Hello. I'm back again. I actually finished chapter 3 like 2 years ago but have been too busy with life stuff (mostly college), got into reading web serials over fanfiction, and some files initially got lost in a shuffle when I swapped to a better PC, so I had to keep the original around and dig around in it once in a blue moon to find the lost ones I wanted to keep like the one this chapter was in.
Anywhat, important author's notes at the end of the chapter. Not answering reviews this time around since it's been so long and I can't be bothered to even check how many I've accumulated since I last posted. Enjoy the chapter.
"I'm afraid your services won't be required here sir." An English accented voice speaks from the television in the Mystery Shack. The Twins and the Cousins are all sitting in various parts of the room, at least partly watching. Dipper and Mabel sit in front of the chair adjacent to the tv, the former eating popcorn and the latter knitting, Ben sits in the chair, his head resting in his hand while he elbow rests on the chair's arm, and Gwen sits leaning against the wall where she was reading a book but had paused to watch the show instead. Dipper slaps Mabel's hand away as she reaches for some of his popcorn.
"My men have examined the evidence and this is obviously an accident." An English policeman on the tv states, gesturing to a phone both with a mangled body in it.
"An accident, Constable?" a duck in a detective's hat asks, walking into the shot with subtitles translating its quacks into English, "Or is it…" the duck turns its head dramatically toward the camera as it finishes, "Murder?!"
"What?!" the constable exclaims in shock. A moment later a large duck foot appears on the screen alongside a banner with the show's name on it. "Duck-Tective will return after these messages." A dramatic announcer declares as the show cuts to commercial.
Mabel's pupils expand in admiration as she drops her knitting and brings her hands to her cheeks. "That duck is a genius…"
"Eh." Dipper folds his arms, unimpressed. "It's easier to find clues when you're that close to the ground."
"You think you could do better?" Ben challenges, lifting his head off his hand.
"I have very keen powers of observation." Dipper proclaims, pointing to his head proudly. He faces more toward Mabel and Ben, "For example: I can tell from Gwen's posture that she didn't get enough sleep last night."
"It's a good book!" Gwen defends herself, straightening against the wall.
"Ben, I can tell from your expression that you want to know more about those things you can turn into." Dipper continues.
"That's pretty obvious." Ben folds his arms sarcastically.
"And Mabel, I can tell from smelling your breath that you've been eating," he takes a second to sniff and then gets a confused look on his face. "an entire tube of toothpaste?"
Mabel turns away, ashamed. "It was so sparkly…"
"Hey dudes!" Soos calls out from the hallway, sliding into view, "You'll never guess what I found!"
"Buried treasure!" Dipper immediately calls, raising both his arms.
"Buried…" Mabel began moments later, chuckling a moment as she realizes her brother beat her to the punch, "Hey, I was gonna say that!" she playfully punches him in the shoulder.
"A secret library?" Gwen asks, setting down the book she had been reading and readjusting herself to face Soos.
"Some bad guys to throw more of my monster guys at?" Ben asks, pumping his left arm ready to battle.
"No dudes, just follow me." Soos, motions for them to follow with the stick of a broom he's holding.
He leads them down the hall, explaining how he found it. "So I was cleaning up when I found this secret door, hidden behind the wallpaper." He says just as they arrive at said secret door that's partially open. He stops just in front of it before opening it to show the kids, "It's crazy bonkers creepy!" He opens the door, which squeaks loudly at its first use in years. Cobwebs built over it tear away as he does so.
"Whoa…" Dipper awes as he shines his flashlight around the room observing the things inside, "It's a secret wax museum."
Gwen points to a couple as she names off ones she recognizes, "Genghis Khan, William Shakespeare, Robin Hood,"
"They're so lifelike." Mabel points out, even going so far as to touch one of them.
"Except for this one." Ben states, pointing to a potbellied wax figure in an undershirt and wearing a gold chain around its neck.
