[September 2012; First Day of 8th Grade]
"Let's go Dipper, we're going to be late!"
Mabel Pines shouted ecstatically at the top of the steps of the school building. Summer had just ended the day before, when she and her brother, Dipper Pines, returned from their faithful summer at the one and only Gravity Falls.
To both of them, it had been a huge mixture of bizarre, crazy, weird, and absolute madness. Although within that mixture, there had also been much fun, thrill, and overall excitement, despite the most disastrous events. They fought gnomes, zombies, a shape-shifting monster, lumberjack ghosts, unicorns, and a dream demon which nearly brought the end of the world.
Dipper and Mabel Pines had gotten through it all. Not alone, of course. That summer was originally planned as a normal summer to stay with their Great Uncle Stanley Pines, although they normally call him their Grunkle Stan. From the moment Dipper found the journal in the middle of the woods, he had a feeling Gravity Falls was not what he expected it to be. Things had changed most after the return of Stan's twin brother, Stanford Pines. From that point, the summer was heading in multiple different directions that eventually led to one eventual outcome: Weirdmageddon.
This was the summer's highest and riskiest point. Especially for Dipper, who had struggled through a good portion of the event on his own, with his sister encased in her own world, and one of his Great Uncles turned to gold. It was a rough time. But by the end of it all, they had made it. When all hope and seemed lost, they survived and made it through with no major loss. And the most important thing that Weirdmageddon had done was make them stronger. That if two twelve-year-olds, almost thirteen, could survive the apocalypse, then they could survive just about anything.
Dipper Pines, however, struggled to simply walk up the main stairs of the school as he carried an overloaded backpack that tugged down on his spine and a stack of textbooks in his arms. This was the hardest thing he had done since Weirdmageddon.
About a week prior to the summer's end, Dipper and Mabel's parents had gone to their school's open house night to retrieve information on the twin's classes and school supplies. Mabel had it easy, only needing to carry her fairly light and brightly decorated backpack, as to fit her style. Dipper, having been signed for a bunch of more advanced courses, didn't have it as easy. He basically had a textbook and a binder for just about every single class and it weighed him down hard. He didn't mind so much having to have what's needed for his class, but it had become an immediate realization that fighting off an apocalypse didn't prepare him for having to carry a stack of 8 textbooks.
He continued to struggle climbing up the steps. His back was in pain and he needed to take a break, but he kept pushing himself upwards. Eventually, he started to break a sweat and just couldn't keep going. He collapsed down to his knee and dropped half of his textbooks on the ground.
He looked up at Mabel, who was just standing at the top of the stairs looking down at him with her arms crossed.
"Hey, since your arms are empty, care to lend a hand?" Dipper asked through his panting.
Mabel groaned while throwing her arms in the air. She proceeded back down the stairs. "Why do you smart people have to go and take the super smarty pants courses? Why can't you be like me and just be in regular classes?" She asked while picking up Dipper's dropped textbooks. "With that big head of yours, it's not like you'd fail."
Dipper got up from his knee and continued walking up with steps, with Mabel following. "Well, regular classes don't give high school or college credit, so I think I'll just stick with what I got. A few textbooks aren't gonna stop me." He said.
"Ha, tell that to the stairs." Mabel chuckled.
"Yeah, well, it's just something I gotta get used to. If I have to carry this bag and these textbooks up these stairs every day just to get some college credit, then so be it."
As the two finally reached the top of the steps, they can hear the school bell ringing throughout the area.
"Hmm, I wonder if they still hand out college credit to people who're late," Mabel says with a slight grin.
"C'mon, it's the first day. I doubt they'll do anything," Dipper said, as he changed the position of his arms holding the books to open the door. The two walk through, leaving the door to shut behind them.
"Oh really? These advanced classes don't have advanced expectations for nerds like you?" Mabel teases, Dipper rolling his eyes in response.
The two walked through the halls of the school until they reached the main locker halls. The plan was to head to Dipper's locker to store his textbooks and then they'd both go on their way to their first hour. Since the first bell already rang, the halls were barren at that moment.
"231, 232, 233…ah, here we go. Locker 234!" Dipper read aloud. He sets his textbooks down on the floor so he has access to the lock itself.
He popped the locker open and the two put Dipper's stack of textbooks inside his locker, barely managing to fit them all inside. Dipper closes his locker, letting in a deep breath and exhaling loudly, expressing his exhaustion from the whole process.
"Man, that was tiring. But it's done," he says, then turns to his sister, "Thanks for the help."
"Don't mention it. I'm always here to be the muscle to your fragile, little bones." She teased while laughing at her own wit.
Dipper didn't appear amused though. Instead, he just grabbed his bag from the ground and straightened the lumberjack hat he wore on his head before proceeding to walk down the hall. Mabel's smug look slowly faded into one of concern.
