The sunset cast red-gold light behind a weary and emotionally strained group of humans, angels, demons, and one Devil.
The latter seemed to be the only one with any significant cash, so he got Ella and the Detective loaded into two cabs and sent home. Lucifer passively hoped Daniel wouldn't catch too much hell from his wife, whoever she was.
He really wanted to get to the bottom of this nonsense about there being Ella and Dan but no Chloe here. Especially with the first two being dead ringers, down to Ella's enthusiastic hugging and Daniel's...Dan-ness.
In the meantime, he had to get back. WIth both him and Maze being gone, their humans might get worried. He probably should have left Chloe a note but this wasn't supposed to go this long. Amenadiel hadn't turned up yet, and their phones still wouldn't connect. New sim cards were high on the list for the next day. No use crying over spilt angels.
Without any better ideas, they headed in the general direction of the brothers' ride.
Lucifer smiled when he spotted the Impala as their destination. "Ah, one of you has style after all! Lovely wheels, boys."
Dean was unmoved. "She was dad's. Gets us around."
"Pish. She's glorious. If you don't take good care of her, I'm taking her back home somehow. She can sleep next to my Corvette. Also black and silver, incidentally."
Sam rolled his eyes. He had the duffle over one shoulder, hesitating at throwing it back in the trunk where it wouldn't be accessible. "Well, you aren't riding with us, wherever we're going. I doubt anything here in L.A. is going to be in our budget anyway, so we'll have to drive out of town. I'd prefer not leaving either of you out of our sight, but five of us in Baby is out of the question."
"No problem, there are any number of L.A. inhabitants who owe me favors. I can just-"
Maze counted down mentally.
Lucifer grumbled. "Right, hmpf. Perhaps I shouldn't have been so heavy handed with the booze. Maze, love, how much cash have you got on you?"
Their luck held out on at least one thing. Lucifer's American Express worked, at least for tonight. After some feet-dragging on the part of the boys, Lucifer housed them in one of his favorite five-star hotels, just around the block from the club, which was unchanged enough that he recognized the manager as someone he knew in his world and sweet-talked him into thinking they were old friends in this one.
The Devil himself happily scrubbed his damp, clean hair with a plush towel. He wore another one around his waist, having sent his suit downstairs for cleaning, with instructions to provide a second shirt, burn the socks he arrived in and replace those. He ordered an overnight bag packed with toiletries, to be sent up with clean clothes when they were done.
He sprung for a full suite- 'smoke 'em if you got 'em.'- while the card worked, with two bedrooms, two baths and a living area. He predicted their good fortune wouldn't extend beyond the next day before the card was canceled since the odds of it even working were low to begin with. Luckily, he'd eventually developed the sense to obtain credit cards with names other than 'Lucifer Morningstar' emblazoned across the front.
Sam and Dean rejected first attempts to order room service, but after Lucifer's Pittsburg style porterhouse, seared scallops, butter potatoes and steamed greens arrived, they grudgingly allowed him to call up for sandwiches. Lucifer obligingly added crisps, beer and apple pie.
Dean eyed the pie very suspiciously. "Why pie?"
"Who doesn't like pie? Seriously?"
Cas startled. He didn't seem inclined to remove his coat. "Dean, you...devour pie. You also use fake cards."
Dean snagged a slice with only a little reluctance. "No card I ever scavenged had credit limits that could get us in a place like this."
Maze, oddly enough, opted for sandwiches as well - roast beef. She ate leaning near the door, not letting her guard down just yet, matching Castiel side-eye for side-eye.
Lucifer, naturally, was oblivious. "Enjoy it! Sounds like you 'hunters' don't get nearly enough creature comforts."
Sam emerged from one of the rooms in a plush robe, also toweling his hair.
Lucifer picked up a few bread rolls, weighing them, but directing his gaze over at Sammy. "Well, don't you clean up nice. I don't suppose I couldn't persuade you to share my room?"
Sam jerked back, reflexively holding the robe closed. "Seriously? Aren't pining after some woman?"
