A/N: Yeah. Well. This wasn't an easy chapter to write. I couldn't get into the heads of any of the characters anywhere near enough to get a full grasp on it ... but I think I pulled it out in the end.

I thought Lucifer would be easy to write ... nope! I'm having difficulty reconciling his character on the show and the legend that I grew up with during Sunday School and what-not... mishymashy guh

That said ... I hope you find this chapter enjoyable. The next one will be fun to write, that's for sure... :)

~~oooOOOooo~~

Lucifer frowned a little with puzzlement at the Doctor's sudden frozen stance and looked curiously over the Doctor's shoulder. Hopefully if his mind could capture the same image playing before the Doctor's eyes, then the answer might present itself without him having to ask.

His lips parted in an open purse of concentration as he scanned the crowd for anything out of the ordinary. There was nothing. Nothing aside from his hired dancers, scantily clad waitresses and enamoured party-goers flirting and dancing any of their cares away. A familiar buxom redheaded woman he recalled from an encounter several days – maybe a couple of weeks – prior offered him a wink from across the room. Lucifer raised his whisky glass with casual and dismissive greeting, and went back to the scan of the crowd.

He caught the Doctor's voice of longing and abandoned his search to look toward him. Inside just a single syllable that seemed to hold so much utter devastation, Lucifer was able to very accurately determine just what it was that the Time Lord held so dear. At that moment he could easily visualize just what it was that was the Doctor's deepest and most repressed desire.

A woman….

With a smirk of victory, Lucifer scanned the crowd once more. This time it didn't take him too long to find the source of the Time Lord's focus. The Doctor wasn't exactly being subtle. He was locked on to a female – a very specific female, and when Lucifer finally registered the target of the Doctor's attention, he choked on his whiskey.

"The Detective, Doctor?" he barked hoarsely with little or no attempt to hide the incredulity.

The Doctor blinked rapidly and shook his head to shake the image of a beach and of a tearful goodbye. His eyes fell on the woman, again, and he exhaled a disappointed breath to see only a mere resemblance of Rose Tyler, rather than the woman herself.

Wishful thinking…

"My apology," he breathed out raggedly. "I thought I saw someone. A friend of mine." He tugged at his earlobe and swallowed thickly. "Of course, I should've known better. She's lost now. Gone. Impossible to see her again without breaking the laws set by my people and crossing back into her timeline." He dropped his hand and stared back into the crowd and toward the woman who held an uncanny likeness to his Rose. His voice was broken. "For all the good that would do me if I did cross it, anyway. Not a fan of watching from a distance, me. Even if the image is worth it, my hearts wouldn't handle it."

"Oh," Lucifer breathed with a mixture of discovery and empathy. "So this friend of yours was someone that you cared deeply about…"

"Care," the Doctor corrected sharply. "My affections for her didn't end because we were separated."

Lucifer took a draw from his glass and let his eyes fall toward Chloe Decker, who was now in deep conversation with both Ellie and Linda at the bar. He ignored the question in his mind as to just when had they become such good friends, and tightened his focus upon her,

He let his eyes rake over her head and shoulders in search of just what part of her might have reminded the Time Lord of a love lost. She was hardly physically remarkable. In this room of physical perfection, she didn't exactly stand out. If anything, even under the lights atop the bar, she seemed to be mired in the shadows of the beauty that surrounded her. Oh, she had many very remarkable qualities to her. He wasn't about to deny that. But to consider her looks worthy of being the mate to a Time Lord of Gallifrey? No. He would have expected almost ethereal exquisiteness from a woman to capture the hearts of a semi-immortal quazi-God such as the man who stood at his side.

Still. Detective Decker had captured the untiring attention of the Devil himself despite the beauty he consistently held at his fingertips. Then again, the perfection that swirled and swilled around him lacked any real substance to take a relationship beyond the bedroom.

…And even then, sometimes their performance when naked, panting and writhing on his bed lacked enough substance for him to justify wasting a perfectly good orgasm on.

