"IT HAS SOMETHING TO DO WITH GETTING US BACK TO THE BARGEYARD WITHOUT ACCIDENTALLY CRUSHING US ALL INTO AN INFINITELY SMALL POINT-"
The scenery around them of the sinking ship collapses down to a dot, leaving them standing in a white void.
"-OR SPREADING OUR ATOMS OUT ACROSS TEN MILLION DIMENSIONS!"
The dot explodes silently, Big Bang style, into stars and planets.
Yes. It does have something to do with the higher plane. He's diverting - the magician makes a show of fixing locks on the front of the box he's about to saw in half, while his assistant is already sneaking out the back.
Ford's eyes narrow. He's not so sure about that. If Bill used to have a laptop and was doing multiversal calculations in some kind of computer program before they lost the first Barge and everything in it, then this predates their plan to turn the Admiral in.
Sure, it might help prevent the scenarios Bill so helpfully illustrated. But that can't be all. It doesn't add up.
"Where is it the two of you are going?" he asks. Well, three, technically, including his other self, but Ford really doesn't want to include that guy. "I thought for sure you were planning to go back to my dimension, to finish what you started. You know, cosmic party, unwriting the laws of physics, that kind of thing."
Oh. That's a good point. They would kill him on sight if they could. Bill could probably get around that by killing any one of the members off the bat, though, so it would be a very literal arms race. You know. Because they have to hold hands.
"So instead you're going to go somewhere you can take advantage of their unfamiliarity." Yeah, that's about what he expected.
"I was never only trying to save my dimension! If I just wanted you out of my hair, I'd have taken the portal-stabilizing tech from the Institute of Oddology and settled down somewhere years ago!"
He winces, ducking his head when he's noogied, and glares -- even though Ford's not content with just having Bill out of his hair, he doesn't want Bill in it.
(Ford's never played gay chicken before, he has no idea what it is, but he's pretty sure that's what's happening here and also he loses immediately.)
Ugh. He wants nothing to do with what their other selves were involved in and Bill has expressed similar distaste, but of course Bill's not going to make not making this weird easy. Ford doesn't want it to be weird, he wants it to be businesslike and over with as soon as possible. He's having 0 more complicated emotions about it and even if he weren't there is a fresh grudge sitting in the front of his mind like an open wound.
"The point is," he says in a tone that angrily insists on getting back to it, "we might be working together to get on board a better Barge, but you and I aren't friends. Don't get any ideas about coming to me for favors, because I won't help you with anything else. If you want Iris to get you otherworldly materials for a laptop, ask her yourself."
Ford bristles at the implication. He's not going to knowingly manipulate Iris's feelings for him for Bill Cipher's benefit. That would be terrible! That's the kind of thing other people do, not Ford Pines!
(He has unknowingly manipulated others' attraction before for his own benefit during his travels through the multiverse. He thinks it's because he was quick-witted and convincing He would be horrified to learn that it was just because a surprisingly broad range of beings have found him attractive.)
Anyway, he refuses -- and his mouth opens in are-you-serious surprise when Bill brings up D, D & MD, similar to his surprise when Bill asked why he was taking Horseriver's side in his murder.
"What? No! Obviously not!" Why would they? That was just because they were at a loss for something to do and Bill didn't want to be ignored! They have something to do together now: working on breaking into the bridge. That's important, and much easier than sitting down with Bill to play a game that's supposed to be fun.
That's so incorrect that the truth comes out of Ford with surprising force. He means to say no, it's because we don't need to anymore, but what comes out is a bit different.
"No, it's that you tricked me by playing dead and handed Stanley's universe to a new Bill!" Ford grits his teeth, huffs a breath. "I'm not surprised that you did it," he clarifies with a wave of his hand and a roll of his eyes. "I really didn't expect anything else." This is true. "But you can't expect me to play Dungeons, Dungeons & More Dungeons with you like nothing happened! Stanley's out there fighting him right now, for crying out loud!" (Okay, maybe fighting is a little dramatic. What Stan is doing is making key friends. But Ford's not explaining that his plan is the zodiac. Bills know too much about other Bills.)
