her jacket is already half on before Lucifer even realizes she was preparing to leave.

“Hang on, where are you going?”

“We just got a new case,” Chloe waves the file she’d just been reading from. “You got here just in time, let’s go.”

Lucifer stares, offense and disbelief potent. “You know, Detective, if I didn’t know better I’d say you weren’t taking this seriously.”

“I mean…” Chloe laughs, only half attentive as she packs up her desk. “It’s definitely creative, I'll give you that.”

“The only thing that’s creative is what I’m going to do to his bloody spleen when I finally track down the bastard who did this to me.”

Chloe pauses and squints at the ceiling. “Wouldn’t that be your spleen?”

Lucifer’s exhale could melt iron. “Can we just—” he splutters, and it’s enough to earn a suspicious squint from Chloe as she stands up and pushes in her chair, “—deal with the technicalities later? This fetid molerat is out there swanning around somewhere and he needs to be found!”

“Well, have you checked Lux?”

“Of course I checked Lux!” He snaps and stands up with her, sending the office chair rolling backwards into the middle of the ground floor. “I woke up in a crack house in West bloody Adams — I had to come home for a shower and a change of clothes at the very least but he wasn’t bloody there.”

Chloe’s pace is agony, but it’s nothing new. She smiles, humoring him, letting him play what she’s sure is just his little game as she collects her phone charger and switches off her monitor, unhurried. “Okay, well, I’m sure it’ll turn up eventually.”

“We’re talking about my body, Detective, not a misplaced cufflink!” Lucifer jabs the button behind her screen, turning it back on. “I need you to search the database.”

“Huh?”

“Take my fingerprints—” he wiggles his hand, “—ie, his fingerprints, search them up on your computer to tell me where he’s hiding!”

Her laugh is a complicated sound — half amused, half tired. After all, she only plays along when it’s convenient to do so. She leans forward and switches off the monitor a second time, holding her hand there over the button until he withdraws his.

“There’s a dead guy,” she says, in a final sort of way that ends all other lines of conversation. Firmly, but not without warmth. “We have a job. If we don’t finish too late, I’d love to hear more about your… thing. But work comes first.”

At a loss, Lucifer does the only thing he can do, and smiles tightly. “Of course it does.”

It always does.

—

The Samuel Oschin Planetarium blares like a bruise. With the house lights all up, the white dome ceiling stretches above them unremarkably, and the cork floor resembles a high school gymnasium far more than it does the gateway to the cosmos. Tired, mustard-yellow theater chairs ripple outwards from the center of the room, where a huge spherical projector sits like a hundred-eyed beast.

“Hey.” Chloe’s hand brushes against his arm as they dip beneath the police line taped across the doorway and straighten back up. “Are you alright?”

“Hm?” It only takes turning and seeing her frown to become aware of his crooked posture. He scowls and forcibly straightens his back, swallowing the hiss. “Yes, of course. Just cramped from the car ride.”

“Hey! Check it out.” Ella hooks her thumb at the lens-covered projector. “One of your brothers, Luce?”

“Please. That book is a work of fiction,” Lucifer scoffs, mildly offended as he looks the projector up and down. “Though maybe Chamuel. Right ugly bastard.”

“You got anything yet?” Chloe moves past him, drawn to the body Ella’s examining. She’s wedged halfway down the row of seats, leaning over a man who Lucifer might have thought was just especially early for the evening show, if not for the deathly pallor of his skin and the uncomfortable angle of his neck

“Sure do,” Ella straightens up, gently maneuvering the man’s head to show angry red indents on his throat. “Marlon Griggs, 42. Petechial hemorrhaging, ligature marks around the neck. C.O.D — strangulation. Hundo percento.”

“Strangulation?” Chloe frowns, leaning in. “With what?

“Reflexall Jumbo in hot red honeycomb,” she answers, then holds the murder weapon up in front of their blank faces. “Shoelace.”

“Eugh,” Lucifer wrinkles his nose. “I’m not sure which crime we should prosecute first — the murder, or the fact he removed his shoes in a packed theater.”

Chloe frowns at the shoelace, then down at the body. “Anything else we know?”

“Well, the vic was strangled from behind, and because of the offset pattern of the chairs, there’s only two possible seats the killer could have been sitting in when he laced Marlon.” She points at the chairs in the row behind on either side of him. “Based on a visual assessment of the furrow, it’s slightly heavier on the left-hand side, meaning the force was being applied from the right — which puts our killer in seat 6F.”

“Hm.” Chloe nods, scanning the rest of the dome. “Okay, thanks Ella.”

On the other side of the room, a portly, sweating man in browns and grays speaks with an officer, holding a cloth cap in his hands like he’s at a funeral. His eyes flick back and forth to the body, and his face is pale with stress. Chloe edges out of the row of seats, and makes her way over to him. Begrudgingly, Lucifer follows.

“Are you the owner?” she asks.

“Uh, manager. Hi. Rex Bamford.”

Lucifer swallows a snicker. The man doesn’t look like a ‘Rex’. A Wilson, maybe. An Egbert, even better. But not a ‘Rex’. Chloe eyes him, the look a clear warning, then turns back to the trembling middle aged man.

“Were you here when the crime took place?”

“No. I mean, I was, I mean…” he fumbles. “I was working. But I was in the back office, not here.”

“And you didn’t hear anything?”

“Not until…” Bamford swallows. “Well, everyone started screaming when the lights came up.”

“So a murder takes place in a packed auditorium, and no one sees it happen.” Chloe folds her arms. “How is that possible? There’s like two hundred seats in here.”

“290, actually. But, er…” He glances uncertainly between them, a small smile threatening to surface despite his distress. “...well, the wonders of the cosmos are quite captivating.”

“So captivating you don’t notice a man being strangled to death in the seat next to you?” She narrows her eyes and looks up at the white domed ceiling, making no attempt to hide her skepticism. “Wow. Must be some show.”

“Oh, it is,” he titters, bunching his hat in his hands, halfway between lingering grief and mistimed enthusiasm. “The observable universe is the greatest show on earth. Stars are truly the most breathtaking of all wonders.”

“Well, thank you very much,” Lucifer inclines his head graciously. “You should listen to him, actually, Detective. He’s clearly a man of superior taste and intelligence.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen stars,” Chloe scoffs, gesturing vaguely upwards. “They’re great. But they’re not gonna stop me from noticing a murder happening right next to me.”

“Uh, with respect, Detective Decker… you haven’t seen stars,” Bamford says. “Not properly.”

Chloe tilts her head upwards. The dome stares back.

“Alright,” she says. “Fine. In that case, I’m gonna need to see what the conditions were like in here when the murder took place.”

”Oh, uh…”

“Awesome!” Ella’s voice pierces across the auditorium and her head pops out of the seats like a sea monster. ”We get to turn on the dome!? Best crime scene ever!”

“…the engineer’s gone home” Bamford says, looking doubtfully over his shoulder towards the control room. “I perhaps could try myself, uh… but that’s not really my area of things. You might be better off just coming to one of the shows tonight.”

Lucifer lets out a light cough and casts a look back at the dead body in row F. “Think I’d check the Yelp reviews first.”

“Nope,” Chloe says, ignoring him. “This is an active crime scene, no more shows until further notice.”

