A/N: So, this is a few snapshots of little scenes I wanted to do or imagined later for the third part of this whole fanfic saga. I hope everyone who reads these enjoys them but please do not raise your expectations too highly in response to this, they're just sort of a side thing I scribble down when I have free time and a really specific picture of a scene. My thanks go out to all of my invested reader and the consistently, surprisingly immense levels of support I received for my fanfic. I hope this provides a degree of closure to anyone upset by the story's cancellation, including myself.
Heavy boots stomped through the forest undergrowth at a hasty, sometimes stumbling pace. While she was normally struck with visible fascination at the strange air of whimsy and death that filled the forests of Gravity Falls, today Janna Orinda was rushing past the trees as quickly as possible.
A smaller startle of birds than you might expect flew away when the beanie wearing late teen burst through the tree line, huffing from the sprint and her eyes wide with a sincere glow of emotional overwhelming. She only had a quick moment to take in the smattering of tents and temp structures springing up around the Mystery Shack, but had fortunately already learned the fastest and most subtle paths to reach the center structure like the back of her hand. Janna's lack of a casual or creepy greeting for anyone in her path surprised everyone who saw her rush by.
At the far edges of the growing camp, the red headed squire Higgs was learning to compensate for the bandages she now wore over one eye by tossing javelins at a bullseyes painted on a particularly broad tree trunk. She was improving, but at a pace the driven warrior found agonizing, causing her to sigh in frustration and pinch the bridge of her nose when the sight of Janna bursting into view surprised her enough to miss the next throw completely.
Further in and a crowd of mewmans, peasants and nobles alike clad in patchy, heavily stained outfits gathered into two bunches near either Old Man McGucket explaining crop rotation with the help of a propped up poster board or handyman Soos leading a workshop about the wonders of power tools. Some of the more bored learners looked aside when Janna ran past them, but most remained watching with genuine curiosity and wonder in their expressions.
A line of similarly displaced mewmans and monsters waited outside a sticker studded changing tent set up on the grass. Inside of it, Mabel Pines was taking their measurements and personal preferences one at a time so as to knit the new arrivals warm sweaters to help them adapt to life in the rainy Oregon woods. Another mixed species crowd was gathered nearby around a map bearing folding table, where Eclipsa Butterfly was helping volunteer squads plan their patrol routes through the wilderness surrounding the Shack.
One of the few who didn't break their concentration in response to all this was Stanford Pines, lecturing from the front of the Mystery Shack to a gaggle of townie volunteers on how to safely maintain, clean and operate some of his hand crafted anti-Bill Cipher weapons. One of the only people who didn't even see the aspiring witch as she raced back into the Mystery Shack was its founder Stanley Pines, who was standing on the back porch of the building, calling in every favor he still had with people who had the ability to move various types of "supplies" to the former tourist trap with a minimum of questions being asked.
Inside the strange but welcoming old forest home Janna paid no heed to Wendy and Robbie hard at work boxing up the phony exhibits and overpriced souvenirs. The town's teen clique had stepped up to dispose of all the clutter no questions ask, seeing as the now closed estate of isolated tourist attraction needed to fill the space with material stockpiles, workshops and laboratories. The basement elevator was still code protected but no longer disguised itself as a vending machine.
By the time Janna stepped out of the elevator her expression had calmed a little but her steps were still hasty, and Star could tell something was amiss with her early friend on earth the moment the troublemaking occult seeker stepped into her line of sight. The princess of a conquered kingdom was in the midst of a planning meeting with Dipper Pines, Pacifica Northwest, Hekapoo and Marco Diaz when Janna burst in. The five of them were arguing around a holographic projection of their neck of the multiverse to figure out their next move, but they collectively fell silent at the unusual look on Janna's face.
"Star!" She called out in a huff, needing to pant a little bit before she could finish her statement but clearly speaking up the moment she was physically able. "We found your mom!"
