Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Triangulum, entangulum. Meteforis dominus ventium. Meteforis venetisarium!”

Nothing.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing!

Bill is sure that he has the strangest roommate in the Academy.

He’d gotten the letter personally delivered to his room that his old roommate requested a transfer and he’d been assigned a new one. Simply lounging in front of the church gives him the gossip he needs. The reverend is needed on a Demon hunt, the rumors said, and he deemed his children would be safest at the Church boarding school, protected by faith and the purest of pastors.

After all, no Demons would ever invade the church grounds.

(Bill laughs and laughs and laughs.)

The twins are a mystery, though. They are so sheltered that it was only recently people realized the reverend even had children. Bill can only imagine what such overprotected religious children will be like. And the rumors say the twins are a little odd.

Bill’s first roommate was a pest, though. He was easily frightened by the late-night rituals Bill tried to perform, and he wasn’t a fan of Bill’s charisma winning over the nuns and pastors when he tried to report Bill for a Demon summoning.

Bill wasn’t summoning a Demon, though. Obviously.

Getting a reverend’s son (related to Stanford Pines of all people, the fates are just cackling) as a roommate might tamper with Bill’s progress, but—

The sound of a key jiggling in the lock jolts Bill into action, and he shoves his spellbook under his mattress, leaning back on his pillows and trying to appear casual, the perfect student people already perceive him to be.

Mason Pines stands in the doorway with a hat too big for his head and two scrappy-looking suitcases of his belongings. The pastor stands behind him, one hand on Mason’s left shoulder and the other on his right arm. His hold is possessive, though Mason appears to find this normal.

Perhaps this is normal behavior for a reverend’s son with a pastor. Bill is quite used to religious authority figures making contracts with Demons. He’s sure he’d have made a few more contracts, if he weren’t trapped in this dumb fleshsuit.

Who is he to question anything?

“Hello.” Mason waves with one hand, oversized sleeve slipping to reveal a delicate wrist, and Bill frowns for having noticed. How pathetic. “You must be my roommate. William.”

He says William the way one would say a name they practiced a few thousand times in the mirror, with fake nonchalance while still sounding all-too stiff. Bill is not impressed. This roommate is going to be as pathetic as the last one, possibly even worse.

He’s dressed nicely overall, clearly the son of a reverend in his black suit. The collar is a bit tight on his neck, adorned with a loose tie and a pretty bow, and he has quite possibly the tiniest waist Bill has ever seen on a boy their age. The all-black outfit makes him look smaller, and it doesn’t help that he’s weighed down by two large suitcases he’s clearly struggling to carry.

“Name’s Bill,” he corrects, because William is too stuffy of a name for the person who’s going to one day be freed as the Demon that will rule them all.

“Hi, Bill,” Mason repeats. Bill’s stupid human heart skips a beat when he sees the little quirk of Mason’s lips, the way his big brown eyes seem to brighten.

Mason is horribly plain, with a tangled mess of brown hair and a spattering of freckles all over his cheeks and limbs so slender a gust of wind could take him away. Despite it all, Bill’s eyes won’t leave his roommate.

The pastor hovers behind Mason like a shadow, so very tall as his fingers linger on Mason’s shoulder for far too long, his eyes darkening. Bill is not blind to the attraction in the pastor’s eyes.

It’s been a long time since Bill has been outside of this stupid fleshsack, but he can still sense a sin or two, can still taste the remnants of a demonic deal. He senses a lot in the doorway right now. He raises his eyebrow in interest.

“Thank you,” Mason says, pulling himself from the pastor’s hold.

“Of course. Anything for the reverend’s boy.” His smile makes Bill shiver. “Come to me if you need anything.”

Mason stiffens, back straightening like someone has sent an electric current through his spine. How interesting. “I will.”

“Behave yourself, William,” the pastor adds, nodding in Bill’s direction before leaving.

Bill wants to stick out his tongue. He rarely interacts with the pastor, only attending Mass on the days they are obligated, but he doesn’t give off the greatest aura, particularly not now.

Mason seems not to notice, eyes wide and bright with his enthusiasm. It must be a freeing experience for him, to finally be away from his home life, away from the reverend and the expectations of a little church boy.

He walks into the room, leaving his bags in the doorway, extending a hand. “Call me Dipper.”

Bill snorts. Dipper is hardly an upgrade over Mason. “Reverend Pines must hate you!” He ignores Dipper’s hand.

He did not luck out in the roommate department again, it seems. He should’ve just continued reading his book, let them make of the Demon spells what they wanted.

“Seriously?” Dipper looks a mix of indignant and uncomfortable, pulling his hand back and sliding it into his pocket. “It’s a nickname, Bill.”

He stands there and stares at Bill, before it becomes apparent that no conversation will continue between them. Then he returns to the door, the tails of his long suit jacket flying behind him. For lack of anything better to do, since he very well can’t bring his spellbook out while Dipper is watching, Bill observes as his roommate drags in the first of his suitcases, struggling with the weight.

“My nickname isn’t after a human cooking instrument.” Bill can’t help his boisterous laughing.

Along with the stupid name, Dipper is awkward and weak, barely able to manage bags of his own clothes. He can already picture the kid saying his prayers before bed, keeping a Bible on his nightstand, squirming at the thought of Bill as a Demon.

Repulsive kid.

“I wasn’t named after a ladle, what’s wrong with you?” Dipper stops his struggle to glare. “And stop laughing, this is actually heavy!”

“Then where’d the nickname come from, kid? Lose a bet? Get put under some kind of curse?” He laughs.

Dipper pauses, scowls. “Maybe you don’t deserve to know.” Dipper finally drags his first bag into the room, leaving it by his bedside.

“What, it’s that much of a secret, Dipper?” Finally, something interesting about the kid!

“No, but—”

“Aww, are you shy about it?”

“No. . .”

“Don’t be shy, tell your new favorite roommate!”

“Maybe you’ll scare me off like Tad Strange, too. You’re not my favorite.”

“You sure?” Bill laughs, “I think I already am!”

For some reason, Dipper looks pained, eyes flicking around the room in momentary panic, before he chuckles awkwardly and straightens up. Bill raises an eyebrow, exhaling at the chill. What a weird kid. “You sure you want to know? I-it’s not that interesting.”

But he’s already walking over, taking off his hat and pulling his bangs from his forehead, where a line of freckles in the shape of a familiar constellation marks his skin. It’s hardly worth hiding but added to how pitiful Dipper is already proving himself to be, Bill can understand his reluctance to share.

An ugly birthmark is hardly a reason to act so strangely, in Bill’s opinion. “You were right! That wasn’t interesting, Pine Tree.”

Dipper tugs his hat back on, scowling. “Then why did you ask?”

“Thought it’d be worth my time!” Bill’s fingers itch to dig his book from under his mattress. “Just go back to struggling with your pathetic suitcases.”

“I wasn’t struggling!” His voice sounds oddly pitched, and he starts dragging his feet toward the doorway again, as though he doesn’t want to finish unpacking. Bill shivers.

“Hurry up and shut the door.” He just wants to go back to his reading, but he can’t risk having his idiot floormates catching what he’s doing. Dipper straightens in posture, speed-walking to his suitcase.

“Okay,” Dipper grinds out, body so stiff he looks uncomfortable. He struggles even worse than before, almost comically so, until his suitcase rips open and his books come tumbling out. There’s some jeering in the hallway, and Dipper’s cheeks blush pink and pretty.

The look on his face is tempting, and it both surprises and disgusts Bill that he thinks such menial thoughts of a stupid human. He decides, just this once, he won’t leave his pathetic roommate to fend for himself. The longer he takes, the less likely he’ll leave, and the more likely Bill will have to stay up later than he’d like reading his spells.

