It only takes a second for Adam to realize he’s going to die. He’s not upset, not about that. He was in Heaven to begin with, before the archangel pulled him down with a mission for him, and he assumes he’s just going to return to where he has been. Strangely enough, he feels a weird pull of sympathy for both of the angelic brothers. He didn’t think either of them would go through with it, but here they are. Lucifer’s face is twisted into a snarl, even as the tears fall, and he’s screaming something about the lack of the true vessels proving that He is no longer paying any attention. Michael is consumed with rage at the blasphemy, and he’s far less concerned with dying than he is with getting one more hit on Lucifer to finish him off. Adam knows that it’s not going to happen. He whispers a tiny apology to the being sharing his body, and then everything goes black.
Being resurrected a second time is even stranger than the first. It’s more comfortable, if any experience can be called that. Adam’s body is intact, no longer bloody and broken from ghouls or combat or anything horrible that might have happened in his short life. He’s laid out across a soft bed, everything silk and embroidery. He struggles for a moment before he’s able to turn his head, and his stomach does a flip when he meets Lucifer’s eyes. He’s not healed at all. The burns of his grace have spread in his exertion, blurring into painful bruises around the edges. He has a series of wounds from Michael’s sword, deep cuts that still flicker white and ooze red. A vast array of contusions and a smearing of dirt and blood, Lucifer’s entire body is a canvas of discoloration. Yet he’s smiling. It’s almost soft, not so much pulling at his lips as it lights up his watery blue eyes.
“Hello, Michael,” he whispers.
Adam thinks a sane person would be afraid, but he must not be feeling any more sane than Lucifer looks because his heart breaks for the archangel. He’d tried to talk Michael out of it, pleaded with him, avoided landing a single blow until his own life was in danger, and then-- then Lucifer just lost it. Still, this isn’t right.
“I’m not--”
“Shh, shh. I know.” A cool finger brushes Adam’s lips. “But it doesn’t matter now, does it? You understand now? He doesn’t love you like I love you. He doesn’t care anymore, Michael. We don’t need him anymore. We have each other.”
Adam rubs his lips together to get rid of the tingling sensation. “You’re going to destroy the entire world.”
“What? No. No, I don’t want that. I never wanted that. I did what I had to do to get to you. Don’t you remember, Michael? I didn’t want to destroy it; I wanted to live in it.”
“What about humans?”
“I don’t care. I don’t care anymore. I just want you.”
Adam feels like a sacrifice being placed on the altar. He spent enough time with his mind tangled up with Michael that he can mimic his speech and manners if he tries hard enough, but his humanity is going to be a problem if Lucifer sincerely believes him an archangel. Perhaps more important than that is how wrong it would be to trick him. It might be more wrong to abandon him-- this celestial, infernal, ancient being staring at him with the most heartbreakingly imploring eyes.
“Do you know who I am, Lucifer?”
He answers with a solemn nod.
“Are you sure?”
Lucifer closes his eyes, tears falling down his cheeks. “Yes.”
“Very well. I will stay with you.”
Lucifer breathes a sigh of relief and crawls onto the bed with exhaustion trembling limbs. “Thank you. Michael, thank you.” Lucifer’s body is far larger than Adam’s, both taller and broader, but he somehow manages to curl himself up against the young man’s side, laying an arm across his waist and wrapping cold fingers around his wrist. “I missed you so much.”
Adam doesn’t know what to say. It feels like the right thing to do, if he can save the world by playing along, and yet this grief feels grossly private, something not meant for him. But Lucifer rambles on.
“I was so… so afraid, Michael. When I was falling. And then it hurt. It hurt in ways you can’t even imagine, brother. I thought I was dying. Some days, I wanted to die, just so it would be over. But it was worse. It was worse than dying. I called for you. Michael, I called for you until I had no voice to scream with. You never came. You never came back for me, and--” Lucifer’s voice breaks.
“I’m sorry,” Adam says simply, and Lucifer nods.
“I was so alone. I just kept waiting and waiting and screaming. Do you know how time down there moves, Michael? It just drags on and on and on. What was one year for you was millenia for me, and it hurt so much. ...It hurts now. It still hurts. I think it always will. Everything inside of me is burnt and twisted and scarred. I’m not beautiful anymore, Michael.”
