"Bring Stefan Back Fanfiction Challenge"     The Lesser Evil   By Speedgeek Luke Spencer walked into the darkness of his office at Luke's Place. He grabbed a cigar and felt around for a match. With his lousy luck lately, if he turned on the lights, Baldwin or his own damned son, as if Lucky could even be called that anymore, would be waiting to arrest him again. Stefan Cassadine was gone. No one was upset, no one missed him. It wasn't as if he'd actually committed a crime. Hell, killing a Cassadine should be rewarded, not punished. Murder, what a crock. Add insult to injury, Helena was still walking around free, with most of the Cassadine fortune to boot. She had shown up to the funeral and no one had done a single thing to stop her. Nikolas, Alexis, Lucky, Scotty, they were all too concerned with that terrible and dangerous criminal Luke Spencer to worry themselves with harmless little Mama Cass. The fact that she was supposed to be in jail, that she was a danger to everyone at that funeral, even the deceased himself, meant nothing to anybody. All she'd tried to do was destroy the damn town and kill everybody. Yeah, what he did was way worse than that. Hmph, maybe he should take a page from the House of Cassadine and freeze this ungrateful waste of space. On top of it all, he couldn't even find a match to light a cigar in his own office. "Looking for something?" Luke turned at the sound of the voice behind him. In the doorway stood a "murdered" man. "Shouldn't you be hiding, Vlad?" he asked dismissively. "Somewhere where the She-Devil's henchman ain't watching?" Stefan pulled out a lighter and threw it to the other man. "And miss Mother's grand entrance at my funeral? Or her predictable eulogy?" Luke lit his cigar and blew a puff of smoke in his direction. Predictable was the perfect word. Getting Helena to reveal herself had been all too easy. "Yeah, wouldn't want to miss that. Not every day you get to attend your own funeral." "Jabbing the body with the shovel, nice touch, by the way." "I thought so." "I'm sure it pleased Mother immensely." "I live to please." The two men stared at each other in the darkness for a few tense moments. "What about the charges? I can't hide from Port Upchuck's finest forever, no matter how worthless they are." "Agent Jones said he thought he might have a lead on getting the charges dropped without raising any suspicion." Stefan crossed the room and poured himself a drink. "However, it may require you to be arrested first," he added with a smug smirk. "Why can't that kid just use the damn phone?!" Luke cursed. "One word from him and Bubba would let me go. Probably wouldn't even question why." "He and Scorpio are being very careful about not raising Mother's suspicions. She's not as uninformed as the rest of this town. Ignorance is bliss, as the American saying goes." "Well, her ignorance is cramping my style." Stefan shook his head. "Just enjoy Ms. Chandler's company for awhile longer. She seems to be quite an intriguing woman." "Don't give me orders, Cassadine. I like Skye, so don't go using her as a way to get to Laura. It ain't gonna work, buddy," Luke sneered. "You just tell Frisco and Robert to hurry up and bust Helena already." "You mentioned something about orders?" Luke blew a puff of smoke directly in his rival's face. Stefan wouldn't even give him the satisfaction of a reaction. "I'll pass on your message. But if I were you, I'd get used to the catacombs." "I'm not pathetic enough for the catacombs. I'm uptown now, man." "I'll tell Jones you said that as well. I'm sure he'll appreciate that." Stefan turned to leave, but stopped in the doorway. "Just concentrate on your end of the plan and we'll all get what we want." Luke watched the man go. "What I want," he snorted. Too late. The damage had already been done. The only thing left was retribution, even if it meant working with Stefan, the lesser evil of the bunch. Helena, Stavros and Faison would pay dearly for their crimes, he'd make sure of it. For Felicia and Anna. For Nikolas and Lucky. For Laura.