A/N - This is my first time writing with the characters from Lucifer. I think it will be two or three shorter chapters only. Any critiques about characters would be very helpful as I am not entirely comfortable with their speech and mannerisms.

I hope you enjoy!

Chapter One - Warning Sign

The lights flickered from blue to red to green, arching flashes which illuminated the crowd pressed tightly together as they danced. The energy of the room was nearly palatable, a mix of heat, arousal, and alcohol creating a savory mix that sent every nerve firing. Music thundered from overhead speakers, unattended glasses rattling on the tables from the bass.

Leaning back against his pristine bar top, Lucifer's eyes roved approvingly over the scantily clad club goers frequenting Lux. Bosoms were bouncing, hips circling in time to the music. Reaching behind him, he grasped the tumbler the bartender had been dutifully refilling for the better part of the night. He threw it back in one go, not savoring it as he usually would. Ordinarily he took the time to appreciate every drop of alcohol he ingested but not tonight. No, tonight he had more pressing things on his mind.

Placing the glass back, he pushed off the bar. The movement drew more then one pair of eyes, those nearest to him sensing the change in atmosphere as he switched from resting to prowling. He stalked towards the center of the room, heads turning to follow his descent down the few steps to his piano.

The attention, those hungry, desirous looks, made him smirk. He added a bit of flair to his movements, tight suit leaving little to the imagination.

They had called him King of Hell but here was where he truly ruled.

The temperature of the room rose a few degrees, the yearning tangible as he drifted through the crowd, looking for something special. It was incredible how provocative humans seemed to find him even when he was fully clothed. He had toyed with the notion, once or twice, of spending an evening in the nude. Such a thing would probably lead to pandemonium though. Humans were like rubber bands, you could only stretch them so far before they snapped.

A movement on his right caught his attention and he cocked his head. Standing near the rail was a dirty blonde woman, pale face flushed. Besides her was an equally enthralled male. He could taste the desire coming off them, a desperate plea. It tugged on his flesh, a call for pleasure and all sorts of devious acts.

Approaching, he ignored the crestfallen faces of those whom had not been chosen. Once Lucifer chose that night's bed mate, it was game over.

"Hello." he said softly, eyes crinkling as the couple stared wide eyed. "I'm Lucifer Morningstar, the owner of this establishment. And you are?"

"Becca." the woman breathed. "And this is James." she pointed to the man besides her who looked too starstruck to answer on his own.

Lucifer's lip curled in delight. Couples were simply bundles of fun, so much to touch and tweak.

"Well Becca, James." he leaned forward slightly, lowering his voice. "What is it you two desire?"

James' adams apple bobbed interestingly at the question, a strangled noise forcing its way from his vocal chords.

"I'm sorry, didn't quite catch that." he held a hand to his ear, excitement coursing through him as he thought about how tonight would unfold.

The two were blushing so hard that he wondered if an ice cube could melt on their faces. He would have to try that, as well as on their backs, chests, hips -

A vibrating from his pant's pocket shattered his musings.

Distractedly, he pulled the phone from his pocket, intending to dismiss the call. The name appearing in bold letters made him hesitate.

"Terribly sorry but I must take this. Why don't you two use this brief reprieve to find your tongues again?" he turned partially away, keeping the couple in his peripherals as he accepted the call. "Detective! As pleased as I am about you calling, I am a tad busy at the moment." he said cheerily.

"We have a case." Chloe responded shortly, not bothering with a greeting.

"Right." he said, looking at the couple in frustration. "Are you quite sure this requires my skill set?" he asked.

As much as he enjoyed working with his partner, his body was demanding he hung up and gave into more carnal desires.

"Since when do you bail on a case?" Chloe asked. There was a sharp intake of breath and she continued outraged. "Are you having sex right now?"

He jerked the phone away from his ear with a wince as she yelled. "I was about to until you called!" he shouted back, squaring his shoulders. "Really, I don't know why you care. I propositioned you for weeks and every time you declined." Beginning to pace, he realized with dismay that Becca and James had vanished, their spot conspicuously empty. "Bollocks." he growled.

