A/N: There are days when I actually write Serious Stuff. This is not one of those days.
"Sixer, it's not that I ain't loving Dragons and Dragons-"
"It's Dungeons, Dungeons and More Dungeons. Your turn to roll!"
You mean Boring, Boring and More Boring. First thing I do when I take over this dimension will be outlawing it.
"... But shouldn't we, you know, be doing science here? Hey, Brainiac, I'm talking. Get your nose outta that book."
Ford looked up from the Rules Book and, to Bill's surprise - and utter worry - winked. "Why, would you stop now that she's beckoning you?"
Bill blinked. "Who?"
"Princess Unattainabelle!" Ford declared, striking a pose to look at him through half-lidded eyes, and that was just about the last straw.
"Ain't into princesses," Bill said quickly, and snapped his fingers, causing the board game to disappear. Ford blinked.
"Really? We were just getting to the best part!"
The best part will be when the portal is done and this is all over.
Bill scoffed, crossing his arms. "We did. Best part of this game is that it ends."
Ford crossed his arms as well, looking supremely offended, and puffed out his chest. "If you gave it a chance, I'm sure you'd find Dungeons, Dungeons and More Dungeons to be the best game in existence."
"Suuure."
"You're no fun."
… Wait, what? Had Sixer just told him he was no fun? Had he seriously just said that?
"Whoa there! I am plenty fun!" Bill protested, lifting himself in the air so that he'd be at Ford's same eye level. He knew he was being baited, of course, because Fordsy couldn't do subtle to save his life, but the accusation was still so out there he had to say something. "Your game is boring."
"You don't have enough imagination to enjoy it, that is all!"
Well, now that was rich - a mortal, telling him he had no imagination? Implying that a human's limited mind could be more imaginative than his own? Still some thirty years away from meeting Mabel Pines, Bill laughed at the absurdity of the notion.
"Oh, yeah? Since we're on the subject of imagination, care to explain why you've been playing your boring board game like you're trapped in your meat cage?"
"... Huh?"
Bill threw up his arms. "I rest my case, Your Honor," he muttered. "We're in the Mindscape, Sixer! Your mindscape! You can make anything you want happen in here by willing it, and you sit down playing a nerdy game with your nose stuck in a book full of rules."
Ford blinked at him, taken aback. Once again, he looked all the multiverse like a confused owl. "I… had never thought about it."
"Good thing I did," Bill muttered, and snatched the dice from Ford's hand. "So hey, lemme show imagination. You're some kinda wizard, right?"
"I'm a mage."
"Mage, shmage, who cares. Gonna use magic anyway," Bill said, and his hand clenched on the dice, blue flames engulfing it. "So, I'm gonna be a rockstar or whatever."
"A bard."
"I said whatever. Ready for some real fun?" Bill asked, and rolled the dice before Ford could answer. It wasn't like he really cared to listen to his opinion, anyway.
The Mindscape faded into a blinding blue light, and Bill noted Ford's startled shriek in the back of his mind, just in case he ever felt like using it against him.
What spread out before Ford's eyes when he opened them again was beyond anything he had ever imagined - or so he would have thought if it wasn't for the fact all of it was already in his mind, and Bill had done nothing but bringing it up to surface.
The sun was low on the horizon and red as blood, setting aflame the clouds and mists surrounding the Peak - the only mountain in a landscape that was nothing but forests and lakes as far as eye could see, at least from the hill Ford found himself standing, holding a staff with a gleaming golden gem on top, the wind making the grey robe he was clad in flutter.
It was breathtaking. It was epic, awe-inspiring, humbling, majestic.
At least until he heard Bill singing somewhere behind him.
"We'll meet agaaain, don't know where, don't know wheeeeeen… Hey, Brainiac, why aren't you singing? Chop chop!"
Ford tore his gaze away from the scenery and turned to see Bill floating in the air a few feet from him, with a lute in his hands, without bow tie and, in place of his hat… wait, no. That couldn't be right.
"... Bill?"
"Oh, I know we'll meet agaaaaain… hey, still not singing!" Bill protested, and stopped playing. "What's the matter, Sixer? I'm a bard and all, so may as well sing. Would be nice if you bothered to sing along. Or at least clap to show your appreciation."
"Is that an Elvis Presley wig?"
"Yup!" Bill said, reaching up to run a hand through the hair. "Like it?"
