The robots had stopped chasing him. He turned to see if they'd gone, but instead he saw them change into a man. A man with a patch over one eye. The newcomer opened his mouth as if to speak, but before he could, the scene was replaced by blackness.
Sun streamed through the small gap in the curtains, illuminating the triangle-patterned bedspread and lighting up the early morning dust that shimmered in the air. He glanced at the clock. It read 7:05. Less than an hour to go until we leave. Phineas stretched out, yawning, his body bathed in sunlight. Climbing out of bed, he walked sleepily over to his wardrobe. He still hadn't finished packing, and although he had already packed his toolkit and folder of blueprints, he had neglected to include any clothes- much to the annoyance of his mother.
Pulling on his usual attire of a striped orange t-shirt and blue shorts, he shoved the rest of his wardrobe into the suitcase that lay open on the floor and zipped it up, only succeeding by sitting on the lid and pulling at the zipper with all his strength. He hoped he hadn't woken Ferb, and glanced cautiously at his brother's bed. It was empty. Typical Ferb. Just like him to be organised early.
Dragging his suitcase behind him, Phineas walked slowly downstairs. It wasn't as if he wasn't eager to go on holiday, it's just that the strange dreams he'd had during the night had kept him awake for several hours, and he was still extremely tired.
'Phineas, I'm afraid we're going to have to leave now, dear. You can eat breakfast in the car' shouted his mom, Linda, from inside the kitchen.
Great. Now I won't be able to have beans on toast. Looks like dry cereal for me. Dragging his suitcase out the front door and to the car, Phineas noticed that his Sister Candace was already seated, next to his green-haired stepbrother Ferb. Luckily, Ferb had opted for the middle seat, leaving Phineas his favourite position of the right hand side.
'Hey Ferb, hey Candace' yawned Phineas, noticing that somebody had very kindly left him a Tupperware box of cheerio's and a spoon on his seat. Lifting them up, he noticed a brochure of some kind underneath them.
'That's the leaflet all about the stupid place Mom and Dad are dragging us to. I bet there's, like, no cell service out there.' said Candace, pulling out her phone and beginning to text away with her super-speed-teenage-girl thumbs.
'But Candace, it looks so cool! Look, there's a lake, a giant forest, a water tower...' Phineas grinned. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad after all. He began to flick trough the pages as his parents got in the car. He didn't even notice when the car pulled away from the driveway or that Candace had deposited Perry on his lap. The Cheerio's lay forgotten on the floor.
The place looked mysterious, even just from looking at the small photographs. The misty woods, the old shack, the water tower with a muffin spray painted on it... Gravity falls certainly seemed like a cool holiday destination.
But something caught Phineas's eye.
In the corner of the last page, in amongst details of the chalet costs, was a string of jumbled up letters-
GDKO TR. LZADK ZMC CHOODQ.
What could it mean? He quickly tried making an anagram of the first word. Nothing. Same for all the others. Then what could the rule of the code be?
'Try doing one letter forwards from each' said Ferb, startling Phineas. He wasn't aware of his brother watching him, and it as a shock whenever he spoke.
'Um, Ok.' Phineas wrote out the alphabet on he back of the brochure. Starting with GDKO, he made out the word HELP. Then, continuing along the sentence- HELP US. DIPPER AND MABEL.