For much of that night and the next morning, they stayed out of the oppressive heat and ruminated at home, debating – sometimes silently – about their next course of action. Winnie had taken the position that there wasn't a whole lot else they could do besides start asking hard questions, while giving up some additional truths about themselves in exchange.
Sue did not agree. "If they talk, aren't you worried about shattering everyone's perception?" she asked after the latest round of debate. "Remember what happened the last time one of us did that."
Her words hit Winnie right where it hurt. She folded her arms and frowned into her lap. "I know. But what we're feeling isn't supposed to be here. They know the place better than we do." She glanced over to the dormant TV. "You've altered things since we arrived, right?"
"Only what was necessary."
Winnie scowled faintly. "Doesn't it seem different?"
Sue tilted her head. "I hadn't really paid attention, to be honest. Why?"
"Try it. Tell me what you feel."
With a shrug, she looked at the TV and lifted her hand. A snap of her fingers caused it to fold up and shrink into a silvery teapot, which she suspended in the air. "Wow. It doesn't feel quite the same, does it? It's not even whispering at me." Another snap brought the object back to its original form. "It's... it's kind of like clay."
"Exactly. Gravity Falls is very squishy. And not just Gravity Falls," she stated, nodding out the window at the BMW in the driveway. "I had no problem at all changing that thing – and we were well out of town when I did. This whole world is so pliable."
Sue rubbed at her arm thoughtfully. "Oh. That could be a problem."
"Now you understand why I'm so anxious. If we don't figure this out... the world as these people know it could cease to exist. We have to make sure the power isn't spreading." Winnie's expression grew distant. "And..."
"You're trying to atone, too. I understand." Sue reached over and gave her a pat on the knee. "I wish I'd been there. Maybe... maybe we could have found some other way to stop it."
Her voice grew weak and awkward. "I know."
Silent seconds trundled by, which turned into minutes, then nearly half an hour. Sue couldn't save them with a change of subject this time; the topic at hand was one of her sister's greatest regrets. There was only one way to fight it: hugging. Just as they embraced, however, a thumping knock erupted from the front door. Winnie grunted with annoyance as she rose to answer. "I am in no mood for this right now." However, the person standing behind it was enough to replace her anger with surprise. "Mister Corduroy?"
The mountain disguised as a lumberjack looked genuinely timid standing there, with hands wringing and a distinct inability to make eye contact. "Miss... ah, Winnie? I didn't mean to... uh..."
Wendy suddenly leaned out from behind him, an apologetic grin plastered on her face. "Sorry. I couldn't stop him. I was lucky I was able to make him wait this long."
Sue joined her sister at the door, head cocked curiously. "Oh, hello. What's this about?"
Words were well beyond his reach, but the relieved expression he bore said quite a bit. The twins came outside, and together they all waited on him to speak. "Her name was gonna be Diana," he finally choked out. "When I was born she would have been eleven years old."
"...I get it." Sue took him by the hand and smiled. "That was your sister we heard."
"Yeah. I wish she'd made it. Wendy coulda had a mom after..." Rendered speechless by the pain, all Manly Dan could do was sit down and struggle to contain his tears. Wendy came over to give him an awkward half-hug. "We never knew how she died, you know? Never charged him with her death, but my mom always had doubts. I'm just happy she was able to say goodbye before she moved on." He stood abruptly, leaving his daughter hanging on his back.
"Hey!" she protested, dropping off. "Man, you gotta warn me next time."
"How can I repay you?" he boomed dramatically. "You got trees that need choppin'? Oh, I'll chop those trees. Chop 'em real good."
"We can chop our own trees," Winnie replied, arms crossed. "Like I said to Wendy, there's no need to thank us. All we did was hear the voices."
"You better think of something," Wendy advised with a smile. "He ain't gonna stop until you do."
"Hrm..." Sue looked from side to side, a hand on her hip as she considered options. Her eyes went to the brick exterior. "We've been meaning to pressure wash the house, but-"
Dan didn't give her a chance to finish. "I'll make that dirt regret being born! Come on, Wendy."