"Hello!" the figure greets, raising both its arm and everyone's heart rates. The entire room screams in surprise, Dipper whipping his flashlight out to look at the figure while Ben staggers back, reaching for his watch! Dipper's flashlight reveals that it is not in fact a wax figure but someone they know all too well. "Hehe. It's just me! Your Grunkle Stan!" This prompts more screaming from the bunch.
A few minutes later, after everyone calms down and the light is turned on, Stan stands in the middle of the room and raises his arms dramatically, "Behold the Gravity Falls Wax Museum! It was one of our most popular attractions!" he places his hand on his chin as he finishes, "Before I forgot all about it."
Waving his bad memory off, he starts to stroll past Soos and the kids, "I got em all! Genghis Khan, Sherlock Holmes," he pauses by one he doesn't actually recognize, scratching his head, "some kinda…I dunno-goblin man." He shrugs.
Dipper audibly shivers, looking around at the figures. "Anyone else getting the creeps here?"
"And now for my personal favorite:" Stan ignores Dipper, holding his arms as if the gesture to something above a melted pile of wax, "Wax Abraham Lincoln! Right over- Oh, oh!" he grabs his head with hands in dismay, "Oh no! Come on! Who left the blinds open?!" he gestures down to the pile. Then he points to another of the figures accusingly, "Wax John Wilkes Booth, I'm looking in your direction!"
He sighs, kneeling down and digging a bit of the wax up with his finger, "How do you fix a wax figure?"
"Cheer up, Grunkle Stan." Mabel advices, now standing right next to him. She grabs onto him and asks, "Where's that smile?" Stan responds with a deadpan 'nyeh' noise, and Mabel responds to that by poking his face in a few places while saying, "Beep, bop, boop!"
"Ow." Stan deadpans, standing up to escape the onslaught.
"Don't worry, Grunkle Stan!" Mabel continues, "I'll make you a new wax figure from all this old wax!"
Stan, taken aback, gestures to the other figures and asks, "You really think you can make one of these puppies?"
"Grunkle Stan, I'm an arts and crafts master. Why do you think I've always got this glue gun stuck to my arm?" she raises her left on up, showcasing a glue gun and some art supplies stuck to the sleeve of her cyan sweater with a strawberry on the front.
"How long has that been there?" Gwen asks.
"Not important." Mabel answers, without looking back to her.
"I like your gumption, kid." Stan compliments, putting one hand on his hip and pointing with the other.
"I don't know what that word means but thank you." Mabel gets excited, clasping her hands together in front of herself.
Later, in the main living area of the Shack, Mabel could be found standing on a stool doodling her ideas for what to make with the big block of wax in front of her. She notices someone coming up behind her and jumps down to greet her. "Gwen!" Gwen jumps back, taken off guard, "What do you think of my wax figure idea?" She holds up her drawing as she describes it, "She's part fairy princess and part horse fairy princess!"
Gwen visibly cringes a bit, though Mabel doesn't seem to notice. "Maybe you should make something from real life." Gwen suggests, folding her arms.
Mabel flips to another page in her sketchbook and draws her next idea based on that, "Like a waffle! With big arms!" She shows off a drawing off of said waffle, which also has a screaming face on it as it flexes.
Gwen frowns for a second, "I was thinking more along the lines of a person. Like maybe someone in your family."
"Kids!" Grunkle Stan shouts, approaching in his suit and tie but without wearing his pants, "Have you seen my pants?" he stands under a beam of light shining through the rafters and props one foot on a suitcase laying on the floor, searching the room for his missing clothes.
Mabel turns around, the inspiration in her eyes visible, "Oh muse, you work in mysterious ways!" she swoons.
Stan notices and turns to Gwen, "Why's she talking to the ceiling?"
Mabel would go on to spend the next few hours sculpting her masterpiece, chipping away unwanted material and painting it the correct colors.
Soon, she wipes the sweat off her forehead as she takes a final look at her nearly complete figure, Soos and the other children in the room watching. She takes a few steps back to scrutinize it. "I think it needs more glitter."
"Agreed." Soos hands her a bucket full of pink glitter, and she dumps the contents on the wax figure.
