The Unknown

9

Dipper laid on his back with his hands crossed over his stomach, staring up at the knotted wooden beams over his head. He watched as flies buzzed around and listened to the rustling of the trees in the warm summer winds through the open window. Mabel left it open for him to ‘get some fresh air’ while she hung out with Candy and Grenda.

It had been days.

He’d waited and waited, the seconds seemed to take eternity to tick by. There was no sign of Bill. Dipper had hardly moved from the spot he was in except to use the bathroom and occasionally to get yet another can of pitt soda or another mini-tub of ice cream. Mabel used every trick in the book to get him out of bed - encouragement, threats, bribery - but nothing worked. He would just roll over and put a pillow over his head, and if she tried to remove it, he would just turn back and stare at her with a chillingly empty gaze until she gave it back or left. His eyes burned with exhaustion but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t sleep longer than five minutes at a time. Part of him hoped this was Bill’s doing, but he knew that if that were true, he would instead be having an endless stream of nightmares instead of insomnia.

He turned his head to the side and reviewed his desperate attempts to get Bill’s attention; the walls were scratched and lined with drawings and carvings of Bill, papers scattered across the floor with his image drawn in pencil, pen, marker, highlighter - he tried anything he could get his hands on. The flurry of emotions he felt were enough to make him wish a zombie would drop by and rip his brains out.

At first he was scared - he knew he’d royally messed up and there was a looming terror that Bill would exact his revenge on him eventually, or even worse that he would never come back and it would ruin all of Dipper’s hard work along with breaking his heart.

Then he was overcome with sadness - it didn’t take a professional to know that Dipper was in a rut of depression. He couldn’t eat and anything he tried to hold down would just come back up five minutes later. He hadn’t slept more than a wink since that night and he feared he was going to die of exhaustion any moment.

But the worst of it was anger - Bill was so selfish for refusing to help him get protection for Mabel and then refusing to do it himself! Something had changed in that demon recently and whatever it was was downright infuriating. Some of the drawings Dipper had done to try calling him back were shredded up or scribbled out and, on occasion, burned. Wherever Bill had left to, he took a piece of Dipper’s sanity with him. And without his guidance, the world around him seemed foggy and humid. There was nothing Dipper hated more than the unknown and Bill left him without a clue. Secrets, secrets, and more secrets.

The house shook as Dipper pounded a fist against the wall. His arm was shaking - no, his whole body was shaking. His teeth were grit and his breath cut short and stifled. Sweat beaded at his forehead and under his arms. This had gone on long enough, it was time to have a word with that hateful triangle one way or another.

He assembled every ounce of fight he had left in him and pulled himself out of bed. Still a bit wobbly on his feet, he shook off the dizziness and hunger pangs to go search for the materials needed to make a summoning alter. This time, he was going to use Bill’s alter, if he had to slay Gideon to find out what it was.

Luckily, all he needed to do was ask Soos. Since the handyman had been there the day Gideon called Bill back into the world, he was able to explain, in startling detail, what he’d seen. Candles, a chalk wheel, a photo of a target with the eyes crossed out, and of course he would need to use the chant. A chill passed over his body, those words were going to taste sour in his mouth but he was ready to sacrifice an arm and a leg to talk to Bill again.

It was fortunate enough that Mabel was out all day with her friends as he wouldn’t need to venture out into the forest someplace private to get this done. Once he had all the supplies (his picture of choice was one of himself), he spread everything out on the floor and began drawing the Cipher wheel that was depicted in the journal. It was somewhat sloppy in the end despite his best efforts. His dexterity was at an all-time low between the sleepless nights, unwillful starvation, and his emotional suffering. But it would have to do. He lit the candles haphazardly and ended with the one directly in front of him, then began to recite the chant.