"Tell me something, Doctor," Lucifer hazarded gently.

The Doctor twisted his neck just enough to offer Lucifer the full sight of his face. "What would you like to know?"

"Your friend." He lifted his chin in a gesture toward the Detective. "Is her resemblance to Detective Decker the uncanny sort; or is it just a ghost of similarity?"

The Doctor pursed his lips and turned back toward the crowd. He let his eyes roll over the casually dressed detective and then let them fall and hold on the angle of her jaw and the pout in her lips.

"She…" he paused and swallowed thickly enough that a dimple formed in his cheek and he had to lower the seat of his head to accommodate the movement of his Adam's Apple. "She is… No." He shook his head and schooled his expression to match the sudden confidence in his voice. "It's irrelevant. Rose is gone, and although I might see her image in the face and movements of perfect strangers, I'm never going to see her again."

"No?"

The Doctor shook his head. "No. I can't. It's impossible."

Lucifer nodded slowly, a small show of sympathy to his pain. "She's dead?"

The Doctor shook his head. While his posture still cried out sorrow, he smiled a happy grin. "No! No, not at all. She's alive. So very very alive."

"Then what's the problem?"

His smile fell. "It's a complicated event in time. One that not even a Time Lord or a-" he gestured toward Lucifer with a wave of his hand. "Celestial being can reverse."

Lucifer drained what remained in his glass and levered the Doctor a rather salacious smile. His voice left his lips with the smoothness of silk as he slowly lowered the glass to the table. "What would you do to see her again, Doctor. I mean if it was possible to make it happen."

"Not make a deal with the Devil," the Doctor answered dryly. "If that's what you're alluding to."

"Are you quite sure about that?"

The Doctor lifted a brow at the smokiness of Lucifer's voice, and of the sizzle of challenge in his stare. He didn't let it sway him. Tempting though it was, the Doctor merely inhaled a deep breath through his nose and shook his head. "I'm sure there's already quite a lien on my life already, Lucifer." He blew out a short breath before adding a barely audible: "All thirteen of them."

Lucifer let one side of his mouth curve up into a smile and he tugged a silver cigarette case from his breast pocket. "I'm not interested in your life, Doctor," he quipped as he took a short white stick from the case and popped it into his mouth. He curved his hand around the flame as he lit it with an expensive Dunhill-brand lighter. He spoke as he lit the cigarette, which muffled his words somewhat. "The Devil always asks for your soul when he makes his deals, doesn't he?"

The Doctor let out a single laugh. "That's something that's never been mine to sell." He lifted his eyes to watch the small stream of white smoke that Lucifer blew up toward the ceiling. "That's been owned by the Time Lord Council since the day I was loomed. My soul is to be encased forever in the almighty Time Lord Matrix." He looked back down to Lucifer, who seemed to be analyzing the cigarette in his fingers. "Which would be the equivalent to Hell, I would expect." He pursed his lips in thought for a moment. His voice quietened a little. "Been in there once, oh, back in my Fourth incarnation. Wasn't quite what I imagined it would be, all barren lands and lush swamps, death and destruction and rather vivid hallucinations."

"Seems to me that it isn't that much of a stretch to trade one for the other," Lucifer remarked with encouragement as he popped the cigarette in between his lips and then lifted his hand to take another drink from a passing waitress. "And who knows, perhaps you might find enjoyment from an eternity of bondage and torture." He chuckled and blew out a puff of smoke. "If you're that way inclined, of course."

"No, taa," he answered simply.

Lucifer huffed with disappointment. "Oh well. You're no fun at all, are you?"

He had to laugh at that. "I'm a Time Lord," he stated as much as scoffed. "Fun isn't exactly in our vocabulary." His face lengthened to seriousness. "And I really wish I was kidding when I say that. There truly is no translation of that word in my native language, ancient, or contemporary."

