Not Until We Are Lost

Lucifer felt the cool sheets and the warm sun. Turning over, she realized that she was indeed a she today. The long, lean body stretched and loosened muscles, happy. Content. The ride with the aliens had been more than interesting. Better than television, better than trying to manipulate humans into giving up their souls. Better than anything that had ever existed, really. And it just kept elevating in amusement.

The note was on the nightstand, and she picked it up to look it over. An resort vacation was a perfect place to thaw out, she thought. Stasis. Lucifer wondered if the aliens would have been able to use that if she hadn't been complying with everything else already, or if their technology was so advanced that they could retain even the devil against her will.

When she stood up, she found she was in a little white bikini already. Digging through the drawers revealed a matching white wrap that went elegantly around her hips. She decided to forgo the sandals, as she expected that sooner or later she'd find herself on a beach and unwilling to keep track of those things. Not that she particularly cared about them, but they were awful cute to lose on the first day.

So people were gone, were they? Lucifer cast out with her power and discovered that the pesky angels were missing. Good. Two less faces to worry about. Nobody else knew the truth. The game could go on for longer, now.

Lucifer grabbed a pair of fashionable sunglasses with white rims and plopped them on her head as she left the room, intent on exploration.

Lucifer was as amused by the ship as she had been on the island and on the monochrome world before that. It was a new thing to explore, and this time, the aliens were a lot closer. She was fond of going to the common area and watching them, knowing that it made them all highly uncomfortable to be gazed upon as if they were the ants in the glass cage.

Another amusing thing that was discovered upon the ship was that there were others around that had powers at least on par with what were at her fingertips. Different sorts of power, of course. It was a draw to Lucifer, but not one that felt like it needed immediate attention.

What was more of a pull was that there seemed to be another angel in their midst. The one, she thought, that had paired up with Castiel.

So while there were oodles of bodies around, and seemingly endless ways that they could fall to sin, and certainly faces that had been met before and needed to be met again, Lucifer was drawn to the angel who was not. Would she be as Castiel had been? Eager to see the devil cast away, anxious to smite the great evil?

There was, truly, only one way to find out.

The island was a sudden and jolting change from the 1940s black and white that he'd been dumped into originally. It was bright and warm, filled with wonderful color. He didn't even much care that there wasn't anything of his laying around. He'd spent a small amount of time checking the spot he'd woken up in for signs of what was his. It hadn't taken him long at all to give up and make his way to the beach, almost right to the edge of the water. The waves lapped up against his toes.

Lucifer was sure that he could see movement across the way, on the island that was close enough, but not really all that close. A good swimmer could make it. He squinted his eyes to see through the glare of the water and tried to make out what he was seeing.

Of course, he could have just gone over there. Popped in. Walked across the water in a show of glorious blasphemy. Flown. All things which would signal the truth of him to anybody who might be sensitive to that kind of thing. He was building a good thing at the moment, some people knowing Lucas and some knowing Lucretia. He wanted to build more on that. So he couldn't exert too much power. Had to keep it down almost completely, to really stay away from risk. And now that he wasn't stuck in an era where people might not like him just based on skin color, he had no need to continually pump out that charisma that calmed them and made them putty.

He leaned back, digging his fingers into the warm sand, tilting his head up. Whatever these aliens were up to, they sure had interesting spots to plop them all down in. He was still far too curious to be defiant.

Frank had stepped out a few nights ago and hadn't been to the office since. Eleni was worried, but she kept trying to convince herself that the older p.i. had just gotten a lead that panned out. That he was busy somewhere, working.

She didn't know what was normal and what was not in this business. She assumed that someone who had worked on his own for who knew how long might not think to check in.

She hoped that was all.

So when she arrived at work early enough to sit down with the paper and look over the news of the day, she wasn't expecting the little blurb of an article that didn't show nearly enough regard for the staggering loss of her new boss.

Her coffee cup sat on the desk, now forgotten. Tears glistened in her eyes as she read and reread the too-short, too-vague blurb. She even thumbed through the rest of the paper, searching for more. More... something.

She supposed that the police would be by soon enough to talk to both herself and Max to see if they had any insight. Eleni didn't yet, but she was certainly going to see what she could dig up on her own.

She hadn't known Frank for very long, but she'd liked him. He'd given her a job when almost no one else would and underneath the gruff 'just the facts ma'am' exterior,' it was clear that he'd been in this particular line of work because he wanted to help people.

