Sternutation
All things considered, it was a lovely day. The sky was a beautiful shade of red that was soft on the eyes and there was a rare breeze that carried a welcome chill despite the dry heat. The proverbial cherry on top of that fine morning was the pleasant aroma wafting across the roof from the newly installed flowerbed.
Ever since the hotel's reconstruction, Charlie had taken the initiative of establishing a small garden on the roof as a form of therapeutic group activity. As it was, none of them had the ever aloof green thumb so the hellish roses had pervaded the majority of the plot. Alastor couldn't bring himself to complain. He quite liked their scarlet petals and the eerie eyeballs nestled betwixt them.
Alastor wasn't the only one who liked them. The King of Hell himself had also displayed some fascination to the little thorny bush. Though, in Hell, roses were more like an invasive vine, as was evidently displayed.
Alastor let out a contented hum as he draped one leg over the other and took a reveling sip of his morning coffee. The roof had become a new favorite haven of his at the hotel and he often found himself sitting at the glass drink table he had summoned some weeks ago and enjoying a beverage. Sometimes, he even allowed others to join him in company.
His moment of piece was abruptly disturbed when there was a ruffling between his ears and a sharp chirp of a noise. He might have dismissed it, not thought much of it at all but, given the circumstances of this particular morning, that noise could only mean one thing.
Sighing out through his nose, Alastor patiently set down his mug and instead used his hand to reach up. He reminded himself to be gentle as he grasped the petite bird nestled in his hair.
"Did you just sneeze on me?" he asked, doing his damnedest to refrain from acting on his growing frustration.
The yellow bird looked up at him from the palm of his hand, looking ever the epitome of misery and guilt. Then, as if to condemn itself, it let out another sharp chirp that was indistinguishably a sneeze. Fighting a growl, Alastor brought up his other hand and poked the bird on the beak. "That's well enough proof that this is too much for you. I believe it's time we've taken you back to bed."
In protest, the bird began to peck at his fingers. "Now, stop that," Alastor growled as he swatted at it. The act was little more than a love-tap but it was enough to have the tiny little thing toppling over. It would have fallen off his hand completely if Alastor hadn't flexed his fingers to catch it. "Thank you for proving my point. Let's be off."
If anyone could manage to pull a face whilst wearing the guise of a bird, it was Lucifer Morningstar. The King of Hell all but pouted in Alastor's cradled hands, looking up at him sullenly. "Don't give me that look," Alastor chastised, taking extra care to smooth out his steps and prevent any undue jostling. "I granted you the benefit of the doubt and went along with your pathetic little plea. It was you who decided to ruin it by sneezing in my hair."
Lucifer ruffled his feathers and again pecked at his fingers but the fight was gone. He was evidently exhausted. It didn't take long at all before he settled himself in the crest of Alastor's hands, using the curve between thumb and forefinger as a pillow.
"You should listen to me next time," Alastor said as he used a little magic to shift the stairs into a ramp so he could smoothly slide down. "I'm quite the well of wisdom, you know."
Lucifer let out a gruff squawk. Did he just scoff at me? It was hard to tell the emotions of a bird. As expressive a man as Lucifer was, it didn't all convey the same when he changed his shape. "Perhaps I should have you walk yourself back to bed. It would save me a great deal of trouble and effort." In display of protest, Lucifer somehow buried himself deeper into his hands.
"Are you always this pathetic when you're under the weather?" Alastor asked as he scrutinized the tiny bird. "Or do you simply use it as an excuse to do what you want?" Lucifer seemed to be ignoring him. No bother, Alastor had a knack for filling silent spaces. "You are quite the spoiled brat, aren't you? I might even say the wurst." Lucifer let out a noise that could either be deciphered as an indignant huff or a chortle. Alastor hoped it was a combination of the two. "While we're on the topic, do you know the difference between a brat and a wine snob? Nothing! Because all they do is whine!"