Human bodies require so much work, sleeping and eating and whatnot.

“Jeez, kid, didn’t think you’d struggle that badly!”

Dipper frowns as he picks up the different books. “I didn’t think so, either,” he says, rather bitterly.

Bill’s eye catches the different supernatural titles, and he pauses. Dipper could have promise, after all. “You’re into Demons?”

“Demons?” He startles, dropping his books. The sound seems extraordinarily loud when it’s just the two of them, and it’s rather irritating. Along with being a strange religious nutjob, he got stuck with the clumsy roommate. Doing anything with him around is going to be a pain. “Are you?”

“I asked you first.”

“That’s a loaded question to ask someone without revealing anything about yourself, Bill.”

“Oh, Pine Tree’s got some backbone in his puny body!”

Dipper pouts but presses on, “I did my research before coming here. Your old roommate reported you for trying to summon a Demon.”

Bill towers over Dipper, leaning closer so Dipper has to take a step back. Their height difference is exaggerated when he stands like this—perhaps they have some inches separating them, perhaps a few more—and Dipper seems so small in his black suit.

A roommate that isn’t as easy to manipulate could prove difficult, and as annoying as Dipper seemed when he was tripping over his luggage and stuttering to show off his birthmark, this curious side of his is an intriguing annoyance.

“And just where, pray tell, did you hear that?” Bill smiles, as charming as ever, but he isn’t very pleased with this turn of events, eye narrowing.

“I—”

“Hey, isn’t that the reverend’s son?”

Dipper turns to face the voice, and Bill glares at the interruption. He was finally having a good time.

“Must be, look at that outfit!”

“Go back to church, demon-spawn!”

Bill shivers as Dipper clutches his book so tightly his fingers look white. Then he stands straight and nods. “Okay.”

“Really, Pine Tree?”

He shrugs at Bill, clearly looking for a way out of explaining his interest in Demons, and heads toward the stairs, leaving taunting laughs behind him.

More importantly, however, he is leaving Bill to drag in the rest of his things. They are, indeed, much heavier than they look, and it is out of the sheer goodness of Bill’s fake human heart that he doesn’t just leave them in the hallway to get stolen.

As he leaves, Bill catches the scent of something demonic. Though he’s not sure what sins Dipper may be hiding, it must mean he’s getting close to his breakthrough. He’s never felt such a strong demonic presence before. Dipper leaving is perfect timing.

It leaves Bill plenty of time to finish his reading, though the room feels much colder without Dipper there.

Bill’s notes are full of the changes he’ll be making during his spell, the ingredients he’ll need. Certainly things his old roommate could have reported him for writing—if he’d been smart enough to present evidence instead of simply whining.

Bill is a model student, with effortless perfect grades, not a single broken rule on his record, the face of an innocently attractive student. No one would ever believe Bill Cipher could do anything wrong.

After all, his demonic charisma wouldn’t just disappear because he’s been forced into this stupid meatsuit.

Bill buries himself into his reading and plotting, the time flying by.

Dipper does not return until after the sun sets, dragged in by a girl bearing his mirror features.

“Hi! I’m Mabel!” She grabs Bill’s hand before he can refuse it, shaking it vigorously. His book remains on the bed this time, and he quickly flips it, so the cover is face-down. His secrets are his own. Her hand is freezing, and he’s overwhelmed by the scent of her perfume, the smell of freshly baked cupcakes. “Did you let some boys bully my brother?”

“Mabel!” Dipper squawks, indignant.

“I’m just protecting you, Dip! Maybe if he kn—”

“Stan said not to,” Dipper reminds her. “And we don’t know if we can trust him yet.” His mumbling is more for himself, but it’s clear enough for Bill to understand. “He did bring my stuff in, I guess. . .”

Bill smiles, all his sharp teeth on display. A predator, if only they knew. “Oh, I’m the most trustworthy person you’ll meet at the Academy. Bill Cipher, at your service, Pines twins.”

“See?” Dipper flops backward onto his bed. “Definitely not trustworthy. Who else—No one else would say something that suspicious.”

Points to Pine Tree!

Mabel has long, curly hair, and her features are as soft as her brother’s, a small nose and long eyelashes, perpetually rosy cheeks. She’s very pretty, and she has a confidence that her brother lacks. She is dressed in an oversized pink sweater rather than something from their church, though she’ll soon be in the standard uniform.

Bill thinks he would prefer her as a roommate instead of Pine Tree, but the Academy separates the dormitories by sex out of fear the students would get ideas. The only ideas Bill plans on getting are related to freeing himself from this cursed meatsack and the contracts he plans on making once he’s out of this ridiculous body.

“I didn’t let anyone bully him,” Bill says, referring to her previous question.

“This is a church boarding school! It should be a bully-free zone!” Mabel insists.

“Don’t blame me, Shooting Star! He did that on his own.”

Dipper’s cheeks flush red—“No I didn’t!”—and Bill stares longer than socially appropriate.

He drags his eyes away when he recognizes he’s being a bit too much, though the image of Dipper’s blushing face is imprinted on his mind. Because like that, with his cheeks so red and his eyes so wide, Dipper is actually maybe slightly a little bit pretty.

And maybe it’s because his sister is there, and Bill is mixing them up—but he isn’t that stupid and he knows where his thoughts are going and he needs them to stop—but Dipper has the features of a painted doll, bitten pink lips and eyelashes so long they kiss his cheeks when he blinks.

Bill turns back to look at Mabel, who he decides is the prettier one. She has to be.

They’re both just stupid humans, though, so these thoughts are positively asinine, remnants of the soul that inhabited this body before Bill took over, instinctive reactions of the leftover body because humans don’t seem to know what to do with themselves.

Mabel rolls her eyes as if she can hear his ridiculous thoughts. Bill almost smacks his own head for thinking things so idiotic. Bill is a model student after all, and the Academy won’t allow anything like this. Not after last time.

“I’m in Rosewood Hall if he ever gets into trouble.” Mabel’s smile is the brightest thing Bill has seen all day. “You can drop by any time!”

“What trouble could I get into?”

“Well,” Mabel hums, “you could—”

“Don’t answer that!” Bill begins to laugh, as Dipper scrambles to cut off Mabel’s words. “It was rhetorical, I swear!”

“Dipper!” she chastises. They communicate silently, and Bill eyes them with interest. “You should know better! That would’ve been more embarrassing for you!”

“Ugh! Why was I the one stuck with. . .” He notices Bill—which, rude, he’s been here the whole time, people can’t just ignore Bill Cipher—then turns back to his sister. “Stick to your own conversations, Bill.”

“Don’t let me stop you, Pine Tree.”

Bill likes to know all of the secrets in the Academy, particularly if they can benefit him in any way. He doesn’t know the potential of these twins just yet, but it is clear they are hiding something from him.

Rather than answering, though, Mabel waves her goodbyes. “Keep my brother out of trouble, Bill!”

Except that, well, Dipper does get into a lot of trouble.

It takes Bill all of one week to decide that there is something strange about his roommate. At first, he believes it’s just his own strangeness, his own weird desires—that’s a little sadistic, Bill, you shouldn’t like seeing your roommate like this, trembling with pinkened cheeks, eyes wide and almost crying—manifesting into an obsession with a boy who makes these really attractive faces at seemingly ordinary moments.

(Not an obsession, just noticing things about the relative of his old enemy.)

Sometimes Dipper is listening attentively to something, or he’s deep into a conversation, just, something normal, when his face will twist into a deliciously pained expression: pretty brown eyes squeezing shut, little tears glistening on his dark eyelashes, cheeks pinking to just the right shade of red, lower lip bitten to swell.

