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It was nothing, absolutely nothing. Just a normal argument, it happened everyday. The brothers were always fighting, nagging each other and taking jabs. It was normal, so why was there this tightness in your chest? That shaking in your hands? That- that- terrible, stomach twisting nausea that left tears in your eyes?
Maybe it was because you were the subject of this argument this time? A mere human against multiple demons wasn't a comfortable situation to be in obviously. This wasn't just a normal three hour argument in the evening with your parents either. This wasn't a situation where you felt you could stand up to them.
No.
You felt eight years old again, situated at the dinner table in front of your mother as she yelled at you, calling you and everyone around her names. A child against a long living devil. That's what it had felt like and that's what it felt like now as you stood in front of the brothers.
They were centuries older than you, in comparison to them you were a baby. And in regards to strength they were way above you as well. You could only stand there and nod or shake your head, gaze downwards as they lectured you.
You wanted to leave, run away and hide somewhere nobody could find you ever again.
"Are you even listening? Look at me," Lucifer demanded, sending a shock right through your body that left your hands trembling even more and your legs ready to run and bring your body to safety. In an attempt to hide your trembling hands you clasped them together behind your back so as to not come off as disrespectful.
"I'm sorry," you whispered, voice shaking.
Carefully you lifted your head up, locking eyes with the eldest of the brothers as he continued the lecture.
"I hope you get how embarrassing that was yesterday alright? Not only for us but for Diavolo as well. An outlash like that could've put the relationship between the realms at risk even more."
"I know, I apologize. I didn't mean to do that, it was just that-" Satan interrupted you with a scoff, "Don't even try and excuse your behavior, __."
You let out a small sigh, "Okay."
Lucifer looked at you for a moment, taking in your shaking form and tear-filled eyes. "Diavolo will decide on an appropriate punishment soon. Leave."
It took everything left in yourself to not sprint out of the room like a child, even though it was hard to walk on shaking legs. The first tears ran down your face when you finally stepped into the hallway, not waiting any longer to sprint and just run.
It was somewhat freeing, but running while you were about to bawl your eyes out wasn't a good thing and it just ended with you running into one wall after the other.
Though it was difficult to find a reason to care for that in yourself as the only goal right now was to get to your room and hide. Under the cover, under your bed, in your closet. Anywhere.
Diavolo will decide on a proper punishment. Rang through your head. You thought your mother's punishments had been bad already, how would they look in this world? Especially since demons were naturally more violent than humans. It was second nature, easily observable by the way Lucifer and Mammon treated each other in arguments.
As you dove under the bed covers a sob escaped through your lips, hand flying up immediately to cover it. But it was to no avail as another one followed. And another one. And another until you were a sobbing mess, screaming and wailing as the year old pain broke out of it's cell in your heart, continuing even when the tears dried.
The shame, the embarrassment, the guilt that came up everytime you thought of the events, how you had ruined a party organized by Diavolo for high esteemed members of the Devildom and Celestial Realm.
Just because some guy couldn't shut his damn mouth. Just because you had tried standing up for yourself you had caused a scene and upset multiple demons in the process.
How embarrassing.
After some time the only thing you could do was lay there, under your covers and stare into space. It was uncomfortable, way too hot again and your body was screaming at you to just move.
But you couldn't get yourself to. It was as if something blocked that part of your brain, focusing solely on the fact that you hadn't been able to stand up for yourself again. How you had been back at home with your mother.
And how nobody had listened to you as you tried to explain yourself.
They never did.
Quietly you turned over towards the wall, closing your eyes in hopes of getting some sleep. Hopefully as long as possible so you wouldn't have to face the brothers again. You couldn't. You just couldn't.
You'd have to walk to school with them, eat breakfast, lunch and dinner with them. How? How would you be able to look them in their faces again after this?
In the past you just ignored the issue as much as possible, but that seemed so much harder to do now even though there wasn't really another possibility. And Lucifer's voice hadn't stopped echoing in your head either, still sounding too much like mother as your body didn't stop trembling from the memories.
