TEN MINUTES EARLIER

"What?" said Fidds, his voice a little hysterical.

"Quiet," said Lee. He undid the belt at his side and held it out, knife and all. "I need you to do this for me."

"No!" Fidds said, the word bursting from him without a second thought. "No, I'm not going to—"

"Quiet."

Fidds lowered his voice and hissed, "I'm not going to kill you."

"You have to. Andrew's gone. And I can't do it."

"I can't do it either," Fidds protested. "It has to be someone else."

"Who?" Lee demanded. "Ford? That'll never happen. Melody? I'd never ask something like this of her. And I definitely can't ask any of the kids."

"Why would you ask me?" Fidds said, his voice strained. "I can't do it. You can't ask me. Why not one of the other minotaurs with us?"

"Who knows if they'll be with us by the time we get to Bill?"

"Lee, you can't—"

"Look," Lee said. "You offered yesterday to do anything I asked. Well, I'm asking you to do this."

"But—"

"You said yourself that it's like you killed me thirty years ago when you wiped my memory. Now you have to do it again."

Fidds was stricken. "I. . . I can't. . ."

"Please." Lee pressed the sheathed knife into Fidds' hand. "Please do this for me. Take this, hide it under your clothes, and be ready. We have to get to Bill, and you have to be the one to stop him."

Fidds shook his head.

"Please."

There was a long moment of silence. There was no way Fidds could do this. Right? Absolutely no way.

But. . . he had to.

"Okay," Fidds whispered. A few tears slipped down his cheeks.

"Thank you," Lee replied, his voice also a whisper.

Fidds tied the belt around his waist and hid the knife under his clothes. He hated every moment of it. He hated Lee for asking him to do this. He hated Bill for inhabiting Lee's body and leaving no other option.

He hated himself for agreeing.

"Let's get back to the others," Lee said, "before anyone gets suspicious."

He turned, but Fidds grabbed his shoulder before he could walk away. "Why? Why are you being so secretive?" he asked Lee. "Don't the others have the right to know?"

A stark look of pain came to Lee's face. "Do you want to be the one to tell them?"

Fidds didn't have a response to that. No. He didn't.

"There's always a chance that something else will work," Lee said, though he sounded very doubtful of that. "Let them have their hopes."

"Isn't that crueler than telling them?"

Lee's hands curled into fists. "Maybe it is."

Before Fidds could reply, Lee turned and walked away.