And then he’ll straighten up like nothing is wrong, then go off to do something, acting like he hadn’t just made Bill shiver and flush, hadn’t just made Bill squeeze his thighs together and think of less enticing things.

As if the distressed look on Dipper’s face is not the lewdest sight Bill has ever seen.

Bill has to catch his breath just thinking about it. He’s pretty sure he wouldn’t at all be attracted to a reverend’s son of all people—related to Stanford Pines, of all people—if not for the faces Dipper keeps pulling during class.

Bill is sure that every dumb human has noticed at this point, there’s no way to ignore those kinds of looks.

(Stupid human flesh suit, making him think these stupid human thoughts about a stupid human boy. He’s a Demon! Humans are vile little beings only good for one-sided deals!)

Mabel Pines has no effect on Bill whatsoever—though her eyes seem to read much more deeply into Bill’s persona than he would like for a stranger to know. The judgement in her gaze is enough for Bill to double back on his thoughts, shifting them to something controllable. She can’t read the mind of a Demon, but she’s socially astute, and oddly aware of her brother’s strange behavior.

She is an odd one, herself, though. She is much more bubbly and less reserved than Dipper, and her tendency to overshare will prove useful. She talks a lot, but she seems less inexperienced than Dipper. He wonders how this came to be.

As the reverend’s son, so sheltered and protected, Dipper’s naïveté is so obvious it makes Bill want to vomit every time they make eye contact.

It just enrages Bill how obedient Dipper is. He doesn’t know if it’s because Dipper thinks he’ll invoke the wrath of his creator by misbehaving, but he follows every rule to the letter. Mabel is nowhere near as annoying.

The nuns in charge of their dormitory insist on lights off by nine, and Dipper is quick to turn off the lamp and blow out Bill’s candles as soon as the announcement is declared through the halls. Their room is old, one of the remnants of the original building from the 1600s. And the room clearly shows its age; it is dark, with no light fixtures other than a lamp on the desk in front of the singular window.

Bill has set up candles around his side of the room, more for his spells than anything, but it helps with how dark their room is and distracts people’s suspicions.

His behavior is particularly annoying, as Dipper likes to read as well, and he chooses to squint in the dark simply because they were told to turn off their lights.

“Just go to sleep, then!” Bill snaps one night, when Dipper is being his usual frustrating self, and the sound of his book smacking the floor is enough to tell Bill that Dipper has once again taken his words to heart. He shivers at the thought.

If Dipper ever notices the prolonged stares on Bill’s part, the way his touch sometimes lingers a bit too long, the way he says things purposely silly just to see how Dipper will laugh, he doesn’t say anything. He’s happy overall, if Bill has to guess, so excited at the prospect of doing his schoolwork, of getting to explore the campus with his twin, finally away from the church where he grew up.

Dipper runs around in his generic uniform, looking like the prettiest person to ever grace the Academy’s doors, blissfully unaware of the effects he has on Bill’s stupid human body.

Bill crushes the thoughts out of his mind, turning back to his spellbook. When he is free, there won’t be any further worry of this nonsense.

All will be right in the world.

“Your brother has an interest in the supernatural,” Bill starts, conversationally, matching his stride with Mabel’s. She waves goodbye to the friends she is with, smiling at him and playing with her hair, scented like fresh cookies. It is still early in the autumn, so the trees of their boarding school campus are still lush and green, the air still happy and bright. “Why is he so interested in Demons?”

“Are you asking because you’re interested, too? Dipper mentioned you do a lot of reading!” She’s cheerful, but her eyes are narrowed. Bill smiles, teeth gleaming. His meatsuit is well-maintained, dazzling. He knows his effect on people. Mabel blushes pink. She looks like her brother, but Bill’s body doesn’t react in the same way. Human bodies are so strange.

“I think we could have a lot in common.”

The air feels colder now, and Bill buttons his blazer. It’s a bit early in the season for such a chill.

“He’s interested in curses.” What a coincidence! “It’s a family thing.”

“Oh, right! The reverend is a Demon hunter!”

Bill acts like this is new information, but they both know this is well-discussed, known to everyone. Stanford Pines was renowned for his hunting abilities, and it makes sense that his family would be the same. Bill had been one of the Demons Stanford tried to destroy, but Stanford had lost miserably.

Bill wants to laugh at how pathetic Stanford’s defeat had been! Bill reigned supreme, as usual!

He thought he’d scared Stanford from fighting for good—casting a curse so his children would be the ultimate prey for all Demons—but his stubborn pride must have kept him going.

And, Bill notes bitterly, Stanford didn’t even have children, rendering Bill’s curse useless. The fact that Bill affected him to the point he didn’t have children is both touching and frustrating.

“Are you both interested in hunting?” He tries to keep the mirth from his voice as he says, “I admire Stanford Pines a great deal and want to ask questions. Talking to Pine Tree is so difficult.”

Mabel seems to soften, laughing at the insinuation that Dipper isn’t a great conversation partner. He isn’t. “He does struggle a bit, but you can’t blame him. He wasn’t allowed outside while we were growing up.”

Bill perks up a little at this. Interesting. “Why’s that?”

“Our family is overprotective of us, but especially of Dipper.” Mabel glances at one of the statues near them. An angel looks like she is crying. “This is the first time he’s been allowed away from me or someone from the family in years, actually!”

“What makes Pine Tree so special?” Bill doesn’t want to seem that interested, but he kind of is.

“You know,” Mabel waves a hand passively. “Peer pressure and all that!”

Even though that made no sense, Bill presses on. “Where did the interest in Demons come from, then? If he was locked in the church, it hardly seems like appropriate reading.”

“Dipper is the one interested in Demons, but he’s the one more affected than me, so it makes sense.” She pauses, pouting, and Bill feels his lips upturning into a smirk. How is Dipper affected by Demons? What else can Mabel reveal about the Pines family? “You know, you two could bond over your nerdy interests if you just communicate!”

Bill stops walking, placing a hand on Mabel’s shoulder. He shivers at the contact, but he smiles, charismatic to his core. “You’re so right, Shooting Star. Do you think Dipper would open up to me?” He tries to look eager. “Be honest.”

“He can’t help it!” Mabel looks at him with stars in her eyes, enchanted by his lies. “Dipper’s just like that!”

Bill usually keeps to himself. He has no desire to pretend to care about pathetic human problems, and as such only interacts with them on a minimal basis in order to get what he needs. His curse leaves him trapped in this never-aging human body, and after the first two decades of trying and failing to free himself, he had the realization that he either needs help or he needs more information.

He's not ready to think he can’t do this on his own—he’s Bill Cipher, king of the nightmare Demons, destroyer of the Flatlands—so he finds each church or school or library with texts that could pose helpful and sneaks his way in.

Dipper slides a book toward him, the dim, flickering light hanging from the ceiling barely illuminating the title for Bill to read. Ciphers and Curses.

Bill smiles sardonically at the title.

“Thought you might like this one,” Dipper says, taking a seat across from him at the library table.

The library is older than the Academy, with texts from hundreds of years before, first editions detailing accounts of sacrifices and rituals not written in any other form. The books on Demons are meant for the students planning to become Demon hunters one day, and Bill is crafting his reputation around such a thought, so no one questions his immense amount of reading.

“You want to sit with me,” Bill says gleefully, “so persistent of you, Pine Tree. Trying to be best friends with your favorite roommate!” Even when he’s not interested.

“I figured I could help you with whatever you’re doing.” He narrows his eyes at Bill. “I have a lot of experience, you know. With Demon stuff.”

“Sure, Pine Tree!” Bill starts to laugh, feeling his face warm at the red coloring Dipper’s cheeks. No one has more Demon experience than Bill, of course. “Experience in staying locked in your basement!”

“Base. . . Mabel told you?”