She stared at him helplessly. "Are you nuts, man? It's a million degrees out here!"
"We'll get the equipment," Winnie sighed, leading Sue back into the house.
They conjured up a washer and a few rolls of hose from a pile of junk in the closet in the hallway leading out of the living room – a closet with a small stack of gold bars in the back right corner. Hauling all this to the eager lumberjack and his not-so-eager daughter took three trips, but in a few minutes they were at work on the front, starting with the section covered by the porch roof. The twins watched their progress for a while. "Look at him go," Sue commented, her brow cocked. "I didn't think you could clean something that fast."
Winnie nodded idly. "Mm. Maybe they'll be done when we get back."
"Where are we going?" By the time she looked over, her sister was already on her way to the car. "Wait for me!" Her tone had gotten grumpy by the time she started buckling up. "Sister! Would you mind filling me in?"
"You said we shouldn't fight them."
Sue's face screwed up. "Fight who?"
She glanced up at the mirror and backed out, taking off down the hill. "Mabel and Dipper. Let's see if you're truly right about them being able to help us."
Yes, she recalled saying it, but Winnie's sudden acceptance of the idea left her a little anxious. "Are you..."
"The fairies altered matter too. Maybe they've seen it happen already." Winnie glanced about as the town moved past outside. "Having the Corduroys clean the house should buy us enough time. I don't think they should hear this."
"I see. I guess it couldn't hurt to ask." Sue relaxed and allowed her attention to wander. It landed on her arms, which were as unmarred as they'd been before the fairy attack yesterday. "Those little swords of theirs were sharp."
"I wanted to vaporize those little bastards."
"Oh?" She tried to seem surprised, but dropped the act after a second. Her eyes grew dark as storm clouds. "So did I. Nobody hurts my sister."
The rest of their trip passed wordlessly. A tour bus was departing as they came in sight of the Mystery Shack; Stan watched them from the gift shop entrance as they parked and emerged from the red BMW. "Hey, it's you!" he called with a wave. The twins regarded him warily as they approached the steps. "Still mad at me? Listen, uh..." His demeanor shifted into something more grateful – almost vulnerable, they decided.
And for this reason Winnie decided to hear him out – but only after glancing around for the tiny spirit light she'd seen following him at the party. It was missing. "Yes?" she urged, peering at him suspiciously. "Are you about to ask us for money again?"
"No, no. No. I just... Dipper told me what happened at the hospital." He put his cane aside and sat on the top step. "How you saved 'em from the collapse." Abruptly, he raised his hands a little. "I ain't sayin' it's your fault. I know what he did. I don't even know how you all got in there. Doesn't matter. Thanks. For, you know. Not letting 'em get hurt."
At first, they didn't know what to say. Winnie deferred to Sue with a brief nod. "It's nothing, really. We weren't going to let something bad happen to them if we could help it." That was as far as she'd go without knowing the extent of what Dipper had confessed.
"Yeah. Yeah." The old man stood and scowled at the forest. "Look, maybe we got off on the wrong foot. By maybe I mean absolutely." He put on his best smile while offering a hand. "Let's try again. I'm Stan Pines. Just call me Stan. But not Grunkle Stan. I ain't your Grunkle."
They shook it in turn, smiling to various degrees. "I think you already know our names," Sue said uncertainly.
"Winnie and Sue?" He addressed them in reverse order, then blinked at their denial. "Oh. I got it backwards, didn't I."
"Yes," Sue giggled. "Our given names are Summer and Winter."
"Oh. Huh. My real name's Stanford. Hadn't been called that by someone who wasn't Gideon in..." He suddenly became a little crestfallen. "A long time. Meh. Which you like best?"
After a brief, shared glance, Winnie took over the spokeswoman role. "I prefer our full names, to be honest." Sue nodded her agreement after a moment.
