Chapter Text
When Bill opened his eyes to the sight of a ceiling instead of trees he was briefly confused. He could feel his brows furrowing in irritation while he made to sit up, kicking off the blanket he was wrapped up in. Waking up to the sight of dead wood rather then the sight of leaves and trees could disorient anyone though. Since that was just silly he let it go. He knew where he was at least, he could have just as easily woken up in someone’s cellar. If he was going to wake up anywhere his attic room in Gravity Falls was a good place to be.
“Great, your awake!”
Just when Bill thought he might forgo the idea of premature wrinkles his brow furrowed again and he fell back into the wall his bed leaned against. The child in front of him had to be more then ten— eleven, twelve? He didn’t know, he wasn’t going to sit here and play a guessing game with himself. The kid was dressed like he was ready for a day out at play, thermal vest, faded sneakers. Brown curls framed the boy’s wide green eyes and Bill might have even admired the color if he weren’t so busy trying to figure out why they were so familiar.
“What the hell are you?”
Dipper cocked his head to the side and said, “What?”
“Yeah heard me.”
“Yeah, no. I know. I heard you, but you asked WHAT I am, not WHO I am.”
Bill scowled, “Yeah, because Fez doesn’t let just anybody in here and sometimes things from the forest crawl in here. They’re a lot sneakier.”
There was a split second where Dipper was going to argue how most of the creatures he’d sensed or watched dance along the edge of the forest early that morning probably would have liked to be known as a who but he stopped himself facing the more significant problem. Bill was sitting there looking at him confused and questioning. That was odd, for lack of a better word. He knew when Bill finally came around to himself that there might be an initial loud of unawareness but this seemed a little excessive. Had he missed a piece.
“So what are you?” Dipper was snapped out of his thoughts and decided that the only way to answer was with action. Popping back into his Demon form he halfway expected Bill to blow up at him the way the he had the first time Dipper appeared to him. What he hadn’t expected was the blank look Bill gave him. It was obvious that the gears in Bill’s head were turning and sputtering. It was moments like this he wished had the sort of access Mabel had to someone’s emotions. He’d give anything to know what was going through Bill’s head. He was powerful in many ways but he was no mind reader.
“I don’t remember,” Bill started, his whole body was tense and that unnerved Dipper. “I don’t remember you waking up, Pine Tree. Why don’t I remember?”
The suspicion Dipper was facing was frightening. When he’d finally managed to trace Bill from the forest back to the house last night he’d been well aware of what had happened. All he had to do was look at the evidence to put together the pieces. He’d managed to get there just in time, watching as Bill struggled to hold on to the last scrap of sanity in his mind. Gold eyes were flashing and immediately upon contact Dipper felt what little reality, was left in Bill.
It was hard to explain the kind of power Dipper had. Other Demons called him a Demon of Reality because if it existed in reality he had power over it, which apparently also made him all knowing. It wasn’t true though, he didn’t know everything —he learned just like anyone else did. It just so happened that he learned a lot and it was all based in fact and reality. His magic was almost like science, he could tear an entire building down with a look just by his knowledge of architecture. Or he could delicately pull together the pieces of a mind losing it’s grip on what was real because everything real was in his domain.
“Why do you think?” Dipper deadpanned, Bill winced. The Guardian hadn’t intended it to come out so cold. Bill would be fragile, he knew that but how fragile was yet to be determined. And he knew things now. Dipper knew things that he needed to talk to Bill about but not now, he couldn’t risk another break.
“This is stupid.” Bill said, cutting through Dipper’s thoughts — a talent in itself when the Guardian got going. Teeth grit and white knuckled Bill fought back the temper he felt rising. He was destructive when he was upset, even he knew this, and on any other day he’d just go for it. Today felt so different though and he couldn’t pinpoint it. Normally he couldn’t rationalize, he’d impulsively throw himself into the fire and he couldn’t. He wanted to but it was like he could physically feel reason sink in and tell him to ask questions instead of fly off the handle. He wasn’t used to this. “Pine Tree, what happened?”
