#Tell me are you Lucifer?;Masks are off and bridges burned / Lucifer

[clown-demon]

@starmetal-farms

"Apple trees are great to have on a farm! You can make ALL KINDS of things with apples! A snack, an apple pie, or the best-- caramel apples!"

[clown-demon]

Lucifer was different than a demon. He was a fallen angel, not a full blooded demon. And he knew Clem was a friend of Charlie's. So he wanted to help out with the best of his ability.

"Thank you.. And don't be a stranger-- if you need help with something.. you can ask me for help.." he spoke softly before he waved a hand and turned his back to her.

"Take care of yourself, Clem. I hope to see you soon."

Clem managed a small smile, his words were... weird. But not unappreciated. It was strange hearing it from the King of Hell. "... I promise I'll do everything I can to do that." She wouldn't give it in full... not while people were after her head. Clem didn't know how many there were and if she'd figure something out before she was found.

But she wasn't about to tell the king that.

[mindfights]

Tell me, are you Lucifer? Masks are off and bridges burned.

[unhingedselfships]

Elle Lexxa - Lucifer

"Tell me, are you Lucifer? Masks are off and bridges burned Oh tell me, are you Lucifer? Will you let me play the victim and make me your addiction?"

...

we have Kenshi as the Devil, and Kimi willing to send him on fun power trips to get her way. not that shes by any means innocent herself ;p

[s8ncake]

Satan x Reader, NSFW

My Secret Santa gift for a friend on my Obey Me Discord server! (please enjoy my first nsfw piece) 

word count: 4.4k

Summary: Satan is in heat, and you are determined to help him every step of the way.

Other relevant tags: Jealousy, biting

Note: Pronouns aren’t used, but the reader is afab

It starts with eyes following your every move. Satan staring at you isn’t exactly uncommon, but it’s never this intense. This… dark.

Is he okay?

It’s hard to tell. Because as much as you try to bridge the distance between you, he always ends up pulling away before you can get to close. Almost like he’s afraid.

But it’s never been this bad. Not enough for him to leave the room without even saying hello. You turn around to follow him before Lucifer grabs your shoulder.

His gaze is as stern as ever. “Leave him be. You’ll be in danger otherwise.”

Lucifer being cryptic and overbearing isn’t exactly new, but this warning still throws you for a loop. “What makes you say that?”

A pause. He seems to mull something over. “Satan is… different from the rest of us. Once every 200 years his other sins take root, and they threaten to overwhelm him.”

A pang of sympathy runs through you. Satan has spoken with you about his anger before, about how much he struggles to keep it all in check. From the moment he was born, he had to keep himself contained. Hidden away.

The word monster is never used, but it’s heavily implied. In the self loathing that drips off of his tongue, in the way he never does anything more than hold your hand. Satan is a man who has struggled to accept himself throughout his entire life.

It’s something you can relate to. Your problems are entirely different from his own of course, but existing is rough. And on the days that it’s at its worse, Satan is there. Whether it’s reading you a book or showing off some of the neighborhood cats, you are grateful to have him in your life.

So it’s only natural for you to want to make his life better in return. Just like the dozens of times that Satan has supported you… you are determined to do the same. Lucifer’s warning be damned.

Whatever Satan is going through, he shouldn’t have to go through it alone. Even if it’s just talking over the phone, even if the distance between the two of you can’t be breached, you make a promise to yourself, then and there.

No matter what, you are going to be there for him, every step of the way.

Lucifer continues, completely unaware of your plan. “Wrath is an interesting emotion, one that can cause everything else to burn brighter. He will get over this soon. But until then, it is best that you stay away. His self control is not infallible.”

His concern is noted, but also unneeded. Even though Satan is the Avatar of Wrath, you trust him. More than you’ve ever trusted anyone in your entire life. And the very self control that Lucifer claims to be imperfect is the reason why. Satan won’t hurt you. He can’t.

...Well, not in the ways that matter. There won’t be any broken bones or copious amounts of blood; of that you’re certain. Even if this plan goes downhill, you’ll live. Satan may be a demon, but he’s also your demon.

So you have nothing to lose.

You nod along to the rest of Lucifer’s lecture. And once the demon leaves, you head towards Satan’s room.

~~~~

He isn’t there. His bedroom. The common room. RAD’s library. For some reason the demon seems particularly elusive now that you want to find him. Figures.

Your stomach lets out a rumble, and with a heavy heart you realize you’ll have to end your search. For now at least. There’s no use looking for him on an empty stomach.

Thankfully the kitchen isn’t far. And your day is absolutely made once you spot the demon rummaging around in it. Satan is opening every cabinet imaginable and emptying it’s contents down his throat. You’ve never seen him this sloppy before. In a way, it’s kinda cute.

A giggle escapes your lips, and Satan immediately whips his body around. His face flushes once he spots you. The demon lets out an awkward cough as he hides an empty bag of chips behind his back. “Good morning.”

It’s late afternoon, not morning at all. But you still decide to humor him. “Good morning to you too. Did you sleep well?”

His face flushes brighter, and he begins to fidget. “Yes! Fine I mean, I slept fine. Sleeping was definitely something that I did.”

“I can tell.”

A pause. Satan’s face has only grown more red. Beads of sweat trickle down his neck. His expression looks pained, and you would give anything to wipe it away. “Are you okay.”

“No.”

His gaze drops to the floor. “I’m…”

He struggles for words, but you gently shush him with one of your fingers. The touch is light, barely even there, yet his entire body shudders all the same. “It’s okay. Lucifer’s already explained everything.”

Satan takes a deep breath, and the empty bag that he was holding falls to the floor. A part of him seems to give in, if only for a moment, as he rests his head on your shoulder. His nose brushes up against your neck.

He breathes in your scent, although you aren’t wearing any perfume. Perhaps it’s a demon thing. The action seems to soothe him, and eventually he collects himself.

Satan pulls away, his face now an impenetrable mask. “The closest equivalent is a heat.”

“You mean like what animals go through?”

Satan nods. “It's a lot like that, although for me things are a little more… complex.”

That’s right. Lucifer mentioned that his other sins take over. Clearly he was struggling with gluttony a moment ago, but pride, greed, envy, lust... It really must be overwhelming, to experience all of that at once. And while you can’t help with most of them; There is one sin on there that you can help him work his way through. One that, if you’re being completely honest, you feel around him quite often.

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

The innuendo isn’t lost on him. His breath hitches, and he takes a tiny step back. “You can stay away from me.”

He says that, but he doesn’t try to move away from you when you step closer. His blushing cheeks, the dilated pupils of his eyes; it all gives him away.

“But that’s not what you want, is it?”

Satan scowls. “What I want isn’t important.”

“Of course it is. I know you’re worried but—“

You reach towards him, and he lightly bats your hand away. “Do you think you’re safe?”

A growl. His fist clenches. “You’re not. It’s barely set in, and even now I—“

The door is thrown open. A very familiar demon walks in the kitchen, one whose stomach lets out a rumbling growl. Beel greets the two of you, and immediately opens the refrigerator. It’s completely barren.

The demon frowns. Judging by the guilty look that’s formed on Satan’s face, it isn’t hard to figure out who the culprit is. His heat must have truly been getting to him, if he went and devoured all of Beel’s food as well. Although that’s still somewhat his fault, it’s not something he deserves to be punished over.

So you take a box out of your bag, one with a ribbon wrapped around it, and offer it to Beel with a grin. “I got these tarts from Madam Devian’s. You can have them if you want.”

Beel’s eyes light up. He opens the box, his gaze traveling over each and every tart before landing on your face. “We’ll share them.”

~~~~

When Beel first said that, you would never have pictured him feeding it to you. Yet here the two of you are, brushing your fingers against each other's mouth as you giggle and wipe away crumbs.

Satan didn’t join you, but he has yet to leave the room. Instead he simply stands there. Watching.

You turn towards him and wave a tart in the air. “Do you want any?”

His eyes narrow. “I’m not hungry.”

He says that, but you can feel the hunger in his gaze. It follows your frame, and grows when Beel hand-feeds you another tart. A glow, green and full of envy, is locked onto the two of you. The intensity, the beauty of it all, threatens to set you aflame.

You aren’t trying to make him mad of course. But you get the feeling that it would happen no matter what. Satan is more irritable now, and that becomes incredibly obvious as time goes on. It won’t be long before something sets him off.

Your thoughts are interrupted by one of Beel’s fingers brushing up against your lips. A gasp, soft and light, leaves your mouth. In the distance you can hear some sort of snarl. It sounds like an animal, one who’s just had their territory encroached upon.

Beel’s touch doesn’t linger. He quickly pulls away, and there’s a dollop of cream on his finger. The demon lets out a satisfied hum as he plops it into his mouth. “Thanks.”

As if he asked you for permission. Still, you can’t help but chuckle. “You’re welcome.”

More tarts flow between the two of you. There are more in this box then you thought, definitely too many to finish on your own. Beel presses another one to your lips, and laughs. “You’ve got some on your nose this time.”

And that, apparently, was the final straw.

Beel’s hand reaches out to touch you, but Satan is quicker. He growls and grabs Beel’s arm, his claws clinching into the fabric. For a split second, you could have sworn that his eyes started to glow even brighter. “I’ll get it.”

Beel frowns. “Satan—“

You place your hand over Satan’s, and the demon drops Beel’s arm in favor of holding onto you instead. Your fingers intertwine, but Satan’s glare doesn’t waver.

Still, you do your best to reassure Beel with a smile. “It’s fine.”

He doesn’t seem to believe you, not completely at least. Yet none of that matters. Satan is already determined to have every bit of your attention. “Look at me.”

It’s a command, and once your eyes meet everything stills. Satan’s breath hitches. A layer of tension blankets the room. He leans in, and for a brief moment you think he’s going to kiss you. But his lips never make contact.

A pause, and then you feel one of his fingers brush up against your nose. He steps back and plops the digit into his mouth. Something about the act seems… lewd. You automatically turn to Beel instead. “Are you okay?”

Beel nods. “I’m fine.”

His gaze travels over to Satan, who already seems to be staring at him with the intent to kill. It then lands on you. “I think you should stay with me tonight. It’d be safer.”

“Belphie already takes up enough room in your bed as is. Besides, I have a lock.” It’s not a lock you plan on using, but it does exist.

“That won’t deter him. It barely deters me.”

“What do you mean?”

Beel’s eyes widen, and then he lets out a flustered cough. “I still get nightmares sometimes, and having you near helps me feel better. ...I think it’s because you’re so sweet. You chase all of the bad dreams away.”

Your heart melts in response. It’s only natural to abandon Satan’s hand in favor of wrapping your arms around Beel, to assure him that everything’s going to be okay. He always goes out of his way to protect the people around him, but who is there to look out for him in return? “I can stay with you tonight if you want.”

Beel glances at his older brother before letting out a sigh. “No. I think I’ll be fine for now. Just call me if Satan starts bothering you.”

“I will. But I expect you to do the same if you have another nightmare.”

