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[neverjoinyou]

Leave a message. I will hear you.

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[neverjoinyou]

"About three weeks," Luke says, and when he notices Bill checking for all his parts, he goes over to another drawer and pulls out Bill's satchel, which he'd made sure to keep safe while Bill was out. "How are you feeling?"

[tetractys]

Bill brightens. Yeah, that!

"HEY, THANKS! YIKES, THREE WEEKS.

DISORIENTED, I GUESS. I THINK I'LL LIVE!"

[neverjoinyou]

"I'm glad," Luke says a little dryly, though he's visibly relieved to have Bill back. Still, he sobers as he hands him the bag and sits down near where Bill's floating. "Hey," he says, putting his hands on his knees and looking Bill in the eye. "I'm sure you want to go... stretch your legs, say hi to Ford, all that, but there's something we need to talk about."

Uh oh is right, Bill.

[tetractys]

Aaaaaaah shit.

"IS IT THAT I DID SOMETHING GOOD AGAIN?"

No, try again Bill.

[neverjoinyou]

Yeah.... no.

"No. Well, possibly--I'm sure you've done some good things, and I really like my presents, so thank you, but... That is not what I wanted to talk to you about."

Presents, Bill. Can you think of anything that might be related to that?

"Remember when I was worried about you giving a knife away?"

[tetractys]

"TOLD YOU, I GAVE IT TO A WARDEN. I DON'T THINK HE EVEN USED IT BEFORE I TOOK IT BACK."

[neverjoinyou]

Luke waves a hand. "That's not the point, I don't care about the knife. What I care about is that you gave a dangerous weapon to an inmate."

Does that jog your memory, Bill? At all?

[tetractys]

Honestly, not really. Give him a minute. You're not gonna trick him into blurting something out this time! Sneaky.

"IS IT TOO LATE TO BE INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY?"

[neverjoinyou]

Luke sighs.

"I'm sorry--I should just tell you what happened." If he waits for Bill to figure out everything he's ever done wrong on his own, well, they wouldn't even be here. "You gave Beetlejuice a present. Two presents, actually. And two people died, as a result."

[tetractys]

The good news is that he remembers now.

The bad news is that a laugh bursts out of him before he can really stop it.

"AND I MISSED IT?"

[neverjoinyou]

Luke crosses his arms and frowns.

Like, really hard.

[tetractys]

"DID THEY NOT COME BACK OR SOMETHING?"

[neverjoinyou]

He has to pause a moment so as not to make the first sound that occurs to him.

"Bill," he says, with the patience of a saint, "that's not the only reason killing people is bad."

[tetractys]

Right. Okay.

"I MEAN, IT HURTS, BUT LOTS OF THINGS HURT!"

Pause.

"I CAN TELL YOU WANT ME TO TAKE THIS SERIOUSLY, BUT THE WHOLE THING WAS REALLY JUST A JOKE."

[neverjoinyou]

While they've come a long way, it's times like these that remind Luke just how ... alien Bill Cipher is. Which shouldn't surprise him anymore, though apparently he's still capable of that emotion. He's unsure what to make of that.

He centers himself.

"Bill," he says patiently, "does it mean anything to you when I say that most people, being mortal generally, don't find death... funny?"

[tetractys]

"I KNOW. I'M NOT GOING TO CONVINCE YOU ABOUT MY WAY OF SEEING THIS, EITHER!"

Even though he was (maybe?) on skates and that's objectively hilarious.

[neverjoinyou]

"No, you're not," Luke says seriously. "Because it's not really a matter of how you see it. It's not funny because... for us, the consequences aren't minor. It's not like someone putting salt in your caf, which is also not at all funny but doesn't intend to kill you. You engineered a situation where an inmate killed two other people. What if they hadn't come back to life? What if dying was really traumatic for them? What if the experience of being sliced in half and bleeding to death wasn't really fun for them?"

[tetractys]

"I THINK IT'S EXTREMELY UNLIKELY THEY WOULDN'T COME BACK TO LIFE! THE ONLY TIME I'VE SEEN IT HAPPEN IS WITH YOU, AND THOSE WERE WEIRD CIRCUMSTANCES! THAT WAS BAD!"

