Chapter 109 of human Bill Cipher helping Melody's dreams come true (by telling her her sleep paralysis demon is real) (and then murdering it), featuring:
the weirdest plot development of the fic so far.
Naturally, Mabel has some mixed feelings about this.
####
With the unicorn glade gone—and that infuriating sleep paralysis demon with it—Bill collected his hoodie and began the walk back to the Mystery Shack.
He immediately tripped over an exposed root and went sprawling.
He didn't remember that root. "Ow. How the heck did I get here?" he muttered, squinting through the trees for the right route. He'd been asleep the whole time he was stalking Parry; he could barely remember the chase now.
But then he caught sight of a strand of hot pink embroidery thread looped over a branch and jumped to grab it. Right—that was how he was navigating. And Mabel would want as much of her thread back as possible.
Even after taking the unicorn hide belts Soos had gotten at a Northwest Manor garage sale, Bill still hadn't had nearly enough unicorn hair to lace the whole forest with tripwires. So the threads closest to the shack were the real deal—genuine unicorn hair peeled off the base of the shack and taken from Ford's remaining stash, complete with moonstones and dipped in mercury—so that when the demon got a taste of them first, it would learn to avoid them; and for the rest of the forest, Bill had rumplestiltskinned up some embroidery thread into faux unicorn hair: he'd taken the unicorn hides, shaved them, and glued shavings from them along the length of the threads, so that if the demon ran into them, they'd sting just enough to seem real—real enough that it wouldn't notice they couldn't actually contain it.
Bill loved it when people actually reacted the way he wanted them to.
He began the long, clumsy walk out of the woods, collecting embroidery thread as he went.
####
He was halfway back when he ran into Soos inelegantly thrashing through the trees, coming the other direction. Bill called, "Marco!"
"Dude! There you are!" Soos shoved his way over to Bill. "You were so fast, I didn't see where you went! You were totally like a ghost." He paused. "Wait. Is that offenseive to say? Since you died that one time?"
"Naaah, it's fine. I've been a ghost for most of my life!"
"Oh. Okay." Soos blinked in confusion. "So, uh... is it over already? How did it go?"
"Perfectamente! Our little pal is in the unicorns' hands—hooves—and is probably being executed as we speak." (Soos shuddered. Bill ignored it.) "By the time its buddies realize what happened and send someone else to monitor Melody, she'll be under the unicorns' protection—and they'd have to be morons to harass her then. She meets them at dawn. Tell her to be up early enough to prepare."
"Aww. I think she was looking forward to sleeping in for the first time in weeks."
"She can nap after she opens up diplomatic relations," Bill said. "Oh, by the way? No unicorn hide accessories. They were super offended by that. Go figure, right?"
"Dude, you let them see one of the belts?"
"Uh, yeah? I had to tie up that nightmare somehow."
At Soos's cringe, Bill said, "What! Was I supposed to just guess that they'd be personally offended by a belt made out of one of their fallen peers' skin?"
"Yyyyes?" Soos said. "How would you feel if an alien demon came up to you wearing part of the corpse of one of your species?"
Bill's mouth snapped shut. "Hmm."
After a moment, he said, "I think I'd wonder where they got it."
"Haha, fair enough."
####
As the trees thinned and they began to glimpse the shack's walls between the trunks, Soos asked, "Hey, I've got another question, actually. Hhhow did you get out the window?"
"What window?"
"It was when you were I guess following the demon we couldn't see? But you jumped through a closed window."
"Did not."
"Did too. You straight up defenestrated yourself, dawg."
"I don't know what you're talking about!" Bill said. "I didn't go through any closed windows. I don't know how to do that."
"Dude," Soos said, exasperated. "You totally did. There's broken glass and stuff. I'm gonna have to fix that later. Which, the Mystery Shack is always breaking down, so that's okay, it was just a matter of time before we had to replace another window—but like it definitely got broken by you."
"I don't know what you're talking about," Bill repeated slowly. He plucked the last of the embroidery thread off a branch at the edge of the Mystery Shack's clearing. "I didn't see any windows, just an opening in the wall. There's no way I coulda gotten through a closed window, you know that. You must've been dreaming."
