Well, I haven't posted anything in ages, so you can have some billdip trash to make up for my absence. In case you can't tell already, this is basically my Billdip Youtuber au. It's probably pretty bad compared to a lot of other fanfictions on here, but here it is, and I hope you enjoy. (Also, just as a note, this is set in a slight au style Gravity Falls, where there is no supernatural stuff, but there are still a lot of scientifically interesting things, so, for example, instead of a deer centaur type thing, there might just be a deer with a genetic mutation that gives it a half-formed extra leg, or something like that). Anyway though, you probably don't want to hear me rambling, so I'm going to shut up.
Chapter One
Dipper Pines, was, as could be vouched for by many people, one of the least likely people to take on work that would involve dealing with a large amount of people. Yet here he was, 21 years old, with a degree in Creative Writing, Halfway through writing his first novel, standing in the front door to Gravity Falls' very own Tourist Trap, The Mystery Shack. The main set of keys to the door sat in the palm of his hand, just another reminder that he was in charge. If someone had asked him 10 years ago where he wanted to be in life- He'd probably respond with anything but this.
But here he was, suddenly in ownership of Gravity Falls' biggest ripoff, and, to be perfectly honest, he had no idea what he was doing.
So maybe he had agreed with his Grunkle Stan to take over the Mystery Shack when he retired if he didn't have a job by then. But that didn't mean he was expecting for his Great uncle to retire in the exact few week interval when he was looking for a job. Stanley Pines, a certified con-man, who probably should be in jail for the kind of prices he sold t-shirts for, had only just left Dipper in the doorway to the Mystery Shack, and he was already feeling overwhelmed.
Dipper had expected to know what to do the moment he had stepped through the door. After all, he had worked in the Mystery Shack almost every summer since he was 12 years old, alongside his twin sister Mabel. Granted though, he never really did much work inside of the actual Shack. Dipper much prefered to explore the woods that surrounded the town, following the observations made in a Journal, filled with notes made by his Grunkle Stan's brother, Stanford Pines, who was killed before Dipper or Mabel were born, when an experiment involving the seemingly impossible cliffs that framed the entrance to the town backfired in a catastrophic way. Stanford's Journal still remained, however, detailing all the scientific phenomena that he has discovered over his years spent in Gravity Falls, and his extensive notes were now combined with Dipper's own handwriting, as he filled in any blank spots and corrected results and readings; his understanding of the town's strange features growing along with his intelligence every year.
Now that he was back in Gravity Falls, however, Dipper was unsure of what to do. No longer with the freedom to spend his days in the woods, and a half-finished draft for a book his only current prospect for income, he would need to find a way to earn money, and the Mystery Shack was, at this point in time, his only decent chance of doing so.
Faced with the sudden realisation of what he had gotten himself into, Dipper was, to put it simply, more than overwhelmed. To the point where he felt as if he would be sick. Pulling open the door to the Shack that was apparently his home now, Dipper dragged his Laptop out of his bag and made his way into the nearest room that had the closest thing to a desk; which just happened to be Stan's office.
"Or my office now, I should say." Dipper mused out loud to himself, his voice cutting through the silence painfully, and causing him to flinch out of fear of disturbing someone, even though he was the only one there. He instantly regretted the statement, as it only caused the wave of sickness to rise even higher, the realization that he was in charge of the Mystery Shack just causing him even more worry. Dropping the laptop down onto the desk and opening up Skype, Dipper was relieved to see that Mabel was online. Moral support and Optimism was what Dipper needed right now, and that was what Mabel seemed to do best. That, and coming up with obscure colour combinations that could probably give someone cataracts just from looking at the clothing designs she created.
Pressing the call button, Dipper waited, then almost laughed out of relief as Mabel's face popped up on the screen, a grin decorating her face. Some things had changed about Mabel since her and Dipper had last spent the summer at the Mystery shack- her hair had been cut to shoulder length and was currently laced through with purple streaks, which dipper could have sworn were blue only a few days ago, and a large pair of round, pink-framed reading glasses balanced on her nose as she leaned close to the screen and practically yelled into the computer.
"Hey DipDop!" After all, only some things had changed. Dipper raised his hand and waved wearily into the webcam, pushing his own glasses back up the bridge of his nose before responding.