“Oh,” Bamford’s face falls. The hands twisting his hat droop. “Well… I can get one of the engineers to come down and run it for you this evening, I guess.”

“I’d appreciate that—”

“How long?” he cuts in. “How long do we need to be closed for?”

“It depends,” Chloe says, and the vague answer adds visibly to his anguish. “You can help speed things along by cooperating with the investigation.”

“Of course.” The man is whiter now than when he’d been looking over at the body. “Anything you need. Anything. Please, just ask.”

“Okay,” Chloe says. “Let’s start with the seating allocations from the matinee.”

Bamford nods so fast he resembles a woodpecker, and cranes his head towards the exit.

“Donna!” he yelps, making them all jump. “Could you help the Detective, please?”

Donna, a wiry redhead with smudged mascara, unfolds from the upturned milk crate she’s sitting on just outside of the door, and gestures for Chloe to follow her into the admin office.

“Anything at all,” Bamford calls after her. “You have my cell!”

”What’s the urgency?” Lucifer asks with a light chuckle as Chloe leaves. “Not enough vacation days?”

”I’m out of a job,” he says in a weak, distant voice, staring into the sea of empty chairs. “I can’t believe it.”

“No, just temporarily,” Lucifer offers. “Then the Detective will solve your grisly workplace murder and you’ll be back right as rain.”

”You think they’re gonna keep me on after this?” Bamford chokes. “After a murder on my watch? I’m done, the board’s gonna replace me the second we reopen. I’m forty-seven! It’s too late for a career change. I’m as good as homeless. My wife’s gonna leave me. I’ll end up as one of those vagrants that has to shower at the gas station!”

”Well, just as long as you’re not jumping to conclusions.” Lucifer warily watches the man twist his hat until the threads start to break.

“And maybe that’s what I deserve.” His voice is a dark, hopeless sound. “I shouldn’t have this job, I’m not a leader. And now somebody’s dead.”

”Oh, cheer up, this is really quite routine,” Lucifer tries. “Throw a stone anywhere in Los Angeles, it’ll land on a strategic rug-covered bloodstain.”

“Oh God, you’re right.” Bamford’s breath comes in gasps, high in this throat. He reaches out, grasping for the back of one of the chairs to take his weight, and a horrible, clammy dread begins to pack the air between them. “We live in a city of horror, nowhere is safe.”

”Don’t you think you’re being a tad—“

Bamford turns to him, and by the time Lucifer realizes what’s happening, the man is captured like a mosquito in a slowly closing venus flytrap.

“My life is ruined,” Bamford whispers. “Nothing will ever be okay again.”

The fear thumps Lucifer in the chest. It’s a tangible thing, as real as the desires he used to hunt for pleasure. The feeling of drawing it out is remarkably similar, but rotten, like a honeycrisp apple left out in the sun. His soul gags on it, but his body salivates.

“No.” Lucifer shoves a hard smile onto his face, straining to keep it there. “No need to worry. The Griffith Observatory is a jewel in the crown of Los Angeles. I’m sure you’ll be just fine.”

“But what if I’m not? Oh God, I’m gonna lose dental. What if I need a root canal?

“Well, let’s not fret over hypotheticals, shall we?” Lucifer’s face aches, his shoulder aches, the air aches. “In fact — better idea, let’s not fret at all.”

Bamford keeps talking, but Lucifer can’t take anymore in. He can feel the stream of worries and what-ifs flooding in from the few staff still waiting in the lobby, from Ella, from the unis, from the people in the parking lot — every step on the spectrum of terror represented until Lucifer can’t tell who they’re coming from, he can’t think, he can hardly breathe—

“If everyone could just stop with the fretting, please!”

Lucifer’s voice smacks against the inside of the dome, rebounding back, breaking the spell. Bamford sinks woefully into the seat he’d been leaning on. Ella blinks at him from across the room.

Lucifer looks away. His shoulder throbs.

“I need some air.”

—

Cigarettes taste like tar to Michael’s mouth, but Lucifer chain smokes three of them anyway, leaning against the white stone outside the observatory and blinking against the blood orange glare of the setting sun.

Fear is dreadful.

Aside from the pain, it had been far too easy to almost forget that he wasn’t himself presently. A little pomade, a proper suit, and Chanel Stylo Yeux had gone a long way towards fixing the outside, but that’s a mere distraction when it’s the core that’s rotten. He’d spent half a day as Michael, and it was half a day too long. Tit-for-tat with the Detective would have to wait.

Lucifer stubs the third cigarette butt against the building and lets it fall into the little pile he’s gathering, then puts his hands together, pointing at the sky.

Michael, you slimy rodent, he prays. I know what you’ve done. Show yourself.

He waits, glaring into the acid orange of his closed eyelids, until a moment later he hears a faint reply;

Michael, you slimy rodent. I know what you’ve done. Show yourself.

“Oh, for goodness sake.” Lucifer drops his hands, scowling up at the sky. “Wrong number!”

So, he’s getting Michael’s prayers. There’s a small mercy — perhaps Michael’s getting his, too. It took him eons to learn how to tune out the constant stream of sickening requests, fanatical worship, and unsanitary offerings.

He swallows his pride, and tries again.

…”Lucifer”, he prays with gritted teeth. You know who you bloody well are. We need to talk.

Birds chatter in the trees by the freeway, and Lucifer waits. Silence gapes like a trench. He squints through one half-opened eye, watching fiery ribbons of cloud roll past, and no answer comes.

“Figures,” he grumbles, and goes to wait in the car.

—

Los Angeles is draped in cobalt when they finally leave the observatory. Lucifer sits quietly in the passenger seat as the car snakes down towards the glittering grid of the city.

“I want to look a little more closely at Donna,” Chloe says. “She got really nervous when we were in the office. I think she had a panic attack.”

“Ah,” Lucifer grimaces. “Apologies, that erm… might have been my fault, actually.”

“What?” Chloe screws up her nose. “How could that have possibly been your fault?”

“Well, it’s a bit complicated to explain…” Lucifer murmurs. “But suffice it to say it’s a side-effect of my current predicament.”

“Oh. Right.” The mention of it gets a small laugh out of her, and even though it’s nothing to laugh about, Lucifer feels pleased by the way her hands relax on the steering wheel ever so slightly. “Still body-swapped, huh?”

“Since four hours ago? Oh no, it cleared right up with a bit of fresh air.” Lucifer grumbles, and pushes himself back into the seat. His spine sings from the support. “Yes, of course I’m still… dealing with that situation.”

“Why would your identical twin take your body?” Chloe muses. “I mean, what’s the point in that?”

Lucifer sighs. He knows well enough now to hear the disbelief in her voice. It isn’t malicious — as far as he can tell, she enjoys it. This is her after-work playtime. A little make-believe to ease the mind between the rigors of work and home. Sometimes, he likes that he can give that to her. Other times, it stings.

“That’s precisely what I intend to ask him while I hold his head inside a toilet bowl,” Lucifer clips, deciding he needs a sounding board more than he needs an argument. “But it hardly takes a rocket scientist. His life is a dreadful, dreary bore, and mine, well… isn’t. I can only assume he hopes to take what’s mine.”