"I'm a block from Lux. Are you in or out?" Chloe asked shortly, far too accustomed to his sexual banter to even acknowledge it.

"In." he grounded out, still searching for his escaped toys.

The line went dead and he conceded defeat. Stuffing the device back into his pocket forcefully, he made his way towards the stairs, pausing only to inform the bartender that he would be out for the rest of the night.

Once outside, he waited impatiently in the narrow alley between Lux and the next door building. Lighting a cigarette, he planned how Chloe would have to repay him for ruining his evening. He could not leave her to do all the case paperwork (he did that already). Maybe he could convince her to re-enact a few choice scenes from Hot Tub High School.

When Chloe finally pulled into the alley, his cigarette was all but forgotten, burning dangerously close to his fingertips, and his pants were uncomfortably tight.

"I thought you said you were only a block away." he said, opening the car door and climbing in stiffly.

"I lied." she said, putting the car in reverse and pulling out again.

The traffic was minimal as it was so late, the drive to the crime scene taking only ten minutes. On the way, Chloe filled him in.

"A body was found in Grovewood Park. Some late night jogger stumbled on it." she said.

"And? People turn up dead all the time." he shifted on the seat, his large frame not designed for such a compact car.

"It was a kid." her knuckles whitened against the steering wheel.

"Ah." was all he said.

He knew Chloe took every case hard but dead children tended to shake her up. She had confided once that she could not help but imagine her daughter at these crime scenes, blood matting her unruly dark hair and brown eyes lifeless.

He looked at her profile uncertainly. She was bothered, though she tried to hide it. The death grip on the steering wheel kind of gave it away. This was not his area of expertise. He could make anyone scream with pleasure with hardly a touch but offering comfort?

What was so pleasant about hugs anyway?

Awkwardly, he reached over, placing his hand over her's. Working his nimble fingers between her own, he loosened her grip. She glanced over at him, startled by his uncharacteristic touching.

He kept his eyes trained straight ahead, faking nonchalance. The feel of her skin, colder than his own, was the only thing he could focus on though. Hand holding was not something he had partaken in. Ever. Period. Feeling her hand warm against his though… he was beginning to see why humans did it. It was kind of nice, if a tad odd.

The moment was broken as the car pulled into the park parking lot and Chloe had to untangle her hand to unclip her badge and show it to the officer baring the path forward.

"Hello Detective Decker." the officer said. "Forensics is already here." he pointed to one of the three paths that stretched outwards through the park. "Just take the right most one and you'll find them."

"Thank you." she said and parked in the first available spot, climbing out quickly.

Lucifer followed suit, shaking his legs to re-establish some blood flow as he looked around. For all the police vehicles present, the area was rather quiet.

Chloe was already heading towards the path and he hurried to catch up with her. They walked in silence, shoes occasionally scraping against the asphalt. The playground was to their left, located dead center of the park. The path they were taking, however, led towards the bit of forest that had been preserved for joggers and dog walkers. Bits of light peeked from between the trees.

Chloe's pace increased, her long strides bordering on a trot. It was still too quiet.

When they entered the wooded area, the first thing they noticed was the number of people not doing anything. Usually a crime scene was bustling as officers took statements and forensics did their thing.

Massive lights had been set up around a ditch just off the main path. It was difficult to see what lay beyond, the lighting too bright after the near darkness blanketing the rest of the park. Shielding her eyes, Chloe continued on doggedly and Lucifer was forced to follow, mumbling under his breath as bits of rock and dirt slid under his loafers and nearly sent him tumbling.

"What do we have?" Chloe asked, gaze focused on a small body covered by a white tarp.

The forensic, someone Lucifer was not familiar with, was kneeling on the ground besides his kit. At the question, he rose and brushed himself off.

