The Cache of Friendship?

Sighs filled the attic as the young paranormal investigator stared at the ceiling. He was officially bored without his Grunkle Ford, who said he couldn't come down to the basement today due to a particularly dangerous test he was running. Dipper could tell the old man was upset about this too though, as he said "Sorry kid, I wish I could assure your safety and have you along but-"

"Cheer up Dipper!"

Cue his thoughts being interrupted by his perky twin sister.

"I know, but it's gonna be so boring here. Grunkle Stan and Soos are working on re-building, Grunkle Ford says I can't visit him today, Wendy's taken a trip up to Portland for the weekend, and you're sleeping over at Candy's tonight."

Mabel seemed to pause for a moment and began to think. Darting her eyes around the room, she let them rest on the piles of books that lay at the foot of her brother's bed.

"You could use the peace and quiet to read your mysterious mystery books!"

"Mabel you already know I've read all those a few times right?"

She groaned as mentally cursed her brother's "know-it-all" persona, till she came up with the answer.

"Well then you just have to get some more."

Walking towards their shared night table, she rummaged through some of the stuff they've collected over the summer and pulled out what she was looking for, immediately thrusting it into the hands of her brother.

"Huh, I was wondering where my library card was."

"Under the bag of emergency Smile-Dip."

"What?"

"NOTHING!"

She rubbed the back of her neck nervously as her brother inspected the card.

"I guess a trip to the library should do me some good."

"Exact-o mundo bro bro! Well I'm going to head out to Candy's now, have fun with your books ya big dork!" She cheerfully replied, playfully sticking out her tongue.

Dipper huffed and rolled his eyes at his sister whilst waving her bye with a small smile.

After she had gone he too began making his way out the door- or at least he would've if Grunkle Stan didn't turn him around on his way out the door demanding that he take the shower that promised for the last few days. Once the quick shower was over with, began trekking across the town. Which was a lot worse for wear honestly, and that came from someone living in an infested out of the way shack.

Even the library had sustained some damage, though miraculously only half of the roof caved in. It seemed to be mostly cleaned up and the owner seemed intent on keeping the place open, so she used a tent to replace the ceiling. There was even more people than usual, probably due to the fact that cable TV was still down for about half the town.

He walked into the makeshift building and realized that the librarian was angrily stomping towards a laughing Lee and buried beneath books Thompson. He decided to get a closer view of the action from behind the shelves.

Suddenly he thought that a noise was going on behind him but-

"Phsst!"

Okay he definitely heard something. He looked around to find the back room of the library slightly open, and after feeling a harsh pull on his arm was standing face to face with-

"Pacifica?!"

She immediately shushed him and pointed at passerbyers outside the difficult to see through window.

"Do you want to let the whole town I'm here?"

She was dressed in a similar get-up to the day she knocked on his door needing his help, expect the trenchcoat had been replaced with a blue hoodie.

"Why? What's going on?"

"My parents grounded me for the rest of the summer, I'm only out cause they're off on vacation and the servants are grateful to me for saving their lives."

It made enough sense to Dipper, besides if the servants kept their mouth shut her parents probably wouldn't even notice.

"Oh, ok… wait. Why did you drag me into a dark back room?"

Both their eyes seemed to pop open a bit after they realized how that sounded.

"I mean- do you need me or something?"

"Yes. I found this back in the manor."

After shifting through a larger purse, she brought forward an old book, so old that the leather was peeling off and the title was unintelligible. Opening it up he found what looked like old recipes to create certain materials.

"Where did you-"

"Under the squeaky floorboard in the library, after we found that secret room I got a bit curious about what else my family been hiding. I always thought that floorboard was weird and I was right. After checking some of the library at home, I came here to see if I could find anything… then I saw you and decided it would be better to just ask the dorky guy obsessed with the paranormal."

He raised an eyebrow at the "dorky" comment and let it slide in favor of her thinking highly of his opinion. After flipping through a few more pages a couple symbols started to pop up in his mind.

"Hmm… this looks like alchemy, a lot of it seems to be stones and runes for magical items."

He kept on giving the book a once over until suddenly a pointing finger appeared aiming at a title.

"Look!"

Dipper began to read the words out loud as-

"The Cache of the Grand Shamen. Wait why does this one interest you?" he stated whipping his head up to face her, and then bringing it back down once he realized how close they were.

"Because I recognize that statue, it's in the next town over."

Taking a closer look at the diagram it appeared that opening it involved solving a particular code and allowing the light of the full moon to shine through the glass eye of the mighty deer the statue presented.

"Does it say what's in it?"

"Yeah, it's in code though so give me a sec."

Dipper pulled out a piece of pencil and paper out and began decoding from memory, having spent so much time decoding this summer he had ciphers completely embedded in his brain. Unbeknownst to the boy however was how the blonde's eyes had widen as she couldn't determine whether she was more shocked at his nerdiness or amazed how he memorized all this stuff.

"Okay, I'm just about finished… there it is."

The code read "The Grand Shamen have protected this woods for centuries, he who wishes to do the same is welcome to our collection of protective-" before cutting itself off.

"Where's the rest of it?"

"The letters were faded out."

"So it's just a protective something or other?"

Dipper shut the book.

"Appears so. Just for curiosity's sake, how far away is that town?"

"About fifteen minutes, why? Don't tell me you're planning to hike over there-"

She paused as she watched him quickly put away what appeared to be notes into his backpack and began heading towards the door.

Before he could turn the doorknob a flash of blue now stood in the way straining her teeth.

"Are you crazy!"

"Nope, you said the town was fifteen minutes away so I should be able to get there in a about an hour."

"Won't your family worry about where you are?"

She got a rather quiet, deadpanned response in return.

"Everyone at the shack is either busy or out today, I was looking for something to do anyways. Now if you don't mind…"

His hand was poised to to grab the knob before he was interrupted again.

"Wait."

Dipper shot her an annoyed glare as once again she seemed to just stop him for no reason. Until he noticed her taking a deep calming breath like she was mentally preparing for-

"I wanna come with."

He looked at the heiress as if she grew a second head.

"I mean Wiston could drive us and I could come along with the book to help, also I don't have anything better to do." She avoided his eyes during that last part.

There was silence as the solo mystery twin considered her offer, it sounded perfect since he didn't have anyone else that could help out and that ride would be extremely convenient…

"Ok."

With the simple utterance of that word the new team was formed, consisting of a nerdy, paranormal chaser, and the girl who was the belle of the town. They figured it had to be seen to be believed.