"Dipper?" she called out to him as she quickly caught up to him in the hall. He turned to look at her as she continued to walk right next to him. "C'mon, I was only joking."
"Huh?" he asked in confusion. But then he immediately processed and understood what she had meant after. "Oh. No, that's not…I'm fine. Just a bit anxious is all."
"Anxious about what?" Mabel asked, walking in front of him as they climbed up a stairway.
"I don't know. Just being here again, I guess," Dipper said with dismay, placing his hands in his pockets as he continued walking up the stairs. "Maybe I got a bit too comfortable back in Gravity Falls. Just not sure if I'll be able to readapt to the school environment again."
"I know how you feel," Mabel said with empathy. "This morning, I couldn't stand leaving Waddles back home by himself. So, I didn't!"
At that moment, Waddles' head popped out of Mabel's backpack while she was in front of Dipper on the stairs and oinked right in his face, surprising him.
He stood shocked on a single step. "You brought Waddles to school in your backpack? Mabel, are you crazy?"
"C'mon Dipper, it's not like I didn't leave it open for him to breathe," Mabel explained, rolling her eyes as she reached the top of the stairs. "Plus, I didn't bring any of my other supplies so it's not like he didn't have room either."
"Mabel, that's not the..." Dipper stopped, facepalming before continuing to follow her upstairs. "You know what, I'll let you deal with that. I didn't know about any of this."
"Whatever you say," Mabel said dismissively as she pet Waddles in her bag, waiting at the top of the stairs for Dipper. "Anyways, you shouldn't be anxious about school, Dipper. We've faced so much worse this summer. I'm sure whatever school throws at you will be nothing compared to a demon triangle or an evil, creepy child. Trust me Dipper, you got this! We got this!"
Dipper caught up with her at the top and smiled, "You're right. What do we have to worry about? A couple of As instead of A-pluses are nothing compared to the threats like Gideon or Bill used to be."
"Yeah, quite the comparison you made," Mabel said, rolling her eyes at what Dipper considers a threat in school.
"And at the very least, we have homeroom together," Dipper said. "So we can't say we don't have any classes with each other this year. Unlike last year."
"Yep!" Mabel said eagerly. "The great room 324."
"Actually, it's room 325," Dipper corrected.
"No, I'm sure it's 324," Mabel argued.
"Well, I'm sure it's 325," Dipper reiterated. "I reviewed my schedule this morning. I'm positive about it."
"So did I," Mabel said. "And it said 324."
Dipper dug into his pocket, taking out a folded piece of paper. He unfolded the piece of paper and turned the front toward Mabel, pointing his finger at 'Room 325' on his schedule. "See? Room 325. Mr. Thomas."
"What?" Mabel asked in disbelief. "But mine said 324, Ms. Rady. I didn't have Mr. Thomas."
The two then noticed two doors right beside them. They had both had their own sign next to them. The left door was Room 324, Ms. Rady. The right door was Room 325, Mr. Thomas.
Dipper stared at the two signs, eyes narrowing in annoyance. "You've got to be kidding me."
"So we don't have homeroom together?" Mabel asked disappointedly.
"I guess not. Which means just like last year, we don't have any classes together," Dipper says, also disappointed with the whole situation.
"Well, I mean, we still have lunch together," Mabel reminds him. "At least there's that. We could hang out then. I'm going to make some new friends by talking about all the adventures we went on this summer and I bet it's probably not gonna be easy to convince them. You could help back me up later!"
"I mean, I guess that's better than nothing," Dipper says, smiling slightly, "Lunch it is then."
"Yep!" Mabel agreed joyfully while playfully punching Dipper in the arm. She then flipped the top of her backpack back over Waddles' head. "Alright, Waddles. I gotta hide you again."
Waddles oinked before unexpectedly jumping out of her bag and running through the halls. "Waddles!" Mabel shouted as Waddles continued running. "Aw man, mom and dad are gonna kill me if they find out about this. They already don't like me bringing Waddles home in the first place!"
"Well, you better catch him before any of teachers or administrators do," Dipper reminded.
"Argh!" Mabel groaned. She dropped her bag and quickly ran after Waddles. "Come back, Waddles!"
Dipper watched her run off, shaking his head at the fact that his sister brought Waddles to school in the first place. He turned toward the door of Room 325 and took a deep breath. He opened the door to the room and walked inside with a confident smile.
"Hey, it's Dipstick!" a voice called out, immediately wiping the smile right off of Dipper's face. The announcement brought the eyes of everyone else in the class his way.
In the middle of the classroom sat a boy wearing a familiar black shirt that read 'STRAIGHT FEAR', with a bulldog's face placed right in the center. It was Trevor, Dipper's childhood bully. Trevor tormented and picked on Dipper constantly when they were younger. It wasn't until he moved away at the end of the fourth grade to another school in Berkeley, which now seems to only have been a temporary break from said torment. Seeing him again after all this time replaced Dipper's confidence with pure horror.