It might have not been unexpected, but Ford's still mad about it. He can't help thinking of Stanley's universe, about that sector of the probability stream that will pay the price if Stan fails. He won't fail, of course, Ford believes in him, but rrgh it rankles that it's necessary. That he was fooled. That everything he did was for nothing.
He knows sort of the way other people think of him now - dangerous in a way that makes him not worth being around. Does that matter enough to him to change? Not sure yet. But what he does know is that the Bill he just helped bring back to life doesn't understand the damage he's doing.
He wasn't comfortable being around the other Bill in port. They didn't have the same priorities any more. It's just going to be worse now. He's out of sync with the others, maybe permanently. At least he's never had a problem with being out on his own.
"IF HE'S SMART HE WON'T STICK AROUND. HE'LL BE GONE TO AN EASIER WORLD TOO! STAN WON'T EVEN MEET HIM!"
"You really think he'll just leave?" Ford demands. "Take off just like that without some kind of parting shot? Even if I believed that Bill would kiss Stan's reality goodbye without causing a disaster, I already told you: this isn't about one universe! This is about another Bill being out there wreaking interdimensional havoc in spite of everything we sacrificed to kill him!" His voice is raised a little at the end there, whoops. Ford Pines: rational and unemotional, a creature of pure logic, always.
Ford feels kinship with Stan's Ford. They both shot Stan with the memory gun before the timelines diverged: according to the bifurcation theory of multiple realities, they were the same, at that point. But the individual Bills are responsible for their own actions after their deaths, after their timelines split off: his Bill isn't responsible for the say-murder-six-times-fast thing, just for bringing the third Bill back.
They'd been so close. If only Stan hadn't fallen asleep. If only Ford hadn't been fooled into thinking his Bill was too dormant to act. If only he'd gone ahead and made that stupid unicorn hair hat idea he'd scrapped. Ford can tell himself that it's no good thinking about if-onlys, and it works most of the time, just like it's helped him deal with resentment and anger in healthy ways all his life.
Bill's death what caused the timelines to split at all. One universe where Bill went with the Admiral, two where he invoked the Axolotl, and one of those where another barge came to scoop Stan, Dipper, and Mabel up afterwards. Very close timelines produce nearly identical Bills.
He draws up short. Ford was about to go on about how you wouldn't even if you could, and I have to live with that because you're like a bad penny, the worst penny ever minted, but his brain's finally caught up to his ears.
"Wait, wait. Did you just say fix it? Come on, this whole thing was your idea. You're the mastermind. You planned it."
It's only half accusatory. The rest of it is checking to make sure he has his facts straight. ....but it's definitely half accusatory.
Does it? Does the fact that Bill did it because the other Bill was there, and is talking about it in terms of fixing, matter?
They're both jerks. Ford doesn't care how weird Bill's week has been. He's got all the emotional intelligence of a charging rhinoceros, especially when he's upset.
He's right. There isn't. >There's one thing I want to ask.
He's certain he already knows the answer. He wants to hear Bill say it, to confirm what he knows and dispel any temptation to doubt it -- to prove himself right. And that's how it's said: with rhetorical finality.
"Would you take it back?" Even if Bill could, even if he had the chance to do it over, he'd do the same thing.
That's what I thought dies halfway to his mouth. ...that's both exactly what he expected and not what he expected at all.
There's no cheery NOPE! A++ WOULD HARASS YOUR FAMILY AGAIN.
"Bill, if my parallel self were a reality-destroying maniac, you bet I'd leave him dead! ...or stuck in a high-tech trap forever. Whichever the case." But he digresses. "But more importantly" Ford says, "why does it matter to you how many Bills are alive or dead? There's thousands of parallel versions of me out there who are all perfectly non-deceased, but that doesn't make a difference to me! I'm still dead! Are you planning to use that other Bill to save yourself somehow?"