He grins. “I can do that. And thanks for the tarts.”

“Anytime!”

The moment Beel leaves the kitchen, Satan’s grip around your hand tightens. It doesn’t hurt, but the message is clear. You aren’t going anywhere.

His expression looks neutral. Measured. The mask is back on once more. “Before you leave, can you come with me? I believe you left one of your books in my room.”

It’s all a formality, but you nod your head. There is a small chance that Satan is telling the truth, although you highly doubt it. All of your textbooks and novels are safe in your room. It’s clearly a ploy to get the two of you alone. But that idea doesn’t bother you as much as it should. You trust him after all.

So you allow Satan to escort you to his bedroom, where the two of you will finally be alone.

~~~~

To your complete surprise, one of your books is actually there, although it’s one you had forgotten about. You lent him one of your favorite ages ago, when he had mentioned that he wanted to read more literature from the human world.

It’s a story you had read dozens of times, but it’s not one you read anymore. You no longer have the time, and even then you’ve grown so much since then. So perhaps it’s only natural to place the book back into Satan’s arms. “You can keep it.”

There’s something comforting about giving it to him. Although Satan has dozens of books, each and every one of them is looked after and held in perfect condition. He treats them with kindness, as if they were made from glass. In comparison to his strength, they probably are. Your book, one of your greatest treasures, will be loved under his care.

Satan’s eyes widen, and he gasps when your hands meet. His Adam’s apple bobs. A thank you leaves his lips, the gratitude rolling off of him in waves. He clutches it to his chest, and seems to breathe in its scent. Or maybe he’s smelling you again. Who knows?

After a second or two he perks up. “Allow me to give you one of mine in return. Anything from the second shelf to your right is free for you to take.”

You feel his eyes watch you as you wander off to look at the bookshelf in question. There’s one, a title that catches your eye. You reach up to grab it, and falter for a moment when you feel his gaze practically caress your ass.

This is fine. You take a deep breath in order to calm your racing heart, and grab a book from one of the top shelves. Once you flip through the pages, it becomes incredibly clear that you’ve grabbed a children’s book. Given the title, that’s not a surprise. The Cupcake Knight and the Fallen Kingdom.

The Knight is indeed a gigantic cupcake, one with big googly eyes and multiple limbs. The artwork is vivid and fun. You laugh as you turn another page, and notice that the fallen kingdom is nothing more than a gigantic wedding cake. “Beel would love this.”

Satan is by your side in an instant. He snarls, and smacks the book out of your hands. It falls to the floor unharmed and closed shut. The demon, needless to say, looks upset. “I didn’t realize you and Beel were so close.”

His flushing cheeks, the anger that has tensed his shoulders and made him look at you with nothing more than a glare; it all points to one thing.  He’s jealous.

You can’t help but roll your eyes. Satan has nothing to be jealous over. There is only one demon in the Devildom that’s stolen your heart, and that’s him. You love his brothers, that’s true. But you love Satan in an entirely different way.

One that has you comfortably chilling in his bedroom while he’s in heat, on the off chance that you might get railed. “I enjoy hanging out with him, but we’re just friends. You know that.”

Satan doesn’t seem to believe you. “Do I?”

He draws closer. You take several steps back, and are surprised to find yourself bumping into his bed. There’s nowhere to run. Satan has you trapped. The arousal begins to make your brain fog, especially once the distance between the two of you finally closes.

His nose sniffs at your neck.  “His stench is all over you. You were eating out of the palm of his hand. And from the way he was looking at you…”

He whispers the words against your throat. “You would have been eaten, then and there.”

He presses a kiss along your pulse. A shiver runs through your spine as his mouth travels down lower. “But the only one who will be eating you is me.”

A growl. “You’re mine.”

And then his teeth sink into the junction between your shoulder and neck. It’s painful, but not overwhelmingly so. The wound is incredibly shallow. A gasp falls from your lips, one that quickly morphs into a moan once he begins licking the tiny droplets of blood that’ve sprung forth. 

Mine. Mine. Mine. Mine. The words are whispers against your skin, alongside the dozens of hickeys that he’s starting to pepper it with.

He’s desperate. You can tell from how he clings to you, and from the way his breath hitches when your hands glide over the tent in his pants. Satan growls, and then pushes you down on his bed.

He’s hovering over you now, face flushed and a ravenous gleam in his eye. Yet there’s something else there, a tiny pinprick of doubt that is all too familiar to you. He’s afraid. Whether it’s of his own feelings or it’s the possibility that he might hurt you, you can’t be sure. But even like this, Satan summons up one last desperate attempt to push you away “I need you to stop me. Tell me that I’m a monster, and that you want me to leave.”

That’s the last thing you want him to do

“Satan, I want you to fuck me.”

There’s a sharp intake of breath. Satan’s grip on you tightens.

You reach out, and caress his cheek. “I don’t want anyone else other than you.”

And with that last sentence, Satan finally breaks. Your lips meet in a passionate kiss, one that takes you by surprise. The demon already seems determined to explore every inch of you with his tongue. But you have absolutely no problem with that.

Your hands tangle themselves in his hair, and his tail wraps around your waist, tugging you closer together. One of his fangs nicks your lip, and the moment your blood hits his tongue, he moans.

“Fuck.” His voice sounds completely wrecked. Buttons fly everywhere. Your entire uniform is absolutely ruined. Yet you don’t care, especially when Satan’s mouth travels down lower, and he gently pushes your legs apart. “You have no idea how much I’ve wanted you.”

You’re unable to smother a curse of your own once he starts mouthing the wet fabric of your underwear. Your hands make their way to his hair, and you tug at the strands once another wave of pleasure runs through you.

He eventually tugs at the barrier separating him from his goal, but it doesn’t budge. Before you can lift up your hips in order to help him, you hear a piece of elastic snap. Satan had bitten into one of the straps of your underwear, tearing it in half. The garment falls to the floor. With your cunt and your entire body now exposed before him, he gets to work.

Satan leaves a mark on your thigh before his lips brush up against your core. He lets out a pleased him once he tastes you, and dives right in.

He immediately focuses on your clit. His tongue moves around in random patterns, which has you moaning his name. The pleasure is almost too much to handle. You knew that you’d be experiencing it of course, but you didn’t expect Satan to be so focused on it. Especially given his current condition.

But the demon eats you out as if he can’t get enough. As you are the most delicious thing he’s ever tasted. Satan groans into you, and the vibrations from that act alone are enough to send you over the edge.

You tighten your hands in his hair, and cum. Satan laps up each and every drop. And when he pulls away, you see him lick his lips. “You taste even better then I imagined.”

He’s beautiful like this. With his inhibitions cast aside, and pupils dilated. But he would look even more breathtaking without any clothes.

His boa fell off a long time ago, and you pathetically paw at the ribbon on his chest. The knot is too complex, and only seems to tighten as you tug on it. You’ve never hated the damned thing more than you do now.

A frustrated whine spills from your lips, one that Satan quickly smothers with a kiss. There’s a rip, followed by the sound of something tearing, and Satan’s entire outfit lays in tatters across the floor.

It seems he did all of the work for you.

His fingers start to skim over his handiwork, before they poke and prod at your entrance. Several of them slide in, and you immediately moan. It didn’t take long for him to find the spot that he was looking for. He looks like the cat that got the cream (which he technically did, about a minute ago). His smug grin only grows wider when you begin to grind into his fingers. And then, he fucks you with them.

You gasp and claw at the sheets. The demon’s pace is ruthless, yet it isn’t enough. You want him. And while his fingers are nice… you’d rather be cumming around something else.

“Please, I need—“ It comes out as a whine, needy and high pitched. But Satan seems to listen to you. For a brief and horrible moment, you're empty. Your thighs and your pussy clench around nothing.

Thankfully you don’t have to finish your sentence from before. The two of you are on the same page. He lines up his cock, and then eases himself inside of you.

It’s slow, but he fills you up perfectly. As if he were made to do so. Another inch, and Satan groans into your shoulder. “Fuck. You’re perfect.”

Words fail you right now. The most you can do is dig your nails into his back. There’s no pain, only a sense of ease. As if you are two puzzle pieces finally sliding into place.

He bottoms out, and everything stills. Satan is big, but not overwhelmingly so. It’s enough to make you feel full, more full then you’ve ever felt in your entire life. 

His cock is everything you could have dreamed of, and more.

No toy, nothing you own, will ever be able to satisfy you like this. The ridges… the shape… You move, and feel every bit of him gently scrape against your walls. It’s too much. Your legs already feel weak.

You whine out his name, and he immediately takes the lead. His hands intertwine themselves with your own as he pins you to the bed. He thrusts his hips forward, and his cock brushes up against that spot from earlier. Pure pleasure. Pure euphoria. The bed frame shakes.

Everything about this is amazing. Perfect. And the words tumble out of your mouth before you can stop them.

“I love you.”

Satan stills, and for a split second you worry that you’ve scared him off. But that doubt vanishes immediately with another thrust, this one harder than the last. 

You gasp. Your hands twitch in a desperate attempt to move them, to drag Satan’s body closer towards you, but he still has you restrained. He growls into your ear, “Again.”

The only thing that leaves your mouth is a garbled moan. Satan pulls back, and pushes himself into you once more. “Tell me that again.”

And you do. The words spill out of your mouth, over and over in a never ending loop. I love you.

Satan doesn’t respond, not with words at least. He can’t. The only thing he can produce is growls and moans, both of which send shivers down your spine. And there’s another noise, a low and rumbling sound that spills out of his throat. You’re able to put a name to it a second later. It’s a purr. Satan is purring. And it gets louder with each and every thrust. With each and every declaration of love that escapes your lips.

He cums, and his teeth sink into your shoulder. The wound isn’t deep, but the brief flicker of pain combined with the feeling of him filling you up is enough to make you climax as well.

And once you’ve come down from your high, you can feel Satan’s tongue lightly trace over the mark in question. 

A contented sigh escapes your lips. “I love you.”

The words are softer now, but it still has Satan blushing all the same. He buries his head into your chest. It’s muffled, quiet, but you can feel his response as he mumbles it against your skin. “I love you too.”

He’s still purring, and that sound grows louder when your hands tangle themselves in his hair. After a moment for two, you feel something hard poke your thigh. It isn’t difficult to figure out what it is. Apparently Satan isn’t quite done with you yet.

You laugh. “Still in heat, are you?”