Distracting yourself or even just reassuring yourself from these memories was difficult, even when you repeated, It'll be fine. I'll just take the punishment and everything will end up okay, everything will be fine and this'll all be forgotten soon. I'm gonna be fine, in your head as if your life depended on it, your brain couldn't let go of the memories.
The night passed while you tried to calm down and sooth yourself with clutched hands and deep breaths and shut eyes, your mother's voice getting quieter but never silent.
You were only pulled out of your concentration when someone knocked at your door to wake you up. Mammon yelled at you to get ready as you would be leaving for school soon before he walked away from the door and to the breakfast table.
Fighting against the wave of exhaustion trying to pull you back under the covers you got up, not even bothering to change as yesterday was the first day you wore this outfit. And if you were being honest, you couldn't give a single fuck how you looked today, not with how fatigued you felt.
You only quickly brushed your teeth and hair before entering the dining room with your best poker face. "Good morning", you greeted the brothers, typical smile plastered onto your face as you sat down. Their responses were mostly quiet, a nod in your direction or a wave with the hand. Only Lucifer and Mammon said 'good morning' back, Mammons more cheerful than that of his brother.
However, that didn't make you feel better. Your body continued to feel as if it were trembling like a leaf while your shoulders were stiff, causing your neck to pain.
Additionally, the meal in front of you did nothing but make your stomach tighten and send waves of nausea through you, killing off any previous feelings of hunger.
Mother's voice echoed in the back of your head, telling you to stop acting like a baby followed by an immediate shiver down your back, which you pretended was a cold chill.
Everything was fine.
Everything would be fine.
After what felt like an eternity of you sitting there, trying but failing to listen to the others' conversations, Lucifer finally spoke up, "we should get going," he paused, shifting his gaze towards you, "____, I'll accompany you to school today."
Again your legs began to shake slightly as you stood up with Lucifer, nodding meekly before both of you got your school bags and went out the door.
You didn't take the usual route, instead walking up to the demon lord's castle. Diavolo didn't leave it at this time yet.
When you arrived Barbatos greeted you, motioning inside before leading the way towards Diavolos office. He knocked three times and the door was opened by said demon.
"I apologize beforehand, _____. But punishment is necessary," he said softly. You just nodded your head, a quiet "I understand" leaving your mouth.
A second of silence hung in the room. Diavolo looked you up and down with a creased eyebrow and worry behind his eyes."Well then," he began slowly,"we will curse you with the Oath of Silence for a week as punishment for your misbehavior. After that week is over the curse is lifted by itself. Would you step forward, please?"
You did without hesitation. It was easier to get it over with fast even though you already felt like you were drowning and only inhaling more water the longer you breathed.
You wished nothing more but to leave this situation, to leave this shame and humiliation behind and, better yet, your body and everything with it.
As Diavolo raised his hands you couldn't stop your legs and hands from trembling, eyes fleeting from one thing to the other in this room. Diavolo and his raised hands, to Barbatos at the door, to Lucifer next to you and back to Diavolo right in front of you as he pressed his hands on your mouth and throat.
They were covered in a barely visible layer of magic, its touch cool on your throat. A pressure built itself inside it slowly, reinforcing your panic. It almost felt like you couldn't breathe at all, as of you would die right here because of a misunderstanding. Because nobody wanted to hear you out yet again. They never listened and they never would, you'd always be invisible and soundless.
And as slowly as the pressure came it also faded out again, leaving a weird sort of emptiness behind in your throat. You could practically feel the curse taking effect and when you opened your mouth, trying to say something, anything , in hopes of still being heard somehow nothing came out.
The sound got swallowed somewhere along your larynx.
You raised a shaking hand carefully, waving goodbye as Lucifer led you out of the castle.
