Mabel's first three weeks of high school were one-hundred-percent normal. She went to school, hung out with her friends, did her homework, and made fun of Dipper.

It was super boring.

And then something awesome happened. Dipper and Mabel were walking home when there was a flash of light, and everything on their block turned pink. The houses, the trees- even Dipper was coated in neon pink stuff.

The twins shared a look.

"What do you think-" Mabel began.

"We should check it out," Dipper agreed.

They ran in the direction the light and the pink stuff had come from. More flashes flew by them, and Mabel and Dipper did their best to dodge.

"Sparkle rainbow tsunami!" a girl's voice called. A giant, sparkly, rainbow-colored wave flooded past the twins.

"So cool," Mabel whispered.

Dipper frowned. "Focus."

The magic was coming from a girl Mabel's age. She and a boy were surrounded by monsters that were different from any Mabel had seen before. With a shared glance, Mabel and Dipper split up and circled around. Mabel watched while her absurdly pink brother scrambled up a tree.

When he was in position, Mabel jumped out and yelled at the monsters. "Hey ugly! I'm over here!"

Three things happened at once.

Number one, Dipper jumped down from the tree and grabbed hold of the closest monster- a big, lobster-looking guy- and covered its eyes.

Number two, the boy took advantage of the lobster-monster's distraction to use some sort of super-awesome ninja powers on it.

And number three, the girl raised her magic wand into the air and shouted, "Super butterfly banishment!"

Giant butterflies flew out of her wand and swirled around the monsters, herding them into a group. The butterflies flew faster and faster until Mabel couldn't tell them apart anymore. With a crack!, they disappeared, and with them, Dipper and the other boy.

"Dipper!" Mabel shrieked.

"Marco!"

"Where did they go?" Mabel demanded.

"I'm not sure, actually. I've never done that spell before." The other girl rubbed the back of her head sheepishly. "But we'll get them back!" She grinned. "I'm Star, by the way. Star Butterfly."

Mabel smiled back, reassured. "Mabel Pines. And the doofus who got disappeared was my brother, Dipper."

"Well, I also kinda accidentally banished my best friend Marco," Star said. "But I might know how to get them back. Come on!" She grabbed Mabel by the wrist and tugged her along, chattering about magic and Mewni all the while. Mabel weighed in with abridged stories from Gravity Falls and her thoughts on unicorns ("jerks"), gnomes ("way annoying"), and mermaids ("over it").

Star lived in a normal neighborhood, except for the house with a mushroom-like tower sprouting out of the side. That, of course, was the Diaz's house, where Star lived. They said hi to Mr. and Mrs. Diaz, petted the puppies with laser eyes, and trotted up the stairs to Star's bedroom.

Star pushed a giant pile of dirty laundry out of the way, and lugged a huge, ancient-looking book into the middle of the floor.

"This is my magic instruction book," Star explained. She opened it in the middle. "Hey, Glossaryck!" She watched the book, as if she were waiting for something.

Mabel looked carefully at the book. Nothing seemed to be happening. "Um…"

"Oh, right, he said he was going on vacation."

"Who said?" Mabel was pretty sure she'd missed something.

"Doesn't matter. Guess we'll have to look through here ourselves." Star sighed heavily.

"Great. This is the kind of nerd stuff I usually leave for Dipper," Mabel complained. Even so, she reached for the book, and began to flip through it. It wasn't very well organized; it reminded her more of Great-Uncle Ford's journals than any real book she'd ever seen. Star was lying next to her, looking at the pages from the back to the front. Eventually, the two would meet in the middle.

The girls were about to take a break for snacks (although not Marco's Super Awesome Nachos, which Star had made Mabel promise to come back and try sometime). "Found it!" Mabel called.

"What's it say?" Star asked, despite the fact that she was right next to Mabel.

"I can't read it," Mabel said. "Just the spell. The rest is in another language."