He shrugged, juggling three rolls. "Can't blame a Devil for trying. She won't have me, alas. So I have to drown my many sorrows in whatever other lovely subject happens across my path." He didn't sound particularly distraught and he spared Sam another leer. Maze snorted.
Dean shot a look at Cas. "Is this normal? I feel like we've been saddled with a horny teenager whose balls have just dropped."
Cas sat on the couch. "I didn't exactly know him. Our Lucifer apparently took being kicked out of heaven a lot more personally."
Lucifer took some pie for himself. "Your boy sounds like a miserable fellow."
Sam tightened his robe, snatching a sandwich and beer quickly, and sitting next to Cas, as far from Lucifer as possible. "Yes, because all we really need to do is put him up in a nice hotel instead of Hell and maybe he won't try to fight Michael for possession of the earth."
"Michael is a prat in every universe." he looked in a mirror, squinting closely at his face. "Where's Dad in all this?" To Maze. "Darling, did you happen to get demon-napped with any liner on you?"
Maze rolled her eyes. "Really?"
"One of us out of this lot should probably look our best. Never hurts."
Sammy blinked.
He shot a look back at him before turning back to the mirror. "Vanity is one of my favorite deadly sins." He ran his fingers through clean hair critically. "I'll need product too."
Dean scraped his plate clean. "Dad?"
Cas rubbed his face. "He means God. And no one really knows."
"So, same as in mine then?" He cocked his head. "How about Mum?"
The older brother got more pie and a beer. "Can we leave this for later? What's the plan? And for the love of God, can you please just...stop being British?"
Lucifer looked put upon. "My American accent is atrocious. You really don't want to hear it."
Castiel cleared his throat. "The original plan was to borrow the blades. However, we still don't know why Mazikeen came through. We don't know why we haven't heard from Amenadiel, phone coverage area aside. If any of his powers work here like mine do, he should be able to find us eventually. There does seem to be some crossover on limitations, there might be some on abilities as well."
"There's a thought. Maze, can you turn into smoke?"
She responded with a rude gesture.
"I'll take that as a 'no'. What other activities do demons do here, other than rampantly murdering?"
Dean responded reluctantly. "They trade deals for your soul."
The Devil was offended. "This place gets worse and worse. Half the bloody population sends themselves to Hell anyway, why make deals for more?"
The other angel in the room tilted his head slightly. "They want power. The demons vie for position in Hell. More deals get you more power. Makes them harder to exorcise, harder to banish. Harder to kill."
That earned a snort from Maze.
"In any case, we'll try to avoid any...smoke demons."
Sam's phone pinged. Dean tossed it to him from the table. The younger brother looked at it curiously. "It's Ella. She regained consciousness and says she emailed several photos from the basement. I'm pretty sure she doesn't still think we're FBI agents though."
Dean broke out their laptop. "Go get dressed. I'll get these downloaded and we can have a look." He eyed Lucifer who moved to get out of his chair at the prospect. "Before I let you get near this thing, or me, what was it you did back there to Sam?"
Sam waited to hear as well.
"Nothing, just my Devilish mojo, as some call it. I draw out innermost desires. Some humans are more complicated than others and harder to crack. I'm not a Jedi...Do you have Jedi here?"
Double eye rolls from the brothers. Sam asked with a look over at Cas, "Not mind-reading then?"
"That'd be much more useful. Cut right to the chase. No, no mind-reading. Sammy there is far more resistant than most, in fact. I find it intriguing."
Dean snorted. Cas offered, "It's the truth. He's not a mind-reader, nor a mind-controller. He does compulsions. He's probably going to try it on you too at some point."
"Cas. Quit spoiling all my fun."
Dean glowered. "You do that, and you get a fist to the face."
"You do that and you'll have a broken hand. I'm no vessel."
"If you want our help getting back home, you need to abide by our rules. No mojo. No other 'Devil' crap on us you haven't told us about. On us or Cas."
"No more banishing my ride and you have a deal."
Dean clamped his jaw tight.
"For heaven's sake. My kind of deal. I'm not interesting in your souls. Any of you."
Lucifer turned to toss his hair towel back in the bathroom, earning a collective inhale from the other men in the room.
"Hmm? Right, told you had the scars to prove it."