"Boy, fourteen. Cause of death was blunt force trauma." he rattled off wearily.

"Was this where it happened?" Chloe asked.

"No, from what we gather, the body was dumped here. Judging from the poor hiding spot, we think we're dealing with an amateur. The killing does not seem to be premeditated."

Lucifer was not paying attention. Instead, he looked curiously at the tarp. Bodies were normally covered for two reasons. One, to offer the body some semblance of privacy. Death tended to draw crowds and the police usually deemed it necessary to hide the body in order to control the crowd. Two, the injuries were too grotesque to be seen.

And seeing as it was two in the morning in a deserted park, he would have to go with the latter.

He was curious now about the state of the body. What most people considered horrific he merely thought of as a typical Tuesday in Hell. He edged towards the covered form, wanting to take a peak at what was so terrible, even the forensic team looked ill.

"Do you have an ID yet?" Chloe asked, ever the diligent detective.

"We won't know until we get the body out of here." the man sighed, tracing the dirt with the toe of his sneaker. "I hate these sort of cases. Who could kill a child? Smash them in the skull and watch the life bleed out of them?"

Lucifer was only a few feet from the body now. Crouching, he looked over at Chloe but she was paying him no mind. His gaze fell to the sheet again. Stretching out a hand, he grazed the pad of his thumb over the wrinkled surface. What lay below was cold and solid, like rocks.

He frowned to himself. Humans did not die in Hell. Their bodies never went stiff with rigor mortis or turn to ice. Caressing the tarp again, he felt the features of a face, a nose protruding slightly.

For all the time he had spent at crime scenes, he had never actually touched a dead body before. He had never really had reason to. By the time he and Chloe usually showed up, forensics had done their thing and the body was ready to be carted off.

His fingers found the edge of the tarp. With near reverence, he peeled it back carefully.

First exposed was a mess of light brown hair, some of it matted darker with what smelled like blood. A few soft strands shifted from the sheet being moved, ruffling. He tugged, wanting to see more.

The tarp stuck for a moment and he had to yank it harder. Uncovering the top half of the face, he scrutinized it carefully.

A massive wound had been dealt to the side of the teen's head, blood staining his ear and forehead. Lifeless eyes stared up, sparkless. It was weird how… empty he looked. Lucifer knew the body was merely a vessel for the soul but he had not anticipated for it to look like a deflated shopping bag.

His gaze cut back to the wound. It was ugly but hardly something worth covering. He had seen worse with Chloe, much worse. Broken skulls were hardly pleasant but they did not compare to flayed flesh or arms torn out of their sockets…

"What are you doing?" someone whispered, horror struck.

He looked up, dropping the sheet back over the teen's face and found Chloe's stricken gaze trained on him.

"I was looking." he said, not sure why she seemed so off put.

"You were looking?" she repeated.

He rose from his crouch, frowning. "I wanted to see what the injury looked like. You were all acting like it was horrific and I was curious. " he said.

She reeled away from him as if he had struck her. "People… people don't do that." she said, looking pale.

"Detective? Are you alright?" he moved towards her but she backed up, arms crossed tightly across her chest.

"Don't… don't please." she whispered.

Lucifer had no idea what to do. It seemed he had done something vulgar but what he did not know. Chloe was breathing deeply through her nose like she might be sick. Her reaction, as far as he was concerned, seemed a bit on the dramatic side.

"We have an ID!" someone yelled from the path, breaking the tension.

Chloe whirled away from him, suddenly the height of cool and collected. She climbed out of the ditch carefully. "That was fast." she commented.

The other detective nodded. "Turns out he was reported missing by his parents just after nine. The mother went to check up on him before she went to bed and he was gone. She's been calling the station every half hour, demanding updates. When we heard you found a kid, well, it just seemed to fit."

She nodded. "Time of death was placed at around seven hours ago, before he was reported missing. I want to speak with the parents."

"Here's the address." the other detective handed her a piece of paper.