What was fear blossoms easily into sympathy. A tiny voice in the back of Adam’s mind asks what Lucifer might have done to deserve that kind of torture. He’d never believed in the Devil, not until he was ripped out of Heaven to stand against him, and with each passing moment, he sees less and less monstrosity here. He never had siblings of his own, not for more than a handful of hours, but he can understand what it is like to have them forget all about you and leave you behind. His own resentment makes Lucifer’s capacity for forgiveness suddenly very stark in comparison, and when Adam reaches his hand up to smooth down his messy blond hair, it’s a gesture born from complete sincerity.
“You’re very beautiful, Lucifer,” he whispers, and he means it.
Lucifer sniffles, almost like a child, and presses his body closer. Archangel or no, the battle ravaged him, and his body is a mess of knotted muscles and twitching nerves beneath the layers of exterior damage.
“Can you not heal yourself?” Adam asks softly.
Lucifer shakes his head. “I’m too weak,” he confesses shamefully.
“Perhaps you should rest.”
“...Are you going to leave me?”
“No.”
“Are you going to kill me?”
Adam shuts his eyes. “No, Lucifer. I’m not ever going to hurt you again. Close your eyes and try to sleep.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Just relax. It will come.”
“I don’t think I can.”
“Why not?”
“It hurts too much.”
Adam finds his lips pressed against Lucifer’s forehead, and it almost feels like the most natural thing in the world. “Tell me what hurts.”
“Everything, Michael. Everything hurts.”
“Then tell me what hurts worst of all.”
Lucifer hesitates, extending one finger and tracing it along the inside of Adam’s arm, following the pale line of his veins. “My wings,” he says softly.
Adam glances down at him, noting the guilt and the shame in that confession. He nods and chews his bottom lip for a moment, feeling like he’s being tested in this new role already.
“Could you let me see them?”
“...They’re ugly.”
“I’m sure they’re not.”
“Yes they are.”
“Lucifer.”
Somehow, Adam manages to pull off the disapproving older brother tone, and Lucifer responds by frowning up at him for a moment before he pulls out of the embrace. He pulls the bloodstained shirt off over his head and casts it aside before unfolding his immense black wings. Adam certainly wouldn’t call them ugly, but he can see why they hurt. What looks as if they were once silvery white feathers have been charred black and bent in various directions. Many are missing, leaving patches of burnt, scarred over skin in their absence. The sticky coating of blood is in several layers, ranging from the old and dried brown to a fresh, vibrant red that trickles between his shoulders. Lucifer keeps his eyes down, wings fluttering lightly as he folds them down against his back in shame.
“You’re very beautiful.”
Lucifer scowls. “You’re making fun of me.”
“I’m not. I promise I’m not. I’m sorry I ever did that to you, and I’m impressed that you’ve endured it.”
Pressing his lips together to still a hint of a tremor, Lucifer finally looks up to meet Adam’s eyes.
“Lie down,” Adam tells him, and after he sighs and tacks on a gentle “Please”, Lucifer does. Adam sits on his knees, inspecting the lines of Lucifer’s back for several moments before he’ll dare to touch. The way the muscles shudder and the feathers ruffle slightly under his hands worries him for a moment before he sees how relaxed Lucifer’s expression becomes. Then Adam feels powerful. He takes the old shirt, using it to wipe his hands free of blood and ash as he works the debris of Hell from Lucifer’s wings and smooths his feathers affectionately. Lucifer’s muscles jump occasionally, but Adam can tell that’s from pain rather than doubt. Lucifer is very calm, his soft, slow breathing an indication of encroaching sleep, and Adam realizes with sudden clarity that Lucifer trusts him, maybe even more than he would trust the real Michael.
He continues in his work as the day wears on, wiping away filth and massaging out pain. Lucifer sleeps on, lips parted in gentle breaths. He looks more like a lonely little brother than any sort of monster that would ravage the world. With a lingering flare of resentment, Adam can’t help but think Michael was a bit of a fool to have refused the offer of peace, to have rejected this beautiful brother when he had one more chance to embrace him. That’s alright though. The conflict has ended. Michael is at peace, and in Adam, there now exists a surrogate brother to care for Lucifer in his stead.
