The Good, The Bad, and The Broken
Chapter Two: Hell Hath no Fury
"Mabel!" Dipper yelled as he crashed the golf cart through the forest, barely maintaining control. "Mabel where are you?"
"Dipper! Help me!" Mabel's voice echoed faintly from his left.
Dipper instantly jerked the wheel towards the noise and sped over a hill, the cart flying a foot into the air before landing and zigzagging. Dipper corrected course and floored it.
"Don't worry, I'll save you from that zombie." he yelled.
After Stan had given him an old video recorder, he had set out to collect the evidence need to convince Mabel of the danger Norman posed. He had taken the time to familiarize himself with the camera, finishing just in time to follow Mabel and Norman on their date. He spent an hour following them, capturing every moment of it on. After that he was beginning to doubt his claims. Dipper hadn't seen anything that would actually warrant any form of negative reaction towards him. Just a weird boy with no feeling of pain. He had given up after another half hour, heading back to the Shack feeling thoroughly humbled.
It was boredom more than anything else that had caused him to check the camera to see if he had missed anything. He had reviewed the footage halfheartedly, fast forwarding every few seconds. At first it had seems that all was well, but then the camera had caught Norman's hand falling off and then him reattaching it! Dipper had dashed outside and gotten the keys to the golf cart from Wendy, Stan's red headed cashier. Now that he thought about it she was kinda cute-
Dipper's line of thought was cut short as he nearly flew off the side of a cliff. He swerved and heard Mabel calling his name in fear. She also seemed to be reassuring herself that they were going to be okay. He drove the cart towards her voice once more and barreled deeper into the woods. He drove down into an underground clearing and slowed down as he saw a hoard of things that wore red-hats swarming around a girl in a blue t-shirt who's arms were tied to the ground, struggling and writhing, and Mabel, who was swatting at the things as they tried to force her down beside the other girl.
They looked like three foot tall, middle to old aged men wearing overalls and lumberjack boots, and, of course, every one of them wore a tall, pointy, red hat. One of the men stood outside of the group, seeming to be the leader. He had a brown beard that covered his chin and was shouting directions to Mabel and the other men.
"Come on you two, the more you struggle the more awkward this will be for everybody," he said encouragingly. "Ah Steve, you might not want to-"
He was cut off as the blue-clad girl kicked one of the men that was about to jump onto Mabel into a tree. The tiny man bounced off the trunk and clutched his stomach painfully before barfing up a rainbow.
"What the heck is going on here?" Dipper shouted brandishing the shovel that Soos, the Mystery Shack's handyman, had given him.
Some of the men froze but most of them just kept trying to force Mabel down. The captured Pines twin turned at the sound of her brother's voice and waved her arms frantically.
"Dipper! Norman turned out to be a bunch of gnomes and kidnapped me and this other girl." she shouted before grabbing a gnome that had crawled up her back and drop-kicking him away.
"Huh, gnomes? Oh I was way off then." Dipper said as he pulled the journal out of a pocket on the inside of his vest. He opened it up to the correct page and quickly scanned its contents. "Gnomes: inhabitants of the Gravity Falls forest. Weaknesses: unknown."
He looked up from the journal to see Mabel now bound next to the other girl. Neither of them looked very happy. The other girl glared at the gnomes and muttered something behind the cloth gag covering her mouth.
"Oh come on!" Mabel complained as the gnomes secured the last rope.
"Hey! Hey!" Dipper shouted charging up to the one who appeared to be the leader. "You let them go."
"Oh hi!" the gnome said as he jumped around. "You see, thing is, this is all just a big misunderstanding."
The gnome spread his arms placatingly while Dipper crossed his arms angrily.
"You see, they were never in any real danger." the gnome continued. "Your sister, she's just marrying all one thousand of us and becoming our gnome queen for all eternity. And the other one? Oh, well, every queen needs servants, right?"
He turned to the two captured girls and smiled pleadingly. The blue girl mumbled something behind the cloth and Madel opened her mouth angrily.