"Fine. Winter and Summer. No offense, but your parents must have been hippies." He didn't get the expected chuckle – even awkward laughter would have been better than the utter misery that marred their pale faces. "Oh. Sorry. Didn't mean to... I dunno. Whatever I just did."
"We don't get along very well with our... parents," Winnie explained quietly. "At all."
Stan winced a bit too hard, requiring him to readjust his red fez. "Oooo. Yeah. I kinda know where you're coming from. Still, though, I suggest makin' up with 'em if ya can. You—you never know when the window will close."
The blue-eyed woman's face became unhappy. "Perhaps one day," she said, her tone steely.
"Alllll right, movin' on." Vocally and physically, as he motioned them to follow him into the gift shop. They found it empty, though Mabel could be heard laughing about something behind the living room door. "Guess I was wrong about the inheritance part, huh?"
"We're self-made," Sue clarified, not a hint of irony in her voice. "Dealing in... precious metals. Gold, mostly."
"Nice." Stan's vaguely greedy cackle drew their ire once more. "Hey, I wouldn't take you for a ride. Not after what you did for the kids. I might be a liar, thief, con, cheat, uh... you got it. But I have principles, and – don't you dare tell them this – I love those kids. I'd do anything for 'em."
Sue found his clunky expression of affection adorable. "Oh, how cute. We'll keep your little secret."
"Mm," Winnie groaned, rolling her eyes. However, she was smiling too. "How long have you lived here?"
He trundled behind the register and sat, using the stool normally occupied by Wendy. "Born here. Wandered a little while. All over. Moved back... twenty years ago, I guess it was."
Winnie decided to act while she had the huckster alone, despite Sue's reluctant vibe. "And you haven't noticed anything strange since you returned?"
Stan allowed himself a chuckle. "Strange? Oh, you been hearin' the stories too, huh? Old wives' tales. Legends. Buncha bored knuckleheads makin' up stuff."
The blue-eyed woman moved in for the kill. "Even the dinosaurs?" she asked, hands on her hips.
His eyes got wide with shock. "Eh? Uh... they told you that. And you believed 'em?"
"We looked ourselves," Sue replied quietly. "Dinosaurs aren't very friendly."
He busted out laughing in full this time. "Yeah! Yeah, I'd agree. How'd you get away?" A brief examination gave him what he sure was the answer. "Ah, you probably rock climb and run marathons all day or something."
"Mm." Winnie glanced over as Mabel walked in, but she wasn't prepared for the high-pitched shriek that came next.
"Grunkle Staaaaaaaaaaaaaa—oh. There you are. Hey!" She displayed a slightly vacant grin at the two women, although her smile didn't last long. "Wait, is he trying to extort you guys again? Did I use that word right?" After a second she leaned back through the living room door. "Dipper!" she screeched. "What does extort mean?!"
"I'm not extortin' anybody," Stan assured her, a hand over his good ear to absorb her volume. He wasn't the only one trying to shield his ears; the twins were covering theirs with both hands. "Geez, kid, I'm seriously thinkin' about gettin' you cellphones so you can text or whatever you call it."
"There isn't a phone plan on this Earth that can handle me, but thanks anyway," Mabel informed him happily. "So, whatcha doin'? Are—are you buying stuff? I didn't think we had anything you'd want."
Sue tried to match her cheerfulness. "No, we came to see you!"
Winnie, however, did not try. At all. "We need to talk. About... things."
"Feeling like the fifth wheel here," Stan admitted with a sigh. "I gotta go to town anyway. Need to buy some more brown meat. Tell your brother I'll be back later. And don't let Soos on the roof. Ever again." He departed, leaving a cloud of grumbles in his wake.
"Bye!" Once he'd gone, Mabel returned her attention to the twins. "What's up?"
"It's complicated," Winnie answered plainly. "Get Dipper. We need to show you something."
"Ooo! Wait. Are we gonna die?" She smiled wide at their head shaking. "Okay, my ooo stands. Dipper!"
