From The New World
Second Movement: Largo
(Alternate Title: "The Hand That Rocks The Ladle")
Gideon flipped back and forth through the contents of the journals, unsure of what to do with the information at his disposal. The symbols fascinated him. Excitement sparked in his chest whenever he was able to recognize one. But he was in the dark for most of them. The gibberish language, too, eluded him. He had no doubts that the seemingly-random combinations of letters were intentional.
The journal was amazing. Gideon suspected that Pacifica was paranoid, but according to the book, Gravity Falls had a secret, dark side. Pacifica would never shut up if he ever showed it to her. More so, after a certain point, the pages just stop, as if the guy who was writing it mysteriously disappeared…
He hung upside down on the living room armchair, beckoning the blood to rush to his head, as if it would help him decide what to do with the journal. None of it could possibly be true. He flipped to a random page to prove his point—gnomes, little men of the Gravity Falls forest. The writer of the book sure had a lot of imagination, Gideon knew that much. The material in the book was enough to base a movie on, or perhaps a lighthearted romcom show, say, one where a naive girl accidentally marries a colony of gnomes in need of a new matriarch and has silly adventures every day with her tiny husbands. That sounded wonderfully innocent and suitable for audiences of all ages.
Yet, even Gideon couldn't resist the same vice that led Pandora to unleash horrors upon the world. He was curious about what he could do with his new knowledge. He had no doubts that the contents of the journal was real. Pacifica and that boy were on to something, and the journal was proof of it.
He studied the gnome page more closely. "Weakness unknown, huh?" he contemplated aloud. Perhaps these little men were more dangerous than they first appeared if any foils were undetected. The forest was just beyond the front door. Gideon could see for himself if this gnome nonsense was true or not, become their 'queen', use them as a personal army or something. He hadn't a clue what he could possibly do with an army of gnomes. World domination, maybe. That sounded nice.
He was shocked out of his ruminations by the doorbell. He fell out of his position on the armchair onto the floor, the journal dropping onto his face in the process. He wobbled as he stood up thanks to how long he was upside-down. Pacifica beat him to the door before he was able to regain his balance.
Gideon couldn't see who was at the door since his cousin was blocking his line of sight, but he overheard the banter she had with the visitor. Apparently, the conversation was intended to be private, from the hushed tones both used while arguing back and forth about some issue regarding Gideon. Instead of immediately revealing his location, Gideon attempted to catch what they were saying about him. It was hard to figure out the topic when they kept interrupting each other.
"I canceled the show for—"
"Dipper, I think you're—"
"He's literally right—"
"I don't care, because this isn't—"
"—Yes, it is."
With that, the conversation ended, and both parties finally acknowledged Gideon's presence. Said boy sheepishly waved at the guest, obviously hiding the heavy journal behind his back. Pacifica opened the door wider and let Dipper inside. Gideon was surprised to see him holding a gorgeous bouquet of pink freesias. A twig stuck out of his black hoodie, which was now fully zipped up, along with tufts of grass sticking to his sleeves. Weirdly, he was also donning formal black slacks and shiny dress shoes. His disheveled appearance gave the impression that he had looted a grave for the flowers, as was common practice during the Great Depression. If not stolen from the dead, they would've been left to rot until the cemetery directors collected them and tossed them in the garbage.
As soon as they met each other's gaze, Dipper looked away. "'S-Sup?" he greeted, voice cracking. He cleared his throat and repeated himself in an exaggerated deeper voice to play off his crack. "'Sup?" He kept his eyes focused on the large object non-inconspicuously hidden behind Gideon's back.
Gideon glanced between Dipper and Pacifica, unsure of how to react. "Howdy?" Cute magician boys don't just show up on the doorstep for no reason. "... Dipper, is it?" He prayed that the boy was here to sweep Pacifica off her feet and out of Gideon's hair. He already had a ship name for them: the mystery lovers. Maybe they could squeal over Arthur Conan Doyle novels and gnome theories together, but, like, out of Gideon's earshot.
He nodded, then held out the bouquet towards Gideon. A blush involuntarily rose to his cheeks. "L-Let's, uh… Let's hang out today," he suggested hesitantly. He attempted to brush off the offer as casual, something that he didn't plan out hours in advance with elaborate lists and diagrams. "I have nothing else to do."