"You guys are butt-faces!" she shouted at the top of her lungs. The other gnomes quickly clamped her mouth shut and gave her the same treatment as the other girl.
"Give them back. Right. Now." Dipper demanded holding the shovel like a spear at the gnomes face. The tiny man scoffed and laughed.
"Do you think you can hurt me with that?" he laughed. "Do you have any idea who you're dealing with?"
"Do you?" a demonic sounding voice snarled from the forest.
The gnomes all jumped in fright and whirled around as a new girl in a green t-shirt stalked through the foliage towards them. She wore black jeans that were flecked with some sort of dark red paint. In her hands was a blood red carving knife that had a string of the same color connecting to a golden, heart-shaped hanging from her neck. Her eyes were black where they should have been white and she had dark crimson irises. They seemed to be bleeding slowly as there were inch-long red streaks sliding down her cheeks. She flicked the knife in front of her face and smiled broadly, drops of red flew off the blade once she stopped its movement.
"Give me back my sister, you wastes of space," she commanded in the same creepy, echo-y voice. "Or else you'll end up like your friends back there."
"Come on now," the lead gnome said nervously "let's talk this out. Why don't we make a deal?"
"Oh yes, I like that idea," the girl giggled evilly. "You give me back your hostages and I don't kill you. How does that sound?"
The lead gnome gulped before nodding slowly. Dipper stared at the girl in horror. She had to be insane or, at the very least, dangerous. He wanted to run away but he was frozen in fear. The gnomes seemed to be suffering from the same problem. The girl took another step forward and everyone who could took a step back. Before the girl could do anything else she flickered, as if her image were projected on a old fashioned TV with a bad connection.
Dipper jumped as a hand touched his shoulder. He turned to see another girl who looked exactly like the psychotic girl, even down to the same clothes, but without the demonic features. Dipper yelled and swung the shovel at her. The girl's eyes widened just before the shovel smacked into her side.
The girl stumbled back and landed onto her back. As soon as she landed, the psychotic girl flickered and vanished, like she had never been there in the first place. Dipper reached into his vest with thoughts of checking the journal if disappearing people was something he should be worried about. This was cut short, however, when the blue girl struggled and yelled towards the green girl, fear and worry evident in her voice.
As soon as the psychotic girl vanished, the gnomes all turned to stare at the green girl and Dipper. The green girl got to her feet lethargically as she glared viciously at Dipper, her eyes flashing with barely contained malice. Her expression didn't change at all when she looked towards the gnomes.
"Intruder!" the lead gnome yelled
The green girl grabbed Dipper's shovel and ran towards Mabel and the other girl, cutting the ropes with a downward slash of the blade. The blue girl got to her feet and pulled the cloth away from her mouth, spitting violently. The three girls ran past Dipper, who was gaping at the green clad girl in fear. Mabel grabbed his arm and hauled him into the golf cart.
"They're stealing our queen!" the leader shouted. "Everyone after them! gnomes of the Forest, get them!"
The four preteens clambered into the cart with the blue girl and Dipper sitting in the back with a perfect view of the gnomes as the climbed onto one another and formed something akin to a giant made of gnomes.
"Drive." the blue girl squeaked "Chara, drive!"
The green girl nodded and floored it, yelling something about holding on as she did, as if Dipper needed reminding. The monstrosity towered above them and took a step forward, narrowly missing the cart.
Frisk watched in horror as the gnome army turned into a giant mass of bodies hell bent on destroying the cart and capturing them again. The massive creation was being controlled by Jeff, the leader of the gnomes that had taken her and the other girl, who was now sitting atop the heads of three other gnomes and controlling them from there. The giant took another step forward, shaking the ground and knocking the cart a few feet into the air.
When the cart landed and was back under control, Chara turned around in her seat to look at the giant mass of gnomes stomping towards them. It only took a few seconds for Mabel to yell and pull on her shirt, causing the former demon to turn her eyes back to the ground in front of her. She swerved to avoid a rock and pressed the pedal harder, as if that would make the cart go faster. The giant raised its hand over it's head and slammed it down a few feet from the cart, the gnomes dissembling then scrambling back together.