Much less time later than what it took Janna to run from here to the Mystery Shack, a very driven looking Star Butterfly hacked down the last bushel of plant life in her path with a machete made out of rainbow energy and was quickly followed out of the dense forest by what seemed like half the camp! Everyone in the group except for King River seemed worn out keeping pace with the Butterfly blonds, but the strange atmosphere of the grove they were stumbling into was like a cold splash of water to everyone's faces: Star and River cooled off while the rest of the gang felt their senses sharpen.
The grove they were in was a strange feeling but humble place, a circular clearing in the trees with flat grass, a few smooth stones scattered around and a crumbling stone well near the center of it consisting of naught but a waist high cylinder made from crumbling red brick. Laying across the soft grass at the foot of the well was none other than the lost Moon Butterfly, looking as though she was lost in a gentle sleep inside a cocoon made out of her own overgrown hair.
"There you are Star, good to see you again. Thank you for so bringing so many essential people with you for this, trust me that you'll get tired of explaining all this over and over again in the future."
For those in the crowd that felt distinctly uncomfortable when they realized the sleeping queen was naked under all her hair, the voice of Glossaryk (one of his many, at least) proved a welcome distraction, though some in the crowd were clearly perturbed at the sight of the little blue wizard floating out of the well, legs crossed in a lotus position and a shit eating grin on his face.
"Where the heck have you been!" Hekapoo was the first to shout indignantly, while besides her Rhombulus had detached his snake arms from the cart carrying Omnitraxus Prime's viewing crystal to wave them wildly in the air and yell "WHY HAVEN'T YOU CALLED!?"
"Aren't you supposed to be dead?" Dipper asked mystified.
"Did you know what they did to my daughter!?" Eclipsa unexpectedly yelled out, clear troubled betrayal in her voice even as she actively tried to moderate it for the sake of the sleeping Meteora still swaddled up at her chest. At the front of the crowd, Star shared a knowing look with her father before River scooped Moon up wordlessly and carried her back to the camp, while Marco stepped up in similar silence and wove a comforting hand through one of Star's.
"He looks a lot more impressive in fresco, I have to admit..." Stanford Pines commented quietly near the back of the crowd, leaning closer to Stanley's ear to keep the remark private while he observed. In response, his similarly self-shushed twin brother asked "You think the jewel in his head is worth much?"
Glossaryk raised flat palm to the crowd to gesture for quiet and they complied, not happy about this so far but all wanting to see what the old sage had to say for himself. His other hand promptly snapped his fingers while he declared "Omnitraxus, the time has come."
"Acknowledged." The supposedly omnipotent voice in the crystal ball respond, right before it exploded with a very unconvincing looking smoke and fire effect.
Before shouting could break out in response to this however, Glossaryk filled the fleeting stunned silence with a declaration he knew no one in the crowd could ignore. "I have spent trillions of years battling Bill Cipher in a cosmic game of chess for the fate of magic, and now that Omnitraxus has finally done his job correctly, unlike the rest of you, it is time for someone to checkmate someone else. That was a little bit of insurance to make sure there will be no take-backsies."
Stunned silence turned more mystified in response to this, with Dipper and Ford shushing a few of still agitated people in the crowd so as to let this explanation continue. "I created the Magical High Commission to serve as specialized weapons against Bill's favorite tricks as part of a mutual move that allowed him to create the original Lucitor family. As per the deal we each got to infect the other's creation with one flaw, and Cipher picked very well by poisoning you lot with free will."
Revelation dawned on Ford's face as he stepped closer to Glossaryk and looked at Hekapoo, the pieces beginning to fall into place for the old scientist. "Yes, without her ability to quarantine dimensions against travel Bill would already have irreparably won..."
"No, not quite." The guardian of the spellbook commented with an undertone of sly knowing. "Up until this moment you could have reversed an ultimate Bill Cipher victory through time travel, so long as he didn't stop you. On several future occasions this has already bound to happen, as was Bill getting salty at being defeated fair and square and bludgeoning himself a second chance through the future use of outdated time travel techniques." Dipper was scowling slightly as Mabel wobbled around on her toes with swirls in her eyes, having completely last track due to the time travel tense use that Glossaryk's fleeting grin suggested was intentional, even as his next lines were delivered very seriously.