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
Fill: Team Castiel/Lucifer, Surrogate
Date: 2013-11-30 07:12 pm (UTC)(I hope this was not creepy...?)
It only takes a second for Adam to realize he’s going to die. He’s not upset, not about that. He was in Heaven to begin with, before the archangel pulled him down with a mission for him, and he assumes he’s just going to return to where he has been. Strangely enough, he feels a weird pull of sympathy for both of the angelic brothers. He didn’t think either of them would go through with it, but here they are. Lucifer’s face is twisted into a snarl, even as the tears fall, and he’s screaming something about the lack of the true vessels proving that He is no longer paying any attention. Michael is consumed with rage at the blasphemy, and he’s far less concerned with dying than he is with getting one more hit on Lucifer to finish him off. Adam knows that it’s not going to happen. He whispers a tiny apology to the being sharing his body, and then everything goes black.
Being resurrected a second time is even stranger than the first. It’s more comfortable, if any experience can be called that. Adam’s body is intact, no longer bloody and broken from ghouls or combat or anything horrible that might have happened in his short life. He’s laid out across a soft bed, everything silk and embroidery. He struggles for a moment before he’s able to turn his head, and his stomach does a flip when he meets Lucifer’s eyes. He’s not healed at all. The burns of his grace have spread in his exertion, blurring into painful bruises around the edges. He has a series of wounds from Michael’s sword, deep cuts that still flicker white and ooze red. A vast array of contusions and a smearing of dirt and blood, Lucifer’s entire body is a canvas of discoloration. Yet he’s smiling. It’s almost soft, not so much pulling at his lips as it lights up his watery blue eyes.
“Hello, Michael,” he whispers.
Adam thinks a sane person would be afraid, but he must not be feeling any more sane than Lucifer looks because his heart breaks for the archangel. He’d tried to talk Michael out of it, pleaded with him, avoided landing a single blow until his own life was in danger, and then-- then Lucifer just lost it. Still, this isn’t right.
“I’m not--”
“Shh, shh. I know.” A cool finger brushes Adam’s lips. “But it doesn’t matter now, does it? You understand now? He doesn’t love you like I love you. He doesn’t care anymore, Michael. We don’t need him anymore. We have each other.”
Adam rubs his lips together to get rid of the tingling sensation. “You’re going to destroy the entire world.”
“What? No. No, I don’t want that. I never wanted that. I did what I had to do to get to you. Don’t you remember, Michael? I didn’t want to destroy it; I wanted to live in it.”
“What about humans?”
“I don’t care. I don’t care anymore. I just want you.”
Adam feels like a sacrifice being placed on the altar. He spent enough time with his mind tangled up with Michael that he can mimic his speech and manners if he tries hard enough, but his humanity is going to be a problem if Lucifer sincerely believes him an archangel. Perhaps more important than that is how wrong it would be to trick him. It might be more wrong to abandon him-- this celestial, infernal, ancient being staring at him with the most heartbreakingly imploring eyes.
“Do you know who I am, Lucifer?”
He answers with a solemn nod.
“Are you sure?”
Lucifer closes his eyes, tears falling down his cheeks. “Yes.”
“Very well. I will stay with you.”
Lucifer breathes a sigh of relief and crawls onto the bed with exhaustion trembling limbs. “Thank you. Michael, thank you.” Lucifer’s body is far larger than Adam’s, both taller and broader, but he somehow manages to curl himself up against the young man’s side, laying an arm across his waist and wrapping cold fingers around his wrist. “I missed you so much.”
Adam doesn’t know what to say. It feels like the right thing to do, if he can save the world by playing along, and yet this grief feels grossly private, something not meant for him. But Lucifer rambles on.
“I was so… so afraid, Michael. When I was falling. And then it hurt. It hurt in ways you can’t even imagine, brother. I thought I was dying. Some days, I wanted to die, just so it would be over. But it was worse. It was worse than dying. I called for you. Michael, I called for you until I had no voice to scream with. You never came. You never came back for me, and--” Lucifer’s voice breaks.
“I’m sorry,” Adam says simply, and Lucifer nods.
“I was so alone. I just kept waiting and waiting and screaming. Do you know how time down there moves, Michael? It just drags on and on and on. What was one year for you was millenia for me, and it hurt so much. ...It hurts now. It still hurts. I think it always will. Everything inside of me is burnt and twisted and scarred. I’m not beautiful anymore, Michael.”
