Anon asked for Stan and the Triplets, so here's some Stan being a bad (good?) influence on the kids.


Stan wouldn't trade his family for anything. He'd had long enough on his own (made enough mistakes, things he could never take back, wouldn't now that they'd given him skills he could use to keep those kids, those precious, precious kids safe, but still) to understand just what a gift he'd been given, to have Mabel and Dipper still trust him now, after everything.

And not just with themselves, but with the three tiny little kids Mabel and her 'big bad moose man' had blessed them with, which was a miracle all itself, that he not only was allowed around the kids, but they lived with him, trusted him with them. Him, of all people.

All in all, he loved them all more than he'd ever thought he could love anyone.

But damn if he didn't miss the peace and quiet sometimes.

Like right now, when he had three tiny, red headed shadows, watching him with varying degrees of attention as he ran the Library.

A little part of him was glad the triplets had arrived after the Shack had been transformed into a Library, even if the transformation hadn't stopped all of his conning. (Some habits were hard to give up, too ingrained with years of them being the only thing keeping him alive to let them go.)

On the one hand, it was a lot harder to be tempted to con someone when they were browsing a Library.

On the other, well...they really were just asking for it.

Especially when they were trying to find information that would let them trap and enslave different supernatural creatures (because even for someone like Stan Pines, who had seen and done things that he wasn't sure even his kids could forgive, there were lines), doubly so when one of the books they were looking at had information about Alcor the Dreambender and they'd made a few comments digging for information about Stan's grandson *ahem* great–nephew that had his back up and looking for an excuse to deck them. (Even if they didn't know they were talking about Stan's great-nephew and not just any demon, or if Dipper could break just about any binding by this point. Just...no.)

Even though this was gonna hurt worse, in the long run, and needed less explanation than the well-deserved left hook, it was still tempting.

Now, the big questions – what to do, and how to do it without three tiny redheads figuring out just what their G-Grunkle was doing. It would be so much easier without them around, but Stan was never looking back. It was figure out a way to do it without them noticing, or just do it and suffer parental wrath later. Heck, Mabel and Dipper had seen him con people before and been fine. Mostly. Stopping that line of thought now.

Trying to figure out how to keep the kids from noticing was always preferable to how things had been before any of them had come into his life. Now then, how to keep them occupied...

Hank, well, that kid could be distracted. Acacia...he'd already decided the girl was getting his brass knuckles next birthday, and didn't that say something about her and they way she was taking after him as it was. (And he was going to have to keep an eye on her, or between her and Dipper he just might lose his title in this family.) She wasn't going to be easy. As for Willow...

She was already staring at her G-Grunkle, that too-old look in her eyes again as she looked at his 'colors', glancing over at the man her Grunkle was debating just how to con.

She looked over at her brother and sister, the three speaking wordlessly before nodding, so like their mother and uncle it almost hurt.

Then she slipped off the stool she'd been sitting on beside Stan and was out from behind the counter with her siblings before Stan could stop them.

Acacia tugged at their target's coat, eyes wide and guileless and innocent – a look directed at uncles and parents far too often for them to think of it as anything other than absolutely, utterly fake.

Strangers lapped it up, though, especially when her siblings copied it. Apparently three still tiny redheads with huge eyes was irresistible, even to scumbag would-be slavers.

"Are you trying to make spooky friends too?" Acacia asked, overly sweet, and silently Stan decided to have a word with the kid about laying things on too thick.

Willow, meanwhile, had the intent look she got when she was trying to tell her uncle something from a distance, while Hank covered for her and Acacia continued to chatter to the indulgent yet disbelieving patron.

"We've got lots! Our Grunkle helped us!" Acacia chirped, bright eyed and cheerful. "We started with fairies but we've got a demon now! He has to do everything we say, 'cuz our Grunkle told him so!"

The man she was talking to looked skeptical, if fascinated. Acacia pouted (and how her siblings were keeping straight faces Stan didn't know, it was taking incredible willpower on his part to do it himself, even with thirty odd years of experience) and stomped her foot. "You don't believe me! I'll prove it, I will! ALCOR! GET IN HERE, WOULD YA?" she yelled, brandishing something shiny she'd dug out of her pocket, too small and clutched too tightly for the adults to make out.

The man's eyes went wide as he straightened and caught Stan's eyes, opening his mouth to speak just as a pouty Dipper appeared with a puff of smoke, hovering in front of the kids.

"W͋̎͂ͬͦ͑͢h̥̰͙̹ͨ̒̆ͅa̹t̳̮̜̑ͪͅ?̑̍̐̏ͥ̚ " he demanded, arms crossed and sulky, every inch projecting irritation and sullen unwillingness.

Stan thought their mark just might faint and didn't bother to fight back the mocking grin that spread across his face. Their patron was paper white, eyes wide and round as he silently flailed and panicked.

Obviously, he hadn't prepared himself for the actuality of being in the presence of a 'tamed' demon, despite planing to enslave one – this one in particular, actually, if what he'd been hinting at earlier was anything to go by. Then again...no circles, nothing but their word that Alcor was going to obey them...

Dipper glanced over at the mark, baring his teeth in a quick snarl (one the triplets and Stan recognized as playful but Stan reckoned they had about one more of those before the man wet himself).

"Pick me up!" Acacia demanded. She brandished the whatever-it-was when Dipper pretended to hesitate, scowling with distaste. "Now!"

"U̡̾g̷͎̖̝͋̊h͈͚̲̲̬̤͋ͦͩ̽̎͐͆.͖̪̱̞ͩ̿ͯͫ͂ ̢͈͙̭̂͊ͬ̀͋̏F̪̊̿͗̿̃i̖̣̗͍ͫͧ̀ͬ̚n̙̻͍̬̏ͫͬ͋ͩ̎͟e̊́ͮ̐́," Dipper said, rolling his eyes. He bent and scooped up Acacia, looking carelessly rough and like he'd rather tear her to pieces than touch her while actually being as careful as he always was with his precious niblets.

Acacia twisted in her Uncle's arms to grin smugly at the shocked mark, while Hank drawled out a "She tol' ya."

Willow grabbed a wing and gave it a tug, demanding ice cream imperiously when Dipper looked down (and it was a good thing Stan had all those years behind him of conning folks like this or he'd be laughing right now at the look on the man's face. Despite wanting to enslave a ridiculously overpowered demon, he apparently had enough self-preservation to know pulling on demonic limbs was a Bad Idea, but he was buying the act, and was sliding from panic to near drooling want for whatever they had that forced Alcor to let a little girl yank on his wings without retribution.)

"Well, get to it," Stan snapped instead of laughing, keeping up the act. Dipper hissed at him, soft and inhuman, and yeah this putz was made of sturdier stuff than Stan had thought. Most folk unused to Dipper downright fainted when he made the demonic noises, and to the uninitiated that one must have sounded downright furious.

"Don't make me use this," Stan warned, palming one of the more mystic looking key chains still stored under the counter from when it was the Mystery Shack and brandishing it at Dipper, who played along, cowering away from the silly bit of wood and metal with a surprisingly believable grimace before huffing, turning in midair with a flare of coattails and floating through the 'employees only' sign, trailed by a skipping Hank and Willow, looking surprisingly like a cat projecting 'I meant to do this' the whole way.

Stan was so teasing him about that later.

The man watched, wide-eyed and unmoving, until the door had stopped swinging and the foursome were definitely not coming back.

Then he dropped his books with a thud and dashed to the counter, gripping it with shaking hands as he stared at Stan with ravenous, starry eyes. "Teach me your ways," he breathed.

Stan smirked. Oh, this was going to be fun.

Damn, but he was proud of his kids.