Is he expecting some kind of rescue? Was that the plan?
"BAD EXAMPLE! YOU HATE YOURSELF! THE BILLS OF THE MULTIVERSE LIKE EACH OTHER. IF THERE WAS A WAY THOSE OTHER TWO BILLS COULD RESURRECT ME, THEY'D DO IT, BUT I HAVEN'T HEARD ANYTHING SO FAR!"
Bill starts pacing in mid-air, hands behind his back.
"YOU AND LUKE AND EVERYBODY - WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO, HUH? NOT LOOK OUT FOR MYSELF? WHAT A LOAD. I'D NEVER HAVE MADE IT OUT OF THE SECOND DIMENSION IF I HADN'T PUT MYSELF FIRST, THIS DOESN'T CHANGE ANYTHING!"
Ford scowls at the accusation that he hates himself, but after a moment realizes he can't actually argue. He is pretty terrible. He's doing a terrible thing to Stephanie. Thank god he's got enough sense to avoid the terrible thing Bill wants him to do to Iris. He's brilliant and talented and ingenious but he's also been such an ass. He'd hate to meet his younger self.
"You think I have the answer?!" Ford demands, throwing out his hands. "I don't know what you're supposed to do! I barely know what I'm supposed to be doing, and I'm pretty sure I'm not doing it!"
Anger flashes through Ford again, not in a way he would describe as acidic given that he is familiar what it is like to have acid pass through you, but hot and burning anyway. Seeing Bill take that other Bill's place, hearing him say no one else is ever going to fight for him, makes Ford erupt. He waves a hand, shoving Bill out of the place he's chosen to occupy, hopefully onto the ground.
"Are you kidding?" he snaps, taking a step forward. "Do you have any idea how many people on this barge are protecting you, Cipher? Who have told me specifically not to try to kill you? I know for a fact that Luke would protect you, and Dillon, and possibly Jean -- and last I checked, Quentin called you a friend! I might not agree with them, and I might think it's a colossally stupid idea, but that doesn't change the fact that you're not the only one fighting for you anymore!"
A breath in. Then, Ford gestures to himself with both hands. "For crying out loud, I came to get you from the freezer!" He jabs a finger in Bill's direction. "I'm furious with you, Cipher, for everything you did in the Bargeyard, and I'd kill you in an instant and damn the consequences if I knew it'd work, but I think you're different! You're like the other Bills, but you're not the same as them anymore! I'm doing things that are definitely not making me any more of a good person or getting me back to my family any time soon for your sake because I need to get you to a Barge where maybe, one day, you'll graduate! If I didn't think you'd changed, that you had a capacity that they didn't--" It takes a split second to imagine it. "...I'd probably still be following you around, but I'd hate it much more."
He doesn't want to talk about him being a freak. He'd much rather yell.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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The scenery around them of the sinking ship collapses down to a dot, leaving them standing in a white void.
"-OR SPREADING OUR ATOMS OUT ACROSS TEN MILLION DIMENSIONS!"
The dot explodes silently, Big Bang style, into stars and planets.
Yes. It does have something to do with the higher plane. He's diverting - the magician makes a show of fixing locks on the front of the box he's about to saw in half, while his assistant is already sneaking out the back.
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Sure, it might help prevent the scenarios Bill so helpfully illustrated. But that can't be all. It doesn't add up.
"Where is it the two of you are going?" he asks. Well, three, technically, including his other self, but Ford really doesn't want to include that guy. "I thought for sure you were planning to go back to my dimension, to finish what you started. You know, cosmic party, unwriting the laws of physics, that kind of thing."
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"So instead you're going to go somewhere you can take advantage of their unfamiliarity." Yeah, that's about what he expected.
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Duh, why wouldn't he?
"I THOUGHT YOU'D BE HAPPY ABOUT THIS! I'M OUT OF YOUR HAIR!"
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He pops over to give him a noogie. Okay, so Bill's flirting is pretty juvenile.