"Dipstick! What's going on, buddy?" Trevor called out. "You're like ten minutes late, bro. I thought you cared about perfect attendance?"
Some laughs were heard around the classroom. Others just smirked and others just dismissed the entire situation. A boy in a dark navy hoodie that sat in the back of the classroom angrily eyeballed Trevor. Dipper was frozen in place, still horrified and distraught at Trevor's unexpected return.
"That's enough, young man," the teacher, presumably Mr. Thomas, called out to Trevor as he stood from his desk. Trevor noticeably snickered as he sat back in his chair. The teacher directed his focus toward Dipper. "And what is your name?"
Dipper shook his head quickly, breaking from his horrified trance so he could address the teacher. "Um, Dipper Pines, sir."
The teacher looked down at his clipboard and flipped through it. He raised an eyebrow before glancing back at Dipper. "I don't have a Dipper Pines on my roster, but I have a Mas-"
"YES!" Dipper loudly and swiftly responded, cutting the teacher off before he could finish announcing his real name to everyone, also grabbing the attention of everyone else in the class once more. Part of being late on the first day meant that he couldn't go through the ritual of personally clarifying his nickname to the teacher ahead of time. With everyone's attention directed toward him once again, he cleared his throat and calmly responded. "Yes, that's me. Just call me Dipper, please."
The teacher stared at Dipper in continued shock for a moment before writing on his clipboard. "Alright, Dipper Pines. Please sit down in that empty seat in the fourth row," he said, pointing out to an empty spot placed in between a bunch of students that Dipper didn't recognize.
Dipper quickly sat in the specified seat, folding his hands. He hoped to just squeeze in without directing any more attention to himself.
"Anyways, I believe we've waited long enough," the teacher said, placing his glasses down on his desk. "My name is Mr. Thomas and I'll be your homeroom teacher this school year."
Dipper listened to Mr. Thomas giving his introduction talk, sitting quietly in his chair like everyone else in the class. He tried to relax after tensing up from his 'grand entrance'. He looked around the classroom, noticing the variety in student behavior that sat in the class. While some students were paying attention to Mr. Thomas, others were either asleep, falling asleep, or generally paying attention elsewhere.
As Mr. Thomas kept giving his introduction, Dipper felt something hit the back of his head. He placed his hand back, finding a piece of wadded up paper that was shot in the back of his head. He turned around and spotted Trevor a few seats back in the row beside him, but he appeared as if he wasn't even paying attention to him. Dipper narrowed his eyes before turning forward again.
Within a few seconds, Dipper was shot by another spit wad. He turned toward Trevor once again, and he looked the exact same way. Dipper looked at the other students behind him, but none looked suspicious or expectable enough as Trevor was. He looked forward again, and as expected, more spit wads were shot right at him. This time, Dipper didn't turn around. He took several hits over a course of a few seconds until he quickly turned around to finally catch Trevor in the act. But he didn't hide, proceeding to shoot a spit wad directly at Dipper's face. He laughed loudly at his success, while Dipper remained visibly unamused and annoyed by the whole ordeal.
Trevor's outburst caught the attention of Mr. Thomas, however, and was promptly approached by him. He silently put his hand out to him, clearly asking for him to hand the straw over, which he did. Mr. Thomas continued his introduction as he walked over to a trashcan to throw the straw away. Dipper wiped off all the spit wads that he had taken to the back of the head and face, letting out a sigh of relief now that the situation was concluded.
However, within a few moments, he felt another spit wad hit the back of his head. Surprised, he turned around and noticed that Trevor had another straw on him. Fed up but exhausted by the issue, Dipper turned forward with an annoyed look on his face and simply took every next shot that Trevor had at him without looking back again or doing anything about it, wishing to cause no further commotion or interruption that would bring more attention toward him. So he simply let Trevor have this win.
In the back of the classroom, however, continued to watch the boy in the dark navy hoodie, who continued to angrily eyeball Trevor's actions against Dipper. He narrowed his eyes even further, putting complete emphasis on his visible frustration.
The bell rang, indicating the end of the first class period and the start of an early lunch period. Students began pouring out of each classroom, making their way toward the cafeteria. Dipper walked out of Mr. Thomas' class brushing off all the spit wads that covered the back of his head and hat. He thought it was a miracle that he managed to escape first period alive with a need for nothing but a shower to wash off any remains of Trevor's saliva on the back of his head.
After brushing his lumberjack hat clean, he placed it back on his head. Remembering his deal with Mabel to meet up at lunch, he looked among the nearby crowd of students walking down the halls for her, considering that she was right next door to his first class. Unable to find her anywhere in the halls, he had to search around the cafeteria when he got there.
Eventually, he found her sat at a table with another group of girls, talking and laughing away. He sighed and approached the girls.