Stan comes walking into the scene soon after, now wearing his normal Mr. Mystery outfit barring shoes. "I found my pants but now I'm missing my—" as he catches sight of the figure, he starts screaming in terror, falls over, tries to crawl away from it backwards, and then looses balance and falls over again all in the span of two seconds. He takes a moment to compose himself and props himself up.
Mabel approaches him hopefully, "What do ya think?"
"I think…" he pauses for dramatic effect and then raises his arms in celebration, "…the wax museum's back in business!"
The next day, a large yellow banner reading 'Wax Museum of Mystery Grand Re-Opening!' can be seen flying above of the entrance to the Mystery Shack parking lot. Cars are pulling in below it, guided by Soos using corndogs to direct the flow of traffic, and taking a bite out of one of them, and Gwen a bit further in directing the cars to the individual parking spaces using rulers.
A second banner reading 'Eighth Wonder of the World!' can be seen above the Shack's stage, and another sign reading 'World Famous' can be seen above the entrance. Below that sign are Dipper, Ben, and Wendy sitting at a table selling tickets to the event, with a strangely large line in front of them.
"I can't believe this many people showed up." Dipper comments.
"I know, right?" Ben adds, "Why would this many people come to some boring old wax museum?"
"Stan probably bribed them." Wendy cackles.
"He bribed me." Dipper smiles, retrieving a small bundle of money from within his vest. Wendy pulls a similar bundle out of her shirt, and Ben gets one from his pants pocket, prompting mild snickering from all three of them.
Mabel struggles to contain her excitement as Stan steps up to the podium, the girl surrounded by various wax figures, Gwen, and Soos. Gwen puts a reassuring hand on Mabel's shoulder, to which the Pines calms down a bit as they nod at eachother.
On the podium, Stan coughs a few times and slaps the microphone to make sure it works, causing a horrid sound to resonate. "You all know me folks! Town darling, Mr. Mystery. Please, ladies, control yourselves." No one seems all that pleased with Stan's presence, least of all the ladies. "As you know, I always bring the people of this fair town novelties and befuddlements the likes of which the world has never known! But enough about me." He steps away from the podium for a moment to grab the tarp Mabel's wax figure is under. "Behold: Me!" he yanks the tarp away, revealing a wax Stan Pines sparkling with a faintly purple color. Soos plays a ta-da sound on his key-soundboard, followed by excessive pressing of a 'yeah' sound effect.
A few couple people in the crowd clap unenthusiastically, but most remain bored.
Returning to the podium, Stan continues, "And now a word from our own Mabel Angelo." He takes the microphone from the podium and hands it to the girl.
"It's Mabel." She corrects him. Turning to the crowd, she begins her big speech, "Thank you for coming! I made this sculpture with my own two hands! It's covered in my blood, sweat, tears, and other fluids." A wave of disgust washes over the crowd at that last statement. "Hehe, yeah. I will now take questions!" She points to a raised hand in the back of the crowd, "You there!"
The one who raised a hand stands up, "Old Man McGucket, local kook. Are the wax figures alive? And follow up question: Can I survive the wax man uprising?"
"Uh…" she takes a moment to answer, "Yes! Next question."
A short man resembling a reporter in the front holds what looks like a microphone forward, "Toby Determined, Gravity Falls Gossiper. Do you really think this constitutes a wonder of the world?"
"Your microphone's a turkey pastor, Toby." Stan deadpans, dodging the question with ease.
"It certainly is—"
Stan interrupts before he can even finish the thought, "Next question!"
A woman looking more like a news reporter stands up toward the back of the crowd. "Sandra Hemanaz, a real reporter." She gives Toby a disapproving glance while announcing herself, "Your flyers promised free pizza with admission to this event." She holds up a flyer depicting a pizza with a slice missing wearing Stan's fez saying 'Free pizza!' and text underneath clarifying 'with admission to the grand unveiling at the Mystery Shack', "Is this true?" she holds her microphone up toward Stan.
Most of the crowd starts to mumble amongst themselves and complain that that's why they showed up at all.
"Pizza?" Wendy asks, looking worriedly to Dipper and Ben, who both look back at her with the same look.