“She may have hinted at why you’re so awkward.” Bill smirks. “And sweaty.”

“Shut up!” Dipper stares at his own book, tapping his fingers on the journal he seems to carry with him everywhere. I’m not that sweaty, he mumbles more to himself. “And stop haggling my sister!”

“Or what? You’ll wave your notebook at me?” He laughs. “Maybe we’re friends.”

“She can make better friends.” He sighs, tries again. “Tell me what you’re doing with all the Demon stuff, and I can trust you’re not being weird with Mabel.”

“I’m plenty weird, Pine Tree. If I want to be weird with Shooting Star, then I will be.” He opens Dipper’s peace offering, pleased at the Table of Contents. Maybe the original curse on him was coded in some way. “What I do with my time is none of your business!”

“Bill, you—”

“Oh, look, it’s the Pines kid!” One of the older students—not as old as Bill, but older than this stupid human fleshsack makes him out to be—elbows his friend, eyeing Dipper the way one might stare at a frightened potential meal.

“Hey, Pines, join us for a walk!”

Dipper stiffens in his seat, a ball of tension, and he seems to try and ignore the boys for all of one minute before he closes his book. “Sure,” he says, voice dull.

Bill shivers. Upperclassmen and Dipper aren’t a good sign. “Didn’t know you were into that stuff, Pine Tree.”

“I’m not, I just. . .” Is Bill supposed to help, or something? The kid needs to be able to defend himself, and Bill has two new books to read.

“Let’s go, Pines!”

Bill shrugs, reaching forward and snagging Dipper’s abandoned book. Satanic Rituals: What Not to Do.

Shoving his journal in his backpack and putting it on in a rush, Dipper stands to meet with the boys, horribly small in comparison to them both. “We’ll finish this conversation in the dormitory later,” he tells Bill.

They do not, in fact, finish the conversation.

Bill raises his hand and answers at least one question in each class, so it seems like he cares about participating. Whatever they’re learning is knowledge he’s had about human society long before they even conceived of it, so everything is just a waste of his time.

Appearances are appearances, though.

He rejects offers for social activities more often than he can count. It’s almost frustrating how attractive he is in this body, even with the eyepatch and the ugly uniform. Several humans offer to do his work for him, and he takes them up on the offer if only to dedicate more time to his task.

Whoever cast this curse on him is going to pay once he’s free. An eye for an eye, as they say!

He's going to reach a breakthrough, soon. He can feel it.

“Pine Tree!” Bill not-very-subtly kicks the rabbit cage under his bed as Dipper barges into their dormitory, a hefty stack of books in his arms. “You’re back early.”

So annoying.

Dipper sighs, kicking off his shoes as he makes his way to his side of the room. “Rosewood Hall has a new curfew on having boys in the dormitory, even though I’m her brother.” He sets the books down carefully, but they still topple over. Dipper focuses more on his studies than Bill or his previous roommate, but at least it keeps him away from Bill and out of their dormitory. “But I’ll stay out of your ridiculous hair.”

Ridiculous? Bill runs a hand through his hair, long and blonde and styled to perfection, the longest parts covering his useless right eye. He glances at the titles scattered on Dipper’s bed, a smile stretching across his lips. “What do you have here? You never told me why you’re so interested in Demons.”

He’s in the middle of sliding out of his blazer, and Bill, though quite interested in the way the white fabric clings to the kid’s scrawny arms, focuses his stare on Dipper’s eyes. “Didn’t I? Maybe you forgot, along with your explanation of what happened with your old roommate.”

Bill had cornered Mabel about it, once, because of her tendency to overshare, and it was clear she told Dipper afterward, because he’s noticed a few of his things scattered about, in positions he didn’t leave them. He’s sure that snooping through a roommate’s possessions constitutes a misdemeanor by Dipper’s god, but what would a Demon know?

Dipper is hiding something and he’s searching through Bill’s belongings for answers. Bill doesn’t like not knowing things: he’s going to find out Pine Tree’s little secret, and he’s going to enjoy crushing him the way he destroyed Stanford Pines.

What a shame his curse couldn’t have scare the whole Pines family out of procreating. Then maybe he wouldn’t have to deal with Dipper at all.

“Tad was. . . a tad bit strange!” He grins at his own joke, then keeps his eyes carefully trained on Dipper’s face to monitor for his reactions. “He thought I was trying to summon a Demon, since he walked in and saw my candles.”

Rather impressively, Dipper does not appear concerned at Bill’s admission. Whoever told him about Tad hadn’t spared the details. How hilarious! “You’re saying you weren’t?”

“Heavens, no.” The word feels horrid on his tongue, but appearances are appearances. “But he wasn’t very comfortable with me.” Not too many people feel comfortable with him, but that isn’t his problem!

“I can understand why.” Dipper smirks, loosening his tie as he climbs onto his bed. “You can be a bit. . .”

“Do I make you uncomfortable, Pine Tree? You can tell me!” Bill forces his golden gaze onto Dipper, who seems almost frozen at the sudden question. If they weren’t so far apart, Bill would be leaning close, trying to pry answers from him, utilizing their height difference to his advantage.

(The thought makes him smile.)

“You’re,” Dipper swallows, licks his lips, “you’re puzzling. But I’m going to decipher you.”

“I’d love to see you try.” Bill’s grin widens, like he’s caught Dipper in the midst of a lie. No one can figure out Bill Cipher, not without a deal and a Demon summoning. Stanford Pines tried and failed, and Dipper Pines will not succeed, either. “But now that I’ve humored you, why don’t you humor me?”

“I’m not very funny—”

“Tell me about your Demon research.”

“It’s not. . .” Dipper suddenly seems uncomfortable, his previous confidence wavering. Mabel wasn’t lying about her brother then. He is awkward, but he just wants to talk. “You don’t have to say it like that.”

“Oh? You’d like me to say please?”

Demons don’t say please.

Dipper nods quickly, clutching his bedsheets until his knuckles go white. Bill shivers at the sight, delighted at how he’s caused his roommate such discomfort. It’s so engrained in Dipper to be polite, the perfect picture of a morally pure student; but he’s so corruptible, so pretty like this.

Bill would love to be the one to ruin him.

(He’s going to be.)

“I’m not trying to summon one,” Dipper says, at last, exhaling like he’d run across the Academy campus. “I just want to understand them.”

“What about them?”

“Demon curses,” Dipper grinds out, “and how to break them.”

“Why?”

“For research purposes.”

Bill taps his fingers on his arm, frowning, deliberating. Is Dipper interested because he knows something about Bill? Does he know Bill is a Demon? He’d used a different name when fighting Stanford all those years ago, so there should be no association between his current, cursed meatsack and his past, powerful Demon form.

But how would Dipper know? And is it a coincidence that they’re roommates?

He’s grateful that none of the Pines family have been able to visit the boarding school—there are strict visitor policies in place, and it seems that the reverend’s Demon hunt is taking longer than expected.

Deciding not to draw further attention to himself, he asks, the picture of human innocence, “So it has nothing to do with a specific curse, Pine Tree?”

Dipper glares at him. “It almost seems like you have a curse to break yourself, Bill.”

Stupid human. Bill scowls. “What curse could I possibly have?”

“Being the Academy’s most annoying roommate, perhaps?”

“That award goes to a certain Pine Tree, doesn’t it?”

“I’m so inexperienced, though. I’m just learning from the best.”

“What’s a good little reverend’s son doing, trying to learn about Demons?”

“Well, what’s a good little Academy student doing, trying to dig up secrets about Demons?”

Touché, Pine Tree. “What’s stopping me from reporting you for inappropriate behavior? Summoning Demons, and all that.”

