Chapter Eleven

The next morning at breakfast I was leaving food on my plate to bring to Luke. That probably would have worked with minimal suspicion. The problem was that Beel decided to do the same thing, causing quite a stir with his brothers. They assumed he was sick and something was wrong. It was nice confirmation that they did indeed still care deeply for each other, so maybe this family is still salvageable.

We managed to escape one problem with breakfast just to run into another. Luke was wandering the halls.

“Luke,” I scolded, “What are you doing out here? You know you can’t be spotted.”

“But staying in Beel’s room is boring,” he whined. He really is like a child, I wonder how old he actually is.

“Well, get on back if you want food. I’ll bring up some art on my tablet and you can color them, okay?”

“Okay!”

He happily marched on back to Beel’s room while Beel and I shared a tired look. I followed Luke back and was showing him art on my tablet as he munched on some food. The door opened in a rush as Beel announced a new problem. Great.

“What’s wrong,” I pressed, annoyed at how much stuff goes wrong here.

“Lucifer is doing a surprise inspection of the rooms.”

“So we gotta hide Luke.”

“That’s the problem. Lucifer can find anything. Satan tried to keep a cat by turning it into a spider. But when he did the inspection, he still found it.”

“Well do you have any ideas then? I don’t have any magic to try and hide Luke.”

A knock on the door cut our brainstorming short and Beel panic-shoved Luke into Belphie’s closet. I opened the door as Beel stepped away.

“Good morning,” Lucifer greeted smugly. Oh, fuck. “I’m here to do an inspection.”

I moved aside and he began going through the room. Checking underneath the bed, both the frame and the mattress itself, under the couch cushions, in tight corners. Just everywhere. As he approached the closet Luke was in Beel opened his mouth to try and stop him. But I motioned for him to stay quiet.

I was hoping Luke found a little nook to hide in and Beel saying something would definitely tip Lucifer off to us hiding something. We held our breaths as Lucifer opened the closet, revealing clothes. Luke was nowhere to be seen.

“I thought your behavior this morning was odd,” Lucifer shut the closet and turned to us, “Anything to tell me?”

Beel obviously wasn’t good at thinking on his feet so I answered first, “I’ve not been sleeping so my appetite is small. But, I need to eat so I was bringing food back to snack on. I guess Beel noticed and was trying to make sure I had enough to eat.”

“Right,” Beel nodded, “If humans don’t eat enough they die and it would be a problem if Drizzm dies.”

“I see,” it was hard to tell if we actually convinced him or not, “I thought you may have snuck a stray in here.”

“The only stray here is me,” I joked.

“Seems so. Well, have a good day.”

Beel and I visibly relaxed when Lucifer’s footsteps faded away. I opened the closet door.

“Okay Luke, come on out,” I sighed tiredly. But he wasn’t there, “Beel, we have a new problem.”

“What now? I’m too hungry for this,” his stomach rumbling on queue as he took the food we smuggled for Luke.

“Well, Luke’s missing.”

“What? But that closet doesn’t go anywhere.”

“Let me test it,” I climbed in the closet, “Close the door. I wanna see what happens.”

“What if you disappear too?”

“I’m smart. I’ll get Luke and I back.”

He looked really unsure but closed the door. After a few seconds he opened it, “You’re still here.”

“Appears so,” I got out and crossed my arms as I thought, “We gotta find Luke. Who knows where he is. Let’s split up.”

Beel nodded and we spent the entire day scouring the house for Luke but with no luck. We convened after dinner as we tried to brainstorm where Luke could possibly be. If he was in the walls, someone would have heard him by now. I had already inspected the closet for any false walls or trap doors but I didn’t see anything like that. I had another sleepless night while Beel tossed and turned on his bed.