Part One: Dark One

Chapter Three: Rarely Pure, Never Simple

What do you think the Devil did,
after he fell from Heaven?

Did he curse the Lord's's name,
He most beloved by Lucifer above all others?
Did he nurse his wounded Pride with poison and fire,
to further stoke the furnace of his Wrath?

Did he vow revenge against all of Creation, and Man most of all,
to whom God's finest angel was expected to bow?
Did he take joy in depriving them of Heaven's light,
to suffer with him in the cold Darkness, abandoned?

I believe he did all of these things –
but first, I believe he wept.

He cried - not as the Devil, but as a son;
as a child cast out of home,
while his Father called it Love.

April 5th, 2011

Vetis waited for Adrienne to finish eating, circling his finger around the goblet of wine that Dakota had brought him.

She practically shoveled the food into her mouth without ever stopping to take a break and was done in less than five minutes. She seemed somewhat embarrassed when she stopped, and averted his gaze.

They sat in awkward silence before she spoke. "Why did you bring me here?"

"Because we need you."

"That is cryptic and creepy."

Vetis resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Fair enough. Let's start by explaining who you are."

"I know who I am." Her gaze was challenging, as though daring him to say otherwise. She has lost much in the past two weeks, but she refuses to lose who she is.

Vetis smiled apologetically. "My apologies. I should have been more clear. I want to explain what you are."

She felt like arguing, but it seemed pointless. Instead she asked him, "What do you mean?" It's more of a demand than a real question. Her voice is commanding and her gaze is stern. It's easy to see why she decided to study law.

Vetis stood up and started to walk around the table. "Who are your parents, Adrienne?"

Adrienne looked caught off guard. She narrowed her eyes. "Why do you care?"

He shrugged. "Just want to see if you get it right."

Adrienne was starting to get angry. How dare this man who she didn't know demand her family, her memories?

But he had saved her, and she had to believe that he would help her.

"My parents are Mariam and Josef Morgenstern."

Vetis shook his head. "No they're not."

Adrienne's hand curled into a fist as she stood up. Vetis held up one of his hands, palm out, to placate her. "They cared for you. Took care of you. Loved you. They thought you were theirs as surely as you do. But they weren't your parents, not really."

"Then who were?"

"Ordinary people that you were given to to keep you safe. Your real parents were Lorelei Abeln and Lucifer."

Several beats passed while Adrienne simply stared at him as though he were insane. Then she said, "Lucifer. My father… is Lucifer."

Vetis nodded. "Yes."

"Lucifer," she repeated. "As in… Satan?"

"Exactly."

A beat passed before she responded, "Okay… What have you been smoking and can I have some?" Deciding this man was insane and not wanting to take any chances, she carefully reached for the butter knife Dakota had given her.

Vetis smirked. "I assure you, Adrienne, I am not smoking anything. And you shouldn't either. It's… beneath you."

Adrienne lifted an eyebrow as she curled her fingers around the knife's handle. "'Beneath me'? Okay. Fine." She moved away from him under the guise of walking around the table. "So, Lucifer, huh? And I guess that makes you… what? A demon?" She stopped moving and looked him in the eyes. They were an ordinary brown now, and she found herself missing the red.

"A fallen angel actually."

"Fancy."

He smiled. "My rank grants me certain powers and privileges not given to others."

"Cool." He doesn't say anything. The silence and full and awkward, and crazy or not, it is wonderful to talk to someone again. She decides to try Dakota instead. "Are you a fallen angel too?"

She shook her head, seeming surprised at being addressed. "I'm a demon, ma'am."

"Really? What's that like?"

"It was hard getting here, but very much worth the pain. Ma'am."

She wonders what about being a demon was painful, but decided that would be too awkward to ask. "What makes it worth it?"

"You."

Adrienne drew back in shock from the pure conviction in Dakota's voice, the certainty that no matter what hell she had gone through, somehow Adrienne of all people would make it worth it.