Gideon accepted the flowers with one hand and took a deep inhale of their fragrance. He wondered if there was something in the journal that would help him interpret this encounter. Sure, the flowers could simply be a welcoming gift, but the sheepish charm Dipper had said otherwise. Boys didn't ask to hang out with each other with a bouquet of pink flowers—maybe girls did, Gideon wouldn't know, but certainly not boys who played football and went to church every Sunday. Did Gravity Falls even have a church?
Gideon tried to approach the subject with as much tact as he could. "Is there a special reason why you're called Dipper?" Back where he's from, a "dipper" could mean two things, and Gideon wasn't referring to the constellation.
"Friends, Gideon," Dipper emphasized. "We're going to hang out as friends..."
Gideon was relieved until Dipper amended his statement.
"... y-you know, as boys who are friends?"
He gave up on finding a clear answer in Dipper and sought Pacifica's reaction to the ordeal. She seemed annoyed, from the way she crossed her arms, but Gideon couldn't decide whether it was because of Dipper's presence in general or the implications that floated around. Or, perhaps Gravity Falls was a lot more liberal than Houston and Gideon was overthinking everything. As disappointed as he was that the mystery lovers weren't going to unite, he was still interested in a free meal. What was better, an army of gnomes or a cute magician boyfriend?
"Don't wait up," Gideon told his cousin in advance.
He tried not to think about her disapproving frown before he slammed the door behind him.
Dipper took Gideon's hands in his and gazed intensely into the other boy's eyes. "You know I like you, right?" He caressed Gideon's hands gently, smoothing his fingers over every callous and crease and papercut—all fresh information to read. Undertones of fear twitched within his soft tone. There were only a few seconds of eye contact before Dipper seemed to have found whatever he was looking for, and glanced around him for any spectators. Nobody was around besides the two of them, together, and that scared him even more.
"Umm…"
Gideon could hear static all over again. It was silent enough to hear his ears ring. He, in fact, did not know that Dipper liked him. He was hardly aware of Dipper's name until he heard his cousin call him that a few minutes ago. Pieces were scattered before him and he was never a fan of puzzles, yet, apparently that was all he would ever get in Gravity Falls: a puzzle wrapped in a riddle written in a cryptogram locked under a three-digit code found in a journal deep in the creepy woods. He didn't want to adapt to a new way of thinking; it wasn't like he asked for any of this peculiarity when he wanted a new start. If it was implied, he wasn't unaware that his wish went to a bored genie.
The separation of their hands was like an unexpected gust of wind sweeping a stack of papers away.
"I'm sorry."
"For what?" Gideon hadn't meant to imply rejection with his hesitance. He was dumbstruck, and, well… dumbstruck. Yes, dumbstruck and dumbstruck. That was the best he could think of at the moment.
Dipper started walking away and Gideon could only assume that he was supposed to follow. He shoved his hands in his pockets. "I like you just the way you are, you know?"
Again, Gideon did not know that, or where they were going, for that matter.
"It's fine if you don't know. We're going into town, by the way. There's nowhere else to go from the Shack, unless you want to go into the woods."
… Either Gideon was thinking out loud or Dipper truly did possess a sixth sense. He wasn't sure what he expected from someone who worked at a place called the "Tent of Telepathy." Yet, he still held skepticism. Dipper had proved before that thought-out reasoning passed for a gullible boy's magic and Gideon preferred to not let it be proved again. He felt stupid enough the first time. Psychics, fake or not, were supposed to be sensitive to body language and emotions. It was only natural for Dipper to reassure him.
The Baader-Meinhof phenomenon explained it all—coincidences aligned due to selective attention. It was the same reason why his life suddenly felt centered around mysteries, as if a few oddities on his first day foreshadowed an entire summer of weirdness. Nothing had to mean anything. Dipper didn't need a reason to like Gideon and just the way he was. Emotions are based on perception, constantly varied by factors as frivolous as color or a worm in an apple. Forward into town they went, not that it mattered what direction or path they took to what direction. Time was well-wasted either way.
They followed the dirt path to town. Paradoxically, Gideon forced himself to relax. He wasn't anything like his cousin so he most certainly, definitely, and absolutely not search for legitimate evidence proving that Dipper had ESP the entire day. Instead, he focused on one specific thought. It wasn't bait to observe how the independent variable would stimulate a certain response from Dipper. He was genuinely briefly distracted by the fleeting reminder of a musical he saw once by the title Into The Woods. Personally, he preferred the movie version. "The woods can be a dangerous place…" In hindsight, his first thought should have jumped to his earlier experience when he was actually in the woods Dipper spoke of, but songs were catchier.
Dipper perked up. "I was thinking of Into The Woods, too! You must be psychic, or something."