You couldn't hear Diavolo or Barbatos say goodbye properly, too focused on the rapid beating of your heart as you looked up at Lucifer.
His eyes were downcast, a weird mix of pity and guilt swirling behind them and you couldn't help but be confused as you thought, why is he looking like that? I deserve this.
---
It wasn't gonna be easy. Third period had barely started when you heard people start whispering about you.
"Did you hear? Apparently Lucifer cursed ____ with the Oath of Silence. They haven't been talking all day." A girl whispered, shooting not so subtle glances in your direction. The person in front of her sent you one as well, "For real? What do you think they did to make him so angry? I'd never have the balls to do something like that."
Classes were already annoying enough as it was today and now your classmates didn't have anything better to do than gossip about you right in front of your face. You were mute now, not deaf.
A third person joined the two demons, not even bothering to be quiet, "I heard it was actually Diavolo who cursed them. They messed up big time." The other two gasped, staring at you, while you simply sat there, hunched over and your face buried in your arms. You just wanted to get this day over with and disappear.
___
In the end you had left early. Not only to avoid the demon brothers, because they had to stay late for a council meeting, but also as a way to simply escape school.
Since the third period everyone seemed to try and get some kind of reaction out of you. You weren't sure what exactly triggered it, but everyone who had finally left you alone had now started to insult and laugh at you again.
So, after the fifth period, you left. An hour before school ended, but it would give you a peaceful walk home without anyone from the school mocking you.
And enough time to lock yourself into your room when you finally got there. Easy.
And you did as you had planned. As soon as the door clicked shut and you had turned the key so it couldn't open anymore something inside of you broke open.
The dam that kept all the water you were drowning in ripped apart, violently flooding out as you screamed and sobbed.
But it was quiet, only soft drops of tears on the hardwood floor being heard as you held your head in your hands, mouth stretched open in a silent scream with wide eyes.
That didn't stop you though. Soon hands found their way into your hair. Gripping, tugging, pulling. The pain was comforting in a way, keeping you somewhat grounded while you wailed silently.
But even when you stopped there were too many emotions. There was no way you would be able to just fit them back into their bottles and cans and chests that you had carefully prepared years ago.
So you stood up abruptly, first walking over to your desk. A few school books littered the surface, with papers strewn about and a lamp sitting idly in a corner emitting a soft glow.
The room darkened considerably when you pulled both your arms across the surface in anger, the light bulb shattering on the floor and books and papers landing next to the shards in a cacophony of sounds.
Next you stomped over to your shelves, filled with books, decor and trinkets. You took each one, throwing it across the room, on the floor, against walls and stomping on them again for good measure.
This wasn't normal anger, this was fury. At everything. At the brothers for not hearing you out. At your mother for making you the way she did. Weak. A pushover. A coward.
And mostly at yourself. For even standing up for yourself in the first place. For trying to be strong. For trying to feel good about yourself for once.
When the fury and anger finally burned out it left nothing but ashes and wreckage behind. A scary kind of numbness after the overload, leaving you falling to the floor without any strength to get back up again.
But it was okay, it wasn't the floor beneath you.
One of those fluffy rugs you bought in the human realm. Not because you liked it or thought it looked well in the room, but simply because it was fluffy. Because it felt good when you walked over it and when you brushed your hand across the fabric.
It was comfortable in its own way even though you knew this position and the fact that you were still on the floor would leave you with back and neck pain. Maybe you would even be able to just spend the days that the curse was active like this.
Not moving, simply surviving, just existing.
Somewhere in the back of your mind, as you started to drift off to sleep, you could hear yourself laughing at how little it took for you to get back into this mental state.
___
"Um, ___! We already had dinner, 'cause we couldn't get you out of your room but if you want to eat there's some in the fridge! You gotta be fast though or else Beelzebub will eat it," A pause, "just wanted to let you know."
Leviathan's shadow was still seen under the door for a few seconds before it moved away accompanied by his fading steps.