He frowns, and then towers over you once more, his eyes blown with lust. The demon’s gaze travels across your body, along each and every mark that he’s made. There’s a smugness in the way his fingers begin to skim over them.

“Didn’t you know? My heat can last for weeks at a time. I’ll take care of you of course, but I hope you don’t have any plans coming up soon.”

His voice lowers. It’s more than just a sultry purr. It’s a promise, one that has you wet with anticipation. “You won’t be leaving this bed for a while.”

[sidecarghost]

15x18+ Spn Coda Happy Destiel Ending Fic

Dean was in a hospital bed. His eyes stared blankly at the ceiling. There were no doctors, but Sam brought him here to take advantage of the medical equipment. He found his brother like a corpse with his eyes open sitting with his back against the wall of the bunker’s dungeon.

Chuck stopped by now and then to make sure Sam and Jack still looked miserable. They had not disappointed Chuck yet.

Jack could visit Dean’s dreams, and he brought Sam too in an attempt to awaken Dean. But Dean was blind to their presence. No matter how loud they screamed, Dean couldn’t hear them. And Dean couldn’t feel them, no matter how violently they hit him.

From what Sam could tell Dean was dreaming they were working with Michael to take Chuck down. And that Jack had some kind of power vacuum ability. Michael and Lucifer were throwing fireballs at eachother like a couple kids having a snowball fight. Lucifer somehow snapped Death out of existence, and now they had a pet dog running around the Bunker.

“It’s not supernatural, Sam,” Jack said. “I can’t fix him.”

“I know,” Sam held his brother’s hand and watched the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest. “That Heaven he is stuck in is so depressing though Jack. Jeez I can’t believe our dad is there with him. John definitely didn’t deserve to go to Heaven after the shit he pulled. Then Dean was talking like he was an actor from the AU where our lives were a tv show on that bridge. It’s just so bizarre I wish we could ease his mind.”

“Me too, but what can we do?” Jack asks.

“Something must have happened to Cas,” Sam says, “Dean keeps starting the same dream over and over telling the dream us that Cas saved him. By summoning the Empty somehow.”

“Cas had made a deal with the Empty. Maybe that let him summon the Empty here,” Jack said. Sam raised an eyebrow in question, so Jack explained the terms of the deal to Sam. The deal was a contract to save Jack’s soul, and the Empty would wait until Cas was happy and then strike him down and drag him away.

“So maybe the Empty has something to do with Dean going catatonic,” Sam says.

Sam and Jack watch the still body of Dean in the hospital bed.

They were the last three souls on an empty planet.

~~

Jack started performing the ritual he had seen Nick do to summon Lucifer from the Empty.

As the spell finished, Cas and Billie, emerged through a portal from the Empty.

Sam was surprised to see Billie and after glancing towards Jack it looked like he was too.

“Jack!” Cas hugged Jack and then Sam. “Hello Sam, where’s Dean?”

“He’s gone into a coma Cas,” Sam tells Cas. “We found him sitting against the bunker’s dungeon wall, and he hasn’t been responsive since then.”

“We have business Castiel,” Billie tells the angel.

“Billie, the CE, and I have decided Chuck needs to be stopped, and we have put aside our differences for the time being,” Cas says. “Jack can you help Billie with whatever she needs. Sam, show me where Dean is.”

Jack and Billie find Chuck and use a powerful spell that Billie learned from the CE to free Amara so she becomes the dominant form and Chuck is left trapped inside her mind for safe keeping. Amara snaps her fingers and the Rapture is undone. The world is full of noise once more as people and animals once again appear as though they had never left.

Amara tells Billie and Jack that she needs to leave and work to get Heaven fixed. Now that she understands light and darkness she is confident she can restore what her brother left broken. And she has ideas that may help the CE in the Empty too.

Billie thanks Jack for his help and leaves to restore order to her library and her reapers.

~~

Meanwhile, Sam took Cas to the hospital room. Dean was still staring at the ceiling. Cas walked up and cupped Dean’s face in his hand.

“Hello Dean,” Cas says softly staring down into the blank eyes of the man he loves.

Dean remained motionless. And a moment later Cas appeared in Dean’s dream.

Cas looked around and saw he was at a gas station. Dean was carrying a dog towards the Impala.

“Who would think finding a dog would be a miracle?” Cas overhears Dean tell the canine.

“Dean!” Cas yells.

Dean looks up, but he doesn’t see Cas. He looks right through Cas to something across the street. Cas turns and sees Chuck standing there laughing like a lunatic. The dog disappears in a puff of smoke.

Cas can’t get Dean’s attention. He runs up to Dean, but Dean can’t see him. He yells at Dean, but Dean can’t hear him. He punches Dean, but Dean can’t feel him.

Cas attempts to burn down the church where Michael is hiding but no one reacts to the raging inferno. They keep talking about some plan to defeat Chuck.

“Stop Dean!” Cas yells “Its not Chuck. Michael would be dead Chuck isn’t going to be fooled by some human house of worship.”

Dean is in the bunker, and Cas follows him through his dream never leaving his side. Dean hears the phone ring and answers “Cas!”

Cas wonders if he’s about to meet his dream self. He wonders if dream Cas is going to be taller. Cas watched Dean sprint up the stairs to meet him at the bunker door. And he sees Lucifer?

Well at least Lucifer is an enemy they have confidently beaten before. Cas ignores dream Lucifer and starts looking through the lore while dream Michael and dream Lucifer engage in some embarrassing snowball fight. Cas tries to tune it out while he searching desperately for something in the library that could help Dean’s condition.

Suddenly they are all at the side of a lake. Chuck killed Michael. And now he was beating the snot out of Sam and Dean. Cas tried to put his body as a shield between Chuck and the Winchester’s but no one was affected by his presence. Cas screamed in bitterness and frustration, but no one paid attention to him. Jack walked over and knocked Chuck down. Cas was relieved that Dean wasn’t getting hit anymore.

They got into the Impala and drove to some town. Jack made people appear and then Jack disappeared. Sam and Dean drove to the bunker. Dean drank himself to sleep and Cas watched over him.

The brothers started working a case and Cas watched in horror as a vampire in a mask pushed Dean into a spike.

Cas couldn’t watch Dean die not even in a dream. Cas grabbed his angel blade and slit his own throat. Cas was cutting his grace out. He hoped that if Dean had angel grace he’d snap out of it. Cas began to feel light headed from the quick drop in power.

Cas knelt down on the barn floor. Then he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up and saw Dean smiling at him. The dream vampires and dream Sam all had disappeared. Cas and Dean were alone in the dark barn. Dean looked unhurt to Cas.

“Cas, why are you hurt?” Dean asked.

“You are in a coma Dean. I couldn’t wake you, and I thought angels don’t sleep. So I wanted to give you my grace,” Cas said.

Dean knelt down beside Cas, and put Cas’s hand to his own neck. “Heal yourself Cas!” Dean said with worry furrowed on his brow.

“I can’t Dean. I gave it all. I’m human now.” Cas smiled. Cas knew his situation was dire and now he’d bleed out. But he got to see his Dean again, and he couldn’t help from smiling. “I thought I lost you. Dean, does this barn remind you of the night we met?”

“Forget about the memories Cas. I want the real you. I’ve been stuck in this dream over and over. And I knew if I could just find you I’d snap out of it. You can’t leave buddy. We just found each other again. I thought you were gone forever. Because you never told me goodbye before,” Dean whispers to Cas. Dean puts his own hand over Cas’s throat and to his surprise his hand glows and Cas’s throat is healed.

“Cas, what the fuck?” Dean asks Cas.

“Uhh, you have my grace so now you have angelic powers.” Cas tells Dean.

“I don’t want them, Cas. Can I give them back? How do I fix this?” Dean asks. Dean stands up and offers Cas his hand to help him up.

“There is nothing to fix, Dean. I don’t need those powers anymore. I’d like to live a human life.” Cas looks at Dean.

“Cas, I think losing you. It broke something inside me. Everytime I lose you it gets harder for me to recover. When you pulled me out of Hell, I was torturing souls and I enjoyed it. Ever since then I’ve been barely keeping it together. I close my eyes and see myself ripping limbs off of humans with a smile on my face. Cas, you are the only one that knows that and still loves me. You have seen me at my worst and love me for me.” Dean tells Cas.

“Who you were then, that’s not who you are now. That doesn’t define you,” Cas says. “You—” Dean leans in to kiss Cas on the lips. Then Dean pulls back and looks at Cas. Cas appears totally astonished, and Dean smiles at Cas because he’s beautiful and amazing.

“I love you, Cas. I never believed in angels or a greater power before we met. I only believed in the things I could see. But then I met you Cas. You gave up Heaven, and everything you had ever known because you believed in doing the right thing. You believed in us. You fought for us.” Dean said, “You are more than an angel to me. You are my Cas.” Dean wraps his arms around Cas. “Cas, can we get out of here?”

“Yes Dean, you just need to wake up,” Cas says.

~~

Cas blinks and is back in the hospital with Dean and Sam. The hospital also has nurses and technicians walking along the hallways.

“Hey Cas! It looks like the Rapture got reversed.” Sam looks at Cas. “Um... any luck with Dean?”

“Yes Sam, actually Dean was the one that pulled me out of the dream,” Cas said.

“Oh wow really?” Sam walked over to the side of Dean’s bed and leaned over to see if there was any change in Dean. Dean’s eyes were still open and looking on the ceiling. Then Sam felt an arm grab his shoulder and shake him, and Sam found himself flinching involuntarily.

“Got you!” Dean laughed.

“Go to hell,” Sam rolled his eyes and then leaned in to hug his brother.

Dean hopped out of bed, and asked Sam if he could borrow his knife. Sam nods and hands his brother his blade. Then Sam announces he has a text from Eileen, and he’ll be back in a bit.

“Where’s Jack?” Dean asks.

“Here I am,” Jack appears in the room. An orderly screams. “Oh don’t worry I’m a magician, and that was part of my magic act,” Jack tells the frightened orderly.

Dean grabs a specimen cup out of a drawer and slices his neck. The grace drips into the specimen cup. After it’s filled Dean replaces the lid on the jar.

“Dean, I meant it before I don’t want my grace back,” Cas says.

Jack reaches out to heal Dean’s neck. “Here Jack can you keep this in a pocket dimension for safe keeping?” Dean hands Jack the jar.

Jack nods his head and disappears. Another orderly screams but the first orderly explains it’s part of a magic act.

“I’m glad you still don’t want your grace,” Dean walks over to Cas and reaches out to hold his hands. “I’m ready to try new things. The stress of hunting has been wearing me down. I’m running on adrenaline and I am barely coping anymore. I’m too tired to feel anything but anger most of the time. I want to find some peace, and I’d like to grow old with you Cas.”

“And I’d like to grow old with you, Dean Winchester.” Cas says.

They share a kiss and then another. “Dean if we’re still in your coma, I don’t want to wake up,” Cas says.

“No Cas, we’re not dreaming. This is real. We’re real,” Dean tells Cas while punctuating the answer with kisses under his jawline. “And now that we have each other, nothing can drag us apart.”

[clown-demon]

@demon-blood-youths

"Yeaaah.. I'm not really FROM around here. Mind being my tour guide?"

[clown-demon]

Lucifer wasn't exactly.. what you'd think of when one thought of the king of Hell.. When mortals thought of Lucifer, they usually pictures a looming figure full of sharp teeth that feasted upon flesh. A goat's head with six horns and a long serpentine tongue.. Instead, the man was a five foot one pale guy.. that didn't look too much different than your human. Though, he DID have the sharp teeth...

