Chapter Text
“Fids, this place is run by an actual cult. What possessed you to book us a room here?”
Stanford Pines was sat in the passenger seat of his best friend Fiddleford McGucket's beat up van. The two had just finished college and Fiddleford decided they should celebrate with a vacation. Where to, you might ask, a small town in the middle of nowhere built just under five years ago. Sounds fun, right? Ford was reading all he could about the town, which wasn’t much, from the small stack of paper he had printed out before they left.
“It’s not a cult.”
“Ah yes, small village who all worship the illuminate’s dapper cousin. Sounds absolutely nothing like a cult, I have no clue what came over me.” Ford deadpanned.
“Quit yer paranoia, this place looks nice, relaxing. Lord knows that’s what we need. Tell ya what, if someone tries to sacrifice one of us to a well dressed triangle we’ll leave straight away and you get eternal ‘I told you so’s. Yeah?”
Ford flick to one of the last pages, “Look at this the ‘mayor’ of the town is replaced every few months, but when the town was just founded it was pretty much every week.”
“Sounds like a lot of voting.”
“No, there is no time between the previous mayor's disappearance and the new one's arrival. It’s on the day or at longest a few days. No time for voting.”
“And this makes it a cult?”
“No, this makes it weird.”
They had been driving for days, it really was in the middle of nowhere. In a fast car it would take just under a day to reach civilization and walking, up to twenty days. They drove by a large sign, ‘Welcome to Ciphome’
“Weird name for something built recently.”
There was a moment of silence before the southern man looked over at his friend and realised the devilish smirk on his face.
“No Ford, no! You are not about to Sherlock Holmes your way through this. We are going to have a good relaxing time. And most importantly, solve nothing! Because there is nothing to solve! You got that? If I catch you using even a tenth of your brain power, I swear I will… I’ll… I’ll lobotomise you! Ya hear me?”
“Yes Fids but you can’t expect me to-”
“No!”
“Fids-”
“No! You have lost your thinking privileges! No more using your brain! I forbid it!”
They turned the final corner and entered the town. It all felt very medieval, the street floors were cobbled, the houses were made from stone and wood and surrounding the houses was a lot of farm spaces. All of this was enclosed in a tall dense forest. The houses were arranged in a long line with the road, which was more like a glorified footpath, in the middle of them. Closing off the end of the road was the largest house of them all, it truly magnificent especially compared to all the other dull looking houses. It was tall, far taller than the trees, and was made almost entirely of unnaturally yellow sandstone. It had stained glass windows, and bulky gates and looked far more like a church than a home. But the strangest part of it was how triangular it was, almost a pyramid, almost.
The two friends parked the van just out of sight of the town, not wanting to spoil the olden atmosphere and made their way up the roads.
It was quiet, too quiet. Until it wan’t. When they first saw it, still in the van, there was no one out, like they’d found the wrong place, but as soon as they came back around on foot the community had bustled into life. It seemed that everyone was out to meet the two visitors.
Not wasting a second, a woman ran up to them. She wasn’t too tall, and was wearing heels to it up. Her whole outfit was in a plane shade of dusty yellow, the same clothes as everyone else. Neatly buttoned shirts with ridiculously high waisted trousers, no one’s hair was longer than their shoulders and the look was completed with a triangle pendant. The symbol on the front matched the photos Ford had found in his search: equilateral, bright yellow, one large eye in the centre, a bowtie and bricks lining the bottom.
“Welcome home! My name is Pyronica!” She sounded far too chipper for Ford’s interest.
“Home? I don’t know what you’re talking about but-”
“I’m Fiddleford McGucket, this here is my pal Ford- Stanford Pines. He ain’t really a people person.”
“Fids!”
A stern glance from his friend shut him up quick.
“That is no problem! Well, I need to introduce you both to Mr Cipher, our g- mayor, our mayor! He's just ecstatic to meet you both!”
“I thought your mayor was called Robet Williams.”
“Someone’s done their research, haven’t you Stanford! He technically is… however all mayors take on the name Bill Cipher! Lovely, isn’t it!”
“Well ain’t that interesting, we hope to find out more about your… umm, customs while we stay but I reckon we best go meet this Bill fella, don’t you Ford?” No response, Ford was too busy nervously glancing around at all the smiling town folk, it all felt wrong. “Ford?” A light nudge woke him up.
“Uh, yes. We better do that now.”
△
Bill lived in the triangular looking building at the end of the road. Well he lived in most of it.
The bottom floor, the largest floor, was some sort of worship room, walls lined with tapestries and paintings. Rows of pews surrounded the centre of the room leading to what looked like a triangular hole, he tried to get a closer look but Fids grabbed his shirt collar and pulled him back with a quick, stern “No.”. The sealing was too low, far too low. It gave the whole room an uncomfortable claustrophobic feeling, as if Ford wasn’t uncomfortable enough as it was.
Gliding over to the crudely cut stone stairs Pryronica assured them that they would be with Bill soon and he would explain everything soon with the same unnerving smile.
Fiddleford didn’t seem to be having any of the problems Ford did though, he was too busy keeping one eye on what was happening around him and the other on making sure that Ford didn’t run away and hide in a corner, which happened a lot more than either of them would like to admit.
The next floor was very similar, but had a lot less of a religious atmosphere. Still a lot of triangles, maybe too many triangles.
“Welcome home!” Seemingly coming out of the shadows came a very tall man. He was leaning on a shiny cane, adjusting his bowtie. His skin had a sickly grey tint to it and smelt like a funeral. He was beautiful.
“Stanford Pines, not good with people. Fiddleford McGucket, talks for him!” Pyronica filled in, smiling tightly.
“That’s not-”
“It is just WONDERFUL to meet the two of you! Bill Cipher, the lucky mayor of this here town! Let’s find somewhere for you both to stay, hmm?” He turned his head to a map of the town. “You two can… oh? Well that might be a problem, never mind, HA!”
“Mr Cipher? Is everything okay?”
“Of course Fiddleford! See, I was going to stick you both in this house with my buddy Teeth but we had a HORRIFIC storm hit us just last week, wrecked his whole house! Imagine that! It’s mostly fixed but the damages will only allow ONE of you to stay! …Oh don’t look so nervous! Ronnie, why don’t you show our new friend Fiddleford to Teeth’s house …and you Stanford will have to stay with ME!”
The mayor’s gaze felt like it was burning through his soul, intense yet paitent.
“I- uh- I don’t know, I-”
“Oh, but I INSIST! I have room, you won’t be a problem will you?”
It took him an embarrassingly long time to collect enough of his wits to respond, how could he when Bill was looking at him like that, his head titled with a slight smirk of curiosity and amusement.
“No…”
“GOOD! And you?”
“No.” Fiddleford stepped closer to Ford. “But I don’t think that-”
“Perfect! Pyronica if you please?”