neverjoinyou | lastvoyages IC Inbox

"UUUGH, BUT YOU GOT IN THE WAY. I SHOULD'VE KNOWN. I SHOULD'VE KNOWN!"

He goes back to pacing, in the opposite direction this time.

"LOOK, I LIED TO YOU, ALRIGHT? THE GUY THAT MADE ME IS DEAD. BUT IT WAS SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE AN ACCIDENT."

Early on in the port, Bill stole the body of the man who created him. Pretty routine. Luke had been there for that.

Just before the final fight, Bill had become a triangle again. He'd dodged questions about why, and where his creator's body had gone, and claimed it was still intact.

As apparent proof, he appeared to be wearing the same human body during the fight where Luke died, and stood next to him as a human. That's as much as Luke stayed alive to see.

"I WAS WEARING AN ILLUSION. ERSKINE WAS SUPPOSED TO KILL ME, WHICH WOULD DESTROY MY PHYSICAL FORM! EVERYBODY WOULD SEE HIM KILLING THE MEAT PUPPET I WAS INHABITING - IT'D BE HIS FAULT THE GUY WAS DEAD, AND NOBODY WOULD GO LOOKING FOR A CORPSE!"

This doesn't surprise Luke nearly as much as maybe it should. Is he disappointed? Yes, but he's not shocked. But he does realize that any progress with Bill has an as-yet undetermined number of steps back for every one forward.

"I realize this doesn't make sense to you," he says slowly, thinking it through for himself. "But I'm going to tell you, anyway. I'm more upset that you lied to me than that you killed him. And if Erskine had killed the man, I wouldn't have been angry--because he'd have done it thinking he was taking down someone he thought was dangerous." Luke rubs his eyes with his hand. "But you knew I'd be upset that you killed that man, and so you knew enough to know it was wrong. Or at least, that I would think it was. Why do you care?" He watches Bill closely, though his expression is actually more curious than angry. "What made you hide it?"

He remembers the conversation with Fives, reluctantly.

"THE GUY DIDN'T DESERVE ANYTHING LIKE THAT. I JUST WANTED TO DO IT. AND I DIDN'T WANNA EXPLAIN MYSELF TO A BUNCH OF PEOPLE WHO DON'T WANT TO HEAR ANYTHING THAT MEANS THEY COULD BE WRONG."

Luke shakes his head.

"You're not making sense," he points out. "You're admitting he didn't deserve it, and that the people who disagree with you are wrong. You can't have that both ways. We don't agree with you because he didn't deserve it. You're acting like there's no context for any of this. Just you getting what you want, versus not. That's not the same thing as morality.

"IT'S NOT MORALITY! IT'S - "

Bill turns, breaks eye contact.

"HE REALLY HAD MY WORLD IN HIS FIST, WINGS. WE WERE JUST PUPPETS, AND NOBODY WANTS TO HEAR THAT. THEY THINK I'M CRAZY 'CAUSE I CAN'T PROVE I'M RIGHT. BUT I KNOW. I'VE ALWAYS KNOWN. AND IF I KEPT HIM ALIVE, I'D NEVER BE ABLE TO STOP WONDERING WHICH THINGS I DID WERE REALLY COMING FROM ME AND WHICH WERE COMING FROM SOMEBODY USING ME FOR ENTERTAINMENT. I'D NEVER BE ABLE TO KNOW IF I WAS REAL OR JUST THOUGHT I WAS."

Luke takes a deep breath.

"Don't you think I wonder that every day since I got here?" he asks quietly. "I've spent the past four years of my life trying to life up to a future that people a lot older and a lot smarter than me believed was my destiny. I broke that future, and then I came here--and learned it had all been someone else's holofilm. So what am I supposed to think? Am I real? Am I a tool of the Force? Is my life being written by a filmmaker or a cosmic power? And if I never do find out, how do I move forward?"

He does not expect Bill to answer any of these questions.

"It is about morality. Because morality is about choosing right or wrong. And yeah, it's more complicated for you, because you learned something that affected your perception of whether you can choose. But here's the thing--either you chose to kill him, which was your moral choice, or you simply did what was written. So either way, has anything changed?"

"IT CHANGES TO ME."

Bill turns back around.

"LOOK, I DON'T KNOW ABOUT HOW ALL THIS INTERACTS WITH RIGHT AND WRONG, BUT I KNOW PEOPLE DON'T BELIEVE ME OR DON'T CARE WHEN I TRY TO EXPLAIN THIS. AND I BET THEY WOULDN'T BELIEVE YOU OR CARE EITHER. THAT WAS MY WHOLE REASON I NEEDED HIM DEAD. SO IT WAS JUST EASIER TO NOT EXPLAIN IT AT ALL. LET PEOPLE THINK WHATEVER THEY WANT, I DON'T CARE."

The big sulk he's doing now indicates that he does, in fact, care.

"That's why we're here," Luke insists, growing slightly irritated again. "To figure out how 'all this' interacts with right and wrong! You went straight from assuming people don't care about you to needing some poor man dead. Don't you see what a huge leap that is? Don't you see that something being difficult isn't a good moral reason? Gods. I risked everything to avoid killing the one person everyone in my life told me had to die for us to win the war, because I thought there had to be another way. Don't you think I would have fought for another way for you, too?"