"And just when we thought we were going to fall to our death, I pulled out my grappling hook and saved us at the last second," Mabel told the girls.
"Wow!" a blonde girl with very large glasses exclaimed.
"So cool!" a black haired girl agreed.
"And what happened to the evil demon child?" the blonde girl asked as Dipper walked up right behind Mabel.
"Oh, don't worry. He lived," Mabel replied. "Fun fact: apparently you can be inside a giant exploding robot falling down a cliff and survive mostly unscathed! But he went to jail. But that wasn't the last time we heard from the evil demon child."
"Evil demon child?" Dipper intervened, grabbing the attention of all the girls. "I guess that's one way to describe, Gideon."
"Dipper!" Mabel exclaimed joyfully. "Girls, this is my brother. He's the one who was with me during all the adventures we went on."
"Woah," the girls said in awe.
"Dipper, these are my new friends!" she explained. "Sammy, Angela, and Gretchen!" she pointed out.
"Is it true you punched a child in the face?" Sammy, the blonde girl with glasses, promptly asked.
"Um, I mean, yeah. I guess," Dipper answered, somewhat unsure of how to answer. "Just to clarify, this was a child that nearly cut me in half with a giant pair of scissors and tried to kill me and Mabel several other times, so I think it evens things out."
"Don't worry, Dipper," Mabel cut in. "I already told them everything about Gideon. They know what a butthead he was. In fact, they actually believe me about all the adventures we went on!"
"Oh, cool," Dipper said. "By the way, what happened with Waddles?"
"Well, he was caught by an administrator," she explained. "But I lured him back with a candy bar that mom and dad packed me for lunch when the admins weren't looking. Now I think they're going crazy thinking there's a loose pig in the school."
At that moment, they turn their heads behind them to see a man placing a 'Lost Pig' sign on a wall. The man quickly glances around before sprinting off.
"Haha, that's the man who was in charge of watching him," Mabel chuckled. She opened the flap of her bag, revealing Waddles to be safe and secure in her bag. "But he's safe and sound with me. I'm not gonna let him go running around again. You hear that you bad pig?" Waddles oinked in response. Mabel smiled, hugging her bag. "Aw, I can't stay mad at you."
"Well that's great that you got him back," Dipper said. He looked around at the table, noticing no empty seats. "So is there a place I can sit? Maybe move to another table or something?"
"I don't think there's any room any place else," Angela, the black haired girl, answered. "I mean, we barely managed to grab this table when it was empty."
"Yeah, Dipper," Mabel agreed, sadly, "I'm not sure you'll be able to sit with us."
"But, you said we'd hang out at lunch!" Dipper said, somewhat irritated. "Where else am I going to go?"
"I know! I know!" Mabel stated, clearly expressing guilt. "But I just met these girls and I really want to hang out with them. They're so cool!"
"I can scoot over for you, Dipper," Gretchen, a redhead girl with pigtails who also wore pretty sizable headgear, dreamily offered.
Flattered, yet very much uninterested, Dipper took a step back, "Actually, I'll find somewhere else to sit. Thanks for living up to our deal, Mabel," he said bitterly before storming off.
"What's his problem?" Angela asked.
"Doesn't he have his own friends?" Sammy asked.
Mabel sighed. "You see, Dipper's not exactly the king of being social. He tends to scare others with his nerdiness. Even other nerds are scared of him!"
"He's also terrible socially?" Gretchen sputtered through her headgear. She sighed dreamily. "We'd be perfect for each other."
"You two probably would," Mabel agreed cheerfully, "Speaking of being perfect for each other, who wants to hear the story about me having my first kiss with a merman?"
"I do!" the three other girls said in unison.
Outside on the school's deck, Dipper bitterly sat by himself on a bench. Dipper acknowledged the fact that he didn't have any real friends in Piedmont. It never really disturbed him or impacted him that much. He's been used to it. He's tried making friends many times before, but being accepted for who he was in school was never as easy as it was in Gravity Falls.
Though it occurs to him while he's eating his sandwich that he has developed much better social skills after the summer. Before the summer started, simple eye contact with anyone he didn't know was an issue. But after everything he's come to learn and all the people he's interacted with in Gravity Falls, maybe things would be different this year.
"Hey, Dipstick!" a voice called out, grabbing Dipper's attention. He looked up and saw Trevor, accompanied by two of his goons. He sat beside Dipper on the bench and put his arm around him. "You look so lonely over here, man. Like you could use a friend. And we both know you've never been a man who could make friends."
Dipper pushed Trevor's arm off him and got up from the bench, standing defensively across from him. "What do you want from me, Trevor?"
"I've treated you like garbage for so long, Dipstick," Trevor responded, getting up from the bench as well. "Now that I'm back from Berkeley, I was thinking we could put that all behind us and become the best of friends. All you gotta is do is give me your lunch money."