Lucifer had made his way to the path as well during the exchange. Now, positioned behind Chloe, he looked over her shoulder to read the address.

"Chesterfield Square?" he questioned. "Not exactly a nice neighborhood."

Chloe jolted, spinning around. She still looked deeply uncomfortable and refused to look him in the eye. Without a word, she headed back in the direction of her car. Lucifer followed, still not sure what he had done to warrant her new aversion to him.

When he climbed into the passenger seat of the sedan, she hesitated, like she wanted to tell him to leave. Instead, she sighed and put the key in the ignition.

When they pulled up to the house they were looking for, still not so much as a glance had passed between them. It felt like someone had erected a concrete wall, impenetrable.

Lucifer tried not to let the tension bother him too much. As he had seen earlier, these cases always affected Chloe badly. Perhaps the young age of the victim was playing into her new behavior now.

She knocked on the door and, despite the late hour, it was opened almost immediately by a frazzled looking woman.

"Is this about Mark?" she asked frantically, looking around like she expected her son to appear from behind them.

"Mrs. Porter, my Detective Decker with the LAPD. May we come in?"

The woman frowned at Lucifer, Chloe's failure to introduce him not going unnoticed. She relented however, stepping aside to let the two in.

"Harry!" she called. "The police are here."

Something was dropped, a clatter echoing through the house, and a man came rushing into view, eyes almost crazed.

"Have they found Mark?" he asked loudly.

All the excitement was wearing on Lucifer but he kept his mouth shut. Chloe had hammered it into his head often enough 'do not insult the families of victims'.

"Is there somewhere we can sit down?" Chloe asked, stiff lip threatening to wobble.

The couple's faces fell, despair stealing any glimmer of hope. Wordlessly they led the way into a crowded living room. Chloe took a seat on a low couch and Lucifer followed suit, trying to fit his legs between the couch and coffee table.

He was not normally included in these sorts of things - his personality considered too "unprofessional". There was only one exception to that rule… if Chloe thought the person she was notifying was involved in the murder.

"Mr. and Mrs. Porter, I am so sorry to inform you that your son Mark was found dead in Grovewood Park from blunt force trauma." Chloe was fighting to hold it together, not allowing her inner turmoil to show.

The mother collapsed in on herself, sobbing. Her husband, however, maintained some self control.

"Blunt force? I don't understand." he spoke carefully, as if he had to fight to articulate every word.

Chloe hesitated which Lucifer took as his que to speak up.

"Someone broke his skull." he said conversationally. "And the Detective thinks one of you did it."

"Lucifer!" Chloe said sharply. She addressed the parents, aghast. "I apologize for my partner. He is completely out of line."

Mr. Porter stood up sharply, teeth clenched. "How dare you!" he thundered. "How dare you imply I or my wife would murder our child! Who the fuck do you think you are?"

His tone was grating on Lucifer, annoyance taking hold at how he was being addressed. Rising gracefully, he offered a mirthless smile.

"I advise you to not disrespect me. That sort of thing never ends well." he threatened lightly. Something caught his eyes and he frowned. One of the tables on either end of the couch was missing a lamp. The other had one. "One of your lamps appears to have gone astray." he noted.

Mr. Porter was still seething but his words had caught the attention of his wife. Even through her tears, she noticed the same detail, seeming surprised.

"I want you out of my house! Out now!" Mr. Porter screamed, spittle flying.

"Yes sir. We'll leave immediately." Chloe rose hastily and body checked Lucifer, shoving him towards the door.

The moment the two were outside, the door slammed with a resounding clatter so forceful that the house numbers stuck to the wall fell off.

"The husband did it." Lucifer said casually, reaching into his pocket for his carton of cigarettes. "He must have used the lamp. The wife looked surprised when I mentioned it. Evidently she was too caught up with her missing son to notice until now."

Chloe was facing away from his breathing deeply in massive billows. Her fists were curled at her side.

