Notes at the end of the chapter
Walk 8766 Miles in my Elven Shoes
(7th of December, 18:00)
"Lucifer are you sure about this?" Douche clasped his hands and rubbed them together nervously while stealing glances from the half-opened door.
"It's a mission, just pull yourself together and hop your way around this" Lucifer growled and readjusted his well-fitted trousers. This was not what he would have signed for merely but two pairs of eyes held the promise of retaliation if he backed down now.
"I'm not the Easter Bunny!" Dan raked his fingers through his tousled hair and his shoulders slumped in defeat.
"You could have fooled me with those ears," Lucifer whistled and caught effortlessly what Maze had thrown him thus effectively missing Dan's wounded glare. Maze winked at both of them and joined the crowd outside the door.
"And she thought that there would be nothing she could learn from humanity," he mused and took a deep breath preparing himself for the inevitable.
"I though she wasn't the mothering type," he could still not fathom how things had turned out the way they did. Lucifer turned to look at him and Dan caught the dramatic rolling of his eyes.
"Torture, Douche. I'm talking about torture!" Shaking his head he pondered what was about to do under the pressure of a Demon with forged in hell daggers and something unconditional.
'This is it'
(48 hours prior)
His head was pounding and from the vile aftertaste in his mouth, he certainly had a pleasant evening that previous day. That, of course, did not explain why he was wheeled out of to the freezing cold.
"Chop, chop no time to lose!" a chuckling Lucifer took him by his underarms and threw him carelessly to the backseat of a car.
"Feet in!" Dan felt his legs being lightly kicked inside and a door closing much louder than he would have liked at his current state.
From the backseat, he was now lying at he could see outside the window an ominously cloudy sky passing quickly through his eyes, of course, the speed of the car had certainly something to do with that as well. With a groan, he massaged his temples but a drilling headache was still there. A sigh of contempt came from the driver and he felt something hard hitting his stomach.
"I've put enough Advil in your right pocket to make you moderately functional for this. Go ahead, what use you will be if you're driven mad and by such as a pathetic reason." Lucifer joked and took one more sharp turn.
Blindingly Dan found the small water bottle and with some struggle retrieved two pills from his pocket. Downing them quickly he slowly drifted to sleep for the remaining of the ride. The next time he woke up he could hear the hushed tones from outside the car when unexpectedly the car door opened to reveal a grinning Lucifer.
"Look who's up!" he was greeted and urged him to a sitting position too quickly for his taste. With Lucifer next to him he had the chance for the first time to look once again outside the window. Lucifer handed him a cup of steaming coffee and by the way, he was checking his watch, he knew that he had better finish his beverage as quickly as possible.
"Are we in Boston?" He sipped his coffee slowly and the dizziness he was plugged with since he had woken up started to clear up. Then again it was a welcoming alternative to a splitting headache.
"Have you ever been to Boston, Detective?" By his indifferent tone, Dan was not about to share the long forgotten cross-country trip he had done with his family as a child.
"So you dragged me across the whole country and from the lingering bitterness I would assume that you also drugged me!" He had his suspicions when he had first woken up but when Lucifer's shoulders lifted in a golden shrug on the accusation he finally had his confirmation.
"Firstly not across the whole country, but half the globe, if the word half makes you more at ease." Lucifer uncrossed his legs and took the last sip from his hot beverage before shaking the cup to confirm that indeed it was empty.
"Secondly, not my fault you went through my Tuesdays' old habit leftovers." he admitted with no real remorse.
"You use drug-spiked drinks?" Dan bellowed and accidentally crushed his paper cup.
"Now look what you have done!" he offered him his handkerchief to clean the mess and with took his own cup out of the window for a man to quickly take it away.
"To be clear. Tuesdays were my high days. I never offered substances, drugged or took advantage of anyone under any kind of influence, not even the Detective." Lucifer had to be honest if he wanted this errand to be over soon and get back home just in time for breakfast.