He peers up at the other and arched his brow when they bowed their head to him. He wasn't sure if the stranger was being respectful, or kissing ass... A lot of demons would suck up to him to earn his favor...

"Well, I hope I'm not too much of a disappointment!" the king laughed with a grin. "Oh? A... Saxon? Is that like... a saxophone?" Sorry, Lucifer doesn't know what a Saxon is.. he's guessing...

Each step is cautious when approaching the King of Hell, as if they had made sure to toe around Kings in their past life. Eivor crowned them, dethroned them... They were not known to bow to Kings in their life, but they still respected those they crowned or met that was actually a very good King. Once they stood before the shorter blonde man, the wolf-kissed gave a humble bow of their head before shifting their head up - light icy azure gaze seem to study him - curious. ❝It is an honor to be meeting you, great King. I have always wondered what you looked like - even when I was alive when those saxons talked about you.❞

@clown-demon

[katsidhe]

Fic: honesty among thieves, 13.12 coda

Tl;dr Season 13 is making me positively prolific. 

Read on AO3

When Dean said, “How about honestly,” Sam had opened his mouth and started, and found he couldn't finish. There's so much that’s been left unsaid, years and years, that when he finally tried, the words got caught somewhere.  

Sam's head hurts. He needs coffee. He’s desperate to sleep but knows he won’t be able to.

What Dean doesn’t get is that Sam can’t talk to Dean about this. It’s not that Dean wouldn’t understand. Or maybe it is, how would Sam know, because they’ve never fucking talked about it. Not the torture part, though Dean knows too much about that. And not the other parts either.

The parts that—Rowena had called it an abusive relationship.

And, and, the cosmic mind-shattering scope of it. Sam has seen the faces of demons and felt them inside him, he’s drunk of their power. He tries not to think about it these days. How it felt. How the worst of it was not the otherworldly power of it, but the familiarity. It spoke to something inside Sam, and it has never let him forget that demons are, at the end of the day, corrupted humans.  

Archangels are not human. Yeah, Sam, well-spotted. He’s reached the kitchen. He tops up the coffee machine, pours the water in.  

Dean treats everything like it’s human. He snarks at gods, he calls angels by nicknames, he pops the pop references. Dean’s devils get fitted down to life-size.

Sam envies him that casual, shattering insolence.

Sam envies other things, too. When Dean gets sad or scared—which is plenty often, Dean is an open book as much as he likes to pretend otherwise—Dean can still talk. He might be brusque and grim, he might punch a wall and be dismissive, he might be vulnerable and frank, he might even be cruel, but he talks. Eventually.  

Dean’s a force worn cold and tired and ragged, every emotion written on his face and his sleeve. Dean feels so deeply, so desperately, that he spreads a suffocating fog or a buoyant energy wherever he goes. He fills the room. He’s a vortex that Sam can’t help but get dragged back into, again and again. Dean lives so firmly in the real world. Sam doesn’t even know what the real world means anymore—if he ever did, with Heaven and Hell pulling all the strings since the beginning.

The coffee’s finished, so Sam fills a mug and heads back to the library.

All that stuff wouldn’t matter, shouldn’t matter, if Sam could just talk. Because, yeah, there’s a lot of it that wouldn’t even need an explanation, with Dean. Like, the ripped-apart-while-you-can’t-die kinda stuff. He’d get that. There’s a lot of depressing commonality, with him and Dean.

Maybe that’s part of why Sam’s never tried to explain. Maybe the understanding is, well, understood.

Or maybe it’s not. Because sometimes Dean says things like, we’ll work through it like we always do, you and me, or sometimes Dean puts an angel in Sam to keep him from dying. Sometimes Sam can’t bear to look at him and Dean doesn’t understand why.

But Rowena—Sam remembers the look on her face, on that ill-fated trip to hell two years ago. The Darkness was looming, consuming, and the visions were telling him he had to do it, so he went back. Rowena wasn’t afraid. She was incandescent. Dressed for an expensive date, boiling over in excitement. When the warding failed (when she sabotaged the warding), Sam remembers her glee.

She knows better now. Sam sips his coffee. He burns his tongue a little, but the heat feels good.

Rowena doesn’t know Sam. Sam doesn’t know Rowena. Sam doesn’t even like Rowena. She’s dangerous, and a liar, and so selfish she didn’t even love her own son until he was dead. She’s powerful and old and manipulative and casually cruel. People are objects to her.

Why did he talk to Rowena, then? The look on her face, Sam reasons. You pitied her, that was all.

No. More than that. It shook him to see her like that. She wears shallowness on her sleeve; she’s so transparently manipulative that the truths are easy to miss. It shook him to see her truly afraid, to believe her fear. To see her untouchable, vapid mask slide off.

To sit in the car and hear her ask him, vulnerable. So Sam answered. More than he meant to. He’s not sure if he regrets it. He’s not sure of anything, hasn’t been for a long time. When Lucifer talks to you it’s enough to make you doubt the sky.

Sam contemplates, just for a moment, going to Dean and saying—he doesn’t even know what, he can’t even start in his own head. It all breaks down so completely into paralysis.  

Saying, do you remember when they did this, or that, when they tore us apart, when they made it horrible, when they made it hurt, I’m sorry to ask, but which hurt worse, for you, was it the fire or the hooks.

Do you remember? Do you know? Do you understand, please, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, but do you understand?

Or saying— he could say—

His face made me wish I could go blind and insane, but he wouldn’t let me. He made me keep looking. It hurt, all the way down to my soul, I could feel him there. But it was sublime. Beautiful beyond words. Like a star. It was too much. Sometimes I thought I loved it. Sometimes I told him that while my eyes burned out.

Sam’s cold. He must have lost time, because his coffee’s cold too. He definitely can’t say all that.

Here’s what happens if Sam says all that to Dean: Dean flinches back in disgust, says, lip curled, god, Sam, always with the hard-on for evil. No, okay, no, that, at least, Sam doesn’t fear. He doesn’t. Not really, not usually. He hasn’t for awhile, anyway.  

Here’s what happens instead: Dean looks at him with an uncertain, twisted compassion—desperation and rage and horrified pity, filled to the brim with all the emotions Sam can’t handle, more violent for what they can’t comprehend, and underlying that a yawning well of separation. The confirmation that this really is the thing that keeps them from understanding each other the way Sam imagines they used to, once upon a time. Sam is something other. The distance between them is hammered in with bloody spikes, a chasm too big for either of them to bridge, this horrific huge abyss Sam can’t explain and Dean can’t grasp.  

Or, worst of all: Dean looks at Sam, and Dean knows, and Sam sees his own sick helplessness reflected back, and neither of them can pretend any more, they can’t pretend ever again.

Sam doesn’t fear Rowena the way he fears Dean. He doesn’t fear her judgment. But so much more than that, he doesn’t fear her understanding.

[pherryt]

can you do a destiel fic where cas finds out that dean killed himself in season 13 episode 5

Hullo! So this is sort of a continuation of my Sam Finally Gets It coda (which means I’m ignoring 13.06 right now.)This is nearly identical to another prompt I got on my other blog so instead of writing the same story twice, i’m answering it here. (and i’ll link to it on the other one. Hey, I don’t know, you might even be the same person?)

This wraps up at almost 3k words, so I put the majority of it behind a cut (though picking WHERE to put that was HARD)

Supernatural, Destiel, angst, mature, implied smut but nothing graphic, feels and confessions

Cas could tell something was off. It didn’t take a rocketscientist – as Dean might say – to see that. Dean was putting on a cheerfulface and he smiled every time he saw Cas, but there was a desperation behind itthat Cas could not only see, but feel.

Thelonging and fear every time Cas was out of Dean’s sight was overwhelming. Thefirst time it happened, Cas had rushed to Dean’s side, thinking something washorribly wrong.

Dean’srelief was immense when he saw Cas in his door frame, the feeling of it washingthrough Cas like a balm, though Dean’s face was as calm and Dean-like as itever was.

Cashesitated. “Good morning, Dean.”

“Morning,Cas. You, uh…sticking around, right?” Dean fidgeted with a shirt, pulling on abutton up flannel over his dark grey Henley.

“Ofcourse, if I wouldn’t be a bother,” Cas said carefully. He wanted to stepinside, to reassure Dean with a touch that he wasn’t leaving, but he still feltunsure of how welcome this invasion of personal space would be, now that a fewdays had passed. He felt sure that the level of panic Dean had been feelingwarranted such action, such reassurance, but the mask Dean had slipped onseemed to push Cas away again.

Itleft him as confused as he always was where Dean was concerned. Not as much, hesuspected, as Dean was, constantly being at war with himself.

“Pfft,you’re never a bother, Cas.” Dean clapped a hand on Cas’s shoulder and, throughthe light button up shirt Cas wore – “Cas take off the goddamn coat and stayawhile, will ya?” I keep thinking you’re about to bail on m- us, man!” –Cas could feel the warmth of Dean’s hand like a brand.

Notunlike the one he’d once accidentally left on Dean.

Emotions,raw and hurting pushed its way through the contact and it took Cas’s breathaway as it always did, though he betrayed nothing on his borrowed face.

No,that wasn’t completely true. Not anymore.

Itmay not be the whole of him, his broken wings stretching restlessly behind him,unseen by mortal eyes as usual – oh what he wouldn’t have given to have beenable to show Dean their full glory and not the shadows of what they were, butnow even that possibility had long since passed. Cas wanted no one to see thebroken, burned husks of his slowly healing wings -  but Jimmy’s body wasno more and this vessel was a vessel no longer, belonging solely to him.Created new and stronger, more capable of holding not only him, but an Archangel– something that should have been impossible. Jimmy Novak would never have beenable to contain such power, or Michael and Lucifer wouldn’t have worked so hardto get Dean and Sam as their vessels.

Andeach time Cas was reborn, he settled more into his body more completely, morecomfortably, his ability to express emotion via tone and look coming easier andeasier while it also became harder and harder to maintain his composure, or tohold his nightmares at bay.

Especiallyaround Dean.

Sohe stood there before Dean and hopedhe wasn’t betraying to Deanexactly how much the hunter was giving away. He didn’t want Dean angry about aninvasion of privacy Castiel just couldn’t help.

Thepain and hope, love and fear that Dean emitted was stronger than ever. Guilt, too,pulsed through their connection, though Cas couldn’t begin to fathom what theguilt was about – unless it was continued guilt over his grief drive resentmentand treatment of Jack.

Caswas still quite upset about that, though he had – somewhat – understood it. Butit had been the beginning of Dean pulling back just when Cas had thought…whenhe’d thought that maybe they could move forward, together. Something he’dwanted for so long, just waiting for Dean to be ready.

“Dean,are…” Cas stumbled to a halt, unsure of what to ask.

Deanraised an eyebrow. “You okay there, sunshine? Cat got your tongue?”

“Thereare no cats in the bunker, Dean.” Cas sighed. “Are you all right? Youseem…troubled.”

“I’mfine, Cas. Never better. We’re all alive and safe and sound. You’re back,Jack’s not the anti-Christ, the BMOL are dust…never better,” Dean repeatedwhile giving a weird little half shrug. He moved to leave, brushing past theangel as he did. “C’mon, let’s get some coffee.”

