Lucifer's Odyssey

by Rex Jameson

  ***

  The group came to a stop at the vortex exit, and Lucifer could see stars and a large, green and blue planet through the portal.

  “We should bubble him just to be safe,” Michael said. It was more of a statement than a request for input.

  “I’m surprised you care,” Lucifer replied.

  Michael bent over Batarel and started the magical work of surrounding Batarel with a thin shield that trapped atmosphere from the tunnel around him.

  “What is Jehovah going to do with him?” Lucifer asked.

  Michael clapped his hands against his legs. “How am I supposed to know? I’m sure he’ll be given the same choice everyone else gets.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “If you’re so desperate to find out, summon a sword and fall on it.”

  Lucifer felt his sword hand twitch at his brother’s attitude.

  “So, if someone dies right here, they’re just reborn somewhere else and that’s that?”

  “Eventually, yeah.”

  “And that planet there is the new Earth?”

  “No,” Michael said in a condescending tone. “Earth is not the center of the pattern. It’s just a planet. That’s New Eden.”

  Lucifer had had enough. He summoned a sword and plunged it into Michael’s chest before kicking him through the portal.

  “Lucifer!” Anne pointed a finger in his face. “What the hell do you think you are doing?”

  “Relax,” Lucifer said, sheathing his sword. “I’ve killed him here before.”

  He turned toward the portal and found a knife pressed against his throat.

  “You cause my father any more pain than is necessary here, and I’ll see you join your brother.”

  Lucifer batted the blade aside and glared at her. “This is unfamiliar space deep inside of enemy territory, and I’m on edge. Keep your blades to yourself.”

  “Yes, sir,” Anne squinted at him through her soiled headgear.

  “If that’s New Eden, then Jehovah is probably down there with the rest of the Intellectuals. Let’s wing up. Anne, would you mind carrying your father down to the planet surface?”

  She coughed uncomfortably.

  “What?”

  “I don’t … I don’t have wings.”

  Lucifer looked her up and down. “Batarel’s daughter, and you don’t have wings?”

  She put one hand on her hip and flipped a dagger in the other.

  Lucifer turned his palms upward and tried to be as delicate as possible. “I’m just confused about how a greater demon could have a child without wings.”

  “Look,” she said. “I’m tired, I’m absolutely filthy, I’m in need of a hot bath and some sleep, and I could use a lift down to that planet.”

  “I’ve got our uncle,” Sariel said as he grabbed a handle through the bubble shield and leapt through the portal.

  Lucifer pushed his wings through his sweat-stained red pinstripe suit and extended his hand. “Well, I guess that means you’re with me, then.”

  “You’re a real gentlemen,” she said sarcastically.

  She moved to his side and put her arms around his neck before mounting his back. He took the weight with ease, but he choked slightly as the smell of weeks of caked-on sweat reached his nostrils. He buried his face into his shoulder to try to escape the odor, but then realized he was just as fragrant.

  “I guess we could both use a shower,” he said, carrying her to the exit.

  “I noticed that.”

  The vortex offered very little resistance to his wings, and he flailed around trying to find a small local foothold on an asteroid. Meanwhile, sheets of ice crept over their bodies as the frigid vacuum of space blanketed them. Anne squeezed him hard and dug her face into his back.

  He slammed his wings into a decent-sized asteroid and flung them toward the center of New Eden. The planet grew larger, and before long, air entered his lungs again. He felt Anne’s chest filling with the same stuff.

  “Land at the edge of that lake over there,” she commanded him.

  “But I can see a huge city on the horizon. That’s where Jehovah will be.”

  “We smell like crap, Lucifer. You’ve already killed one of their angels. Do you really want to mortally insult them with our stink?”

  “I don’t think Chaos and Order can be more at war at the moment.”

  “Just land.”

  They passed Sariel, and Lucifer motioned for him to follow. Instead, he apparated to the lake, laid Batarel on the ground, and stripped as he ran into the lake.