"Are you at least clean now?" Dan questioned him and Lucifer gave him a pointed look.
Opening the car's door he paused for a bit before bending down and with a rare firmness in his voice he delivered Dan his answer.
"I'm sparkling actually and we are now late." Coffee time was over and with some difficulty, wet patched and all, he made it out of the car. The blinding lights were manageable but this was certainly not Boston. In a daze, Dan followed Lucifer through the grand doors. For what seemed like forever they turned through corners and went up through different escalators to finally find themselves in front of modest wooden elevator.
"Which floor my lord?" The middle-aged man inside the elevator stared at Lucifer in wonder and he discreetly passed him what Dan could recognise as several bills.
"To Bryson's office if you please."
"You're a lord?" Dan whispered while trying to get more comfortable in the confined space. Lucifer ignored him until the elevator's doors opened again and flashed his winning smile to the man behind the desk. If a room could scream money and power this certainly was. A completely wooden dressed office packed with the finest trifling decorations he had ever seen.
"Clive!" Lucifer cried in delight and it appeared to be well received from the short guy behind the desk. With shaggy hair and a short posture when Clive hugged Lucifer the difference in height was rather comical.
"My lord!" Clive gushed in adoration and hurried to pour a drink for his apparently esteemed guest completely ignoring Dan in the process.
"Enough with the pleasantries man, do you have what I commissioned?" Instead of drinking from the glass he was given he passed it to Dan and after a quick scanning, he helped himself from a bottle underneath the bar.
"You still hide the good stuff aren't you Mr Bryson?" Lucifer teased and generously filled three fingers of neat scotch just to spite the man. Not that it was possible really. How his sub-servitude nature had landed him this job he would never now. Clive just massaged the back of his neck which changed Lucifer's pleasant disposition.
"Almost everything my lord, please do check what is ready." Clive gestured towards a large pack of neatly arranged packages at the nearest table which Lucifer quickly started to inspect with no real care for the world.
"He is a lord?" Dan couldn't help but ask the short man next to him. Clive's eyes lightened mischievously over sharing a well-guarded secret.
"All I know is that he a King's son and that he holds several hush-hush titles," Clive spoke softly as Lucifer was going through every package two or three times.
"Clive!" an infuriated Lucifer snapped. "Something of great importance is missing! Where are the shoes?" It was obvious how a stare from the self-proclaimed Devil could paralyse grown men. Clive was certainly slightly trembling and was attempting to find a way to explain why something like that was missing.
"Hold that thought," he forcefully ordered Clive and took out his vibrating mobile.
"Hello Detective!" he cheered over the phone. "Yes, he is here," he affirmed with a fake wounded stance. "At a mall of course. Well, kind of… Now, now would I ever lie to you?" his deep seductive voice came to play. "Fine!" he whines and put the phone in Dan's ear. "Say hi," he instructed.
"Yes, he is here," he affirmed with a fake wounded stance. "At a mall of course. Well, kind of… Now, now would I ever lie to you?" his deep seductive voice came to play.
"At a mall of course. Well, kind of… Now, now would I ever lie to you?" his deep seductive voice came to play.
"Fine!" he whines and put the phone in Dan's ear. "Say hi," he instructed.
"Hi?"
"See? Yes, pass her through. Maze... Oh, I see-" he scratched the back of his head and marched to take a seat at the large wooden desk. He started scribbling things down in a hurry and proceeded to ask several hushed questions. No longer than he had his phone back to his pocket he was dragging him towards the elevator.
"Clive I'll be back in a couple of hours. Your commission will be tripled if you have everything you owe me and the additional ones by then," he instructed the man who was now reading carefully Lucifer's notes. Before he could reply they were back to the elevator and the only word Lucifer had uttered to the man was down.
Dan didn't bother the man when they entered what appeared to be an ancient pub deep under the foundations of the building they were in. It was a smart decision to let him let some steam out. When Lucifer returned from the bar he set in the table in front of him a cold soda while he had a teacup in hand.