"Until now, at least." The sage explained while gesturing towards the melting, steaming glass shards on the ground. "The being you called Omnitraxus Prime was a simplistic self-adaptive personality AI that was cocooned around a complicated space-time phenomenon involving several arcane and technological devices capable of manipulating linear time and the multiplication of realities due to personal choice. Time locks, personality amplifiers, future visors, the Foot of Alpha, etc etc..."
This was proving difficult for most of the audience to follow but since Ford, Dipper and Eclipsa were at least nodding in response to Glossaryk's rambling they were content to let him continue. "Now that you have the greatest chance out of a million timelines to destroy Bill Cipher and the Nightmare Realm in their entirety, his purpose is served and Prime's component parts have broken apart to the various jobs needed to... seal this place in history. You will either win against Bill going forward, or he will destroy you eternally."
If this was meant to be a comforting proclamation to everyone listening, it wasn't working. "Hekapoo's use in containing Bill Cipher is something I'm sure you've already become aware of, even if she hasn't. Rhombulus and Lekmet I created so that valuable pieces in this game could be frozen in ageless crystal until the time was right for them to be unfrozen and enter the scene at the wrong place at the right time, while Lekmet would have made it significantly easier to deal with Bill's hostage bodies since he could simply restore them to life if they have to be killed to end the possession." Disdainfully, the sage added that "Somehow Rhombulus managed to fail less at his task that Lekmet did..." while casting an appreciative glance over at Eclipsa.
"So that's it then? The MHC, the Butterfly Kingdom... we were all just tools for you to battle against Bill with?" Star asked, a weary in mixed tone in her voice. She wasn't angry per say, thinking it pointless to start feuding with Glossaryk over this given the sheer scale of threat Bill posed to reality, but couldn't help but feel hurt at the confirmation that her first magical mentor truly had no genuine affection for her, as little as she was showing it. Surprisingly, the little blue sage did give her and Eclipsa both a fleetingly regretful expression.
"Well... yes." Glossaryk replied bluntly but without the mockery in his tone that was always present when instructing the MHC. "Star, I am trillions of years old and have seen this game play out more times than most present here could count up to. I do have... some feelings inside me for the people I guide, but I never allow them to influence my decision making. People, worlds, dimensions, timelines... sometimes I have to destroy make them destroy themselves so that the pudding ripple spreading out from them in such a specific way forces Bill to flip the table and agree to start things over again. I find you and Eclipsa... stimulating in a way that very few Queens of Mewni have turned out to be, because of how often you surprise me. For that, I do thank you."
The solemn air that rained over all present evaporated when Glossaryk clapped his hands together and began to talk fast, slowly beginning to float back down the well. "So! That about covers everything, good luck with the war that's going on... Oh, and Ford!" He realized, stopping, floating back up above the mouth of the well and pointing finger guns at the old scientist. "This is the earthly entrance to the Realm of Magic. Don't go exploring it until you really have the time to. That's all I can say for now, we'll talk more later..."
And just like that, the expository sage had gone back down the well. Instead of bursting into another argument however, everyone present was content to set a much more measured pace back towards the Mystery Shack. Some had their heads swimming with doubts, while others were more determined than ever.
All of them knew that the hard work ahead of them had only truly just begun.
Far below the burning surface of the dimension of Mewni, Bill Cipher sat upon his throne in triumph and felt his power expand. The devil machine that the Lucitors had constructed for him from soul forged steel and organic circuitry lacked the tactile physical feedback of a proper host body, but the scale of its perception was something to be treasured for the moment. From inside this device Bill was able to coordinate the great invasion of the surface world through a wide network of information relay spells and receive in turn the satisfying sights of the great invasion fissures opening, the battle lines of his minions spreading further and further, and the territory of the nation turning red as his kingdom of pawns solidified their dominance.
At the very edge of the machine's senses clawed something else however, a vague tingle of ambition that humans might have ignorantly described as magnetic attraction. The other aspects of his power, strewn across the multiverse following the Pines family's first victory over the dream demon. A barrier existed that numbed the sensation, left the exact locals of his other pieces beyond knowing. Bill's triangular edges burned with unfulfilled chemical reaction, hungering to be bonded with his lost sides so as to achieve full power.
