A/N: Using the notes again to thank everyone who left an unlogged review - thank you, glad you're enjoying the read so far!
I heard the sound of many voices in the street commanding silence. Then followed a louder voice. It was a herald's proclamation. Listening attentively, I recognized the words of the Resolution of the Council, enjoining the arrest, imprisonment, or execution of any one who should pervert the minds of people by delusions, and by professing to have received revelations from another World.
"Hey, are you gonna knock or what? I don't have all night."
"Eep!"
Bill felt just a touch smug when the square before him - a tilted square, which was a bit of an oddity but nothing unheard of, and not a problem as long as all sides were equal - gave a yelp and very nearly jumped out of his frame. He turned to look at him, eye wide, pressing himself against the bookstore's door. He had been standing there for a bit, unaware of Bill's presence behind him, as though he was trying to work up the courage to reach up and knock.
Except that Bill had no time nor patience to wait.
"Friend of Randall's?" he asked. Knowing what he did, it was easy enough to guess the guy had to be there for the meeting, too: no reason to be that nervous otherwise.
The guy seemed to relax just a fraction. "You know him?" he asked in a voice that Bill found kind of funny, squeaky as it was. It took him a bit off an effort not to laugh.
"Yeah. Invited me to today's party, so to speak. I make a killer Martini," he said, and that seemed to calm the guy a big deal. Then again, Bill couldn't have made the reason of his presence even clearer without spelling it out for him.
"Randall did mention someone would be joining us today," he said.
"That'd be me. Name's Bill," he added, holding out his hand. Squares were a class above him - that of lawyers, doctors and such, which belonged to those with four or more sides but below aristocracy - and he was not supposed to be that casual, with no 'sir' thrown in: an approach like that on the job would have resulted with a perplexed look at the very least, and a client leaving to never return.
Except that he wasn't on the job now, was he?
A nod, the the other just reached out to shake his hand. Good to see he wasn't the only one not to care for formalities.
"I'm Kryptos."
"Great to meet ya and all that. So, we're supposed to knock thrice, right?"
"Yes. I was waiting for my cousin Tad, really, but…" Kryptos paused, looking around, then shrugged. "He's probably in already, or late. Yeah, let's just get in," he added, and turned to knock thrice, making sure to let a couple of seconds pass between each knock. As they stood waiting for someone to open, Bill spoke again.
"So, how long have you been on board?"
"Not long, really. Less than half a year. I was the last one to join - before you, I mean. Tad introduced me - that's how people usually get in, anyway. Got to be known by someone who's already in, to make sure they can be trusted," Kryptos said with a slight frown, and glanced at Bill. "Who introduced you, anyway?"
"... You could say my brother did."
The door creaked open before Kryptos could say anything of it, and Randall stood in the doorway, gesturing for them to come inside - and quickly, too, because you're never too careful, even when the street empty aside from them.
"The others are already in, except for Nora and Esther, but they should be coming soon," he said, closing the door behind them. Bill blinked.
"You've got women here as well?" he asked. That was unusual, as women were not allowed to know how to even read or count. That made Bill's mother virtually useless for anything but housekeeping and rearing children; he couldn't imagine someone with her same level of knowledge being of any use in an organization like that.
"Two fine examples on how the Circles' laws are folly," Randall said, intent on locking the door. "And probably our most important allies. You will see. Kryptos, take him to meet the rest; I'll wait here for their knock."
"Sure. Follow me, Bill."
He followed.
About three hundred years ago, it was decreed by the Chief Circle that, since women are deficient in Reason but abundant in Emotion, they ought no longer to be treated as rational, nor receive any mental education. The consequence was that they were no longer taught to read, nor even to master Arithmetic enough to enable them to count the angles of their husband or children; and hence they sensibly declined during each generation in intellectual power. And this system of female non-education or quietism still prevails.
The others turned out to be a group of four people - a Square, a Pentagon, a Hexagon and, to Bill's surprise, even an Octagon. That was high class right there, one of those who'd be all too happy to maintain things as they were. What in the world was a guy like that doing there?
"Hey, guys," Kryptos called out, causing them to stop talking to one another and turn to the door. They were in the secret room Randall had shown him previously, the splashes of color still on the wall at the far end, and Bill had to make a conscious effort to keep his eye off them: they were just too intense, and that wasn't the right moment to get his eye sore. "This is Bill - the new guy Randall told us about."
