Title: Carnations
Ship: Lucifer Morningstar/Chloe Decker
Genre: Hanahaki Disease/Unrequited love/Hurt no comfort/Character death
A/N: Well… Hello, I'm back! And with a not so happy story. Sorry, but not sorry. This is a story for the May prompt of a Facebook Group I'm part in which we were supposed to write a story of Hanahaki Disease.
For those that don't know what Hanahaki Disease here is a brief explanation: is a fictional disease in which the victim coughs up flower petals when they suffer from one-sided love. It ends when the beloved returns their feelings (romantic love only; strong friendship is not enough), or when the victim dies. It can be cured through surgical removal, but when the infection is removed, the victim's romantic feelings for their love also disappear. (Source: Fanlore Wiki)
Description: He crushed the flower in his hand as he felt desperation and anger pound in his chest as he looked up to the sky.
"This is what you wanted, Dad?" he said with a hoarse voice, brown eyes flashing bright red-orange before it faded back to its normal color.
Single Chapter: Carnations
It started with a stray coughing every odd day, and Lucifer would drown it with cups of Scotch as he walked around Lux. He would continue to smile and flirt with every passing patron, enjoying the sultry looks sent his way.
He would choose from the men and women that came flocking in his direction and bring one (or two, or three, or four…) to his penthouse to stay the night. It made things easier for him, it made him forget.
But as the weeks passed, he started to notice a strange weight in his lungs, and sometimes he wheezed when he took a long breath. And the coughing fits increased in occurrence, turning worse the closer he was with the Detective. However, he still ignored it, passing it as a strange new bout of vulnerability because of Chloe's status as a miracle.
He spent weeks ignoring it and walking away from his human friends every time he felt his chest rattle and coughs start to climb his throat. He would ignore the strange looks he would receive from the humans and look for the farthest corner, and that day wasn't different.
It had already six months since he started coughing, and like he always did he went to the farthest place in the current crime scene they were working. An alley between two decrepit buildings at the edge of the street, filled with rotten garbage and smelling like urine, one place Lucifer would never dare to step with his Salvatore Ferragamo, but he didn't care that time.
He could feel his lungs constricting and almost forcing out of himself of how much he was holding in his cough until he reached that hidden place. His body trembled and convulsed as he finally let himself cough, feeling as if he was choking as a lump came through his throat until he finally half-coughed half-gaged a perfect white carnation on his palm. Lucifer blinked the tears in his eyes away as he realized what that meant.
He crushed the flower in his hand as he felt desperation and anger pound in his chest as he looked up to the sky.
"This is what you wanted, Dad?" he said with a hoarse voice, brown eyes flashing bright red-orange before it faded back to its normal color.
He left the crushed flower fall onto the ground to join rest of the rotting garbage and walked back to where the Detective was.
That night he drank three Scotch bottles in midst of violent bouts of coughs where he gaged more white carnations. For every carnation he expelled from his body he would send an insult to his Dad, piling the flowers in front of him in some sort of morbid fascination.
Celestials weren't supposed to have Hanahaki disease, but then again nothing was black and white for Lucifer, why would basic biology be?
Another coughing fit attacked him, and he coughed until he couldn't breath correctly as another carnation climbed his throat and he choked on the thick petals and gagged with them until he finally spat it out. The white of the petals mocked him as he stared at it as tears ran down his cheeks.
Pure Love.
He laughed until another fit happened and this time he expelled two white carnations.
As the weeks, months, passed it was starting to be difficult to hide his condition from the humans. His coughing fits grew in quantity and violence, his chest always rattled as he breathed, because of the vines and buds growing in his chest. He actually could feel them growing and spamming on his chest now. And most of the often than not he wheezed as he ran or did something that exerted him – sex was almost impossible as he would cough so much if he ever started.
And it was starting to show, the nights he barely slept because of his bad breathing. The pale quality of his skin as the disease grew and spread in his body. It was difficult to escape from the inquisitiveness of the Detective, or the suspicious looks Dan sent his way, or the worried hugs Ella would gift him. Linda was being insistent of knowing what Lucifer was hiding, and even Maze was stopping him to ask what the hell was going on. But still, Lucifer kept his mouth shut, changing the subject for safer topics.
That day he was just sitting on his favorite place in the Precinct, the chair in front of Chloe's desk when his coughing started. He couldn't even rise from the chair to run away, because his body started to convulse as he choked as the flowers – they were coming in groups now – came through his throat. He tumbled on the ground as he lost the balance on the chair with the force his body was shaking as he struggled to breath as he gagged the thick petals of the white carnations.
