Disclaimer: I do not own Lucifer or any of its characters.
Also, slight spoilers for Season 2 Episode 13. This will have some of the key features of the episode however I will be interpreting them and creating a new idea.
Authors Note: Sorry for it taking me over a year to post another chapter. I am in college and finding time to write for fun is very challenging. I guess you can thank COVID-19 for this chapter. Please enjoy and stay safe and healthy everyone. If you are feeling depressed, suicidal, or like you might hurt yourself, please reach out to someone. You are valued and you are important.
Trigger warning: Mentions of self-harm, suicidal thoughts, and substance use.
Summary: When Lucifer ventures to Hell to collect the antidote for Detective Decker he becomes trapped in his own personal hell loop with no one to pull him out. Somehow, he escapes but the experience may have broken the perfect man everyone knew him to be. Coming back alive at the last second, he is able to save Chloe's life but the heaviness in his heart increases with every passing day until finally he makes a huge mistake. It is now Detective Decker's turn to save her partner.
The Devil's Mistress
Chapter Two: Beautiful Devil
Lucifer wandered around the penthouse, drink in hand, as he tried to think about something other than murdering himself. It was such an absurd idea. The Devil...commit suicide?! Lucifer laughed before quickly downing the drink and pouring himself another. He needed to do something to keep his mind off of whatever was going through his head, but the Detective still had a day of observation left at the hospital and then she wouldn't be back at the department for another week. He wasn't even sure he wanted to see the Detective but doing his job was always a pleasant distraction. Chugging down his millionth drink Lucifer slammed the cup down onto his in-house bar and quickly stepped toward the elevator. Taking a deep breath, he entered the lift, pushed the button and closed his eyes trying to block out the memory of seeing his brother just beyond the closing door. He rode down to the ground floor and waited for the subtle ding that meant the elevator had stopped and the doors were opening before he let himself see where he was. He could tell his heart was beating at an irregularly fast pace and it felt if ice was running through his vein. As quickly as he could he got out of the horrible contraption and went to the main bar to get another drink before heading to the piano. Maybe running his fingers over the keyboard would lift his spirits. It had been a helpful distraction in the past. Sitting down on the black bench he stared at the beautiful instrument in front of him. He set his drink down and pressed his fingers into the keyboard. The first couple of notes that echoed through the nightclub seemed to take away some of the weight in his chest. He wasn't thinking about what he was playing, allowing the music to flow through him, letting his appendages do whatever they wanted to. It felt relaxing and peaceful especially since he had been unable to sleep the night before.
What his devilish fingers wanted to play however was not in their master's best interests because a few of the notes they chose broke through the bliss, causing memories of Hell to push themselves into the peaceful serenity within the melody. Sighing, Lucifer stopped playing, shaking his head in an attempt to physically rid his mind of the bothersome images. But it didn't work. "Bloody hell!" Standing quickly, he swiped the scotch off of the piano and walked away frustrated that even music couldn't keep the demons at bay. He needed to find something better to do. That's when he got an idea. He knew exactly what he needed. The devil needed a weekend of women, booze, and fun.
Lucifer
Cracking his eyes open the dark-haired man smirked to himself, remembering the previous night. Lifting his head up slightly he looked around and counted no less than three women scattered across his king-sized bed. It had been a glorious night. He might even have outdone himself this time. What surprising him the most was that he had been able to sleep.
Slipping out of the tangle of limbs, he got cleaned up and let his bed mates sleep off their evening. Chloe had been out of the hospital for two days now, but he was trying his hardest to avoid her. She had texted him after she had gotten home, but Lucifer had elected to not answer. Whenever he thought about the Detective it seemed a familiar weight settled into his chest. It was the same weight that he had been trying to relieve himself of all weekend. He didn't like it. He had women, booze and plenty of fun but again, nothing he had tried really seemed to help. Maybe exhaustion finally had hit him, which is why he had been able to sleep but nothing, not even a proper night's sleep had lessened the ache in his heart. If anything, the ache had grown over the weekend. Every time he was with a woman other than Chloe a few ounces were added to the pounds that his heart was packing on. Glancing at a clock he saw that is was only 10:00am meaning that it was a bit early for a drink but shrugging it off he turned to his liquid courage. He would need it in order to face a day of torture. Torture. It was the perfect word for what he was going through. No matter how hard he had tried, his mind always found a way to remind him of Chloe and the ordeal in Hell. Even with a plethora of women, the distraction only lasted a short amount of time. As much as he hated to admit it, he was really starting to like the idea of getting back to work with the Detective. He knew that being around her was going to be painful but finding and stopping a bad individual would give him something to focus on other than the torture of his own mind. "One more week…" he mumbled to himself as he tossed down a glass full of scotch. Turning to look into his bedroom he sighed again at the tangle of arms and legs that still littered his bed. He could waste more time the same way he had done for the weekend by the idea did not interest him. Then a thought popped into his head. He could go to work and assist Dan or some other detective while Chloe was being required to stay home and recover. It was the best of both worlds. He would be able to have that distraction he so desperately desired while also avoiding the subject of his pain. Grinning to himself he changed from his casual clothing into his best, investigation suit and walked toward the elevator. Just as he was about to push the button to summon the elevator, the doors popped open and Maze strolled out. "Ah, Mazikeen! I was just about to head out. You are welcome to stay if you wish. There are a lovely bunch of women pilled on my bed if you are interested." The female demon looked at him with a slightly perturbed look. Her former master had not behaved this way since before he had started growing closer to Chloe so to see him acting this way now, so soon after having returned to Hell, was slightly concerning.