Dean’shand hovered over Cas’s arm for a few moments before he visibly gulped, hishand moving forward in a rush and coming down on Cas’s bicep. Dean tugged athim, only letting go once Cas obliged him by following along.

Casfollowed along, resolving to talk further about what had happened with Deanwhile he’d been gone. Dead, he reminded himself firmly. Andnot for the first time. I’m not sure why I keep coming back against allodds…but I don’t want to waste another chance. He stared after Deanlongingly, wishing he could have that open (touching, emotion) that they’d hadmerely days ago, when they’d reunited. Had been on the verge of becoming theirthing before it had been ripped away from Cas so suddenly.

Again,not for the first time. He restrained a shudder at the thought of when he’dlost his grace, masquerading as Steve.

Inretrospect, he’d understood the rock and a hard place Dean had been in, but hestill wished it hadn’t gone down that way. That Dean had handled it better.

They’dnever talked about it. Not really.

Casthought that might have been a mistake, but it was too late now. Too long ago.Water under the bridge, or something along those lines.

Hedidn’t have a chance to talk to Sam that day, or even the next. Unless he wassleeping, Dean didn’t let Cas out of his sight. Not for long. Constantlychecking if he was still there. Refusing to do a supply run unless Cas wentwith him because he’d need the extra hands. Even volunteering to do researchand help catalogue the bunker – things he hated doing – merely because Castielhad volunteered to help Sam.

Finally,desperate, Cas texted Sam under the table, asking the hunter to stay and talkto him after Dean had gone to bed. Sam texted back swiftly, a simple andemphatic “Yes!”

Despitehaving lived millennia, despite angels learning patience early on, it felt likeforever before Dean went to bed.

“Sam,what exactly did he do? You implied upon our return that Dean…was not himself.Did something happen?”

Samraked a hand through his hair. “Fuck, Cas…It was bad. He was really bad.”

He paused and Cas peered at him intently. “You’ve said. Sam…”Cas trailed off, holding his breath as Sam nodded.

“God, Cas, I’m a horrible brother. I didn’t even notice. That itwas different, that this…I mean, I figured he’d be upset. We both were, whatwith you and mom gone. Hell, we’d just gotten her back againstall odds – not just once, but twice! And then you…” Sam sighed and sank into achair, Cas sitting beside him and leaning forward, his eyes not once leavingSam’s face, determined to understand everything.

Sam’s voice dropped to a whisper. “He gave up, Cas. He didn’t…hewasn’t giving the fights his all. Going through the motions, letting me seewhat he thought I wanted to see. Refused to believe that there was hope formom. We didn’t see her die. She could still be alive, but every time I offeredhim that hope, he shot it down.”

Cas’sheart sank with every word. “You believe she’s still alive?”

Samnodded. “Yeah, well, after Lucifer killed you, she charged him, knocked himback into the rift and then he grabbed her and pulled her in after. Then itclosed. Not sooner, when it could have done us some good, but then.”

“But he didn’t…he didn’t care?”

“He didn’t believe,Cas. He got ugly, a few times, kept throwing you in my face like it was a counterargument.It was, one that I wasn’t comprehending…”

“Sam, it’s not like – “

Sam raised a hand to forestall him. “Save it. There’s somethingthere and I don’t know how I could have missed it. But you wanted to know whathappened while you were gone, so…” he took a deep breath. “Just before you cameback…I thought this was it. I thought…I thought I’d lost Dean for good.”

Cas found himself pinned in Sam’s gaze as the hunter looked upand locked their eyes together. “He said it was for the case, and yeah, we’vedone shit that stupid in the past for a case but…but he was just so willing to do it. I didn’t even know hewas carrying the thing on him, like he’d been waiting for an out.” Samswallowed and his eyes filled with unshed tears. Cas’s heart constricted,certain he wasn’t going to like what he was about to hear, what he suspectedSam was about to impart.

“He killed himself. And he almost didn’t come back.”

Cas sucked in a harsh breath and closed his eyes against thepain of it all, though he’d had an inkling this was where Sam was leading. The ideathat he’d come back almost too late. Or that if Dean had succeeded in what he’dtried, too late wouldn’t have even begun to cover it.

Without even realizing it, Cas was standing at Dean’s doorglaring at the room number even as he pounded on it. “Dean!”

The door opened under his fist to a startled Dean rubbing hiseyes. “Shit, Cas! What’s wrong? Are you –“

Cas glared at him and pushed past Dean, slamming the door behindhim. “You killed yourself? How couldyou – is your life so worthless to you that you’d just throw it away?”

“It…was for a case,” Dean protested weakly, his eyes almostcomically wide, but Cas wasn’t in the mood for laughing. He could feel theguilt pouring off of Dean, the shame.

“Don’t lie to me, Dean,” Cas growled.

“I’m…I’m not lying!” Dean’s eyes shifted away. His arms crossedover his chest defensively. Cas hated that he was seeing Dean like this, butthe anger was only dulled, not gone and Cas stalked forward, crowding Dean againstthe door.

He didn’ttouch him, but he glared up into Dean’s eyes for long moments. Dean’s arms hadshifted down to brace against the door, his fingers twitching as he stared backat Cas.

“God dammit, Cas, you were gone!” Dean finally exploded. “Again!You left me, alone, again!”

“You had Sam,” Cas pointed out.

“It’s not the same, and you damn well know it!” Dean’s voicebroke. “I know we can’t, I know I’m not…but dammit, life just…doesn’t mean muchwith you gone. Every time you leave me hurts like a sonuvabitch, okay? Youhappy now?” Like with Sam, tears had gathered in Dean’s eyes, though they hadn’tyet begun to fall. The words were cutting into Cas hard.

“And I mean every time,” Dean whispered. “Every time knowingthat there are things you’d rather be doing then stay here with me and my…myunwelcome feelings-“ Dean bit at his lip and closed his eyes, but the tearsstarted to fall past his squeezed eyelids anyway. “But to lose you socompletely…It’s getting harder and harder to keep going every time I think ‘Thisis it. He can’t come back from this.’”

“Dean…” Cas said softly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize…” Hecupped Dean’s cheek in his hand and a single, harsh sob broke through as Deanleaned into the touch. “They were never unwelcome. I thought…you never said…I wastrying to give you what you wanted.”

“What I wanted?” Dean blinked his eyes open and stared disbelievingly.

“Personal space, Dean. Privacy. Not to invade your thoughts. I triedto act as if I didn’t have the knowledge of your longing, your…your love.Waited for you to tell me yourself, in your own time.” Cas tentatively leanedforward, touching their foreheads together. “Was going crazy in the meantime. You’dthink one thing and present another and…I didn’t know what to think, what todo. You drive me crazy.”

Dean laughed weakly. “I knew you had to know. God, we’re morons.I thought you didn’t say anything or make a move because…because you weredisgusted that a human would dare to fall in love with an angel. I wasdetermined that I’d just enjoy being your friend if I couldn’t have more.”

“You are my friend. Thevery best I’ve ever had. And more. I’ve always wanted more. But Dean, you haveto promise me…” Cas took his face now with both hands. “No more throwing yourlife away. No more risky maneuvers. We’ve both beaten the odds, beaten death somany times. But our luck can’t hold out forever. And I don’t want to lose you either.You are worth it, Dean. I chose you along time ago.”

“You can’t mean that…” Dean whispered. “I’m just a stupidhunter. A…a grunt.”

“And I’m just a soldier. Built to obey the orders of Heaven.”

“No, you’re more than that,” Dean protested fiercely.

“And so are you,” Cas insisted.

Within seconds, faster than even Cas could parse, DeanWinchesters lips were on his own. The warm feeling of it spreading through hisbody, Dean’s fingers coming to grab and clutch at Cas and pull him in closer.

Cas easily went into the pull, Dean knocking back against thedoor again. Their kisses weren’t gentle things – there’d be time for thatlater. Right now, there was desperation and a need for assurance behind thekisses being doled out ungrudgingly between them. The dam had been broken andthey were both being swept away by it.

Being with Dean, so unreservedly for perhaps the first time inever, Cas was surprised by how fast things progressed. He didn’t quite recallmoving towards the bed, or their clothes being removed. Though he certainlyremembered taking his time to worship Dean’s body, determined to make thehunter understand how special he was.

If it took a lifetime to do it, Cas would. And if it took eternityto convince Dean, Cas would gladly and willingly hang up his wings and followDean to his heaven.

He had no doubts about the depth or truth of his feelings, or ofDean’s, and now that everything was out in the open, Cas would spend everymoment he could with the man he loved. The man that had made Cas more than the angelhe’d been.

They came together in a sweaty tangle of bodies, their pleasure allconsuming – for its newness, for its depth, for all it conveyed. Cas wiped andkissed the tears from Dean’s face as they rocked together, hands clutchingtightly, both of them yet afraid that it would all go up in smoke, prove to beyet another dream of things they wanted but could never have.

“Stay with me, Cas,” Dean begged softly, his words muffled inthe meat of Cas’s naked shoulder, as they lay on the bed catching theirbreaths. They yet remained tangled together, each of them unwilling to let theother go.

“Always. I love you Dean,” Cas said, angling down to once morecatch Dean’s lips in a kiss that was less searing and was instead gentler, moreexploring, than it had been earlier.

Dean whimpered at the kiss, gasped at hearing Cas say thosewords that Dean had tried to say so long ago but had lost the courage. Cas knewthat Dean had come close, back in the crypt, what seemed so long ago, now. Deanbroke the kiss long enough to whisper them back - to finally say aloud what he’dbeen screaming in his head loud enough for Cas to hear for years, even breakingthrough to him in the crypt - thendove back in for another kiss.

It was new, and a little scary, but at the same time everythingfinally felt so goddamned right, like everything had finally fallen into place.

Like everything was finally the way it should be.

“Your life has meaning, Dean. With, or without me in it,” Cassaid softly.

“But without you, I don’t want to live, Cas,” Dean’s breathhitched again.

“Dean, promise me that you will. Don’t ever give up. Don’t everstop believing in us. We’ve beaten the odds before. How many times have both ofus died? One day, it may take…but please…” Cas’s breathing stuttered now too,his heart beating too fast. “I can’t stop thinking about how you died the verysame day I returned. How I was almost too late…Don’t turn us into Romeo andJuliet. Please…” Cas clutched at Dean. “I know it’ll be hard but please…?”

Cas felt how Dean tightened his own grip, attempting to pull theangel closer. They were already as close as they could be, but Cas knew it didn’tfeel like enough to either of them.

“Okay, Cas,” Dean whispered, shuddering in Cas’s arms. “Okay, I’lltry.”

Kissing Dean’s tousled hair, Cas accepted it. They liveddangerous lives. To promise more was impossible. But to know that Dean wouldtry lifted a weight off Cas’s heart, and he relaxed into Dean’s arms.

And though he was still an angel, and it maybe should worry himhow easily Cas fell into a comforting sleep, Cas couldn’t bring himself tocare. Being in each other’s arms felt so good, so right, that he didn’t want itto end. Dean eventually turned over, nestling back into Cas’s chest, Cas’seyelids growing heavy as he curled around the hunter.

It was absolutely perfect.

[clown-demon]

Honestly, that made Lucifer really happy his daughter wanted to spend time with him too, that the feeling was mutual. Charlie felt sometimes like a stranger to him, because he hardly got to spend time with her. But he wanted to change that.. he wanted to support her and help her out.

