#like just picture you're Chloe in S3 and you don't have any idea that Lucifer is the actual devil

[amtrak12]

Long rambles about my current fic project because I’m too excited but I promise it will be horrifically boring for all who follow me unless you also happen to like reading Lucifer fic so I’m putting it behind a cut.

Okay so I'm that person who actually loved S6 and the finale but who also loves reading all the alternate 'Lucifer stays and gets to raise Rory' takes that fic writers put out because, while I don't want kids in real life, I am such a sucker for a good baby!fic. I'm also a HUGE sucker for time travel shenanigans so all the 'Rory time travels to a different season' fics are mmm *chef's kiss* delicious. Right up my alley.

Time travel shenanigans are also right up my writing alley. So, if I was going to use Rory to change any season of the show, it would 1000% be season 3. I abhor season 3. It was so uneven. It doesn't flow from season 2. The timeline was inconsistent from episode to episode making it hard to follow the main arc. Cain is arguably the MOST boring antagonist of the series and yet he was also supposed to be sympathetic at times???? I HATE HIM!

(also his curse doesn't make any sense. Is he really the only person in the history of humanity to not feel guilty for his actions? THE ONLY ONE? That doesn't make any sense! YOU DON'T MAKE ANY SENSE!!)

Anyway, I have tried multiple ideas to shift the events of S3 but my favorites just weren't working out so I let myself play with an idea someone else did in a fic: time travelling TODDLER Rory. The original fic writer dropped her in S4 right after Lucifer learned about Chloe's plot to permanently banish him to hell -- so you know, the absolute perfect time to drop their toddler daughter from the future on them. It was AMAZING. That fic took me for all I'm worth and then some. I'M IN LOVE.

So I thought, time travelling toddler fic, what a perfect treat to give my brain instead of beating my head against the wall. Except when I dropped a toddler Rory halfway into S3... it worked? Like the entire plot just ran through my head, one event after the other, and the emotions were delicious, but not as delicious as the ones that came after the goodbye to Rory. The fic is done, Rory's gone home, but the GRIEF my friends, THE GRIEF!!!!! Like can you imagine? 'Hey here's your daughter. No she hasn't been born yet but you don't mind, right? Great.' *two months later* 'Okay time for her to go back to her own timeline now. Say bye Mommy! Bye Daddy! See you in two seconds for her and SEVERAL YEARS for you' like ????? Heartbreaking. Just absolutely gutting stuff and I must write about Lucifer and Chloe navigating that. Especially because they're not even in a real romantic relationship yet when Rory goes home? They're full coparents and have recovered their S2 'dancing on the line of a relationship' but they haven't actually crossed that line yet. Then the adorable creature tying them together is just.. gone. She's just gone. Now what are they supposed to do?

(Also my god, the pressure knowing the future would put on you. Like, hey we know we're going to have a daughter before we even start a relationship. How awkward is that? So weird. So delicious to explore too.)

And then of course after the time travel and after the grief, you have to change the timeline right? Like sure, sure you showed Rory triumphantly returning home to her family in the epilogue of book 1. The reader knows they changed the timeline and Lucifer stays. But S3 Lucifer didn't believe the timeline would change when Rory left. S4 Lucifer didn't believe it would change either even as he and Chloe figured out how to have a relationship with each other. So OBVIOUSLY we need a third one to finish the story out. And OBVIOUSLY -- given that toddler Rory accidentally invented time travel because Trixie was sad about her daddy and Rory was determined to go to heaven and bring him back for the 'best big sister ever' -- we show Lucifer moving from 'I'm destined to abandon my daughter :(' to 'oh shit we actually can change the future! I can stay! :D'.... by allowing them to save Dan.

Now, I didn't know if they would save Dan or not. I know it's fic, but I still worried it would feel cheap if I let the *entire* future get rewritten. But if it's a plot device, it's not cheap. It's just smoirt. *taps side of head* Also it would still have to be a close call so that they know they've changed the future. They need to know they've changed the moment that Dan died in Rory's original timeline.

(Also also, since they don't know how Dan died in the original timeline, I get to write things like Maze stalking Dan 24/7 as a protection detail and Dan finally catching her and being like WTF are you doing? It's gr8. I'm totally normal about this trilogy. I promise.)

(Also also despite my main rants about Cain -- he lives in this trilogy? And goes to jail for the Sinnerman crimes/murdering Charlotte instead? But I've also changed his curse to being tied to Abel's guilt instead of his own. It was my spouse's idea to make it God's response to 'am I a brother-keeper?' like yes. Yes you are Cain. And now you don't get Heaven until your brother does. AND this means I get to have Eve interact with her son which would be both interesting and useful because Cain can tell Eve about Chloe being a gift and then Eve can tell Chloe because 1) it would drive a wedge between Lucifer and Chloe and 2) Eve can relate to being created for someone else and thinks it's kind of shit that Chloe doesn't even know she was created but mostly 3) it would drive a wedge between Lucifer and Chloe so Eve can get closer to Lucifer again. \0/)

(I love my girl. She's such a shit-stirrer when she's got that tunnel-vision on. <3)

Um, so yeah. That's what I'm working on. What are YOU working on? Are you also being completely normal about a story idea? :P