Stan, at a loss for words, answers with the first thing that comes to mind, "That was a typo. Goodnight everyone!" He waves furious, then slams a smoke bomb down in front of him to hide himself as he rushes away, grabbing the admissions box from the ticket table as he flees!
The crowd begins to riot, throwing chairs everywhere, and one muscular guy even breaking part of the banner at the entrance to the parking lot screaming, "In your Face!"
Mabel goes over to the ticket table after the chaos subsides and leans on it confidently. "I think that went well."
Later that night, Stan exclaims, "Hot Pumpkin Pie!" while thumbing through a wad of bills, "Look at all this cash! And I owe it all to one person!" Mabel turns from where she'd been rubing Wax Stan with a rag to keep it clean, expecting praise. Stan instead gestures to the wax double, declaring, "This guy!"
Mabel playfully punches Stan in the gut to remind him who made Wax Stan, forcing an 'Oof' out of him. He ruffles her hair in response, "Hehe. Yeah, you too ya little gremlin." He pushes her away for a second so he can talk to her and Dipper, who had been sitting on the cow skull reading The Journal, "Now you kids wash up. We got another long day of fleecing rubes tomorrow. Make sure the Tennyson kids wash up too." He shoos them up the stairs to speed them up, "Go, go!" Dipper makes sure to hide the Journal from Stan's view as he passes. Once the twins are gone, he leans on Wax Stan's shoulder to sigh. "Kids."
Back on Duck-Tective, "Well Duck-Tective, it seems you've really quacked the case!" the Constable winks, pointing at the duck.
The sleuth stares blankly for a moment and replies, "Don't patronize me."
Stan laughs at the joke, commenting, "Stupid duck." and putting an arm around his wax twin. After a moment he gets up, stating out loud, "Welp! I'm gonna use the John!" He turns back to Wax Stan after stepping over it to ask, "You need anything?" When it doesn't respond, he laughs, "I love this guy! Don't you go nowhere." and leaves.
In the bathroom upstairs the Twins and the Cousins were all brushing their teeth, oblivious to what else could be happening. Mabel, now wearing a purple night gown with a voice recorder depicted on it, pauses to ask, "Hey, anyone wanna do a toothbrush race?"
"Ok." "Sure." Are Dipper and Ben's respective responses. Gwen just rolls her eyes, not dignifying the question with a response.
"No! No! Nooooooooo!" Stan's voice echoes from below. All four children pause and give eachother brief looks.
Downstairs, they find Stan in a cold sweat, rubbing his hands together anxiously. "Wax Stan!" he exclaims, even his voice quivering, "He's been…m…" he gestures down to the floor, "murdered!" There on the floor in front of him, is the now headless Wax Stan, still giving the thumbs up it had since creation. Mabel faints, Dipper just catching her. Gwen stares, unsure of how exactly to react to something like this. Ben scratches his hair, getting over the shock a bit more quickly than the rest.
Later that night, the police arrive to see what they can do.
"I get up to use the john right?" Stan explains, the deputy writing down the story while the sheriff drinks some coffee. "And when I come back? Blammo! He's headless!"
Mabel kneels down by the body and mournfully pats it. "My expert hand crafting…besmirched. Besmirched!" she starts to lightly cry into her hands.
Dipper kneels down by her, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Who would do something like this?"
"More importantly, why do something like this?" Gwen adds, more matter of fact than sad.
"What's your opinion Sheriff Blubs?" the deputy asks.
"Look, we'd love to help you folks but let's face the facts; This case is unsolvable." Sheriff Blubs answers, just before taking a sip of coffee.
"What?!" Stan, Dipper, Mabel, and Ben all shout in shock! "You take that back Sheriff Blubs!" Stan demands, getting his finger into Blubs's face.
"You're kidding right?" Dipper asks, "There must be evidence, motives." He starts to nervously scratch the back of his head. "You know, I could help if you want."
"He's really good!" Mabel adds, "He figured out who was eating our tin cans!"
Following her encouragement, Dipper finishes the story, "All signs pointed to the goat!"
