I am very bad at regular updates, I do apologise.

Chapter 13: Forget Purgatory

Chloe climbed out of the car and looked up at the church. There was already a bustling police presence around the building keeping the curious onlookers at bay. Lucifer rounded the car and stood by her shoulder looking up with the usual distrustful look on his face. He wasn't a church person.

"Three bodies in four days, this guy's something else." Chloe said sadly. Lucifer put his hand on her shoulder. She looked up at him and smiled. "Come on, let's get to work." She ducked under the crime scene tape and followed Beckett and Castle into the church.

The scene was horrific. Chloe had seen the crime scene photos from the previous murders, but nothing ever came close to the real thing. This body had been thrown unceremoniously down the central church aisle, it lay in a crumpled pile. All across the floor in front of the altar were the bloody words. Chloe shook her head as she examined the body. Beckett sighed. "We need to find this guy." She said, looking over at Chloe. "He's going to rack up a whole heap of bodies if we don't do it soon." She cast her gaze over the body. "And he's getting more and more disrespectful with each kill."

Chloe looked over at the words which were being photographed by CSI. "Well hopefully this phrase will confirm our theory and we can start working up a suspect list." She looked around, however Lucifer had disappeared. "Damn it."

Beckett and Castle looked about as well. "Where's Lucifer?" Beckett asked, she looked worried, clearly she didn't trust Lucifer. Not that that was anything new. Anyone with any sense didn't trust Lucifer.

Chloe gritted her teeth in an attempt not to just yell for him. "Do you have any good looking lab workers?" She asked, still looking around, Lucifer wasn't exactly easy to hide.

"Why?" There was a definite note of concern in Beckett's voice now. Castle just looked intrigued.

Chloe propped her hands on her hips as she caught site of Lucifer talking to a good looking black woman with a clipboard. He was flirting, she could tell. "Because Lucifer has the attention span of a goldfish and thinks mostly with his downstairs brain." She made for her partner.

Resisting the urge to kick him firmly in the shins Chloe settled for clearing her throat suggestively. Lucifer turned to look at her, he was definitely in full flirt Chloe recognised the smirk on his face. "What are you doing?" She demanded sending an apologetic look at the poor woman Lucifer had ensnared. She had the happy slightly glazed look most women got when Lucifer actually turned up the charm. She had been told it was quite devastating, mostly Chloe found it extremely annoying.

"I'm just discussing the finer points of blood-letting with Laney here." Lucifer told her defensively. "It's very interesting."

Chloe rolled her eyes. "I'm so sorry Dr. Parish. We'll let you get on with your work." Chloe had noticed the lanyard ID around the woman's neck. She grabbed Lucifer by the arm and dragged him towards the words in front of the altar. It had become a slightly surreal thing to do. After all Chloe knew Lucifer was easily strong enough to prevent her pulling him around, but he always let her do it.

Dr Parish's words floated after them. "No worries."

"You are supposed to be helping, Lucifer." Chloe hissed at him releasing his sleeve.

"I am helping." Lucifer insisted, tugging obsessively at his cufflinks.

"It would be more helpful if you could translate the new phrase." Chloe pushed him towards the altar.

"Very well detective." Lucifer sighed and stepped around the body, up onto a pew and looked down at the Enochian words.

While Lucifer read their newest clue, Chloe turned back to Beckett and Castle who were talking to Dr. Parish. "Sorry about Lucifer, is there anything new?" She asked. She knew that the doctor wouldn't be troubled by Lucifer's attentions, people never were. However it didn't exactly make a good impression on the NYPD detectives. Laney chuckled and glanced over at Lucifer with a definite look of longing in her eyes. "No need to apologise. The man is fine."

There was a soft grumble and mutter from Javier. Laney gave him a frosty look and turned back to Chloe. "I don't know how you get any work done."

Chloe sighed. "I wonder that sometimes myself. Though that has less to do with Lucifer's looks and more to do with the fact that he is very easily distracted."