There was only a brief pause where Dipper returned to his more physical self and sat on the edge of the bed. “You attacked your family,” it was probably best not to beat around the bush.
It was almost like Dipper hadn’t dropped a proverbial bomb. Bill’s amber eyes barely flickered, he just faced down his Guardian before finally he took a deep breath and opened his mouth to speak.
Dipper beat him there.
“Don’t.” His command was soft but no less powerful. Bill couldn’t help but be surprised looking at his Guardian, this boy, on the edge of his bed. It was almost tangible how uncomfortable Dipper was with using any sort of force against him and yet he still did. It was confusing. “I don’t know what to do with everything I’ve learned, Bill. When I met you I already knew why it took so long for me to get to you. I knew something was wrong and I thought if I could just figure it out, let you open up to me that I could fix it. I really wish I didn’t know now.”
“I want to be mad at you.” Bill turned away as he spoke. “I really, really do. But I can’t, because I know I deserve it, somehow.” It was much a confession as he was going to give, he didn’t know how else to explain what he couldn’t remember.
Dipper frowned.
“You talked to Dot last night. I didn’t hear everything, but you were apologizing when I finally tuned into it. I am going to assume you don’t remember any of that either?” Bill shook his head. “Okay, well, I guess he can talk to you about that.”
Silence engulfed the room as the two sat there. The only sound was the flapping of bird wings as they went passed the triangle shaped window or the ticking of the old alarm clock Bill kept on his nightstand. There were a million things hanging unsaid between the two but it was impossible to pick just one thing. For the first time in a very long time there was a sense of remorse giving Bill a bad taste at the back of his throat. In some way he knew it was a result of whatever Dipper had done to stop his mind from feeling so fuzzy but it didn’t mean he had to like it.
“So,” Bill started and Dipper jumped at the sudden word, “do you eat like Shooting Star does?”
“No one eats like Mabel does.” A smile tugged at both of their lips, small but visible to the other. “I could go for something though. Happy birthday, by the way.”
Bill’s smiled briefly wavered in it’s confusion. “Uh, thanks.”
The clock had read somewhere around 10 a.m. when Dot finally padded out of his room. The sun shinning it was impossibly bright. He was used to waking up much earlier when the sun wasn’t so high in the sky. He swore to himself never to sleep in again, it wasn’t worth nearly losing his eyesight. Mabel must have felt the same way because when he’d fully woken up he was only sharing his bed with Cuddles. The sound of clinking pans and the smell of eggs told him exactly where she might be though.
Standing in the doorway to the kitchen he almost had a brief moment of panic as last nights events flashed through his minds eye. Bill still had a knife in his hands but instead of holding it against someone he was finally chopping an onion, his concentration looking to be only on the methodic thump of the knife on the cutting board. At the table was Mabel carefully trying to string a couple of beads together, one tongue out. Beside her was Dipper his face completely hidden by the large book in his hands; Dot recognized it as the one GIF had given to Bill. The scene was warm and Dot tried hard to swallow.
Bill was the first one to look up. A smile broke out across his face as he threw the onions onto the hot pan letting them sizzle and spit oil. “Morning, I’ll be done in just a minute, take a seat for now.”
“Morning,” both Mabel and Dipper chimed, still very focused on their own individual activities.
Dot ran a hand through Mabel’s hair, sitting down between the Guardians. A quick glance around said Bill had been up for a while and that no one else was around. He furrowed his brow and asked, “Where’s Stan?”
“Hmm?” Bill maneuvered the large amount of eggs in the pan into separate rolls, he looked to be pretty good at it. “He’s where he is every morning, at the shop with Aunt Mo.”
“No, I mean, he’s usually the one making breakfast.”
