A Favor, if You Will

[madimpossibledreamer]

Canon changed in the merge so Azrael’s blade is the only thing that can permanently kill Angels, and an Angel Blade only temporarily banishes them. 
Only extra powerful wings (like those of Archangels) can manifest physically, though only one of the sets of wings can do so (which is why most angels are depicted with only one set).
They’re still twins, but Michael is the older twin.  I’d say by a few minutes, but who knows what that means in celestial time.
Side characters from Lucifer are mentioned, but I don't think you have to watch the show to understand what's going on.  Probably the only relevant thing to mention is that Lucifer owns a club.

Happy Thanksgiving (if you celebrate it, and otherwise have a great day)!  I guess if you really wanted, you could see this as a holiday fic somehow...

New notes, because of the Supernatural Ending: Chuck wrote Lucifer to be the villain of his story.  But he doesn't have to follow the script.

Main Points:
Supernatural AU (now a Lucifer crossover!)
Summary: Michael begs Lucifer for help.
Word Count: 1743
Rating: Teen

 

         Lucifer’s finally worked up a good buzz (such an effort, even on such depleted Grace) when he hears screams coming from the front of the club.  Normally, he’d greet those with excitement—a case, getting to see his beloved detective, ensuring the guilty are punished—but right now he can’t manage the effort.  He just feels irritation that someone would bother to come into his place and cause trouble, and that his bouncers aren’t doing their jobs.  But he strolls out regally, like he’s the king of the kingdom holding court.
         It quickly becomes clear why his patrons are screaming, because the person they’re giving a wide berth to is covered in blood, and there’s already a pool on the floor.  It takes him a moment to place the intruder, because his wings are retracted and his Grace is weak, barely visible.  And then he recognizes the cold burn of that Grace, and snarls at that realization.  “Michael.”
         Distantly, he realizes that at least one of his patrons is probably calling the police.  Some of his bouncers start ushering everyone out.  He. Doesn’t. Care.
         The archangel sways on his feet, and it’s probably sheer stubbornness keeping him upright.  Someone had hurt his brother, not just the reasonably good-looking green-eyed, dark-haired vessel he’d chosen but his wings, which are bleeding too, though not visible to the humans here.  An ambush with demons?  He’d given the order for no one to be topside, but perhaps the Good Son felt the need to venture into Hell.  And desecrate the places, just by his presence, the few places Lucifer has left.  The places that were his own, that were given to him, because he wasn’t good enough, but still.  They were his.  His family can just piss off.  Father’s most loyal son can only be here for one reason.  “Let me guess, you’re here to kill the Detective, too,” he hisses.  If he still had his wings, he’d flare them wide as a warning.  He barely manages to stop himself from showing his Devil’s visage, out of consideration for his wanted rather than unwanted guests.
         Michael’s eyes are confused, guileless.  Perhaps sometime in the past millennium he’d learned to lie (that would be real irony, wouldn’t it, Heaven spreading lies and him being nothing but honest) but he looks like he has no idea what Lucifer is talking about.  “I don’t…”  He coughs, loud and painful, and there’s blood.  Most likely broken ribs.  There’s a part of him, the overly sensitive part that still sees his brother with love, that’s worried.  Angry, on his behalf.  Protective.  He’ll burn that too, if he has to.
         “I am not a fool.  Father sent you, didn’t he?” Admittedly, he’s…concerned.  Because what use is a threat if Michael continues to not voice it?  Michael might be the sword, but surely he’d say something before he acts.
         Michael shakes his head so violently he looks dizzy. 
         “Dad isn’t exactly…in a talkative mood,” his brother manages wetly.
         All right, that?  That sets him off.  The last thing he’d heard from Father was casting him down, and his brother has the audacity to complain he hadn’t heard from him in a few days?  “You have some nerve.  The last brother I saw didn’t exactly walk away in one piece,” Lucifer hisses, hellfire just behind his eyes, and Michael drops to his knees.  And Lucifer falters.
         His wrath falters too.  He thought he’d known what to expect, and yet while Uriel had acted perfectly to script, Michael just…isn’t.  He never would have shown such deference before, thinking it blasphemy.  And this can’t be the Mandate of Heaven, either.  Uriel was dead, and he’d defied Father once more.  He had first-hand experience that Father was not a forgiving sort.  So Michael, here, extending an olive branch on orders makes no sense.  But good, dutiful Michael, acting against or without orders, that just doesn’t make sense either.
         Whatever happened, it was clearly violent.  When Amenadiel Fell, it was slow, a mere whimper in the scheme of things.  Erasing, killing a brother, that was violent, but quick.  And Lucifer knows slow and violent all too well.  This is slow and violent, and he’s enduring it like a good little soldier—wait.  Lucifer knows that smell all too well, the electric odor akin to ozone that’s burning Grace.  Michael is not-so-figuratively hurting himself just to stay conscious.  A part of him distantly realizes that Linda could be of use disentangling the cornucopia of emotion, guilt, rage, fear, worry all raging, should he ever make that appointment.  He had loved Michael, clung to his wings when they were tiny, but Michael had turned on him, just like everyone else.  He owes him nothing, and part of him wants to hurt, to tear.  And part of him is terrified that he will hurt another brother. 