“Couldn’t he just do that anyway? I mean, impersonate you? If this is what he looks like,” she gestures at him. “Then it probably wouldn’t be that hard.”

“There are differences between us that run deeper than appearances.” Lucifer’s gaze drifts out the window, watching the swipe of streetlights on winding corners. “Maybe that’s what he’s after.”

“Uh…” Chloe hums. Lucifer sees the reflection of her ponytail in the window as she shakes her head. “Nope, you’ve lost me.”

“Perhaps I’ll be in a better mood to explain once I’m back in my own skin.” Lucifer turns to her. “And speaking of — I helped you on the case, so will you help me now with mine?”

Chloe’s light chuckle comes out with a gently frustrated puff of air. “Oh, and here I thought you helped on the case because it’s our job.”

“I have far more pressing concerns to take care of right now,” he says. “So if you won’t help me, then I’ll need to sit the rest of this one out, I’m afraid.”

Chloe sighs. “Seriously, Lucifer?”

“Deadly serious,” Lucifer retorts. “What if your body had been stolen? Hm? Surely stapling paperwork could wait in that instance.”

“Oh, come on—”

“Pretending for a moment that you actually believed me,” Lucifer snaps, trying to keep the sour out of his voice. “Are you seriously suggesting I should just make do?”

Chloe’s jaw shifts. Her slow breath in and out is swallowed up by the rumble of the car.

“No, of course not. Your body is yours.” She glances across at him, searching all the details. She holds back the smile tugging at her lips. “Even if this one looks… exactly the same.”

“Well, it isn’t exactly the same.”

There’s not much to say, after that. Chloe’s interest in playing along seems to have run its course for the evening, and she drops him back at his car in moderately comfortable silence. As he watches her drive out of the precinct parking building, she leaves with a friendly little honk to let him know they’re okay.

Lucifer’s lips flatten into a hard line, feeling remarkably alone.

Despite the lingering frustration, he stands in the glow of her tail lights until she disappears up the ramp, then turns and walks down the row of cars to where the Corvette’s rear bumper is peeking out. Michael’s body burns from having been held out of place all day. Lucifer rarely makes use of his hot tub without guests but tonight is beginning to feel like just the occasion. He’s ambling down Row G, trying to remember the last time he soaked the filter, when the world drops away.

For a thousand split seconds, Lucifer’s hurtling through space with galaxies brushing past his ears. He’s a formless thing of light and thought and essence, and he stretches, condenses, no beginning or end to all that he is. He could fit comfortably on the head on a pin or fill the entire universe.

Then he slams back into his shoes so hard he stumbles against a parked Volvo.

The car alarm begins to wail, but Lucifer’s head is ringing so loudly he barely notices. He breathes heavily against the back window, so disoriented that even the dagger of pain that had shot through his shoulder takes a while to register. As a 13-billion-year-old archangel who had a hand in creating the universe, there isn’t a lot he hasn’t experienced at least once.

That, however, had been a first.

The world eventually settles, and when he can straighten up, he does. The skin of his palms feels rough and real — waxy in a strangely plastic way after the skim of ozone passing through his body like netting. He leaves the shrieking car and sinks down into his own, leaning his head back, closing his eyes.

“It’s only bloody Thursday,” he mutters to the empty parking lot.

Chapter Text

Hard white uplights illuminate the street-side palm trees as Lucifer arrives back at Lux. It’s after 9pm, and a serpent of sequined dresses snakes from the nightclub’s entrance to halfway down the block. The street pounds with the bass that thumps it from beneath. He glides the Corvette to a stop against the curb, drags his abused body from the driver’s seat and tosses his keys to the valet, trudging towards the lobby.

He stops when he hears the keys hit the ground.

The Thursday night valet is curled over his podium, filling out the log book. Lucifer’s eyelids flutter like a law of the universe has just stopped functioning. “Ah — Jason?”

The valet looks up, and Lucifer points to the small ring of keys on the concrete between them.

“Oh!” Jason drops the pen and rushes forward to pick up the keys. “Sorry, boss. Didn’t see you arrive.”

“Not a problem.” Lucifer sighs and steps out of his way. Or, he tries to. Jason steps the same way, and then they both step the other. Lucifer grits his way through the awkward dance until Jason finally just stops trying and lets Lucifer go around him.

“...have a good night!” Jason calls awkwardly after him as Lucifer stalks inside, refusing to make eye contact with the bouncers and patrons who had just witnessed his degradation.

Lux is a gale of strobe lights and sweat-slicked hair. Making his way across the mezzanine, the promise of his quiet penthouse sings out to him, but Lucifer diverts to the staircase. He has one more task before he can turn in for the night.

Bodies brush him as he makes his way down the stairs and across the floor. It goes some way towards making him feel at home so he relishes it as best he can, but the touches are fleeting. Accidental. Hands don't linger. Eyes don’t swallow him whole. The difference is unnerving enough that when he reaches the bar, he has to check his reflection in the mirrored backsplash. Lines of strain are beginning to show around his eyes and mouth from holding Michael’s mangled form in place all day, but other than that, he appears perfectly passable as himself.

Lucifer pushes his way to the front of the crowd. “Gaurav,” he shouts over the noise, but the bartender doesn’t look up from the margarita he’s garnishing. Lucifer huffs and snaps his fingers in the man’s face. “Oh, for goodness sake — hello?”

“Oh!” Gaurav drops the lime and hands off the drink to the woman who was waiting for it. “Sorry boss, didn’t see you.”

“Yes, that seems to be going around.” Lucifer gestures off to a quiet corner near the bar. “Take five, I need to talk to you.”

He stalks away before Gaurav can argue, leaving him no option but to follow. The crowd parts as Lucifer moves through it, but it parts like old bread instead of hot butter.

Gaurav ambles out of the strobe lights, wiping his hands on the tea towel slung over his shoulder as he joins Lucifer in the shadows by the stairs.

“Did you see me this morning?” Lucifer asks.

“Uh…” Gaurav’s face pinches into a bemused frown. “No. Sorry. Were you looking for me?”

Lucifer growls out a frustrated sigh. He’d been asleep upstairs when his soul had been yanked from his body, so Michael had to have left at some point — probably mid-morning, based on the steam that had still lingered in the bathroom when Lucifer returned. Gaurav was the only one rostered on mornings — if he hadn’t seen anything, then the trail would be as good as cold. “Not even a glimpse? Leaving? Arriving?”

“Not that I rememb…”

“Well, did anyone else go up to the penthouse?”

“I mean,” he shifts, viscerally uncomfortable. “I just, I wouldn’t have seen...”

“Come on, think, man!”

“Bro!” Gaurav jerks away.

It's only once he leaves the sphere of power that had begun to form around the two of them that Lucifer realizes he’d been doing it again. Releasing potent fear—pure concentrate—into the air, thread by oily thread. He sucks them back up instantly, and Gaurav shakes himself, coming back to the room. His face falls. “Uh, I mean sir. Mr Morningstar. Sorry.”

“That’s quite alright.” Lucifer turns his head away, feeling that he’s the one with far more to apologize for. He releases a heavy, tired breath. “Well, if you do happen to see me… be sure to let me know.”

“Uh…?” Gaurav squints.