"Hey, Mabes." He yawned, running a hand through his hair, which was sticking up in the air, seeming to defy the laws of physics. Dipper was pretty certain by now that his hair was a sentient being. "I just got the keys to the Mystery Shack and Grunkle Stan's just sort of left me here." Mabel leaned back and folded her hands behind her head, rocking back slightly on her spinning chair, giving Dipper a glance of her sweater of choice for the day- Neon pink with a Lime green cat on the front. Classy.
"Aww Lucky you, DipDop! You've got the whole place to yourself and I'm still stuck here with my stinky room-mate." There was a disgruntled noise from across the other side of the room, and Mabel swung around on her chair waving to whoever had made the noise. "I'm just kidding Pacifica! You know I love you really, even if you do smell!" Mabel spun back around to face the webcam, and Dipper sighed in exasperation.
"It's really not that amazing, you know. I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing here! I don't know whether I'll be able to get away with ripping people off like Grunkle Stan did, so I'm going to have to find a whole new way of running this place. I need some help, or at least some support." Mabel paused, evidently thinking, then shuffled forwards aggressively on her spinning chair and slammed her hands down onto her desk so loud that Dipper was concerned about whether she has shattered all the bones in her hands.
"You know the woods really well, DipDop, so why not run tours of them? Show people all the science nerd stuff, you know- take them to see the cliffs, that weird rare grass you got excited about, that deer with five legs that you kept spotting. People would totally pay to see that- and you get to rant about all your nerd stuff!" A spark of hope lit inside of Dipper, and he grinned at his sister.
"Mabes, that might actually work! I could do that! Oh wow you might be onto something here." Mabel shrugged in response.
"It was just an idea, no need to worship me over it." A wicked grin spread across the twin's face. "Actually, who am I kidding- it was brilliant." Dipper laughed lightly, then reached over to flick the webcam.
"How do I even put up with you." Dipper reached up to attempt to flatten his hair again, then turned back to his computer. "How should I advertise it though? People know this place as the Mystery Shack, and to be perfectly honest, the sort of people who would visit for the tacky fake exhibits that Grunkle Stan would display probably wouldn't exactly be interested in being dragged around the forest. I need to find a way of drawing in a new audience." Mabel paused again, tangling her hand in her hair in thought, however she was interrupted as another face joined her's on the screen, the face of Mabel's enemy-turned-best-friend-and-roommate, Pacifica Northwest, her blonde hair ruffled from what must have been a swift movement across the room, her golden hoop earrings swinging lightly.
"You should make a Youtube channel, Dipper! Everyone watches Youtube, so if you filmed some videos of the stuff you can see in Gravity falls, people would be sure to see it and be interested!" Mabel nodded in agreement to Pacifica's suggestion.
"That's a great idea! Then me and Pacifica could see what you're getting up to as well." Dipper paused, thinking the idea over in his head. He had never really had much experience with youtube- aside from the stupid channel he posted videos on when he was 12- so he didn't really have any idea how it worked. But what Mabel and Pacifica were saying was true- it would be a good way to bring attention to the tours that he would soon be running from the Mystery Shack. Plus recording himself saying some stuff about each of Gravity Falls' Phenomena would give him some practice for the things he would be saying in the tour.
"That sounds like a good idea- thankyou, Pacifica!" He confirmed, and the blonde-haired female shrugged modestly, then waved and stood up to walk back to her side of the room, pushing Mabel's chair as she walked so that it spun around slightly, a startled laugh escaping the brunette, who almost went toppling off the chair.
"There you go, Bro-Bro. No need to worry! You have this sorted!" Mabel spoke as soon as she had righted herself, and Dipper nodded his head slightly.
"I guess I did panic a little too much. Thankyou; you really helped." Mabel grinned.
"No problem! Anything to help my Bro-Bro! Plus now I can get you to watch some really great youtubers that I've been trying to get you to watch for ages!" Dipper rolled his eyes as Mabel began to list off a long monologue of youtube channel names, none of which he planned on ever watching, as Mabel had been attempting to get him to for years. "Oh, I know which one you'd love. You should check out mIndscape's channel. He does some really interesting stuff that I think you'd like." Despite trying to drown out the name along with the other ones, Dipper found his attention caught, and he made a motion of agreement.