Fidds, feeling hopeless and horrible, followed.

~~~~~

PRESENT MOMENT

Lee cried out, almost as if he felt the pain of being stabbed.

He didn't. But he heard the knife cutting into flesh, saw the sudden red in his periphery, even felt some of the blood splatter into his hair. He didn't dare look — his head was turned sharply to the left, with his eyes locked on the carpet.

Fidds stabbed again. And again. He sobbed as he did it, but he kept going. Lee, without looking, moved a hand up to the neck and felt for the carotid artery, finding a pulse. It seemed Fidds would keep going until that pulse stopped.

Lee felt absolutely sick, but he held his position — kneeling on the ground, looking down at the carpet, one arm braced on his own chest, the other feeling for his own pulse. His own stuttering, dying pulse.

It was percussion to Ford's screams.

Everyone else had quieted down — hopefully looking away. But Ford was screaming, sometimes in unintelligible words and sometimes in raw noise. Lee hoped Ford had looked away, but he wasn't sure he had. Between Ford's screams and Fidds' sobs, it felt like Lee was going deaf.

But he wasn't. He was just dying.

How strange it was to feel his own body dying while inhabiting the body of another. He could almost feel phantom pains in Greg's body. He realized in a fleeting moment that he hadn't thought about what would happen to his spirit once his body died. He wouldn't be somehow forced out of Greg's body, would he?

But no, he wasn't forced out. He was just feeling the shock and horror of it all.

"Stop," he whispered to Fidds. "Stop. Please."

Somehow Fidds heard him, even through the noise. He stopped. The knife thumped to the carpet.

Lee could still feel a pulse in his neck, but it would stop soon. The ribcage might've stopped a few stabs, but surely Fidds had pierced the heart eventually. It wouldn't beat for long.

Fidds was still sobbing, and Ford was still screaming. It was Gideon who took command. "Everyone—" he started. But he couldn't be heard over Ford's screams, so he used his amulet to shut the man's mouth.

Ford furiously continued screaming through a closed mouth, but at least it wasn't as loud.

"Everyone get into position for the Cipher Wheel," Gideon said. "Or at least start moving. Get in position around Ford. The spell should lift soon, and then we'll be able to form the Wheel and stop Bill for good. This isn't over yet. We have to keep going."

Thank you, Gideon, Lee thought. Someone your age should never have to do what you're doing right now. But thank you.

With Ford quieted, Lee could hear some of the others' crying. He just hoped they could effectively form the Wheel. With all the shock of the past minute, would it be possible?

And did Bill have any backup plans? Any other bodies he could possess?

While Lee was worrying about that, he hardly felt his heart stop. Hardly felt himself die.

But then he realized that the pulse beneath his fingers had faded away. And the weighty, life-draining effect of Bill's spell had ceased.

The Symbols were free. And it didn't seem like they'd reached Bill's dimension.

"Wheel. Now," Gideon directed as soon as the spell lifted.

Lee could look up now. But he didn't dare look at the bloody body beneath him. He closed his eyes, stood up, and walked until he thought he was standing opposite Ford. Then he moved his head to look Ford straight on and opened his eyes, adjusting his position.

Ford stopped screaming. He stared desperately into Lee's eyes.

Lee could see the others getting into position. Gideon was on Ford's left, and needed to be on his right, so he walked around him without turning away from him, without taking his eyes off him and canceling the amulet's magic. Then Mabel came, her eyes squeezed tightly shut, and felt around for Ford's left hand. Dipper took Lee's hand on the right, Pacifica on the left. Both were crying.

Fidds stumbled over to Gideon to join the Wheel.

Wendy, who stood on Fidds' right, shied away. "Wendy," said Gideon, "take Fidds' hand."

She made a pitiful sound of fear and disgust. Lee felt his stomach lurch at the thought of taking Fidds' hand, with fresh blood on it. Lee's own hands were bloody, but it was from Andrew's injury earlier, and the blood had dried somewhat. Not so for Fidds.

"Take it, Wendy," Gideon demanded. He didn't turn to look at her, but his voice was forceful.

Everyone was ready — everyone was grasping hands. Except Wendy, who looked like she was about to be sick, and Fidds, who looked much the same.

"Now," Gideon said.

So Wendy took Fidds' hand.

The multicolored glow of the Cipher Wheel appeared immediately. Lee felt a lurch of hope. That was good, wasn't it? The magic was working, and they could form the Wheel, right?

"Think of Bill," Lee said, closing his eyes. "Think of stopping Bill."

But that was impossible to do, knowing that his own dead body was only a few feet away. Lee couldn't focus, and he doubted anyone else could, either. He started sensing the others' confused, panicked thoughts, and he felt how scattered those thoughts were, and he despaired of ever uniting the Symbols' minds.

The Wheel, thankfully, wasn't going to be stopped by the Symbols' inability to focus. The room buzzed with power, and the magic of the Cipher Wheel knew that this was the time.

So, even while Lee was thinking about how he should be thinking about Bill but instead was thinking about the horror of the last few minutes — and thinking about how the others also weren't thinking about Bill but they should be — even with that, the magic rushed in, overtaking Lee's mind and everyone else's, and suddenly they were shoved into the Cipher Wheel.

And the determination to defeat Bill overruled any other thought.

~~~~~

The Wheel was ready to stop Bill Cipher.

The demon was there. In the mindscape. No backup plans, no other bodies to possess. He was alone and exposed. Oh, he tried to flee — but with the mindscape free from the constraints of physical distance, the Wheel had no problem catching up to him. They pursued him until their view was high above the forest, with the false moon suspended in the air and the stars from the current unknown dimension splayed across the sky.

Bill was darting through the air, his yellow triangle more of a yellow streak of light as he moved. But surely he knew it was pointless. The mindscape had visuals, but they didn't really mean anything. Not in the way power meant something.

The Wheel's power meant something.

Their magic grabbed ahold of Bill, forcing the yellow streak to a stop. He turned. "You really did it, Blind Eye! You let yourself be murdered!"

We are not Blind Eye, the Wheel said. We are the Cipher Wheel.

"And Portal-Bound! I can hardly believe you would do something so horrible to your friend. Or is he your friend? I guess it'd be hard to be friends after you wiped his memory. It's almost like you murdered him twice."

We are not Portal-Bound, the Wheel said. We are the Cipher Wheel.

"Are you?" Bill said. "Or are you ten people, trying desperately to hold the Wheel together even though you've all been struck with a sudden grief?"

