Mute: 1
The Mute Kid
A/N: HAW HAW HAW! Tis here people. The first chapter.
Hope you like it. READ FORTH!
Warnings: I'm sure there's swearing.
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters.
=X=
Damien looked at the school, scowling. He didn't like Earth, he didn't like mortals, he didn't like the cold, he didn't like school and he HATED South Park. The people here were crazy, stupid or annoying. Most were just assholes, especially the kids.
He went into the old building, grimacing as he took in the dirty halls, disgustingly coloured walls, dingy lockers and over-all horrible appearance. Teenagers were either lent up against lockers talking to friends, trying to suck their girlfriend/boyfriend's tongue right out of their mouth or walking around in small groups.
One of the worst things about being new, Damien decided, was not knowing where to go or anyone to ask for directions without seeming inferior or stupid and sticking out as a quite obviously new student.
After complaining internally about his problem, Damien searched out someone who would give him directions without ever thinking of being an asshole to him. He'd been instructed not to kill anyone, and asking a total douche for directions and getting insulted could easily end in that situation. He picked a small, lone boy (or, it looked like it was probably a boy; it was rather feminine) with long straight blonde hair, a flat cap and some smart clothes.
"Hey, do you know the way to... Mr. Mattson's English class?" he asked. The boy jumped and looked up at him, then nodded. He started to walk off, and gestured for Damien to follow him. Although he wondered why on Earth the boy hadn't just told him the way, he followed anyway. The hallways were clearing as everyone went to their own classes, and Damien almost lost the small blonde in the thick sea of students jostling each other, but the boy waited for him to catch up before continuing.
The blonde turned into a classroom that read 'English Room 22: Mr Mattson' and Damien followed him in. The boy smiled, nodded, and walked off to sit at his desk. Damien walked over to the man at the front, presumably Mr Mattson.
"I'm your new student." He announced, and the teacher nodded.
"Okay class." He said. "Today we have the new student in, everyone welcome Damien Thorn."
There was a murmur around the classroom that sounded kind of like 'Hrrrnnnggh' and Damien rolled his eyes.
"Right then, take your seat over there, next to... Pip. Raise your hand Pip." Mr Mattson continued, and the small blonde who had guided him there raised his hand. Damien walked over and joined the boy at the double-desk. Pip smiled at him again, though Damien realised now the smile was just as nervous and weary as it was fleeting. He turned to the front, pen ready to write, hazel eyes bright but showing a degree of fear. His body was tensed and lent subtly away from Damien, and he kept his head low.
The English lesson wasn't exceptionally interesting; the teacher kept on going off on tangents, the kids all talked and it didn't seem that they were really doing anything important anyway. Damien was on the verge of banging his head against the table. After most of the lesson had gone by, and no more information was being provided for him to write down, Damien turned to Pip.
"So, you actually manage to learn something in this class?" he asked.
Pip nodded, but continued to read over and over his notes.
"Huh. The teacher seems like a total douche."
Pip shrugged, and pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, which he then began to fold into itself; first of all making it into a square then folding all the corners into the middle, then in half, and continued to fold it as small as he could.
Damien raised an eyebrow. The kid hadn't said a word, never replied to him in anything but gestures.
"Are you foreign?"
Pip nodded, unfolding the piece of paper and folding it again in a different way.
"So do you speak English?"
Pip nodded again, finally tearing his attention away from the paper and looking up at Damien.
"So why don't you?"
Pip didn't respond at all, simply stared up at him for a second before looking back down at his hands.
"Are you like, French or summin, and not fluent?"
Pip shot him a death glare. Damien raised his eyebrows at how seriously offended the boy seemed.
"Okay, I'm guessing you aren't French." Pip nodded to confirm. "So where are you from?"
Pip rooted around in his bag, and pulled out his planner. He flipped to the back, where there was a small world map. He pointed to England.
"You're English?" Pip nodded again. "So you obviously speak English. So why don't you?"