"It's… not quite blending with the setting, is it?"
"I don't blend, Fordsy. I stand out."
"Believe me, it is impossible to miss you even without the-"
Ford was cut off by a hissing noise, and then a sound halfway between a thud and a squelch.
"Whoa!" Bill looked down, and Ford followed his gaze. There was an arrow tip protruding from Bill's centre, clearly having gone through his back. "Hey, you're right. This one sure didn't miss me!"
Another arrow flew out from the woods around them, knocking off Bill's wig - "Aw, c'mon!" - and then another missed Ford's head by a scant inch. He yelped and instinctively raised the staff, causing what looked like a shimmering glass dome to appear around him and Bill. As more arrows shattered against the dome, Ford turned to look at Bill - who had pulled the arrow out of himself and was watching with some fascination as the hole began closing up.
"How… how did I do this?"
"By willing it, genius! What else? We're in your mind. You can do anything now - a literal wizard!"
"I am a mage."
Bill rolled his eye so far back that the pupil disappeared within the socket, only to reappear again from the bottom. "What you are is a nerd. C'mon, let's kick some fantasy butt. Use your imagination, why don't you?" he said, and snapped his fingers. A feathered hat appeared over his upper angle, where the wig had been, and he lifted the lute again. "Imagine theeeeere's no heaveeeeen-"
"Are you going to sing all the time?"
"Well, duh. What else would a bard do? Music's the weapon, ain't it?"
Ford heaved an exasperated sigh and turned his attention to the situation at hand - namely, someone hidden in the woods trying to skewer them with arrows; at least two or three people. Something should be done about that: even though he knew nothing happening in his mind would cause him actual physical harm, Ford rather liked it better when he did not have a wooden shaft through him.
Or at least, he assumed he did. Not that he had ever been skewered by an arrow, so it was hard to make scientific comparisons and he would have to go on instinct at the moment. And his instinct's input on the matter was something along the lines of 'no arrow, arrow bad'.
Alright. Fine. Imagination. I can do this, I can- wait. Have the arrows stopped coming?
Ford had barely enough time to notice as much before three figures - elves? - ran out of the forest undergrowth to throw themselves on their knees. "Please! Enough! We surrender!" one of them, with long blond hair, wailed.
Wait. What?
"I didn't do anything yet," Ford found himself saying, lowering his staff and letting the force field around them fade. Not a smart move in case of a trap, he would think later, but it was no trap.
"Not you! Him!" the same elf said, pointing a shaky finger at Bill - who was still hovering in mid-air, playing the lute with his eye shut and singing at the top of his lungs. Did he even have lungs?
"I watched with glee while your kings and queeeeens fought for ten decades for the gods they maaaaade…"
"Please! This is too much! Make him stop!" another of the elves pleaded, scrambling on his knees to grab then hem of Ford's robe. "Make him stop, oh powerful one! Cease this torture! We'll do anything you ask!"
Huh. It looked like Bill's take on music as a weapon was more effective than Ford had thought it could be. "Er, I… sure. Bill?"
"Let me please introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taaaaaste-"
"Bill!"
That finally caused Bill to snap out of it, and he opened his eye to glance down at them. He blinked. "Oh, right. These guys. Sorry, got carried away. How'd you beat 'em?"
You did, Ford was about to say, but he thought better of it. Someone, letting Bill know his singing voice had just been qualified as torture didn't seem the best course of action.
"They surrendered," was all he said in the end.
Bill laughed. "Oooh, nice of them, to make it so easy!" he exclaimed, and slung the lute over his back to hover down, closer to the cowering elves. "Okay, you know the drill. Hand over your weapons and potions and… woah. Where were you carrying all of those?"
"I have a magic bag as well," the blond elf explained, handing it over to Bill. "Infinite space. As for the others, don't ask."
"I'm happy to tell," another elf called out from the back, waving his hand.
"No, trust me. Do not ask," the blond one whispered, a note of urgency in his voice, and Ford decided to take his word for it.
"Er… we're good, thanks," he called out, earning himself a rather disappointed pout and an approving hum from Bill.
"Good call," he said, counting a handful of gold coins. "I mean, I know, but you're better off in your ignorance. Hey, hey! I saw you over there! Hand over that gold!"
"That is a fearsome bard you have," the one Ford could only assume was the leader said, watching as Bill held one of the others upside-down and shook him to make sure he got all the loot possible. Ford couldn't help but chuckle.
