Mountains

Chapter Two

Dipper ended up burning his fingers before getting to eat the marshmallows. He discovered that although sticking the stick as far as he could into the fire roasts the marshmallow, it also roasts something far less comfortable.

Wendy wasn't much better when it came to toasting the sugary treats, though she was certainly better than Dipper. She seemed to know the exact time to pull it out of the fire, but by then, the bottom was usually blackened and covered in bright flames. She blew them out and ate them with a hearty amount of chocolate anyway.

Soon, the fire was dwindling and the stars were out. The moonlight was brilliant that night, and lit up the landscape with a cold luminescence. The few clouds they could see approaching on the horizon shimmered with the pale light. The pine trees were outlined with the beginnings of dew, while the patchy grass on the ground positively glittered with it.

However, as the night grew more radiant, the temperature dropped with it dramatically. Dipper and Wendy had soon pulled out their sleeping bags and were huddling inside them beside the coals. The air had to be less than sixty degrees. Their noses were red and their fingers stiff, but they were laughing and joking around all the same.

"Ok, ok, so what if Stan actually caught something and let it loose in the Shack?" Wendy choked out, snuggling deeper into her sleeping bag. "Like, a baby dragon or something. I mean, either all the tourists would run away or they'd just stand and watch while it destroyed everything."

"They'd totally just stand and watch," Dipper laughed. "Everyone who goes to the Shack is kinda an idiot, so…"

"Definitely," Wendy chuckled back. She looked over at the tent before peering at a watch she'd brought along. She sighed. "Ok, dude, we should be getting to bed soon if we even want to wake up in the morning. I'm hitting the sack."

"Same here," Dipper replied quickly. "You know, so we'll wake up around the same time."

"Gotcha," Wendy smiled. She hopped over to the tent flap in her sleeping bag and pulled back the zipper. Her younger friend bounded through the small door and crashed in one of the corners of the tent. She followed him before zipping the entrance back up and settling on the floor a few feet from him.

"Goodnight, Wendy," Dipper murmured, burrowing into his sleeping bag and closing his eyes.

"'Night, Dipper," the lumberjack's daughter called back. She stared through the screen flap on one side of the tent and gazed up at the slightly cloudy sky. Smiling tiredly, Wendy pulled herself as far into her sleeping bag as she could and fell asleep.

GF

"Dipper… Dipper, come on…"

Dipper murmured inaudibly and snuggled deeper into his sleeping bag. He could faintly hear Wendy calling his name, and reached one hand out to softly brush her away.

"DIPPER! GET UP! NOW!"

The young detective's eyes shot open. The first thing he saw was Wendy's bright green pair of eyes staring panickedly into his. She yanked him into a sitting position and released his shoulders, grabbing his stuff and throwing it onto her own back.

"Wha… What's going on…"

"Storm," Wendy replied anxiously. Dipper could see she was desperately trying to keep calm. "We aren't in any serious danger, it isn't too close. But we need to get out of this tent. Now."

"Why?" the younger boy found himself mumbling. He was abruptly lifted onto his feet by the redhead, who then packed his sleeping bag up with almost ninja-like speed.

"The wind's blowing us closer to the cliff," she answered breathlessly. With that, she grabbed his arm and pulled him through the tent flap.

It was completely dark outside. Dipper acquired his pack from Wendy, who wasted no time in yanking her own sleeping bag into a bundle and starting to run down the trail in a sprint. He had no idea how she could see in such an obsidian space.

"Dipper, we have to get off this cliff!" The younger boy winced as she nearly screamed at him. He could only see her outline in the dark, waving to him frantically and doing an anxious sort of scruffing with her feet. He ran over to her before feeling her hand seize his. He flinched at the slight pain. With that, they were off.

Because Dipper had neglected to bring a flashlight, they were in pitch blackness for most of the muddy, desperate run. Wendy never let go of him, but she was relentlessly fast and splashed up grime without many other regards. At some point, they veered off the path and began to bolt through the trees. Although both of them thought about getting home at one point or another, neither of them paid much mind as long as they were running from the danger.

Suddenly, Dipper felt water lapping around his ankles. It was the river he had crossed earlier, swollen with the rain. He couldn't stop running with the pure adrenaline rushing through his veins, but the liquid was ice cold and he was already chilled to the bone. Besides, he could feel rocks under his socked feet and didn't want to damage himself any worse than he already had. He was stuck.

The young boy gasped as he felt powerful arms wrapping around him, lifting him above the ground. He heard Wendy grunt behind him before leaping into the water, wading through the river as fast as she could while carrying him.

The current was incredibly strong. At the part where the water was deepest, Dipper could feel Wendy struggling to move. With a pack, sleeping bag, food and roughly 90 pound boy clinging desperately to her chest, he could easily see why. But he realized that the reason she was trying to go so fast was because of the risk of electricity in the water. They were in more danger here than they were on the cliff.

Soon, the redhead was crawling onto the pebbles of the shore. Dipper detached himself hastily from her shirt before resuming a panicked pace at her side. They couldn't see a thing in the darkness, but both knew that they had to get to the lowest altitude possible, away from the lightning and cliffs.

Finally, the wild dash came to an end. Neither Dipper nor Wendy could go on any longer. Dipper let out a quiet breath as he felt the great girl fall to the ground beside him, slumping against a tree and releasing their packs. He collapsed beside her and felt her shiver as everything went blacker than it was already.