Before long, both sets of twins were enjoying a stroll toward the woods – at least, the younger ones were. Winnie and Sue were unnervingly quiet. "So, what's this about? Did you guys actually go fairy hunting yesterday?" Dipper finally asked as they left the Mystery Shack's clearing behind.
"Yes, we did," Sue nodded. "They didn't like us much."
Mabel darted over to her side with a worried look. "Huh? What happened? Did they do the leaf thing? They totally did, didn't they?!" She checked their bare skin for cuts, smiling when she found none. "Oh, phew."
That was all the indication Winnie needed. "They tried to kill us," she said bluntly, popping Mabel's happy bubble. "So we killed them. Two of them, to be exact."
The Pines stared with slack jaws after her confession. Not even Mabel had the will to make sound. "But—I mean they came at us too," Dipper stammered, "but we just scared them off with Mabel trying to sing."
"I wasn't that bad," she grumbled, but managed to stay on point. "Hold up, though, when we saw them there were like, hundreds. How did you only ice two?"
"Restraint, discipline, or mercy. Call it what you will," Winnie murmured, staring off into the distance. They were well into the trees by now, so the group came to a halt at her direction. "You've seen them change objects?"
"Well, yeah. A bunch of them rushed us with little swords they made out of leaves," Dipper acknowledged with uncertain eyes. "We nearly got our butts handed to us. Did the same happen to you?"
"More or less," Sue shrugged. "We got mad and... well, mad enough to be scary enough to make them stop." Her ruby eyes rolled about as she mentally checked her diction. "I think that made sense."
Mabel detected a serious shift in tone and became uneasy, despite their cheerful surroundings. "What does 'get mad' mean for you guys, exactly? I'm gettin' a bad feeling over here."
Winnie went right to the point, snapping a small branch from a nearby bush and holding it in her clenched fist. "See this?" She snapped with her free hand. The twig spun out into a silver necklace, eighteen inches or so in length. She let it dangle between her fingers.
All Dipper could do was voice exactly what he was thinking. "Um. You can't do that. You're not a fairy. You can't just make things into other things oh gosh my brain's starting to cry." He ducked his head and whined. "My eyes aren't working! That's all. No problem. Just need to wake them up. My... oh boy." For once, his sister was the silent one, standing there with mouth agape and right eye faintly twitching. "Mabel, could you pinch me?"
"I think you broke them," Sue groaned, rubbing her face.
"Are... are you fairies?" Mabel asked at last, her voice wavering. "Like, big... fairy queens! You're – that sounds like Dairy Queen and now I'm hungry." She tried to laugh at herself, but it was almost painfully forced.
"We're not fairies, no." Winnie's tone had gotten quite gentle. In order to make herself less intimidating, she dropped to one knee. "I'm sorry to dump this on you so abruptly, but..."
Mabel was trying to shake sense back into her brother. "What the heck are you?" she demanded. "How did you do that? And can I have it? It's shiny." She squealed a little as Winnie handed the necklace over. "Awwwww, yeah. Now talk!"
"We're not like you," Sue said quietly, her eyes on the ground. "We never have been. Normal, I mean."
Dipper let out one more groan before his mind reengaged. "I—okay, Mabel, I'm back. Easy." He needed one more sharp breath to collect his thoughts. "Are you using magic?" Their nod made his brow furrow. "But... how? I mean, there are magical things in the journal and all but you certainly aren't one of them."
"A topic for another time," the blue-eyed woman decided. "There's something about this place that speaks to us. Would you help us find out what it is?"
"Iiiiiiii dunno," Mabel said with an open-mouthed frown. "You're all magical now and you talk to ghosts and I dunno if I like where this is going. 'Cause the last guy we met that had powers? Real creepy, man. Reeeeeal creepy."
Her brother nodded along as she spoke, then crossed his arms. "She has a point."
"Oh, but we'd never hurt you!" Sue insisted vehemently. "You're our friends! We don't..." She began to break down, slumping over with her eyes tightly shut. "We've never had many friends." Winnie arrived by her side just as she started to weep.