"Nuh uh! You're the one who took a bunch of sleeping pills so you could do secret triangle sleep magic, maybe you dreamed it—" Soos cut off. "Oh. Ohhh. Is that how it works? The way you've been getting around doors and stuff? You just dream there isn't a door?"
Bill gave Soos an innocent look. "How what works?" But he still wasn't very good at pulling off innocent looks in a human body, and the corner of his mouth curled up in a satisfied smirk.
####
Mabel opened the bedroom door, sleepily rubbing her eyes. "Bill. Knock it off, you're gonna wake Dipper."
"Too late," Dipper groaned, dragging his bedsheet over his head.
She yawned. "What do you want? If you expect me to help you write another apology..."
"No, not tonight—and I appreciate you doing that. I'm doing you a favor to show my thanks!"
"At four in the morning?"
"You know what they say! The early bird feasts on the guts of its enemies," Bill said cheerily. "I'm offering you an opportunity. Wanna get a little vengeance?"
Mabel groaned. "No way. Vengeance is lame, I'm above that. Go back to bed."
Bill tilted his head to keep his eye on Mabel as the door swung shut. "Even vengeance on unicorns?"
She yanked the door back open.
####
"Oh, hey! That dress cleaned up nicely," Bill said.
"Thanks," Mabel said, brushing out the skirt of her princessiest dress. It was the same one she'd used to practice the "summon every animal in the forest" trick Bill had taught her—and, consequently, the one she'd been wearing when some kind of tree-giant had kidnapped her. "I had to turn it inside out to hide the mud."
"I didn't even notice."
"Hey!" Melody hurried down the stairs and shook out her skirt. "Sorry! Are we running late?"
Mabel looked at Melody's dress—sleeveless, ivory white, and accented with faux pearls—then looked at Soos following her down in his Mr. Mystery suit, and asked, "Isn't it bad luck for the groom to see the bride in her wedding dress before the wedding?"
"Oh no, it's fine," Soos said. "This is just the base dress."
"We still have to do all the modifications to make it look like the Lunar Navy Queen's gown," Melody said.
"Aww, you're doing a cosplay wedding? You two are so cute."
"Hey, I just realized the costume suits you even better now," Soos said. "Dude—do you think we could get unicorns at the wedding? To be like the queen's pegasodes? Wouldn't that be awesome?"
Melody's eyes widened. "Oooh."
Bill said, "Wedding talk later. It's an hour to the unicorn glade and dawn's coming fast." He rapped on the door with his umbrella cane. "Let's get this royal procession on the road."
####
As Bill summoned up the unicorn glade, several voices behind the ivy-covered walls groaned. One said, "Is it dawn already?"
It was indeed dawn; and with the leaves above silhouetted black against the rosy pink sky, the unicorns grumpily paraded out where Bill, Melody, and Melody's entourage were waiting.
Bill gestured theatrically at Melody and, with a half bow, announced, "Presenting Melody, heir to the long-lost house of Grue, youngest maiden of their lineage, and the only unicorn princess west of the Mississippi."
Melody stood there in her untailored wedding dress and slightly muddy sports shoes, hair and face damp from a hasty morning shower and a hike through the forest, staring in dumb wonder at the crowd of actual real-life unicorns; and, when the unicorns looked at her expectantly and Bill didn't cue her on what she was supposed to do now, she awkwardly lifted one hand to wave from her elbow. "Ummm... hey," she said. "Sup? Big fan of—of unicorns."
"All right, everyone move aside, let's see what we're working with." Celestabellebethabelle cut through the crowd and trotted up to Melody. Her horn glowed as she squinted down at Melody consideringly. "Hmm... Hmmmm... It's been so many generations, your bloodline is so diluted... It's difficult to sense whether you truly do have the pure heart of the maiden we seek..."
"Oh, come on," Mabel muttered. Bill put a hand on her head before she could jump into the discussion.
"Dude," Soos whispered, "can they really sense whether or not Melody's a princess?"