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(Ford's never played gay chicken before, he has no idea what it is, but he's pretty sure that's what's happening here and also he loses immediately.)
Ugh. He wants nothing to do with what their other selves were involved in and Bill has expressed similar distaste, but of course Bill's not going to make not making this weird easy. Ford doesn't want it to be weird, he wants it to be businesslike and over with as soon as possible. He's having 0 more complicated emotions about it and even if he weren't there is a fresh grudge sitting in the front of his mind like an open wound.
"The point is," he says in a tone that angrily insists on getting back to it, "we might be working together to get on board a better Barge, but you and I aren't friends. Don't get any ideas about coming to me for favors, because I won't help you with anything else. If you want Iris to get you otherworldly materials for a laptop, ask her yourself."
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Finger-gun. You know what he means.
Bill is feeling some... lost progress, here.
"ARE WE STILL ON FOR A D,D,& MORE D GAME ONCE WE FIND SOME DICE AGAIN?"
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(He has unknowingly manipulated others' attraction before for his own benefit during his travels through the multiverse. He thinks it's because he was quick-witted and convincing He would be horrified to learn that it was just because a surprisingly broad range of beings have found him attractive.)
Anyway, he refuses -- and his mouth opens in are-you-serious surprise when Bill brings up D, D & MD, similar to his surprise when Bill asked why he was taking Horseriver's side in his murder.
"What? No! Obviously not!" Why would they? That was just because they were at a loss for something to do and Bill didn't want to be ignored! They have something to do together now: working on breaking into the bridge. That's important, and much easier than sitting down with Bill to play a game that's supposed to be fun.
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"IS IT THE REPETITIVE MURDER THING?"
The scene Bill entered the dream on shimmers back in, staticky and distant.
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"No, it's that you tricked me by playing dead and handed Stanley's universe to a new Bill!" Ford grits his teeth, huffs a breath. "I'm not surprised that you did it," he clarifies with a wave of his hand and a roll of his eyes. "I really didn't expect anything else." This is true. "But you can't expect me to play Dungeons, Dungeons & More Dungeons with you like nothing happened! Stanley's out there fighting him right now, for crying out loud!" (Okay, maybe fighting is a little dramatic. What Stan is doing is making key friends. But Ford's not explaining that his plan is the zodiac. Bills know too much about other Bills.)
It might have not been unexpected, but Ford's still mad about it. He can't help thinking of Stanley's universe, about that sector of the probability stream that will pay the price if Stan fails. He won't fail, of course, Ford believes in him, but rrgh it rankles that it's necessary. That he was fooled. That everything he did was for nothing.
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He knows sort of the way other people think of him now - dangerous in a way that makes him not worth being around. Does that matter enough to him to change? Not sure yet. But what he does know is that the Bill he just helped bring back to life doesn't understand the damage he's doing.
He wasn't comfortable being around the other Bill in port. They didn't have the same priorities any more. It's just going to be worse now. He's out of sync with the others, maybe permanently. At least he's never had a problem with being out on his own.
"IF HE'S SMART HE WON'T STICK AROUND. HE'LL BE GONE TO AN EASIER WORLD TOO! STAN WON'T EVEN MEET HIM!"
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Ford feels kinship with Stan's Ford. They both shot Stan with the memory gun before the timelines diverged: according to the bifurcation theory of multiple realities, they were the same, at that point. But the individual Bills are responsible for their own actions after their deaths, after their timelines split off: his Bill isn't responsible for the say-murder-six-times-fast thing, just for bringing the third Bill back.
They'd been so close. If only Stan hadn't fallen asleep. If only Ford hadn't been fooled into thinking his Bill was too dormant to act. If only he'd gone ahead and made that stupid unicorn hair hat idea he'd scrapped. Ford can tell himself that it's no good thinking about if-onlys, and it works most of the time, just like it's helped him deal with resentment and anger in healthy ways all his life.
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"I CAN'T FIX THAT!"
Ford, be mad at him for something simpler!