"Well I'm going to have to politely decline your offer," Dipper responded sarcastically. "I brought lunch, therefore, I have no lunch money on me."
"Well I guess there are other ways we can become friends," Trevor replied with a smirk.
He snapped his fingers, prompting one of his goons standing behind Dipper to push him down in front of him. Caught off guard by the goon, Dipper came plummeting to the ground, his face bashing against the concrete. While Dipper groaned in pain, Trevor crouched down and snatched the lumberjack hat off his head. Dipper looked up at him, the side of his face scratched up.
Looking around, Dipper can see that Trevor is causing a commotion, and other students begin to circle around the two. He can see people getting ready for the upcoming action. People are even pushing others out of the way to get a better look. Some guy in a dark navy hoodie emerges closer to the front of the crowd too.
"I heard your sister came back to school with a pet pig. She's cool," Trevor said, examining the lumberjack hat. "But you? You came back to school with yet another stupid hat."
"Hey, give that back!" Dipper pleaded, reaching out for the hat.
"Nuh-uh, Dipstick," Trevor said, placing the hat in his other hand and extending it outwards to make it even harder for Dipper to reach. "If we're going to be best friends, you're going to have to give up this garbage hat of yours."
"A friend gave me that hat!" Dipper exclaimed. "Trevor, please! Just give it back!"
"A friend?" Trevor asked in surprise. "You have friends? Where? Are they imaginary?" He chuckled. "I'm sorry, Dipper's imaginary friend, for stealing the hat you gave him," Trevor mocked in a high pitched voice, causing Dipper to grind his teeth angrily. "If you don't mind, Dipper's imaginary friend, I'm going to rip it in half because, to be frank, it's a frickin' stupid hat."
"I said give it back!" Dipper repeated angrily before swinging his fist against the side of Trevor's face, slamming him against the ground, causing him to drop the hat. Dipper quickly grabbed the hat from the ground and backed up as the surrounding students awed in Dipper's unexpected beatdown. He looked around at the students murmuring about him, as Trevor's two goons came to his aid and picked him up from the ground. Immediately regretting what he had done, Dipper slowly backed away from Trevor as he began to stand on his own again, angrily assuring his goons that he was fine.
"Look, Trevor," Dipper began. "I'm sorry. I really am. I didn't want to hurt you, but I told you to-"
"But nothing!" Trevor angrily shouted, quickly walking up to Dipper and grabbing him by the collar, holding him up in front of him. "I gave you a chance to be friends and you threw it away in favor of a crappy hat! Now I'm gonna kick your little ass!"
He held up his fist, preparing to punch him. Helpless, Dipper stopped trying to fight back, loosened up and closed his eyes, leaving himself as a clean and easy target for Trevor.
"Hey, Trevor!" a voice called out, "Drop him."
Trevor turned back. The guy in the dark navy hoodie entered the circle away from the surrounding crowd of students to make himself visible.
"Drop him?" Trevor asked. "This punk just nailed me in the face and you're defending him?"
"Yeah, because you deserved it. You're the one who needlessly started picking on him in the first place," the navy hooded guy continued.
"Needlessly picking on him? I was just looking for a bit of friendship," Trevor defended with a smirk, clearly lying.
"Cut the crap, Trevor," the hooded guy said. "I was in your first hour. I saw you shooting spit wads at him. Humiliated him in front of everyone when he walked into the classroom. Then the guy's just trying to eat lunch by himself and you wanna come up to him, take his hat and start all this commotion. You're nothing but a pathetic, stereotypical bully."
The surrounding crowd went wild at the hooded boy's comeback. Dipper slightly opens his eyes, now paying attention to the commotion. He looks around and wonders why no teachers or administrators have intervened to put a stop to all the situation.
"Stereotypical?" Trevor questioned, raising an eyebrow.
"Oh I'm sorry, do you not understand how you're stereotypical or are you too dumb to understand the word?" the boy roasted. "I mean, come on. Shooting spit wads? Bullying for lunch money? Having two goons that you probably bullied as well so they could back you up because anyone with half a brain wouldn't support the kind of thing you do?"
Trevor's goons frowned guiltily at that roast, looking at Trevor before stepping away from him, leaving his side.
"You see?" the boy addressed. "You're the very definition of stereotypical. A big fat brute, small head, thinks with his fist instead of his brain. Probably has parent issues, and I'd know because I'm not the best person either. The difference between you and I is that I'm actually aware that I'm a bad person. You, on the other hand, are probably blinded by your own stupidity, leaving you to believe you're actually a person who has redeemable qualities and is flawed by anything other than himself. Isn't that right?"
Trevor stares at the boy for a moment, looking around to think. After a brief silence, Trevor tears up, placing Dipper back down on his feet and silently turning away and walking out through the crowd from the whole situation without another word.