"It's difficult to find a properly made tea nowadays but you can always unscrew a bottle." With a hum of appreciation, he enjoyed the fragrance of his hot drink and relaxed back at the hard wooden booth.
"Care to explain all this?" Where to start with the questions he had. He went from a being hangover and drugged to making shammy deals with Lucifer in a matter of a few hours.
"Let's see," he drawled smoothly. "London, Harrods, VIP service, a lord indeed and I need you sober for tomorrow night." Lucifer despised to be at the mercy of the man across him even if Dan didn't really know that.
"London, Harrods, VIP service, a lord indeed and I need you sober for tomorrow night." Lucifer despised to be at the mercy of the man across him even if Dan didn't really know that.
"Look, Detective," he signed with only a hint of remorse and not really placed in the situation he had dragged him in.
"I promised that I would include you to this," when Dan attempted to ask to what exactly he was just forced into, Lucifer held a hand for him to allow him to continue.
"Beatrice wants you there tomorrow and If I had to kidnap you half across the world to make sure that happens and moreover have everything she requires under the threat of torture then I just had to do it." his words were deliberately pronounced and carried the graveness of the situation. What the Devil promises, he delivers.
"Damn it Lucifer, It's just an elementary show! There is a huge bust for a three billion worth of cocaine cargo at the port tomorrow." Dan's unblinkingly focused his eyes on Lucifer and then titled his head back in frustration.
"You are not a bad father Dan," he sighed but the reluctance was carrying the exact opposite belief.
"Your work is grand and everything, but human life is fleeting and childhood not even a second in time. Children are a responsibility not limited to cakes and obedience. That much I do know," he slowly stirred his tea and ordered with the raise of his hand a second cup.
Children always meant responsibility but also a target of enforcing idiotic beliefs. Lucifer's greatest abhorrence towards human reproduction was the restriction of free will. Why bring a young into the world just so to mould and restrict it at each and every turn? In a game of no clear rules the shackles were certainly there and tightened at every turn, may it be wrong or right.
"I do, I do know that but lives of thousands are equally important!" Dan thickly swallowed his own guilt over turning down Trixie's pleas.
"I'm trying to be a good father be there and do things right but until you join fatherhood you will never know how it is." he pinched his nose and nursed some of his soda to cool down.
"Believe me, I neither intend to nor I'm able to endeavour to such an adventure," Lucifer huffed in annoyance and if not for his immortality he would have scalded his lips for a second time this evening.
"At first it was easy," Dan recalled his thrust into parenthood. "I never knew why that night at the beach bar she picked me and a year later Trixie was here." She was lovely but feisty as a baby but the demands of fatherhood were always more than he could give.
"I never knew why that night at the beach bar she picked me and a year later Trixie was here." She was lovely but feisty as a baby but the demands of fatherhood were always more than he could give.
"Well, that was quick," Lucifer humorlessly mumbled and checked his watch. Knitting his brows he checked his mobile and a small smile graced his lips.
"Soon everything will be ready and so we will take our leave. Therefore, we have exactly one hour for getting some mindless shopping done," with that he handed him several large bills and as if was chased left the pub, leaving him staring the elevator in absolute bewilderment.
(7th of December, 18:02 )
"We would like to thank the parents of our Elementary students for their help and participation tonight!" The ever bored principle announced in a forced cheering voice. "First act for tonight The Sleigh Ride!".
The lights dimmed and Chloe was fuming. Dan had blown this once again and Lucifer perhaps for the first time ever had lied to her. He had promised he had it under control. Although she didn't hold much hope of Dan making an appearance tonight, Lucifer had sworn to Trixie that he would attend even if hell froze over. Something that once had claimed to be arrangeable.
"Hey there!" A slim figure took the seat next to her and before she could explain that it was saved for someone else, she saw Maze fumbling with her phone.