What was fear blossoms easily into sympathy. A tiny voice in the back of Adam’s mind asks what Lucifer might have done to deserve that kind of torture. He’d never believed in the Devil, not until he was ripped out of Heaven to stand against him, and with each passing moment, he sees less and less monstrosity here. He never had siblings of his own, not for more than a handful of hours, but he can understand what it is like to have them forget all about you and leave you behind. His own resentment makes Lucifer’s capacity for forgiveness suddenly very stark in comparison, and when Adam reaches his hand up to smooth down his messy blond hair, it’s a gesture born from complete sincerity.
“You’re very beautiful, Lucifer,” he whispers, and he means it.
Lucifer sniffles, almost like a child, and presses his body closer. Archangel or no, the battle ravaged him, and his body is a mess of knotted muscles and twitching nerves beneath the layers of exterior damage.
“Can you not heal yourself?” Adam asks softly.
Lucifer shakes his head. “I’m too weak,” he confesses shamefully.
“Perhaps you should rest.”
“...Are you going to leave me?”
“No.”
“Are you going to kill me?”
Adam shuts his eyes. “No, Lucifer. I’m not ever going to hurt you again. Close your eyes and try to sleep.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Just relax. It will come.”
“I don’t think I can.”
“Why not?”
“It hurts too much.”
Adam finds his lips pressed against Lucifer’s forehead, and it almost feels like the most natural thing in the world. “Tell me what hurts.”
“Everything, Michael. Everything hurts.”
“Then tell me what hurts worst of all.”
Lucifer hesitates, extending one finger and tracing it along the inside of Adam’s arm, following the pale line of his veins. “My wings,” he says softly.
Adam glances down at him, noting the guilt and the shame in that confession. He nods and chews his bottom lip for a moment, feeling like he’s being tested in this new role already.
“Could you let me see them?”
“...They’re ugly.”
“I’m sure they’re not.”
“Yes they are.”
“Lucifer.”
Somehow, Adam manages to pull off the disapproving older brother tone, and Lucifer responds by frowning up at him for a moment before he pulls out of the embrace. He pulls the bloodstained shirt off over his head and casts it aside before unfolding his immense black wings. Adam certainly wouldn’t call them ugly, but he can see why they hurt. What looks as if they were once silvery white feathers have been charred black and bent in various directions. Many are missing, leaving patches of burnt, scarred over skin in their absence. The sticky coating of blood is in several layers, ranging from the old and dried brown to a fresh, vibrant red that trickles between his shoulders. Lucifer keeps his eyes down, wings fluttering lightly as he folds them down against his back in shame.
“You’re very beautiful.”
Lucifer scowls. “You’re making fun of me.”
“I’m not. I promise I’m not. I’m sorry I ever did that to you, and I’m impressed that you’ve endured it.”
Pressing his lips together to still a hint of a tremor, Lucifer finally looks up to meet Adam’s eyes.
“Lie down,” Adam tells him, and after he sighs and tacks on a gentle “Please”, Lucifer does. Adam sits on his knees, inspecting the lines of Lucifer’s back for several moments before he’ll dare to touch. The way the muscles shudder and the feathers ruffle slightly under his hands worries him for a moment before he sees how relaxed Lucifer’s expression becomes. Then Adam feels powerful. He takes the old shirt, using it to wipe his hands free of blood and ash as he works the debris of Hell from Lucifer’s wings and smooths his feathers affectionately. Lucifer’s muscles jump occasionally, but Adam can tell that’s from pain rather than doubt. Lucifer is very calm, his soft, slow breathing an indication of encroaching sleep, and Adam realizes with sudden clarity that Lucifer trusts him, maybe even more than he would trust the real Michael.
He continues in his work as the day wears on, wiping away filth and massaging out pain. Lucifer sleeps on, lips parted in gentle breaths. He looks more like a lonely little brother than any sort of monster that would ravage the world. With a lingering flare of resentment, Adam can’t help but think Michael was a bit of a fool to have refused the offer of peace, to have rejected this beautiful brother when he had one more chance to embrace him. That’s alright though. The conflict has ended. Michael is at peace, and in Adam, there now exists a surrogate brother to care for Lucifer in his stead.