"Chara-" Frisk started
"Faster, go faster." Mabel said as she stared at the gnomes in fear.
"Give us back our queen!" Jeff yelled
"Well I can see that you're just the object of attention here, Frisk." Chara said not taking her eyes off the trail. Frisk didn't respond. This was because she was gaping mutely at the gnomes that had ripped a tree out of the ground and raised it above their head.
"Tree!" Mabel yelled, leaning out of the side of the passenger seat as the gnomes threw the twenty foot tree at the cart.
"Gogogogo." Dipper yelled quickly at the same time.
"Chara?" Frisk asked when Chara didn't respond in any meaningful way.
The tree flew in front of the small vehicle. It slammed into the ground just after Chara squeezed the cart under it, ripping the flimsy roof off and sending the cart careening onto it's side. The four kids grabbed onto whatever they could and held on for dear life.
The cart slid several feet before stopping a not far from a multi-storied house. Chara crawled over the side of the cart and flopped onto the ground, the others following her slowly. Frisk had a few gashes on her arms and legs while Dipper had lost his army green baseball cap and was scratched up a little. Mabel's sweater was a little ripped but other than the miscellaneous scrapes and bruises they were fine.
The giant made of gnomes flicked off ten or so tiny men and they surrounded the four quickly. They were all snarling and baring their teeth like animals. The giant stepped back and Jeff smiled at them menacingly.
"Stay back." Dipper ordered, placing himself in front of girls and holding the shovel like a weapon.
Jeff made the gnome giant lean down and flick away the shovel. It went flying into the trees with a resounding clang. The giant stood up straight and Jeff cupped his hands around his mouth.
"It's the end of the line." he shouted through his hands. "Mabel, marry us before things turn ugly. Trust me, if you resist, you're really not going to like what happens next."
Frisk's eyes widened in horror as an old phrase popped into her head. She dropped to the ground, clutching her head. Dipper could hear her muttering a string of apologies and sobbing quietly. Kara, he thought that was her name at least, glared at Jeff and took a step forward, only to be stopped by Mabel's arm on her shoulder.
"Wait, I gotta do it." she said, stepping forward as Dipper dug in his vest for the journal, hoping it would have an answer to the situation.
"Mabel," the boy complained, taking a step towards the two girls "don't do this. Are you crazy?"
"Dipper, just trust me." his sister said, not looking away from Jeff.
"What?!" he asked, shocked
"Dipper, just this once, trust me, okay?" she begged. Dipper sighed but backed away from the two girls. Mabel walked towards the giant slowly.
"Ok Jeff, I'll marry you." she said reluctantly.
"Hot dog!" Jeff cheered loudly, swinging his arm in a sort of victory pump. "Let me just crawl down there and we'll make it official."
He hopped off his perch and crawled down the clump of gnomes, muttering apologies every now and then as he accidentally stepped on the face of a gnome here or there. He walked over to Mabel and offered her a ring with a large, clear crystal on it. He smiled hopefully, silently asking her approval of the gift. She lowered her hand and he slid it onto her finger.
"Badda bing, badda bang!" he cheered, doing a fist pump. "Now let's get you and your servant back to the forest, honey!"
"You may now kiss the bride." Mabel interrupted as Chara took a threatening step forward with a blood red knife in hand.
"Well, don't mind if I do." Jeff said happily, not noticing the other girl at his back.
He leaned forward and closed his eyes, puckering up for the twelve-year old. Mabel smiled and leaned away from him, reaching for a leaf blower she had hidden in a pile of leaves earlier in the day; don't ask why, she'll never tell. She flicked the leaf blower into reverse and pushed it towards Jeff's face, her smile gone. She glared at the gnome as he got sucked into the hand held machine and got lodged in the barrel.
"Hey, hey wait." Jeff squawked in fear. "Let's talk about this."
"That's for lying to me." the Pines girl snarled. She cranked up the power on the machine, sucking the man further into the tight space. "That's for breaking my heart! And this is for messing with my brother and friends!"