“Appreciated.” Lucifer turns towards the stairs, every fiber of his body now pounding with exhaustion.

“Sorry I couldn’t help, boss,” Gaurav says to his retreating back, and it only makes Lucifer feel worse — he must look pathetically dejected. “I haven’t seen you at all since you came down to pick up your package.”

Lucifer freezes halfway up the stairs.

“I did what?”

“Last night. When you picked up your package,” Gaurav says as Lucifer turns slowly to look down at him. “I haven't seen you since then.”

The imminent promise of a drink, a soak, and a lie down all fall away. They can wait. Lucifer clomps back down the stairs. “You’re saying I came down here last night and picked up some sort of package?”

Gaurav frowns. “Is… everything okay?”

“Just—” Lucifer purses his lips and draws a deep breath in through his nose. “Tell me exactly what happened the last time you saw me.”

—

Lucifer wakes to the pale light of pre-dawn. A cool breeze whispers through from the open balcony, and outside the sound of distant traffic and the occasional bird forms the peaceful white noise of early morning.

And his spine seethes like a car crash.

He’s worked his pillow into the crook of his neck, clamping it between his chin and his shoulder, and his body lays zig-zagged across the mattress like a lightning bolt. His immediate, desperate impulse is to get out of that position. The impulse that chases straight after it is to abandon all thought of ever trying to move his body again.

Lucifer groans up at the ceiling, then pries himself off the bed.

An hour later, he’s idling on the 101, staring at the ‘our family’ bumper sticker on the Volvo in front of him.

“Five?” he murmurs to himself in horror, counting the stick-figure children. “No patience to simply wait for Hell, then.”

The sun had risen aggressively, burning up the early cool air and beating down over them until the highway’s all heavy and sizzling. The Corvette rolls forward an inch, then the Volvo stops again, and so does he. All four Southbound lanes are packed and barely moving. He grinds his teeth.

“Oh, come bloody on!” Lucifer leans on his horn, craning to see around the car in front. “Since when does Los Angeles have traffic jams?”

An exit rolls into view, and Lucifer takes it gratefully, cutting across the lanes at a crawl and escaping down the off-ramp. He’s nowhere near downtown yet, but he settles for taking the long way around. The wide street is quiet enough, winding lazily around the Silver Lake Reservoir, and the Corvette rumbles gratefully up to speed. A breeze ruffles through the hot stale air, and Lucifer leans back with a groan of relief.

Then the lungs of the universe breathe him in.

In seconds, Lucifer is a vapor, nothing more than particles, spanning the breadth of the galaxy. The warm California sun is swallowed away into the blackness of space, and it drinks him down like a tonic. Every distant smudge of a glimmering star pulses as he passes it — remembering him, reaching for him as he streaks through the endless dark. Lucifer inhales the light and the light inhales him in return.

And simultaneously, he’s fire, and he’s ravenous — devouring a sycamore then simmering back into the earth to die on the razed ground he was born from. He clings to the stem of a rosehip, glinting through ice crystals, beading his way up a frozen spiderweb and whispering across the long grass. And he spins, surging with convection currents, skimming across mountains, across dead planets, endless, endless—

There’s water in his lungs when he gasps for breath.

Lucifer has skin again. His heart ricochets against the inside of his chest as he collides back into himself. He has nerves that scream out through his spine, and eyes that can barely see; a pitiful set of senses that sluggishly tell him he’s underwater. Light filters down from above in shafts that ripple with the murky surface, drawing closer and closer until he breaks through it.

“Hey, buddy, I gotcha.”

Someone’s gripping him around the chest. There’s a rough Midwestern voice near his ear.

“You’re gonna be okay.”

The memory of being pure heat—pure light—lingers, as lake water runs into his eyes. He can still feel his body bursting apart in a way that was anything but painful. And as he slowly comes back to his simple little form and waterlogged suit, he becomes aware of himself. He’s gulping in oxygen, forgetting himself. That, or perhaps the habits of this particular body are far too eager to place self-preservation above dignity.

“Keep your head up out of the water for me,” the man says. His arms tighten around Lucifer’s chest, trying to hoist him like a ragdoll. “I’m gonna call for help.”

Lucifer distantly recalls driving through Silver Lake an eternity ago, leaning back in the morning sun, coasting wide empty streets in a car he was rather fond of. The smell of ozone dissipates.

“Thank you!” Lucifer splutters, relearning his body in an instant and spitting out lake water. “It’s Premium Panels in Reseda, quick as you can, please.”

“Huh?” Their legs knock awkwardly as Lucifer begins to kick free from the embrace. “Premium what?”

“My mechanic!” Lucifer pats down his jacket, finding the brick of his sopping wet phone inside the pocket and pulling it out. Water pours from the charging port, but the screen turns on. “Oh! Small miracles.”

Lucifer holds his phone high above the surface of the lake. There’s a signal, but his fingers slip against the wet screen, refusing to dial. He shakes water off his hand and when he tries again, the call connects. “Arturo! Thank goodness, I need immediate roadside assistance. It’s an emergency.”

The man tugs at him, trying to get a firm hold. “Hey, hey guy, would you put the phone down?”

“Sorry, could you speak up?” Lucifer wrenches his arm free and starts to swim to shore. “I can’t hear you, I’m being rescued from a lake.”

—

“Daniel.” Lucifer plants both hands on Dan’s desk. “You’re technically a detective.”

Lucifer is dried and dressed, though not showered, and the grit of sediment scratches at his skin beneath the fresh cotton shirt. Dan looks up, tired acceptance flattening his features. “I am a detective.”

“Yes, pretty much,” Lucifer agrees, and drags a chair over to join him at his desk. “I need you to test some evidence for me.”

Dan grimaces and shifts away. “Ohh, dude, what is that smell?”

“Lake,” Lucifer informs him tersely. “Now, will you help me or not?”

Dan spins in his chair and stares him down. His hand reaches automatically for his grip trainer and squeezes. He always seems to be using that thing when the two of them are together. Lucifer’s starting to suspect it’s a stress response. Silly Daniel.

“Just send it to the lab,” he says. “The lab processes evidence — not random individual cops.”

“Well, this particular evidence is actually in relation to a personal matter,” Lucifer drops his voice, scooting forward on the wheelie chair and reaching inside his jacket. “So I thought I’d better bring it to the Back Door, instead.”

“The ‘Back Door’?” Dan’s lips flatten into a hard, unamused line. “Do not tell me that’s what people call me.”

“Yes, I’m trying to get it to catch on,” Lucifer beams cheerily. “Do you like it? See, it has a double meaning, because—”

“No,” Dan groans, turning back to his desk. He snatches up his pen and hunches over his paperwork. “I don’t like it. And I’m done sticking my neck out, anyway. I’ve gotten in enough hot water doing things off the books.”

Lucifer hums, considering him.

“Well, that’s exactly why I came to you.”

Dan squints at him out the corner of his eye. “What do you mean?”

“Well, I could hardly take it to Miss Lopez directly,” he explains. “She has a bright future. It wouldn’t do for her to risk her reputation by going around processing things off the books — but you, Daniel?”

“Right,” Dan gives him a hard smile. “I get it. Real nice, man.”