Without saying a word, the hooded guy walked away. Before merging back into the crowd, he took a look back at Dipper, who looked back at him, the two making direct eye contact. The kid doesn't react, and faces forward to continue walking away, the crowd watching him silently.
It doesn't take long for the crowd to break up and resume to normal again. Dipper is stuck standing still with his mouth agape, completely shocked at the events that had just occurred. He has a sick feeling in his stomach and wishes he was in the middle of a bad dream. Unsure how to react next or what to do, he simply grabs his bag, places the lumberjack hat back on his head, and rushes off in another direction. After all that has happened, he doesn't have much of an appetite anymore.
"And then he started making out with his puppets, so I think it's safe to say I dodged a bullet there," Mabel said, finishing another story from the summer.
"Eww," Sammy and Angela said in disgust.
"I don't know, I think it's kinda cute," Gretchen responded. The other three girls gave her a weird look, to which she backs out. "I mean, eww."
A beeping sound is heard, to which Sammy grabbed her phone from the top of the table and examined a notification. She gasped. "Oh my gosh! There was a fight outside on the deck!"
"Already?" Mabel asked. "Why do people gotta be so cray-cray around here? It's only the first day of school. So immature."
"You wanna see a video of the fight?" Sammy asked.
"You bet I do!" Mabel exclaimed, jumping up from her seat to watch the video with Sammy and the other girls.
Upon pressing play, a perspective from one of the students is shown from behind Trevor outside on the deck. In front of Trevor, Dipper is clearly seen on the ground after getting pushed over. No audio is heard, but Trevor is seen holding his lumberjack hat.
"Wait, is that-?" Mabel asked, looking closely at the video. "-Dipper?!"
On cue, Dipper is seen throwing the punch that knocked Trevor down on the ground. The video promptly ends right after, not showing the bit that occurred after.
"Oh my gosh," Sammy says in disbelief.
"I know right?" said Angela. "How does a single punch equal a fight? Boring."
"Angela, that was my brother!" Mabel exclaimed with concern.
"Oh, and I guess that's bad too," Angela adds.
"Your brother can sure throw a punch," Gretchen dreamily sputters.
"I really hope he's okay," Mabel says, dismissing Gretchen's previous comment.
At that moment, Mabel looks up and notices Dipper walking down the hall at the corner of her eye. Keeping his head down, he seems to be avoiding as many people as he can.
"There he is," Mabel says as she notices him. "Dipper!" she calls out, with Dipper catching her glance before walking off even faster with his head down, leaving her and the other girls to watch him with concern.
There are about ten minutes of lunch left to spare, so Dipper decides to start making his way to his next class, which is inconveniently located across the school. He tries to keep his head down as he quickly walks through the halls, aiming to just blend in and attract as little attention as possible.
He continues to think about the navy hooded kid who defended him from Trevor. It was so unexpected and out of nowhere. By the way he dressed too, it seemed like he has a much darker and rougher personality than Trevor did. His hoodie had all kinds of rips, stains and other marks on it. Being hooded, it was hard to tell, but it looked like he had dark brown hair. Long too, as large locks hung out as he looked down.
He also wore black jeans, which were also ripped, but not the stylish kind of ripped jeans. These rips looked more legitimately obtained rather than an intentional style choice. And his shoes had holes in them too. The way he talked was also tense and threatening. Overall, upon first glance, you would take him for some angry, homeless kid.
But in the end, he had just saved Dipper and even potentially a bunch of other victims from Trevor, who was always known as one of the biggest bullies of the school. Maybe he could be homeless, or just be really poor, and maybe angry, but he didn't seem like the bad guy like he had said he was.
At that exact moment, he turned the corner in the hallway and conveniently spotted the navy hooded kid kicked back against a wall next to two separate vending machines. He was looking at the ground and seemingly didn't even notice Dipper standing there looking at him.
Dipper only felt it was necessary for him to walk up and meet him, or thank him at the very least. He was hesitant though. Although he just saved his life, his appearance still represents some sort of personality that he may want to just avoid entirely.
Despite his hesitations, he gave in and walked up to him. In the end, he at least owes him his thanks.
"Uh...hey, man," Dipper said, as he stopped in front of him.
The guy brought his head up and looked at Dipper. He grinned, which Dipper didn't expect in this moment.
"Hey," He said, "You alright after all of that?"
"Oh, yeah. No, I'm good," Dipper assured. "I just came here to say thanks for defending me. That was just kinda unexpected. Thought I was done there."
The kid nodded. "Yeah, I never liked Trevor. He deserved it. I've seen the stuff he's done to you and other kids years back and seeing him back and at it again, it was just necessary to put him in his place, you know?"
"Um, yeah," Dipper agreed, rubbing the back of his head at the awkwardness of his upcoming question. "It's kinda awkward, I mean, I don't recall ever knowing you or seeing you around back then. If you don't mind me asking, who are you exactly?"