“The same thing keeping me from reporting you for the same.” Dipper gestures at his stack of books, the titles rubbing the curse in Bill’s face. Demons and Their Curses. The Trick to Deals with Demons. How to Break a Demon Bargain. “Curses are a bit different from summoning, though. From what I’ve seen.”

“As I’ve said, I wasn’t summoning a Demon.”

“Then what were you doing?” He smiles at Bill, disarming him with his prettiness yet again. It has to be residual from whoever used to inhabit this body, the way his dumb little heart races, the heat adorning his cheeks. “If you weren’t summoning a Demon.”

Useless fleshbag. “Maybe we should agree not to tell each other what we’re doing.”

“Unless you want to tell me what rituals involve rabbits.” He waves his hand at the cage under Bill’s bed. “My research tells me sacrifices strengthen summonings and curses, but if you aren’t summoning a Demon, then what are you doing?”

Dipper is a peculiar person, but he’s wittier than Bill was expecting. For a sheltered little church boy.

He’s rather fascinating.

Dipper’s research can prove helpful to Bill. He already knows of the benefits of sacrifices in Demon summoning, but Dipper’s theory that curses are strengthened by sacrifices as well may explain why he’s so stuck.

If this is human knowledge, though, was his curse cast by a human?

He isn’t sure what Dipper is researching for—he’s suspicious of Dipper trying to spy on his own actions, and though he doesn’t think anything will come of it, Dipper’s curiosity is aggravating, and he needs to quash his desire to learn more about Demons and about Bill before he learns too much—but the theory is sound, and Bill decides to go forward with the rabbit sacrifice, something smaller before he has to kill a human.

No need to dirty his hands unless absolutely necessary. He has easy access to his roommate, if needed, after all.

“You tell me first, Pine Tree.”

Bill shivers at the look on Dipper’s face. “Just some light reading.”

“On Demon curses.”

Dipper shrugs. It’s not the answer he wants, but he’ll leave it at that, for now. Bill has no reason to believe Dipper knows about his curse, but he’s curious about what Dipper curse is interested in breaking.

Especially if it isn’t about Bill.

“You’re no Tad Strange.”

Bill wills the senseless reactions of his body to stop. He can’t wait to get out of this fleshsuit, to react properly to the silly antics of silly humans. He’s sure it’s something lingering from the old human soul that makes him want to tease his roommate, to tear answers from his pretty pink lips and force him to submit to his Demonic desires.

“Of course not.” He quirks his stupid smile again, opening Tracking the Traitors delicately. “I’m a Pines.”

Dipper reads and reads and reads, mumbles little incantations to himself, glances around whenever there’s the slightest chill. He seems just as stuck as Bill, though, no matter how late he reads or how much he does.

And Bill can’t even try casting his spell until the full moon, unfortunately.

The days pass, uneventfully, his monotonous, human life a crushing, ever-present reminder that he can’t wait to be free. . .

He decides that, if he can’t keep Dipper away from his work he might as well start manipulating his perception of the situation. He probably should care more about Dipper’s own research, but he just can’t bring himself to be that interested in an insignificant human’s trivial research.

“Get breakfast with me,” Bill declares on a bright Saturday morning, picking up one of Dipper’s books off the floor—Demonology III: When Demon Souls Inhabit Human Bodies—and throwing it at him. It startles Dipper out of his sleep, and Bill smirks. “And stop leaving your things all over the room, while you’re at it.”

Dipper’s research has been hitting particularly close, and Bill isn’t happy with his own lack of progress. Since they’ve made the decision to not discuss each other’s work, Bill is even more curious about what Dipper is doing. What kind of reverend’s son—and nephew of the great Demon-hunter Stanford Pines—would be so interested in Demons, enough to ignore someone else who is potentially summoning one.

He’s not summoning one, of course, but Dipper acts like he is, and Bill doesn’t feel up to arguing.

Dipper blinks up at him, frowning. “You have the side of the room with the bookshelves built in, where else am I supposed to keep everything?”

He drags himself out of bed, though, notebook pages and scribbles all falling to the floor as his bedsheets shuffle around.

Bill is a Demon of chaos, but Dipper’s side of the room is just aggravating. He waits as Dipper moves at the pace of a blind slug Demon, tapping his foot impatiently when Dipper makes it back from the communal bathrooms, hair damp and dripping trails of water down his pretty—

“Hurry up, Pine Tree!”

Dipper immediately straightens up and glares at him. “Cranky, much?”

Bill slides into a leather jacket to keep up with the chill that seems to have overtaken the room. He rolls his eye. “Time with me is a luxury, kid, I don’t have all day to wait for you!”

He hastens his routine, following Bill out of their building with the slightest spring in his step. “Why’d you want to get breakfast, anyway? Thought you didn’t want to be seen with me outside of the dormitory.”

“I don’t.”

“Oh.”

Bill attracts attention naturally, but he’s not trying to get everyone’s suspicions on him, especially after the Tad Strange incident. Everything about the reverend’s son demands negative attention, though, and Bill finds it best to avoid him. Even now, Dipper's clothes are rather unfashionable, oversized but plain shirt tucked into his rumpled pants, to the point Bill can't even help his snicker at Dipper's visible socks on such skinny ankles. One kick from Bill and he’d surely break.

That wouldn’t be such a bad idea, actually.

“What’s so funny?”

“You.”

Dipper rolls his eyes, and the look on his face is enough to make Bill’s human face flush warm and pink. It’s Dipper’s naïveté that leads Bill to want to make fun. He knows it, he recognizes it, but he can’t help it, either. Some faces look too good to not bully, and Dipper makes the perfect expressions when he’s being teased. Bill is just giving into Demon instinct and he finds that’s hardly something to be ashamed.

(On the other hand, the human part of him is much too pleased to see Dipper’s looks as well, and Bill is furious about that.)

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Somehow, against Bill’s better judgement, breakfast turns to lunch turns to dinner, and they’re just. . . talking. For hours.

It's horrible. It's wonderful.

Bill doesn’t care for the petty lives of human meatsacks, but he’s quite enamored—engaged—with Dipper’s excitement over his research, his story of being kept indoors and away from other children his age, his family’s Demon-hunting history and how he’d love to one day join them.

“What? Not interested in the religious lifestyle after you got locked away for it?” He snickers. “Look how adjusted you turned out!”

Dipper gives him a dirty look. “They did that for my protection.”

Protection? Dipper is literally rooming with a Demon! All locking the kid away had done was give him a complex and make him obsessed with researching. It’s more fun for Bill, but probably not what the Pines family had been aiming for. “What, from the Demons you’ve been writing about?”

“My great uncle Ford dealt a lot with a powerful Demon. Lucifer, I think.”

An old name for an old time of his life. He couldn’t very well name his fleshsuit Lucifer Morningstar. “I’ve heard the stories.”

“I assume that the Lucifer and Ford stories aren’t why you’re interested in Demons?”

They’ve stayed so late in the dining hall that the lights are being shut off, the sound of chatter having died down around them nearly an hour before. Bill stands up, not wanting the day to end, for some strange reason. “You assume correctly.”

“I’m also assuming you still won’t tell me what you’re doing.” Dipper stands as well, following Bill as he leads them back outside.

“That’s another correct assumption.” There aren’t many other students out at this time, as it is nearing their curfew. It is dark and chilly, and their path is illuminated by flickering lampposts and moonlight. It is his favorite type of night to answer summonings, to make deals, to ruin human lives. “What a smart little sapling you are.”

The breeze ruffles Dipper’s hair, and Bill frowns, sliding off his leather jacket to plop on Dipper’s shivering frame. Dipper looks up at him, gratefully, and Bill feels his stupid human body getting excited.

Don’t say it, don’t say it, don’t say it. “If you want to talk about our findings. Once in a while. . .”