“Oh, good, so you understand,” Lucifer grins. “Reputation really is everything, after all, and now that yours is in tatters, there’s simply nothing left for you to lose.”

Dan’s face scrunches and he edges away from him. “Dude, enough.”

“Well, I’m simply saying, things aren’t going to get better, that much is obvious. You’re not the hero of anyone’s story — you do know that, don’t you? Everybody else does. You're not the hero for your wife — sorry, ex-wife. You’re certainly not the hero for your daughter.”

The line of Dan’s shoulders is a hard knot, twisting inwards like coat hanger wires. His jaw rolls and shifts.

And then out of nowhere, Lucifer’s starving. There’s a black, yawning cavern inside him that opens up and demands more of whatever he just got a whiff of. There’s a taste in the air already — sweet, but too sweet, like a fruit so overripe it’s on the cusp of falling apart, but Lucifer welcomes it. He needs it.

“You may consider yourself fortunate that you’re not fired or in prison, but really, is this any better?” He hears himself speak as if listening from a distance, his mouth choosing the words it knows will sate him best. “Wasting away at the bottom of the totem pole, getting away with everything and going nowhere? Not a hero, no… but not really a villain, either. Just a token dirty cop. Why do they keep you around, I wonder? Could it be that you’re simply so ineffectual, so paralyzed by your own inadequacies, that everything you do—for good or for ill—it’s all just… meaningless? It’s rather like purgatory, actually. Not a good place… but just not important enough to be truly bad.”

Dan is silent. Behind them, the gentle bustle of the precinct goes on. Papers shuffle and rubber soles leave black scuffs against the linoleum. And Lucifer receives no argument in return.

“And that’s why you’re the perfect person to process this evidence for me.”

“Hey, Lucifer?”

Dan’s skin is sallow — gray and as good as dead. Ribbons of veins stand out in his temples, his neck. His pale irises are an angry shout against the redness that’s overtaken the whites of his eyes. Lucifer frowns, and swallows.

“Yes?”

“Go fuck yourself.”

He spits the word at him so viciously that Lucifer feels the spray against his cheek, then the next second Dan’s leg collides with his as he stands and shoves past him, leaving Lucifer spinning in his chair.

And then he hears everything he just said.

—

The blinds swing and clack against the laboratory door as Lucifer throws it open. Inside, Chloe and Ella are gathered around a pile of print-outs. The tail end of Ella’s lively explanation gets lost as he slams the door closed behind him. “Excuse my tardiness.”

Chloe looks up from the counter. “Thought you weren’t coming in today.”

“I wasn’t,” Lucifer agrees. “But then I needed some assistance with a personal matter, and then I drove into a lake—delaying my arrival. Hence; tardy.”

“I’m sorry—?!” Chloe straightens the rest of the way up, eyelids fluttering as she processes this news. “You what?”

“I ought not stay and chat.” Lucifer moves the papers on the counter aside to make room for himself. “I’m afraid I just suffered a rare lapse of judgment and I’d rather not have either of you in the blast zone if it happens again.”

“Hold on, no — you drove into a lake? What happened?”

“Well, I have a theory.”

Chloe’s brows furrow in concern, and she folds her arms. “Okay.”

Lucifer thinks of how the earth had dissolved under his feet—not once, but twice now. And how the world-turning lurch had felt less like he was being ripped from his body and more like he was shrapnel being excised from a gangrenous wound. He himself hadn’t made heads or tails of the surrealist soup of planets and universe, of being impossibly close and impossibly far away… of being, essentially, everything. But his soul had. His soul had known exactly where to go.

Home.

Lucifer leans across the counter. “I think that was my soul trying to return to my real body.”

Chloe closes her eyes. “...right.”

“Right…” Ella echoes, edging towards the door.

“Yes, but the problem is I always get turned back around,” he hisses. “It’s like there’s some sort of block or—”

“Always?” Chloe repeats sharply. “How many times has this happened?”

“Only twice so far.”

“Lucifer, this is not good!”

“Oh no, you’re mistaken,” he corrects. “It’s very good.”

Chloe throws up her hands. “How is it good?”

“Well, I’m not supposed to be in this body, am I?” Lucifer presses his hands to his chest. “So it appears the wrong is attempting to right itself. Nature is healing. This whole issue may resolve on its own — if I can uncover how he’s keeping me from returning.”

“Yeaahh…” Ella clears her throat, standing awkwardly halfway to the door. “This sounds like it should probably be a private conversation so… I’m just gonna bounce for a few—”

“Ah—no.” Lucifer sticks his head up, catching her before she slips out. “Bounce back down here, if you would, Miss Lopez. I did actually come with a favor to ask.”

He reaches into his jacket pocket, fishing out the ziploc bag he’d brought with him. The women stare at it as he lays it on the counter.

“What are these?” Chloe inquires, in a flat voice that doesn’t sound inquisitive at all.

“These,” Lucifer taps the counter, “are three pieces of evidence recovered from my home after a recent break-in.”

Ella’s jaw drops. “Oh my God, you were robbed?”

“Oh.” Lucifer scoffs darkly. “Substantially.”

“Have you filed a police report?” Ella asks.

Lucifer catches Chloe’s glare across the table. She knows exactly what break-in he’s referring to. He knows that look. It’s the drop after the crest of the roller coaster. The point where she’s decided she’s indulged him long enough.

“Lucifer can’t, um…” Chloe smacks her lips. “He can’t report this one.”

It’s a clear instruction.

Ella squints. “Why not?”

“Because what he’s describing is impossible,” Chloe says levelly, holding his gaze.

To the side of them, Ella’s not satisfied. “Huh? Break-ins happen all the time. Especially to billionaires who live in a nightclub and don’t have a door.”

Chloe grinds her jaw. “Well, there’s no evidence that this particular break-in did ever—or could ever—actually happen.”

“What do you call that, then?” Lucifer taps the counter beside the items in the bag. “Hm?”

“An old pill bottle, a piece of string, and…” Chloe turns the bag over with her pen. “Is that blood?”

Lucifer regards the rag with the obvious blood stain. “Well, why don’t you test it and find out? Perhaps it’s only ketchup — just as heinous in your eyes, of course,” he tries, and actually earns a small smile from her. He delights in the little victory. “Only one way to know for certain.”

“Lucifer…” Chloe sighs, letting the bag flop back down on the counter. “You know that I’m always here for you if you ever need help. Actual help. But we don’t have endless resources for just playing make-believe. And we have a lot of real work to get through today.”

Lucifer’s eyes flick between the two of them. It isn’t that he thinks he’s entitled to their help… it’s just that they’ve never been this reticent in giving it before. Chloe, of course, sometimes makes a habit of blue-balling him on his more audacious requests, but Miss Lopez, at least, is usually all too happy to bank up a favor — or, as she calls it, a “good deed”. People just… like to give him things. It seems to make them happy — why else would they have been doing it since the beginning of time? He’s very rarely needed to ask twice for anything. Lucifer sits back, stung. “So you really won’t help me?”

Chloe sighs, a low and weary sound. “Well, it’s Ella’s call, I guess. It’s her overtime.”

“Uh…” Ella looks between them, clearly uncomfortable with being caught in the middle. “Well… if we finish up on time, I can run a few tests before I go home. How’s that?”