"I'm here for my knives" Maze stated simply, choosing to ignore the hint of worry that whispered at the edge of her consciousness. She walked to where the demon knives were hidden and
snagged them before sweeping back to the elevator.
"I see we are both going to be hunting down the bad guys." Lucifer chuckled as he and Maze stepped through the mechanical doors. "I am going back to work." Maze looked at him with confusion.
"Isn't Chloe not allowed to go back to work for another week?" Lucifer nodded.
"She is, but it might be a good thing to have some more bad men off the streets when she gets back. Allow her to ease back into things. Don't you think?" The doors shut and Lucifer's breath hitched for just a second before he turned his mind to the fact that Mazikeen was in the elevator with him. She hadn't been there when he had broken away from Uriel. Shaking his head slighting he looked as the demon. Maze noticed the tension in her friend and the hint of worry strengthen ever so slightly. For the rest of the ride down to the ground floor and as they walked out of LUX, Maze and Lucifer chatted about random things. Once they reached the street, the two said goodbye to each other and the dark-haired man hopped into his iconic car and drove to the police station.
Arriving at the station, Lucifer walked into the bull pen and looked around at the commotion. Taking a deep breath, he took in all of the sounds, smells and sights of his job and it brought him a moment of peace. Spotting Dan, he put on his trademark smile and headed toward the man. "Ah Daniel," he called once he was within earshot. The man whom he spoke to visibly tensed before slowing turning around to face the annoyingly handsome consultant.
"Chloe's not here" Dan said gruffly before trying to continue what he was doing.
"I know! I'm here to help the rest of the precinct while the Detective is resting. We can't let the bad guys run the streets while she is on bedrest." The way the devil said it made Dan grind his teeth. This man acted as through it was not his fault that Chloe had been poisoned in the fist place. Taking a moment to calm himself down, finally Dan responded telling Lucifer that he needed to talk the to the Chief before he would be allowed to work with anyone other than Chloe. "Thank you, Daniel, for that wonderful advice." Dan shook his head in frustration as the taller man floated away toward the office of the Chief of Police. The former detective knew that this week would be a complete disaster without Chloe to reign in her crazy consultants' behavior.
Lucifer
The week had gone by relatively quickly for the former ruler of Hell but now that it was the weekend, he was faced with the same issue he had been the weekend before. He had nothing to distract him from the storm that raged in his unconscious mind, so he decided that he did not want to feel the next several days. That weekend was spent with copious amounts of alcohol and various types of drugs that numbed his awareness and kept him in a sedated state. At some point, Lucifer vaguely remembered, Maze came to visit but the only think that told him that it really had happened were the demon knives that had been returned to their hiding place in his penthouse. Once Monday morning rolled around, Lucifer felt awful. He rarely was affected by the various substances he used however, the amount of them and the combination he had taken throughout the past three days left him with a splitting headache and light sensitivity. Groaning, the devil puled himself off of the ground and forced himself into the bathroom where he took a shower and tried to look semi-presentable for work at the police station.
He knew he probably shouldn't have driven but did. Once he finally pulled into the station, car parked crookedly, he stumbled into the bull pen and collapsed into an empty desk. Noticing the stack of files that was resting on the wooden surface Lucifer started flipping through them out of curiosity. Unbeknown to him, Dan had seen him walk in and the officer was seething with anger. How dare Lucifer stumble in like he owns the place and then start looking through case files without permission. Storming over to the tall man, Dan snatched the file he was currently looking through out of Lucifer's hand. Lucifer tried to protest the sudden removal of the paper in his hand, but his shout turned into a hiss of pain. He looked down at his palm and noticed a long papercut that was starting to develop beads of crimson liquid along its length. Lucifer was confused for a moment at how a simple file had hurt him when he remembered what day it is. Monday… a week and a few days after Chloe got out of the hospital… this was the week the Detective was returning to work.
