Lucifer stepped out of the elevator to his penthouse and headed straight for his decanter. Demons were possessing humans again? How long had something like this been going on? Was this an isolated incident or had it been going on for much longer with him none the wiser? And if it was the latter… what could he do?
"What's got your panties in a twist?"
Lucifer startled at the demon that came up behind him. She started helping herself to some of his whiskey.
"I've got a bit on my mind," Lucifer responded with a lick of the amber liquid from his lip. He placed his glass tumbler down and looked Maze up and down as she took her own sip, "Have you happened to notice any of your siblings visiting anywhere in LA?"
"My siblings?" Maze sounded confused. That came out of nowhere.
"I just came from a very interesting crime scene," Lucifer started to explain, "A body with multiple causes of death and no blood pool to be seen."
"Demon possession," Maze immediately understood.
Lucifer hummed in agreement.
"The Detective is already suspicious… and rightfully so," Lucifer set his glass back down, "She is a detective, after all."
"It was probably just someone going for a joyride," Maze shrugged her shoulder. She didn't seem too concerned.
"A joyride? I banned possession for a reason, Mazikeen," Lucifer didn't share Maze's blasé reaction, "Demons know better than to disobey my orders."
"It's not like you're around to enact any punishment," Maze pointed out, "You've been gone for quite awhile, remember?"
"Well, why would there be a sudden interest in possessing humans again?" Lucifer asked.
"It was a lot of fun," Maze looked reminiscent for a brief moment before schooling her features at Lucifer's un-amused expression, "Honestly, Lucifer, it's probably nothing to worry about."
Lucifer didn't look convinced, but he changed the subject.
"What are you doing back here anyway?" Lucifer gestured to the penthouse, "I thought you were busy sucking up to the Urchin after your abysmal behavior conspiring with Cain."
"I'm not sucking up," Maze defended herself. Lucifer just returned a disbelieving look.
"Okay, so I've been sucking up a little," Maze relented, "The kid's been getting tons of chocolate cake and cash out of the situation. She's learned well. I'm actually a little proud."
A look of pride washed over Lucifer's face as well.
"I'm still working on making things up with Decker too," Maze admitted.
"Yes, well, you did conspire with her ex-fiancé there for a bit," Lucifer pointed out, "Humans tend to hold grudges a little longer than us."
"Well, Cain's dead now, so that's a point in my favor," Maze smirked, "And it didn't start raining frogs after you killed a human, so there's that."
"True…" Lucifer took a thoughtful sip from his drink. Could demons possessing humans again tie in as a consequence for him killing a human? Or was Maze right and it was just one lone demon going for a joyride?
"Decker will come around in no time," Maze repeated. Lucifer wasn't sure if she was trying to convince him or herself, "Though, she has been acting a little weird lately."
"Weird? Weird, how?" Lucifer was immediately concerned.
"She's not her usual Decker self," Maze didn't know how to describe it, "While I was at the apartment one day, moving some of my stuff back in, I saw her sitting in the kitchen just staring at her phone on the counter."
"That is strange," Lucifer furrowed his brow.
"Humans," Maze gulped down the rest of her drink, "Who knows what goes on in their heads?"
"I'll keep my eyes peeled for any of my siblings while I'm out on a bounty, but I doubt it's anything," Maze tapped the bar with her empty glass, "I'll catch you later."
Lucifer nodded an acknowledgment that he heard her. He heard the elevator ding, signaling her departure before he downed the rest of his glass. Maze was probably right. One demon possession after thousands of years didn't necessarily mean there was a conspiracy afoot. He let out a long exhale. He should really get back to the Detective.
~*~
"That was strange, right?" Chloe asked Dan as she watched Lucifer's retreating form.
"Strange is kind of par for the course when it comes to Lucifer," Dan answered.
"Yeah, you'd know more about that than I would lately," Chloe commented as they started to walk away from the victim on the ground.
Dan gave her a confused look.
"I just noticed that you've been hanging out more often," Chloe shrugged her shoulder, trying her best to look nonchalant.
"Not really," Dan shook his head.
"I know I've said no to your invitations before, but… I was wondering if I could actually come join you guys for drinks next time?" Chloe asked. They stopped walking near the front door of the victim's apartment.
"Of course, Chlo," Dan replied, "You don't have to ask. In fact, it'd be nice to have you there."