'Bad' is a word here meaning: Bill was extremely upset and had panic feelings that he doesn't like to revisit by remembering them.

"I'M NOT GONNA DO THAT ONE AGAIN!"

For one.

[neverjoinyou]

At no point has Luke raised his voice or become angry; he knows it won't help, and it's not a feeling he likes anyway. It's touching, that his death had hit Bill so hard. But the compartmentalization brings home just how far they still have to go.

"You hurt people, Bill," he says quietly. "It doesn't matter that they came back--first of all, that's not the usual way of things. And you caused them pain, and distress, and pain and distress to the people who love them. And to Beetlejuice, who is supposed to be learning to value other lives. I'm not sure how to make this real for you, but hurting other people for your own gain... that's wrong. At the very most basic level."

[tetractys]

Bill is starting to get frustrated instead - it's like they're speaking two different languages and can't communicate.

"BUT IT'S OVER NOW. IF IT'S BEEN THREE WEEKS, THEY'RE FINE!

...

I'M NOT DOING THIS ON PURPOSE. I'M TRYING."

[neverjoinyou]

Luke takes a moment to think about this. He's not sure where they're not connecting, only that he knows Bill can't make the leap to other people having feelings about this. He bites his lip.

"Are you fine?" he asks. "When you think about me dying. When you think about breaking up with Ford. When you think about where you came from. Are you fine?"

[tetractys]

"WELL, I DON'T LIKE TO THINK ABOUT THAT! BUT NO! BECAUSE YOU'D BE GONE."

But they're not gone!

"I'VE HAD A LOT OF THINGS HURT ME. I'VE HAD A LOT OF THINGS PUT ME UNDER PRESSURE! YOU JUST, I DON'T KNOW. GET MAD! AND KEEP GOING!"

Okay. He can do this. Bill frowns, concentrating.

"WHEN I GO BACK TO FORD'S CABIN, I REMEMBER DYING THERE. AND THAT'S UNCOMFORTABLE, EVEN THOUGH IT'S OVER. SOMETHING LIKE THAT?"

[neverjoinyou]

"Yes," Luke brightens a little, encouragingly. "It's not just the moment that matters. It's all the stuff that goes with it, and how it makes you feel after. I mean... Okay."

He flexes the fingers of his right hand.

"I guess you could say that it doesn't matter that I got my hand cut off, right? Because look! I have another one. Good as new, right? But for me, it's not the same thing. Because every time I look at it, I remember that I used to have a hand that was part of me, not a machine. And I remember that my father cut it off. And I remember all the other stuff that goes along with it. So the fact that I have a hand and it works fine... that's almost beside the point. Does that make sense at all?"

[tetractys]

"WHAT IF YOU COULD GROW IT BACK THE SAME, WOULD THAT FIX IT?"

No, he is guessing? But. Why. Does it do this. Bill's cane is hooked around his satchel, and he picks it up to fidget with it while he's thinking.

"I DID A LOT OF AWFUL STUFF TO FORD, AND HE FORGAVE ME. HE HAS A BIG SCAR DOWN HIS SIDE FROM WHERE I ELECTROCUTED HIM. I THREW YOU DOWN THE STAIRS ONCE! I MEAN, YOU WEREN'T THERE AT THE TIME, SO IT'S A LITTLE DIFFERENT..."

[neverjoinyou]

Luke shakes his head.

"It wouldn't," he says. "And just because stuff affects us, doesn't mean it's all horrible. I remember what my father did, but I don't hate him. In a way, what we went through made our relationship complicated, but not, in the end, bad. Just like how... you went through stuff in your dimension that you didn't like, that wasn't good, but which made you who you are.

"It's the same with you and Ford. You've been through a lot, and in some ways it's probably made your relationship richer. So it's not that all bad things need to be erased. But what happened here was senseless. It doesn't add anything because there's no context to it other than hurt. Does that make any sense? Ford can forgive you, because there's more to you than that one memory."