He couldn't hear Chloe calling his name, or Dan hovering on top of him, or Ella running to his side. All he could hear was the desperate pounding of his heart as he was deprived of Oxygen as he struggled to cough out the carnations. And when they finally exited his mouth, the white petals were tinged with red. Blood. He was finally coughing blood with the flowers.
He almost, almost, laughed as he stared at the mess of bloody white carnations in front of him. He was dying. From unrequited love.
"Why don't you do the surgery?" Dan's words broke the haze in his head that came with the realization of his mortality.
He raised his head to meet the green eyes of the Detective Douche… Dan. Honest concern was clouding the usually bright green eyes, because he knew like Lucifer did, that when someone with Hanahaki started coughing blood with the flowers were entering the final stages of the disease, and the only way – aside from having their love returned – was the surgery.
The surgery that would take all the vines and buds and the feelings of love for that person that caused the disease.
Lucifer balled his hands and shook his head.
"I… Can't…" He heaved his answer, not daring to look at Chloe.
"Lucifer-" Dan started, but Lucifer shook his head abruptly and raised to his feet.
"I can't," he said strongly this time.
Ignoring all pairs of eyes on him – most importantly those blue-gray ones he always sought – and walked away from everyone, from the Precinct. And no one stopped him.
He closed himself on his penthouse in the months that followed his outing about the disease, ignoring the calls from everyone as the days passed, as his coughing increased. The blood coming with the flowers also increased in quantity, painting his chin in crimson more often than not.
He could feel the tiredness of his body as the disease spread and as he lost more and more blood with his coughs. His lungs were heavy, and every breath was a struggle. But even then, he thought of everything, and called his lawyers and set all his things in order. He knew his time was coming, and he wasn't fighting it, because he didn't want it. Not anymore. He knew he disappointed Chloe so many times, so many fucking times, in his quest to keep her away from his Father's machinations, and in a way, he always expected she would always keep loving him. But here he was… Coughing flowers because she had had enough.
It was fitting, the Devil dying with flowers in his mouth. This time he laughed the irony of all of that, and he questioned if that wasn't his Dad's plans all along.
Another coughing fit attacked him in the middle of his laughs, his body trembling and convulsing as he choked in more carnations and blood. He didn't hear the flapping of wings and the string of curses that followed it, as he was vomiting the mixture of flowers and blood on his linoleum.
He just noticed he wasn't alone when he was brusquely pulled from the floor by an angry Demoness, that shook his weakened body as if it was made of paper.
"Do you know how much you made me lower myself, Lucifer?" Maze snarled. "I had to fucking pray for your brother, do you know what it is a Demon praying?" She shook his body again.
But Lucifer didn't have the strength to stop or answer her at all.
"Maze!" Amenadiel interfered, holding the demoness arms and looking at his brother with sorrowful eyes.
"Oh, Luci…" The older Archangel said, gently praying Maze's hands off Lucifer's robes and placing his younger brother in his expensive leather couch.
Amenadiel studied his brother for a fraction of time before opening his gray wings to pluck some feathers, but Lucifer sat and grabbed his brother's arm. His breath came in rattled puffs as he gripped his brother's arm with all the strength he had left.
That would also take his feelings for Chloe away, and he couldn't, wouldn't allow that.
"No…" He wheezed as soon as he finished speaking.
"Lucifer, are you crazy? You can't—" Maze started saying angrily.
"No!" He gasped as another coughing fit came, and more carnations and blood spilled from his mouth.
Amenadiel sighed sadly and left his wings to disappear again, his hands moving to cup his little brother's face. Lucifer was always white, shiny like the stars he made eons ago, contrasting with his black skin, but now Lucifer's skin was a sick white, too dry, too lifeless. And that broke Amenadiel's heart.
"You fool," he said as his little brother's body succumbed to the tiredness the sickness brought to him.
Maze screamed in frustration, grabbing one of the expensive bottles of Scotch and throwing it against the wall. Golden liquid pooled on the floor, beside a dried stain of blood and dying white carnations.
"This bastard!" She said in between her gritted teeth, trying her best to hide the tears filling her own eyes. Demons didn't cry.
And certainly, they didn't cry for their stupid boss.
Maze and Amenadiel stayed with Lucifer until the end, watching as his body succumbed to the disease as the days passed, as more coughs came and with it, white carnations stained in red were vomited together with pools of blood.