"I want to change that too. I want to get to know my daughter," he said with a hopeful smile. "I want to show my support for you and to your dreams. I would honestly just love to chat with you and have some tea. Catch up with you. There's usually everyone else around.. it'd be nice to get to know my daughter..."

@clown-demon II x

Charlie beamed. Happily accepting her father's hug. Squeezing him tightly before letting go. "Of course I do. I know we weren't close before but I wanna change that. The time we did spend together I really liked it. So what would you wanna do?"

[cuteeiji]

ostinato || part two

summary: the road keeps bending back upon itself, and there’s nothing he can do to stop it. time loop au [start here] [part three] warnings: canon major character death, self harm, numerous errors in hospital procedure word count: 4758

ii.

“On earth, the terrible things and the beautiful things continue to happen beside each other.”

–Jeffrey Morgan, “All Night No Sleep Now This”

The first thing he sees is how the sun sets fire to the stray strands of hair that fall over her face, dust motes floating in the soft rays beaming through her window. The image seems to freeze in his vision, superimposed upon yesterday (today) and the day before that (today.) They align like the stars in syzygy, each a perfect mirror of the other.

“Good morning, sleepyhead,” Natalie says, glancing up from her chemistry book. “You were out longer than I wa–” Her eyes widen as they meet his, mouth dropping open in shock. “Whoa, what’s up with your horns?”

“What do you mean?” He feels himself saying, gaze trailing on the steady rise and fall of her chest, the movement of her lips as she breathes.

She’s awake. She’s alive.

She shoves her textbook to the side and heaves herself off the bed.

“They’re all…glowy and purple,” she says softly, poking one. He flinches away from her, and she retracts her hand in alarm. Natalie has never been frugal with physical contact, and over the months he had become used to her flopping onto him like he was a piece of furniture, playing with his hair, prodding at his horns until they shifted from amber to deep crimson. He doesn’t know why he moved away from her touch. Clearly, she doesn’t either; her face screws up into one of deep concern.

“Are you okay?”

“Fine. Perfect,” he says, standing up abruptly. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“You’re acting a little weird,” she says, slowly rising with him, eyes still trained on his horns. “Are you nervous about going to the coast?” She glances at the clock on her dresser. “Speaking of, when are we leaving?”

“I’m fine,” Lucifer says, running a hand through his hair. She looks at him expectantly, but he doesn’t let any explanation fall from his lips.

“And… I’ve been thinking…” He says hesitantly, rubbing the back of his head. “Maybe it’s not such a good idea for you to go back. You should get your dad to take you to a hospital or something. I can do this alone.”

“What?!” Natalie says indignantly, “Why?”

“You’ve been living off of DayQuil and orange juice for over a week now, and even that’s iffy since you’ve been puking all over the place. It’s about time you get some professional help,” he says, eyes grazing over her chapped lips and the unhealthy pallor of her skin. Her face scrunches up in disapproval.

“Are you crazy?” She demands. “That’ll make my third hospital visit in the span of a year–my dad’ll flip.”

“So you’re just gonna let yourself get worse so you don’t worry your old man?” Lucifer asks sharply, feeling anger boil in his stomach. He welcomes it, lets it wash over him like scalding water, and it’s so much easier to bear than the sadness. “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Why do you care so much? It’s not like I’m dying or anything!” Natalie says, folding her arms.

The words twist like a knife in his heart, and he forces himself to keep the scowl on his lips.

“You don’t know that, kid, that’s why you go to a doctor.”

They glare at each other for a few moments that seem to stretch into space. Natalie finally yields, slowly uncrossing her arms to have her palms rest surely on her hips.

“Okay, fine. You win,” she says. “But my dad’s not going with me.”

“I don’t see how that’ll work, kid,” Lucifer says. “He’s your emergency contact guy and you’re living with him. He’s gonna find out no matter what.”

Natalie’s face breaks into a sly smile. “Unless…he’s already with me when I go.”

“What are you talking about? You just said you didn’t want to–” He cuts off as her smile grows wider.

“Wait–you mean–”

“Yup,” she says, eyes glinting. “That.”

The thin wire of Alex McAllister’s glasses feel odd on the bridge of his nose. He pushes them up slightly, takes them off, rubs them on his shirt, and puts them on again.

“Stop fidgeting,” Natalie whispers as they walk. “You look fine. Very dad-like. Middle aged and dorky.”

He turns to send a heated glare at her. She tilts her head in fascination. “Whoa, I don’t think I’ve ever seen that look on my dad’s face before. Usually he just cries when he’s mad at me.”

“Hopefully you never have to see it again,” Lucifer mutters with disgust, shaking his head. The sliding door of the emergency room opens, and he wrinkles his nose at the clinical smell. Fortunately, it’s not as crowded as the hospital by the coast was, with only a few stragglers sitting on the ugly green chairs.

He walks up to the front desk, Natalie trailing slightly behind him.

“My, uh…daughter needs an evaluation,” Lucifer says to the cheerful-looking woman behind the desk, barely suppressing a cringe at his own words.

“Hi,” Natalie says awkwardly, pausing to cough into her sleeve. The receptionist smiles sympathetically at her.

“Hello, dear. What’s your name?”

“Natalie McAllister.”

“Okay, Natalie, I’m going to need you to fill out this medical history form…”

He zones out as Natalie begins to scribble on the piece of paper she was given, letting the off-white walls and burning smell of chemicals fade away.

What’s happening here?

The past two days feel like vivid nightmares, fragments of memory that he clutches onto with unrivaled panic. He remembers her warm words and her hair like fire, and the way she burned out as the day ended, the way her life was snuffed as easily as one might blow out a candle.

He glances at her, sick but still lively, flashing smiles to the receptionist as she chatters. It seems absurd to think that in the span of twenty four hours she would deteriorate so much…

He has to find out what’s going on.

“Mr. McAllister?”

He jerks, looking at the woman with wide eyes. “Huh?”

“Your insurance information.”

“Oh. Yeah. I have it,” He says, fishing around in his pockets for the card they snatched out of Alex’s wallet. He finds it and hands it to her.

She examines it, comparing the information to her computer monitor. “Alright, everything seems to be in check. We’ll have a triage nurse out momentarily to do some basic check-ups.”

He nods mutely, and they wander in the general direction of the waiting area.

“Hey, are you sure you’re okay?” Natalie asks softly as they sit down.

“Kid, you’ve asked me that five times today. I’m fine.”

“You don’t seem fine,” she says stubbornly.

“I’ll be fine once you stop asking me pointless questions,” he retorts.

She huffs, and slings her blue flu mask over her ears. “I feel ridiculous wearing this.”

He sees her, collapsed on smooth tile and barely breathing, hand barely touching the blue fabric abandoned on the ground.

His heart skips like a rock over water, stuttering beats sinking low in his stomach.

“You look ridiculous wearing that,” he says, mouth dry. “At least you’re not spreading your germs everywhere, though.”

She shrugs, and they sit in silence for a while.

Eventually, a nurse emerges from the doors. “Natalie McAllister?”

Natalie stands up, and so does he.

The nurse smiles at them. “Come with me.”

They follow her into a small room, machinery lined up like jigsaw pieces on the walls and counter. Natalie sits down on the leather chair in the center of the room. The nurse looks down at the form. “So I see you’ve been here twice already this past year, for…” she scrutinizes her chart, “first a concussion and superficial lacerations, and then severe penetrating abdominal trauma. Jeez, not a very lucky year for you, is it, Ms. McAllister?”

Natalie shrugs nonchalantly. “I dunno,” she says slowly, catching Lucifer’s eye. “…It’s had it’s moments.” She smiles slightly, gaze flicking back to the nurse.

He feels his face turning red, but it’s soon forgotten when Natalie breaks into a round of hacking, wheezing into the fabric of her flu mask.

“Oh my, that doesn’t sound good,” the nurse says, taking out a thermometer. “I’m just going to take your temperature; open wide.”

Natalie complies, and the nurse delicately places the metal spoke under her tongue. After a moment, she takes it out.

“101.3,” she reads with a frown. “How long have you been sick?”

“Like…maybe two weeks?” Natalie supplies, shifting uncomfortably.

“Okay,” she says, lifting up a stethoscope. “I’m going to listen to your breathing now, could you take off your sweatshirt and your mask?”

She places the chestpiece on Natalie’s back.

“I want you to inhale as deeply as you can.”

She listens intently as Natalie breathes, and even Lucifer can tell that what she’s hearing isn’t good. Her face screws up a little with concern.

“Well, Natalie, I’ll need to get you a medical screening with a doctor so they can confirm it, but I think you may have developed pneumonia alongside your flu,” The nurse says, standing up. “We’ll probably take an x ray and maybe some blood tests as well.”

He can’t help but shoot Natalie an I-told-you-so glance behind the nurse’s back, and she sticks her tongue out at him.

“Come with me,” the nurse says. “You can come too, Mr. McAllister.”

The x rays stretch on forever, and once they’re done they insist on taking some blood tests as well. Natalie sits through it, wincing as they prick at her skin. He finds himself tapping his fingers on his arms in restless beats, a stuttering rhythm that matches the anxious pulse of his heart.

He thinks of Pestilence, sitting eight hours away in a casino, playing her cards like a skilled musician would their instrument. He grits his teeth.

Is she the one doing this?

After the medical staff poked and prodded at her sufficiently, they put them in a room to wait. There’s a small cot surrounded by machines, a rickety grey stool propped in the corner. Natalie clambers onto the bed, collapsing in a heap on the stiff padding.

“Tired?” He asks her, claiming his spot on the stool.

“Exhausted,” She says, rubbing at her eyes and yawning.

“That’s understandable,” says the attending physician as he enters the room, examining a clipboard that presumably contained her file on it. “I don’t know why you didn’t come to see us earlier. I’m Dr. Jones, by the way.”

“What’s going on?” Natalie asks from her bed, voice garbled by the phlegm in her throat. She clears it roughly, hands instinctively coming up to rub her throat.

“We’re still waiting on test results, but its becoming more and more apparent that you have an infection in both of your lungs,” He says. “Normally we would say that it can be treated at home, but due to the long duration of your illness and the fact that you’ve also shown many symptoms of influenza, we’re keeping you here on an IV drip.”

Natalie doesn’t say anything, so he steps in.

“Okay, sounds good…I need to get to work,” Lucifer says, “Natalie’s friend… Stan will be coming over for a while.”

Jones nods, gathering his supplies. “Alright, then. Visiting hours end at 8:00. I’m going to push on your arm, Natalie, just stay still and relax.”

Lucifer watches as the doctor disinfects her arm and inserts a catheter. Natalie winces a little at the sting, but her expression clears as the doctor attaches a thin tube and tapes it to her arm. “There we go, you did great.”

Natalie smiles earnestly at him. “Thanks.”

“Okay,” Jones says, dropping the used needle into a container. “I’ll be back shortly with your test results. Feel free to call for a nurse if you need anything.”