Oh, the irony. Thought, it's not as if Gideon had any growing paranoia of whether or not Dipper was feigning an innocent common interest. "What's your favorite song?"
"Oh, I don't know any of them by title..."
"What about the lyrics?"
"Ah, not really…"
Gideon was on the edge of his patience. "Did you actually see it?" He could never understand the poor, soulless people who see a play without learning every single lyric and line of every character. When the chorus is stuck in your head, it means it's good enough to learn the entire song. Dipper was an actor, whether he acknowledged it or not, and every Thespian had to be well-versed in more than the overused Shakespearean tragedies.
"Do you know what drum corps is?" Dipper asked.
Gideon had a feeling Dipper was trying to change the subject, but he went along with it to see how stupid Dipper thought he was. "Like military drum and bugle corps?"
Dipper was glad he didn't have to simplify the concept down to a marching band minus the woodwinds. "Yeah, but not necessarily for the military. There's a world-class drum corps called the Blue Devils, and their show last year featured music from Into The Woods. I think you'd really like it."
Translation: Dipper was a band geek, not a theater geek. It made sense. He looked like a low brass kind of guy, maybe a tuba player? Baritone, maybe. Gideon decided his excuse for not having all the songs memorized was somewhat legitimate, but that didn't mean he would let him get away with it. "I'll watch the Blue Devils if you watch Into The Woods."
Dipper wasn't opposed to them hopping into each other's worlds, but the deal was disproportionate. "Seriously? You watch twelve minutes and I watch an entire hour?"
"I have the DVD. We can watch it together in my… Oh."
Gideon realized too late the full implications of his proposal. They hadn't even reached town, yet, and he was already suggesting a follow-up movie date. He noticed then that he and Dipper were walking side-by-side with their steps unintentionally synchronized. Left with left, right with right, at an even tempo. They couldn't have been moving too fast. If they were, he couldn't see the harm in it as long as they were on the same beat. Town wasn't too far, though.
"Is something wrong?" Dipper asked.
"It's nothing," Gideon insisted, "except that I don't have anything to play the DVD on. Do you happen to know someone whose laptop we could borrow?"
The two people that Dipper automatically associated with technology made him cringe. "What about your cousin? She's loaded."
"Inebriated?" The second definition Gideon was ready to suggest had to do with potatoes and cheese.
Dipper rolled his eyes. He assumed Gideon was playing dumb for humorous effect. "Affluent, duh."
"But she works below minimum wage and my dad's business has probably gotten negative customers since the grand opening."
Dipper's assumption was evidently wrong. He shrugged. "It's fine if you don't know."
There was something about both of the boys that didn't seem right and their combination didn't help relieve the uneasiness she felt. Pacifica decided to consult Robbie.
Robbie Stacey Valentino, 16 years old, worked at the Auto Shack as a tech guy. He was an alto in his school's choir and his voice was, in Pacifica's opinion, heavenly. His parents were in charge of putting the dead to rest, but his ambition was keeping the living alive as a cardiologist like the angel he was. He played the guitar, maintained a steady 4.3 GPA, would've been sent to an embalming camp if Pacifica's uncle hadn't hired him, wore sweater vests daily, was a mural artist, and Pacifica probably knew way too much about him than what was healthy.
Every once in a while, Robbie made for a good investigation partner and was one of the few fellow theorists she knew. He helped her concoct the theory that explained why their employer never talked about his family. All they knew was that Bud was divorced and didn't keep in contact with his ex-wife. It wasn't until recently that they discovered someone would start living with him, but Bud never stated who it would be or for what reasons. Robbie came up with the theory that it would be his ex-wife that would start living with him after being haunted by their son's recent death, but that was crushed as soon as Gideon arrived.
She stomped in the Auto Shack lobby angrily, where Robbie was typing away at his laptop. As soon as he heard her loud steps of distress, he halted his work. "Oh, hey Pacifica! Did you hear about your cousin making the news?" He switched to a tab of an online Gravity Falls Gossiper article titled "Little Dipper's Little Boyfriend?" and turned the laptop towards her. The picture depicted the boys holding hands. Gideon waved innocently at the camera, seemingly enjoying the attention, while Dipper covered his face with a hand.