The thought of dinner simply caused your stomach to clench uncomfortably and a wave of nausea to roll over you and settle right in the middle. Or it's because I didn't eat yet , you thought bitterly, not making any attempt at getting up.
It didn't even matter when you were stuck in the demon realm with people who didn't care about you. Not even so little to simply hear you out and let you speak.
Why even try and survive when everyone hates me? I do ruin everything, even myself.
The next two days didn't change at all.
Sometimes, when everyone was sleeping, you would get up to go to the toilet or get a bottle of water, fearing getting caught by the brothers, before retreating back into your room and laying down in your bed, the cover pulled up to your chin.
They would still come around, trying to get you out and eat. Apparently Beelzebub had never touched the foods in the fridge that were meant for you.
But you didn't give an answer. Not even when they got Solomon, Simeon or Luke over.
Until now, as you walked through the halls back to your room. The mirror in the bathroom had frightened you somewhere deep down, a little spark in the void of darkness.
Matted hair, like, really matted, made even more apparent by the ponytail you had gotten yourself to make this morning. After watching your sickly pale skin for what felt like minutes you had torn your eyes away from the mirror, opened the door roughly and practically ran back towards your room with disgust swirling in your stomach.
Before you knew it you had bumped into a sturdy chest and fallen back onto your butt. "Woah! ____, careful!" Mammon yelled out as he helped you up almost immediately.
A bout of panic rushed through your body while Mammon looked you up and down, pale skin, sunken cheeks, matted hair. Everything.
You could practically see his expression morph into one of disgust, but instead of letting you run away he blocked the path to your room with his body.
"Stop," he said, voice lacking any of its usual volume. It was deep, low, serious.
It caused you to freeze at first, but then the panic, the fear, overtook again. You felt practically naked, ashamed of how you looked. How far you had let yourself fall and it was all visible to him.
Without even thinking about it you grit out a fierce, yet soundless, "Move", making use of the pact you had formed with the demon. You actually hadn't expected it to work but still he did as you told immediately, an expression of shock and betrayal now on his face.
The guilt of this action squeezed itself next to your fear, but you ran past him without hesitation, rounding the corner and looking yourself back into your room.
Shortly after you could see the shadow of Mammon in front of your door. He stood there for a moment, quietly, and left again.
It was selfish of you, but you wanted him to stay. To be concerned and worried about you and in the end he left again, leaving you alone.
You pulled at your hair furiously, Why am I so fucking toxic? Do I really just want that much attention? God fucking damnit. Kill yourself, _____. This is why nobody fucking loves you, this is why they don't hear you out!
Stuck in your thoughts and self-hatred you didn't notice the voices outside your door before they were followed up with a loud bang.
You jumped, looking at your door with wide eyes as another bang followed and the door fell into your room.
Lucifer's eyes immediately met yours and he stormed inside, closely followed by Mammon.
The fast approach seized you with panic yet again and you felt pathetic with the amount of fear you had felt this night alone, but when he grabbed your arms firmly but gently, you couldn't help but feel safe at the same time.
It was weird, contradictory even. And yet, those black-red eyes looking you up and down gave you a sense of comfort. They didn't look disgusted and neither did the yellow-blue eyes right next to them.
"I apologize for knocking down your door, but we cannot stand by and watch you destroy and neglect yourself any longer," he finally said.
Mammon nodded along and took one of your hands, "We're gonna have a talk."
And at that your mind went reeling again. Not with fear this time. With anger.
'Have a talk?' Are they fucking serious?
Your face twisted into an angry grimace, sneering at Mammon and Lucifer. You quickly raised your arms and pushed them away from you.
"____? What's wrong?"
You picked up a page that you had ripped out of a notebook in your rage and a pen that was laying a few centimeters behind it and wrote onto it.
I will not have a talk with you.
They simply looked at you in confusion.
"Why?"
You don't and cannot listen to me.
"What do you mean?"