The way Dipper’s eyes light up is enough to curse Bill’s nightmares.

This was a stupid idea anyway.

They don’t talk much outside of the dormitory, only in the privacy of their room or in passing at the library, but it is helpful having a roommate so interested in the supernatural.

Dipper is very much like Ford in that regard, even if he is still horribly annoying about every rule the Academy enforces.

Still, their occasional nighttime walks—apparently Dipper doesn’t mind breaking the rules if Bill is a bit demanding, “Take a walk with me, Pine Tree, no one will catch us,” Dipper nothing but a red-faced ball of tension until he sighs and follows Bill, looking ever-so-pretty while he rambles about his latest theory and asks Bill for his opinions and his knowledge of the world—are enough to spur ideas in Bill’s head.

Some are related to breaking his curse. Most, unfortunately, are not.

(His revolting human body needs to go.)

Dipper sits far enough away that Bill has to extend effort to keep an eye on him, but he knows when Dipper is being his annoying self, overeager to receive the church sacraments. The pastor has come to feed them the wafers, today, all too eager to press his grimy fingers onto Dipper’s soft little tongue—

It’s very clear how much lust exudes from the pastor when it is Dipper’s turn, but it is not so clear to Dipper, who seems to accept that this level of attention and touch is normal if it’s him.

How pathetic.

Bill drags his eyes away, shoving his hands in his pockets. He shouldn’t be noticing these behaviors and feeling these emotions, particularly when he’s in a building actually strong enough to ward off Demons because of the strength of people’s faith. His body is human enough that he’s unaffected.

He can’t wait to set the place aflame.

“You know,” Mabel says, as they’re filing out of the church, “if you’re nicer to Dipper you would probably be the best of friends!”

Dipper directs a small wave at Bill and Mabel when they make eye contact, and Bill glares so hard he hopes Dipper never waves at him again. His meatsuit feels differently, though, and Mabel seems to pick up on this. “What do you mean?”

She shakes her head. “He says you’re a bit secretive, but you keep expecting him to give in to all of your questions. Friendship is about give and take, Bill, and you can’t expect—”

“He’s the one digging through my things, Shooting Star,” Bill says, as though he’s greatly affected by a human’s horrid curiosity. “I asked him for his help already, is he suspicious of me?”

Mabel frowns, a look that is rather unusual for her, and the air feels colder for it. Her initial attraction to him has faded as he spends more time with Dipper. “He isn’t suspicious of you, exactly.”

He doesn’t interrupt her when she pauses, waiting for her to continue. He’s noticed that she drags out her responses sometimes, but she always gives him the truthful answer he needs, if he asks in just the right way. Dipper is not as easy to manipulate, unfortunately. He just follows rules so obediently.

“He thinks you could be helpful to him, but he doesn’t know if he trusts you because you don’t tell him anything. You know more about Demons than you let on. But so does he!”

And does he want you spilling all his secrets to a Demon, Shooting Star? “Why would he think that?”

“You’re already working together, aren’t you?”

They’ve been meeting up in the library, discussing demonology in their dormitory, staying up late just talking. It’s so pitifully human, Bill refuses to acknowledge what’s happening. He just. . . appreciates Dipper’s sense of humor, and his intelligence, and his weird theories, and his strange paranoia, and his desire to help Bill even though he doesn’t understand, and his—

Ugh!

“No.”

“Bill,” she shakes her head and lowers her voice, “if you like my brother, you can tell him. I know the Academy isn’t very open about ho—”

“What does he need my help with?” Bill interrupts, not at all interested in the stupid whims of stupid humans and their trivial emotions. His fleshbag seems to enjoy Mabel’s words, though, his ridiculous false heart racing at whatever she had been about to say.

Disgusting, pathetic, human. He needs to quash all suspicions that he’s acting in such a way.

He’s been in this body for decades now, frozen and un-aging, and if any of its old human emotions are tainting him, sullying him with filthy, revolting, dreadful human thoughts, it is absolutely time to break the curse!

“Breaking the curse, dummy!”

“The curse?” Bill freezes. No. No. No! Dipper didn’t know about Bill’s curse before, what could have given it away? “What curs—”

“Oh, look! Dipper’s waiting for me!” Mabel is not having any of their conversation anymore, bounding away from him to catch up with her brother, likely about to relay the entire conversation they’ve just had. “See you later, Bill!”

“Shooting Star. . .”

Bill can’t stop his thoughts from jumbling, his emotions swirling, anger, disgust, fury, hatred, despair. He needs to end this curse now, before anyone finds out too much and tries to eliminate him at his most vulnerable, before he’s trapped in this horrid body forever, before these forsaken emotions get the better of him—

How much does Dipper know?

It’s hard to get the room to himself, these days, as the nights are darker and colder. Dipper seems to want the warmth of his own room instead of the cold of the library. He studies with his sister in her dormitory, occasionally, but the differing hours of their class schedules leaves little time for Bill to practice his whole ritual.

He isn’t sure how to get his roommate to leave now that it’s the night of the full moon.

Dipper’s so persistent in his curiosity, so interested in the supernatural that the slightest hint of what Bill is doing spurs a barrage of questions.

“You want me to get dinner with my sister,” Dipper says flatly. “When you’re being this suspicious.”

“Humans need alone time,” he agrees, nodding sagely. He hopes the implication isn’t lost on Dipper, and he is pleased when Dipper’s cheeks immediately fire red. He can’t help his laugh at Dipper’s discomfort.

“That’s. . . Not. . .” Bill grins as Dipper stumbles for words. “No, I can tell you’re setting up for something.”

Bill stares at him, smiling widely.

“Something else!”

“So scandalous! What else do you think I want the room to myself for, Pine Tree?”

Cheeks flushed, Dipper insists, “I thought we were working together on this.”

“And I thought this was a private thing you weren’t blabbing to your sister.” Bill doesn’t care that Mabel knows, but he cares more that they’ve been trying to figure out what Bill is up to. Bill doesn’t have a good history with the Pines family, and Dipper is smart enough to catch on if Bill leaves this unchecked.

“You’re as interested in Demons as I am, and your previous roommate left because you tried to summon one, or whatever”—Bill really needs to dispel the Demon-summoning rumors; he wasn’t summoning a Demon, because he is a Demon, and the most powerful one, at that!—“and since it’s a full moon, tonight you want to continue where you left off.”

“Well, well, well,” Bill stands up from his bed, moving toward where Dipper has now taken a step back, “look who thinks he’s figured everything out.”

“You’re not denying it.”

“Oh, I’m denying it.”

“All the evidence—”

“Were you snooping through my things again?” Bill is more incredulous than anything, surprised that Dipper could actually break some rules, repeatedly. He supposes he never told Dipper not to dig through his belongings, but unspoken rules don’t seem to be in Dipper’s list of things to follow to the letter. He almost wants to laugh at the oversight.

“Okay, one. Sorry about that, you were being so secretive and I was curious.”

“Apology not accepted.”

“Two,” Dipper continues, ignoring Bill’s interruption, “you’re interested in Demons, too, but you won’t admit to it, even when I’m telling you, I’m help—”

“I’m telling you—”

“You’re cursed, too, aren’t you?” Dipper wrings his hands together, nervous, but there’s a confidence in his voice that comes from overanalyzing research and coming to a sound conclusion. Bill is not happy to see confidence in such a pathetic little human. “Mabel said you were being weird at church, earlier, and the only reason you could be so weird is if you can relate, which means. . .”

Oh, he should have been more careful with Shooting Star. If she’s so honest with Bill, it makes sense she’d be even more honest with her twin.