"I wonder what that's like." Beckett said, flicking a grin at Castle who smirked back.

"Well that answers a few questions." Lucifer said brightly as he edged himself into their little circle. Laney gave a flirty smile which Lucifer returned eagerly. Chloe would definitely have to have a talk to him later. He had slept with most of LA, Chloe didn't want him to start trying the same trick with New York.

"What questions?" Beckett asked. "What does it say?" She glanced at the otherwise nonsensical scribbling.

"For I shall cast the sinners down." Lucifer pronounced, like this meant something to all of them.

Castle nodded seriously. "It would explain the position of the body, like it's been cast away. But it throws our theory about Purgatory out the window."

"Forget Purgatory." Lucifer insisted with the same absolute delight he always had when he had managed to wrangle a juicy secret out of someone. "I know what this killer is trying to say."

They all turned to look at him. Lucifer had a wide grin on his face, obviously enjoying the fact that none of them had any idea what he was talking about. Chloe sighed and threw herself in. "What are they trying to say?"

"It's a romanticised version of what the angel of death said after she had flown over Egypt. Azrael always had a habit of being over dramatic if father asked her to do something she didn't like." Lucifer explained. "Glory and Hallelujah to God's shining city, open ye the gates of Hell that I may cast the sinners down and enter me unto my place on high."

"So there's only one more line." Javier said. "So probably only one more victim."

"That's a good thing." Castle stated, looking around at their third foray into the deranged mind.

"Unless after killing his fourth victim our killer disappears for good. If we can't get him before he kills again, we might never find him." Chloe pointed out. A detective's worst nightmare was losing a killer in the city crowds; to never know if he was going to strike again and to never get closure for the families of the victims.

Beckett held up her hands, she was frowning intently. Chloe could guess she was trying to translate through Lucifer's apparent babble. If only she knew. Chloe pinched herself firmly, she really wouldn't wish that knowledge on anyone else. Finally Beckett spoke. "Ok so we know what the last line is likely to be, but it doesn't tell us who the killer is or what he's going to do next."

"Well it kind of does." Castle insisted. "He's telling a story. The bodies positioning and the people are matching with what the Enochian phrases are. When he talks about heaven we have holy positions, when he talks about hell he casts them as penitent souls."

"He's illustrating his point." Chloe supplied.

Castle nodded. "The last line is about heaven again, so we aren't going to be looking for a criminal, we're looking for an innocent."

"That doesn't narrow down the location at all." Beckett shook her head. "Or a likely victim."

"What about the rest of the story though?" Castle said, he turned to Lucifer. "You said the phrase was spoken by the angel of death after she flew over Egypt."

"Yes." Lucifer looked intrigued.

Castle was getting into the swing of this now. "So assuming you mean the plagues of Egypt, maybe this is about freeing something. The whole plagues thing was about freeing the slaves."

Lucifer shook his head. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but you're missing the point." Lucifer looked around them. "It's not about when it was said, but why it was said. If you just wanted to make a point about freedom you'd write in English so the locals could understand."

Chloe nodded. "Lucifer's right. Why is he writing in Enochian?"

"He's trying to get heaven's attention." Lucifer summed up frowning. "Well if he's trying to get Dad's attention he's going to be waiting a few millennia." Lucifer scoffed.

Beckett shook her head. "Heaven's not real."

Before Lucifer could jump in and correct her Chloe cut him off with a hand on his sleeve. "It doesn't have to be, our killer just has to believe it is." She steeled herself. "And if he doesn't get what he wants from his first phrase I think we can be pretty sure he'll keep killing until he gets the attention he wants."

"Which means we will be looking at a lot more bodies unless we can find this guy." Beckett looked frustrated. "And he works fast, we've had three bodies in four days. We probably don't have long until he next victim shows up."

"Best hurry then." Lucifer suggested.

The phrase my killer is using is entirely made up, any similarities to anything already written is entirely coincidental.