He woke up several times, each for only moments before lapsing back into unconsciousness. He could remember flashes of things, like Wendy's long red hair lying dirty and wet in the mud, or the lightning overhead. Nothing stuck with him, though, and exhaustion always overtook him before the need to investigate did.

Morning came after the longest, coldest night of Dipper's life unforgivingly. It was still raining, but the light drizzle contained no electricity or thunder. He could barely move his limbs, and his gaze was hazy and unfocused for the first few moments. The first thing that caught his eye was the nearly lifeless form of his best friend.

She was lying in the mud, unmoving save for the threateningly slow rise and fall of her sides. Her flannel shirt was stained and gritty, and part of her jeans had been ripped clean off. He could see she was clinging to his vest, which he had taken off the night before.

Reaching out a tentative hand, Dipper groaned out, "Wendy, wake up." He slowly patted her arm before tugging her sleeves anxiously. She still didn't move.

Dipper hauled himself out of the mud and started to shake the pale lumberjack girl, his expression growing more and more stricken. "Come on, just get up!" he pleaded. He felt of huge breath of relief escape him as she shifted beneath his hands, shrugging him away and moaning softly as she was dragged into consciousness.

Oh thank God, Dipper thought. He slowly pulled her into an upright position and watched her rub her eyes. She stared down at him blearily before groaning.

"Uh… What happened?" she mumbled. Her eyes widened slightly before she dropped his vest and finished her statement. "Oh. Right."

"Um… thanks for helping me across the river there," Dipper remarked gratefully. He wasn't about to admit that he probably couldn't have crossed it without help, especially with his under-average height.

"No problem," Wendy smiled weakly. She handed him his vest and looked at the remains of their camping supplies. "We're out of marshmallows," she groaned, looking into the food pack.

"Do we even have something to eat?" Dipper asked hopefully, looking over her shoulder. His older friend pulled out a stack of six granola bars, an apple and a bag of potato chips. They were silent for a moment.

"Call dibs on the chips," Wendy grinned at last. She stretched out a leg and winced. "Oooh, that hurts."

"So, I guess we should try to find the main trail soon," Dipper yawned, staring dubiously up the broken path they had stumbled down. He remembered falling down countless times, only to have his adrenaline-fueled friend haul him up and keep running.

"We have a long way to go," Wendy replied, almost as though she could read his thoughts. "Especially since we'll be going uphill." A sudden look of worry came over her face and she covered her eyes with her hands. "Ugh, your uncle is going to kill me."

Dipper looked up at her curiously. "Why?"

His friend gave him an almost concerned look. "Well, we're lost in the woods, the tent's gone, we nearly died getting across a river and we're probably going to get hypothermia tonight," she joked weakly. "I checked the forecast yesterday. It's going to get down to the forties."

The young boy shivered. "Really?"

Wendy's smile faded. "Yeah, really," she murmured. She stared up the trail before reaching down and grabbing her pack. She lifted his into the air and gently handed it to him. "Come on, dorkus. The sooner we get out of here, the better."

Dipper clambered to his feet and followed as his love interest picked up the food with one hand. As soon as they were set, the two started to walk through the soaking landscape in hopes of finding the trail again.

By the time noon came, the duo was even more soaked than they had been before, and unbelievably cold. Dipper figured that if this is what it felt like when the air was around sixty degrees, he most certainly wouldn't be warm tonight. Wendy wasn't doing much better. Her normally slightly pale skin looked almost paper white in the dim of the rain.

Finally, they came across a small clearing. At one end, there was an opening in the trees that looked almost like the entrance to the trail. Wendy sat on a fallen log on the right of the opening and pulled out her claimed bag of chips. She tossed a granola bar at the younger boy, who settled beside her and began to eat.

When their impromptu lunch was consumed, Dipper and Wendy started down the path. Neither spoke, but there was a silent agreement between them that they wouldn't stop walking until they reached what could be considered a trail. Though the sun was never visible, they could feel it getting later and later into the day until the sky finally started to darken. They had still not reached the trail by this time, and both were shivering violently. "Ok, time for a fire," Dipper finally murmured, flopping onto a rock beside the trail.

"Agreed," Wendy replied. She surveyed the surroundings with a frown. "Nothing here is dry, though."

Dipper sighed. "Do we have anything we can burn?" Without waiting for an answer, he peered into his pack and started rummaging through the contents. After a minute, he looked up and shook his head. "Nothing here."

"There isn't anything in my pack, either," Wendy moaned. She looked at the rock Dipper was perched on. "We're going to have to make a tent out of our sleeping bags if we don't want to get bothered by animals."

The young boy shuddered. "That's going to be very, very cold," he declared, rubbing his arms. He grabbed a tiny flashlight keychain and shined it around the area, looking at the surrounding woods in the fading glimmers from the clouds. He could make out a few sticks that they might be able to use in the creation of a tent. He got up off the rock and walked a few feet, grabbing a thick but wet branch and bringing it back to his friend.

Wendy smiled. "We can totally do this," she encouraged him. "I'm totally sure we can find the trail tomorrow, too."

Dipper gave a weak grin back and dropped the branch to the ground. Together, the two began to prepare for their second night out in the cold, unforgiving wilderness.

A/N: And there we go! Chapter two! Thank you to everyone who is supporting me so far. Next chapter, we might get a little fluffy goodness, and definitely some action with these two trying to survive. Montydragon, out!