"How utterly devastating," Lucifer moaned. He then looked around the bar, taking in the local female attractions, and then looked back to the Doctor. His smile was wide and inviting as he gestured a sweeting movement of his hand toward the party goers. "Allow me to be the one to show you what fun and games this delightful little planet has to offer." He lifted a finger of argument when the Doctor opened his mouth to protest. "And I won't take no for an answer, Doctor. You sound like you need to live a little. You know what they say: When in Rome…"

"Yes, yes," the Doctor chirped impatiently. "I am aware of the phrase and its connotations, Lucifer. While I do appreciate the offer, I just have no desire to partake in the local attractions."

"But thank you anyway, of course," Lucifer finished with a smile and a shake in his head.

"It goes without saying, obviously."

"Well, no. Not really."

The Doctor's jaw gaped slightly and he rubbed at the back of his neck. "Okay. Then. Well. Thank you kindly for the offer to set me up with an attractive human female. Your kindness is very much appreciated, but I do have to decline. You see, I'm from a highly monogamous species that-"

"Oh, please," Lucifer scoffed with a roll in his eyes. "If I had a dollar for every soul who made that claim then I'd be very wealthy." He paused and his eyes brightened in time with a smile that stretched across his cheeks. "Oh, wait a minute. I am very wealthy."

"And to whom does the Devil deal when he wants something?" the Doctor teased playfully.

"Not my Father, if that's what you're suggesting," he answered with a laugh. The laugh then fell and he leaned in close to the Doctor as he butted out his cigarette into an ashtray beside his drink. "But in all seriousness, Doctor. Don't you want to spend another day with the one your hearts and desires yearn for?"

"Of course I do," he admitted quietly along a breath. "But to even try would risk collapsing two universes and I can't risk that. Not even for her."

"Are you very sure about that?"

The Doctor flicked a suspicious glance toward Lucifer. "Even if I could be drawn into temptation, my soul isn't mine to bargain with."

He grinned around his glass. "Who says I want your soul?"

"You're Satan," the Doctor stated firmly. "The Devil. What else do you want?"

Lucifer shook his head and rolled his eyes with obvious annoyance. "What good to me is a tortured soul except to hand off to one of my loyal demons to use as their own personal play-thing?" He shifted sideways just slightly to take a seat on a high barstool at the table and then indicated that the Doctor should take the other. "Hell is full of destroyed and evil souls of men and woman who fucked about and created mayhem and utter destruction during their short time on Earth. I really have no desire to add in the pathetic souls of men who only wanted their team to win the Superbowl, or yearned for some fame and fortune to make like that little bit easier to bear."

He leaned back against the back rest of the chair and checked the state of his manicure. "Truth be known, those types of people tend to pay their penance, so to speak, before they meet their … natural … demise." He lifted his eyes to the Doctor. "The grass isn't always greener, no matter what people might think. They tend to learn fairly quickly that fame and fortune and money are a curse rather than a blessing."

The Doctor nodded slowly in agreement.

"I'm a punisher," Lucifer continued. "The one tasked with bringing down eternal punishment on men and women who deserve it. I've got no interest in someone who's only sin is that they coveted a little more than what they already had."

The Doctor tilted his head curiously as he slowly took a seat after he has ensured that Martha had quietly taken one herself. "Then if it isn't souls you're after, what's the price to make a deal with the Devil?"

"A favour," he answered with a smirk. "That's all. Tit for tat. I scratch your back, you scratch mine kind of deal."

"A bit like the mafia," Martha noted quietly.

Lucifer shot her a look. Initially his eyes were wide and almost threatening, but the manic expression fell rather quickly. "I'd much rather not be compared to the Mafia, my dear girl."

"But?" she sked coyly.

He slumped. "But I can't really say that we are all that much different, I suppose. My father really is the original God-Father when you think about it." His face contorted into an expression of utter disgust. "Which actually thoroughly disgusts me to say."

"And what would that make you?" she continued. "His enforcer?"

He leaned toward her and lightly pinched her chin between his thumb and the crook of his finger. "I am the maker of deals, Martha Jones. The one who makes your most desperate desires come to fruition."