"Yeah, yeah! Let the boy help!" Stan encourages, "He's got a little brain up in his head! In fact," he steps back to let Blubs have a better view of the four children, "Let them all help! The red head's pretty smart too, and the other boy is…Ben."
"Hey!" Ben responds indignantly.
"And it was the other girl's masterpiece." Stan finishes.
"Ooo! Would ya look at what we got here!" Blubs begins, gesturing to the children, "The city kids think they're gonna solve a mystery with their fancy computer phones!"
Following Blubs's example, the deputy continues the mocking by hollering, "City Kiddiiiiiiies, City Kiddiiiiiiies!"
"You are adorable!" Blubs finishes.
"Adorable?" Dipper repeats, embarrassed while the police laugh in his face. His face contorts in anger as a result, and Ben doesn't take it very well either.
"Look PJs, how about you leave the investigating to the grownups? Ok?" Blubs reaches his hand over to the deputy, who low fives him.
Just then, Blubs's radio goes off! "Attention all units! Steve is going to fit an entire cantaloupe in his mouth! Repeat! An entire cantaloupe!"
The deputy swings his pasty white arms excitedly, "It's a 23-16!"
"Let's move!" Blubs commands, both laughing as they jog away.
"That's it!" Dipper declares, turning around, "Guys! We're going to find the jerk who did this and get back that head! Then we'll see who's adorable!"
"I want no part in this." Gwen deadpans, rolling her eyes.
"Oh c'mon!" Mabel turns to her, "Pleeeeeaaase? It'll be fun!"
Gwen takes a moment to answer, but ultimately can't say no to Mabel's puppy dog eyes, "Fine."
The next morning the children begin the investigation, having used toilet paper saying "Crime scene, do not cross" on it as a substitute for police tape. "Wax Stan has lost his head, and it's up to us to find it." Dipper reiterates to the group while standing next to a board with photos of suspects pinned to it. Mabel walks around the headless figure, taking pictures for possible evidence. Gwen stands opposite Dipper, her arms folded. Ben sits on the chair, holding his head on his propped up arm in thought. Dipper turns around to face the board of photos, "There were a lot of unhappy customers at the unveiling." He turns back while shrugging his shoulders, "The murderer could have been anyone."
"Yeah!" Mabel pauses to agree, "Even us!"
"It wasn't us, Mabel." Gwen deadpans, her eyes half lidded.
"You never know." Dipper rebuttals, holding a finger on one hand while getting the Journal out of his vest with the other, "In this town anything is possible." He flips through its pages while continuing, "Ghosts, zombies, could be months before we find our first clue."
"Maybe one of Ben's monsters can help! You said that dog thing can smell stuff right?" Mabel asks.
"Wildmutt? Yeah. He can't see but he can smell strong enough that he doesn't need to." Ben answers, dialing the watch, "That's not a bad idea, let's try it!"
Gwen's eyes go wide, "Wait, don't transform in the house!" she exclaims, trying to run over to stop him but green light engulfs the room before she can make it.
Inside the light, something unexpected happens. Rather than the muscle bulging effect of the Wildmutt transformation, his forearms both bulge, losing a finger on each hand, and turn a blueish grey color. The symbol of the dial grows on his back at an abnormally large size, and his head gains the same coloration as his arms and bulges into a more of a heart shape, while his teeth sharpen, his eyes turn green, his pupils turn rectangular, and his hair slowly recedes into his head to reveal a black strip going up the back and stopping between his new eyes! His body starts shrinking down at a rapid rate after that until he's no more than 6 inches tall!
"Ben?" Dipper asks, confused by Ben's apparent disappearance.
"Down here!" Ben calls up, his voice a lot lighter and smaller now, "I think something's wrong with the Watch, I don't think I'm supposed to be small!"
Gwen, while initially surprised, starts to laugh a little bit, "You look like a frog!"
"Shut up, dweep!" Ben shouts at her, growling while pointing at her angrily! Then he notices the carpet. "Wait a second." He jumps down and goes to a spot right next to Wax Stan's lack of a head, "Do you see how the carpet's indented right here?" he points to where the hair of the carpet is at a slightly odd angle as if squashed down more than normal, "Foot prints. Heavy ones."