The clatter of the spatula dropping on the ground and Bill’s cursing had Dot out of his chair but not faster then Dipper who seemed to pop up beside Bill almost instantaneously. It looked like Bill had flipped the omelet wrong and sent a spatter of oil across his arm.
“I’m okay,” Bill said trying to snatch the spatula back from Dipper who had picked it up.
“Go run it under cold water. I’ll finish.” Dipper was already fixing the almost broken omelet and lowering the temperature on the stove.
“I’ll just put some ice on it,” Bill was whacked with the spatula.
“You aren’t stupid, Cipher, ice will do more damage on a burn then good.”
“So you’re saying I could have a cool scar if I use ice?”
“If by cool scar you mean shiny patches of skin that look like burnt cheese, then yeah.”
“Eww,” Both Bill and Mabel said in unison, the latter snickering while Bill gave in and put his arm under the sink.
“You guys seem to be doing alright.” All eyes turned to Dot, whose own eyes widened at the realization that he’d said that out loud. “Uhm…”
“It’s fine,” Bill said, his tone utterly void of any real emotion. It didn’t seem like Bill was trying to contain or repress anything. He was sincere. It was fine because he didn’t know for it be anything else but fine. “I don’t know what happened. I can’t remember last night really.”
Dot’s brow furrowed. “Nothing?”
“I remember walking home and everything got really, I don’t know how to put it, wrong. It went wrong. But,” the blond’s face twisted in concentration. The memory of moonlight spilling over them as they sat together briefly flashed in his mind’s eye but it hurt to force it. “I don’t even remember going back to my room.” That last part was quieter and almost like a question.
How convenient, Dot thought, that he would forget the only time he’d ever apologized for anything. But had Bill and Dot ever truly talked about that night? Dot had been taken away so quickly and thrust haphazardly into a lie he wasn’t prepared to tell. When they saw each other there was always glass or a security guard between them, or Mabel. Dot glanced over at her; she was keeping careful watch between the two of them. He hadn’t been around to hear his brother’s side of the story and he’d never asked because frankly, he’d witnessed it. Dot could remember every single word that Bill had said to him, pleading with him to take the fall. Surely he remembered that.
“Bill,” Dipper said, effectively cutting Dot off as he was about to address his brother, arranging the omelets on individual plates carefully before turning back to his charge. “Go bandage yourself up and get that Birthday present you got for Dot.”
“Bossy today aren’t we, Pine Tree?”
“I am not bossy,” Dipper sputtered, even though Bill left the room and hurried up the stairs.
“You kinda are, bro, but I get it. Bill needs a strong hand.” Mabel clapped her hands and a brightly colored box popped up in front of her. “Thanks for reminding me though!”
“Dot,” Dipper placed a plate in front of Dot effectively grabbing his attention. “I know something isn’t right; between you two I mean. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t ask Mabel what happened to push your guys so far apart from each other and I’d be lying if I said if I didn’t already know that it was all a lie.”
“Wh-what?” Dot’s mouth went completely dry and he swore his heartbeat was more audible then it had been only seconds ago. He tried to form words but he couldn’t get the cotton taste out of his mouth. This time his gaze darted over to Mabel and stayed there. Did she know?
Dipper took mercy on him, answering the unsaid question. “She’s not stupid, Dot. She’s just really trusting. What I see, I know. That’s what other Demons usually say about me. That’s not true, I don’t just know things. I learn them and the more I know the more power I have over it. What I learned last night gave me what I needed to start patching Bill up. But it won’t take much to undo it all. Bill only needs one crack to start Weirdmaggedon.”
Nodding his head Dot still hadn’t looked from Mabel. Her large eyes were looking at him no differently then before and he didn’t know what to make of that. Swallowing air Dot whispered, “So you guys are just okay with all this?”
“I’m your Guardian,” Mabel’s voice was so bright, so trusting. “You couldn’t really tell me anything underneath the guard’s noses and I never really asked about all the details. You didn’t need to be there but you were and I’m probably never gonna understand why but it can’t be helped.”