Pip looked around the classroom at the rest of his classmates, but didn't respond otherwise. The bell went for end of lesson, and Pip nodded at him before packing up and getting up to leave.
"Wait, Pip." Damien called.
Pip stopped dead, and turned to Damien, his face seeming surprised.
"Have any idea where Mrs. Handle's Geography is?"
Damien looked over the classroom to where the English blonde was sat, the seats on either side of him empty, as he noted down everything the teacher said in his perfect italic script. He looked up every few minutes, read over the board, looked at the teacher, glanced at the world map pinned on the wall, and turned back to writing in his book.
Damien frowned as he thought about the boy. The boy never said a word to add to class discussion, never raised his hand to ask or answer questions, even when his name was called in register he just raised his hand as conformation. It was like he couldn't speak. No-one spoke to him for the whole lesson, which meant that if he had of spoken he would seem crazy, but even though Damien had asked him questions that didn't have a straightforward yes or no, he still didn't reply in anything other than a gesture.
Right there and then, Damien decided he was going to make the mute boy speak. Somehow, he was going to.
Throughout the other lessons, Damien met Kenny McCormick, a boy he'd glimpsed occasionally in Hell but never talked to. The poor blonde smiled, told him they'd met once before, and invited him to sit with his group of friends at lunch.
"Hey guys." Kenny called as they approached a table that had a lot of other kids packed on it.
"Hey Kenny." One noirette said in a monotone, flipping both boys off as they sat down.
"Is that the new kid?" a boy with a green ushanka and a few bright red curls escaping from it asked.
"Yeah. Everyone, this is Damien, I've met him before in Hell."
No-one seemed to question this, and Kenny set to introducing everyone.
"That's Craig," Kenny pointed at the boy who'd flipped them off, and Craig repeated the gesture. "Don't worry, he does that. Anyway, that's Tweek, and Stan, and Kyle, and Token and Clyde and then Christophe." Kenny pointed to a shaking blonde boy, another noirette in a blue-and-red hat, the redhead, a black boy, a brunette eating what seemed to be a taco, and another, tanned brunette boy who was smoking. A few raised their hands in greeting, Tweek yelled, and Christophe ignored everyone completely.
"Hey." Damien said. He sat with the group, mostly listening to the conversation but not joining it, until he noticed Pip sitting alone in a corner of the cafeteria.
"Hey Kenny," he said, nudging the blonde. "What's up with that Pip kid?"
"Oh him." Kenny laughed. "Frenchie's a loser."
"French? He told me he was English."
"He is, but we love to annoy him by calling him French. Also, I doubt he told you anything. He's mute."
"Why?"
"I dunno, but I'm glad. He stopped talking around 5th Grade, and it's a good thing, cause his voice was soo annoying and his accent was stupid." Clyde said, rolling his eyes and smirking.
Damien hummed thoughtfully, and looked back over to the blonde. There was a muscley-looking boy grabbing his hair and pulling, and saying something to him. Pip was wincing, but said nothing, instead pulling out a few dollars and handing them over. The bully pulled his hair again, and Pip dug around his pocket, but came up with nothing. The boy hit him, and walked off with his money. Pip rubbed his face, replaced his cap, and straightened his jacket, before turning to his lunch like nothing had happened. The sad look on his face and the tears in his eyes said differently.
Damien frowned, wondering why he hadn't tried to do anything, but turned back to the conversation on his table, choosing to ignore what he'd seen.
"How was school sweetheart?"
"Dad, don't fucking call me sweetheart." Damien growled, rolling his eyes. "And it was fine, I guess."
"I said you'd like school." Satan smiled triumphantly.
"I don't like it. I just suppose it's tolerable in the least."
"Did you make some friends?"
"Daad..." Damien whined. He hated his father being such a pussy.
"Well no-one came running at you with a cross did they?"
"No." Damien said, wondering why they would.
"Then they don't hate you."
"Okay, A, it's only been one day. I'm sure they'll all hate me soon enough, and B, I don't think I'm physically able to make friends." Damien rolled his eyes again and tried to get back to eating his dinner.