Pacifica gaped. In the few hours he's been in Gravity Falls, her cousin was already on celebrity gossip news. She scrolled through the article curiously and read aloud. "'Despite his short stature, Li'l Gideon claims to be the older in the couple...' 'Dipper is also fully aware of this fact'?" She was baffled by the quote. Gideon looked ten, at most. Supposedly, his real age was a number she wouldn't believe, but she assumed that meant he was a lot younger than he appeared. The entire interview was loaded with similar nonsense. "Gideon isn't a fan of garlic? He's not religious? He's more of a night person? Who cares?"
"Dipper does," Robbie answered. The teen highlighted a line that literally said that not many people would care about such small details about his boyfriend, but Dipper did, and he hoped to learn all of Gideon's secrets. Robbie gestured to the crystal vase he picked out for the pink freesias Dipper brought earlier. "Did you know that freesias mean 'trust' in the Victorian flower language?"
Pacifica scoffed at the word—trust. There was only one T-word she hated as much as trust, and that was truce. She took a closer look at the highlighted sentence. It was clear to her that whatever it was that Dipper sought, Gideon was the key to finding it. Gravity Falls was a small town and, as such, there were a few maxims every resident was seemingly born knowing, from the advice that Lazy Susan Charges Less To Polite Customers to the fact that Nobody Likes Toby Determined. Everybody knew that The Pines Are Shady. As entertaining as their family was, it was common sense not to linger around them too long, lest strange happenings happen.
She didn't blame her cousin for not knowing, being new to town and all, but she thought it awfully low for Dipper to take advantage of Gideon's naivety. "Dipper is not what he seems!" The back-and-forth pacing started again. First the code on the back of the business card, then a date with her cousin, and now Dipper wants to know all of Gideon's secrets. "Ugh, what could he possibly see in Gideon?" she wondered. All the pieces were in front of her and all there was left was to put together the big picture.
Robbie shrugged. As someone knowledgeable in cardiology, it was his professional opinion that the situation was a matter of the heart. He'd hate to rain on her parade, though. "Well, first thing's first, you can't assume if you have something big to prove. I was the same way when I suspected one of the bodies my parents were working on had its kidneys sold for money."
Interested in the tale, she stopped in her tracks. "So what did you do?"
He partially pulled down his pants for the purpose of demonstration. "Well, first I made an incision at the—"
Her face twisted into a surly expression of disgust. "Spare me the details."
Robbie was disappointed to have his story cut short, but he decided the moral was left intact. "What I'm trying to say is that you need cold, squishy proof, or else people accuse you of being some kind of 'sick, bloodthirsty weirdo' that 'digs through corpse guts for fun.' I'll admit that it was nice practice for when I get accepted into medical school, but—"
"—ThanksRobbiegottagobye!"
The musky smell of cork grease and wood brought Gideon back to a spring from his early childhood, when his father first started to teach him how to play the piano. Back then, his quaint piano was in tune. The average cost to get a piano re-tuned was around $100 and ranged up to $200 at most, and it's recommended to re-tune it every six months, four if it's new to break in the strings. The pitch goes flat regardless of how often it is played due to the extremely high string tension. Re-stringing costs more than the piano itself. Gideon didn't want to imagine the cost of other trivialities: sticky keys, mold, rust, rats... He does not recall his old piano ever getting repaired or re-tuned. He didn't know much about the instrument itself other than how to play it, so he was under the impression that it had value as long as it was mostly functional. He hated to think that the piano was sitting alone in its room at that very moment, collecting dust.
He sat at the shiny grand piano in front of him while Dipper wandered elsewhere (after adjusting the stool's height to accommodate his own). Being in a music store, Gideon didn't need a tuner to know that the instrument in front of him wouldn't be flat. This store had quality products, unlike his father. He lifted the cover off the keys. His most recent reason to resent his father was his failing business. Of all the commodities to choose, Bud had to choose to sell cars in a small town where everything was walking distance. It may be a respectable and "manly" profession, but it wasn't profitable. Why cars? Why Gravity Falls? Gideon smashed the keys in anger, stomping at the pedal so that his emotions could properly reverberate throughout the store.
Dipper reappeared with a concert tuba and a stack of sheet music. "'Do you want to know—"
Astonished that there were suddenly answers to the questions plaguing him, he released the keys and pedal. "There's a real reason why?" he asked, eyes widened.
Dipper shook his head. "No, 'Do you want to know a secret?' by the Beatles. It's a duet. I've never heard of the song 'There's a real reason why' before."
Gideon rested his fingers on a minor chord. He laughed softly to himself. That was funny. He legitimately expected Dipper to know what he was thinking. But maybe he did, and he was just hiding it. "How did you know I played piano?"