"That's weird." Mabel comments.
"How did we miss that?" Dipper asks, now seeing several pairs of footprints around the body.
"Look here!" Ben points out, "Whoever did it has a hole in his shoe!"
"When did you get so smart?" Gwen asks.
"I…don't know." Ben admits, now wondering himself. "The most likely hypothesis is that this monster is just smart by nature, likely to make up for its lack of any other means of self defense."
After his guess on his source of intelligence he examines the patterns of the footprints even more, then points to beside the chair, "There! The footprints lead to something by the chair!" He runs there clumsily while the others all gather around what they find: An axe. They all gasp at the possible discovery of the weapon! "Get some gloves so we don't taint the evidence with our own fingerprints!" Ben orders.
Not long after, the kids bring the weapon to Soos for him to examine, all wearing yellow rubber gloves except for Ben who is nowhere to be found. "So what do ya think?" Dipper inquires.
"In my opinion?" Soos responds, holding up the tool for a moment and then bringing it back down in his palm, "This is an axe."
"Wait a minute! The lumberjack!" Mabel exclaims. She and Dipper both follow up with a synced, "Of course!", recalling how the man had punched away part of the banner after the event.
"He was furious when he didn't get that free pizza!" Dipper follows the train of thought on his own.
"And based on his reaction, he's far more emotional than rational, and his dominant emotion is anger." Ben chimes in, lifting Dipper's hat enough to reveal his amphibious form.
"As much as I hate to admit it, I remember seeing him out on the water during Mr. Pine's fishing trip." Gwen adds, placing her hands on her hips, "As ridiculous as vandalizing art over pizza is, I wouldn't put it past him."
"Oh, you mean Manley Dan." Soos states as everyone looks toward him, "Yeah, he hangs out at this crazy intense biker joint downtown."
"Then that's where we're going." Mabel dramatically states.
"Dudes, this is awesome!" Soos comments, "You guys are like the Mystery Kids!"
"Don't call us that." Dipper deadpans.
"It's a onetime thing." Gwen adds.
The children head outside soon after, Ben still concealing himself under Dipper's hat. While going through the parking lot, they pass Stan who's trying to pull a casket out of his car's trunk. He pauses upon seeing them, "Hey, give me a hand with this coffin will ya? I'm doing a memorial service for Wax Stan. Something small but…classy." With one last grunt, he finally manages to yank the coffin out of the trunk and onto the ground.
"Sorry Grunkle Stan but we've got a big break in the case!" Dipper responds, pumping his arm.
"Break in the case!" Mabel adds, swinging her arms with enthusiasm.
"We're heading into town right now to interrogate the prime suspect." Gwen explains, folding her arms.
Mabel reaches into the backpack Dipper's now wearing and pulls out the murder weapon, stating, "We have an axe!" with a huge smile on her face. She makes small swings with it while chanting 're' over and over.
"Seems like the kinda thing a responsible parent wouldn't want you doing." Stan ponders, holding his chin. He relaxes as he finishes his thoughts, "Good thing I'm an uncle!" He places one foot on the coffin and swings his fist in the air, "Avenge me kids! Avenge me!"
In town, Dipper and Gwen sneak around an alley and hide behind an open dumpster. Mabel emerges from the dumpster, and holds one of the bags above her head, shifting her eyes back and forth. Dipper double checks himself with a note in his vest and nods, "This is the place." He and Mabel peer around the corner to see Skull Fracture, the 'crazy intense biker joint' Soos told them about as well as the large black man covered in tattoos guarding the door. Said man glances toward the Twins, and they quickly return to hiding! After catching his breath, Dipper asks, "Got the fake IDs?" Mabel hands him three decorated cards. Dipper looks sternly at them. "Here goes nothing."
"These will never work." Gwen complains, her hands on her hips.
The guard inspects someone's ID, then states, "Sorry, but we don't serve miners."
"Daaaaag nabit!" an old miner guy in an orange jumpsuit holding a pickaxe complains, spitting on the ground as he walks away.