"One of a kind," he said. "You said you'd do anything."
The elf shuddered. "As long as you keep your bard from singing again, good sir, anything at all."
Ford didn't think there was a force in the universe that would be enough to keep Bill from doing precisely as he pleased, but hopefully he wouldn't start singing again within their earshot. "I'd like to know the shortest way to the Peak."
"You… you surely jest! Are you planning to battle the monsters that dwell there?"
Did they? As far as Ford was aware, there was no definite plan at all. He had hardly had the time to realize what was going on before those guys tried to turn him into a pincushion, after all. In the end, he just shrugged.
"Just tell us the way, and we'll see."
"Sweeeeet home Alabamaaaa, where the skies are so blueeee…"
"Are you going to keep this up for long?"
"Yup."
"Why."
"Bard. Plus, didn't you like this one when your college buddy sang it all the time?"
Sometimes, Ford thought, the fact Bill knew absolutely everything stored in his mind could get more than slightly annoying. Just sometimes. "No. I just… didn't want to offend him."
"Ooh, I see. Yeah, nowhere as good as me, was he? Needed to hone his banjo skills."
Ford very nearly said that Fiddleford's singing had never caused anyone to wail and pledge to do anything in order to make him stop, but he stopped himself when it occurred to him that it had, at the end of one especially nerve-wracking semester.
"Guess not," was all he said in the end, and stopped walking. Before them, the path split in two - with no indication as to what awaited them on either side: only more trees. "The elves had a map, didn't they?"
"Yeah, think so," Bill said, unceremoniously shoving a hand in the magic bag Ford was carrying. He pulled the map out, and Ford reached to take it.
"Thank- hey!" he yelped, pulling back his hand when Bill ignited his own and caused the map to go up in blue flames. "Why did you do that?"
Bill shrugged. "Hey, I ain't letting a piece of paper tell me what to do. Just pick on way and we'll find out where it leads. Where's the fun otherwise?"
"We'll get lost."
"We're in your mind, you stick in the mud. C'mon, just throw a coin or something!"
"If I had a coin to throw. Who decided you're the one who's keeping the gold?"
"I defeated them, remember?"
"After I shielded us. You also got skewered - do I even have to start on how unfair it is that your damage heals on its own?"
"I call it convenient. And besides, so does yours," Bill muttered, and pulled out a gold coin, which he tossed at Ford. "There's your coin. Now throw it and let's see where it leads us."
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"Are we there yet?"
"I don't even know where there is. You burned the map."
"Oh. Right."
"..."
"So, are we there yet?"
"Can you please get back to singing?"
"What, need a little soundtrack that's not birds chirping?"
"Something along those lines, yes."
It took Bill just moments to grab the lute and clear his throat - or at least make a similar sound, because he didn't really have a throat to clear - and start singing. When Ford recognized the song it was like a slight jab in the gut, because it was one he knew, one he'd had avoided listening for a long time now.
"The road is loooong, with many a winding tuuuuurns that leads us to who knows wheeeeere…"
A long time later, Ford would wonder if it was meant to be a stab - because Bill knew of Stan, of course, he knew everything about his life up to that point - or if he had truly chosen the song at random, for whatever reason known to him only.
Right there and then, he could only listen in silence as they kept wandering through the woods of a world that existed only on paper and in his own mind, thinking back of all the times he had heard it on the radio while working on a boat that would never take the sea with him in it.
But I'm strong
Strong enough to carry him
He ain't heavy, he's my brother...
"Ooh, look! A dragon!"
"That is a wyvern. Look, it only has two legs and then the wings- ouch!"
"Nerd."
The wyvern lifted its head and let out a brief roar - or was it a yawn? - before resting its massive head down on the cobblestones again. It was resting on a huge stone bridge littered with burnt bones and armors, clearly the remains of those who had attempted to cross the bridge before. It was easily the size of Ford's house, its scale such a deep red they seemed almost black in the spots that were not hit by the sun, and its teeth like swords.
All in all, not a reassuring sight.
"We should have gone the other way," Ford muttered, trying to remain as low as possible among the bushes. "If you hadn't burned the map-"
"Oh, shut up. It's not like either of us can die in here, so relax. I can get this dumb lizard to sleep in a moment, anyway."