But he doesn’t want to deal with this, doesn’t want to admit to anything. He is going to cure himself of this curse, he’s going to return to his Demon form and be free of these ridiculous human problems, he’s going to be rid of the stupid Pines twins.

“What curse could I possibly have? I’m just a curious student.”

“No you aren’t. I don’t know what curse you have”—and that is enough for Bill to sigh in relief and know that he’s done with this pointless conversation when he has a spell to cast—“but let me help! We can work together, I—”

“Pine Tree. Stop talking!”

“Bi—” Dipper freezes, all words dying on his lips as his mouth slams shut. He looks panicked, frazzled, hurt, mouth moving but no words coming out. Bill shivers at the sight. Good. He starts to reach for Bill, and Bill rolls his eye. Always so dramatic.

“Just wait outside until I’m done with this.”

I’ll be free of this stupid meatsack by then.

Dipper shakes his head, but he’s already dragging himself away from Bill, like he’s about to walk to the gallows.

He moves stiffly, slogging through each movement like he’s putting on a show. He mouths something at Bill, then, perhaps thinking better of what he is going to say, turns away and leaves.

Bill has to admire Dipper for his efforts. Next time they see each other, he’ll be in his triangular form.

He’ll be free.

And he’ll find whoever cursed him and end their pathetic waste of existence.

When he’s sure Dipper is not waiting to burst back into the room, Bill grabs his chalk and candles.

Drawing a perfect circle takes a few tries—he could have probably kept Dipper around just for this, since Dipper is quite the artist, from the sketches Bill has seen in his journal—but he’s able to recreate the Cipher Wheel that likely got him into this body in the first place. He surrounds the circle with eight candles, lighting them carefully one by one.

He’s tried this before, in several different ways. Now, he has a rabbit to sacrifice, a life to exchange for this body, so he can be freed of its constraints.

He raises his blade. “Triangulum. Entangulum. Meteforis. . .”

“Hello, Mason. What are you doing out here?” He can hear the voice filter in at the window, and though he wants to ignore it because he finally has the room to himself and it’s actually quiet like he needs it to be, an odd feeling twists in his stomach. The voice is familiar, but he can’t place exactly who is speaking. He can feel the aura of lust trickling through the window, though.

Bill frowns. Just ignore it. His oblivious roommate can handle himself.

“Dominus ventium. Meteforis venetis—”

“You must be so cold in just that.”

And that. . . is disgustingly flirtatious. Bill knows exactly who is speaking.

The pastor’s voice makes Bill’s skin crawl, and he doesn’t bother to hide his eavesdropping as he moves to watch at his window, looking down at the failure of a human as he runs his fingers down Dipper’s arm. Bill can feel the pastor’s lust, even from this distance. He’s all for sins, but with Dipper. . .

Bill clenches his hands into fists, sure they’d be aflame if he were in his usual Demon form.

Dipper’s silence is response enough.

“Are you cold, then?” the pastor asks, and the tone of his voice gives Bill chills. His fingers are in Dipper’s hair, tugging on the messy curls. His other hand seems nervous to touch, to grab Dipper and pull him in for a hug. “You must be freezing.”

Dipper nods, the slowest Bill has ever seen of one of Dipper’s weird movements.

Is Dipper actually going to follow this creep? He’s not saying no, he’s not doing anything except standing there, as if he’s waiting for something.

“Come to my room, Mason.”

Bill doesn’t know what he expects, but his roommate is then in the close hold of their pastor, the pastor’s hand resting on Dipper’s hip. Bill watches in silence for a moment, his fingers tightening on the curtain, knuckles white to reflect his anger.

And then he senses it.

He feels the Demon’s curse, the chill from the command that had been given, the sense of something demonic he’d always thought was him getting closer to his own freedom.

And somehow, the pieces fall into place. It’s like every unusual moment of Bill's extremely weird roommate has caught up to him, slipping past a wall Bill has finally knocked down. Bill prides himself on his knowledge of everything, yet this all eluded his grasp these past months.

Stop talking has never seemed like such a horrible phrase to say.

Stop talking. Just wait outside.

Bill remembers the numerous times in the middle of class where Dipper would stand up and do stupid things, the times when Dipper would be teased for following their athletic instructor’s directives to the very letter, the way Dipper hung around people so vastly different from him, stumbling around and doing things that made everyone think he was some kind of suck-up trying to get favor with upperclassmen.

All the teasing, all the laughing.

He wonders who else knows.

He almost doesn’t move. He should just continue with what he was doing, keep working on his spell like he wanted, like he demanded Dipper leave him alone to do.

But his meatsuit is moving of its own accord, and he’s sprinting down his dormitory’s stone steps into the cool autumn air, chasing down stupid little Dipper Pines who is pressed against the pastor’s hip protectively.

“Hey! Pine Tree!” He reaches for Dipper’s arm. “Can’t believe you forgot your key again! Such a forgetful human, you!”

Dipper stares at him in silence, but his eyes are wide, frantic. He looks so very lovely.

“I can take him back to our room,” Bill says, smiling at the pastor. And then, in case it wasn’t clear enough, “Follow me, Dipper.”

Dipper stiffens at the new command, but he pulls himself out of the pastor’s hold. He scrambles toward Bill, eyes wide and beautiful (don’t think about it, Bill, don’t think about it).

Bill shivers, recognizing the energy now for what it is. The rush of demonic energy is enticing, and he feels idiotic for not noticing it before. He’d always found it cold when he talked with Dipper or Mabel, and he’d shivered so often whenever Dipper acted strangely.

He thought it was his pathetic human body.

Who would have thought that the reverend’s children had Demon curses controlling them?

Dipper’s interest in the supernatural, in curses, in breaking curses all makes sense now. He hadn’t been trying to spy on Bill—though his actions were startlingly close to Bill’s own and that probably led to his suspicions of Bill’s behavior—but his innate curiosity had him asking the wrong questions, anyway.

They make their way to their room in silence.

“You can talk again,” Bill says, once they’re out of the pastor’s sight and back in their dormitory room.

Dipper sags in relief, the most grateful expression decorating his face before he glances at their room, at the rabbit in the cage, the Cipher wheel, the candles, the knife. “You were summoning a Demon—”

“Is your sister cursed, too?” he interrupts, not interested in explaining, once again, that he has no interest in summoning Demons. “Tell me, Pine Tree.”

“She. . . has to. . .” He looks horribly reluctant, but then his face twists in delicious pain, and he continues, “She has to tell the truth.”

Bill should have been more observant, but he’d honestly believed the twins to be little more than mere annoyances related to his old enemy. Mabel’s propensity to overshare seems so obvious now, when she was obliged to answer direct questions with full, truthful answers.

“And you?”

Dipper doesn’t say anything.

No matter. It’s quite clear what Dipper’s curse is.

“Cry for me, Pine Tree,” Bill commands, voice calm and cool, though his insides are churning and his hands are quivering. In excitement? In awe?

They’re facing each other, Dipper standing rather awkwardly near the foot of Bill’s bed, Bill standing near his desk chair and staring Dipper down, their height difference oh-so-clear.

Dipper takes a step back so he almost falls backward onto Bill’s bed. “B-Bill, you can’t—”

A lone tear makes its way down Dipper’s cheek, then another, then another, and Dipper is fully crying, though his expression is anything but sad, before Bill tells him to “Stop.” And he does within seconds, tears drying on his face as though the previous command hadn’t just taken place.

Unnatural, Bill notes, adding the evidence to his collection. Beautiful.

“Undo your tie.” Bill crosses his arms and lets out a breath, clearing his throat as the best outlandish request he can think of comes to mind, a smirk toying at his liips. “And stick it in your mouth.”

For a couple seconds, he makes that face Bill loves to see.