As soon as he leaves the room Lucifer shifts back into his normal form, crossing his arms and leaning back against the wall.

“Jesus, that was getting uncomfortable.”

“Yeah, a little,” Natalie says, raising an eyebrow. “You have no clue how to be a dad, dude.”

“I guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, then,” he says, taking off Alex’s glasses and shoving them in his pocket. He lets his hands fall to his sides.

Natalie squints at him. “Are you absolutely sure–”

“Kid, if you ask me if i’m okay one more time I will not hesitate to kick your ass,” he snaps, clenching his fists. “I’m fine; I’m the last thing you should be concerned about right now.”

Her face lights up, ignoring the empty threat he threw at her. “Wait. Are you worried about me?”

“Well obviously,” he says irritably, shoving his hands into his pockets.

“I don’t understand why, though,” She says, her grin melting away. “It’s not like being sick is that bad–” She pauses, eyes widening, trying to suppress something locked in her ribcage. She finally gives in, and an involuntary hoard of coughs wrack up her body. She hunches over, chest heaving, hands coming up to claw at her flu mask.

“Okay,” she gasps, ripping it off, “Maybe I should’ve come here a little earlier.”

“No kidding,” he says, clasping his hands together.

She glances at him, eyes watering and snot streaming down her face. She grabs a handful of tissues from the nightstand.

“I really appreciate you doing this for me, Lucifer,” she says, wiping away the evidence of her sickness. Her voice is quieter than usual.

“It’s no problem,” he says, averting his gaze.

“No, really, thank you. For everything.” She hesitates. “…You know I love you, right?”

He freezes at the words, the familiar ring of them chiming through his head, taking him back to a bus station where everything seemed so much more simple, the sunlight streaming through the window panes and her small smile a reverberation of the one she gives him now, sitting in a hospital room.

“…Yeah,” he mumbles, remembering the salty taste of the ocean and the burning fire in her voice when she traded her soul for his freedom. “Yeah, I know.”

He can tell she’s getting worse.

She tries to stifle the painful spasms that come with the coughs, her voice becoming more gravelly as the hour passes. Eventually their conversation trails off into silence, only broken by the rattling sound of Natalie’s breathing.The fluorescent lighting makes it hard to tell if she’s actually getting paler or if it’s just the light leeching the color out of her face. He stands up, peering at the perspiration accumulating on her temple.

“Natalie, are you okay?”

“So I’m not allowed to ask that but you are? Talk about double-standards,” She jokes weakly, curling in on herself.

“I’m not the one who’s sick,” he says, reaching out to touch her forehead. It’s hot against his palm. “Jesus, you’re burning up.”

The doctor from before–Jones–enters the room. “Well, Natalie–” He stops when he sees Lucifer hovering over her bedside. “Who are you?”

“I’m her friend, Stan,” he says curtly. “I think her fever’s getting worse.”

He frowns. “The IV should be helping with that.”

“Well, it’s not working!” Lucifer says, voice rising. “She’s not getting better!”

Natalie pushes on his arm a little, frowning at him. “Stop being a butthead, Stan; I’m fine.”

Jones looks at her, hand reaching to open a drawer and pulling out a thermometer. He holds it out to her. “He might be right; I’m going to check again.”

He waits for a few moments, and looks at the temperature. “103.2,” he says. “We’ll have you take some tylenol and hopefully it’ll break.”

Natalie deflates, sinking back against the bed. “Okay.”

The doctor pauses, and Lucifer holds his breath. He’s seen enough of humanity to know when they have something grim to say, locked behind their teeth like a morbid treasure.

“Also…” He says reluctantly, true to form, “I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but your tests came back. You definitely have pneumonia in both of your lungs, as well as hypoxemia.”

“What’s that?” Natalie asks, looking up at him with confusion. Jones smiles at her, and Lucifer bristles at the subtle look of pity in the curl of his lips, the bend of his forehead.

“You don’t have enough oxygen in your bloodstream,” he says. “We’re going to need to put a mask on you so your levels don’t drop any lower.”

“…Oh,” she says timidly, clenching the thin sheets she’s resting on. Lucifer sees the slight glimmer of fear in her eyes. “Okay, then.”

A nurse comes in after the doctor leaves, sending Natalie a reassuring smile as she replaces the blue mask over her lips with a clear plastic one, attached to more tubes. “You’re doing great, honey,” she says soothingly. She looks at Lucifer. “Just so you know, visiting time ends in an hour.”

He gives her a short nod, and she leaves.

“This sucks,” Natalie says, voice smothered by her mask.

“I can imagine.”

“I’m so tired…”

“It’s been a long day,” Lucifer agrees. “Get some rest.”

She peers at him, examining his features. She doesn’t say it, but he can tell the question on her lips anyways.

Are you sure you’re okay?

He bites his cheek and leaves her silent query unanswered.

She eventually migrates her gaze to the ceiling and closes her eyes uneasily, her ragged breathing evening out into something less tangible.

He relaxes slightly in his stool, absently looking out the door into the hall. It’s stiflingly quiet, save for Natalie’s breathing, deadened with sleep and the oxygen mask obscuring her face. His eyes flicker to her face, her eyelids fluttering slightly, mouth slightly open.

Images jolt into him like a lightning strike, burning into his retinas.

Kid, get up.

She doesn’t answer, still and unmoving on the hospital floor.

He tries to shake the memories away like stray water droplets, but they seep into him and find a home there, venom leaking into his veins.

Natalie.

His fingers dig into his jeans. What the hell is happening?

The past three days have been reflections of each other, curving and twisting back to the time where he opened his eyes at 8:24 to Natalie’s sunlit room. He glances at the clock on the wall. 7:37 PM.

Natalie coughs in her sleep, and he jerks to look at her, automatically rising to his feet. It’s not a coincidence that the minutes and hours bent back on on the day she’s supposed to…

I’m so sorry, but there’s nothing we can do.

(Her breathing is uneven, and it sounds more like drowning than swallowing air.)

She’s not going to wake up.

(She shifts, and he can see the beads of sweat on her fevered cheeks, the red blotchy against her greying skin.)

The realization hits him like a bullet. It’s all centered on her.

She’s going to die, and the day will echo itself again, and she’ll keep dying until he finds a way to save her and he needs to save her.

He looks around, the world seeming to turn on its axis.

Why do you care so much? It’s not like I’m dying or anything!

He sees the crimson call button by her cot and he slams down on it, pressing until he feels the plastic start to crack under his fingers. His hands are trembling, and paranoia is crawling in his rib cage, tugging on bone and flesh, spreading through his chest like infection.

Natalie opens her eyes blearily at the sound. “What’s going…”

“You’re getting worse,” he says, starting to pace, words tumbling out of his mouth like falling stars. “Why are you getting worse? Aren’t they supposed to be helping? It didn’t happen so fast the last time.” He pauses. “Or maybe I was too stupid to see how bad you were in the first place.”

“What didn’t happen so fast…?” Natalie says, her voice hazy through her mask. “Dude, what are you talking about?”

“I thought that if you got to a hospital sooner it wouldn’t turn out his way,” he says, running a hand through his hair. “But you’re still getting worse. It’s all going to end up the same.”

Natalie pulls herself into a sitting position on her cot. “Hey, you’re freaking out. What’s happening?”

“I don’t even know how to fix this–how do I fix something like this?” he says, leaning his palm on the counter. “I’m so sorry. I’m–”

“Is everything alright?” a nurse says from the doorway.

Natalie turns to her, pulling off her oxygen mask. “My friend– he’s–” she gasps, and her spine curves like the end of a fiddlehead as she coughs up phlegm and a sickening yellow fluid, spattered with red. Her hands are vices around her bed rails as her diaphragm convulses.

The nurse rushes over to her, speaking in a low, soothing voice as she calms Natalie down, bringing her tissues and gently guiding the mask back up to her lips. Lucifer stands in the corner, frozen.

“I’m going to see what else we can do for you, Ms. McAllister,” she promises, and turns to him. “It’s time to go; visiting hours are over.”

“You don’t understand. I need to stay with her,” he says numbly. “I can’t leave her.”

The nurse shakes her head.

“Sir, I’m sorry, but if you’re not a patient, you’re going to have to leave,” she says, voice sympathetic but firm.

Natalie coughs into her oxygen mask, staring at them with half-lidded eyes.

Blood rushes in Lucifer’s ears. “…Okay,” he says simply, his voice surprisingly calm amidst his torrential thoughts. His hand comes up to grip his arm.

The nurse relaxes, visibly relieved. “Alright, I’ll escort you ou–”

Lucifer squeezes, and he barely registers the pain as a sharp, splintering sound cuts through the room. The blood drains from the nurse’s face, and he can hear Natalie’s muffled gasp.

“Okay,” he says again, cooly inspecting his bruising, broken arm. “I’m a patient now. Guess I have to stay.”

He does, but not in the way he’s expecting.

“This is bullshit,” he mutters to himself for what seems like the thousandth time, pulling at his restraints. His cast-clad arm itches, and when he reaches to tear away the plaster the padded cuff on his wrist stops him short. He glances at it in annoyance before ripping it off of the cot they’ve confined him to.

Looking back, he shouldn’t have been surprised when the nurse called security, and after putting a cast on his broken arm, they took him directly to the psych ward for reasons they didn’t bother to explain in detail. Something along the lines of being “a danger to himself and society.”

Ridiculous. He’s been a danger to society for the past few millennia and they’ve never locked him up for it before now.

It’s been hours since he’s seen her, and his heart beats faster with every tick of the fucking clock mounted on the wall of his locked room. It’s enough to drive anybody crazy. The hands taunt him as they circle closer to five in the morning.

He uses his free hand to rip his cast off, the plaster breaking apart as he pulls. He tugs his arm free and fumbles with his leg restraints, clumsily trying to undo them before giving up and tearing them off, too.

He stands, stretching his stiff limbs. He eyes the steel door, curling his hands into fists. He doesn’t necessarily want to do this but it’s not his first time breaking down a building to get to her.

It turns out he doesn’t need to, because in that moment the door swings open and an orderly walks in. “Alright, sir, I’m just here to check up on yo–”

He doesn’t get to finish the rest of his sentence before Lucifer hits him cleanly on the neck, letting him drop to the ground with a loud thud.

“It’s nothing personal,” he mutters as he steps over the man’s unconscious form. “I just don’t appreciate being locked up.”

He strides out the door, letting his features shift, the clothes on his back melting away into plain blue scrubs. He walks down the hallway, past more steel doors and other nurses meandering about, desperately hoping that no one would stop him. There’s an elevator at the end of the hall.

There’s only a down button, and he presses it, biting his cheek. He stumbles inside when the doors slide open.

“Where are you, Natalie?” He murmurs, looking at the floor buttons. There are five of them, with him being on the top level. He pushes the third one.

The time it takes for the elevator to descend feels like millennia, and as soon as the doors open, he rushes out, noting with relief that this looks familiar, barely restraining himself enough to walk to where her room is. There’s a pit in his stomach, a sluggish feeling of unease that grows the closer he walks. It’s 5:00 AM.

(For a moment, everything is quiet.)