The corner of her lip hooks itself into a smile. Then she started giggling. Giggling turns into full blown, hysterical laughter that leaves her clutching her stomach as tears poured from her eyes, hissing like acid when they hit the ground. She stops laughing, and then she's just sobbing pathetically, the knife making a loud clanging sound when it fell to the ground.

Vetis pulled Adrienne close to him, wrapping his arms around her like a protective cocoon. Her tears soak his shirt as he rocks her and hums, carefully running his fingers through her hair.

She calmed down after a few minutes. Although it might be more accurate to say she ran out of tears, though she still let out a sniffle every now and then. Finally she asked him, "What were they? The things that killed my brother?" She was certain now that they were things, not people. No person could do that.

"Angels."

Adrienne let out a harsh chuckle. "Is it bad that that doesn't surprise me?"

She wondered for a moment if she was going insane, if this was an elaborate hallucination that her mind indulged in before her body would allow it to give up. After all, men do not have red eyes, lights don't come to life and kill you, and smoke does not save you from said lights. Really, hallucination makes more sense.

"Why did they do it?"

For the first time, Vetis hesitated before answering. "They were trying to find you, but you hadn't gotten home yet. They left about an hour before you got there." He doesn't tell her that he had disabled the wards that would have alerted them to her presence

It occurs to Adrienne that she has never really felt guilty, or at least she doesn't remember it. Whenever people talked about it, it seemed like a minor discomfort that passed once the source of your guilt had left the room. But Adrienne felt as though she were drowning. She wanted to scratch her skin off, hated the feeling of being closed in by the walls, by Vetis's arms, even by her own clothes. She couldn't breath, her lungs refused to draw in air as the image of her brother's burnt out eyes imprinted itself on her brain.

Her vision started to blur, little beads of black and green and red gathering around the edges of her sight.

"Adrienne!"

Vetis shook her, snapping her back into reality. The dots retreated from her eyes, though her vision was still blurred from tears. She looked around. Vetis was holding her in his arms, an almost scared look on his face. Dakota had left, though she'd cleaned off the table before going.

When he was sure that she was alright, Vetis stood up and pulled Adrienne with him. "I think that you should lay down and sleep. You've been through much lately and this is a lot to take in."

He started to lead her to the bed, but she dug her heels into the ground, planting herself in the floor. Vetis looked back to her when her arm refused to move with him.

"I don't want to rest." Her jaw was set in a stubborn line. Her eyes held a sort of fire in them that reminded him of Lucifer's light, tempting Vetis to follow him, to never have to take another order from an absent father, to never bow to humanity, to fall. That same light was now contained within Adrienne, melded together with a human soul. The result was brighter than Lucifer ever was and just as thrilling. Just looking at her was like having fire running through his entire being, exciting and fresh and powerful.

"What do you want to do then?" He resisted the urge give into whatever she said. He needed to be logical, no matter how tempting it was to simply obey her whims.

"I want to know everything. I want to know why a bunch of freaking angels want me dead. I want to know what happened to my parents, I want to know what the hell is going on!" While she spoke, she took small, incremental steps towards him untelling she was yelling in his face with her fists clenched at her waist. Rage and pain were etched on her face in perfect detail. It was in the way her lips quivered and her jaw was set. She was beautiful, like a fire, destroying everything in its path before collapsing into ash. Vetis wondered if ash longed to burn again. To feel its flames wrapping around everything pure and good and reducing it to a pile of fancy dust and choking black smoke. To be warm again.

Adrienne breathed in heavily before realizing how close they were standing. She blushed scarlet and backed away. "I'm sorry," she said, eyes lowered and voice quiet, "I didn't mean to get in your face."

Vetis smiled kindly. "Don't worry. We all lose control sometimes. And you have more reason than most." He walked back over to the table and refilled her water glass before continuing. "You have every right to demand answers. The only problem is that… well, the truth is complicated. Are you sure you want to hear about today? There's no rush."