Lucifer still denied being cured, to be ripped off of his love for Chloe, because that was the only option left for him. Because exactly fourteen months earlier – exacts two months before Lucifer first started coughing – Chloe went through the surgery when she started coughing white roses (Eternal Love) as her love for Lucifer developed into the disease, because she was so sure Lucifer didn't love her back – and she had more than herself to think, it would be too selfish of her to put her daughter in jeopardy because of a love seemingly unrequited.
So, he deserved to die, he deserved it because he was responsible for killing Chloe's love for him, and nothing fairer than to die for something that was his fault.
When she had the surgery, Lucifer felt his heartbreaking, but he didn't worry then. He couldn't catch a human disease. But how wrong he was, and one side of him was happy he was because it meant he would leave her alone. She would finally be free of him, and his Father and his family. She would be free to live her life with her Spawn and forget completely she had ever encountered him.
He croaked a laugh as those thoughts came to his mind, but he felt his lungs hurt at the effort, they were almost completely full of vines and buds – breathing was turning to be a complicated task. He barely could cough the flowers and blood anymore, almost always choking on them if it wasn't for the help of Amenadiel, that would hold him and pat his back until he vomited all of it. He could feel it in the depths of his soul that he didn't have much time left.
Maze watched him from the other side of the room, as he doubled again, retching as his body tried to expel more carnations and blood, but it didn't have the strength anymore to do it. And he felt himself choke, as he gagged on the carnations stuck in his throat. The Demoness moved in alarm, and Amenadiel that had gone to the kitchen came running to his side, both demon and angel rested their hands on Lucifer's shoulders trying to hold him as his body failed him.
Not even Amenadiel's efforts to make him vomit were helping as he felt more flowers and blood accumulate in his throat. His body started to convulse as part of it was trying to fight to bring Oxygen to his lungs, but he couldn't. His heart was thundering in his ears and he barely could hear Maze and Amenadiel screaming at him, his vision starting to slowly black out.
It hurt so much, his lungs were burning because of lack of Oxygen, and he could feel the desperation as he was trying to gasp for air, but none of it passed through the lump in his throat. Aborted coughs and gagging were the only things his body seemed capable of doing as he fought to expel what was in his body. His brain was short-circuiting at he started to feel light-headed. For just a brief second, he raised his eyes and met the desperate dark ones of Maze as she seemed to be speaking something, but he couldn't comprehend.
He weakly grasped the sheets of his bed, barely feeling the softness of the Egyptian cotton, as his body was finally starting to give up. First was his ability to feel touch, as it disappeared, the ability to smell followed, as he didn't notice the metallic smell of the blood dripping from his lips. The hearing came right after, as he even stopped to hear the thundering of his heart. Then his lugs stopped working, his body stopping its quest for Oxygen, followed right after by his vision, that blackened completely, and the last thing he saw were figures he could barely recognize rushing to his bed. His brain had a few mere seconds to register its utter failure before it shut down.
And Lucifer was no more.
White carnations were slowly sprouting from his mouth over a river of bright red blood.
Under the horrified gaze of six pairs of eyes.
Lucifer woke up in Hell again, spluttering white carnations on the ash covered floors. He stared at them for a long while before he raised to his feet, patting his hands over himself.
He couldn't feel the heaviness on his lungs anymore, but he coughed again, another white carnation coming out of his mouth, with no effort, no pain. He stared at the new addition on the floor as tears came running down his cheeks.
That was his punishment, an eternity spilling white carnations, and he would do it as he formed another corporeal body – in the next few centuries – and would continue after that. Coughing and coughing his failure in cherishing the love of his eternity.
Because that was the punishment Lucifer chose for himself, a constant reminder of what he lost. With one last look at those pristine white flowers on the floor, Lucifer turned around and started to walk through the maze of corridors and doors that was Hell. At every step he took, he coughed another white carnation, leaving behind a trail of flowers in his wake.
He would never forget of the pure love he carried in himself. Because he refused to forget her, he refused to forget those feelings that made him more alive than he felt in eons. And if the price he had to pay was to stay even more eons in Hell and cough carnations? He would gladly take it.
Because Chloe was worth it.
A/N: So, hello there! It has a long time since I saw you last… I'm so sorry about that guys. After all that cancellation thing, the campaign and all, I felt slightly burnt out… And with it, I had to take a step back of the fandom because even both reading and commenting were starting to look like a chore, and that wouldn't do.
But here I am again, and hopefully back completely. To those waiting for 'You Know Me' know that I'm working on the next chapter, and those waiting for 'Breaking down' that story will go through a massive re-writing, so… Yeah, it will take a little while.
Hope you liked this one, let me know in your comments!
See you around!
Nath :*