This confused Mabel to no end. "Why wouldn't you have friends? You're rich. And nice. And lookin' good, if I may say so my own self." She ignored Dipper's raised eyebrow with a smile. "Seriously. You should be super popular!"
"Hold it." He eyed them, at first from a distance, then walked over closer. "Were you born this way?" Winnie was the only one to answer, and that was limited to a nod. Her icy eyes were full of bitterness. "Oh, man."
Sue regained her composure at last, shooing her sister away with a gentle nudge. "Don't worry about our childhoods. You can't tell anyone what we've told you, okay?"
Her request flew right over Mabel's head. "We gotta tell Soos and Wendy!" she blurted out excitedly. "They're gonna freak!"
Dipper scolded her with a smack on the arm. "Did you not hear what she just said?"
"If they promise not to talk, I'm okay with it," Winnie decided. "If you trust them, so can I." Sue nodded her approval a moment later.
She celebrated her victory with a fist pump. "Ha! I win. Anything else you wanna spill while we're here?"
Both women were non-committal at first, but Sue gathered up enough courage to speak after a moment. "Well... I think we'd like to be called our real names now."
"They're your nicknames?" Mabel blinked. "But I like them. Winnie and Sue. Winnie and Sue. Hee hee hee," she giggled, saying the names to the tune of 'Winnie the Pooh'.
"I do too! Anyway, I'm Summer. She's Winter."
Dipper shook his head and moved the discussion back to more important matters. "Whoa, whoa. Look, Winter's a cool name and all," he began, but was derailed by his pun. "Wow, I should be shot for that. Ahem. Are you telling me you can change anything into anything?"
"More or less," Winnie confirmed with a nod. "Complex items are generally harder for us to transform. Also, we need to know an object exists before we can change something into it."
"So you could just make a bar of gold out of..." He looked around for a suitable item, scratching his head. "That mushroom?" Sue pressed it into a glittering yellow ingot with a snap. "H-holy crap. You could singlehandedly destroy the entire economy!"
"That's bad!" Mabel chirped. A second later she looked at her brother for confirmation. "That's bad, right?"
Dipper, checking out the gold bar, tried to lift it. It was almost too heavy for him to budge. "Yes! Yes it is. They're not joking, we gotta be careful about who knows this stuff." He yelped with terror as the metal began to float. "What the heck?!"
"There's also this," Winnie said, her left hand stretched out toward the object. "Telekinesis, I guess you'd call it."
"Sweet Sally," Mabel breathed. "I knew you guys looked like superheroes, but dang. Bro, we're in a comic book!"
He watched Winnie return the gold bar to its original mushroom state and stick it in the ground again before backing off to stand with his sister. "I must be dreaming. Okay. You said Gravity Falls 'speaks' to you. What's that supposed to mean, exactly?"
"We feel the same power all over. The fairies used it, for instance," Sue explained, rocking back and forth on her heels. "What we don't know is why. It's not something we felt back in, um, Iowa."
"Now this is a mystery." Mabel's eyes gleamed with excitement. "Still kinda weirded out by the change-y thing, though. Gonna need a few minutes."
Winnie nodded as she started back toward the clearing. "I understand. We should get home anyway. You can discuss it and give us an answer. We'll send Wendy here once they're done cleaning."
"All right," Dipper shrugged. "Man, I hardly believe what I just saw. I knew Gideon could lift stuff with his mind – even if he got the ability from the stupid amulet Mabel broke. Don't even get me started on shifting matter, either. This is insanity."
"Hmm, I guess we are pretty insane," Sue grinned, seemingly back to her usual self. They walked all the way back to the red BMW together. "Maybe we'll see you later?"
"Maybe! Hey, pick a superhero name!" Mabel encouraged as they got in the car. "Bye!"
"We'll... think about it, I suppose," Winnie said with a shrug.
After they'd driven off, the Pines wandered back into the empty gift shop and let out a simultaneous sigh. "Wow," Dipper mumbled. "I know you said Winnie – uh, Winter – looked like Mystique, but I didn't think she was a real mutant. Or whatever she is. I guess we know how they got rich, though."