Adrienne shook her head stubbornly. "No, I want to know now. I need to know."

"Very well." Vetis sat down and gestured towards her chair. She sat down awkwardly, making the chair knock against the table. Vetis didn't seem to notice. He stared at the wall behind her, eyes cloudy and unfocused. She noticed, for the first time, little things about him that set him apart from ordinary humans. His back was too straight, his face too stiff. Every movement was intentional, with no awkward shifting or unconscious quirks. She realized he didn't breath. His chest had only moved up and down when he was speaking, but now it was completely still. It didn't freak her out as much as it might have once.

"When God," Vetis sneered the name, "first created the universe, angels were one of his first creations. It basically went Earth, a few awful monsters, angels. And it was… good. Perfect, really. I was an angel and I served God with my brothers and sisters. Lucifer though… He was the brightest, the most loyal. He and Michael were the most powerful angels-"

"What kind of angel were you?" Adrienne asks.

Vetis looked surprised that she had asked, but not upset necessarily. "A seraphim," he told her, eyes scanning her again, as though he had just noticed something about her that he had not before. "Your father was one of the archangels," he added.

Adrienne's heart skipped when she heard him say father before realizing that he meant Lucifer instead of Josef.

Vetis continues speaking, having not noticed Adrienne's mini-heart attack. "Basically, everything was perfect, and we were a big happy family, blah blah blah, a bunch of boring stuff no one cares about. And then God created humans."

"I know about that. Lucifer fell because he hated humanity."

Vetis scowled in annoyance, though not with her. "That's a vast over-exaggeration. Yes, your father didn't particularly care for humanity, but few of us did. They're… small and weak, but they wreak such havoc, even against their own. Especially against their own. But God wanted all of us to bow to them, to act as though they were above us when all they were were a bunch of filthy, murderous apes -" He caught sight of Adrienne's face and stopped talking before clearing his throat awkwardly. "Anyway. Lucifer decided to rebel against Heaven."

"And you joined him," Adrienne guessed.

"I did," Vetis said, dipping his head in a way that was akin to a nod, but not quite.

"You lost." Adrienne wasn't sure why she had felt the need to say that. It was probably just an attempt to regain some semblance of control.

Vetis had a wry look, as though to say 'No shit.' "Really? I hadn't noticed."

Adrienne smiled. It was a small, dull thing, but Vetis considered it a minor accomplishment.

"As I'm sure you, in all your infinite wisdom know, we were banished to Hell. Many of us died, but a few, such as myself, did survive." He paused then, his eyes haunted. "Adrienne… you need to understand what exactly Hell is."

Adrienne frowned in slight confusion. "Isn't it a place that some people go after they die?" She sounded as though she had read the information once and had never heard it mentioned again until now.

"Oh, it is so much more than that. It's a prison, one made of pain and fear that will make the strongest of souls long for oblivion. Lucifer was kept in a cage while the rest of were abandoned, but not forgotten. That would have been much easier." He paused before continuing, "Many went completely insane, and even now are lost within the worst parts of Hell. I… well I endured basically. Nothing else to do really, didn't exactly have Netflix. And it stayed that way for what felt like eternity." He paused, now standing directly in front of Adrienne. She stared up at him in morbid curiosity.

"How did you get out?"

Vetis smiled. "About four years ago now, a man with demon blood — long story — opened a Devil's gate — one of the Gates of Hell. Now, demons slip through the gates all the time, but they're few and far between. This unleashed a flood of hundreds of demons, including Lilith, the First Demon."

"And you," Adrienne added, still watching him with almost reverent eyes.

Vetis nodded. "Yes, but Lilith's the part you want to focus on right now. You see, Lucifer's cage was locked by 666 seals, which weren't so much physical things as events that needed to happen for him to be let out, and only 66 had to be broken for it to work. And Lilith was the only one that could break them."