Lucifer let out another noise, one that was very distinctly laughter-sounding, and Alastor grinned in triumph. They were far from his greatest jokes, but they at least did the trick. If Lucifer continued to mope about as he had been, Alastor's day would have been completely and irrevocably ruined.
Feeling on a roll, Alastor continued whipping out one pun after the other as he made his way down the hall. Lucifer's mood seemed to be improving until the exhaustion fully pulled him under. When he heard the nasally drag of a long breath, Alastor ceased his jokes. He observed the sleeping bird with a contented grin. The frustration he had felt back on the roof had long since faded away and it was replaced with a sense of… well, he wouldn't call it affection.
Carefully, he curled one of his fingers and gently brushed it along the soft tufts of feathers adorning Lucifer's head. Despite himself, Alastor's smile grew and he began to hum a lulling tune as he concluded their trek back to Lucifer's room.
Using a shadowy tentacle to open the door, Alastor gracefully and silently entered the room. If anything should show Alastor's level of patience, it was the fact that he was opening doors instead of just slipping under them in shadows. Not that he couldn't do it with company, but such a use of his magic would undoubtedly disturb his passenger.
When Alastor finally made his way to the bed, he found he didn't quite know what to do next. Should he deposit Lucifer on the mattress? Or perhaps the pillow? As he stood there in silent contemplation, he fought the temptation to simply dump Lucifer on the bed as a way to properly punish him for his earlier reckless behavior. Or maybe hard impact with the floor will drop some sense into him.
A sharp pain in his finger drew Alastor out of his thoughts. With a blink, he noticed the room had taken on a darker shade and his ever-present static had grown into an aggressive screech. He immediately smoothed out his radio waves and retracted his shadows, effectively clearing the room of the malicious energy that had occupied it while he had been lost in his thoughts. He glared side-eyed at his shadow, who merely shrugged indifference, before looking down at Lucifer.
Lucifer didn't look angry but rather annoyed as he released Alastor's forefinger. "You were about to drop me, weren't you?" he accused in a huff.
"A much kinder alternative to the strangling I wanted to give you on the roof," Alastor defended.
While Lucifer couldn't be considered intimidating in Alastor's eyes, he was less so when in the form of a tiny bird. Regardless, the King of Hell glared up at him with narrowed eyes as if it would have any effect. "Put me down," he demanded. At Alastor's sharp smile, he quickly added, "gently."
"My, you are full of demands today." He considered for just the briefest moment of tossing Lucifer into the bed but something compelled him not to. Instead, he bent at the waist and rested his hands on the bed to allow Lucifer to hop off. The bird looked up at him, somehow managing a pout through that beak of his. "I'm not tucking you in."
Grudgingly, Lucifer hopped out of Alastor's hands. Promptly, he hopped over to the blanket and settled himself beneath it. It was then and only then when he finally transformed back into his normal – though still pint-sized – self.
"You look like death twice over," Alastor observed.
"Asshole," Lucifer grumbled as he rolled onto his side, back towards Alastor. The truth of the matter was, Lucifer truly did look awful. His already pale skin had taken on an ashy appearance, dulling his typical glow. Garish bags had formed under his eyes and his lines of age made deeper grooves into his skin.
"Now, that's a rather rude way of thanking me for this morning," Alastor said as he used the shadows to shift from one side of the bed to the other so he could see the king's face. He reached a hand out to rest it atop Lucifer's brow but he was swatted away.
"I feel worse. You don't have to prove your point," Lucifer conceded. He took a breath to say something further but it caught in his throat with a wheeze before he coughed.
Alastor brought both hands behind his back and patiently waited for the coughing fit to reach its end. "As I expected."
"Look, you were right. Happy? You win. Congratulations, going outside only made things worse," Lucifer bemoaned. He averted his gaze as his cheeks took on a dull golden glow. "But still… it was nice."
Alastor doubted that. "The flowers were hardly worth… this," he said vaguely as he gestured to Lucifer's worsened state.
Lucifer fixed himself to where his back was to Alastor again as he muttered something under his breath. Alastor took a second to try and decipher what he said before using his shadows to move back to the other side of the bed. "What was that? I didn't catch it."