"No, they're bluffing," Bill whispered back, and Mabel nodded in emphatic agreement. "When there's a princess in town, they're required to actually cooperate with humans. It's a huge inconvenience to them."
Melody clearly wasn't buying it either. She offered a skeptical raised brow as Celestabellebethabelle said, "Mmm, no, nooo... I don't think I'm picking up anything royal..."
"We've got full documentation of Melody's family's pedigree," Bill said. "Birth certificates, baptismal records, ancestral immigration papers, you name it! If you want, we can go get the paperwork to see if it's legit enough for you. Maybe call in a neutral mediator to review everything? I could call up the local fae queen, the tooth fairy owes me a favor."
"Whoa, hold on!" Celestabellebethabelle said. "Uh, uhh—group huddle!"
As the unicorns withdrew into a little circle, Soos whispered, "Do you really have all those papers?"
"No, I'm bluffing."
The unicorns' voices drifted from their huddle:
"Do you think he's actually got the documentation?"
"I mean... he could. We already know she's the princess, the sleep paralysis demon confirmed that."
"Man, I don't wanna deal with fae court, do you guys? It'll cut into my prancing time."
After another moment of muttering, the unicorns broke up and returned. "Oh, goodness me," Celestabellebethabelle said, "the morning light must have been in my eyes! Yes, I can now clearly see that you, Melody, are in fact... pure of heart!" She reared up on her hind legs, horn throwing off rainbow light as golden sunbeams rained down from nowhere in particular. "The purest in the land! Indeed, you are truly the princess of the unicorns!"
Mabel's shoulders slumped. Bill patted her sympathetically.
"Cool," Melody said, momentarily a bit too overawed by the fact that that had actually, officially happened to muster up something that adequately expressed just how mindblowingly amazing this whole thing was. She tried again. "Awesome. Um—thanks."
"You are welcome," Celestabellebethabelle said indulgently. "As princess of the unicorns, what is your first decree, fair maiden?" A couple of unicorns exchanged a nervous glance.
"Umm, nothing big, really? I mainly came out here to introduce myself," Melody said. "And—hold on, I had a couple small things I wanted to ask your help on if that's cool, I wrote them down on the way over..." She automatically patted at her pocketless hips. "Soos, do you have my phone?"
While Melody and Soos figured out which pocket he'd stuck her phone in, Mabel whispered, "It's not fair. I spent a whole day trying to get her to say I was pure of heart, just to find out she was making it up to be mean. Why couldn't she have made up something nice?"
Bill wished he'd paid more attention to the unicorn glade during Mabel's visit. He'd spent most of the day hovering around the shack, checking to see whether Ford would make any progress locking Bill out of the shack's minds. He wished he could be more specific in telling Mabel why horns-for-brains was a moron and she shouldn't listen to her.
But he didn't have the specifics. All he knew was the broad overview—that Mabel had tried to prove that she was good until her heart broke—and that she still hurt.
So all he could say was, "It never matters how many people like you, does it? It's the ones who don't that stick with you."
She nodded glumly.
He squeezed her shoulder. "Look on the bright side. Maybe someday she'll make some nice unicorn hide car upholstery." (Mabel snorted.) "But keep watching."
"Okay, here we go," Melody said, looking at her phone. "First—can you help keep any other dream demons from harassing me and my family?"
The unicorns all turned to stare at Bill. He froze.
Melody said, "Except that one. He's with me. Unfortunately."
"Yes, yes, of course," Celestabellebethabelle said. "We always keep away nightmares. It's one of the things we do."
"Okay, great. Then just that and, um—a couple of years ago, I was studying unicorn folklore for my college thesis until I got 'too stressed to finish'? But now that I know I was only stressed because of, like, literal demonic oppression, I'm kinda thinking about trying to finish my degree? So, I wanted to know if maybe I could interview you guys sometime... if that's cool with you...?"
Celestabellebethabelle's ears perked up. "Oooh, you want us to talk about ourselves!" She glanced at the other unicorns, who nodded enthusiastically. "Yes, that sounds wonderful! We'll schedule something."