Dipper smiled brightly, the same way he did when he explained how he knew Gideon and Pacifica were cousins. The answer, this time, was simple. "You have the hands for it. I'm sure you knew I played the tuba, too."
Gideon lazily drifted up the C scale. He should've expected scrutinization whenever Dipper linked their hands together. Fake psychics were observers, and hands were books to them. There was a lot to read in one's hands. "How can we just allocate certain traits to people without proof, though? I don't even have good piano hands. My fingers are chubby and you look too small to handle such a big instrument."
Dipper took a seat next to him on the piano stool, resting the tuba on his leg. "That's called 'conjecture.' It doesn't make sense, but it feels right, so you trust it." The sheet music was placed on the stand of the piano.
Gideon accidentally hit a crooked combination of two notes before he could successfully conclude his scale. An entire orchestra and thousand-person choir played Ode To Joy in his mind. The epiphany had the power of a million horns ripping during a trumpet fanfare. That was the appeal of mysteries! It was like writing a song to completion, like memorizing every song in a musical, like deciphering the chords in a certain progression by ear, like composing a symphony, like harmonizing information in a way that created something entirely new…
He felt as clear as a stuffy nose with a humidifier. "So Pacifica's craziness is just a different manifestation of that feeling?"
Dipper rolled his eyes. "Ugh…" He clicked the keys on the tuba. "Your cousin is a flame who thinks she's the Sun just because she attracts a few moths. All offense intended."
Gideon took no offense whatsoever. He could personally attest to Pacifica's self-centeredness. He hadn't even spent an entire day with her and he was already wondering how he was supposed to share a room with her for who knows how long. Being around her was draining because it was all about her and what she wanted. Even when Gideon slipped a few of his own opinions in, they were for her sake.
"She just doesn't understand people… Isn't that a lonely life? To never understand, to never be understood?" Dipper rested one hand on the piano keys, lightly skimming over the black keys. An only child would never understand the plight of twins, after all. "I understand that you're a music person. It's how you think." He attempted a D-flat scale. If he remembers correctly, the formula for a major scale is whole step, whole step, half step, whole step, whole step, whole step, half step. The piano gave the quintessential visual for music theory. "We could make a lot of beautiful music together."
Gideon sifted through the papers Dipper brought. They were all piano and tuba duets. How romantic. He couldn't think of a better way to understand another person than through complete and utter harmonization. A mixed-in page from a score for Symphony No. 9 Op. 95 caught his attention. "Are you familiar with Dvořák?" he teased. Tubas were only included in the second movement of the symphony, in which they sustained long notes. The other three movements were disappointingly tuba-less, unless it was Robert Ryker's arrangement.
Dipper tucked the page behind the other papers. "As familiar as french horns are with John Philip Sousa." John Philip Sousa, inventor of the sousaphone, was the reason why french horns were sick to nausea with offbeats in marches. "Pick a song, any song!" he beckoned, in a traditional magician's manner. "Except that one."
There was a good variety to choose from: sonatines, concert pieces, pop songs, rock songs, songs from musicals, songs from movies, and a few abstract pieces he skimmed through skeptically. Yet, reverse psychology tempted him. "I like that symphony, though." He had a piano version of the second movement memorized, too.
"Seriously?"
Gideon played the first chord to prove just how serious he was.
"Song-picking privileges lost," Dipper responded. He spread out the sheets of his own choosing, instead. "We're doing Viva la Vida."
"I was kidding! Come on, that song is so overplayed."
"We're doing Viva la Vida."
"What about 4'33?"
"Viva la Vida. Now look over the music while I warm up and tune."
Pacifica was convinced that her cousin was under a spell. There was no other explanation for the way they played together, the way they harmonized, the way they synchronized—all without the need for a metronome. She wasn't gathering evidence, anymore; she was recording a performance. She hid behind a shelf of piano books. It was almost embarrassing to watch them.
Gideon sang softly as he played, intending only for Dipper to hear. "I used to rule the world, seas would rise when I gave the word…" The tempo would have been unbearably slow for anyone else, fifty beats per minute at most, but for them, it was the best pace to give justice to every note. Gideon lifted his hands lightly at the end of each phrase, as if he were caressing the piano. Pacifica wouldn't have known he was sight-reading if not for his heavy reliance on the sheet music. "Now in the morning I sleep alone, sweep the streets I used to own…"
The long tones floated soulfully out of the tuba, making it evident that Dipper had a lot of practice. His posture was straight, but he relaxed into the song like his natural state of being was playing. Crescendos and decrescendos added longing in the context of the lyrics.