"Where is she."

Vetis wasted no breath in telling her, "She's dead. That was the last seal."

"So Lucifer's… released?"

Vetis shook his head. "No. Well, he was, but he got put back in." Now Adrienne just looked confused, so he continued, "Lucifer was supposed to bring about the apocalypse, and it was supposed to end with him and Michael fighting to the death. But to do this, they each needed a specific human vessel, Sam and Dean Winchester, neither of whom were willing to play their part. Well one of them - Sam - did."

"Hold on, back up. Vessel?"

"Angels and demons don't have physical forms," he explained. "So we use humans to move around on earth."

"And the humans are… okay with this?"

"Well demons can possess anyone, but angels need permission. Of course, most of them aren't very good about the 'informed' part of 'informed consent'..." He gives Adrienne a moment to process this, delights in her horror, knowing that the information will only further cement her hatred of them. "But Sam knew what he was doing. Unfortunately, he was able to take control back and forced Lucifer back into the cage. Of course, the angels got him out." Vetis remembered his own anger from when he learned that the Winchesters' lapdog, Castiel (it shamed him to think they were related), had raised Sam Winchester, adding insult to injury. It had been the last straw, and he had immediately put his plans to retrieve Adrienne to him into action. "And that's basically where we are now."

"Okay, but what does any of that have to do with me?" So far, Vetis had not actually told her anything about herself.

One corner of Vetis's mouth hooked itself into a smile. "Lucifer saved Lorelei from a fire soon after being released. You were born some months later."

He watches the information register. Her brow furrows in confusion as she speaks, "But that was barely two years ago. I'm almost 20 years old."

Vetis shook his head. "No you're not. You look 20, and you have several years of memories to support that, but you're not. A spell was used to age you after Lucifer was returned to his prison so that you wouldn't be completely defenseless if you were ever found."

Adrienne felt as though the world were collapsing around her, confusion swirling inside her mind. "No… no, that can't be."

"I'm sorry, but it is. I mean, do you ever really think about any of your memories? Sure, they're there, but always in the background, always blurred, never in focus. It's because they're not real. The only ones that are are the ones that you've formed since you were placed with the Morgensterns."

She couldn't handle it. The thought of any of it being true was too awful, so instead she asked him, "Why would anyone do that? Put me with them? All it did was put them in danger."

"It wasn't safe here. After the Winchesters fucked everything up, a demon, Crowley, crowned himself the King of Hell. And he wasn't exactly fond of the devil. He's been killing as many of our followers as he can."

She misses the fact that he says 'ours'. Instead, anger begins to burn inside of her when she hears that the only reason her family is dead is because some dick with an ego-problem was killing off those who might have protected her.

"Okay. Say I believe all of this, believe you. What do you want with me?"

Vetis doesn't say anything for a while. Just looks at her, as though he's searching for something. Apparently, he finds it. "I want you to fix it."

… "You're gonna have to be more specific."

Vetis resists the urge to roll his eyes. "Yes, Lucifer's in the cage, but he doesn't have to be. Now, we can't break the seals again. That won't work with Lilith already dead anyway. But you're his daughter; you have power not seen since God up and left after the war."

Adrienne chuckles coldly. Power, she thought. Yeah right. If I had any real power, I could've saved Zac. Instead of voicing that particular thought, she said, "I don't have any power."

"Yes you do; it was masked when you were hidden so that the angels wouldn't find you. I guess that was pointless."

Adrienne didn't speak. She stared at her hands, twisted and still in her lap. Finally, she asked him, "What happened to my parents?"

Vetis looked at her pitifully. "The angels killed them. They were in the house; you just left before you could see them."

She was silent again. She didn't even seem to be breathing, she was so still. When she did speak, it was with a cold, emotionless tone, "What do you want me to do?"

The poem at the beginning of this chapter is "he lost so much more than paradise" by dvoyd on tumblr.