Melody's face lit up. "Awesome! Thank you so much," she said. "So, uh, just those two things, aaand please be nice to the other people in the Mystery Shack," she vaguely gestured at the rest of her entourage, "and I guess those are the only 'decrees' or whatever for now."
The unicorns went very still. Celestabellebethabelle tried to fight the urge to look at Mabel, and failed.
She saw vengeance in Mabel's eyes.
One of the other unicorns said, "Y... yeah, sure." Another nervously agreed, "No problem."
####
Soos ambled up to Celestabellebethabelle. "Sup, dawg?" He paused. "Wait—no, not a dog. Uhh, horse? Horse with a horn?"
"That's very offensive," Celestabellebethabelle said.
"Sorry. That's my bad. It won't happen again," Soos said seriously. "Anyway, I wanted to ask you dudes a favor?"
"Hmph! We only answer to the princess."
"No that's cool, it's actually for her. I'm asking instead because I wanna surprise her," Soos said. "Do you dudes do events? 'Cause me and Melody are getting married in like, a month and a half, and it'd be totally magical if she got escorted out by a couple of unicorns, or could ride one of you or something?"
Celestabellebethabelle's eyes lit up. "Oh! A wedding! Hey, guys!" She turned excitedly to the other unicorns. "Do you want to go to a royal wedding?"
"Heck yeah!" "Paaar-tay!"
"Make sure catering has some vegetarian dishes! And not those lazy ones where they just leave the meat out of the main entree or serve a salad. I'll send you a list of our allergies!"
"Okay, great! I'll send you dudes an invite. Do your magical glade have an address, or...?"
"Just hand it to a gnome, they'll know what to do with it.
As Soos left, Celestabellebethabelle quietly sighed in relief that so far being polite to the humans wasn't inconveniencing them in any way. Maybe this princess thing wouldn't be too hard after all.
And then Mabel sidled up to her. "Heeey, C-beth!" She smiled a smile that looked less like her usual big sweet grin, and more like the smile Bill pulled out during the times when he made direct eye contact with people so that he could fantasize about peeling the skin off their eyeballs.
"Isn't this great," Mabel asked forcefully. "Hanging out all friendly like? Being nice? Not saying anything mean or judgy?"
Celestabellebethabelle swallowed down the snide comment that had been forming in her mouth about how interesting it was to see the new friend Mabel was hanging out with. She shifted on her hooves nervously and looked around for a rescue that would not come. "It certainly iiis... Ahaha..."
"Hey! Totally random, but I couldn't help but overhear Soos talking to you about unicorn rides?" Mabel's smile was made of pure malice. "You know, I've always wanted to try that."
Celestabellebethabelle broke out in a nervous sweat.
####
Galloping through the forest with a death grip on Celestabellebethabelle's mane, Mabel bellowed, "THIS IS JUST AS MAGICAL AS I DREAMED IT WOULD BE!" She cackled maniacally.
####
The party had trudged almost halfway back to the Mystery Shack before Melody worked up the nerve to suck in a deep breath and say, "Hey, Bill?"
She hated the way his full attention would snap on you when you caught his eye. It sorta felt like you could get skin cancer if he stared at you too hard. "Yeees?" he said.
"Um—thanks, I guess. For the whole 'breaking a mysterious bloodline curse that was ruining my life' thing. I know you mostly did it for your own reasons, but I still appreciate it."
"Wow. I think that's the first time you've ever said something nice to me!"
"Pshhh, it's the first time you've deserved it."
"Haha, funny! But seriously, now. You've been so down on me that a teensy little part of me started to suspect that those agents showed up at the shack because you called in a tip about me."
She really hated how intense his stare was. "What? Yeah right! I know what kind of illegal stuff happens in the shack, I'm not about to risk Soos and his family getting arrested," she said. "But can you blame me for not liking you? You stuck the whole town in a giant stone throne. I had nightmares about that even without the sleep paralysis demon's help! Do you know what it feels like to be trapped like that?"
Bill's mood sobered so abruptly and steeply that it felt like the hot morning air had dropped several degrees. "Yeah, actually. I do know."
"Seriously?" Melody scrutinized his face, but couldn't get anything out of his hard, grim expression. "If you understand, then why did you do it."