Chloe nodded thanks, about to walk out the door, but stopped abruptly when something caught her eye. There was some red fabric sticking out of the front closet.
"What?" Dan noticed her noticing something.
"Did forensics sweep this section of his apartment yet?" Chloe gently nudged Dan to the side as she stepped closer to the closet and knelt down to look at the fabric a little closer between her gloved fingers.
"I don't think so," Dan replied to the back of her head.
Slowly, Chloe stood up and held the piece of red fabric between her fingers and with her other hand, she slowly curled her fingers around the doorknob to the closet to open it. As she opened the closet door, she let go of the fabric and it fluttered back into place. It was part of a cloak hanging up.
"Maybe he was into cosplay?" Dan suggested once he saw what had captured Chloe's attention. The cloak was a dark crimson color akin to the color of the one Doctor Strange wore in the Marvel movies.
"Maybe," Chloe absentmindedly replied. She opened the closet door a little bit wider and ducked inside. There were a few empty hangers. The only thing that was hanging up was the cloak. The back of the closet looked to be a wood panel. Chloe reached out her gloved hand and pushed on it. The panel slid back and the whole back of the closet clicked open to what could only be a secret room.
"Or not," Dan stated and followed Chloe into the hidden room behind the closet. Dan came to stand next to Chloe as they both looked around the room. It wasn't that large, maybe about twelve feet by twelve feet. The ceiling was maybe about a foot or two above their heads. The small dimensions were probably how Ivan was able to build a room into his already smaller apartment without the landlord knowing. Along the other side of the room stood a wooden table with some bowls and jars filled with things the two detectives weren't sure they wanted to guess were atop it.
The floor creaked below both of their feet as they slowly surveyed the room. There was a design about six feet in diameter on the floor in dried red paint that Chloe couldn't make heads or tails of – only that it looked like something from that long-running CW show Ella and Trixie would go on about all the time. What did they call it? A Devil's Trap? It was too bad Lucifer had run off, who knows what sort of comments he would have about this discovery.
"Looks like this guy wasn't as squeaky clean as his landlord thought," Dan commented.
"Yeah," Chloe agreed as she stepped closer to the table on the other side of the room. There appeared to be an open book she hadn't noticed before in the center of it too.
"Hey, Dan, come take a look at this," she waved him over.
"What is it?" Dan came over.
"It looks like some kind of… I don't know, spell book?" Chloe hazarded a guess.
"Yeah, my Latin's kinda rusty," Dan agreed once he got a closer look at the book. He took another look back at the occult-looking objects in the room, "Maybe we should get Lucifer's opinion on all this stuff."
Chloe hummed in agreement.
"We should get back to the station and see if we can dig a little further into our vic," Chloe said, "Looks like there's a lot more to him than meets the eye."
With that, Chloe made her way out of the room to inform their forensics team about their discovery so they could bag up everything. Dan watched Chloe leave the room. He turned back to the open book. He slipped his notepad into his back pocket and took out his phone. With another look behind him to make sure Chloe wasn't near, he snapped a few pics of their vic's set-up and of the opened page of the alleged spell book.
It couldn't hurt.
~*~
"A spell book?" Lucifer raised a disbelieving eyebrow. After his brief break back at his penthouse, Lucifer found himself back at the station to regroup with his resident detectives. Much to his chagrin, the detective he found first wasn't the one he was hoping for – rhymes with douche.
"What… magic's not real either?" Dan asked sarcastically.
"No… it's real, just not the kind you're probably thinking of," Lucifer replied, "Plus, I doubt our victim had access to the legitimate kind…"
"Considering you think he might've been possessed by a demon, do you really think he didn't stumble on to something legitimate?" Dan pointed out.
Lucifer stayed silent at that and with a barely perceivable huff, he looked around the bullpen, "Not that this isn't a scintillating conversation, but do you know where the Detective might be?"
"Last I saw she was finishing up gathering up the last of the research into Ivan's financials," Dan replied, nodding his head back toward the staircase, "Oh, hey, by the way, Chloe mentioned that she wants to join us for our next hang out."
"Oh?" Lucifer couldn't hide his smile.
"Yeah," Dan grinned back, "And hey, if you want Ella and me to make ourselves scarce, just say the word."