The guy chuckled, which also took Dipper by surprise a bit, now knowing he actually can put on a smile and laugh a bit. Maybe he's not as dark as he originally thought.
"Nah, it's cool. I get that a lot, I don't mind." He held his hand out. "Derrick Mendez."
Dipper shook his hand. "Dipper Pines. Although, even knowing your name now, I can definitely say I don't recall ever knowing you or seeing you around."
"Yeah, I'm not the most social guy out there. I've always been kind of a loner." Derrick admitted.
"Why? I mean, you seem cool enough to have more friends than I can ever get." Dipper asked, unintentionally poking fun at himself and his lacking social ability.
"I don't know. I just never really had the patience to go around making friends, I guess," he answered, shrugging.
Dipper thought for a moment before proceeding with his next question. "Well, this is kind of an awkward thing to admit, but you know, I'm not exactly the best social person either, except it's unintentional. So, I don't know, maybe we could be friends? Unless you don't want to, of course."
"Sure, I'll be your friend," Derrick casually accepted with a grin. "Wanna grab a soda, friend?" Derrick asked, pointing to the soda vendor right next to him.
"Umm, I would, but I don't have any money on me right now."
"Ha, who said anything about buying a soda? Wanna see a trick?" Derrick asked. He looked around the hall to verify there were no adults around. He then uses his fist to pound the top of the glass of the machine twice. Then he backs up and kicks the bottom of the door once, popping the machine door right open. He reaches in and grabs two Pitt Colas, handing one to Dipper and kicking the door shut.
"Woah, nice!" Dipper compliments, checking out the can Derrick just gave him. "Where'd you learn to do that?"
"Uhhh, someone taught me," Derrick replied, opening his can and taking a sip. "It doesn't work on the snack machine though. Which sucks, because I could go for a bag of Burrito Bites right now."
Dipper then realized something and grinned. He set his can of Pitt Cola to the side and walked up to the snack machine.
"You're not the only one who knows tricks. Check this out." Dipper places his hands on the side of the vending machine. He had never done this trick himself before, so he had to go by memory from when he was first shown it. He tapped the edge with his hands, and then popped the door open with his elbow as he said, "Bippidy-boop. Wop." Just like Soos showed him.
"How about that?" Derrick said in awe. "Now where'd you learn to do that?"
Dipper threw Derrick a bag of Burrito Bites and then shut the door of the machine. "Uhhh, someone taught me." He said, mimicking Derrick's own response. "Consider it my repayment for you saving me from getting beaten up." He grabbed his Pitt Cola again and cracked it open. He raised it up in front of Derrick. "Cheers, my new friend."
Derrick chuckled as he clinked his own Pitt Cola can against Dipper's. "Cheers, dude."
The two took sips from their Pitt Cola cans. At that moment, the bell for the end of lunch had ringed, also indicating the movement to the next class period.
"Guess lunch is over," Derrick said. "I should probably be on my way."
Dipper gulped down a sip of Pitt Cola. "Yeah, same here. It was cool meeting you. Thanks again for saving me back there, and also for the soda machine trick."
"No problem, man," Derrick responded. "Hey, thanks for your snack machine trick. You seem cooler than I initially made you out to be. Instead of sitting by yourself at lunch next time, why don't we hang out together?"
Dipper smiled. "That'd be pretty neat."
Derrick began walking backward with his soda in hand. "Cool. I'll see you around, Dipper."
As he turned around, he ran bumped straight into someone, spilling his Pitt Cola can all over them.
Mabel gasped as she saw the giant soda stain on her sweater. "My new sweater!"
"My soda!" Derrick exclaimed.
"You spilled your soda on my new sweater!" Mabel exclaimed.
"More like your new sweater got in the way of my soda," Derrick claimed.
"You bumped into me!" Mabel exclaimed angrily.
"Um, no," Derrick denied. "You bumped into me."
"Oh boy," Dipper said innocently, watching the incident from the distance.
Annoyed, Mabel just slipped past Derrick and approached Dipper, with Derrick rolling his eyes as he walked off in the opposite direction.
"You alright?" Dipper asked his sister.
"Could be better," Mabel answered, examining the soda spill on her sweater once more. "But don't worry about that. Are you okay? I heard you got into a fight with Trevor."
"Oh yeah, I'm okay," Dipper answered. "Few scratches. No biggie."
"Are you sure? You didn't get in trouble?" Mabel asked. "You know how peeved Mom and dad are going to be if they find out that I brought Waddles to school and you go in a fight on our first day."
"They won't find out about anything," Dipper assured. "I'm fine. You just need to make sure Waddles doesn't get caught for the rest of the day."
"I'm trying my hardest," Mabel said. "But sometimes he's just too cute and Waddle-y to keep cooped up in my backpack."