Huh. Right. He was supposed to say something now, wasn't he? That was where all of his smooth talking and eloquence had to come into play, after all.
"... Hey. Looking good. I make great Martini," was the brilliant result.
Ah well.
There was a laugh, and it came from the Octagon. "That makes for an interesting addition! Welcome, welcome. My name is Hillmann," he said, holding out his hand. Bill shook it, and nodded to the others as well.
"Great to meet ya. Got to call the lot of you 'sir', or we can leave formalities out of the door?"
The Square - Kryptos' cousin Tad, Bill supposed, laughed as well. "Hah! You bet we can. This world can keep its rules out of here. I'm Tad. Five-sides here is Pentos," he added, gesturing to the Pentagon by his side. "My recommendation if you ever need a good lawyer, by the way. May not help too much if we're all caught here, though."
"Welcome on board," Pentos said, ignoring the quip. "Hope you're not lying about that Martini."
Bill waved his hand. "Noooo way. Will sell my mother for a Pitagora bar, but wouldn't lie about that. Honest. Sort of."
A snicker. "This guy speaks my language," Tad said, and turned again. "Hey, are you going to say hi, or you're just going to be the usual pain in the angle?"
With a sigh and a roll of his eye, the last person in the room - an Hexagon - finally stepped forward and held out his hand. "Pleased to make your acquaintance," he said. "My name is C-C-Croatoan."
Bill reached to shake his hand. "Got a bit of a stutter there, huh?"
"No, I don't," was the reply. "My father did, and the guy at the Register Office was a jerk."
On hindsight, maybe laughing wouldn't make for the best possible first impression. But Bill didn't precisely excel at foresight - by the time would, he'd simply not care about much of anything anymore - so, of course, he laughed. Loudly.
"Really, guys? Really?" C-C-Croatoan said when a few more snickers were heard from the rest of the group. "This is getting old. "
"Sorry, sorry," Kryptos said, wiping a tear of mirth from his eye. "It's just that-"
"Oooh, so that's the new guy!" a new voice rang out, causing everyone to turn to the door. Randall was walking in, along with two straight lines - two women, clearly. They were hard to see when looked at upfront, thin as they were; the typical swaying gait was what made them visible from the front and back.
"Yeah. My name's-" Bill began, but immediately trailed off when the woman who had just spoken came to stand right before him, eye fixed in his.
"No, no, don't tell me!" she said, lifting her arms above him. "I can read your mind, and I see your name is Bill!"
"She can't actually read your mind," the other one said, a hint of amusement in her voice. "Randall already told us."
A sigh. "You ruin everything, Esther."
"That's what big sisters do."
The first one rolled her eye. "Spoilsport," she said, dropping her arms, and held out her hand to Bill. "I'm Nora."
Bill reached to shake it. "I'm Hermann."
"Nice to meet- wait, wasn't it Bill?"
"What, can't read my mind?"
She chuckled and turned to her sister. "I like this one. He's weird."
Randall cleared his throat, getting everyone's attention back to him. "Thank you all for coming," he said, closing the secret door behind him. "Nora, Esther, how long can you stay."
"A couple of hours at least," Esther replied. Her voice was more like a murmur than her sister's shrill. "We're off to our monthly evening at the theater, remember?"
"And we'll be sniffling and crying when we return home," Nora added. "Because the play was moving and we're so emotional."
A few snickers rose up in the room.
"Doesn't anyone ever ask what plays you went to see?" C-C-Croatoan muttered. Nora made a movement that looked much like a shrug.
"Father doesn't waste time talking about female things."
"I make sure to read the synopsis of whatever is in the theaters, just in case," Esther said. "And a certain someone should do the same."
"Why should I? You've got it all covered so well!"
… Wait a second. "You two can read?" Bill asked. He had wondered about that before, and it sure was unusual - maybe even more unusual than his own birth from Isosceles, and forbidden to boot.
"Our father taught us," Esther replied. "He also taught us Arithmetics. He was worried the lack of intellectual exercise through generations on the female line could result with hidden Irregularities, and we're his only children. Nothing terrifies him more than the thought of an Irregular grandchild. He decided it was worth the risk of bending some rules."
