Chapter Text
It happens after a fight.
The dinner table is quiet, no one wanting to risk saying anything that might trigger another screaming episode. All of them are sitting on broken eggshells, and they're acutely aware of it, too. For the first time in a long while, the house is silent, and even the cutlery on their plates is being dragged with care: as if the quiet noise of steel against porcelain will be enough to shatter this fragile balance they've found.
In an unusual moment of clarity, Mammon thinks about the Sword of Damocles Satan was telling him about yesterday. His eyes flick up to the fluorescent white lights. He can't see anything hanging, but he can its weight hanging over all their heads. He's felt it for weeks now.
Don’t fall, Mammon silently wills. He pushes a spoon of tomato soup into his mouth, forcing a sense of normality. All he wants is one normal dinner. Just one. Please don’t fall.
“I’m gonna go,” Belphie says after a long while, pushing his plate towards Beel. He looks exhausted. “I’ll see you guys—”
“Wait,” Lucifer says.
That’s when Mammon realizes that something terrible is about to happen.
The way Lucifer says “wait” is a request. A plea. The word falls from his lips, gentle and tender, like a glass leaf that floats across the table. It mesmerizes everyone, and even Belphegor, who was screaming obscenities at Lucifer yesterday for daring to order the rest of them around, stops in his tracks. His neck snaps up in surprise, the boy looking across the table into Lucifer’s eyes—and Mammon thinks that, in that second, Belphegor also realizes that everything is about to change.
“I have an announcement,” Lucifer says.
Mammon frowns. Lucifer hasn’t touched his plate. He really should eat first. They should all eat. Please, let them all just eat before this. One happy dinner, please just let them have one—
“I’ve decided to take a job in Australia.”
And it happens.
The sword crashes down, a guillotine upon their family. The glass leaf shatters into pieces that will take years to sweep up, and Mammon’s entire world seems to crack with those eight words.
“Diavolo mentioned it to me a few months ago. He told me this morning that the offer is still on the table.” Lucifer looks his cutlery instead of at anyone's face. His voice is unusually flat. “I’ll be going to set up a nontraditional school in his name there. The Royal Academy of Diavolo. It’s a good fit for me, since I’m already acquainted with the two men heading the project. It's going to be for a very good cause, and the pay is better than what I'm currently making. I'll be able to support you financially while still getting to help a younger generation, and—”
Asmodeus slams his hands on the table.
He rises, throwing a venomous look Lucifer’s way, and leaves without a word.
You didn’t eat anything, Mammon wants to complain. Asmo, come back. You should finish your dinner.
Then, Leviathan stands.
The look he throws at Lucifer isn’t angry. No, Leviathan looks hurt. Crushed. Devastated, his eyes already filling with tears the way they do whenever he watches a particularly sad anime. Mammon already knows what will come next: the blubbering, hysteric mess that his little brother will become the moment he tries to speak.
The resident otaku turns away before any tears can fall.
“Levi?” Satan asks, eyebrows furrowing. It's clear that he doesn't know what to do. “Asmo, Levi, come back—”
The teenager stands abruptly, motioning to chase after them, but he stops when he crosses past Lucifer.
“Lulu, how long before you'll be back?” he asks expectantly. His eyes, deep red just like his eldest brother's, seem to glow with hope, and suddenly, the weight of what Lucifer’s doing hits Mammon.
Satan’s voice hasn’t cracked fully. Standing up like this, he’s just barely at eye-level everyone sitting down. The kid's just barely thirteen, hasn’t even hit puberty, and Lucifer’s already planning on leaving his life.
“Lulu?” Satan asks expectantly.
There’s the sound of a crash, a breaking vase. Then, Levi’s cursing, and Satan turns away from Lucifer, legs carrying him to help his older brother. His instinctive earnestness would be endearing under any other circumstances, but seeing Satan act so oblivious at a time like this only makes Mammon want to cry. The child darts out of the room, completely oblivious to the fact that it'll be years before they're all gathered like this again.
Then, only Lucifer, Mammon, Beelzebub, and Belphegor are left.
“This is my fault, isn’t it?” the youngest whispers. His eyes shine unnaturally. “You’re doing this to get back at me, huh, Lucifer? Because of what I said yesterday? Well, guess what? I don’t care. You can go fuck yourself. You wanna go to Australia? You think I’m gonna beg you to stay? That's—no! Go to Australia! Abandon all of us! Do it, I dare you! 'Cause I don’t—I don’t fucking care!”
All of them ignore how Belphegor’s voice cracked in the middle. How there are tears now streaming down his cheeks.
“I hate you, Lucifer. You know that?" he spits. Yesterday, Lucifer fought back against Belphegor's every insult, but today, he accepts it all like a martyr who's constantly looking for one more reason to perish. "You’re an arrogant, vindictive asshole who—who—who—”
Who never even loved us to begin with, is what Belphegor was going to say.