"Well, try a little harder, maybe?" Dipper asked, beginning to walk away. "I gotta go to my next class. I'll see you later."
"Dipper, wait!" Mabel called out, causing him to stop in place. "Look, I'm sorry for not keeping my promise of sitting with you at lunch. I promise to save you a seat with me and the girls at lunch tomorrow though."
"Oh, no need," Dipper said. "I actually made a new friend today and I'm gonna hang with him at lunch tomorrow."
"Oh, really?" Mabel said, surprised. "That's great. Who is he?"
Dipper looked at the cola stain on Mabel's sweater and then back at her. "Now probably wouldn't be the best time to tell you." She raised an eyebrow, confused. Dipper looked at the clock on the wall and began walking off again. "I really gotta go. See you later."
Mabel was left on her own in the hallway. She was confused on what he could've meant by it 'not being the best time to tell her', so she began to consider a few different options while she went on her own way to her next class, examining the soda stain on her sweater once more in disgust.
Dipper arrived at his next class period. The classroom wasn't quite full just yet, but the next bell hadn't rung just yet so some students still weren't coming back from lunch. He took this opportunity to go up to the teacher's desk and personally explain that his nickname is Dipper and not to call him by his real name. After this was done, he sat himself down in a seat that wasn't yet occupied.
As he sat waiting for the bell to ring, students kept coming in. Eventually, Trevor himself walked inside the classroom. Dipper quickly avoided eye contact with him and pretended to not even notice his presence. Trevor looked at him, however, but simply walked right past him. He sat on the other side of the room, out of range to be able to do anything to him without getting noticed.
The bell finally rang, and the teacher shut the door. As the teacher began their introduction, Dipper looked up and glanced over at Trevor, who looked completely out of the mood and kept to himself.
"Welcome class. I know that most of you, if not, all of you are finding the first day of school exhausting, but I hope you all are getting mentally prepared," the teacher began.
Dipper thought about it. Derrick's words must have really gotten to Trevor and he couldn't believe it. After their earlier encounter, Dipper thought any future meeting with Trevor was going to be a total nightmare. However, as it seemed right now, Trevor looked completely uninterested in creating any commotion with him or anyone else.
"This is your final year of middle school and it will fly by, and before you know it, you will all be in high school."
Dipper was excited for the school year now. A bad day suddenly took an unexpected turn for the best. His biggest bully may be done bullying him once and for all and he may have finally made his first true friend in middle school.
"And before you know it, high school will fly by..."
It was from this point forward, that things were finally starting to look up for the school year. And for the future.
"...and you will all start preparing for college."
Hello, readers.
Gonna try to keep this note as short as possible to just explain some things.
Firstly, it's possible that some of you may recognize this fic. Truth is, this is a rewrite of a fic I was doing earlier this year that I stopped writing and deleted because I wasn't happy with it. I took time off to really think about what I wanted to do with that fic because I really want it to be something long term if it gets enough attention. It didn't get all that much attention last time, so I'm not expecting a lot of people to recognize this.
If you do remember this, then welcome back, I guess. This rewrite will have some noticeable differences if you somehow manage to remember what this was last time, but you know, I only wrote eight chapters last time and a lot of rewrites were on the stuff planned after that, so there shouldn't be too much change from the last one. It was mainly what was set up that I had issues with. I had too much going on and too much planned before, so I'm trying to simplify it just a bit so it doesn't turn into a big mess. Now I think I'm comfortable to try doing this again.
Anyways, to the new readers: Welcome! This is Gravity Falls: Once More.
With this, I'm trying to follow the canon as closely as I can. I'm gonna be honest, I haven't read stuff like Journal 3 in its entirety, so I can't promise that I'll perfectly branch off the canon. I'll try to stay as close to the canon as possible, but if I make a mistake down the line, then I apologize in advance!
EDIT (8/22/18): Sometime in the progress of writing the first 10 chapters of this fic, I did manage to read Journal 3 in its entirety, and so you can expect inclusions from that material in this fic. The same goes more recently for Gravity Falls: Lost Legends, though those tales don't even start to become vaguely referred to until around Chapter 30 or so (maybe like one reference before).
But yes, to new readers, both Journal 3 and Lost Legends will both hold relevance in this fic, but neither will be necessarily required in order to understand or read this fic. If you've read them though, you may be in for more of a treat. ;)
That's about all I'd like to say for now, as this note is already more lengthy than I'd like these to be on average. So I'll explain more next chapter. Hopefully, I got your attention with this one so far. If so, a follow, favorite, or review would be much appreciated and will surely keep me motivated to write more! I don't exactly have a set schedule for how often I'll be updating, but the more support this gets, the more frequently you can expect me to update granted life doesn't get in the way.
And yes, next chapter will be the flash forward. This is just the prologue.
Anyways, that's all for now. Until next time!
-Absolute Rift
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