We are the Cipher Wheel. You will not break us apart. We are here to destroy you.

"Oh," Bill said, "but you can't." He tried to sound confident and superior, but it was clear that he was the one who was getting desperate.

Yes, we can. We will destroy you.

Bill turned red, then grew to about three times his size. "You can't destroy me!" he thundered. "I am immortal!"

The Wheel was unfazed. Bill could change color and size all he wanted, but he was still held fast by the Wheel's magic. We can stop you, the Wheel said calmly. We will strip away your power until you are but a speck of dust in a vast prison.

"You'll only prolong the inevitable," Bill said. "This prison cannot hold me forever!"

True, said the Wheel. But those currently alive, and those born in centuries to come, will live their lives in peace and safety.

"Oh, please," Bill said, turning yellow again. "As if I'm the only threat to people. What about war? Disease? All sorts of other tragedies? You, Symbols, will have to deal with grief once you return to your bodies. Seems to me that it'd be better to free me and let me destroy it all."

The opportunity to live is worth the tragedies, the Wheel said. Don't you feel it? The beautiful physical life throughout the multiverse? The opportunity for progression and growth? There's more to life than just life, although life itself is beautiful in its own right. But everyone existed before their mortal life and will exist after it, on a journey to never-ending joy and—

"Stop!" Bill snapped. "Don't get all mushy and spiritual on me. I don't care about beauty or progression or whatever other nonsense you can spout off about."

Oh, the Wheel said innocently. I thought you'd prefer it to a sudden demise.

Bill's eye was a narrow slit; fury radiated off of him. There was no way to get away from the Wheel, and Bill knew it perfectly well. The Wheel didn't have to be holding a conversation with him. They could've already destroyed him by now. But they wanted him to know what was going to happen to him. Wanted him to know why. They knew it was futile, but they wanted to give him a final opportunity to see the good in the universe.

He wasn't going to.

The Wheel knew what he had done. They knew the darkness he had chosen. They knew that, after choosing such darkness, he no longer had the ability to choose light at all.

No more, they decided. No more talk. No more gestures of goodwill. It was time for the Wheel to use the power they had and get rid of Bill Cipher.

So they tore him apart.

Bit by bit. Strand of power by strand of power. The Wheel reached into Bill's spirit and ripped away his abilities, his consciousness — everything.

Shards of yellow fragmented off of Bill's triangular form.

"No! No!" There was no confidence in the demon's voice now. No superiority. Nothing but pure desperation and terror as Bill was destroyed piece by piece. "You can't destroy me! I am immortal! I will outlive you puny humans and everyone else! And when I finally get free, I'll destroy the earth and all of your descendants! And even if I don't haunt your nightmares, your memories of me will! You'll never be free of me!"

The Wheel kept working. Patiently. Methodically. Even without a body, Bill was a complex being who would take some time to disassemble. The Wheel took everything he had and peeled it back, pulled it off, cast it away.

"You hear me, Blind Eye? Lone Wolf? Pine Tree? Your thoughts will forever be haunted by my memory, and you'll live the rest of your lives knowing I still exist, and I'm waiting somewhere in the shadows, preparing to return and wreak havoc on the universe. No prison can hold me forever. The anci e n t s  k n e w  t h a t   a   n   d   s  o   s   h   o  u  l  d   y   o   u  .  .  .  ."

His voice weakened. Layer after layer of sound fell away. The words quieted, slowed down. Bill kept talking, but the Wheel was taking that ability, too. Visually, almost all of the yellow of Bill's form was gone, save the part around his eye.

Then the Wheel took that too, and Cipher could no longer speak.

His final words whispered through the mindscape: "I    w   i   l   l    r   e   t   u   r   n   .   .   .   ."

The Wheel didn't pay any attention. They still weren't done.

Bill's power was such that he couldn't be utterly destroyed. But he could be scattered. He could be shattered into dust and spread across the mindscape. His pieces would slowly reform over the centuries, and the Wheel needed to be sure that there were no two pieces of him together to start with. They needed to be sure that his reformation would take as long as possible.

Piece after piece. Strand of energy after strand of energy. Bill was pulled apart again and again by the Wheel, ground to dust by their strength.

Finally, finally, only one piece remained. The core of Bill's intelligence: the central piece of life that made Bill Cipher who he was. The Wheel had whittled him down to this last shard. This dust mote.

With a final sweep of magic, the Wheel blew the dust mote away into some far-flung corner of the mindscape.

Thus was Bill Cipher vanquished.