“I’m not okay.” Dipper said with a soft huff of aggravation. “Bill’s unstable and he practically ruined your life, Dot. As his Guardian I need to take care of him, watch him. B-but, there’s no rules that say I have to like him. I can maintain this form only as long as he’s willing to let me learn from him but if he shuts me out again… He’s coming back down.”
Bill rounded the corner almost immediately holding a brown box in his hands. The lopsided grin on his lips insinuating he hadn’t heard anything Dipper -who was now happily munching on his omelet- said not moments ago. His arm had a couple of bandaids where the larger splatters landed. In a way it was comforting to know that Bill was listening to someone besides himself. Then again he really hadn’t learned the dynamic Bill had with Aunt Mo and Stan.
“So Stan made you guys breakfast?” Bill asked as he plopped himself down in front of a plate of still warm eggs and veggies. “I didn’t even know he still knew how to cook.”
“Why wouldn’t he? I mean he feeds Aunt Mo, right?” Dot took a bite of the food and despite the amount of onions he’d seen before it was actually pretty good. That might have been the bits of sausage talking though.
“Yeah, but lately it hasn’t been cooking. He goes out and grabs something for her. Maybe he started again while I was in school. The last time I remember him cooking was a few years ago, his specialty, Stancakes.” Bill pointed his fork at Mabel who was opening a jar of gummy bears, “Hey don’t go adding stuff until you at least try it, Shooting Star.”
Begrudgingly Mabel took a small bite before tossing a couple of bears into her mouth. All three other occupants cringed at the sight. While Dot loved the candy when he was studying both he and Bill had never developed much of a sweet tooth since they’d never been allowed to have them as kids. The sight of someone else’s insatiable appetite only made their teeth hurt. Shaking his head from the sight Bill pushed his box over to Dot.
“Open it, I got it almost the day after I first saw you again. Pine Tree didn’t think I’d get the chance to give it to you but I held out hope.”
“No, wait, mine first.” Pushing her own box toward him Mabel nudged her charge from his other side. It was a familiar size to Dot and despite the dark cloud that he could feel forming over his head he smiled graciously. Mabel was his light and so long as she continued to shine the dark spots in his life would never be completely pitch black. He pulled back the paper’s shiny blue to reveal the box and slowly —to Mabel’s obvious annoyance and his humor— lifted the lid.
“It’s beautiful, really Mabel. You really outdid yourself this year.”
Lifting the sweater out of the box it was a pale indigo color and so light that he could wear it on brisker days in San Francisco instead of waiting till the colder season. The pattern she’d chosen this year was a combination of diamonds and stripes in a darker shade then the base color. He might have an entire closet dedicated to sweaters Mabel had made him but the special ones were always for his birthday; This would be number nine.
“Wait, one more thing.”
“But this is perfect, why…” Dot’s words died on his lips as she lifted from the box one more thing. It was a black bowler hat not unlike the one he’d already owned except for this one’s pristine condition and silk band that he knew probably matched his eye color to the T. When he’d bought his first one last year out of a thrift store Mabel had laughed. She said it made him look to serious. He’d explained how he wanted people to take him seriously and it was just modern enough to not be ostentatious.
“Do you like it?” Mabel’s large eyes looked up at him expectantly. “I made it while you were sleeping, it was really hard not to add just a little bit more to it but I can!”
Dot laughed, “No, no, Mabel this is amazing, it looks amazing. I just. Thank you.” She beamed, her smile a million watts bright and almost blinding. His heart held so much adoration for his Guardian, he was so lucky.
Then Bill was pressing his gift into his side one more time. “My turn.”
The gift was decently sized in length probably about the length of his arm. Dot shot his brother a look but Bill just seemed pleased with himself. “I didn’t get anything for you.”
This did not deter Bill. “You’re here to give it to. That’s fine with me.”