"Where is Lucifer? He pr-" Maze gave her a scandalised look and brought her index to her lips. The music started and she could see her little girl tapping her way around in a spectacular elven suit. A suit that she certainly had not bought a week ago. Despite Trixie's reluctance to do girlish nonsense, her words, she had accepted the part for this Christmas sketch with great pleasure.
When the first part of the song was over a dramatic entrance was to be done for-
"Lucifer!?" she yelped in surprise and Maze gave her one more stern look. Instead for Trixie's eight-year-old partner, there was Lucifer tap dancing his way around in perfect synchronisation with her daughter over the original The Sleigh Ride song. In his effort to not make the height difference too great, he was slouched just enough to make himself seem shorter but not affect his fluid movements. The only detail which ruined the fluidity of the act was the hopping Santa at the background. A Santa with the same awkwardness as…
"No way," she whispered and felt her fingers touch her dry lips. Lucifer taps were giving a great effect to Trixie's quite ones but without ever surpassing her rhythm. His large leather black elven curved shoes didn't seem to be a problem and neither were Trixie's bright coloured ones. Again shoes which she certainly had not bought herself.
"Gail had a nasty fall and broke his leg so we had to substitute him and fast," Maze filled her in quietly enough for the camera not to catch her voice.
"Lucifer had everything custom made and insisted on taking the boy's place." a chuckle escaped her as Lucifer and Trixie did a small swirl and both giggled in delight.
"And Dan?"
"Kidnapped for about three days now," she said with a bored expression which Chloe had learned followed that no more information would be given on that topic.
The Christmas function was over much faster than they had originally anticipated and both women searched the small crowd for the notable green and red hats. Surely enough Lucifer could be seen in the distance being lavished to the attention of several mothers who raved over his and her daughter's matching outfits. But mostly over his stripped tights, Chloe thought.
"Detective" he exclaimed in his best child-like imitation. The attached elf ears were securely glued on the velvet hat but wiggled whenever he cocked his head as a signal for her daughter to protect him from the rest of the children around him.
"You were great, both of you!" she told Trixie and a huge smile rewarded her.
"Now where is your Dad?" she wondered out loud.
"He had a narcotics bust and an awful headache," Lucifer answered her and lifted Beatrice to his arms. He was literally swarmed by dirty little spawns and had no desire to spend his impending holidays with the Detective worrying over an ill child. That and the fact that Beatrice in a bad mood was as terrifying as her mother. Therefore, an easily preventable illness was out of the question to be let to chance.
"Lucifer you did tap danced next to him in a plane for at least twelve hours straight out of the total seventeen, what did you expect from a mere human?" Maze chastised him and took Beatrice in her arms ready for a quick exit.
Chloe took a closer look of his outfit and folded her hands. His innocent face was not fooling her especially when that sly grin was in place.
"What kind of flight lasts for seventeen hours?" she drew nearer and saw him slightly swaying on his feet. Whether it was from the twelve hours of practice or her proximity he couldn't tell but he would adamantly support the first.
"An unconditional something of 8766 miles for the perfect elven footwear, I suppose," he easily told her and followed Maze and Beatrice towards the exit.
The End
(For Now)
Notes: For A03 Christmas Challenge 7 - Elf Shoes, with Lucifer and Dan at a mall. Written by Sanoiro. Challenged by coop500.
- Please visit the A03 Challenge if you want some more Lucifer Christmas one-shots by authors who do not have a FF account but deliver some spectacular pieces daily.
1) The Challenges will be uploaded as separate one-shots but they are indeed all connected. First, part of this is Carols of Rum and Raspberries. They can of course, be read separately.
2) Yesterday I realised that my cousin's surname is actually Morningstar. He carries both surnames from his parents and one of them actually has the same meaning as in English and is also a reference to the Devil in my native language as well. I had some fun with that by the way.
3) I've started to have some really bad splitting headaches since last weekend so I hope this entry is somewhat decent.
4) Piece of music used for this entry: Tango Pasion - Daryl Griffith
5) I'm sorry, I tried. (Afterthought: Apparently, I'm really bad at this.)