With that she handed the machine to Dipper, who had grimaced at the word "friends" and walked up beside her. She watched as he flipped the machine to full forwards force. Jeff shot out of the blower like a bullet, crashing into the giant and scattering the gnomes like bowling pins.
Jeff screamed in terror as he flew into the woods. Almost immediately, the gnomes all began staggering around and muttering about needing orders. Chara stepped forwards to where her back was to the twins and raised her knife menacingly.
"You want orders?" she said, her voicing becoming demonic again. "Fine! Stay away from my sister or it'll be the last thing you do."
The gnomes all gawked at her before running away as fast as they could. She turned back to the twins and threw her knife into the air. The Pines' eyes followed it as it flew into the air then disappeared, flickering out of existence.
"How the heck did you do that?" Dipper asked her.
Chara didn't respond as she picked up her sister. She then began to walk towards town with Frisk's arm draped over her shoulder, the other girl staggering a little. Before she had taken two steps, her phone began buzzing in her pocket. She pulled it out and began reassuring the person on the other end that Frisk was fine. She flicked her phone shut after a few seconds of reassurance.
"Hey, wait!" Mabel called. Chara turned her head slightly but kept walking stiffly. "You never told us your names. I'm Mabel."
"I'm Frisk." Frisk sniffled weakly over her shoulder as Chara didn't react. "And this is my sister, Chara."
"Cool." Mabel said, waving happily. "Want to come in?"
Dipper frowned and took a step forwards when Frisk smiled kindly but didn't respond. Chara never took her eyes off Fisk as she stopped and let the other girl handle the conversation.
"Do you... need us to help you get home?" Dipper asked reluctantly.
"No we're fine," Frisk reassured. "But thank you."
"Thanks for your help," Dipper said, rubbing his arm a little. "No telling what would've happened if you hadn't been there."
The two girls nodded, turned back to the road, and began to trudge back to town. The twins watch them slowly walk towards town before turning towards the Mystery Shack and heading inside. Just as they were about to walk through the door, Mabel stopped and smiled awkwardly.
"Hey Dipper," she started "that got me thinking. I, um… I'm sorry for ignoring your advice this afternoon. You really were just looking out for me."
"Oh, don't be like that. You saved our butts back there." Dipper said approvingly.
"Yeah well, I guess I'm just sad that my first boyfriend turned out to be a bunch of gnomes." Mabel stated glumly.
"Look on the bright side," Dipper encouraged "maybe the next one will be a vampire, that would be cool."
"Oh, you're just saying that." Mabel laughed
"Awkward sibling hug?" Dipper offered, well, awkwardly
"Awkward sibling hug," Mabel agreed.
The two hugged for a few seconds then patted each other on the back twice.
"Pat pat," they said at the same time before laughing and walking into the gift shop of the mystery shack. Inside they saw Grunkle Stan counting stacks of money from the days tours. He looked over at them and his eyes widened.
"Yeesh," he said in surprise. "What happened to you two? Ya get hit by a bus?"
The two twins looked down at their appearance and shrugged before heading towards their room for some much needed rest. Stan watched them before raising his hand.
"Wait," he called. "I, uh, accidentally overstocked on my products and need to get rid of some. So, uh, why don't you two take something from the gift shop. On the house, ya know?" Mabel looked at him with stars in her eyes while Dipper looked skeptical.
"What's the catch?" he asked, his eyes narrowing.
"The catch is do it before I change my mind," Stan said quickly, as if he were already regretting his decision. "Now take something."
The twins looked around while stan counted his money and stuffed the bills into his cash register. Dipper gravitated towards the more practical items, such as the clothes, as it was rather hard to make those cheaply. He eventually settled on a new baseball cap to replace the one he had lost in the wreck. Instead of army green like his old one, this one was white and blue with a blue pine tree decorating the front. Dipper looked in the nearby mirror and nodded his approval before turning towards Mabel, who was still looking.