"We need a plan-"
"Nope, we don't," Bill said, taking the lute off his back. "Just watch and learn, Sixer."
Ford opened his mouth to say it wasn't probably good idea, then he thought of all the times he had said as much just to get ignored, and closed it again without saying a word. If Bill was right, they'd get past the wyvern. If he was wrong, at least he would finally hear him admit that.
All he had to do was wait and see. And he did see. He saw Bill lifting himself in plain view of the wyvern, heard him clearing his throat - and the next thing he heard was a roar, the next thing he saw was a sudden gust of fire engulfing Bill.
A small pile of ash fell right back down next to his hiding place and, on top of the pile, a single bewildered eyeball. Ford stared down at it. The eyeball on the pile of ash looked back at him.
"All right, smart guy. Fine. We do need a plan. And sunscreen."
"If you hadn't burned the map, we'd know where we can buy better equipment."
Bill rolled his eye. As in, the eyeball on top of the ash pile rolled before said pile turned back into Bill - feathered hat and lute included. Ford could have done without the lute making a comeback, to be perfectly honest.
"You know, I could pulverize that dragon-"
"Wyvern."
"... That stupid thing in a second."
Ford shook his head. "No shortcuts in this game. That's the best part - perseverance and work to overcome all challenges."
Bill sighed. "Sheesh, and here I was actually starting to have fun," he said, but snapped his fingers regardless, causing the map to appear again, floating in the air. "Fine, fine. See where we can find the closest village or hut in the woods or whatnot. But I'll be the one handling it, okay? You'd just get ripped off."
Ford puffed out his chest. "I'll have you know that I grew up in a pawn shop. I'm not so easy to scam and- why are you laughing?"
"Hahahah! You're just so cute, Fordsy," Bill said with a snicker, pretending to be wiping a tear from his eye, then reached to flick his nose. "Adorable, really."
Ford raised an eyebrow, cupping his nose. "Not going to tell me what this was all about?"
"Nope. But seriously now - let me do the bargaining. It will be a breeze."
"THIS IS A RIPOFF!"
"IT IS THE LOWEST I CAN GO, STRANGER!"
"NOT IN THE WAY OF PRICE, IT'S NOT!"
Ford heard the argument clearly enough across the market square, but he didn't turn to look and kept his gaze fixed on the book stand, where several books on advanced magic and necromancy were exposed. Not only the books were really interesting, but he also thought it wiser to pretend he didn't know Bill at all - especially since his idea of bargaining apparently included picking a fight with a blacksmith that had to be at least half a troll, or a quarter giant.
"Uhm… is the stranger over there your friend, sir?" the bookseller asked, staring at the scene over Ford's shoulder.
"I COULD SQUASH YOU HERE AND NOW, SHORT STUFF!" the blacksmith could be heard bellowing. Ford flipped through the pages of the closest book.
"Never seen him in my life," he said. "Say, how much for-"
"OH YEAH? COME AND GET IT, THEN!"
"I AM GIVING YOU ONE LAST CHANCE TO BEG FORGIVENESS AND PAY-"
Whatever he had been about to say next was drowned out in a sudden flash of light, bright enough to put sunlight to shame, and then screams. The owner of the book stall ran away along with everybody else, leaving Ford to stand there, the book in his hands, in a suddenly deserted square that now smelled vaguely of roast chicken.
Ford sighed. "Is this your idea of bargaining?" he asked, turning. Bill was hovering a few feet from him, lute slung over his bag and his arms full of all sort of things - another staff, a bow, arrows, what looked a lot like an axe. Behind him, a small column of smoke rose from the crater where the huge blacksmith had been until a few moments before.
"We had a bit of a disagreement, but I got our stuff. Might be a good idea to get away quickly and… seriously? I leave you for a moment and what you do is sticking your nose in more books?" Bill muttered, rolling his eye. "You nerds are impossible."
"This is advanced magic. It will be useful against the wyvern," Ford said, pocketing the book and leaving a few coins on the book stand; he wasn't entirely sure that was the correct price, but he supposed he couldn't be too far off. "I was thinking of staying at an inn for the night, but I suppose that you incinerating the town's blacksmith rules that out," he added. It was getting dark, and that was quite fascinating to see how the world in his mind mimicked the normal flow of time. In the real world he may have been asleep only for minutes, but in there he could live a lifetime before sunrise awoke him.