“Very generous.” Lucifer mumbles, feeling uncomfortably like he’s wrenched her good will from her clawed fingers, and slides the bag across the counter. Ella takes it, turning it over in her hands.

“Sorry you totaled your car.”

Lucifer sighs, thinking of how water had poured from the inside of the Corvette as it was winched from the bottom of the reservoir. “Oh, no it’s fine. It’s with my mechanic right now.”

“Oh my God.” Ella grimaces. “That’s gonna cost a fortune!”

“Perhaps,” Lucifer agrees. “But it’s well worth the money. After all, I originally stole it, so rebuilding it from the ground up seems a rather poetic way to make it truly mine.”

Chloe blinks like the blink had slapped her. “You what?”

“Nice!” Ella’s face lights up, instantly cheered. “What did you use for the slim jim?”

Lucifer frowns. “It’s a convertible.”

“Oh! Right,” she winks. “Low-hanging fruit. Nice going.”

“Are you two forgetting you both work for the police?” Chloe says, massaging her temple. “Like, currently? As in, literally at work right now in a police station?”

“Uhhh…” Ella looks hesitantly between the two of them. Lucifer, unconcerned, does not.

“...buuut that’s why it’s so inspiring! You know, turning over a new leaf.” Ella dramatically thumps a purple-gloved fist against her chest and drops her voice to a movie-trailer growl. “And now we’re on the side of justice.”

Chloe narrows her eyes, gathering up her print-outs from the side of the bench. “Uh-huh.”

Ella shakes her head. “We don’t do that shit anymore, right Luce?”

“Absolutely,” Lucifer agrees. “The cars in this city are far too ugly to steal these days.”

Chloe rolls her eyes. “Wow, lucky thing.”

She taps her papers, squaring the edges, then heads for the door. Lucifer watches her brush past him with barely a glance, and follows automatically.

“Uh…” Ella’s voice calls out behind him. “You’re welcome?”

“Of course — much appreciated, Miss Lopez,” Lucifer says as he shoves his head back in. “I’ll check in on those results as soon as you have them.” He moves to leave, then has a second thought. “And, ah… If you see Daniel today, do take him out for a sundae, won’t you? I’m afraid he’ll be needing it.”

“Wha—?”

He lets the door swing closed on Ella’s confused frown.

“What’s got your ponytail in a twist?” Lucifer asks, once he catches up to Chloe in the bullpen. “You’re not actually upset to learn about my somewhat criminal past, are you?”

She sighs, stopping when he reaches her. “No, I guess not. Not really. I mean, I kinda doubt it's the most illegal thing you’ve done, anyway — no offense.”

“Can’t be offended by flattery,” Lucifer comments cheerfully. “So, what’s the problem?”

“I guess it’s just…” Chloe frowns, looking at him in that way which always makes him feel like she’s seeing inside him. “It’s weird that I never knew that.”

“Well, as you rightly pointed out, we do quite often find ourselves in a police station,” Lucifer reminds her. “It wouldn’t do to parade every nefarious deed I get up to beneath your nose, now, would—”

The words disintegrate. Lucifer doesn’t have a mouth to speak them, or lungs to breathe air into them, or a body at all. The precinct is sucked away like a handkerchief up a vacuum hose, and Lucifer’s streaking through the vapor of matter once again.

But this time, the pulled-apart atoms of the universe begin to squeeze back together, resembling a sky and a ground and buildings, and then Lucifer’s hurtling down towards a tall pillar of steel. The top of it pulses, sounds of all kinds resounding with delight. Sunlight sparkles on the top of a swimming pool, butter yellow shade umbrellas flap in the light breeze.

And his own body lounges in a cabana, sliding an olive off a toothpick with his teeth.

His patterned shirt is half unbuttoned, and a woman rubs sunscreen on his chest, one leg hooked over his. Another woman gives him a sip of her strawberry daiquiri. He says something. She laughs. And in seconds, Lucifer’s close enough to touch.

Then a force rebounds him so hard that he’s miles away again before he even realizes it. The rooftop pool is gone, the matter of reality pulls back into fibrous streaks like cotton candy whipping around a floss head. He passes through layers of wood and fiberglass, and slams back into the broken body he’d just left.

Four blurry shapes jump backwards, clearing his vision, as Lucifer drags in a great greedy gasp of air. The ceiling swims. The hanging fluorescents and exposed air conditioning ducts place him squarely on the floor of the precinct. A cool, damp cloth lays across his forehead, trickling beads of water down his temples to collect in his ears. The rolled up jacket beneath his head smells like old, stale coffee.

“Hey,” a man’s voice says from somewhere close behind him. Deep and smooth, vaguely familiar. One of the officers. “Hey, you okay, bro?”

“I’ve never seen anyone faint that fast before,” Ella chatters. Her voice is high and thin and unmistakably stressed. “He didn’t fade or anything, just chatting one minute then BAM.”

Lucifer’s face breaks into a smile.

“Uh…” Ella scoots closer on her knees. “Hey, buddy. You alright?”

“I’m marvelous,” Lucifer breathes. “I’ve bloody found him.”

“...found who?”

“And in the ugliest bloody hotel in Los Angeles,” he chuckles to himself. “Of course he’d choose that one.”

The other officer clears his throat. “Should we be asking him who the President is?”

“Lucifer.”

Chloe’s voice is quiet, but it slices through the noise. Lucifer frowns and turns his head, pulled by the sound. He hadn’t realized she was here too, but he finds her on her knees with the others, the end of her long sleeve gathered against her mouth. “You really need to go to a hospital.”

“She’s right,” Ella agrees.

“She’s wrong.” Lucifer flips the damp cloth onto the floor and sits up, ignoring the scramble of hands that rush to steady him. “I need to go to The Montzinger.”

—

The Montzinger Beverly Hills is a clashing of sensibilities. An old four-story brick hotel from the post-prohibition era had been condemned, sold, and recently rebuilt. Lucifer remembers it from its heyday. He’d been glad to see the classic brick facade restored to its former glory.

The neon-wrapped skyscraper they built on top of it, though, he could do without.

His eyes scale the building to the very top. Seeing it this way is a little different to seeing it with the naked energy of his being, but Lucifer recognizes the edges of yellow shade umbrellas flapping against the blue sky. He smiles.

The late afternoon sun stretches his shadow back like hot tar, and the Devil slinks inside the building.

The lobby is wide and clean and overly air conditioned. Echoes of Lucifer’s footsteps bounce off the polished floor, making it sound like he’s arriving with an army.

“Sir?” The neckerchiefed brunette at reception cranes as he strides past her to the bank of elevators. “Sir? Excuse me?”

“Yes?” Lucifer tosses over his shoulder.

“Are you staying here?”

She’s leaning over the short end of the L-shaped service desk, holding the leaves of an areca palm out of her face with one hand and the receiver of the hotel’s landline in the other. She’s looking at him expectantly. Almost… sternly. Lucifer frowns at her, so thrown that he has to take a moment to understand what’s even happening.

He’s being… stopped from doing something.

How strange.

Lucifer clears his throat, redirecting towards the desk with a smile that could melt granite. “Visiting a friend,” he explains. “Well, enemy, actually. But this is Los Angeles, so… one in the same really.”