Martha stuttered and even whimpered slightly under his gaze. "I. I see."

"And what is it that you want most in life, you beautiful creature," he purred thickly. "What does Martha Jones want more than anything else?"

The Doctor watched Martha struggle to form words as she battled against Lucifer's intense stare. He still wasn't completely sold on this man being the Devil of Lore, but he had to admit that he played the game rather well. A lazy stretch of his telepathic senses told him that the man wasn't using any telepathic tricks to tempt Martha. It seemed that his companion was merely drawn in by the sultry good looks of a smooth talking pretty boy while under the influence of a pair of Martinis.

He leaned forward across the table. "Martha. Did you want to get going? I'm sure that we-"

"I'm fine," she interrupted quickly with a swat of her hand in the air between them. She didn't take her eyes away from the Tractor beam of Lucifer's gaze. "I'd really like another drink, though. Would you mind please getting me one?"

"I'd rather not leave you alone right now," he argued firmly.

Lucifer took his eyes from Martha. He smirked rather smugly at the gasp she inhaled as she was freed from his gaze, and looked toward the Doctor with an expression of promise. "Your companion will be quite safe with me," he assured him smoothly. "I vow to you that Martha will be right here when you get back from the bar."

"And your word is your bond," the Doctor muttered dryly. He flicked up a finger of warning before Lucifer could comment. "Know this. The last person you ever want to betray is a Time Lord. I have the ability to travel throughout all time and space, and I am not opposed to erasing you from time completely if I come back and Martha is in any distress what-so-ever."

Lucifer looked back toward Martha with a smile. "A very chivalrous man this Doctor, isn't he?"

"And protective," the Doctor warned as he slid off the stool. He thrust his hands into his trouser pockets and slowly made his way through the crowd toward the bar.

Lucifer was amused, and let his small chuckle show that. As he had only moments ago, he lifted his hand to pinch tenderly at Martha's jaw. "Now. Where were we?"

Martha swallowed thickly and avoided his gaze for a moment. She let her eyes flutter closed and inhaled a deep and steadying breath. She was unwilling to succumb to this man's charms as easily as she had done so only moments ago.

"Can I ask you a question, Mr. Morningstar?"

"Lucifer," her corrected softly. "And please. By all means. I am your attentive partner this evening."

That made her chuckle and she flashed open her eyes to offer him a deep chocolate stare directly into his own. "IF you truly are who you say you are, then what is the true cost of making a deal with you?"

"Oh," he breathed out with almost excited curiosity. "This conversation is taking a turn or the naughty. How exciting."

"Hardly," she answered with a laugh as she gently removed his hand from her chin. "I'm not really a person with any nefarious intent."

"That is disappointing," he sang with false displeasure. He sat back in the chair and cupped his glass in his hand. "But to answer your question. The cost of dealing with the Devil really does depend on the severity of the favour you want from me. It can range from a simple request that you linger in my presence a little longer than you typically would, to spending your eternity rolling around in my most humblest of abodes down deep below."

He rethought that and screwed up his face with argument against his own words. "No. Scratch that. No sense in sending you where I don't want to go, and I imagine that your request wouldn't warrant it anyway."

"Can I ask a favour for someone else rather than myself?"

His brows pinched in confusion to that request. "Well. I don't think I've ever come across that situation before. Normally by the time I've stepped onto the favour-scene, the request is rather self-centred toward the asker."

"But I can, right?"

He shrugged and lifted his glass to his lips. His eyes sparkled in the light as he regarded her over the rim of his tilted glass. "It doesn't hurt to ask, I suppose. Do be aware, though, that even though your favour might be for another's benefit, you will pay the price for it." He swallowed a small sip of whiskey and flicked his eyes in the direction of the bar to indicate the Doctor. "Not him." He looked back at her. "So do be wary of the cost of this favour."

Martha nodded. "Asking won't cost me anything, though, right?"

