Title: Ties That Bind
Author: holydread / Elfhelm
Rating: PG-13
Series: Supernatural
Pairing/Characters: Lucifer, Sam
Summary: Free will is for those too blind to see, and Lucifer doesn't have the luxury of disbelief.

- - - - -

Lucifer felt it the moment he was risen.

Felt himself pulled toward this human, this speck of flesh and light - so different, so alien from his brothers. Felt himself be drawn forward, out of what Michael had meant to be his eternal punishment, toward this one small soul in a sea of billions. And he knew immediately, that this had been one to free him. Knew what that meant. The weight of destiny hung heavily across his shoulders and he burned with renewed fury at it all.

He circled his vessel, knew that even now he was following His will. Frustration and impotent wrath set his Grace on fire and he wanted nothing more than to use what was his to shout his indignation to the Host. Make them suffer as he had been made to suffer. Tear their world asunder and see if then, if at the end of it all, his Father would deign to acknowledge him.

Lucifer knew his vessel as he knew himself - knew him as he was made to know him. He accepted a new body, burned out the soul, and tried to make Samuel Winchester see the truth.

"Everything I am, everything you are, Sam, was written long before we walked this Earth. Long before you were born, before I Fell. We were made for this."

His vessel was resistant; he clung to anger and disbelief and Lucifer hurt for him, with him.

Lucifer could feel the thread of fate bringing them ever closer together. Could look back and see how the fabric of destiny had been carefully woven to bring them to this point. A series of impossible events, the manipulated causal tide pushing, rushing them to this moment, to this decision. He knew, the way his vessel refused to understand, that it wasn't a choice at all.

"You saved me from Hell, Sam, but we are neither of us Free."

And now, sitting with him in the dark landscape of his vessel's mind, Lucifer yearns for that freedom. Failing that, he craves vengeance for his torment, for his vessel's torment. His Father may not care to listen, but Lucifer will make sure that his brothers answer to him - to them both.

Even he cannot perceive the ending of His plan. He cannot understand the reason behind it, but he can see His hand in the irony of being created for - of Falling for - one of the messy, cruel, imperfect human beings he once denied. The only solace he finds is in the answering rage boiling just under the surface of his vessel. He will take his vessel's ire and he will still return to him; will wait in his dreams and accept him as wholly as his vessel must soon accept him in return. He will make him see that there is no escaping each other.

Lucifer sees - in the way that his vessel is only just beginning to glimpse - the enormity of what they are caught up in. And soon enough they will both bow to fate.

Samuel Winchester will say yes - it has never been a matter of choice.