“What name is the room under?” she asks, sounding skeptical but pulling the computer keyboard towards herself.

Lucifer barely hesitates. If Michael would steal his body, no doubt he’d want the whole package, identity included. “Lucifer Morningstar.”

She types with the pads of her fingers, avoiding her talon-like acrylics, and Lucifer leans against the marble edge of the desk, waiting.

“There’s no booking under that name.”

“What?” Lucifer peers over the desk to look. She smoothly turns the screen away. “Well… erm, try Michael, then.”

The woman’s hands hover over the keys. “Michael who?”

“Just Michael,” he says. “No last name. Like Beyonce.”

“Beyonce has a last name,” she tells him with a flat smile that he takes a little personally. “And I’m going to need your friend to have one, too.”

Lucifer’s nostrils flare with a frustrated breath. It’s hard to keep up the charm when meeting roadblock after roadblock — though apparently it wasn’t getting him very far anyway. “Well, never mind the room, then,” he tries again. “I happen to know he’s currently on the rooftop, so I’ll just pop on up. Thank you ever so much for your help, darling.”

“You can call me Tiffany,” she advises firmly, tapping the chrome name tag on her lapel. “And I’m afraid the pool area is for guests only.”

“Wh…?” Lucifer lingers, at a loss. Resistance is not a familiar challenge. There’s nothing to stop him simply going up to the roof anyway, of course. Even if he arrives wearing five security guards as a backpack, he’ll be no worse for wear, though it could make having a private conversation slightly difficult.

“Very well.” Lucifer turns back to her, fishing in his jacket. “Then a guest I shall be.”

She scans him with her eyes, from head to toe. Lucifer’s used to it. He’s intimately familiar with the slow once-over, but this time it’s not quite the same. He’s not sure he likes the judgment.

“Sir, the only available room we have is the Presidential Suite.”

“I see.” Lucifer withdraws his wallet and begins counting out bills. “Finally, some good news.”

—

By the time Lucifer’s in the elevator, jabbing the button that says ‘roof’, he’s starving for retribution. He’s ravenous for it. Delayed gratification is usually far more fun than this, but all Lucifer wants to do is skip to the finish.

The doors roll open with a flood of color. White rooftop edges meet a cloudless sky — a punch of blue that makes his eyes sting. Tanned bodies wearing little more than string stretch on sun loungers or slip through the water, dappled with light beneath the surface. Upbeat music drifts at low volume from an unattended DJ booth. The breeze is gentle and warm, and carries on it a twinge of chlorine and Aperol Spritz. Lucifer breathes it in. It smells like home — the home that comes in many forms. The one he could always find wherever he went. Desire; delightful and lively.

He plucks a glass of something fruity and fresh from a tray, and slips his other hand loosely into his pocket as he scans the cabanas, looking for a familiar face and an ugly shirt.

“Hey, bro.”

A hand catches his wrist. Lucifer jumps and turns back to find a man in black swim trunks prying the glass from his hand. “Think you got my drink, there.”

Lucifer cocks his head, studying the man with curiosity, but releases the glass. “My mistake.”

The home suddenly feels far more like he’s standing outside it looking in.

He moves through the tables and clusters of bar stools, disturbed by how easily he slips into the background. Normally, he’d have been accosted at least five times by now, but as he prowls beneath beach umbrellas he doesn’t draw so much as an interested glance. If he does catch anyone’s eye, they stare back impassively, then look away.

The cabanas run the length of the rooftop on the opposite side of the pool, half a dozen little box tents hanging with heavy off-white curtains. Finding the one Michael’s in is as easy as picking himself out in a photograph. He’s still with the same two women; the daiquiri is drained and sitting with several other empty glasses on the small table in front of them. One of the women rubs his shoulders, the other is draped against his side, hanging on every word.

Lucifer boils. The picture is him. Take away the ugly shirt with the summer pattern and he could be staring across the pool at himself. Michael moves with an easy charm, but the charm is not his own. He doesn’t deserve to wield it. Michael has never made anyone smile. He’s certainly never made anyone laugh.

Fumes of rage ripple the air as Lucifer pushes between two tables. The people sitting there shift away from him, wilting like the leaves of a dying plant, and collect their things. Lucifer doesn’t notice. He stalks around the edge of the pool, drawn home like a magnet.

“Well,” he hisses as his shadow falls across the booth. “Fancy seeing me here.”

Michael looks up with casual, detached interest. Both women pause, an uncomfortable silence dousing the lively banter they’d had moments earlier.

“Oh!” Michael’s false cheer slaps against him like a wet fish. “Good to see you, Lucifer. Can I get you a drink? Do you wanna join us?”

The woman who’d been rubbing his shoulders leans down close to his ear and whispers, “No, can he not?”

Lucifer shifts, disbelief and discomfort warring within him, and tries not to take offense. He’d stormed in, propelled by fury with a thousand things to say, but now that he stands in the field of Michael’s gravity, stolen or not, Lucifer feels small and Michael feels, well…

Magnetic.

“You sure know how to clear a room,” Michael comments, eyes sliding across the rooftop behind him. Lucifer frowns and follows his gaze.

The roof is empty. Ripples still flutter along the surface of the pool, echoing with the movement of those who had just been in it. But wet footprints lead to the elevator, and half-finished drinks are left abandoned on tables. Even the plants lean away from him, stretching for the sun hanging low in the sky.

His brother turns to the women, drawing a keycard from his pocket and handing it to the one he’s wearing like a scarf. “Go wait for me in the room. This won’t take long.”

His companions seem all too happy to leave, taking the keycard and extracting themselves from the cushions without a moment’s hesitation. But their hands linger across Michael’s chest in a longing goodbye. They trace the shape of his jaw until it's out of reach. It’s resoundingly clear that Lucifer’s the one they can’t wait to get away from. He clenches his jaw until the molars ache. He has half a mind to clench harder until they break and spit Michael’s own teeth at him. His brother leans back with a stolen ease, gazing after the women until the doors close and they’re alone on the rooftop.

“Well, Michael, welcome to earth,” Lucifer seethes through a hard smile. “You’ve certainly made yourself at home. I don’t know whether to congratulate you for pulling off something so ludicrously Disney Channel, or for doing it in the most remarkably pointless of ways.” He scoffs. “I mean, talk about trading apples for apples.”

And Michael, always so reactive and sullen, drags a half-finished cocktail towards himself and leans back into the smack of orange sunset.

“Oh, I know you don’t believe that,” he says, and his voice is pitched like velvet. He sounds just how Lucifer would have sounded if he’d spent a little more time in the Americas instead of being enticed off to London during his formative centuries. “I don’t need to be able to smell your fear to know that you’ve lost something far more valuable than your face.”

“You must be referring to my patience,” Lucifer snaps. “What is it you want, Michael? You can’t honestly think you can be me.”

“Oh, I don’t need to be you,” Michael says, and his manner is so uncharacteristically open that Lucifer, astoundingly, finds that he believes him. “In fact, I wouldn’t even want to be you. Not now, anyway.”

Lucifer grinds his teeth, but he feels his eyes narrow.

“Oh,” Michael beams. An odious chuckle turns over at the back of his throat. “Did you think I was here to steal your identity?”