Bill shrugged before dumping all the weapons he had acquired in the magic bag Ford was carrying. "So who needs a stinking inn? You can just imagine your house in the middle of the woods, and it will appear. Your mind, Brainiac, remember?"
Well. Ford supposed he could think of something.
"A cave? Seriously?"
Ford shrugged, throwing a log in the fire. "I think it makes for a nice atmosphere. More befitting of a quest," he said, glancing towards the entrance of the cave. There was a violent thunderstorm going on outside, and as far as he was concerned it only added to the charm.
Bill didn't seem inclined to agree. "You could have thought up a castle."
"So could you."
Bill hummed, but said nothing else. He was resting against a rock, hands folded behind the upper angle Ford had come to consider his head, and was staring at the shadows dancing against the cave's far wall as though he could see something in them that Ford could not. Well, he probably could, come to think of it. Still, watching him stare at something in silence was odd, because Bill was never quiet for long.
"Bill?"
"Just restin' my eye, IQ," Bill said, even though his eye was still wide open. Yet, it had a distant cast to it Ford couldn't recall seeing before. "Seeing everything is hard work, you know."
Right, Ford thought: Bill didn't only know things, he also saw them. Hadn't the inscriptions in the other cave, the one in Gravity Falls, referred to him as the All-Seeing Eye? The thought reminded him of something else, something that had briefly crossed his mind when Bill had burned the map and told him to throw a coin to choose their path.
"You have eyes everywhere in my mind, don't you? Full access and all."
"Yup."
"And this is all in my mind. You could see where the paths would lead us even after burning the map."
"If I chose to."
Something about that answer made Ford frown. "And you chose not to?"
Bill shrugged, and this time he actually closed his eye. "Would kinda suck the fun out of it, wouldn't it? Don't get me wrong there, Sixer - having answers is great, but it can also get kinda boring."
Ford had never thought about it, but now that Bill brought it up, it did make sense. He loved nothing more than acquiring knowledge himself, and hitting roadblocks could get amazingly frustrating - and yet there was nothing he found more thrilling than the pursuit of knowledge, spurred onwards by more and more questions he wanted to answer.
Would he want to have the answer to everything just handed to him like that? Would knowledge feel as good is someone simply told him everything? Ford suspected it wouldn't. Perhaps he had always known it wouldn't - perhaps that was why he had never truly been bothered by Bill's clues and half-answers, his riddles and games and twisty paths to lead him to the bits of knowledge he sought.
In the end, he found himself throwing another log in the fire before focusing just enough to conjure something out of thin air - a chess board.
"Chess?"
Bill opened his eye again and blinked a couple of times before laughing. "What, a board game inside a board game? Heh, not bad of a gameception."
"Game… ception?"
Bill shrugged, sitting up. "Yeah, that's gonna make more sense in 2010," he said, waving his hand, and made his move.
"The wyvern is still there. Doesn't look like anything has changed."
"Something has, really."
"What?"
"There are a couple more corpses on the bridge."
"... Thanks for pointing that out," Ford muttered, and sank back behind the cover of the bushes. He held the staff a bit tighter.
Bill shrugged. "Hey, if they're there, then you have thought them up. You've got a morbid mind there, Fordsy. I like that," he said, ruffling Ford's hair. "And hey, relax. We've got a plan this time. I distract it, you kill it off."
"Of course. I can't see how such a carefully thought-up plan could possibly fail."
Bill laughed. "Aww, you're so cute when you try sassing me," he said, flicking Ford's nose. "No need to worry - it's not like we can die, remember? Worst case scenario, you wake up. Did you power that thing up?"
Ford nodded, taking another look at his staff. The book on advanced magic had been quite useful on that aspect - that, and the knowledge that one particular wyvern was vulnerable to electricity. "I have."
"Let the show hit the road, then," Bill said, and dropped the lute. Ford blinked.
"I thought you were going to distract it by playing."
Bill snorted. "As if! Not giving a serenade to a dumb lizard who didn't appreciate it the first time. Nice bard gloves are off," he said, and propelled himself high in the air without saying another word, in plain sight of the beast.
"But how are you going-"
"HEY, GODZILLA! OVER HERE!"
There was a roar, and another gust of fire, but this time Bill was able to dodge it. "Hah! Too slow!" he called out, and immediately darted to the left to avoid another jet of flames.
