Who: Anakin and Lucifer What: Anakin shows Lucifer some things that explain this weird place in the Sun When: Backdated to last month Where: Anakin’s place Rating/Warnings: Maybe swearing
To make things easier (because Anakin suspected, based on the condition of his neighborhood, that Damian would object on sight) Anakin was waiting outside his apartment building for Damian to arrive. He sat on a brick wall enclosing a courtyard next to the warehouse in which he lived. And he was focused on his phone. Occasionally, he glanced up, checking for a limo.
The sun was disappearing down the horizon when Anakin saw the limo approach.
***
Damian had been promised a demonstration of...something. What that something was he had no idea. It would come from a source he mostly trusted. Trusted more than any of the other twats in this town claiming to be a vampire or mutant or whatever. The hitch? He had to go where no decent Armani suit had gone before.
Anakin hadn’t been joking. This neighborhood was bad enough that Damian was certain it would contaminate the limo. He barely used two fingers to get out of the back when they reached Anakin. “Do you live here on purpose?”
***
“I made a choice,” Anakin said, and smiled. “Tell your driver to not make any left turns, that’s sends the wrong kind of message around these parts. If you know what I mean.”
It didn’t mean anything. There were no country clubs or gulf courses this side of Irvine, but it was safe. Mostly. Anakin was just messing with Damian.
***
Fortunately, Damian’s driver was more savvy about things than he was. A questioning look to the man was answered with a slow shake of his head. Damian turned a scolding look back to Anakin while the limo pulled away. “Never mess with someone who carries the devil’s name, darling.” He shook a finger at Anakin, obviously all in jest.
“Now,” he said as he pressed his palms together. “What are we doing?”
***
“I think,” Anakin quipped back. “An inter-universe Messiah has earned the right to mess with anyone they want.”
The door to Anakin’s apartment building opened behind them with what appeared to be no prompting from anyone. Anakin was using the Force.
“Would you like to come up?”
***
“Messiah?” Damian smirked at Anakin as he smoothed his lapels. “And to think that I’ve been accused of having a large ego.” He chuckled since he was only teasing. Oh, he had been accused of that. He had thought it funny then and even more so now. It had been the reason he chose to call himself Lucifer to begin with.
The door opening by itself didn’t quite register as odd to him. “By all means,” he answered with a smile.
***
Anakin led the way through the front door and all the way to the terrifying looking cage elevator. He didn’t press any buttons with his hands, but with the Force, and the screeching elevator descended to the first floor. When it bounced to a stop, the door opened, again, Anakin didn’t use his hands.
“It’s safe, I promise. It’s not going to drop out from under us. And my apartment is just on the third floor. Or we could take the stairs.”
***
Damian watched this performance with slightly narrowed eyes. This one was more difficult to ignore. Still, his logical brain went to some sort of remote. Something like a garage door opener. “No reason why it shouldn’t be,” he said then stepped into the lift with a smile.
***
Anakin stepped in after Damian, and as soon as he turned to face forward, the gated door slid shut. And as soon as the door clicked shut, the elevator began to lift. All this happened apparently with no one’s assitance.
When they reached the third floor, the elevator let them out into a cinderblock hallway. Anakin lead the way to his apartment.
At the yellow metal sliding door, he paused. “You’re about to meet my pets. None of them are mean or dangerous. But they aren’t from earth.”
Without further explanation, the door unlatched and slide open.
The first thing that anyone with hearing would notice was the obnoxiously loud screeching of two small, brown and white, alien-esque birds on their perches along the far wall across the living room. Those were Anakin’s porgs, A-Aron and L’loyd. The birds screamed for no reason, they just like screaming.
Next, would be Majy, Anakin’s “pygmy” bantha. He wasn’t sure how it remained only a meter tall. In his dreams these animals were pushing two stories tall as adults so he’d thought it was a baby when it first arrived. He assumed that after a year of having Majy, it would be bigger than it was the day it arrived, but it hadn’t grown. So, Anakin concluded, it must be a pygmy variant of the bigger ones.
Majy was excited to meet someone, and danced on their front elephant-esque legs and snorted from their flat snout. They bobbed their rams-horned head. But they waited until someone came to them. Anakin had trained them well, because he knew this was no ordinary animal.
“The birds are A-Aron and L’loyd, and this,” he pointed at Majy, “is Majy. What do you think?”
***
All right. There was only so many remotes a person would be willing to install before it became pure laziness, and Anakin never struck him as the indulgent time. At least, not to Damian’s level and if this was all remote control it was definitely to Damian’s level.
However, all of that went right out of Damian’s head when he saw Anakin’s….pets. He stopped with a jerk as his eyes went wide, taking in the sounds and sight of these things. “Bloody hell!” The names went in one ear and out the other. Sorry, but the only thing that was computing at the moment was “...what the ever loving fuck?!”
He wasn’t scared. Some part of Damian’s mind was absolutely thrilled. It hadn’t caught up to the rest of him yet. It would get there.
***
“Uh, A-Aron and L’Loyd are porgs and Majy is a bantha - they are animals from the universe I dream of. Have you started dreaming about strange things?” Anakin asked.
***
“Well yes, but that was naming stars.” Lucifer flapped a hand at the creatures, but he was getting over his initial shock. “Not....pets.”
Now that he had gathered himself he took a few steps closer to the porgs having decided that they looked less likely to take a chunk out of him. His brows came down as he lifted a finger to hover about a foot away from the things. “Fascinating. They look a little like birds.”
***
“They won’t bite. They scream all the time, but they like being pet,” Anakin said. “They’ll start to purr if you pet them.”
***
Damian glanced back at Anakin with a brow lifted. He still wasn’t convinced this wasn’t some sort of spectacular animatronics, but touching them would certainly put that to rest. And if this was some manner of prank…
He looked back to the little things, then reached out to lightly stroke a couple of fingertips over the head of the one on the right. He huffed in astonishment as it pressed into his touch then indeed did start to pur. “Huh! How charming!”
***
“Ya. Real charming when they are screaming at three am.”
He let Damian enjoy a moment with the porgs before adding, “There’s more to see.”
***
Anakin had Damian on the hook now. At the mention of more proof Damian turned from the adorable little creatures to give his host a nod. “Lead on then.” He wanted to see more. Much more.
***
Anakin didn’t have to lead Damian anywhere because he could demonstrate more here. He held up his hand and stretched out with the Force. Mentally he thought of all the items loose on the surfaces in his apartment. And then he pictured them all lifting. And that was all it took. Every object immediately around them floated up to hover in the air around them.
***
Damian actually jumped in place, blinked then gaped at what he saw. “...amazing.” Telekinesis. He’d heard of it, but had never seen proof of it. He’d put it all up to mumbo jumbo and legends. Yet. He was looking at reality, not tales.
Slowly he paced toward the closest floating item. When he reached it Damian circled it as best he could without bumping into anything else. “Incredible. Can I touch it?”
***
Anakin shrugged to grant permission. “Go ahead. I didn’t electrify anything.”
But to just make things more fun, he started moving different objects. Some started orbiting the room, some just spun slowly where they hung in the air.
***
Damian eyed the table that floated in midair as if it were some strange new animal. It wasn’t as if he felt that the table would jump out and bite him. He’d just never seen anything like this before. It was enough to make anyone wary. Still, though, it didn’t take long before he gathered up his courage to reach out and poke at the table.
***
Anakin kept the objects floating. Years of memories plus the years now here that he’d practiced left him skilled enough to keep everything up.
“So these are the kinds of things people dream about.”