  Lucifer drifted down toward a nearby beach, but he was apparently too slow for Anne. Articles of clothing were pushed into his face before she kicked off of his shoulders. He turned around just in time to see her red hair, exposed breasts, and thighs plunging into the water.

  Lucifer checked on Batarel before taking off his suit. He carefully worked his cufflinks and checked the state of the seams and lapel. Lantomine’s perfect three-piece was in need of some maintenance.

  “I’ll be damned,” Sariel said, splashing in the water behind him. “You’re an elf.”

  Lucifer swiveled to find Anne walking out of the water and collecting her armor and cape, which she had pressed into his face moments ago. Her toned muscles shimmered against the cool air, and she wrung her sopping red hair onto the white leather straps and metal plates.

  “My gear needs a bath too,” she explained.

  Lucifer’s eyes were nowhere near her gear. Sariel chuckled as Lucifer watched her bending over.

  “It’s impolite to stare, Mr. Crown Prince,” she reminded him. “I may be an elf, but I’ve lived most of my adulthood under demon rules and taboos.”

  “Those are going to be among the first to go when I get back.” Lucifer said, grinning. “I assure you.”

  “Until that time,” she said, raising an eyebrow, “would you mind fetching me some nice-smelling flowers? I’m afraid a simple rinse isn’t going to be enough for a diplomatic introduction.”

  He tried not to imagine her rubbing flowers all over herself, but that just made it worse.

  She giggled. “I guess you can’t blame it on a whorehouse this time …”

  “Nope,” he said, laughing uncomfortably. “This one’s all you.”

  “I’ll try to take that as a compliment.”

  “I’ll um … go get those flowers.”

  “What a gentleman!”

  Lucifer walked past his naked, laughing brother, who was doubled over and wiping mirthful tears from his face.

  “Oh man, I needed that,” Sariel said.

  “Glad I could help,” Lucifer said.

  He sniffed some colorful foliage near the edge of the beach. The purple ones had a very pleasing fragrance. He picked one and held it above his head.

  “These are nice,” he shouted.

  “Really?” Anne asked from right behind him.

  He stumbled as she playfully pushed him aside and pressed her face into the blossoms.

  “These do smell good,” she said before plucking two of them and wrapping the stems around her elongated ears. “How do I look?”

  He was so embarrassed at this point that he thought it best to just nod. Words would only dig him into a deeper hole.

  She smiled and looked down suggestively, and his brother burst into enthusiastic, breathless bouts of laughter once more.

  Lucifer squinted at him before picking him up with two wings and launching him at the center of the lake. Sariel’s giggling drifted back along the waves before he disappeared under the surface.

  Lucifer sighed and walked into the water for the first time. He welcomed the silence as the crashing surf pulled him under. He mingled with curious fish and wildlife before lying down with fresh water kelp and crawdads that scurried in various directions.

  For thirty minutes, he escaped and tried to mentally prepare himself for his upcoming meeting with Jehovah—the first since Lucifer ran him through with a sword in the old Eden, before b
ecoming imprisoned on that primitive rock. And he’d be doing it without an experienced wizard in the heart of Jehovah’s seat of power. He had no bargaining chips: no new knowledge to trade, and no armies waiting in the wings. Just a couple of swords, the remnants of the most powerful sorcerer in the multiverse, and his obnoxious apprentice. Oh, and a sexy, naked elf who was probably Elandril’s long-lost sister, saved from the Council by Batarel.

  He scrubbed his body with kelp while he thought about Anne. An elven princess? Maybe he did have cards to play on the multiverse table—though nothing he could use on Jehovah.

  He resurfaced to find Anne rubbing flowers on his brother’s back.

  “That was the sexiest, most manliest flower I could find,” Sariel explained.

  “Sure, it was,” Lucifer said as he watched Anne massage the petals into Sariel’s shoulders.

  She returned the stare.