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"Wait, wait. Did you just say fix it? Come on, this whole thing was your idea. You're the mastermind. You planned it."
It's only half accusatory. The rest of it is checking to make sure he has his facts straight. ....but it's definitely half accusatory.
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The feeling of being squeezed under a weird, helpless pressure that he felt so vividly while under the curse is back, duller and more distant.
He didn't consider not helping. He wasn't motivated to consider it. If he had, he understands that the other Bill would have just done it without him.
Doesn't help, though, does it?
"LOOK, I'VE HAD A REALLY WEIRD COUPLE OF DAYS! I KNOW WHAT YOU MEAN, THERE'S JUST NOTHING EITHER OF US CAN DO ABOUT IT, OKAY??"
Even if you regret losing something, it's going to stay lost.
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They're both jerks. Ford doesn't care how weird Bill's week has been. He's got all the emotional intelligence of a charging rhinoceros, especially when he's upset.
He's right. There isn't.
>There's one thing I want to ask.
He's certain he already knows the answer. He wants to hear Bill say it, to confirm what he knows and dispel any temptation to doubt it -- to prove himself right. And that's how it's said: with rhetorical finality.
"Would you take it back?" Even if Bill could, even if he had the chance to do it over, he'd do the same thing.
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"WOULD YOU TURN DOWN A CHANCE TO BE ALIVE?"
Let's face it, Bill's graduation chances are ... questionable.
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There's no cheery NOPE! A++ WOULD HARASS YOUR FAMILY AGAIN.
"Bill, if my parallel self were a reality-destroying maniac, you bet I'd leave him dead! ...or stuck in a high-tech trap forever. Whichever the case." But he digresses. "But more importantly" Ford says, "why does it matter to you how many Bills are alive or dead? There's thousands of parallel versions of me out there who are all perfectly non-deceased, but that doesn't make a difference to me! I'm still dead! Are you planning to use that other Bill to save yourself somehow?"
Is he expecting some kind of rescue? Was that the plan?
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Bill starts pacing in mid-air, hands behind his back.
"YOU AND LUKE AND EVERYBODY - WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO, HUH? NOT LOOK OUT FOR MYSELF? WHAT A LOAD. I'D NEVER HAVE MADE IT OUT OF THE SECOND DIMENSION IF I HADN'T PUT MYSELF FIRST, THIS DOESN'T CHANGE ANYTHING!"
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"You think I have the answer?!" Ford demands, throwing out his hands. "I don't know what you're supposed to do! I barely know what I'm supposed to be doing, and I'm pretty sure I'm not doing it!"
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Bill swipes away the image of the dream-Bill and goes to sit in his place.
"SO YEAH, I'D DO IT AGAIN! AND YOU SHOULD THINK ABOUT THE QUESTION I ASKED WHEN I FIRST SHOWED UP!"
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"Are you kidding?" he snaps, taking a step forward. "Do you have any idea how many people on this barge are protecting you, Cipher? Who have told me specifically not to try to kill you? I know for a fact that Luke would protect you, and Dillon, and possibly Jean -- and last I checked, Quentin called you a friend! I might not agree with them, and I might think it's a colossally stupid idea, but that doesn't change the fact that you're not the only one fighting for you anymore!"
A breath in. Then, Ford gestures to himself with both hands. "For crying out loud, I came to get you from the freezer!" He jabs a finger in Bill's direction. "I'm furious with you, Cipher, for everything you did in the Bargeyard, and I'd kill you in an instant and damn the consequences if I knew it'd work, but I think you're different! You're like the other Bills, but you're not the same as them anymore! I'm doing things that are definitely not making me any more of a good person or getting me back to my family any time soon for your sake because I need to get you to a Barge where maybe, one day, you'll graduate! If I didn't think you'd changed, that you had a capacity that they didn't--" It takes a split second to imagine it. "...I'd probably still be following you around, but I'd hate it much more."
He doesn't want to talk about him being a freak. He'd much rather yell.
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