"Well, there are people who talk to you, and people you sit with, yes?" Satan pressed.
"Yes Dad."
"Then we'll count those as friends." Satan smiled.
"Dad, can I please just eat my dinner?"
"Sure hun."
"And don't call me hun either. You gave me my name, use it."
Next day Damien walked with Pip to their art class. Damien didn't really like art; he doodled occasionally, but wasn't really that good at drawing actual people or things. When asked if he liked art, Pip smiled and nodded. The boy was bouncing along merrily, clutching his art book to his chest.
They were pretty much there, when Damien turned and noticed Pip being dragged off by a boy much like the one who'd hit him at lunchtime the previous day. Pip didn't protest verbally, but he did try to pull away once. He was gripped harder, and Pip looked sadly after Damien. When he saw he was turned, the blonde smiled and waved sadly at him, before he was dragged around a corner. Damien debated following the boys, but decided he didn't want to get lost and have to re-find the classroom. Besides, Pip didn't seem to have a problem going with the boy.
About 10 minutes into art class Pip stumbled in, sporting a red mark on his face, a split lip, clutching his sides and limping. No-one seemed to notice. Pip winced as he sat down, wiped some blood from his lip, and opened his art book to a sketch. It looked like it was going to become a sunrise over the mountains.
"That's good." Damien said, impressed. Pip smiled, and winced when it hurt his lip, and nodded his thanks. Damien frowned.
"Who did that to you?" he asked.
Pip shrugged, and looked away from Damien, his cheeks starting to flush red.
"Was it that guy who dragged you off earlier?"
Pip ignored him completely. Damien frowned, and punched him in the arm to get his attention. Although he hadn't hit him that hard, Pip jumped and rubbed his arm. He looked at Damien, though his eyes seemed to apologise any more than accuse. He dipped his head a bit lower, as if to make himself smaller than Damien, and shifted slightly. He almost looked like he was about to say something, but he simply mouthed the word 'sorry' very faintly.
"Don't apologise, answer." Damien told him. Pip shook his head. Damien hit him again. Pip's mouth opened in a silent cry, and he bowed his head again, like he was cowering and asking for forgiveness.
"Pip..." Damien frowned, confused by the blonde's behaviour. Usually if you hit someone, they'd get mad, say something, and hit you back. That wasn't the case here; Pip only seemed to become more and more submissive.
Pip looked up at him fearfully, as if he fully expected the demon to kill him. Damien sighed.
"Oh, don't look at me like that. If I could feel guilt you'd be heaping shitloads onto me." He muttered. Pip blinked and tilted his head in confusion, but shuffled away slightly and went back to his sketching.
Damien sat watching Pip draw for the rest of the hour; his art teacher said they'd been working on something for a few lessons and would be finishing today, so he needn't bother starting. So Damien doodled random flames and demon creatures (seeing as that was pretty much all he could draw) on a piece of paper while secretly keeping a very close eye on Pip.
As he drew, the little blonde slowly relaxed, until he was happily absorbed in his task. His eyes focused only on the paper in front of him, his lips moved occasionally as if he was talking, or more like singing it seemed, to himself in his own head. His pencil flickered over the paper; occasionally he smudged something here, re-shaded there, erased a small mistake and corrected it. By the end of the hour he had a near-perfect, pencil grey-scale sunrise.
"Wow. That is really good." Damien said. Pip smiled again and nodded thanks, but seemed weary now Damien was talking to him again. Damien could physically see him tense up. The blonde's hazel eyes flickered, taking in Damien's expression, over to the door and tracing a path away. Then he looked around the classroom, scanned over Damien again, and seemed to inwardly sigh in resignation.
"I'm not gonna hurt you Pip." Damien felt this needed to be said aloud so it was understood.
Pip looked slightly doubtful, and rubbed his arm, but nodded. He looked downward, his eyes searching the floor away from Damien, before he made eye contact and smiled tentatively. The bell went for next lesson, and Pip stood up, gave Damien a small wave, and walked off, looking nervously around him the whole time.