"Yes, well… our topics of conversation will have to change a bit with the Detective's presence," Lucifer very carefully didn't respond to Dan's offer.
"Definitely," Dan agreed as he thought about their last get-together.
~*~
Dan slowly ventured into Lux as he came up to the railing at the top of the staircase leading into the club and let out a long exhale. After being brought into what had become known as "The Celestial Insider's Club" by Ella (and as he and Ella had both recently found out included Linda), he had found himself as a reluctant regular at Lux – Lucifer finally told his employees to comp his orders. It only took him digging bullets out of the Devil's body to reach that status, but hey, Dan wasn't going to complain.
It didn't take long before Dan spotted his fellow club member at the bar.
"Hey, Ella," Dan took a seat at the bar next to her.
"Dan! You came," Ella beamed and hugged him. She turned back to the bartender, "Patrick, dos más por favor."
"You got it," Patrick called back.
"I couldn't let you hog all the free drinks," Dan smirked, "There have got to be some benefits to all this, right?"
"Actual answers to biblical-sized questions? I'd say so," Ella replied as she moved the little umbrella to the side of her drink and took a sip from the little straw.
"Daniel," Lucifer came up behind his two friends, "You actually showed up, well, color me surprised."
"This isn't the first time we've hung out like this, Lucifer," Dan pointed out.
"And I continue to be surprised by your continued attendance," Lucifer replied and nodded for Ella and Dan to follow him. Dan turned back to the bar and accepted the drink Ella ordered for him from Patrick before getting up and following the Devil and forensic scientist.
The Archangel led them to the elevator and before long, the three friends found themselves in Lucifer's penthouse. Dan and Ella made themselves comfortable on his couch while Lucifer fixed himself a drink at his bar.
"So," Lucifer gracefully sat down in his plump, Italian leather chair as he crossed one leg over the other, facing his friends. He took a sip, licked the moisture off his lips, and looked between Ella and Dan, "Shall we pick up where we left off?"
"Actually, first there's something that's been bothering me," Ella raised her hand and placed her drink on the table in front of them.
"Before all the craziness went down, I remembered that when we were trying to track down Pierce, when Chloe was on the phone with him, she told him that you said something about him being immortal," Ella began with a pointed finger at said Devil, "We don't have to worry about Pierce randomly popping up back to life or anything, do we?"
"No… no, as far as I know, that former immortal is dead-dead," Lucifer quelled her worry, putting up a hand.
"Former immortal?" Dan asked, "How was he immortal to begin with?"
"He was Cain," Lucifer stated, "Do you not listen to a single thing I say?"
"Cain? Like Cain and Abel – Cain?" Dan's jaw dropped.
"You really need to work on your listening skills, Daniel," Lucifer took another sip from his whiskey tumbler.
"But he's like dead dead, right?" Ella asked again.
"Yes, Miss Lopez, he's dead," Lucifer assured her.
"Good," Ella stated with conviction. After that statement, the three friends sat in comfortable silence for a moment before Ella came up with another question.
"So, I know you don't lie, Lucifer," Ella prefaced.
"I don't," Lucifer wasn't sure where she was headed but let her continue her train of thought.
"And you're the actual Devil," Ella continued. Lucifer sat up a little as he placed his drink down next to Ella's and nodded for her to go on, still unsure where she was going with this line of questioning.
"Sooo, how exactly was Charlotte your step mother?" Ella finished.
Dan choked on the recent sip of his drink.
"Oh," Lucifer darted his eyes over to Dan who looked even more interested in the answer than Ella.
Dan wiped away the little bit of his drink that dribbled from his mouth when he coughed. How could he possibly have forgotten that detail about Charlotte in relation to Lucifer? To be fair, the fact that one of his friends turned out to actually be Beelzebub sort of took over his thoughts.
"Well, that's a bit of a complicated answer, Miss Lopez," Lucifer replied.
"We're not going anywhere," Dan said, eager to hear the answer.
Lucifer opened his mouth to answer and immediately closed it, not sure on where to begin.
"Charlotte… well, our dear Charlotte was actually murdered twice," Lucifer began.
Dan and Ella looked to each other, not quite following.
"What do you mean?" Dan's voice shook.
Lucifer scooted up closer to the end of his seat, fingers spread out and pressed together, as he tried to explain, punctuating his thoughts by talking with his hands.