He grinned and shook his head. "No. Of course not. Although I might request a deposit that requires you to …" He let the remainder of that comment hang in the air between them. While he might not have finished it, he let the waggle of his brows add a little bit of innuendo to it.

Martha opened up at that point. She raised her head and parted her lips in a genuine laugh. She didn't stop her laughter until she felt his hand fall lightly on her knee. She immediately lowered her head and regarded him coolly before she dropped her eyes to his hand.

"In addition to the Doctor's warning," she breathed out through a smile. "Do know that I am perfectly adept at defending myself from unwanted advances."

He grinned and leaned back into his chair. "Very well," he purred. "I could quite easily convince you that there would be nothing unwanted about my advances, but you've intrigued me so I won't."

Martha mirrored his seat by leaning back herself. She quickly flicked her eyes toward the bar and to where the Doctor was waiting patiently for service, and then looked back to Lucifer.

"I want you to do something for him," she stated evenly.

"To bring his girlfriend back," he said blandly. He then pulled from the back of the chair and leaned forward on the tabletop. "A rather unselfish request."

"I'm a rather unselfish person."

"Pitifully so," he sang with a smile. "It's not something I'm ever going to understand with you lot. Humans. For every one of you who is a selfish arse looking only to sate their own needs, there's always another one of you willing to sacrifice it all and … well … be nice." He tipped his head to regard her with gentle curiosity. "There are those of you who will give it all up for someone else's happiness."

Martha shrugged. "I was raised by a good woman who believed in the words of our Holy Father to lead us toward a better way."

Lucifer rolled his eyes. "Yes. Well, I wouldn't really go about crediting him for the words that guide you. HE's not exactly-"

She held up her hand to stop him. "Don't rattle my belief, Lucifer," she warned. "It's what gets me through and I won't let you destroy that."

He smirked and flicked his hand in a request for her to continue. "Then do carry on."

"The most important person in my life right now is him," she tipped her ear in the direction of the bar. "I want him happy."

"You want him," Lucifer corrected. He lifted his hand to circle his finger in front of her face. "Don't deny your desire for him. I don't need to compel you to reveal your deepest and darkest desires, it's written all over you. You're in love with the Doctor."

"I. I love him," she agreed carefully. "I love him to bits."

"And you don't want me to instead help you fulfill the fantasies that swim inside your mind when you go to bed at night?" He waggled a brow. "I could certainly help make that happen."

Martha shook her head. "No."

"Liar."

She slumped and rolled her eyes. "Well. Sure. Every woman wants to have their fantasies realised – even if they know that their fancy is in the mystery and the danger of the man."

"Now you're talking!"

Martha chuckled and shook her head. "But what's the point when it's all just an empty encounter?" She watched his cheer fade and smiled ruefully. "If he is ever to be mine, I want it to be honest. I want him to come to me because he wants to fall in love with me, not because the Devil compels him to."

"Uh. Huh," he huffed with disappointment.

Martha covered his hand in hers. "I'll always be second best to the memory of Rose." She cringed to admit it. "I already am. And you know what? That hurts. Even if I didn't fancy the hell out of him, the fact that I'm basically compared to Rose every second of every day … well that …"

He lifted his hand and nodded knowingly. "Yeah. I understand where you're coming from." His eyes brightened. "Although I don't know how, considering I've never really had any problems with attracting anyone I desire." He flicked his eyes to her. "Present company excluded of course."

"You're just not trying hard enough," Martha ventured with amusement. She then held up her hand in a stop signal. "And that isn't an invitation, so don't even try it."

"I do love a good challenge."

She shook her head with disbelief. "You're as bad as he is, you know that?"

"Then I like him," he said with a wink.

"And so do I," Marth said seriously. "And so. I want to ask you. Can you give him what he desires more than anything else in the universe?"

"Are you even sure you know what that desire really is?"

"Rose," she answered quickly. Her brows then pinched together. "Or the return of Gallifrey. Oh. I don't know."