"I used to roll the dice, feel the fear in my enemy's eyes…" As Gideon became more familiar with the chords and chord progression, he added more notes to what he played to give a fuller sound. He gradually increased the tempo the more he became comfortable. Dipper caught on with no hesitation. "Listen as the crowd would sing: 'Now the old queen is dead. Long live the queen!'"
Pacifica was briefly distracted by that line. The lyric was wrong. It should've been king, not queen. She let it slide, since it fit well with the rhyme scheme and it was likely that Gideon hadn't heard the song in a while.
Dipper matched style Gideon cued: from legato to staccato, from grand to gentle, from mournful to romantic. It had to be a spell. Hours ago, they were strangers, and now, they were running on the same energy to create something more than the both of them. Pacifica didn't miss the glances they cast at each other while they thought the other wasn't looking or their legs casually touching under the piano, as if it were only natural that they were close together. She had stepped through the looking glass into a wonderland of emotions she couldn't all make sense of. There, she could experience a sliver of what they saw in each other.
It was so obvious that she hated herself for missing it before.
Mind control through a music spell. Genius. Luckily, she has dealt with these kinds of situations before. All she had to do was play it in reverse a million times and listen to the real message. Then, Dipper's plot would be exposed and Pacifica would have… bragging rights, she guessed. Plus, Gideon would be out of Dipper's evil clutches. Robbie would be impressed with her for putting his words of wisdom to good use. She would have never thought that the cold, squishy proof she wanted was a well-known pop song by Coldplay.
The proof was a lot warmer and softer than she expected, but it only served to prove her hypothesis even more. Dipper was seducing her widdle cousin. She had to say, he had tact. The display in front of her disgusted her as much as it would have if their hands were intertwined on a candlelit dinner. Not even an hour, and Dipper had Gideon wrapped around his finger. Well, not for long. Dipper may have a shiny tuba and a catchy chorus, but she had something better. She had the truth, and she had seen enough.
Gideon sat in front of the full-length mirror in his now-shared room with Pacifica, his fingers splayed out in front of him on an invisible piano. His reflection is concealed by pages of sheet music taped up. While he fingered through the notes on the papers, he thought back to the old piano he had back home again. Even when he was there, it had been collecting dust. It had been months since he played it. He used to sit down at the stool with his hands hovering just above the keys, piano book turned to a random song, and stare. The same thoughts were running through his mind and they were louder than the discordant noise of him laying his head on the piano. He had no other way to express himself.
It sounded a lot worse out loud than in his mind, but maybe he didn't need to express himself. That wasn't to say he needed to suppress himself. What he was trying to say was that he should allow himself to step out of himself, even his fake selves, and express concepts, instead. He had never felt a song so strongly before as he did with Dipper. It only took him a verse to figure out exactly what 'Pd8=Q?' meant.
The connections were so blatant he hated himself for missing it before.
Really, it was undeniable to him that Dipper was a genius. To concoct such a scheme in a relatively short amount of time and put it into action instantly was a wonder. The namesake of the song Viva la Vida came from a famous painting by Mexican artist Frida Kahlo, with the same title. He had polio, a broken spine, and a decade of chronic pain. Ironically, "viva" was a Spanish word used to acclaim someone or something. The symbolism behind the song title translated to acclaiming life whilst in the throes of pain. Dipper's code warned with the same sentiments.
When Pacifica suddenly burst into the room, polaroid camera around her neck and video camera in her hand, Gideon wondered whether it was best to tell Pacifica the answer or let her come to her own realizations at her own pace. There were still scraps of theories behind the code on her side of the room.
"Gideon, we've gotta talk about Dipper," she announced.
He laughed. There was a lot to talk about, in that case. "Isn't he the best? Check out this piece he composed." He gestured to the sheet music taped on the mirror. It was for tuba, but he was slowly figuring out the chord progression so he could write a piano accompaniment to go with it.
She tore off one sheet to look at closer, intrigued. "I can't read bass clef."
"I wrote the chords below. Sing it out loud?"
"I don't have perfect pitch."
"... Oh. You want me to sing it for you? It's pretty good, but Dipper was right, it would be more complete with a piano part."
"No, Gideon, listen. I'm trying to tell you that Dipper is not what he seems!" She pulled out photographic evidence from her jacket. One photograph showed Dipper gazing lovingly at him while he showed off a little on the piano. The next revealed Dipper rolling his eyes with a bored look in his eyes while Gideon continued showing off a lot more than "a little." The last one depicted Dipper clearly falling asleep while Gideon resumed, you guessed it, showing off on the piano, resting his head on the shorter boy's shoulder. His jacket was off and folded as a makeshift pillow.