She had taken to searching through all the boxes that were scattered along the wall, digging through and throwing aside things that didn't seem all that safe in Dipper's opinion. She was digging through the last box when her face lit up and she whipped out an item from the box. She held it above her head in victory and Dipper finally got a good look at it. It was a gun with a three pronged hook protruding from the nozzle with a bundle of rope tied to the end.
"I'll take this grappling hook," she stated happily.
"Uh, wouldn't you something else?" Stan asked, wondering how his old grappling hook got in there. "Like a doll or something?"
"Nope!" Mabel said as she shot the hook towards the ceiling.
The hook rocketed upwards and wrapped itself around a rafter before the pulley mechanism in the gun hauled Mabel after it.
"Grappling hook," she giggled as she hung from the ceiling
"Fair enough," Grunkle Stan said, ignoring Dipper as the boy covered his eyes with his hand.
After Stan and Dipper got Mabel down from the ceiling, the two twins went upstairs and got ready for bed, much earlier than they normally did. Dipper sat in his bed, adding a few notes to the journal and writing his own entry as Mabel jumped up and down on her bed excitedly. She looked down the sight of her new grappling hook and fired at one of her stuffed animals on the other side of the room. The hook impaled the neck of the toy and carried it back to the girl, who was grinning like a loon. Dipper smiled at ther and gestured to the old oil lamp on the night stand.
"Hey, Mabel think you can get the light?" he asked before ducking as Mabel aimed her gun at both the lamp and him.
He heard a whoosh then the sound of glass shattering. He looked up to see the lamp gone from the room and the window shattered, Mabel's grappling hook hanging out of it.
"Hey, it worked!" she cheered.
"Well that's one mystery solved." Dipper said.
"Don't worry, Broseph," Mabel said as she settled under her covers "I'm sure there will be plenty more for you to solve this summer."
"We'll see, Mabel" Dipper replied as he too settled down for the evening.
Chara walked slowly up to the house just as the sun was going down. Frisk walked slowly behind her, her arms wrapped around herself. Chara waited at the door of their apartment for Frisk to join her. She opened the door and let her adoptive sister in. She was hoping to get this day over with as soon as possible, preferably not dealing with anything or anyone before that happened. What she got was nothing close to that. Some of the monsters who had helped look for Frisk were waiting in the living room, smiling happily.
There was the reptilian Alphys, former royal scientist of monsters, who had yet to actually be recognised by the human world for her work. She had bright, yellow scales and three small, conal, horns that grew from the back of her head. She wore a long white lab coat that covered her entire body and round glasses that she adjusted every few minutes. Her posture was hunched over with her hands never more than three feet from each other. Hers was the only face that wasn't grinning broadly, instead a nervous expression covered her features.
Beside her stood her girlfriend, the fish-like Undyne, formerly a royal guardsmen for King Asgore. She had dark blue scales and menacing yellow eyes with one of them being covered by a black eye-patch. He long red hair was tied back into a ponytail that reached her shoulder. She wore a black tank top, blue jeans, and red combat boots. Her grin was slightly unsettling as it revealed a row of large, pointed teeth.
Toriel stood behind them, looking concerned at the girls' states. Everyone quickly rushed forwards and expressed various degrees of concern. Toriel went about dealing with the scrapes and bruises while Undyne fished for details.
"So, who's butt did you kick?" she asked excitedly in her gravelly voice.
"H-hopefully nobody i-important," Alphys stuttered.
"We didn't kick anyone's butt," Chara grumbled, crossing her arms and glaring at the floor. "They kicked ours. My illusions didn't even help."
"My child, you cannot keep scaring people with those horrible projections," Toriel scolded.
"But Mom!" Chara complained angrily. Frisk tuned out the brewing argument when she saw Flowey sitting nearby, a small smile on his face. She walked over to him and knelt down to his level.
"What's got you so happy?" she asked. Flowey's face morphed into a sneer.
"It's not everyday I get to see her argue with someone other than the trash bag," he explained, his face fell into that of concern. "Plus, I'm… glad she's okay. You guys were gone for a long time." Frisk smiled and pat the flower on it's bulb.