There’s a small bit of something fluttering in Bill’s heart, that maybe, maybe he was entirely wrong. But Dipper undoes the tie, fingers shaking so badly he drops the tie twice before he’s shoving the thing into his mouth as though it’s a perfectly natural thing to do.

They maintain eye contact for about a minute. Dipper’s cheeks are red and he’s a miserable mess when Bill finally turns his head away.

Everything is clicking, the evidence is mounting, and Bill doesn’t at all like where his realizations have led (he quite loves the discovery, actually).

“Why?” Dipper doesn’t say anything, but then he starts gesturing at his mouth and at Bill, and at last Bill manages, “Take the tie out of your mouth, Pine Tree.”

Neither of them says anything for another minute, as Dipper clenches his soggy tie in his hand.

“Explain. Everything.”

“I can’t say no,” Dipper admits, voice barely a whisper. Bill trembles, either from the demonic chill or from excitement, he can’t tell. “To any direct commands.” He’s wringing his hands, his uniform suit making him look so small. “I have to obey all orders.”

“The curse you wanted to break?”

“A Demon cursed my great-uncle almost forty years ago, so his children would be easily susceptible to Demon influence. . .”

No way.

“And it hurts if I try to say no, like my limbs are on fire if I try to keep myself from. . .”

No way!

Somehow, hearing Dipper explain just feels surreal, like his stupid human brain is floating away. It’s Bill’s curse. It’s Bill’s curse.

It’s Bill’s curse!

He almost wants to laugh at the irony, except that his mind is too busy spinning at the wild thoughts building and bubbling at the revelation. Stanford didn’t have children, so the curse passed on to the closest relation. But for such a curse to be on his roommate, the reverend’s son, the closest relative to Stanford Pines, it’s remarkable.

It worked out better than he could have ever wanted.

To be weak to a Demon, to answer all his commands truthfully, to be forced to do whatever he asks. . .

Bill is going to be free and get his revenge!

“That’s why I needed to break this curse. And you can relate, can’t you? You’re cursed, too!” The slightly hopeful pitch at the end almost makes Bill feel for Dipper’s predicament.

Almost.

Trapped with a Demon now aware of his obedience problem. He was cursed to be easily influenced by Demons, and lo and behold, his own roommate is a Demon with a curse to break, himself! You can use him. You can take advantage of a pathetic human boy like this.

And it will be so easy.

Bill actually begins to laugh at this, unable to control himself. The fates are looking kindly upon him, giving him all the pieces to finally be freed of his own curse.

“You can’t. . .” His laughter makes Dipper lean back and away from him, visibly hurt and confused by Bill’s reaction. “Don’t tell anyone.”

Don’t tell. A command, like he has any power in their relationship. Bill blinks, tries to seem calmer than he really is because how could something so delightful play out like this for him, and with Dipper Pines, the roommate taunting his stupid human fleshsuit these past few months. . .

Wonderful!

He can’t help his smile, the stretch of his lips over too-sharp teeth, as he sees the wariness in those large brown eyes. His voice is full of glee as he demands, “Grab that book for me, Pine Tree.”

“Bill!” And then his face twists in pain. “Which one?” He’s mocking, cheeks turning pink as he begins to drag his feet, biting his lip before he stiffens, suddenly clambering toward the shelf Bill has pointed out, much too far from his reach, positioned above Bill’s desk in such a way that even Bill would have to use his desk chair for leverage.

“The top one.” There is mirth in his tone as he continues, “You shouldn’t need to climb anything. Just reaching for it will do.”

“What? But—” But his legs force him in that direction anyway, and he stretches as tall as he can, fingertips barely brushing the bottom of the shelf with the spellbook Bill has requested.

Bill rounds the boy, fingers brushing gently across the small of his back, earning a high-pitched squeak at his touch. And, oh, his human body loves this, craves this, demands he do more of this.

“Fascinating. Will you stay there forever, if I tell you I really need that book?”

Dipper scoffs, fingers twitching as he manages, somehow, to tug the book from its place. He hands it to Bill, a smirk on his lips. Bill hardly glances at it, setting it down on the desk. “Why would I care what you want?”

“Hmm.” Bill smiles, practically purring in excitement. “That’s the thing, Pine Tree. I think you care what everyone wants! Especially me. Like when I tell you to touch your cute little nose!”

Dipper looks irritated. “This isn’t a game you can play with me,” he snaps, but his fingertip is pressed to his perpetually pink nose, unavoidable. “Bill!”

“Touch your toes,” Bill instructs next, entertained by the snap of Dipper’s spine to perfect straightness, before he bends down to touch his fingers to his scuffed shoes.

“Bill!”

He circles Dipper again, enjoying how it looks like Dipper is bowing to him—and the image of this boy on his knees is quite delicious, lingering past appropriateness, especially because this is his roommate, a boy Bill cannot be thinking about, a human, the direct relation to Stanford Pines—before eyeing the way his bottom curves just so.

Licking his lips, he clenches his hands into fists, avoiding the urge to touch. It would be so easy to just command Dipper to submit to his every request.

He can’t do that (yet). Later. He wants something different.

“You can stop,” he says, at last, watching the way relief seeps into every nerve of Dipper’s body.

“Are you done playing around?” Dipper grinds out. “I think we’ve established I’m stuck with the most annoying curse. But it means I’m familiar enough with Demons to help with your curse, too.”

“So if I order you to do anything,” Bill decides, the words like metal in his mouth, blood from biting the inside of his cheek too hard, imagining what the pastor could have done to his pretty roommate, what he can do to his pretty roommate, “you have to listen to me.”

It isn’t a question, and Dipper doesn’t respond at first, just staring at Bill, unsure of where the conversation is taking them. “Obviously.”

You could tell him to kiss you. You could make him love you, worship you, adore you. You could tell him to do your dirty work for you. You could tell him to kill for you.

He’ll do it, when you tell him to love you.

Idiotic, pathetic, residual feelings from his stupid, useless human fleshsuit.

You could tell him to sacrifice himself for you to get your true form back.

Better. He’s still a Demon, after all. What revenge that will be!

“I’m not going to do anything, Pine Tree!” Bill raises his hands in innocence, smiling at Dipper like this revelation changes nothing. His mind, of course, is brimming with possibilities.

“So, you’ll help me with my curse?”

“Of course,” Bill almost wants to laugh at how easy Dipper is making this for him, how sad Dipper’s life is about to become, “that’s an unfortunate affliction you have!”

“I know a bit about curses.” Relieved, Dipper begins rambling in that way that makes Bill smile. “There’s all the research I’ve been doing, and my own curse, and my great uncle Ford actually cast a curse on the Demon Lucifer since he did this to us, so together we could. . .”

Bill freezes. “Oh?” Bill’s grin widens until it hurts, his false heart skipping a beat. “Did he, now?”

Freeing himself from this curse is going to be a lot easier with a pretty little human at his side. Maybe the rabbit wouldn’t help his ritual, but a human? Particularly the human he wants to break and corrupt and keep all to himself?

“First, Pine Tree, I want to thank you for telling me.” Dipper looks up at him, pretty eyes so trusting. Bill’s human body feels warm, pleased. “Now, hand me that candle, would you?”

Dipper does, anxiously, a reflex to avoid inevitable pain, reaching to Bill’s Cipher Wheel to grab one of the eight candles surrounding the rabbit cage. The bend of his back is so appealing, but Bill resists the urge to touch, for now. The warmth of Dipper’s hand as he passes the candle makes Bill shiver, and he begins to laugh.

Oh, he can use this; he’s going to use this.

He laughs and he laughs and he laughs. “Lock the door and come here, Pine Tree.”

What a pitiful little Pine Tree. What a beautiful little Pine Tree.

The candles dim. The lock clicks.