Gideon took a closer at the last photo, where a pink marker circled a turquoise amulet on Dipper's ribbon neck tie. Without the black jacket, it was apparent that Dipper had been previously dressed up in preparation for that night's canceled show. He wore dark blue vest over a white button-up along with that peculiar amulet. According to the pink ink, that amulet could possibly be the source of Dipper's powers. "You think he might be…" He gasped for effect, and lowered his voice to a whisper. "... a psychic?" He waved the picture in the air as he gesticulated wildly to convey the sheer surprise he felt from the revelation. "Oh my stars and stripes! Imagine what chaos he could wreak with such abilities! Why, such a gift is a real money-maker. He may even set up a tent—the Tent of Telepathy! It all makes sense!"
"Guess again, cousin…" She whipped out a newspaper clipping. "Shabam!"
He genuinely cried out in surprise this time, astonished by the headline. "Ah!" Since that morning, on the same hour he arrived in Gravity Falls, three citizens have complained of wounded cattle. In all cases, two small punctures were present on the neck, but nothing more. El Chupacabra was a main suspect.
She glanced at the clipping, only to realize she had pulled out the wrong one. "Oh, wait, I'm sorry, I'm sorry…" She pulled out another one. "Shabam!"
It was an article juxtaposing two interviews Dipper had on the same day. In one, he was heavily emotional and couldn't stop crying. The other, he was aloof and offhandish. In one, he was fascinated with the sinful potentials the human race had to offer. The other, he wanted nothing to do with anyone (except his sister). In one, he loved sweets. The other, the mere mention of sugar sent him rushing to the nearest trash can to vomit. In one, he believed every form of love was a frivolous waste of time and energy better spent building a doomsday device, or something. The other, he declared that the only girl for him was his sister.
"A split personality?" Gideon deduced. As someone who wanted to harness the power of gnomes for his own nefarious purposes, none of what Pacifica said particularly fazed him. It was almost cute how she was only looking at the shallow waters when there was a lot more to see on the ocean floor. He sighed. "Will you get off my case if I tell you what 'Pd8=Q?' means?"
She grabbed him by the shoulders with wide eyes. "You know?" Her hands tightened on him like a vice grip.
He nodded slowly, unsure of whether or not he was making the right decision. "I have a…" He inwardly groaned at the phrase. "... theory about what it all means."
Her smile was too bright and too wide for his liking. He was past the point of no return, now. No backwards glances. The games of run and hide were at an end. "Tell me!"
"On one condition: you let me borrow a laptop or DVD player tonight."
"Yeah, sure, whatever! Just tell me!"
He took in a deep breath. "It's in chess notation. Pawns that make it to the eighth square can be promoted to a queen, which is the most powerful piece on the board, but the two question marks are symbols in chess annotation that commentators use when you make a blunder. He's warning you that gaining too much power will ultimately lead to your loss."
She let go of him. As one case closed, three more opened. "But why did he ask you out?"
He rolled his eyes. "Does everything have to revolve around you, Pacifica? I've got my own life, too, but it looks like that ain't possible with you butting in my life, analyzing who I go out with, questioning my life choices…"
"Okay, geez, sorry! Have fun on your dumb date!"
Dipper and Gideon traversed the forest in unnatural silence. It reminded Gideon of every warning telling him to trust no one in Gravity Falls. There were poems, riddles, and songs with similar sentiments. They walked on the road less traveled by, where if he fell, nobody would hear. Good things never happened in the woods. It was a shadow realm of the unknown, away from shining civilization with shinier technology. Yet, Gideon had made the foolish decision that he liked Dipper, and that was enough to follow him deeper and deeper.
Gideon surmised that Dipper knew these woods well, though he couldn't pick up why he would assume such a thing. It looked like they were aimlessly wandering around and it felt like they were aimlessly wandering around and they were still technically on Gleeful property. A Pines wouldn't be familiar with Gleeful property, but Gideon was starting to become more comfortable with the idea of making theories. Dipper could be a regular trespasser.
"Bud's house used to belong to Stan," Dipper revealed, out of the blue. He stopped when they arrived at a clearing, where the soft gold of the afternoon warmed them in halo. He kept his back to Gideon. "My sister and I used to visit our Grunkle Stan every summer at his place. He turned his house into a tourist trap called the Mystery Shack…" He laughed nostalgically. "The real mystery was why anybody came."
