[detroit!AU: Summoning]

[stilljustandrew]

There's a triple circle on the floor of the room: standard Summoning, and two extra tracks. The one of holy oil is a matter of last resort.

Oddly enough, it's the true name part that's easiest this time.




Andrew speaks the last words of the Summoning, and rises to his feet.

Comments

[gavemea_45]

"If you insist," he agrees. "Why not?"

"There'll be time."

[stilljustandrew]

"Yeah."

He waits. Knowing there's nothing he can do about it if Lucifer decides to keep him hanging indefinitely.

[gavemea_45]

A tense silence stretches out between them.


Lucifer's studying Andrew carefully.

[stilljustandrew]

Andrew folds his arms, trying to still the trembling in his stomach.

A bit hoarse: "Anytime."

[gavemea_45]

There's something heartbreakingly sad about his gentle, sympathetic smile.

"Being glad to see someone isn't the same thing as wanting to talk to them, Andrew."

A beat.

"You don't want me to force him, do you?"

[stilljustandrew]

The breath goes out of him in a rush, as though at a blow.

For a few seconds he can't speak.

[gavemea_45]

"He loves you very much, you know," Lucifer adds, each word dropping quietly into the silence left after Andrew's gasp.

[stilljustandrew]

Andrew's mouth closes, quivers, flattens into a hard line.

"Then if he doesn't want to talk to me," he rasps, "let him at least tell me so to my face."

[gavemea_45]

"So you do want me to force him."

Lucifer smiles.

"Good."

[stilljustandrew]

Beat.

"Why good."

[gavemea_45]

"Because you're going to need that kind of determination and willingness to make hard decisions," he informs him, casually. "It's invaluable in a good lieutenant."

He takes a step forward, examining the edge of the circle with apparent curiosity, and then begins to pace slowly around it.

[stilljustandrew]

That's never a good sign.

"There's no Binding," he says; and while it's meant to sound like an expression of assurance, it comes out sounding hasty, conciliatory, just short of cringing.

[gavemea_45]

"So I see."

He glances up at Andrew, even as he comes unerringly to a pause at the point of the circle that's closest to him.

"Why not?"

[stilljustandrew]

"Because I'm not interested in keeping you here against your will. Even if I were strong enough, which you and I both know I'm not."

It's the truth, and he knows it now more completely than ever. It's all he can do to hold himself straight and look Lucifer in the borrowed face.

"I wanted to talk to Sam. That's all."

[gavemea_45]

"That's all," he repeats, and smiles. "Of course."

Lucifer looks directly into Andrew's eyes.

"What did you want to say to him?"

[stilljustandrew]

Andrew swallows hard.

Almost inaudibly: "I'd rather say it to him."

[gavemea_45]

"You will be."

"He hears you."

[stilljustandrew]

"Not good enough."

He's visibly shaking now.

"Let me hear him."

[gavemea_45]

He shrugs.

"I suppose there's no reason I can't be generous."

Lucifer smiles again, and slowly lowers his gaze.

Everything goes quiet and still for a moment, and then the air within the innermost ring seems almost to ripple around him with a single swift shiver.

His head jerks up.

"Andrew?" The voice is tight and strained, but unmistakably Sam's. "Andrew, no, what are you doing--"

(Within the carefully-shaped illusion, Lucifer watches, still smiling.

As the old saying goes: be careful what you wish for.)

[stilljustandrew]

"Sam?" Andrew's voice is strained too, hope and dread mixed together.

He's still in there. Oh god.

[gavemea_45]

He shakes his head. "You shouldn't have summoned him. You shouldn't have done it. Do you realize what that means?"

[stilljustandrew]

"...What?"

It's not what he was going to say. At all. But it's the oldest rule of Summoning, know what you're calling upon, and this --

"What does it mean?"

[gavemea_45]

"You should run. Right now. Get out of here."

He leans forward, right to the edge of the circle.

"Go. Leave me."

[stilljustandrew]

"Or what?"

Andrew steps forward, at the parallel edge of the outermost circle.

"What happens if I don't?"

[gavemea_45]

He shakes his head again. There's a bare second's beat, no more than that, and it bursts out of him in a near-agonized cry--

"Why are you even here?"