There was a roar, and Ford peered out to see the wyvern standing on its legs, wings briefly flapping, a tail covered in spikes swinging dangerously back and forth across the bridge. It was clearly furious, but not enough to take flight and leave the bridge it was guarding. There was a tower at the very end of it; whatever was in there had to be important.
"C'mon, you overgrown iguana! Can't you do any better?"
More roaring and stomping, but Bill kept well out of the wyvern's reach, and was able to get closer without being hit - until he was circling over the beast's head, causing it to spin and ceaselessly, snapping its jaws and spitting fire in the attempt at catching him. A spiked tail slammed against a couple of statues on the sides of the bridge, turning them into dust.
"Hey, Brainiac! Whenever you got a moment!" Bill called out, causing Ford - who had been staring at the scene with wide eyes, utterly fascinated, to recoil. He stood from his hiding place, the staff held up, just as Bill lifted himself high above the wyvern, causing the creature to stand on its hind legs, snapping its jaws… and leaving the underbelly unprotected.
Well, here goes nothing, Ford thought: he willed the staff to turn into a bow, evoked the sort of arrow he needed - blinding white and crackling with electricity - drew back, released...
… And missed. By far. So far, actually, that the arrow barely missed Bill - who just managed to escape both that and the wyvern's swipe of a wing.
"SERIOUSLY, SIXER?"
"Sorry!" Ford blurted out, and tried to draw back another arrow. Tried to, because the next moment the wyvern's eyes turned to him, and it let out a roar. Its maw opened, and he could see in stunned awe the fire beginning to form in its maw, ready to turn him into ashes and-
"Oh no you don't!"
The wyvern let out a cry and jerked back, as though something very heavy had just landed on its back, and twisted. Ford had barely enough time to throw himself on the ground before its tail lashed across the spot where he had been standing, pulverizing part of the bridge's wall and covering him with dust and debris.
Ford coughed, blinking repeatedly to get some dust out of his eyes, aware of nothing but the thrashing sounds all around him, the snapping jaws, the furious roars and, above all, laughter. For a moment, he thought it had to be Bill - who else would be laughing? - but it sounded so wrong, far too deep and loud, far too much like a growl. With a groan, he lifted himself just enough to look up, and… and… wait, was that…?
"Bill?" Ford found himself breathing, eyes fixed on the huge, monstrous thing locked into a vicious struggle against the wyvern. He could think of no one else that huge, pyramidal being - all mouths and black tongues and sharp teeth, slit pupils glowing gold in the middle of pitch black sclera as it kept the wyvern's snapping jaws at bay with four arms - could possibly be.
The thing - Bill - laughed. "Told ya that my nice bard gloves were off!" he called out, and lifted up the thrashing wyvern just enough to expose its belly.
That was amazing, simply amazing. He had no idea Bill could-
"Hey! Wake up and finish it now, Robin Hood! Doesn't like being hugged!"
… Oh. Right. Ford stood as quickly as he could, turned the staff into a bow again, and summoned another arrow. He drew it back, paused for a moment… and released. To this credit, his aim was better than at his first attempt. He would have got the wyvern right in the middle of its belly if it wasn't for the fact the beast suddenly covered it with its spiked tail. The arrow tore through it, but it did nothing more than slicing it off, leaving the wyvern only wounded… and twice as furious.
Before Ford could do anything else, the wyvern roar and, what seemed like a terrible effort, it managed to break free from Bill's grip - just enough to turn on him, making him disappear under a wall of leathery wings, scales and smoke. There was a sound like fabric being ripped, and the scream that followed made Ford feel as though his blood had turned into ice in his veins.
"AAAGH! NO! NOT THE EYE!"
The wyvern threw back its head with a roar, something black and golden in its maw while, beneath it, Bill reached to press multiple hands onto an empty socket. He was trapped against the stone bridge, claws sinking into him, blinded and screaming and it was all because Ford had missed. Again. Because he had failed, again.
"STOP!"
There was another cry, one Ford didn't realize had come from him, and his grip on the bow tightened, causing it to morph back into a staff. He lifted it into the air and, without thinking, brought it down like a sword.
The crack of thunder drowned out any other noise, and lighting drowned out everything else, forcing Ford to close his eyes against the glare. When the thunder faded, leaving his ears buzzing, he dared lower his arm and open his eyes. The wyvern was gone, the bridge's stone blackened and cracked - and, in the middle of that blackness…
Bill…?"