"Detective? Did you hear me? We've solved the case." he approached her, confused. "Well, I more than you I suppose. Really, this one was quite easy. I thought perhaps we would get a challenging one this time aro-"

Smack.

The open palm slap was completely unexpected. Stumbling backwards, he raised a hand to his cheek, the area throbbing sharply.

"Detective! Whatever has gotten into you?" he asked angrily.

Chloe finally looked at him and he immediately wished she had not. Every line on her face, the downward slant of her mouth, the narrowed eyes spoke of only one thing.

Hatred.

"What is wrong with you!" she screamed, almost hysterical.

"What is wrong with you?" he said. "By all means, I enjoy a little roughness in the bedroom but this hardly constitutes."

She was in his face, hands twisting in the lapels of his shirt. There height difference did not seem to matter in the slightest.

"This is not a fucking joke!" she snarled, teeth grinding with rage. "You… first you uncover a dead child just because you're curious and now you're making accusations of murder to grieving parents. Do you understand how sick that is? How completely fucked up a person has to be to do something like that?"

He didn't. Not one bit.

"Chloe…" he said uncertainly.

She shook him. Hard. And he let her.

"Don't use my name. God, I can't believe this." he released him abruptly, her revulsion so deep she now wanted to be as far from him as possible.

"I… I don't understand." he said, the situation spinning away from him.

What had he done? He knew so little of this world, of its rules. How could he fix something when he did not understand how he had broken it?

"I don't know why I didn't see it before. I mean, you think you're the fucking Devil. Of course you're sick in the head." she was not listening to him, too caught up in her own ramblings.

He stepped towards her again, wanting to breach the distance that seemed to be growing by kilometers every second.

"Don't come near me!" she roared, crying. Actual tears were streaming down her face, glistening in the light cast by the street lamps. "You're a monster!"

The ground dropped out from under him.

Or it felt like it at least.

His feet were firmly planted but he felt weightless. In free fall.

"N-no." he stuttered.

She could not think that. Not her. Not his Chloe.

"You are!" she was still screaming. "This was a mistake, all of it! I never should have let you near me, near my daughter!"

"Stop it." he said feebly, his stomach twisting in a foreign way as if it was trying to pop itself inside out.

"You were a mistake!"

It was the final nail in the coffin.

He had heard this all before. From his father. From his brothers and sisters. From the people he tormented in Hell. And never once had he believed it, not really. But every word Chloe said, it was slicing into him, tearing ragged hole through his chest. He could not breath, could not speak.

Chloe was no longer speaking, not that he even noticed. His world had grown unbearably cold, a numbness sweeping through him at an alarming rate. Where was the anchor which had once grounded him?

Oh right, she was standing before him. She thought him a monster.

He was no longer aware of Chloe, his mind curling inwards to protect itself. The words still bounced around his skull though, tearing through long since healed scars. His body ached, a pain beyond the physical.

He wanted to die.

Self preservation, however, was one of his greatest attributes. So instead he ran.

He took off as fast as he feet would carry him, arms pumping at his side. Everything was a blur and his lungs burned but still he moved. Once or twice a car honked at him but he refused to stop. He could outrun this, outrun the pain. He had to.

It was his knee that was his undoing.

The joint reached its point and simply collapsed. He pitched forward onto the ground, scraping his face and palms against the concrete sidewalk. The sun was starting to rise, the sky turning purple and red.

Everything was still blurry.

He dug into his pocket, fingers landing on his phone. Pulling it out, he dialed a number he knew by heart. And then he waited.

The minutes crept by slowly, or so he thought. Time was not really his biggest concern at the moment.

And that was how a frantic Maze found him half an hour later: sprawled out on the ground, bloody scratches adorning his face, and tears falling hard and fast from devastated deep brown eyes.

A/N - Uh oh. Lucifer's bleeding and Chloe is nowhere near. I like to play with canon elements a bit - apply them to different scenarios and see how they work. This work does follow the immortality rules as set by the show, I'm just having a bit of fun with them.