Something abruptly began to rumble from below however. The most vivid sense of contact the victorious Bill fragment could feel inside his artificial machine body was the one he cared the least about responding to. Naturally.
The once dusty and crumbling halls of the Castle Lucitor grand cathedral had been abruptly and horrifyingly renovated on the eve of the historic invasion: the bowls of ceremonial oil danced with grinning blue flame spirits while the skeletons nailed and impaled across the walls sang endless praise to the temple's masters. Kneeling at the viscera coated thirteen steps that rose from the black slate floor to the pyramid bearing dias were Tom and Wrathmelior Lucitor while Dave stood up straight, arms raised over his head and trembling with emotion as he barked a spittle punctuated summoning into the air.
"I call upon the prime god of our mighty civilization, emissary of hell's imperial will! Come forth Bill Cipher! Uncoil your all knowing form and bless this enlightened servant with your dark guidance, and solidify their divine right as newly incorporate dark lords of the Empire of Lucitor!" Dave's blessing finished.
The air was still and the chanting stopped. The seemingly metal pipes that connected the slate red, eight foot tall pyramid towering over the flat space below the steps abruptly began to beat and pump like organic arteries, and the sleek surface of the pyramid structure inexplicably molded and wrinkled as a single eye opened up on the surface that faced the congregation. The only sound anyone within the dark cathedral could hear was the beating of their own hearts, until a blue flame of malice sprung to life inside the glaring eye.
"CIPHER LIVES!" chanted the impaled skeletons across the wall as King Lucitor began a soon to be familiar ritual. All who had aligned there kingdoms against the Butterflies had been asked to take part in such a ritual, to forever swear their allegiance to the dark god that had made this victory over the hated Butterflies possible. This was merely the first of many such ceremonies.
The subject of the historic fealty ritual and Bill Cipher's piercing gaze was the massive form of King Ponyhead, a distinct glimmer of sweat creasing the monarch's brow at the elaborate and mildly revolting summoning process, but neither the decapitated monarch's physiology or culture made displays of humility easy for him to express. With a unsquashable cud chewing stall to his voice, King Ponyhead pompously declared from the floor below "Oh great deity of the Underworld, see that I, and my many daughters, wish to present the absolute fealty of the Cloud Kingdom and it many resources and services..."
Near the back of the cloud composed of floating, sparkling equine heads Whistine and Angel were whispering to one another in nasty tones, some of the few in the ground that weren't standing frozen at attention by the bizarre sight their father had taken them to. "Ugh, can't believe Lilacia ditched us on this."
"Are you really?" The other link on the absurdly long chain of succession rhetorically asked with a snort that prompted an agreeing expression from her sister. "She's probably still rolling around with ol' Princess Butterface. They're old news though, and so is she!"
"Oh you know it sister! Finally, the position of inheritance will go to who truly deserves to..."
"I'M SORRY, IS THIS BORING YOU!?"
The moment Bill's voice echoed across the chamber, blue fire sprang into existence inside half the members of the royal family presented before the dark god, causing the pyramid cathedral to abruptly ring with the screams of suffering equines and the stench of glittering flesh melting in blue fire. King Pony Head's dull pledge had become a manic, babbling mantra of freely flowing screams, whinnies and pleadings as half of his daughters melted from the inside out. Despite the suffering cacophony that echoed through the early pyramid, the Word of Cipher still rang clear.
"FROM THIS DAY FORWARD, ALL OF YOUR ROYAL BLOOD AND VAUNTED LINEAGES ARE TO BE TREATED FOR WHAT THEY ALWAYS HAVE BEEN. HORSESHIT!" Bill declared in a booming proclamation that still tingled with the tone of his sadistic enjoyment of it all. "HERITAGE, BLOOD, AND DIVINE RIGHT MEAN NOTHING IN MY UTOPIA OF DEATH! THE ONLY RULE FROM HERE ON OUT IS THAT YOU WILL OBEY BILL CIPHER, OR YOU WILL SUFFER." The machine seemed to grossly blink as half the royal children had melted into sticky puddled by now, their bright colors and broken horns mixing into a pungent stain as the survivors, including the king himself, wept and shrieked above them. None of them would ever forget this stench. "IS THAT EASY ENOUGH FOR YOU ALL TO UNDERSTAND?"