Something about this was very fishy. She knew darn well that he'd been closing in on the serial killer. What were the odds that someone else would murder him while he was working that particular case and getting closer to the truth?

She stood and moved over to Frank's desk. There was a momentary hesitation as she felt a flash of guilt at invading the privacy of a dead man, but that was disregarded in her need to search for the truth and she started to look through the haphazard piles of papers for anything that might be of use.

Lucifer moved as easily in the female body as in the male body, even though she spent less time in the female. Only one week out of every month. Not always the same week. Sometimes, for the fun of it, it was two weeks that bumped up against one another to prolong the time. Others, it was stretched as far as possible, but most of the time, there was no thought to it. The time just came for her to be walking the earth, and so she did.

The differences were, of course, only physical. Everything else remained the same. The mind, the thoughts, the powers, the charm, the wit, the sensuality, the sexuality. It all oozed from whatever body was put forth as the current face.

Another thing that stayed the same was the apparent disregard of the people in this time of what color the flesh held. While they would have turned their noses up at a woman who looked like her walking on this side of town at all ordinarily, they smiled at her and even held doors. Politeness and pleasantries abounded. That sphere of influence would stay, because while she wasn't really ready to show her hand completely at this time, she did not want to deal at all with the prejudices of an ignorant time if she didn't have to. And she didn't.

As Lucas, an apartment and car and money had all been collected by persuading various people that they wanted to hand them all over. As Lucretia, they were given freely, with very little effort. So her dress was of very good material, of a fine cut. Her shoes were custom made, and the hat with small veil that she wore was the height of fashion. She clutched a small bag to her side as she walked, choosing to move among the people right now on foot than in the vehicle she had at her disposal. She wanted to see faces. Eyes falling upon her.

Lucifer moved into a bar, carefully finding one where Mary did not work, pushing through the door and moving straight to the high seats. The habit of smoking was not let go of, though Lucas' fine cigars were traded for Lucretia's thin cigarettes in an elegant ivory holder. As soon as she was settled, she fished one out of her purse and settled it into the shiny accessory, picking up the big bar lighter and looking around.

He was more than satisfied with the area that he'd been placed in. Every city this size had a seedy underbelly, ripe with sin and corruption. People hiding shameful secrets. Delicious things that he enjoyed so very much.

Lucifer was not opposed to flexing his power when he needed anything, either. So while he'd not turned up on this world with anything to call his own save for the clothing on his back, it didn't take him but a couple of hours to secure a place to stay, a nice car to drive, and a wardrobe befitting a prince. Not to mention a fine box of cigars that would have an embargo on them in a few years.

The Morningstar cruised in the black 1930's Bentley 8-Litre Gurney Nutting Sportsman Coupe that he'd acquired from a showroom, taking a snails pace and enjoying the sights and sounds of the life around him. There was freedom, and then there was freedom.

As he passed from one street to the next, Lucifer felt like he was being pulled toward a particular place. When he saw the sign for The Duchess, he felt like he'd arrived. Parking was easy enough. He just charmed another guy out of the spot he'd been about to take.

It was with an otherworldly grace that he entered the establishment with. He glanced around a moment, before finding a table and sitting himself down. It wasn't, as some might have expected of him, in the shadows or in the back. He picked a spot where he would be seen. Then he waited for service.

The dark figured strolled down the sidewalk in a time and place that he hadn't started out in. Despite the incredible jump, he didn't seem to be disturbed in the least. There was a smirk on his face, a pleased twinkle in his eye. He'd been here before. Or, more precisely, not here but in a place similar enough that he would be able to get along. There were differences, of course. The convergence of 10 years of history being the main point.

Even he was not immune to the monochrome visuals. This, too, amused him. He looked to the sky, judging the clouds above and the sun that hung there. All of nature seemed to think this was a natural state of being, which made him think this wasn't so much an alteration to his own being, but just the way things were here. On this strange and wonderful planet. While his eyes were positioned heavenward, he winked. An appreciative gesture to the ones who had organized this. It was possible he could escape the cage that he'd been put in, but as of right now, he had no plans to do so. He was far too amused by all of it to abandon it now. He couldn't even be angry. He should have been angry.

He brushed his hands down the arms of the coat that was not his, yet was perfectly tailored to fit, and then straightened the tie that held no color. He ran his fingertips along the edge of the hat before pulling it a bit lower over his eyes. A cigar appeared from the inner pocket of his jacket, and he bit off the end, then lit it.

Puffing smoke into the air and entirely too pleased, he walked.