Dot bit back the comment about how cheesy that line was and opened the long brown box with the scrawl Happy Birthday, Dot across the top. Inside was probably the last thing he expected (severed thumb was somewhere in the top three of the list of things he did expect). Long and sleek it was an umbrella, it’s pointed end gleaming in silver and along the curved leather handle where it meet the shiny aluminum of the shaft was the silvery script Dot Matrix. It looked antique but was certainly made of more modern material.
“Perfect, we can throw out that old ratty red one,” Mabel was leaning over the box now, peering in at the gift. Dot made a sound of affirmation before reaching in to pull it out. It was heavier in his hand then he expected. He twisted the top of the handle experimentally and jumped as the umbrella unfolded. It was somewhat large but not overly so.
“The city get’s a lot rainier then over the bridge on my side of things so it seemed appropriate.”
“He was gonna weaponize it.” Dipper said over a mouthful of egg and cheese.
“What?” Dot looked affronted.
“Hey,” Bill raised his hands in defense, “I didn’t, okay. It was just an idea I didn’t know if you knew how to defend yourself or not. Better safe then sorry.”
Dot closed the umbrella back up and cocked a brow at his brother, “The question is whether you can. As part of my anger management they had me do a few martial arts things on dummies once a week.”
With a laugh Bill nodded, “I know something about anger management, Stan had me kickboxing almost a month after coming here. Taught me himself.”
It was almost relatable.
“So what’d you get Bill?” Mabel said, turning to her brother. Dipper looked at his sister and nearly choked on the last bite of his food. “You did get him something, right?”
“Uh, yeah,” Dipper swallowed hard and laughed nervously under his breath. “Of course, I did, Mabel. I’m not completely brain dead. Ah…” Dipper reached into the vest that he wore and withdrew from within it a large voluminous leather bound book. When he dropped it on the table Dot reached out to steady his plate. “Sorry it’s not wrapped.” The Guardian’s cheeks were red and he tried not to look at his sister who threw a gummy bear at his head.
“Dipper Pines, did you forget to get your charge a birthday present?” Another gummy bear. “This is your first birthday with him and you completely forget.” Two gummy bears. “Then you don’t even have the nerve to say sorry, you just hand him homework!”
“Hey, if you haven’t noticed yet, Mabel, I’ve been unconscious and I’m not exactly good with a needle and thread the same way you are. What should I have got him? A hand turkey?”
“It would have been better then forgetting.”
“Wow.” Dot had reached over to stop Mabel from pelting her brother with more of the candy that he undoubtedly knew she had an unlimited supply of but he stopped at the sound of his brother’s breathless word. The Guardians froze as well and turned their attention to the blond who was thumbing through the first pages of the book.
Leaning over his brother to get a better look, Dot saw diagrams on the worn antique pages of the book. There was a messy scrawl in the margins of the book but still legible despite the years. Bill looked up at his brother and Dot’s breath caught in his throat. His eyes shone gold, not the sick gold that represented something more sinister, this gold was warm and almost like liquid. Dot couldn’t find it in him not to smile back when Bill’s own smile nearly split his face him half. Bill turned back to Dipper.
“This is amazing. I, I love it. Thank you.” Bill closed the book and ran his hands over the golden script on the worn leather texture it read, Mindscape: A Guide to Dream Walking.
“I’ve had this book as long as I can remember.” Dipper said, “But it doesn’t fit me. I’m not a demon of the mind, let alone dreams, I deal best with what the mind perceives and it perceives what’s real. You live in your head a lot though. I think it’s perfect for you.”
“Yeah, me too.” Bill said. The two shared a look and it was almost comfortable. For a second Dipper felt warm, he felt as if things really were okay even if just for a second.
He missed the frown on Mabel’s lips, her green eyes downcast.
I tear my heart open, I sew myself shut
My weakness is that I care too much
And our scars remind us that the past is real
I tear my heart open just to feel