"You know? You're a good friend when you want to be, Flowey," she said.
"Go away Frisk," Flowey hissed. "And if you dare say that again, I'll kill you."
Frisk quietly laughed the flower's halfhearted threat away. Flowey wouldn't kill her, Chara would kill him if he did. And even without a soul, he still cared deeply for Chara. Frisk got up and went to bed. She fell asleep almost instantly, the day's worries losing themselves in the flow of time. A few minutes later, Chara entered the room. She glanced at Frisk and sighed. She crawled into her bed on the other side of the room and fell asleep after several minutes of considering the strange creatures that had taken her sister.
They weren't native to the underground, she knew that for certain. So they had to have been on the surface for the past three hundred years. Chara scowled. Whatever happened, she got the feeling that more was going on here than just the rehabilitation of Monsters and Humans.
Twilight poured in through the windows of the corridor. The golden light lit up the hall as she stared at the short skeleton that stood in her way. She held the Dust covered knife loosely in her hand. Tears streamed down her face as she once again confronted her best friend. He stood there with his hands in his pockets as he watched her sadly
"So, you're finally here? How many friends did you kill this time? Ten? Twenty?" the skeleton asked in his deep voice, shutting his eyes and shaking his head.
"Too many," she sniffled.
"Told ya kid, you don't want to go down this path," the skeleton sighed. "Come on Kid, reset. Let's just forget about this."
"I can't," she cried, tears coming one after the other. "I have to do this."
"Then I have to stop you," the skeleton said sadly, taking his hands out of his pockets. The room started to take on a reddish hue as the light shifted into a crimson.
"But.. you promised," She whimpered
"Yeah… and this is why I don't make promises. Too many strings attached. Too many regrets," the skeleton said, his white pupils vanishing. "Sorry old lady. Sorry Kid. I just can't do this anymore."
The room erupted into flames and Frisk screamed in terror and surprise as they burnt up the hall. In place of the beautiful hall was a burning plain, flames and dust flying everywhere with the searing wind. The skeleton was engulfed in a matter of seconds, giving no outward reaction as he was turned to dust. Frisk ran towards him, screaming his name, but she seemed to be moving in slow motion. Suddenly the flames opened up to reveal the skeleton's skull. It's eyes were glowing a bright blue and a thick red red liquid ran past his teeth.
"Welp. Can't say I didn't try," the skull said tiredly. "But I guess I didn't really stand a chance, did I? After all who could beat the murderer who killed all her friends?"
The flames flickered then formed into people. A tall skeleton holding his head as he disintegrated, particles blowing off him from the wind. A broken robot with it's limbs strewn across the burnt ground, sparking violently. A blue fish-person in pitch black armor with a large gash across the front dissolving into a puddle. And finally, a goat-like creature in purple robes with a bleeding slash across her chest and cheek.
"You killed us, Frisk" they said in unison as they started to dissolve further. "Don't you remember?"
The fires burned bright and rushed towards her. Frisk covered her face with her arms in a futile attempt to protect herself. Just as the flames were about to reach her, she woke up with tears streaming down her face. She sat up and tried to calm herself down, until she saw the small fire flickering to life on her covers. She quickly grabbed her jeans and beat at the flames until they were out. She threw the slightly burnt jeans and covers on the floor and sat on the edge of her bed, her breathing ragged.
Chara opened her eyes and sat up as well. She watched curiously as some sparks danced around Frisk's fingers. She noted the tears and the ragged breathing and knew instantly that her savior had suffered another nightmare. Sighing, she got up and walked across the room to sit next to her sister. Chara hugged the other girl and held tight as Frisk sniffled and cried, the sparks disappearing as she got close.
"Hey, it's alright," Chara said softly. "We're safe. No one's hurt. You saved us, remember?"
Frisk nodded shakily, her tears starting to dry. Chara released her and led the other girl to her own bed. The demon of the underground sat at the foot of the bed as Frisk fell asleep, alternating between watching the stars through the bedside window and watching over Frisk as the twelve-year-old now slept dreamlessly.