As the survivors burst into a muddled mix of pleading and desperate vows of obedience, the Lucitor three looked on from the shadows. The elder royals watched the whole display with cold, unmoving expressions while the crown prince had to actively fight back his shock and mounting horror at what was in front of him. "What the heaven have we gotten ourselves involved with!?" He couldn't help but ask in the deepest corners of his mind as Bill met the suffering choir with unrestrained sadistic laugher at the Pony Heads debasing themselves before him in the still warm melted puddles that remained of their sisters. Tom found his father's expression unreadable in all this, but to his very small comfort found his mother to be reciprocal when his hand unconsciously sought comfort in her much larger palm.
Before the remaining royals had completely fled the room, the blue fire in Bill's eye calmed to an ember, and he remarked to his side that "IF WE HEAR A WORD OF LIP OUT OF HORSEFACE AGAIN, CUT THE STRINGS TO THEIR FLYING KINGDOM AND BUILD A GLUE FACTORY OUT OF THE CRATER." Only when the cathedral door slammed shut did the eye wrinkle itself shut and Bill began to laugh, his cruel enjoyment of the first of many atrocities ringing out through the underworld and up through the fissures cut to the surface, letting it known to all of Mewni and whoever was listening out in the multiverse that no one had won the titanic battle for the dimension's fate but him and him alone.
FROM THE RECORDS OF THE MAGICAL HIGH COMMISSION
I, Eclipsa Sunshine Butterfly, final monarch of the original Butterfly bloodline and grieving widow, write this confession while of sound mind and body but with acutely little time left to them. If my instructions regarding this final admission of truth have been followed, then the first person to lay eyes upon these words will be Star Platinum Butterfly, to whom I relinquish all claims to throne of Mewni and the Butterfly name.
You are a far more worthy successor to the title than I could have ever been Star, and I am so sorry to have placed so much additional difficulty upon your already burdened shoulders. I leave this record not with the intent of adding more to your, or to cloud your judgement even further, but simply because a mutual friend of ours reminded me of the priceless value of genuine truth, and if the MHC decide to execute me I do not want the truth to be killed alongside me. The true fates of my husband and daughter were revealed to you during the trial you organized for me, and for that I shall be grateful beyond death. Only one of my relatives still has their true fate obscured: My mother, Queen Solaria the Monster Carver, recorded as having been carved in turn by a monster, one of the countless she was planning war against as she slept.
This is not the truth, though I do not doubt that even after reading this confession, many on Mewni would still argue it as being true in spirit. The hard truth of things is that I killed my mother. I made the journey alone from Butterfly castle to her forward camp built on the ever advancing front line of her war with the Septarian Legion, was admitted into her command bunker by her loyal Queensguard, had an emotionally charged but short conversation with her, and then discreetly cast a spell of my own invention that would cause her heart to stop exactly five minutes after the magic had entered her body.
This was not a crime of passion. The inevitable argument we'd had in her bunker was stronger than I had expected but I had no illusions that I would be able to talk her out of her madness, and had spent my entire journey to the front pondering my decision, letting the weight of my dark magic be felt with every step to ensure I was ready. Solaria Butterfly was my loving mother and the only parental figure I had ever known besides Uncle Jushtin, but I knew I could not save her, and much later I realized I didn't understand her, didn't understand the nature of the war she was fighting.
Let the record show that this was not a plan influenced or coaxed in anyway by Globgor or his political allies. As a matter of fact, the monster peace movement had regularly advised Seth against pursuing regicide in his war with Mewni, correctly arguing that it would only turn the Mewman people more bitter and hateful, amplify the atrociousness of the fighting. Globgor echoed their sentiments to me in private, but I was young then, and didn't understand the full political ramifications. I was just a girl, a child I suppose, who had just realized she'd lost her mother to madness years ago without realizing it, and desperately wanted the blood on her hands to stop accumulating before it spilled over onto me, and washed away everything good and beautiful in our dimension.