"Because I don't care about any of your feelings!" Bill laughed, and the momentary solemnity popped like a bubble. "But you, kid—you're starting to grow on me. And I actually mean it this time!"
"Gee, thanks." Somehow, she doubted it would save her from any future stone thrones.
####
"I can't believe it's finally over," Melody sighed. "It hasn't sunk in yet. I keep telling myself that I don't have to be afraid to go to sleep. I don't know if I've ever felt safe sleeping before. Even during the good times, I always knew the nightmares could come back, you know?"
"I can't believe it took us so long to figure out that there was some kind of weird demon magic going on," Soos sighed. "I guess I didn't realize how bad it was. I'm so sorry, Melody."
"It's not your fault. Honestly, I try to downplay it. I didn't want you to worry about it when I knew you couldn't really change it." She gave Soos a small smile. "Besides—being haunted by a demon obviously sucks and I don't want it back, but I'm kinda glad it happened. If it hadn't, I never would've spent a summer in Gravity Falls and met you."
"Aww... babe..." Soos's heart melted a little. Like a piece of moderately expensive chocolate left in your pants pocket, the good stuff that melts at body temperature. "I'm not gonna say I'm happy you got haunted—but, I'm glad you came to Gravity Falls too."
She pecked his lips. "I'll get ready for bed."
While Soos waited for his turn in the bathroom, he heard Ford downstairs indignantly cry, "And I missed it?!"
He didn't hear Bill's retort, although he recognized the teasing tone. They exchanged several words before Bill headed upstairs and his voice became clearer: "Tough luck! If you're not taking the class, you don't get to go on the field trips! Now if you'll excuse me, I haven't had a full night's sleep in over a week—"
He stopped at the sight of Soos. "Questiony."
"Hey dude, you heading to bed? Heh, I don't blame you—me and Melody are taking the day off to catch up on our Z's too."
"Oh, yeah?" There was a wariness in Bill's voice that Soos couldn't quite figure out the source of. "Who's handling the Mystery Shack tours today?"
####
A tourist studied the tangled bramble of glued-together pretzels, then asked the tour guide, "Excuse me—what's the story behind this one?"
Wendy—wearing a clip-on bow tie, reflective sunglasses, and a black jacket she'd borrowed from Nate to look more mysterious—said, "Oh, the pretzelpus? I'd love to tell you..." She whipped off her sunglasses dramatically, "but it's classified. If I told you, we'd both, like, go to jail."
"Oooh," the tourist said appreciatively.
She put her sunglasses back on. "Plus it's totally haunted," she said. "You can appease the spirit with dollars or whatever."
She'd managed to go the whole morning without actually tour guiding anyone.
####
"If cool girl's doing the tours, who's handling the register?"
####
The line of customers was fifteen people deep and growing, and hadn't moved in five minutes.
The lady in the front tapped her foot impatiently, glaring at Dipper, who was ignoring her.
He was writing in his journal as fast as possible as Mabel said, "—and when we broke the sound barrier, it exploded into glitter, it was awesome!" She shook her princess skirt and rained pink sparkles onto the floor. "I bet you could win every horse race in the world by painting a unicorn's horn with invisible paint—"
Exasperated, the woman looked over Dipper's head at the third person behind the register. "Excuse me—sir? Do we get to check out any time soon?"
Ford—leaning over Dipper's shoulder and also taking notes on everything Mabel said—mumbled vaguely, "Sorry, I don't work here."
####
"All right," Bill said, but in that distracted way that made it clear this was just the small talk to ease into whatever he really wanted to talk about. "So. Are we even?"
Soos blinked. "What?"
"Are we even," Bill repeated. "I saved your fiancée from a threat controlling her life that you couldn't even see, much less stop. She was helpless, and you were useless. If I wasn't here, she would have either left town or died an early death from stress and insomnia. Most likely both! So, are we even?"
For a split second, Soos took offense at Bill's assessment—he'd done the best he could for Melody, it wasn't his fault he didn't have dream-o-vision—but quickly realized that his intent had nothing to do with being offensive. To Bill, this wasn't about Soos, or even about Melody; this was all about Bill.