Damien shrugged and went to his next lesson.
"Hey Dad?"
"Yes Damien?"
"If you want to get someone to talk to you, how do you do it?"
"What do you mean?" Satan asked.
"Well like, if they're mute, but they can apparently speak, they just don't." Damien explained.
"Find out why they're keeping quiet."
"If they still don't tell you anything? Just, how do you get them to say something."
"You either hurt them..."
"Did that."
"So you be nice to them. Make a friend. When they trust you, they'll talk. It's probably insecurity, that's why they're mute. Does that answer your question dear?"
"Don't call me dear. And yes, it answered my question."
There was a pause.
"Dad, how are you nice to someone?"
Damien was pissed. Kenny was being a douche, and most of his friends were assholes. Of course, he'd expected it, and decided he should just not really hang around with them any more than necessary. He didn't care about popularity here anymore. He was here because he was being made to by his father. If they thought he was an asshole, big deal, he thought they were assholes too.
He felt a tap on his shoulder, and turned to see Pip smiling down at him. He waved his hand.
'Hi!' was the message he conveyed.
"Hey Pip." Damien said, raising his hand in a similar greeting. Pip sat down with his lunch-tray, and looked at Damien questioningly, gesturing at the table.
'Why are you here?' he seemed to ask.
"I didn't feel like sitting with those guys today. You always look kinda lonely, so I figured I'd sit with you."
Pip smiled gently, and this one wasn't polite or weary, it was genuine and thankful. He looked off into space, still smiling, before he turned to the apple he'd bought and started eating it. Damien chewed thoughtfully on his ham sandwich.
"You know, our conversations are kinda weird. I feel like I'm talking to myself." He said aloud, a joking smile on his face. "I'm going crazy."
Pip's smile widened, and his shoulders bounced, like a laugh without sound.
"Was that you laughing?"
Pip nodded, still 'laughing'.
"You odd little person." Damien muttered. "I don't think I could live if I never said anything. And you've survived, what?"
Pip thought for a minute and held up six fingers.
"Six years? That's ages." Damien raised his eyebrows. "Still. Six is my number."
For a while they both went back to eating. Damien then thought of something to ask that would definitely require Pip to use his vocals.
"Do you remember the last thing you said to someone here?"
Pip nodded.
"What was it?" Damien grinned slyly. Pip got out a piece of paper and his pen.
'Right-o' he wrote, pushing the paper over to Damien.
"Dammit." He muttered in defeat. He looked up to see Pip smiling knowingly at him, as if he knew he'd beaten Damien's plan. "That is such an English thing to say."
Pip shrugged and did his little silent-giggle.
"Do you talk to your parents, like at home?"
Pip stiffened and looked away instantly. Damien got the feeling he'd hit a touchy subject.
"Uh, sorry, I didn't mean to..."
Pip patted his hand and smiled. He shook his head gently.
'It doesn't matter.'
Pip's fingers were cold when they touched Damien's hand, and sent a small shock up his arm. He stared at their hands for a second, before Pip snatched his back like it was on fire and blushed. Damien didn't know if everyone here was cold, because he'd never actually had anyone ever touch him, either purposefully or accidentally. Pip looked around nervously and hurriedly took a bite out of his apple, trying to look like nothing had happened. Damien grabbed his hand again and pulled it over to look at it.
"You're really cold." He murmured, rubbing the fingertips gently. The skin was smooth but he could feel the pattern of the fingerprints. "Is everyone this cold?"
Pip shrugged and looked away, trying to hide his pink cheeks. Damien kept a hold of the Brit's hand for another minute, before he let it go. Pip slowly pulled his hand away, then looked it over and rubbed it with his other hand. Then he looked nervously around the cafeteria again.
"What are you looking for? No-one's coming to get you or anything."
Pip gave Damien a flash of a look that begged to differ. His eyes rested on someone behind Damien and for a moment he looked slightly worried, but the person apparently passed and Pip relaxed. His hazel eyes darted again, then he settled back to eating his lunch. Once he'd finished the apple, he made a gesture to the exit and stood up.