The Oath of Silence, the argument that even lead to this goddamn curse. You wouldn't hear me out.
If you were being honest, you didn't know why you tried getting yourself heard again. Maybe you were just tired, maybe you were exhausted. Or maybe something had built up inside of you again the last few days. But whatever it was, it didn't wanna back down and fall apart again.
"What do you mean? You admitted you were at fault, ____!" Mammon exclaimed with his hands raised up to his chest, palms facing upwards.
I did not do that willingly! You wouldn't hear me out in that argument so I just accepted my fate.
You turned to Lucifer.
Lift this curse off of me. I wanna be heard and explain my own side to all of you. I don't care if you need to wake up your brothers for that. I am sick and tired of being mute.
He mustered you for a moment, expression unreadable.
A sigh filled the silence.
"Alright."
He did the same thing Diavolo had done when the curse was cast and you couldn't even begin to describe the emotions that overcame you when you felt your vocal cords work again.
A smile was on your lips as you hummed, feeling the vibrations along your throat.
Your eyes snapped up towards the brothers.
"Get the others, I am gonna explain myself. I don't care if you want to hear it or not."
Immediately they moved, waking up everyone else and getting them downstairs into your room. Most of them, especially Belphegor, looked way too tired.
But this couldn't wait until the morning. What if your courage slipped away, like sand through your fingers, until the morning?
You leveled the brothers with a fierce glare, "Again, you will listen to me."
A pause.
Then the wall fell.
"Do you guys have any idea how hard it is for as a human here in the Devildom? Do you have any idea how exhausting and how scary it can be? Especially in a room with many strong demons, highly esteemed ones of this realm and the Celestial Realm? They would be able to snap me in half with a simple spell.
And yes, that should've probably caused me to be more reserved. To not explode as much as I did. But I did. And you know why?"
Tears pricked your eyes again. The brothers stared at you in shock.
"He sexualized me and you guys. That fucking demon sexualized my body, the mere fact that I am a human and that I 'must enjoy the perks of having pacts with you'. Do you know what kind of look he sent my way? It was dehumanising and everyone else he was talking to just laughed about it. They laughed at that! Even the women did!"
A gasp for air and then a sob.
"You can't understand how it feels to constantly be under attack down here. The other students made fun of me when I first arrived here, they insulted me, glared at me and gossiped about me when you weren't there."
Again, you fell to your knees. The demon brothers took a step forward, then another, surrounding you and sitting down themselves.
"I am constantly scared down here, I feel like I am dying sometimes and I just think 'will something ever change? My life is never once peaceful. It wasn't when I was a child and it definitely won't now, so why am I even alive?' And it hurts. And instead of listening to me and maybe understanding why I would react like that and what my side of the story is, you ignored me and then silenced me!"
You barely registered the arms wrapping around you and the warmth surrounding you as the brothers formed a group hug. Lucifer sitting outside of it, holding your hand. But you kept yelling, ranting.
"I am just so fucking tired," you whispered at last, going a little limp inside the pile.
It was quiet.
Lucifer met your eyes.
"We are sorry that we made you feel that way. You are right. We should have listened to your story and made a decision based on that."
Your expression didn't change.
"I will report back to Diavolo tomorrow and the resident that said these things about you will face consequences.
I hope we can gain your trust back someday. We will better ourselves."
His speech couldn't bring you to smile, you were just so exhausted, but it did relieve you somewhat somewhere inside of yourself.
"And I would like to apologize as well. I disrespected you when you were making an attempt to explain yourself," Satan mumbled next to you, hugging you just a little tighter.
The other brothers followed suit, showering you in apologies as they continued to hug you and you felt Lucifer squeeze your hand a little tighter to emphasize their statements.
Finally they had listened to you, and even apologized.
You felt happy, relieved and somewhat safe.
And while your trust in them wasn't back one hundred percent, you were sure that it would be rebuilt someday.
You would work on it, setting one brick upon the other with their help.