Mammon is grateful that the youngest can’t even get the words out, the lie catching in his throat and forcing him to choke through his hysteria.
Instantly, Beelzebub has an arm around Belphegor’s shoulders.
“Let’s go, Belphie. Let’s…”
Belphegor tears himself free of his twin’s hold, storming out of the room with a tearful glare thrown Lucifer’s way. Seconds later, Beelzebub is following. Mammon swears he hears a quiet “I’m sorry” from the sixth-born.
Come back, Mammon wants to tell all of them. You didn’t finish your plates. You need to eat.
All he wanted was one happy family dinner.
“Your hands are shaking.”
Even now, Lucifer’s voice is strong and comforting. It’s a steadying rock, a rock that’s been there for all twenty-four years of Mammon’s pathetic life.
Soon, it’ll be gone.
“I’m not,” Mammon says quietly in response. The lie isn’t convincing at all, but Lucifer understands the plea. That Mammon just wants one dinner. One final memory. If it can't be with their whole family, then just with Lucifer, the way it was in the early days.
Even with Lucifer's subtle agreement, though, drinking his soup is impossible. Mammon’s hands are trembling. His fingers feel weak. His grip on the spoon is already unsteady, and the miserable shudder his body is locked in spills all the liquid before the spoon can ever near his mouth, cruelly preventing Mammon from finding any reprieve in the warm soup Lucifer cooked for them all.
Yet, Mammon keeps trying.
He lifts spoon after spoon to his lips, searching in vain for the moment when his hands will steady. When his heart will calm. When Lucifer will change his mind.
(Except that Lucifer never, ever changes his mind.)
There’s the sound of shuffling, and then a different spoon—one held strong and confident by pale hands and crimson nails—appears at Mammon’s lips.
“Drink,” Lucifer says.
Mammon drinks.
The flavor hits his tongue like a summer festival. It’s warm and inviting, rich and pleasant. Mammon remembers when Lucifer made this exact soup for all seven of them two years ago at one of California's many music festivals. It was the only thing they had ingredients for, since Beelzebub and the rest decided they were hungry at the ripe hour of three in the morning, and Mammon still remembers the soft smile Lucifer wore as he chopped garlic in a hotel apron.
With Lucifer leaving them, who’ll take over the cooking? The chores? The matter of keeping their family together, in one unit?
“Please don’t go,” Mammon croaks when Lucifer brings a second spoon to his lips. “You don’t have to, Lucifer. They’ve learned their lesson. No one wants you to go.”
Lucifer remains silent. He pushes the spoon against Mammon’s lips.
Mammon drinks a second time.
“I can feed myself,” he says shakily. “I'm an adult. It’s just soup. It’s not that important.”
“You need to eat to be strong,” Lucifer says. “Let me feed you one last time.”
Mammon’s brow twitches at that.
“Last time?” he asks. Panic rises in his throat like bile. Please, not now. God, this would be a terrible time to throw up. “Lucifer, when are you leaving? Lucifer?”
The man remains silent. He casts his eyes down, scooping up another spoonful of soup and bringing it to his brother’s lips. Only now, Mammon is terrified. He slaps the spoon away, fear edging deeper into his eyes than the gold of his pupils.
Tomato soup spills all over the table.
“Lucifer,” Mammon gasps, tears filling his vision. He knows his big brother, knows him too well. Now, the man prays that his brother hasn’t done what Mammon thinks he has; “Lucifer, tell me. When are you leaving?”
Silence.
It seems to last for an eternity.
Then finally, Lucifer sighs, closing his eyes in what Mammon knows can only be shame.
“My flight is at four in the morning."
“You already packed,” Mammon whispers in disbelief. “You weren’t…asking, during dinner. You were telling. All the paperwork is finalized. You’re going. You’re as good as—”
“Gone,” Lucifer says. “Yes.”
Mammon falls back into his seat, numb.
“Is it because of yesterday's fight?” he asks, even though he knows the answer. “Could this have been avoided?”
“The fight was what helped me realize that I need to leave,” Lucifer says, “But this was inevitable. Belphie was right when he said that you guys don’t need me anymore. You’ve all outgrown me, and I’m the fool who’s still trying to parent a group of grown men.”
“I need you,” Mammon mutters. “Satan needs you. Didn’t you hear him? He probably thinks you’ll be back next week. And you know why Asmo was angry? Because he needs you, too. And he doesn’t want you gone. And Leviathan cried because he needs you. And Beel and Belphie—Belphie especially—they need their big brother, Lucifer. They all need—”
“They need a big brother,” Lucifer says, smiling sadly. “But not me.”
He looks at Mammon.
Realization hits the second-born, and then he’s a stuttering mess, desperately trying to convince Lucifer of what a terrible idea this is.