"Oh. Right." Star propped herself up on her elbows. "Apparently I accidentally banished the boys to Crystalline Jungle." She dug in her desk and pulled out a pair of scissors. "Ready to go?"

Mabel took a deep breath and let it out. "Ready."

Star used the scissors to cut a hole in the air, which Mabel thought was really freaking cool. They stood side-by-side and looked through the hole.

Mabel couldn't see anything beyond. "Are you sure you know what you're doing?" After all, Star had accidentally banished Marco and Dipper to another dimension. Maybe she wasn't very good at this magic stuff.

"I travel between dimensions all the time!" Star said. "It's no big deal." She held out a hand to Mabel. On impulse, Mabel took it.

Hand-in-hand, they stepped through the dimensional portal.

It was clear they weren't on Earth anymore. The ground they were standing on was white and sparkly, so bright it almost hurt to look at. The sky was cotton candy pink. And, most importantly, crystal spires of all colors jutted out of the ground, criss-crossing past each other and reaching hundreds of feet into the air.

"Whoa," Mabel said.

"Wow," Star said at the same time.

The two girls looked at each other and giggled, some of the stress of the situation falling away. Mabel suddenly realized she was still holding Star's hand and dropped it.

They set off in a random direction.

"Marco!" Star called. "Marco Diaz!"

"Dipper!" Mabel yelled.

No one answered.

This went on for a few minutes, and Mabel's throat had begun to get sore. She was just about to ask if Star had any better ideas when she heard a growl behind them.

"You heard that too, right?" Star whispered.

Mabel nodded.

Slowly, they turned around.

A giant crystal tiger was stalking them. If it wasn't so scary, it would have been really cool- it was made of crystal, like everything else in this dimension, but it moved just like a real tiger.

Mabel looked around for something to use as a weapon, but it was like this world didn't have any rocks. Or branches. Or random junk piled up because Grunkle Stan refuses to throw it away.

Luckily, Star had her wand. "Glitter shark swirl!"

True to her words, a bunch of sharks exploded from her wand in a burst of light and glitter, and chased the crystal tiger away.

Excited by the victory, Mabel gave Star a quick hug. "That was so cool!"

"I know, right! Magic is the best!"

"Star?" A boy's voice, this time, from farther away.

"Marco!" Star grabbed Mabel's hand and the two girls ran in the direction of the voice they had heard.

The boys were in a clearing of sorts, and the many crystals surrounding them made a prism-like illusion. Dipper, who was still pink, was looking more disheveled, and his clothes were torn.

"Sorry about all of this," Star said. "I should probably study that spell a little more."

"You think?" Marco sounded seriously irritated.

"Do you realize what this means?" Dipper asked. "I mean, we knew there were multiple dimensions, because of Bill, but we never knew how many! I just have to figure out how to prove it!"

"Yeah, we should probably get home before Mom and Dad start wondering where we are," Mabel cut him off before he got any more distracted.

Star pulled her scissors out of a pocket. First Dipper, then Marco, then Mabel and Star left the Crystalline Jungle and found themselves once again on Earth. The boys quickly made their way downstairs, leaving Mabel and Star alone in Star's bedroom.

"This was fun," Star said to Mabel.

Mabel smiled, feeling strangely shy. "We should hang out again sometime."

"Yeah!"

They stood there for a moment, neither one of them quite wanting the day to end, but neither one of them knowing what to say.

Mabel grabbed a pen off of Star's desk. "Can I see your hand?"

Star obediently held out her hand, and Mabel scribbled her phone number on it.

"There. Now you can call me," Mabel said.

"Mabel! Are you coming or what?" Dipper yelled from downstairs.

"You should probably go," Star said, but didn't take her hand away from Mabel.

Instead of leaving, Mabel tentatively leaned forward and pressed her lips to Star's. (Her lips were soft, but not slimy or sticky. Just the right texture.) They pressed together for a few moments, then pulled apart.

"I should go," Mabel said, suddenly embarrassed. She dropped Star's hand and darted toward the door.

"I'll call you tonight!" Star said.