Billy 'Bill-E' Spleen

Infobox character | name = Billy Spleen
first = "Lord Loss"
last = "Demon Apocalypse"
alias = Bill-E
gender = Male
family = Cal Grady (father, deceased)
Emily Spleen (mother, deceased)
Grubitsch "Grubbs" Grady (half-brother)
Gretelda "Gret" Grady (half-sister, deceased)
Dervish Grady (uncle)
Bec MacConn (ancestor)
Juni Swan (distant relative)
portrayer =
creator = Darren Shan

Billy "Bill-E" Spleen is a character from Darren Shan's Demonata series. He is half-brother of the main protagonist, Grubbs Grady, but he believed that Dervish is his father (and therefore, Grubbs his cousin) until Lord Loss revealed the truth in book 6, "Demon Apocalypse". He suffered from the same disease (Lycanthropy) that led to the death of Gret Grady at the hands of demons. Dervish and Grubbs saved his life but he was not informed of that fact until a few months later. He also has a noticeably lazy eye. He is featured in "Lord Loss", "Slawter", "Blood Beast", and "Demon Apocalypse," and he plays a major role in the series. Although he and Grubbs were close at the start of the series, in "Slawter" and "Blood Beast", there relationship is constantly tested by Grubbs's new friends. In "Blood Beast", Grubbs's friend Loch bullies Billy a lot, and this drives Billy to let Loch fall and die. This begins the reopening of the tunnel seen in "Bec". Billy's life is ended when Grubbs kills him in "Demon Apocalypse" to avoid the reopening of the tunnel.

Close family

*Grubitsch Grady: Grubbs (short for Grubitsch) is Billy's half-brother. Billy befriends him when he moves in with Dervish at Carcery Vale. Like his Uncle Dervish he also has a cruel taste in pranks. Grubbs never revealed to him that he was Billy's half-brother, as he had intended to in "Slawter". He waited for the right moment to bring up this revelation, and never got the chance.

*Cal Grady: Grubbs (and Billy's) father and Dervish's brother. It appeared that he was happily married to Sharon, his wife, but it turned out that while visiting Dervish in Carcery Vale he had a one night stand with a local woman, resulting in the birth of Billy.

*Ma and Pa Spleen: Billy's over protective grandparents. In "Blood Beast" they are thought to be killed by Grubbs when he is struck with lycanthropy, but later revealed to be killed by Juni Swan (or Nadia Moore).

*Dervish Grady: Billy's uncle. He battles Lord Loss alongside Grubbs when fighting to cure Billy of his lycanthropy. Billy originally believed him to be his biological father.

Biography

Billy first meets Grubbs, who is actually his half-brother, in "Lord Loss". They soon become good friends and spend a lot of time with each other. At the end of "Lord Loss", Dervish tells Grubbs that Billy is really his brother, but they decide not to tell Billy.

In "Slawter", Grubbs and Dervish take him to the Slawter set with them.

In "Blood Beast", his relationship with Grubbs becomes strained. Grubbs now has a group of new friends, including Loch Gossel, who constantly picks on Billy, and he harly spends any time with Billy anymore. The day after Grubbs's party, he becomes very frustrated with Loch and decides to go look for Lord Sheftree's treasure. After Grubbs explains to Loch what the treasure is and how he and Billy used to go searching for it, Loch decides to join Billy in the search; because he is not feeling well, Grubbs does not want to go, but the other two convince him to join them. After a long time of searching, Loch is about to leave, but Grubbs recognizes the place where they are from when Billy and he were spying on Dervish in "Lord Loss", so he decides to dig one last hole there. What they do not realize at the time is that this is actually the entrance to the cave from "Bec" after having been filled in. They begin to think that this must be where the treasure is buried, so the decide to dig here everyday until they find it. One day, after the hole has gotten to be several feet deep, Billy is digging by himself in the hole until he breaks through the dirt that had been used to fill in the hole, revealing the shaft that leads to the cave. After some hesitance from Grubbs, the three go down into the cave. The all begin to explore the cave for the treasure. After giving up on the treasure, Billy and Loch decide to try to climb one of the cave walls, but Grubbs decides not to because he is feeling ill. As they are climbing, Loch slips and falls off of the wall, hitting his head. As Billy goes to get help, Loch dies from head trauma. Billy blames himself for not catching him as he fell, and he becomes very depressed; Grubbs tries to comfort him be telling him that he would have just been dragged down with Loch because of his weight, but it does not help much.

At the end of "Demon Apocalypse", Grubbs discovers that since Billy 'sacrificed' Loch by letting him fall, he is now the key to opening a tunnel which will allow thousands of demons to come to earth. Grubbs is forced to kill Billy to close the tunnel, but does this in a painless way, by instantaneously stopping his heart with magic.

Appearances

* Lord Loss
* Slawter
* Blood Beast
* Demon Apocalypse