Lucifer shot him an indignant glare, his lips pursed as he glowered at him. His eyes rested somewhere behind Alastor. "It wasn't about the flowers."
Alastor raised a brow and thought back to the conversation they had earlier that morning.
An unspoken routine had been established between Alastor and Lucifer in the hours before daybreak. With the King of Hell suffering from anxiety-induced insomnia and the Radio Demon unable to get much rest with the overactive radio waves during the night, the two often overlapped one another during their nightly rituals. Eventually, that overlap developed into casual interactions, typically resulting with them winding up in the kitchen over concoctions of coffee.
Then Lucifer went and tarnished everything by abstaining. Alastor roamed his usual path in the hotel and never once encountered the damned insomniac. While suspicious, he didn't let Lucifer ruin his morning and went about his usual business with the anticipation that the king would eventually join him. However, even as the sky began to brighten, Lucifer remained aloof, even when it came time to brew the coffee.
Finding Lucifer's absence suspect, Alastor decided to investigate only to find him in a pathetic heap of snot and sniffles. As it turned out, even a fallen angel could catch a virus. Alastor was endlessly entertained at the sight of the king fallen so low in a bout of simple sickness.
"You look an absolute mess," he observed with a pleased grin.
Lucifer had aptly responded with a nasally, "Fuck you, asshole."
They fell into their typical casual banter, albeit Alastor carried most of the weight of the conversation. Once Lucifer grew too drowsy to do much talking at all, Alastor grew bored. He announced his departure with the intention of drinking his coffee on the roof when Lucifer managed to pipe up again.
"Take me with you." The way he whined out the words, it was practically a beg.
That sent a shiver down Alastor's spine. "And why should I do that?" he asked over his shoulder. When Lucifer didn't respond right away, Alastor twisted to fully face him. "You're in a pathetic enough state as it is. Being out and about would only make you all the more insufferable. You'd be doing us all a favor if you just wallowed in your own misery for a while."
Lucifer wasn't deterred, however. He had been insistent and had an argument for every turn. In the end, he concluded it all with, "I want to see the flowers and there's nothing you can do to stop me."
That's what wound them on the roof, though Alastor couldn't quite recall at the moment what convinced him to let Lucifer nestle in his hair. "No," he said slowly with a dubious expression shot down at Lucifer. "I clearly recall you saying you wanted to see the flowers. Perhaps that fevered mind of yours has finally burned away any brain cells you may have had left."
Lucifer considered him with an incredulous stare, one brow slowly raising high into his hairline. "I can't tell if you're fucking with me or if you're really that thick."
Well, that was unnecessary, Alastor thought as his eye twitched. "Excuse me? Between the two of us, I do believe mine is the sharper wit."
"Father above, you really are that thick," Lucifer responded, a smirk gradually forming on his face. He rolled his eyes. "I'll spell it out for you, in payment for the sneeze."
"I believe you owe me more than some feverish ramblings."
"Shut up for a second. I know that might be impossible for you, but try and bear with me," he teased, the sickness seeming all but gone in that moment as his typical prideful grin made him radiate. "I wanted to spend the morning with you."
Alastor's static sputtered. "…Why?"
Lucifer laughed but the moment was short-lived before he fell into a series of wheezing coughs. "And you call me the pathetic one," he managed to say as they tapered off. "Think about it, Bambi, then get back to me."
The nickname was new and did nothing to help steady his already stammering radio waves. He left the room shortly after, his mind littered with questions. Why had he agreed to take Lucifer to the roof? Why had he allowed him to rest in his hair? And, most pressing of all, why had Lucifer wanted to spent time with him, of all people?
It didn't occur to him until significantly later that a virus that could take down the King of Hell himself might impact others. His own arrogance had made him blind to the possibility that he could get sick just as well, until it happened.
In his feverish state, whilst sneezing, wheezing, aching, and being just utterly miserable, he thought back to that fine morning with Lucifer cradled in his hands… and couldn't help but smile.