"I know, right? They'll definitely be great to have around. They be strong." Mabel's grin faded, however. "Wait. If Gravity Falls is magical, where did the magic come from? Dead people? Is that why they hear spirits?"
Dipper didn't see her expression; if he had, he wouldn't have walked away. "I dunno. Bill can change stuff like that too, at least if he's in your head." The thought made him stop. "Hey, you don't think he has something to do with this, do you? 'Cause that would mean they're either not from Iowa... or Bill has a longer reach than we think."
Mabel folded her arms and scowled. "I don't like the last option very much. And if they were Bill-ified, wouldn't we'd know? Not sure how, but... some way. Like they'd have triangle pupils or something."
"I doubt it. Okay, granted, my journal's entry doesn't mention him being able to do that, but we don't know what Gideon knows. And I guess you'd have to summon him to do anything. I'm pretty sure nobody else knows how." Suddenly his eyes got huge. "Holy mackerel, could you imagine what would happen if he got into one of their minds? Everyone on the planet would be in danger!"
The image was enough to maker her shiver in her sweater. "Dude, stop. I'm getting paranoid enough."
He rested his chin on his arms. "Same. I need to hear what Soos and Wendy think."
"You sure you wanna drag her into this, bro?"
"Not so much drag her into it as prepare her for what we might find – or what might happen. Maybe we should tell Grunkle Stan, too. Things could get really, really dicey if we're not careful."
"So we are gonna help them?" Mabel asked, poking him on the elbow.
"I guess. If they wanted to, they could have made us disappear ages ago. And they did save our lives from that ghost thing." His eyes betrayed the fact that other issues were weighing on his mind. "Do you remember what Bill said after we beat him? 'A day will come in the future when everything you know will change', and whatever?"
"Yeah. What about it?"
He leaned up, regarding her with an anxious stare. "Do you think he meant this?"
It took all the way until the first red light in town for either woman to break the silence. "I think it went okay," Summer said. Her tone wasn't exactly confident. "They didn't run away screaming."
Winter kept her eyes squarely on the road. "For the moment."
"You're such a pessimist."
She squeezed the wheel a little tighter. "I'm practical." A light bulb went off in her head. "Wait, we forgot to tell them we can't really speak to ghosts."
Summer braced herself as they accelerated through the intersection. "Among other things, but it can wait. They have enough to chew on right now."
Winter accepted this with a small nod. "Fair enough. They gave us something to chew on, too. I want to know about the amulet that Gleeful boy had. And why his name keeps coming up. We should have a talk with him."
Before long they were heading back up the hill. Upon cresting it, both women tilted their heads at the additional vehicles near their mostly-clean house, all parked along the sidewalk. Dan Corduroy's muddy silver truck was among them, but the others were unfamiliar. After parking in the thankfully unblocked driveway, they emerged and looked around. While Wendy was audible around back, as was her father, the owners of the other vehicles were absent.
"Um... what's going on?" Summer asked, squinting at the cars as she tried to remember whether or not she'd seen them before.
"I don't know, but I don't like it." Winter bolted for the front door with her sister in hot pursuit. What she found behind it nearly made their hearts leap from their chests. The living room was full of people, many of which they recognized from the party – and those familiar faces all had twinkling companions that night. The twins checked for golden lights, but found none.
"'Scuse me, but you're the ghost whisperers, right?" Lazy Susan asked, rising from the sofa to meet them. "We think we've got ghosts too! Can you help?" The rest of the crowd began to raise the same question.
Dumbfounded, Summer emitted a polite, but surprised noise and ushered her sister back out the door. She closed it and held it shut with her strength in case anyone tried to follow them out. "Looks like the Corduroys are hopeless at keeping their mouths shut," she grumbled angrily. "Sister! What do we do?!"
Winter let out a low, long sigh. "Answer what we can," she replied, looking at the door, "and lie about the rest. We're good at that."