"The Charlotte you both knew before everything that happened at the Santa Monica Pier last year, before she "lost her memory" – was my Mum," Lucifer started.
"What does that have to do with her being murdered twice?" Dan held back tears and restrained anger at the thought.
"You'll recall when we first "saved" Charlotte, she had "survived" a stabbing by her junior associate," Lucifer replied with air quotes, "Well, she didn't actually survive… she really was killed and…"
Lucifer darted his eyes to Dan, hesitating in his story, before continuing.
"And her soul went down to Hell," Lucifer said, "Her body became an empty vessel for my actual Mum, the Goddess of All Creation."
"So that whole time during the Perry Smith trial and everything, that was your Mom?" Ella's voice went up.
Lucifer simply nodded in confirmation.
"That explains the light I saw," Ella muttered to herself.
"S-S-So, that was your Mom the whole time we knew her before the Pier last year?" Dan gulped, "So that was your Mom when we… when w-w-we…"
"I'd prefer we not revisit that brain-bleaching thought, if you don't mind, Daniel," Lucifer stated with a hand up to halt Dan's words and a look of disgust briefly passing over his face.
Dan just imitated a bobble-head with a mix of fear and shock on his face before downing the drink he brought up with him.
"That explains the whole "You were my favorite human" thing she said to me," Dan mumbled mostly to himself, but Lucifer and Ella heard him.
"Any-way, after my Mum's Celestial light began to burst out of Charlotte's mid-section and I sent her to another universe to save this one, the real Charlotte came back to life," Lucifer finished his explanation, choosing to ignore Dan's comment.
"I get it," Ella said, "So she was your Step-Mom because she was possessed by your real Mom and so you technically weren't lying – clever."
"Yes," Lucifer said.
"Wait… if Charlotte went to Hell the first time she was killed… does that mean…?" Ella didn't want to finish that thought as she looked to Lucifer with dread.
"No, Miss Lopez," Lucifer was quick to assure her, "Our dear Charlotte got a first-class ticket to the Silver City, courtesy of my brother."
"The Silver City? What's that? Heaven?" Ella asked.
"Heaven," Lucifer nodded as a soft smile spread across his lips, "I'm sure Amenadiel's up there personally making sure she's settling in."
"Amenadiel's up in Heaven? What happened to-?" Ella immediately grew concerned before realization caught up with her.
"Amenadiel's an Angel."
"That he is," Lucifer replied, "And now that he's got his wings back, who knows if he'll come back down to Earth any time soon."
"You think he's going to stay in Heaven?" Dan asked.
"Wouldn't surprise me," Lucifer replied. He looked a little sad at that thought for a moment before immediately slipping his jovial mask back into place.
"Now, enough chat about him… should we pick up where we left off from last time now?"
"Okay," Dan said as he scooted up a little in his seat, "I'm just gonna refresh my drink first."
Lucifer minutely shook his head in fond amusement. He shared a look with Ella after they both watched Dan get up to go and fix himself another drink at Lucifer's bar.
~*~
Dan shook himself out of his thoughts when he spotted Chloe heading in their direction.
"And here comes Chloe now," Dan nodded behind Lucifer.
Lucifer's whole demeanor changed. His whole face lit up with a smile as he turned around just in time to see Chloe come up to them. Without a word, Lucifer took part of the stack of papers Chloe was carrying to lighten her load.
"Lucifer, nice of you to join us," Chloe commented as she continued her way without a break in her pace to her desk with Lucifer dutifully following.
"I just had to address a personal matter," Lucifer replied.
"Yeah, well you missed all the excitement," Chloe placed her stack down and Lucifer set his pile down next to hers.
"After you left, Dan and I discovered our vic had a secret room full of all sorts of interesting things," Chloe opened up the file at the top of the pile and handed it to Lucifer.
"Yes, Daniel started to tell me a little bit about it," Lucifer said as he looked down at the case file.
"It gave me a little bit of déjà vu to one of our old cases," Chloe said, "You know, the whole Children of the Goat thing."
"Really wish I knew who started that," Lucifer mumbled under his breath.
"After digging into Ivan's financials, I found he had a membership to another one of those Satanists clubs called The Old Scratch-ing Post."
Lucifer laughed.
"Kinda sounds like the name of a cat café or something," Dan commented.