As he edges in on her room, a steady beep cuts through the silence, a tone that he’s heard before but never in reality, and other people are running to where she is, shouting and reaching for machines and shock paddles.

“Code!”

Something fractures inside of him, and he’s running too because this can’t be happening again. He pushes into her already full room, and he doesn’t want to look but he can’t stop looking as they press onto her chest and shoot her full of adrenaline and other drugs. She lays limply on the cot, jerking as they pump electricity into her body.

No. No. This can’t be happening again.

They try.

They try.

The clock ticks, ticks, ticks, and he can barely breathe as they crack her ribs to beat her heart for her, sending currents through her body and shaking their heads as they fail, time and time again.

“I’m calling it,” someone says, an hour later. “Does anyone want to try something else?”

There’s just exhausted silence in response. Lucifer can feel his knees starting to shake.

“I don’t know how she deteriorated so quickly,” a nurse says, distress evident in his tone. “She was talking and smiling just a few hours ago.”

“It happens sometimes,” the doctor says softly. He catches Lucifer’s eye, hands braced against the wall to keep himself steady. He walks up to him.

“She your first code?” He says, putting a hand on his shoulder. “I can’t say it’ll get easier. It’s always rough when they’re young.”

Lucifer shakes his head, a thump in his throat. “I need to go,” he whispers, backing out the door, away from the doctor, away from the straggling medical staff, away from her body.

He starts to run.

There’s a senselessness in his escape; he blindly stumbles out of the building, the cool night pressing on his skin. He feels himself grow in height, the scrubs disintegrating into air, horns ripping out of his forehead, and he can see the violet light they’re casting on the road.

His feet catch on the concrete but he loses his thoughts in the feeling of his bones pounding onto the road, pushing him further away from reality.

(Distantly, he thinks that he would be consumed by the voices by now, if not for her.)

(Distantly, he thinks that maybe letting Hell take over would’ve been easier than this.)

The ground below him eventually shifts from asphalt to grass, and he lets his knees buckle, collapsing onto the earth, a breath rattling its way out of him.

He looks up. The sun is starting to rise, the sky dyed deep crimson by the slowly emerging light. A bird starts to chirp. 

He vaguely feels his body convulsing, and after a little bit he realizes he’s crying, his ribs expanding almost painfully and air rushing out of his lungs in unsteady, choking sobs. He lets himself crumble, his shoulders shaking with grief.

He stays there for a while.

He doesn’t know when the daylight happens or when his tears stop, because one moment he’s kneeling in the grass and then he sees a dark silhouette cut against the sky and then–

His stomach twists, time bends.

He opens his eyes.

“Good morning, sleepyhead,” Natalie says, looking up from her chemistry textbook, “You were out longer than I was.”

[clown-demon]

@hannah-the-small

"Are you someone who works for Char-char's hotel? I came to see how things are going here."

[heaven-said]

✞ " Love has always had that risk. "

Its as Lucifer said. Its as all of them have said. Its always love, always love that traps the angels like flies to honey. Perhaps because it looks so much like holiness, but feels so invitingly warm. Until the next thing you know, you have the blood of half your family on your hands. But at once, its love now that also stalls his blades.

He might have responded to their question of what could be asked of the archangel of protection, if not for realizing what is straining them. He thought it was just pain-- but its not. He recognizes that fight, he knows it like the back of his hand. His brother is burning himself alive from the inside out. It isn't right. He's sick with anger...

He listens, instead, to the story of the exorcists, the story of Lute or... Lyriel. And he understands immediately. He feels it in himself, merely imagining it, their words-- children, whipped, scarred. It stokes the fire in his stomach, makes him tense, as if being wound tighter by it. " I see. " Is at first all he could bring himself to whisper, his tone cold with too much emotion to even express. And he nearly wavers right then and there. He steps back from them as they finally rest to the bed, that alone a strange relief to some growing discomfort in him-- for the madness that that was, knowing this injured brother before him might very well not show him that same mercy. But then they... keep talking.

He knows they're right. Immediately there's a sharp pain in his chest he has to brace against, and he looks away from them, their eyes suddenly unbearable. " God... damn you, Michael. " He practically says to himself. " You tell me you don't want me to fight... then you put my blade up to your neck..? Will you stand down for five minutes and just talk about this!? " He suddenly reaches for the clasps on his mask, clawing them off before yanking his entire mask off, throwing open his wings to lock gazes with his multiple piercing blue eyes wet with tears. " I shall do it for neither! Do you understand? I'm not here because of them-- and I'm not here because of you either! I'm here... because of what I believe is right! Now stop beating yourself up and LISTEN to my proposal! " He shouts, promptly taking a position with his helmet under his right arm as if his infinitely engrained discipline is mixing messily with his earnest frustrations.

" Maybe I don't call them daughters... but they were my sisters. One of our millions of heaven-born brothers and sisters! I spent every New Year with them, I drank with them, laughed with them, I LIED to protect them from scrutiny even though it burned my tongue! If the council are guilty I want them punished, stripped of the power that let them approve such heinous, heartless, incompetent methods! I don't want you NOT to act-- I am begging you not to act in anger. We have been here before, brother… Haven't we? You trusted them and they kept secrets from you-- tricked you-- hurt people that meant everything to you, and now you might never be able to heal the harm they did. There was a time when I thought I would have that same anger forever-- but brother, I have learned. " A deep breath, his places his armored knuckles to the bridge of his ebony nose. When he lowers it he speaks clearly, getting to the point he wishes to make.

" I propose that you cast them down. I shall even aid you doing so. Just like Lucifer. In attempting to lead us they have committed horrible sins, so dethrone them! But... do not destroy them. Give them the chance to be better someday... That means risking one day having to coexist with such people, I know. That was always my greatest hurdle in accepting the redeemed into Heaven at all-- but you convinced me of redemption's virtue. And now you truly know the weight of what forgiveness means; the unfair toll it takes on the ones wronged. But, you can still show your daughter that there's a better way to face pain than just killing what hurt her... "

And with a heavy sigh, he closes his eyes, lowers his head, and lets the wings wrap back around his face. He's said all he can, it feels. If nothing else... let it be known he did try showing mercy. But is it Michael... or the Council he's referring to as he thinks that?

" We are the right and left hands of God, brother. If I sever you, I only cut off my own hand... and vice versa. Please. Let us, for once since our creation, stop... drenching Heaven's streets in the blood of our own. That is... all I came to ask of you. "

“I am the same as I have ever been, Gabriel. If my love makes me evil, then I have long forgotten what righteousness tastes like.”

He had not been created to love. He had been made to protect, to guard, to lead, to fight, to conquer. To strike down all of those who stood against their Fathers Great Plan. Yet it had found him regardless.

In Eden, as Eve sat upon a rock with him and shaken pomegranate juices from her hands. After the Garden, when he had taught Adam to till the soil, when he had held Cain in his arms when he was brought into the world. Before the Fall, as Lucifer had sung with him, as Gabriel had laughed with him.

In dainty, soft hands, the blinded eyes that had still found him beautiful.

In tiny bodies curled against him, utterly faithful that he would keep them safe.

“Erratically, Gabriel? God, what can I do? I was created to protect the weak! To defend the innocent! And I come to find that those who hurt them are those that I was always supposed to be able to trust! How can I not seek to recompense? How can I not do everything in my power to keep them safe?”

His mention of Ephraim seems to give his brother pause, and Michael takes a moment to suck in another breath, his fingers gouging runnels out of the marble wall in his effort. The very utterance of the late angels name brings a snarl to his lips, and he sneers.

“I acted on my suspicious after the Mid-Year extermination. Went to that secluded hellhole with my daughter.” Not the Lieutenant, not Lute, not Lyriel. My daughter. His tone seems to dare the younger Angel to correct him. “We spoke to one of the youngest cadets…she could not have lived for more than fifteen years. She winced with every movement, and I found fresh lashings upon her back, still bleeding.”

The words leave him in an animal snarl, and several feathers drop from his wings, floating to the floor, his halo flickering and dimming ever so slightly.

“We went to Ephraims office, retrieved his filings. It was like any cult I have ever put to the sword, Gabriel. Right beneath our noses. No names, but only numbers. No belongings, not even the clothes upon their backs. Barely fed, viciously whipped, beaten for the slightest infractions. Lyriels back is just a mess of scar tissue. Children, Gabriel. They were children.”

As Gabriel approaches him, he finally relents, allowing himself to lower to sit on his bed, ichor still dripping onto his boots, his gaze still fixed up at his brother, the tears that gather in his eyes finally overrunning to cut channels through the grime that clings to his cheeks.

“My children.”

He finally breaks his gaze from Gabriel, looking down at his hands, at the little stone that is now nearly embedded in his right palm. A tear falls from his face and into the wound. It stings. He deserves it.

“I received reports, they…they knew I wanted to check on them. On her. They all said the same, that Cadet Lyriel Morningstar was excelling, but did not wish to be distracted from her instruction. They carried the signatures of the Council. The real reports, the ones I found in the academy, they were signed with names I did not know. Pseudonyms, they have to be, for Councilors. Not all of them, they were too few, but I do not know which.”

He inhales, shakily, and when he speaks again, his voice is tiny. Weak. Barely more than a whimper.

“I failed them.”

He draws his arms around himself, and the pain from his broken ribs shrieks up his spine at the pressure with which he squeezes himself. But he deserves it. Deserves to be punished, to be struck down, to be made to suffer in all of the ways he failed to protect them from.

“I am not your enemy, Gabriel. But if you feel you must strike me down, if you feel that I am your enemy. you know that you must do it now. If you make that decision only after I recover, you will not stand a chance. You know that you will not.”

There is not a single hint of pride in his voice. It is not braggartry. It is a simple fact. One that they both know. He blinks, breathes, and his halo brightens once more, the feathers that had fallen previously suddenly appearing in once-empty places once more.

“But I beg you, brother. Do not make your judgement because I stand against the Councils actions. If you kill me, kill me because I did not protect my girls. Kill me because I failed those who needed me most in their time of need.”

[clown-demon]

"Has anyone seen my rubber duckie? His name is Steve and he went missing.. He was a one eyed purple one.."

[clown-demon]

@vocaliist

"Ooh~. A singer I can assume? What kind of songs do you sing?"