         And if he’s not mistaken, he sees the same emotions mirrored in his twin’s eyes, all but the rage, which has been replaced with…hope?  “Our home has nothing to do with my request.  I hear you do favors now.  I’ll owe you anything, it doesn’t have to be for me, just…please, the humans outside.”
         He’s caught up in the enormity of everything his brother’s saying, everything he isn’t.  His brother’s caring about humanity, the project that had torn the Host apart.  Michael, good soldier, loyal son, Michael, is acting on his own.
         And to his humiliation, the rest melts away, and hurt is what remains.  Agony, that even acting on his own account, Michael didn’t come to see him.
         “Father didn’t send you?”  His voice is barely a whisper, but Michael manages a lopsided, bloody smile, shaking his head firmly and biting back a whimper when that apparently jostles something.  Blood starts flowing more freely.
         “It’s a soap opera shitshow,” the archangel states firmly, and Morningstar definitely gasps at the open blasphemy.  The second of the night.  “I’ve been trying to keep you out of it, Lucifer.  I know I don’t have a right to ask.  But please—for them.”
         He remembers having gleefully taunted Amenadiel, urging him to Fall.  Father forbid he refuses to reward the same behavior in yet another brother.  (That he might not be alone, a treacherous part of his mind whispers.  The others who had followed him, they’ve lost everything.  They don’t remember, they don’t understand.)
         “All right,” he agrees.  He’s not sure what does it—the favor, the uncharacteristic actions, the indication—well.  His words could be taken to indicate that he was protecting Lucifer.
         He remembers that smile.
         He flinches a little as his brother forces himself to his feet, and the smell of burnt Grace intensifies.  The club, he notes, is now empty.  Interesting.  Perhaps the archangel’s actions are a trap, giving him hope only to snatch it away, but.  Perhaps the Hosts have learned to lie, perhaps, but his most recent dealings suggested they were still at least direct.  If his twin isn’t careful, he’ll burn himself up entirely, pushing himself like this, but Lucifer doesn’t voice the thought, hoping the vessel won’t cooperate to that point.  He follows all the same, rolling up his sleeves.  “You certainly know how to make things interesting.”
         “I know, it’s going to be a pain with your new hobby and all.”  He—he knew.
         “Water cooler gossip back home?” he asks, raising an eyebrow, and Michael shakes his head, wincing once more at the gesture as they head to the parking lot.
         “I haven’t been Upstairs in more than a year, Luce.”  Despite himself, his footsteps are starting to falter, voice to slur.  Lucifer tries not to react to that announcement, or the nickname he’s reasonably certain he’s never heard once in his life, and is only moderately successful.  “Hitchcock’s Rear Window.  Sorry ‘bout being a little stalker, but you’ve got a good thing going.  Didn’t wanna ruin—”  Michael’s legs give out, and it must really hurt, because the scream when he falls is in his True Voice, breaking the windows of the few cars still parked.  Fortunately, only one of Morningstar’s is in this parking lot, but at least that he can fix with money.
         He pulls his brother to his feet, looping an arm around his shoulder, burnt Grace much stronger from proximity.
         “I’m more than capable of doing that on my own, thank you,” Lucifer snarls, even as he realizes that nothing’s been ruined precisely because no one knows what he’s done.  They don’t understand why he can’t trust himself, why he needs to forget.
         The next words are almost beyond recognition, but the tone, self-depreciating and anything but the assured Commander of the Hosts, makes Lucifer wonder.
         “I didn’t hear,” Morningstar states gently.
         “Same,” Michael coughs, and the smell of burning ozone is almost unbearable, now.  He gestures at a car as well as he can, a 1967 Impala, if Lucifer doesn’t miss his guess.  The vessel winces.  “Dean’s gonna kill me.”
         “…And you still desire for me to save them?”  Hunters, then?  Does…does Michael want to die?
         “Baby,” he gasps, head lolling.  “Windows.”
         Still, he’s agreed to this favor, though perhaps he should take extra care not to put anyone in danger, particularly a child.  Speaking of which—there’s the siren of the ambulance, getting close.  And Michael, stubborn as ever, takes the moment to remove his arm from around Lucifer’s shoulders.  He nearly crumples once more but manages to stay standing, swaying a little.  He doesn’t look like he wants to leave.
         Lucifer scrounges it all up, every bit of authoritative, commanding presence he can muster, to ask.  “What happens, if you leave?”
         “It doesn’t matter.  I’m not part of the deal.”  All of the emotion’s gone, and it would be terrifying if the switch wasn’t so complete.  If it doesn’t feel like a lie.  It gives him away as much as if he had started crying.
         “You’re burning your Grace,” Lucifer corrects, sharp and unyielding.  “What. Happens.”
         “Maybe I die.”  Michael shrugs, like it doesn’t matter.  “If that happens, I guess, I won’t be able to live up to my side of the bargain.”
         That is utterly unacceptable.  Morningstar tells himself the only acceptable solution is to punch his brother unconscious so he’s still here when the ambulance shows up.  He has to then explain the same thing all over again to the paramedics start lecturing him.  Well, if nothing else, he is owed a favor by a doctor at the hospital…