And in a way, that made this easier.
"Oh. Ohhhh," Soos said. "Yeah, dude, totally! You basically just saved Melody's and my futures, I don't know what we would've done without you. Plus you had all that, like, cool unicorn info? Not even Ford told us about any of that stuff." (Bill straightened slightly. Soos must've said the magic words. He wasn't sure whether Bill remembered the stuff he'd said the night before about feeling dumb, now that he was sobered up; but Soos did.) "That's worth way, way more than a bedroom and a minifridge. In fact? I basically owe you now."
None of this had anything to do with debts, of course; but if feeling like he'd done something for Soos was what it took for Bill to stop feeling like he'd been made an inferior by Soos's charity, then okay. He could give him that.
"Ohhh, you're gonna regret telling me that, Questiony!" But the way Bill's face had lit up, Soos thought he'd done the right thing.
"Don't abuse it, dawg."
"No promises!"
Wow. All this time, Soos had thought maybe there was something else he needed to do to get Bill to stop hating him—that he needed to say the right thing or do the right favor—when really, Bill needed to do something for him. Really made you think. Maybe Bill had a secret generous side, if he wasn't comfortable around somebody he couldn't help out in some way!
In order to consider this theory, Soos casually chose to ignore just about everything else he knew about Bill's personality.
But as Bill pranced up the steps the rest of the way to the attic, Soos felt a weight that had settled over them for the past couple weeks lighten and disappear.
####
(I think the only thing in this chapter directly inspired by TBOB was Bill's comment that he'd been in situations just as restrictive as the stone throne; I was thinking partially about Theraprism but more specifically about that wizard who trapped Bill in an orb. I feel like that kind of crap happens to him a lot.
Anyway! Plot arc finished!!! I really like how this one turned out. Looking forward to hearing y'all's thoughts!)
We're bringing back this gorgeous but mean gal for Throwback Thursday, Celestabellebethaelle!
A beautiful unicorn who claims to be able to sense whether those who approach her are pure of heart… but really she’s just screwing around and likes making people feel bad about themselves. Like other unicorns, her horn can glow, point toward the nearest rainbow, and play rave music. She would really like to travel, but accepts that it’s just not feasible in this economy.
---
There is no nuance button, if your answer is some variation of ‘I would if X’ then the answer is yes.
Hi hello I was told offhandedly, like, ages ago that you have different fonts for each different character and thought you might particularly find this cool !!!!
oKay I WAS NEVER HERE . HAVE A GOOD DAY !!!!
Well, thank you much for sharing, I do love starry fonts. And that does look pretty fitting for a character like Astra.
For reference in the context of Gravity Falls; when I'm making formatted fics, I differenciate supernatural and otherworldly creatures from other characters by having their dialogue be in different font from the rest of the typeface.
For example; if a story is primarily written in Arial font, most of the characters when they speak, their dialogue is also going to also be in Arial. However, it there's a supernatural creature such as a vampire, unicorn, manotaur, or of the cosmic/weird variety, they will speak in a font unique to them or their species. Most recently, you'd see this with the Fairies.
Here's some other examples:
Supernatural Creatures
Cosmic Beings
Bill Cipher's Gang
Shifty Variants
Other
If any of the fonts are white-on-black text, it is an indication that the creature is fire based or adjacent. If the original document doesn't use black-on-white text, the font colour and highlight are just inverted.
Shapeshifters use fonts that are similar to common typefaces, which is meant to signifty their ability to blend into the crowd but still be 'off'.
While a lot of the time a magical/supernatural species will share a singular font, sometimes a very prominent member of said species will still have their own seperate font (Such as Archibald). This also happens with very individualistic/scattered magical species such as fairies or vampires.
This is entirely seperate from handwriting. Individual characters will always have separate fonts from the typeface when they are writing things by hand.
Here's some examples of what I personally use for the characters handwriting:
Stanford Pines - Stanford Regular by @tsunamiholmes
Stanley Pines - DK Cool Crayon, or OpenDyslexic in some AUs.
Dipper Pines - Joe Font file provided by @trickengf