“Lucifer, I can’t,” he blurts. “They. I. It. It won’t work! I’m not a big brother to them, I’m just a friend! I can’t keep them in line like you—hell, you hear the things they say to me! They think I’m dumb and careless and—”
“They adore you,” Lucifer interrupts, somehow gentle. His voice is soothing. Mammon wishes his siblings could see this side of Lucifer: the loving, comforting, angelic side. Would that be enough to stop their fights? Would that fix this? If all of them—everyone who hurt Lucifer in that fight yesterday—realized how much Lucifer loved them and apologized, would he stay? “They all run to their rooms the second I come home. They avoid my conversation at every turn. All I do is pay bills, Mammon, but you’re the glue that holds our family together. I’m…I’m the demon that threatens to tear us apart every time we get closer. I need to leave before I wreck things for good.”
“You’re wrecking things by leaving!” Mammon blurts, and he tries to quiet himself when he sees Lucifer flinch. “I mean…you’re gonna rip us apart, Lucifer! We need a leader. I need a leader!”
Lucifer chuckles.
“We’re not a military squadron. Or a student council. We don’t need a leader to be family.”
“But—but—” Mammon’s shaking all over again. “You’re—you’re the one we look up to! The person who keeps us in line! You literally sit at the head of our table, Lucifer, you’re—”
Lucifer rises from his seat. He looks so tall, Mammon thinks, and the second-born has to wonder when his big brother got to be so big. They grew up together, so why does Lucifer now feel so out of reach?
“I don’t belong here anymore,” Lucifer says. “At least, not right now. I’ll come back.”
“What if you like it better without us?” Mammon whispers. “What if—if in that school you set up, you decide you don’t want to come back?”
Lucifer looks at his little brother and sighs, running a hand through Mammon’s hair gently before leaning down and kissing the man's forehead.
“Do you want to know a secret, Mammonie?” Lucifer asks.
He waits for no response before answering.
“I will always want to come back. I already don’t want to leave. But I need our family to be ready.”
“We’re ready. We learned our lesson, we’re—”
“Be good to them, Mammon,” Lucifer murmurs. He tries to hug Mammon sitting down and nearly stumbles backward when the second-born rises to trap his brother in the tightest embrace he’s ever felt—as if holding Lucifer closer to Mammon’s chest will somehow prevent him from leaving, as if a single embrace can undo any of the hell that's about to be unleashed unto this family when Lucifer leaves.
It doesn’t work.
Lucifer pulls away much too early in their embrace, giving Mammon two squeezes on the shoulder that feel dangerously close to the two syllables of goodbye.
“You didn’t finish your soup,” Mammon blurts. It’s a pathetic attempt to keep his brother here longer.
“I didn’t,” Lucifer hums. “But you look like you’re going to collapse, Mammon, and you've lost weight as of late. Finish it for me, will you?”
“Won’t you stay with me?” Mammon pleads. “While I eat?”
Lucifer laughs.
It’s a gentle sound.
Mammon wants to bottle it up and hold onto it forever.
Don’t leave me, he wants to say. Please, Lucifer.
“You’re an adult now,” Lucifer says, his voice suddenly thick with an unknown emotion. He doesn’t face Mammon, keeping his head forward as he starts walking to the door. “I think you can drink your soup on your own.”
“Wait!”
“Yes, Mammon?”
Lucifer’s feet come to a standstill, and the way he refuses to turn his head back is the clearest sign that he, too, is crying. It breaks Mammon’s heart. Because it means that Lucifer is hurting, that Lucifer doesn’t want to leave either. It means that Lucifer isn’t doing this because he wants to get away—he earnestly believes that this is what their family needs.
And Lucifer is almost always right.
“...make sure you say goodbye to Satan,” is all Mammon can say, whatever pleas he was about to utter dying on his tongue the moment he realizes that he’s only making this more painful.
“I’ll speak to anyone who’s willing,” Lucifer says. He laughs in an attempt to hide that he’s crying, but Mammon knows the truth.
Then, Lucifer is gone.
Mammon is alone.
His family forgot to eat dinner, and there’s no one to put away the dishes, and everything is going to be changed from here on out, and—
Mammon stares at his reflection in the stupid tomato soup. It taunts him. Tempts him. Reminds him of a better time, reminds him of how easily it all came undone.
In the end, he throws out all the food. If Mammon didn't feel so broken, he might have the sense to put some of it in the fridge, but everything ends up going down the drain, into the sewer where it'll remain unappreciated and forgotten until it's broken down into something so different he'll never recognize it again. Mammon intuitively knows that it'll be a long, long time before he gets to taste the richness of that soup again, longer before he gets to savor any closeness with his big brother, and so he almost stares at the sink wistfully, regretting his actions before realizing that he would end up feeling like this no matter how much soup he drank, no matter how much soup he saved.
It doesn't matter, Mammon realizes, numb.
And he's right.
His brothers never liked leftovers, anyway. Mammon will have to make them his own soup, starting tomorrow.