Right at that moment, applause broke out across the bull pen. Turning around Lucifer looked up at the balcony where Chloe was standing looking out at the crowd. She had a soft smile on her face as she waved to her coworkers but when her eyes fell onto Lucifer her smile grew even wider. At the same time however, Lucifer's heart felt like it was twenty pounds heavier and he was finding it hard to breath. This was the first time he had seen her since the hospital and… the hospital… where he died and went to Hell again. "Lucifer?" The tall man snapped out of his internal torment and realized that Chloe was standing right in front of him looking at him like she was expecting him to say something in reply. When had she gotten there?
"Huh?" He shook his head clearing the rest of the fuzziness from his mind. "Sorry, what did you say?" Chloe glanced at Dan who have her an eye roll at the consultant.
"I asked how things have been going without me, but I now see that I need to ask if you're okay." She looked him up and down assessing the state he was in. She noticed that he still had sunglasses on even though he was inside, and his usually pristine suit was slightly rumpled and untucked, each a sign that he was not entirely sober or that he had a severe hang over. She also noticed the way he was holding his hand in a strange manner and when she looked closer, she saw what looked like a pretty nasty paper cut running across his palm. "You're cut." She chose to ignore the other issues as she pulled his injured hand toward her in order to inspect it further. Lucifer hissed in pain again and Dan couldn't help but scoff at it. It was funny to the former detective that something as small as a paper cut could be such a nuisance to the consultant. He also was pleased with the fact that he had been the one to cause Lucifer the smallest of annoyances when the man was a large one in Dan's life.
"Serves you right for looking through files you have no right to." Dan said receiving a warning look from Chloe. He set the suspect file back onto the desk and turned to walk away. "Good to have you back Chloe." Once the other man was gone Chloe pulled open the drawer of the desk Lucifer was sitting at and pulled out a small first aid kit. It was only then that Lucifer noticed that the desk he sat at was his partner's. As she patched him up, the tiny amount of pain from the new injury was clearing Lucifer's mind of the storm that was raging inside. Being this close to her was suffocating him with the memories of what had happened. He wanted to pull his hand away and retreat from her, but he realized that the physical pain he was experiencing was actually helping him battle the mental torment.
"So… How have things been while I was gone? You never texted me back after I got out of the hospital, so I wasn't sure you were going to be here today." Chloe finally let go of his hand and Lucifer felt slightly disappointed.
"Well Detective, the Chief had me help with a handful of cases over the past week. All the criminals were caught, all thanks to me of course." Lucifer put on his signature smile and tried to focus on something other than woman in front of him.
Chloe noticed that Lucifer was avoiding looking at her, but she chalked it up to the fact that he was definitely hung over. It annoyed her that on her first day back, her consultant was not at his best however, she knew that her hospitalization must have been hard on him too. They had grown quite close before she had been poisoned and she knew that he had been instrumental in helping save her life. She was not sure exactly how he got the recipe for the antidote but however he had, she was glad he did. Keeping that in mind she had decided to give him some room after she got out of the hospital and she didn't want to push him too hard about his hangover, especially on her first day back. "Sounds like you kept yourself busy." She picked up the files on her desk and turned to him. "Are you ready to get back to work?" The tall man quickly hopped out of the chair and headed off with the Detective to hunt down more bad guys.
Lucifer
Stumbling into his penthouse Lucifer collapsed onto the couch. He was glad to see that the women were gone, meaning that he did not have to play the gracious host while he was completely exhausted. The day he had spent with the Detective had been one of the hardest since he had returned from his former domain. Throughout the day he was fighting against flashbacks any time he had nothing to focus on during their case however, during those times, he also found that he was pressing his thumb into the bandaged area of his palm, relishing in the peace that the physical pain brought his mind. Thinking about it now Lucifer realized that, when experiencing the pain in his hand, it was the most peaceful he had felt since he came back to life with the antidote for Chloe. The paper cut had lightened the weight of his heart, had calmed the storm in his mind, and helped him banish the images of Uriel he saw while standing in an elevator. Pulling himself off of the couch he changed into his pajamas and then went to the bar to pour himself another scotch. Standing by this personal bar he found his eyes falling onto the place that Mazikeen stores the demon knives. This caused an idea to pop into his head. Moving over to the small box that held the weapons he set his glass down and pulled the wooden container onto his lap. Opening it a small grin pulled at the corners of Lucifer's mouth."Hello you, beautiful devil." Lucifer said to himself as he held up one of the blades in front of his face. The light glinted off the edge in a way that sent a cold pang throughout his body. He had an idea and it was a devilishly terrible idea.