Oh, how easy it was to shoot down theories. Though, the answer was a lot more interesting than Gideon expected. "Used to?"
"After our parents died in a freak car accident, he became our caretaker. Then, as soon as we started exhibiting our 'special gifts,' the Telepathy Twins became the main attraction. He realized how profitable we were, so he sold the Shack to your dad and we became a traveling freak show. But every summer, we always come back to Gravity Falls."
It was a terrible mistake to like Dipper. It wasn't that Dipper had dead parents—Gideon could sympathize—or that Dipper had mental issues—Gideon could relate—or that Dipper would be sand slipping through his fingers the entire summer, closer to disappearing every second—Gideon could cope. It was the unsaid reason why Dipper would return to Gravity Falls every summer. Knowing never hurt more than it did now because he knew what inevitable truth this spiel was building up to.
Dipper stepped away from him. "I have something to tell you, Gideon. Just… don't freak out." He whipped out a folded piece of paper that unfolded to reveal endless diagrams, notes, glued-in photos, and hypotheses that all pointed to everything Gideon was afraid of.
Please don't do it.
"Yes. I know that you're a vampire. Do you, uh, do you need to sit down? Get a glass of cold cattle blood? I know this is a lot to take in, but, well, there it is! Haha… Please don't suck my blood, I have a show tomorrow."
Oh my God. Gideon hated fate and it was obvious that fate hated him back. He couldn't believe he wasted the entire day not enslaving an entire race of little men. Nope, instead, he had some magic tuba boy trying to tell him that he was a vampire. This is what rock bottom felt like. Now he knew why the journal told him to trust no one in Gravity Falls. His dad was an idiot who sold cars in a town where everything was walking distance, his cousin was a weird voyeur that thrived on character inconsistencies, and now his boyfriend thought he was a vampire. He knew he should have been a bottle blonde. He had the perfect shade in mind and everything.
Gideon took in a deep breath, then let it out. Deep breath, then let it out. It's fine, he told himself. Just let it happen. "You're right, Dipper. I am a genuine, certified vampire. I was a fool to think I could keep this secret from you, a born genius." He had so many questions regarding why exactly Dipper was eating this up, but he just went with it. From now on, he would roll with the punches. It didn't sound like too hard of a lie to live up to for the rest of the summer. After all, this wasn't the first time he has been accused of being a vampire. At least this time there weren't wooden stakes or garlic. God—the garlic. He was so sick of garlic now that he developed an ironic aversion to it. "Fear not, mortal. By your human standards, I am on a vegetarian diet. I only drink animal blood. I mean, are you aware of how poisonous fast food is to human blood? Obesity rates in vampires have skyrocketed thanks to the fast food revolution. Sometimes I settle for coconut water. The war myths were true."
Suddenly, there was a pen in Dipper's hand. "I have. So. Many. Questions."
The incessant clicking would later haunt Gideon in his nightmares.
There it finally is. I've been writing this on infinite repeat since the last time I updated. It's funny, the first chapter only took a day, but this chapter had seven other drafts before I settled on this because I was just really needed to move on. Now I'm halfway through the symphony. Btw the Mabel date is still going to be a thing that happens, but like, "The Hand That Rocks The Ladle" sounds cool.
Fun fact about the New World Symphony: as alluded to in this chapter, the tuba is only used in the second movement, the triangle is only used in the third movement, and the cymbals are only used in the fourth movement. And I didn't know this before this draft, but there's also a version called "Goin' Home" which is basically just Largo but with lyrics. The lyrics are pretty irrelevant to this chapter, though, lol. But I think of Largo as a movement of atmosphere, with a little mini reprise of the New World theme. And if you listen to the recording of Largo on YouTube, you can notice some squeaks and intonation problems and I'm a bad person for laughing at it. The "Viva la Vida" song origin thing is legit. I had no idea about it until I saw it on, you guessed it, Wikipedia. They were originally supposed to play Boulevard of Broken Dreams because I found a cool duet on YouTube with the piano and tuba, but Viva la Vida worked out better. On a final note, his chapter's code is relevant to pianos. It makes sense with a little bit of research.
.- / .-.. .. - - .-.. . / .-.. .. . / -.-. .- -. / ... - .- .. -. / .- ... / .- - .-. ... . / .- ... / -... .-.. .- -.-. -.- / -.. -.- . .-.-.-