"Yeah, sure. I'll take a look at them." By which, he meant that he'd probably only check out the final name. 'mIndscape'. Mabel smiled at him, then paused, looking up at the clock that hung on the wall in her and Pacifica's brightly coloured room, in the University where the two of them were studying on the same Design course.
"Sorry DipDop, I have to head along to a class- go and do your nerd stuff- you'll be great!" Dipper opened his mouth to say goodbye to his sister, but the brunette shut off the call before he could, leaving the room in silence again.
However this time, the silence was punctuated by the noises of his fingers skimming across the keyboard as Dipper went through the sign-up procedure for Youtube, the red and white colour scheme glaring back at him through the screen as he raced through the steps, an unexpected surge of excitement as he moved his cursor into the area that would allow him to name his channel. He hesitated, thinking of what exactly to put as the name of what would probably be his main way of drawing in income. Glancing off to the side, he saw the journal, sitting in the hallway. Sticking slightly out of his bag, the golden, six-fingered with the number three written upon it was clearly visible, and a spark of inspiration struck him. The perfect name for his channel. A wide smile passed across his face as his fingers flew over the keyboard once more.
Channel Name: Journal Number 4
As Dipper clicked to submit the name, he felt a small wave of satisfaction pass over him. He was getting things done. He was going to do things for himself. He was going to make the Mystery Shack his own place to run and come up with ideas for. At that point, Dipper probably should have attempted to get some writing done, or study the Journals, or at least draft some stuff up for what would be his first video, but he couldn't bring himself to. Far too hyped up on energy to even attempt calm productivity, Dipper made the decision to stick on youtube for a little while longer, his fingers hovering over the keys as he pondered over what to search for.
mIndscape
The name popped into his head once again, and Dipper made up his mind, typing the name into the searchbar and observing what turned up. The first thing was a link to what was obviously the channel that Mabel was recommending to him. The first thing that Dipper took note of was the subscriber count of the channel- close to one million. Next, he noted the profile picture the account- what seemed to be of a man with an unruly wave of blonde hair, his face hidden by a triangular shaped mask with a single eye in the middle- a crude representation of what most people would know as the symbol of the Illuminati. Upon further investigation of the channel, he found that the owner of it produced a huge variety of content, from Playthroughs of games to dramatic readings of Horror Stories, he seemed to do everything, but what seemed to make mIndscape unusual to so many people was that not one person had any clue of who he was. Not once had he shown his face or used his real voice in a video, always disguised behind the Illuminati mask and a voice filter that warped his voice into a high-pitched tone that resonated back onto itself in echo-like tones. The evidently successful youtuber also seemed to be far from sane, his game commentaries especially spitting out some lines that could be passed off as borderline psychotic, namely on one video, which was simply a montage of him dying in as many ways as possible in the space of five minutes, with added narrations that were mainly high-pitched bouts of warped laughter. Dipper was simultaneously disturbed and entranced by this strange person- who, in his mind, was a challenge, a code, a puzzle, one that he wouldn't be able to rest on until he cracked.
Dipper coughed to himself, reminding himself that this was another human being he was talking about, not a new, strange species of moss he found in the woods and wanted to probe with a stick to see what it did. If mIndscape wants anonymity, then he would give him his privacy. Clicking through some of the extra tabs on mIndscape's channel, Dipper came across the 'About' section, and read it through.
"HEY MINDSCAPE HERE. BEFORE YOU EVEN ASK, NO I WILL NOT SHOW MY FACE OR VOICE ON ANY OF MY VIDEOS. NEITHER WILL I SEND A DRAWING, PHOTO, COLLAGE, FLESH CARVING OR ANY OTHER ENVISIONMENT OF MY FACE TO YOU. NOR WILL I SEND YOU A RECORDING, WAVE GRAPH OR SCREAM OF ETERNAL DAMNATION FROM THE DEMONS THAT LODGE INSIDE ALL OF OUR EYEBALLS TO DEPICT MY VOICE. MY ANONYMITY MAKES ME FEEL POWERFUL AND I ENJOY IT. FEEL FREE TO TRY AND FIGURE OUT WHO I AM THOUGH. GO ON. I DARE YOU."
Well wasn't that just infuriating.
Yeah, I'm sorry it's so bad