Lucifer blinked slowly and drew his glass to his lips. He tooka moment to draw back a deep steal of the amber liquid and swallowed thickly. After what seemed like a long moment, he licked at his lip and nodded his head.

"I'll tell you what."

Martha nodded eagerly. "Yes?"

"I can't really fulfill a desire if it truly isn't what your friend desires." He tipped his head to one side and winced just lightly in thought. "I could find a way to bring his Rose back to him. The cost for that, though. Well. I don't think it's a debt that you can repay." He shook his head. "Not at all, really. Something of that magnitude has to be his call to make. I know your intentions are disgustingly selfless and good." The expression on his face was one of repulsion. It fell quickly, however. "But you really can't ask me to do that."

Martha slumped. "I just want him to be happy. He deserves something anything." She exhaled a long breath. "He's just come back from having his heart broken all over again back in 1913 England. It's really not fair. Not when he does so much for so many."

Lucifer looked across the bar toward where the Doctor was still patiently waiting for service. His head was downcast and his hands fidgeted uncomfortably inside his trouser pockets. This was a fellow who needed a fast little pick-me-up. Fast and fleeting he could manage. He was good with the power of suggestion, and the downtrodden mind of a man in pain could be rather easily swayed.

"There is something I can give him," he offered almost distractedly. He looked back at Martha with a grin on his face. "You'll get your favour, but it'll be on a temporary basis, and by that I mean tonight only."

She looked mortified by that. "But one night's not enough! It'll make his longing for her so much worse."

A lazy smile spread across his face. "Indeed it will," he breathed out almost dangerously. He looked back toward the Doctor and brought his glass to his lips. He kissed the rim of the glass and then drew back deeply on it. "I have a favour I need of him," he whispered inside the glass. "And this will make it so much easier to be able to make that deal."

"What was that, Lucifer?"

"Oh," he coughed out quickly, with wide eyes softening in apology. "Just that if he has a taste of temptation, he might be more willing to embrace the happiness he truly desires." He smoothed out his smile and sizzled a look toward her. "I'll do you this favour. Free of charge."

Martha shuddered out a breath and nodded with an almost jagged movement of her head. "And how will you do it? Can you bring her back?"

Lucifer looked up and snapped his finger toward a scantily clad woman passing by. "Brittany, love. Come here will you?"

Brittany, blonde haired and full-lipped, curled around Luficer's body and sucked a lazy kiss against his mouth. "Yes, Lucifer?"

Lucifer languidly rolled his jaw with hers in a lazy kiss of promise, and then pulled away gently. He cupped at her cheek and looked deeply into her eyes. "I need you to do something for me, love. You think you can help me out?"

"Anything," she breathed in a rather stereotypical bombshell manner.

He nuzzled his nose against her ear. "I have a friend who needs some entertaining this evening." He felt her pull away with protest and tugged her back toward him. His nose dragged along the shell of her ear as he hissed into it. "I'm not asking you to sleep with him. Unless, of course, you both find that fancy – which I very much doubt."

She shuddered in his hold and then nodded. "Oh-kay."

He kissed at her ear. "Just be who he wants you to be, Brittany. Batt your eyes at him. Dance with him. Make him think he's your entire world."

She nodded as she breathed hotly through an open mouth.

"I'll make it worth your while, love," he assured her. "Consider it a favour to me, and I'll return that favour by granting you whatever little desire is running through that impossibly simple mind of yours."

She panted her acquiescence and nodded her head. "Sure thing, Lucifer."

"That's a good girl," he purred. He gestured toward the Doctor with a jut of his chin. "The man over there. The one in the coat. He's called the Doctor. He's a very long way from home, and very lonely right now."

She nodded. "Sure thing, Lucifer." She looked back to him and played with the collar of his shirt. "And when I'm finished with him…"

"Whatever you want," he promised her. "Anything."

Brittany pulled away from him and began the slow and sensual walk toward the Doctor. Lucifer watched her go with an arch in his brow and a look of appreciation on her arse. His eyes suddenly lifted. "Oh, and Brittany. Your name is Rose."