“That feigned incredulity would be a tad more convincing if you weren’t speaking to me with my own face,” Lucifer reminds him tersely. “What is it you’re really after, then? Reputation? Riches? A new set of shoulder blades?”

“Believe it or not, Lucifer, I’m not here to take any of that,” he says. “In fact, I have something of yours.”

Lucifer clears his throat. “There’s an understatement.”

Then Michael sets his drink aside and rises from the cushioned bench, moving with the fluid ease Lucifer now lacks. Jealousy flares in his chest. Michael steps from the cabana as the string lights criss-crossed above them flicker on in the dying blue light of the evening. On his brother’s hand, Lucifer’s onyx ring catches a glimmer, and the ache of longing doubles.

Then Michael slides it off his finger, and hands it over.

Lucifer eyes him warily. “Not your style? I’d have thought you’d have flipped it on Craigslist by now.”

“I mean it,” Michael says. “I’m really not here to take over your life.”

Lucifer tentatively accepts the ring and slides it back on his finger. The cool metal is familiar, the weight of the stone a comfort, and it feels like home — even if the hand it rests on doesn’t. “Well, that doesn’t sound like the weasley, sniveling rat I know. Why the change of heart? Or whatever passes for one, in your case.”

“Because I don’t need to,” Michael says. Satisfaction curls around his lips. “You’re going to lose it all on your own.”

Lucifer doesn’t like this convincing new Michael. He doesn’t like that it isn’t so easy to dismiss every word from his mouth as a lie — or that they nudge at a quiet fear Lucifer’s been harboring since he first stepped out of the crack house in West Adams and found the light too bright for his eyes.

But as always when dealing with a snake, Lucifer makes no sudden moves. “Am I, now? That’s quite a theory, care to explain?”

Michael hums to himself, considering Lucifer silently, then brushes past him. Lucifer watches him stroll down the rooftop to the abandoned DJ booth, still quietly pumping lively Latin Urbano out into the cooling evening air. A collection of half-finished cocktails sits in a line to the side of the turntable. Michael runs his fingers down the rims, selects an orange-colored one, swirls, and sips.

“Have you ever wondered what things would have been like if Father had given our gifts in reverse?” he asks over his shoulder.

Lucifer squints, bemused, and stays put. “Not for a single moment, I’m delighted to say.”

“No?” Michael plucks the orange slice off the rim of the glass, sucking at the fruit as he wanders back. “Because I know you know it could’ve gone either way. In that tiny moment before he gave us our gifts. When we were… almost finished. Dad hadn’t decided who’d get what yet. Who’d be the carrot and who’d be the stick.”

“Yes, everything was a lot more phallic back then, wasn’t it?” Lucifer jeers.

And Michael chuckles. It’s a genuine, warm chuckle that lights up his stolen face. Almost… good-natured.

“I’ll give you this, Lucifer. You are funny,” he says, shaking a finger like they’re some form of friends. “It’s a shame that sharp wit’s gonna fade just like everything else you thought was yours.”

A breeze drifts through the open backs of the cabanas, swaying the canvas and shivering across the surface of the pool. It’s a Friday night. This rooftop should be bustling. It had been — before Lucifer showed up. That thought is hard to grasp. Lucifer has always been a magnet that draws people in.

“It doesn’t taste good, does it?” Michael comments. “Fear. You’ll learn to use it to your advantage, of course. Fear’s powerful, but it never really becomes… palatable. But desire? Oh, now that’s a delicacy. I can see why you’ve glutted yourself on it.”

“Please,” Lucifer scoffs. “You wouldn’t know desire if it rode up on horseback and delivered a swift polo mallet to the crown jewels.”

Michael chuckles lightly — just an amused breath of air — and says nothing. It’s unlike his brother to not dignify something with a response. The non-answer tells Lucifer far more than words could have.

“Sure, maybe your name used to be synonymous with power, luxury. Desire,” Michael continues as if Lucifer hadn’t even spoken. “But I’ve got a feeling… pretty soon, people are gonna start to realize that Lucifer Morningstar isn’t quite the charmer he used to be.”

Lucifer shifts his jaw. He thinks of the dropped keys. The hotel receptionist.

A dreadfully sharp, predatory delight comes over Michael’s face, so ghoulish that his blunt teeth might as well be daggers. The sun dips below the horizon, deepening the shadows on his face and for a second, Lucifer doesn’t even recognize himself.

“You’re noticing it already, aren’t you?”

“Noticing what?” Lucifer snaps, before he has a chance to appear rattled.

“The way that people treat you now. The way they look at you — or rather, don’t look at you. You’re not the center of attention anymore, are you? You’re just not… captivating.” Michael tilts his head to the side, studying him. “The truth is, you’re no one special, Samael. You were just given an unfair advantage — and now it’s mine.”

“That is not my name,” Lucifer barks. Through his teeth, his voice grates like metal.

“Actually, you know what? Agreed,” Michael concedes, holding up his hands. “I’ll call you Lucifer from now on. Suddenly, I’m no longer in the mood to punch down.”

Lucifer scoffs. “A relief to earthworms everywhere.”

Michael smiles. “And now to you, too.”

Perhaps it’s the arrogance, or the false mercy, or the insinuation that Michael’s somehow above him now, but in that moment Lucifer remembers himself. He came here for a confrontation, not a lecture, and so far all he’s done is allow a thief to parade his stolen goods in front of him. Michael steps past him, heading toward the exit, and Lucifer doesn’t move.

“You know, I’ve been having the most peculiar experience,” Lucifer says, with a voice that’s dark and deathly gentle. “I keep… leaving this body.”

Michael’s footsteps slow to a stop. The silence is some much needed satisfaction in an otherwise humbling evening. Lucifer turns to find him standing there halfway to the elevators, considering the leaves of a pot plant.

“Whatever you think you’ve achieved, Michael, it’s already coming undone.”

“Hm.” Michael brushes a hand down the face of one of the banana palm leaves and checks the dust between his fingers in an infuriating display of nonchalance. “Thanks for the heads-up, but I covered my bases.”

Lucifer’s stomach sinks as his only pocket ace flutters uselessly to the ground. Michael looks back, smugness twisting Lucifer’s face into something hateable. “Oh, you didn’t think I’d lock the door behind me?”

He snaps the stem of the leaf, leaving the huge tropical plant bent over on itself and brushing the ground.

“Funny, isn’t it? How every trait you built your superiority complex on goes away as easy as shed skin,” Michael comments. “Take away the casing and suddenly… you’re no longer persuasive? You’re not even desirable? Guess all that was never really you to begin with. I mean, are you even still the Devil?”

“Of course I am,” Lucifer snaps — sharper than he’d meant to. Harder.

Michael squints. “Why?”

The question is so bizarre that Lucifer finds he can’t answer it. And then his brother’s in his face, dipping his head slightly as if they weren’t the exact same height. Leaning into his ear, whispering.

“What is there to you… that wasn’t given to you?”

Then Michael takes the last long sip from the orange-garnished cocktail and flicks the rind into the pool. Lucifer stands numbly, watching it sink.

“Lucifer, you were never likable,” Michael tells him, and throws the glass in as well. “You were just wearing it.”