'I've got to go'
"Wait." Damien said, standing up. "Can I come with you?"
Pip looked totally stunned for a second, before he nodded. He looked at Damien, and shrugged.
'Why?'
"Cause." Damien shrugged back, and followed Pip. The blonde led him to the school library, where he turned and gave Damien an apologetic smile. Damien just followed him inside.
Pip briefly searched the shelves, and came back with a rather large book. He set it down on a table in a secluded alcove between the bookshelves, and looked around in his bag for a minute until he produced his class book.
'Philip Pirrup 11.4
Religious Studies
Miss Day'
"Whoa whoa, Religious Studies?" Damien asked, looking mortified. Pip nodded with a concerned frown. "When do we have that?"
Pip pointed at his timetable in his planner. Next lesson.
"Shit!" Damien muttered. Pip looked at him with his head on its side.
'What's wrong?'
"Eh... I'm gonna skip next class."
Pip nodded, then turned to open the book and write for whatever assignment he had. Damien sat and stared across at him. Damien decided that Pip focusing on a task and actually relaxing was the best thing for him. He was kind of like that other blonde, the twitchy one with Kenny's gang whose name he didn't really remember; he always looked paranoid, constantly checking over his shoulder, always tense and looking like he wanted to just get as far away as possible. Only Pip did it quietly, much, much more quietly than Twitch-boy, so no-one noticed.
Damien watched Pip do his assignment, thinking over in his head his various methods of gaining some sort of sound out of the little British boy. When the bell for end of lunch rang, he waited until Pip had packed up before he stood. Pip walked to his lesson, and Damien flanked him for most of the walk. Pip reached the classroom door, gestured to show this was where he was going, and gave Damien a small wave and a smile. Damien raised his hand in farewell and continued until he was outside of the school and walked behind it.
=X=
An hour passed and Damien walked back into school to meet Pip. It was fifth period, which meant that form-room was next for half an hour until school ended. He waited for the blonde outside the classroom, and when he didn't appear, dared to poke his head into the classroom.
Pip sat in a chair that was presumably his, rubbing his ankle and moving it, as if testing it.
"You okay?" Damien asked. Pip jumped, but once he noticed who it was he nodded and smiled. He stood up, using the table as support for a moment before walking towards Damien, a subtle limp showing his ankle wasn't completely fine.
"What did you do to your ankle?" Damien asked. Pip winced and shrugged, though Damien knew this was his way of shrugging off the question. He'd known Pip for a while now, and could easily tell what it meant.
'I don't want to talk about it. Leave it.'
Damien knew there was something going on with Pip that he wasn't saying anything about. He was an outcast from the rest of the student body, he got 'mysterious' injuries, and he looked around a lot, as if expecting someone to pop out from no-where and hit him.
Because that was what he was expecting. Damien thought, frowning.
But again, he chose to ignore it, and dropped the subject.
"Come on, we don't want Mr Mattson going bat-shit crazy on us for being late." He said, and he walked slowly beside Pip to their form-room.
=X=
A/N: Pfft. This chapter is quite old, but I read over it recently and it wasn't horrendous or anything. Next chapter will hopefully be better. And from Pip's POV, I'm planning. So we all get to learn... yeah.
You'll have to wait ;)
This story will probably be much shorter than ISAIH, though I can't guarantee it being any less angst-y
I hope you enjoy this, I'm sorry if it takes a while to update (I'm still not 100% sure on the full plot... but hey, I wasn't during ISAIH either, but that worked out okay!)
Thank you to EVERYONE who voted. Once this is finished there will obviously be another, and don't worry, my story ideas will keep piling up so you have new choices...
Well, goodbye, and hope you like it so far. Umm... reviews GREATLY appreciated, I will skip for joy at the first reviewer. I'm hoping to get minimum 4/5 reviews for this chapter soo... yeah.
Au revoir.