Bill looks ... a little lost. He holds up his hands in a T-shape: time out.

"EITHER - I DON'T UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU MEAN OR YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND WHAT I MEAN. OR BOTH."

Awesome, so it's like every other conversation they've ever had.

"Okay," Luke says, considering. "So which part do you want to start with?"

"I CHOSE TO KILL HIM. I'D HAVE KILLED HIM WHETHER OR NOT PEOPLE UNDERSTOOD OR CARED WHY."

Bill shifts. Okay, so, what's a good metaphor...

"YOUR DAD NEEDED THE EMPEROR DEAD TO BE FREE. IF YOU WANT TO THINK OF IT LIKE THAT, GO AHEAD.

Luke waves away the metaphor--he doesn't need to think about dad. And it's not the same thing.

"It's not the same thing," he says. "Let me start with this--you say you chose to kill him, but did you? Can you be sure? If your theory was correct, how do you know you chose to kill him?"

"BECAUSE HE WOULDN'T HAVE WANTED TO DIE."

Easy one. The guy wasn't the kind to set up long cons that his death would benefit, wasn't suicidal, had stuff to look forward to.

Wings is really still sitting, huh.

Bill reluctantly floats down lower, near the tops of the grass.

Try to be patient with him, Bill--Luke is trying to use logic.

"Okay, so he wouldn't want to die. What allowed you to kill him, then, if he controls you? I mean, just the fact he didn't expect you to be real and in his universe? Because... it seems like if you had the free will to do what you did--get into his universe, take an action he could not control--you also have the free will to have gone about this a different way."

Does that make sense?, his expectant expression asks.

"THE BARGE."

He does have an answer for that one.

"THIS PLACE - "

Bill gestures up to the ship looming back the way they came.

"THIS ISN'T HIS DOMAIN. I'D NEVER HAVE BEEN ABLE TO PULL THIS OFF WORKING OUT OF GRAVITY FALLS, HE MADE SURE OF THAT!"

"Fine," he says, conceding the point, for what it's worth. "But that sort of proves my point. You had an opportunity, and you took it. So far, so good, and I can't imagine faulting you for it. But what you did with that opportunity. Is it the only possible course of action you could have taken?"

"NO," Bill admits.

"IT'S THE ONE I WANTED TO TAKE. I WANTED TO DO THIS."

He looks over at Luke, finally.

"IS THAT BETTER? OR WORSE?"

Is that what you wanted? Bill is pretty sure it's 'worse.'

Luke steels himself. It's what he expected, more or less, so he's not surprised. And in fact, he thinks it's a good thing, this conversation. Getting Bill to admit what he actually did. If Luke shows anger now, it may be interpreted as another reason not to talk to him.

"Let's forget that for the moment," he says. "I'm not your jury or executioner, here. Most of the people on the Barge have killed someone." Well, he doesn't have the actual statistics on that, but it's close enough. "For me, anyway, it's not about a list of actions you did or did not do, totaling up to 'good' or 'bad.' It's about the context. Do we do these things because we feel there's no choice, or out of self-defense, or some other overpowering factor? Or do we take pleasure in the cruelty and suffering of others?"

He watches Bill.

"I don't think either extreme is true, for you. You did what you wanted to do, because it felt good but also because it was one method of overthrowing a power he had over you, and a man is dead. You would do it again, I'm guessing, if you could tweak a few of the things that went wrong. And now you're upset because people don't understand, and are treating you in a way you don't like. Does that sound accurate, so far?"

Bill watches all this, his expression neutral.

"YEAH..."

Where's the catch? is what that tone means.

Bill knows he's smart enough to create choices, but also knows that there are hard limits to what he's able to accomplish. One of those hard limits had, previously, been his showrunner. Bill wants to be free, and doesn't have any qualms about going the direct route to get there.

There was an element of revenge, in this, but it was cold. Almost scientific: the man in question had to be made to fight against Bill and fail in order for Bill to be certain that the scales of power had tipped.

Deep breath.

"Okay. So you took a course of action, chose one branch of many possible. You weren't backed into a corner, so there was some discretion about how you handled it." Luke gestures between them with a hand, then sort of to the wider world. "Now, people have different opinions about it. Some question your motives, some question your means, and some question the amount you took their needs and wishes into account. Don't you think that's fair, given that you've just admitted yours wasn't the only possible course of action?"

Bill huffs.

"YEAH."

But it's complicated, isn't it?

"So basically, you're mad because there are social consequences to your actions and you don't like it."

He lets that hang there.

"I'M MAD FOR A LOT OF REASONS!

NOBODY CARES THAT I KILLED AL. THEY CARE THAT I CAST THAT SPELL AND MADE A PORTAL. BUT THAT'S NOT WHAT YOU ASKED!"

Luke shrugs.

"What I asked isn't really the point," he says. "I'm trying to get you to understand why people are reacting this way. Because this is part of living in a society and having free will. You sort of have to deal with the consequences. Am I wrong?"

"I DO, BUT - "

Bill is having trouble articulating and makes little fists in frustration.

"LISTEN! I DIDN'T HAVE OTHER OPTIONS FOR BUILDING THE PORTAL. NOBODY BELIEVED ME WHEN I BROUGHT IT UP - NOBODY EVEN BELIEVES ME NOW!"

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i spy a boy 👀