"Didn't expect us to stick our points in his private library, though. Taking the books out of the house be too risky, but we can copy them," Nora said. "He thinks we spend a lot of time writing on our diaries or something. Because we're so emotional," she added with a dramatic sigh. Another few chuckles were heard.
"Nora and Esther's father is a one hundred-sided Polygon, and a highly respected scholar," Tad explained to Bill's benefit, causing him to blink. With a hundred sides he was, while still below a Circle, nothing short of aristocracy. "He has access to texts we'd never have a chance to get our hands on otherwise - some of the deepest secrets of mathematics and, after some trial and error, we were able to obtain color," he added, gesturing towards the wall at the far end of the room. "We-"
"Aren't we getting a bit ahead of ourselves?" Kryptos spoke up. When everyone's gaze turned on him, he seemed a bit uneasy. "I mean, Bill just got here. There's a lot to explain, and we don't know how much he knows yet."
"Agreed," Randall said, and put a hand on Bill's back. "Come now. You'll tell us what Liam's books have taught you, and we'll take it from here. Are you ready to listen?"
He was.
Why will you refuse to listen to reason? I had hoped to find in you-as being a man of sense and an accomplished mathematician-a fit apostle for the Gospel of the Three Dimensions, which I am allowed to preach once only in a thousand years: but now I know not how to convince you. Stay, I have it. Deeds, and not words, shall proclaim the truth. Listen, my friend.
For the two years that followed, the monthly meetings were the one thing Bill Cipher truly looked forward to. The things he learned were countless; the possibilities that opened up to his imagination astonishing. The more he knew, the more he needed to know.
Little else of what happened meanwhile had much or any importance at all, compared to the knowledge he was offered, and the companionship of like-minded people. He grew into the official adult age, his father passed away not long afterwards, and he took full control of the business. He was good at it - great at selling and even better at haggling good deals with suppliers - and his activity flourished.
Not so for his mother, who passed away not too long after her husband. Bill made arrangements for the funeral and did not attend, as he had not attended his father's. Business came first, had been the explanation. Maybe it was true, up to a certain point, but it was not all.
You let them take Liam away.
A couple of other traders mentioned, more than once, that they had daughters the right age to marry. Bill pretended not to get the message and sent them their way. Now that the house was his own, he had no intention to share it with anyone else.
Liam's old room remained locked.
Our physicians have discovered that the small and tender sides of an infant Polygon of the higher class can be fractured, and his whole frame re-set, with such exactness that a Polygon of two or three hundred sides sometimes-by no means always, for the process is attended with serious risk-but sometimes overleaps two or three hundred generations, and as it were double at a stroke, the number of his progenitors and the nobility of his descent.
Many a promising child is sacrificed in this way. Scarcely one out of ten survives.
"Have you ever thought of looking for your family, Bill? I mean, your… the original one?"
The question was unexpected, and came after a long discussion speculating who precisely was the Sphere and who, or what, allowed it to visit their world. Why only once at the turn of each Millennium? Was it truly always the same Sphere, and if so, how could it live so long? Would it come at the turn of their Millennium, two hundred years from then? And how was the Apostle of the Gospel of Three Dimensions chosen - what made anyone worthy of being picked, alone every thousand years, to know and see the Third Dimension?
A lot of questions and, frustratingly enough, not many answers; it felt to him they had hit a wall when it came to knowledge, and the fact he couldn't know more gnawed at him.
At least Nora's question just now, however unexpected, was one he could answer.
"No," he said, swirling his glass a bit. The others were not looking at him, but he knew they were listening. No one else was speaking at the moment, anyway. "Never thought about it."
"I could look them up for you," Pentos spoke up. He was a lawyer, known for trying - rarely with success, but he tried - to overturn destruction sentences for Irregulars in court. As far as Bill knew, Liam hadn't had the privilege of a waiting time before the sentence was carried out. "There are registers of all Regulars born from Isosceles. I can access to them and find out who they are."
Bill shrugged and put the glass down. "Thanks, but no."
"Aren't you even curious?" Kryptos asked. He sounded somewhat confused. "You could have siblings you don't know, or-"
"Not interested," Bill cut him off, and ignored Randall's look. He shrugged and lifted his hands. "Already had one. Didn't end well," he said. It was true that he had never thought about it, but now that he had, he could tell he had no wish to find out just what else their world's precious rules had taken from him.
Not until he had the means to make sure they were no more.