"Old Scratch is one of my favorite nicknames," Lucifer conceded.
"Despite its name, this one seems a lot more exclusive," Chloe continued, getting them all back on track, "Which would explain his secret room behind his closet."
"So, he was a closeted Satanist?" Lucifer couldn't resist the pun.
Chloe rolled her eyes fondly.
"Ella's still going over all the evidence found in that room and trying to narrow down his actual cause of death," Chloe said, "I was just about to see what she's found. You coming?"
"Lead the way," Lucifer motioned her toward Ella's lab.
~*~
The notes of Sympathy for the Devil by the Rolling Stones reached the two detectives and Lucifer's ears as they all entered the lab.
"Excellent song choice, Miss Lopez," Lucifer approved.
"Oh, sorry," Ella turned it down once she realized she had company.
"Any luck narrowing down our victim's cause of death?" Chloe got straight to the point.
"The medical examiner's still working on it, but signs seem to be pointing toward it being strangulation as to what did him in," Ella said as she backed up toward her microscope and a few bagged-up pieces of evidence.
"So, he is a murder victim, after all," Dan said from Lucifer's right side.
"What else would he be?" Chloe turned to him.
Ella and Dan quickly exchanged a look with Lucifer, too quick to be seen by Chloe before the resident scientist got back on topic.
"Yeah, it's still being narrowed down, but that's what it looks like."
"Any luck finding anything on the stuff we found in his secret room?" Chloe gestured to the bagged evidence.
"I've been dusting everything for prints, but so far the only set that I've been able to lift has been from our vic," Ella replied and lifted a finger with dramatic effect, "Except…"
She picked up the book Chloe and Dan found, still in the evidence bag, with her gloved hands.
"There's another set of prints on this book… specifically on the edge of the papers to open to a certain page or at least the page I think he frequented given the state of it."
Carefully, she took the book out of the bag and put her gloved finger around the spot where she found the other set of fingerprints, pausing to show her friends where she meant.
"Any hits?" Chloe asked.
"Still running 'em through AFIS," Ella replied with a shake of her head.
"So, what page does that open up to?" Dan asked.
"From what I can tell, I think it's some kind of summoning ritual," Ella replied.
"You can read Latin?" Chloe asked.
Ella tilted her head in a "sort of" gesture.
"To be honest, the only reason I could make heads or tails of it was with help from Sam and Dean," Ella smirked.
"Sam and Dean?" Chloe furrowed her brows. Were they persons of interest in the case?
"She's talking about Supernatural," Dan clarified.
"That show's rife with inaccuracies," Lucifer commented, "Though I can't deny all the leads are lovely to look at."
"You mean you could translate what you read because of a TV show? The one you and Trixie watch together?" Chloe raised a disbelieving brow.
"Hey, whatever helps the investigation, right?" Ella shrugged a shoulder.
"Who was he trying to summon?" Dan asked.
"From what I managed to translate… a demon," Ella stated and looked to Lucifer.
"What, did he lose Maze's phone number?" Chloe tried to make a joke, looking to her friends, but given their lack of reactions, her joke fell flat.
Lucifer swallowed. Maybe there was more to the possession situation than he thought.
When Chloe saw no one shared a laugh in her attempt at humor, Chloe cleared her throat. Don't joke about demons. Okay, check.
"What we really need is to find the actual crime scene," Chloe said instead.
"I'll see if the medical examiner can put a rush on it and give us a definitive COD and time of death to narrow the search," Ella said.
"Thank you," Chloe said, "And let us know as soon as you get a hit on those prints, okay?"
"Will do," Ella nodded.
~*~
Meanwhile, across town a lone figure sat in a dilapidated building. The once stained-glass windows were indistinguishable. The rows of seats had fallen in on each other – splintered wood that could only be the remnants of pews. The lone figure sat in the abandoned church at the only remaining table, pouring over the pages of an old book full of newspaper clippings from history.
He flipped right through the Chicago Fire and Nazi Germany. His only form of light came from a lone lit candlestick in an ancient-looking candelabrum as he thumbed through the pages. He stopped on the last page and stroked a finger along the edge of the newspaper clipping that read: "Police Officer is Killed" with a picture of one deceased Marcus Pierce above it.
"Soon," he breathed in barely a whisper, "Soon your reign of terror will end… Lucifer Morningstar."