He had shrunk down to his usual size, turned back into his usual bright yellow - but now he was lying eye down and, most worrying of all, he was completely motionless. Had the lighting hit him, too? Was he… no, it couldn't be. He couldn't die, neither of them could, not in his mind - hadn't Bill told him so himself? He had, and he couldn't have been wrong. He was never wrong, right?
… Right?
"Bill!"
He didn't move when Ford reached him, nor when he turned on his back. His eye was blank and filled with gray static, and it felt like looking into a broken TV screen. His limbs were limp, and he showed no sign of having heard him. The lighting must have hit him as well - of course it had. What had he been thinking?
It's not like either of us can die in here, so relax.
But why wasn't he moving?
Mind suddenly numb with panic, Ford reached into his bag to pull out the book and flipped through the pages as quickly as he could. Healing spells… healing spells… there had to be something there that could help-
There was a sudden burst of static, followed by a cheery tune, and Bill abruptly sat up. The gray static in his eye faded, replaced by… was that a sound wave?
"Radio Cipher here with the latest - Sixer has the worst aim known to man and very nearly friend your favorite DJ!" Bill's voice rang out, sounding all the world like it was coming from a radio. "Congrats, Brainiac! You win a lifetime supply of mocking, starting… now! More news at 11!"
"What… did you… were you just… were you just playing dead?" Ford found himself sputtering, and Bill laughed, his eye returning to normal. He laughed so hard that he very nearly bent himself in half.
"Aww, were you worried! That was adorable! And dumb! And adorably dumb!" he snickered. "I told you over and over, Brainiac - this is all in your mind. No danger whatsoever for you and surely not for me."
Ford groaned, reaching up to rub his temples. "And I fell for it."
"Yup! Hook, line and sinker!" Bill confirmed before hovering to Ford's left to pick something up - a long, heavy-looking sword that seemed untouched by the lighting bolt that had struck the bridge. "And look what the lizard dropped! I'm keeping it!"
Ford frowned. Technically, he had been the one to get that weapon - he recalled reading that the sword could only be obtained by slicing off the wyvern's tail, which had been his doing. Why should Bill be the one to equip it?
"You're the wrong character class," he pointed out, already knowing what Bill would say to that.
"You're saying that like it's relevant," he said, and slung the sword over his shoulder, narrowly missing Ford's head in the process and forcing him to duck. "But no worries, you won't be missing out the soundtrack! I'll keep singing anyway and-"
"Actually, I was thinking it was enough for now," Ford said hurriedly, cutting him off. He really, really wasn't sure he could stand more of Bill's singing right away. "You know, I… we have so much to do. Maybe I should wake up and get working."
Bill turned, once again swinging the sword dangerously and causing Ford to flinch back. "You sure, Sixer? Thought we were having fun here. You know, on a quest and all."
"It was fun," Ford said quickly, and to be fair, it wasn't entirely a lie. It was just… best in small doses. And he'd just had a big enough dose to last him a month. "But I am behind with my work. There is much yet to do to get to the bottom of the Unified Theory of Weirdness."
Bill shrugged. "Ah well. If you insist," he said, and snapped his fingers. The scenery around them faded in moments, leaving behind the vastness of space - which was what Ford's mindscape looked like, most of the time. Ford's own clothes turned back to normal, and Bill was wearing his usual bowtie and hat as well. In place of the sword, he was holding a cane. "So, ready to talk about weird again?"
Ford chuckled. "Sure."
"How 'bout I sing about it?"
"NO."
Bill narrowed his eye, leaning on his cane - which on the other hand, was resting on nothing at all since he was still in mid-air. "Well, well. Who's no fun now?" he said, and laughed at Ford's sigh before poking him with the tip of his cane. "C'mon. You liked the trip. Admit it. Better than your rolling dice for everything, huh?"
Ford would sooner die than downright saying it had been better, but he couldn't deny it had been an amazing experience. "It was different," he conceded. "I wouldn't mind giving it another try, at some point. Just one condition."
"Yeah?"
"Never sing again."
Bill sighed dramatically. "Ow, that hurts, Sixer. Ah well. Muses are always unappreciated. Ahead of time and all," he said. And, to his credit, he did not subject Ford to his singing again.
For another thirty-something years.
We'll meet again
Don't know where, don't know when
But I know we'll meet again some sunny day...