A brief silence followed. Finally, it was C-C-Croatoan to stand. "It seems I must take my leave. I have a delicate procedure to perform tomorrow. Not one I enjoy performing, but you'll understand I must be at my best."
A few grim looks followed him to the door. He was a surgeon, and they all knew what kind of procedure he was referring to.
"The more sides you gain, the more insane you get, or so it looks like," Tad finally said, breaking the grim silence. "No offense, Hill."
"None taken," Hillmann said, bitterness plain in his voice. Being higher than any of the in the hierarchy of classes had not spared him an Irregular son, whose case Pentos had argued in court. He had managed to save the boy, but his lot in life would remain meager.
"This world is rotten through," Esther said bitterly. "Sometimes I think the Sphere should come to destroy it at the next turn of the Millennium. What is the point in revealing the Truth to one and only one, every thousand years? One who's likely to be imprisoned or worse before he has a chance to spread it?"
"But word has been spread regardless," Randall pointed out. "We are here, as are others like us. We know-"
"That's great. And what are we gonna do with that knowledge?" Bill snapped, causing Randall to trail off. Several eyes turned to him, and he returned each gaze. "We've learned a lot. That's smashing, don't get me wrong, but what now? The Sphere comes once every thousand years, Circles know how, to speak with some random guy, and then leaves - again, Circles know how. And it's not gonna be back within our lifetimes, either. Don't know about you, but I ain't going to spend it in wait for something I won't be alive to see. Since you keep saying that knowledge is the best weapon, Randy, isn't it about time we use it?"
Randall's look turned into a glare. "It seems I was wrong in the assumption knowledge begets wisdom," the said coldly. "A wrong move may result with us being found out."
"Afraid to lose what years of life you've left, old man?"
"What I am afraid may happen is that all that we know - all that we have gathered - may be lost with us, and then there would really be no hope," Randall retorted.
"Hope for who, if we're not going to do anything? For whoever lucks out and is born close to the next turn of the Millennium, with a slim chance of running into the Sphere already knowing who it is? What's in it for us, then?"
"This is not about us," Randall said. A hint of rage was starting to show beneath the disdain. "And it is not about you, or what's in it for you. We need to be reasonable, Bill."
"Reasonable," Bill repeated, and laughed. Somehow, the whole thing was really funny. "Sure thing. Law is harsh, but it is the law."
"Bill-"
"This whole world is nothing but reasonable, if you listen to what they say," Bill snapped, cutting him off, and stood. No one else moved, all eyes still fixed on him. "Weeding out Irregulars is reasonable. Keeping women from reading is reasonable. Your place in life depends on your sides and angles - that is also reasonable. Giving any Regular born from Isosceles up for adoption with other Regulars is reasonable. Killing nine Polygon newborns out of ten trying to make Circles out of them is reasonable. Hey, Hillmann, what about your kid?" Bill asked, glancing at the Octagon. "Miserable lot in life but hey, he's alive. Not allowing him to breed is also reasonable, right? Like that? Willing to keep it as it is, just in case someone in some two hundred years gets a better shot? Oh, and if that fails again, no worries! We get another shot after another thousand years! Shame your line won't get to see it, since you'll never have grandkids!"
Hillmann looked away and said nothing. Tad stood as well. "Bill, I think you're-"
"Not tired of losing case after case, Tad?" Bill cut him off, causing him to stiffen. "All those Irregulars, and you can barely save any. But hey, give it a couple of centuries and maybe, just maybe, something will work out better than it did the last three times! Doesn't that make you feel better? It's reasona-!"
Tad was faster than Bill's eye could follow, and he had no time to brace himself, let alone to try avoiding the blow. It hit him straight in the eye and sent him tumbling back and then on the floor, the room around him exploding in a flash of white-hot pain. There were a few exclamations, someone speaking, but it was hardly more than background noise Bill couldn't be bothered listening to, aware of nothing but the pain and the cold floor beneath him.
Whatever they were saying didn't matter. Unless someone actually did something, unless someone was willing to risk it, not one word they uttered would mean anything.
And yet at times my spirit was too strong for me, and I gave vent to dangerous utterances. Already I was considered heterodox if not treasonable, and I was keenly alive to the danger of my position; nevertheless I could not at times refrain from bursting out into suspicious or half-seditious utterances, even among the highest Polygonal or Circular society.