I loved my mother, and as hard as it is to say in light of what she had become I think I still do, but I didn't understand her, and I didn't understand the war she was fighting until too late. I was in love with A monster, yes, but I had seen what the Legion had done in their battle against Mewni, and had heard from Globgor what Seth himself had done to monsters who refused to march under his banner. I knew my mother was extreme in her methods but thought it was all a necessary evil, the only sword capable of cutting the head off the snake and stopping the conflict.
I didn't understand how deep her madness ran until Uncle Jushtin passed away. He was the only person who could place some measure of direction to my mother's rage, keep her on target. The Ponyheads and the Lucitors weren't Mewni's allies because we wanted to be friends, but because they lived in some of the only places in the dimension that even Solaria could see the sense in not invading. Too much difficult terrain that didn't have the potential to grow corn, hence why she gave Jushtin's diplomatic work with them her blessing. The Lucitors move to seize power and the many allies who flocked to their banner does not come as a surprise to me, unfortunately. They were allowed to submit bloodlessly to the winning team because they were not worth exterminating, and I doubt they ever forgot that.
After Uncle Jushtin passed away however, I could see first hand that those treaties would not hold, and it would be my mother's red hands that would have ripped them to shreds. Solaria wouldn't have stopped at simply pacifying Seth's legions, but would kill and kill and kill until there was nothing left. She wouldn't stop until someone killed her, and by that point, I was the only one who could.
She was much more obviously mad by that point, as the first cracks began to form in her overstretched war machine. The mysterious Solar Guard of Mewman legend were the only ones who saw her face to face by then. Them... and myself. So, I visited my mother for the last time in her war bunker, claiming I'd finally agreed to marry Shastican to get inside. I'd gone to great lengths to prepare a powerful, unique spell that could be discreetly placed on her and do the dirty work after I'd left, but her entire personal guard began to convulse and die along with her. Leaving no one to know the truth except me.
Despite what many think (and they're not without ample evidence for their opinion) Queen Solaria did have love in her heart. An abundance of it in fact, but she only ever shared it with me. My mother was a warm, friendly ball of sunshine to me in my youth, but for the rest of the multiverse she was a burning scourge, with nothing but hatred and cruelty to show and bearing no other gifts besides death.
If this was always true of her, or if it was the result of a gradual change which I was too young to recognize in motion, I do not know. This is the only piece of knowledge in the multiverse that I would fear to possess.
I am sorry if this confession comes as another burden to you Star, but if the MHC makes the decision to execute me then I can't make things much worse for myself by admitting to this, can I? And this truth had weighed inside me for so long. I am relieved to put it to paper, even if I hope strongly that it never sees the light of day.
Of all the dark deeds I have done in my life, this is the only one I yearn to be forgiven for despite knowing it had to be done.
Hekapoo stared at the neatly written page of script for a long, long time, despite having only needed to actively read it once. She hadn't been sure what to expect when the deposed queen, placed back into the dungeon for her uncovered association with Bill Cipher, had offered to create a sealed confession of further crimes on the condition that it be opened and read only with the full Commission as well as the current Butterfly queen and heir in attendance, but it wasn't this.
"Another trick... it has to be..." The master of portals and forger of scissors muttered aloud, the fire witch's paradoxically cool composure clearly sounding shaken and unsettled to everyone who could hear her, which was admittedly no one. She had volunteered to sort out the random collection of quickly grabbed MHC classified documents alone, given that Rhombulus has problems with written words, both due to his snake arms slobbering all over the paper as well as being an idiot. She hadn't even really expected one of the Commission's most recently created secret files to be among the few saved from Mewni's fall, but here she was.
Hekapoo looked over at the two cardboard boxes which the cruder, smellier version of Stanford Pines had delivered to this back room of the Mystery Shack for her to sort all the classified documents into, one box to be saved and the other to be shredded. Hekapoo looked down at the dark queen's testimonial one more time before it burst into flames between her fingers, a single eye looking with impassive uncertainty past her red drape of hair, watching the past burn...