The Twins and Gwen approach once the miner's gone. "We're here to interrogate Manley Dan the Lumberjack for the murder of Wax Stan." Mabel deadpans, while all three hold up their fake IDs. Dipper is visibly nervous, and Gwen is shaking a little. A closer look at the IDs reveals why, since Mabel used photos of them with goolgely eyes and marker made mustaches, macaroni, glitter, and stickers. Mabel potentially makes it worse by playfully shaking her card while making a 'Deedeleeledee' noise.
The man stares for a moment and then half lids his eyes. "Works for me." He opens the door to let the children in.
Inside, they find heavy metal blaring through the establishment, and people who look like they should be in biker gangs beating eachother to a pulp, and broken bottles littering the floor. "I can't believe that worked!" Gwen whispers as they walk through the place, unnoticed by anyone else.
While searching, the group walks over a man laying on the ground. Dipper and Gwen glance at eachother, Ben's amphibious face twists in concern, and Mabel just smiles, justifying by claiming, "He's resting."
"Alright, let's just try to blend in, ok?" Dipper interjects, changing the subject back to their purpose.
"You got it, Dipping Sauce!" Mabel agrees, pointing to her brother playfully.
"Seriously, blend in." Gwen reiterates, more sternly than Dipper had.
"Don't worry, I'll be fine." Mabel waves her off. Gwen rolls her eyes, and follows Dipper toward an arm wrestling machine. Mabel stays behind and climbs onto one of the stools at a table. "Hey there fellow restraint patron!" she greets the man already sitting there, a muscular fellow with a shaggy black beard, a scar on his face, and a tattoo on his arm depicting a knife and the word 'bats' on it. She playfully slaps his hand in an attempt at a high-five, and he responds with an intense growl.
Dipper, Ben, and Gwen meanwhile find the suspect at the arm wrestling machine, struggling against it. "Manley Dan! Just the guy we wanted to see." Dipper opens the dialog. He narrows his eyes, "Where were you last night?"
"Punching the clock." Dan answers, not taking much attention away from the machine.
"You were at work?" Gwen confirms?
"No!" Dan angrily spits out his words, and points outside, "I was punching that clock!"
Outside is a lamppost with a clock on it instead of lamp, which is dented as if it were hit by a car. The clock's hands are frozen. "Ten o'clock…the time of the murder…" Dipper scratches his head in thought as a huge blow to their original theory is revealed.
Gwen picks up Dipper's slack, puts on a rubber glove she had in her pocket, and takes the axe out of Dipper's backpack, "So I suppose you haven't seen this before?" She holds it up for Dan to see.
"Listen little girls!" Dan growls through his teeth.
"Hey, actually, I'm—" Dipper was about to correct the lumberjack but was interrupted.
"I wouldn't pick my teeth with that axe!" Dan holds up his left hand, "It's left handed! I only use my right hand! The Manley Hand!" he pulls so hard on the machine that he rips its arm off of it!
The small little man who seems to follow Manley Dan around comes out of nowhere, cheering, "Get em! Get em!" as Dan beats the machine apart with its own arm, throws the arm on the ground, and roars in pure manley rage!
"Left handed…" Dipper looks more closely at the axe as if to examine it.
"…three, four, five, six." Mabel and the man she sat next to count as Mabel folds around one of those paper things that predicts the future. She gasps as the man holds his hands to his mouth in anticipation. "You're wife is gonna be beautiful."
"Yes!" the man pumps his arm in victory.
"Mabel!" Dipper grabs his twin's attention, "Big break in the case!" Eager to hear, Mabel follows Dipper and Gwen as they collectively leave the building.
"But will she love me?!" the man begs, reaching toward his newfound friend leaving.
"Turns out it was a left-handed axe." Gwen explains as they walk down the sidewalk.
"This is a list of all the human suspects." Ben, still the tiny but intelligent frog thing, says, pointing to the notebook Dipper's holding listing, 'Manley Dan, Old Man McGucket, That Fat Guy, Angry Lady, Mikey R., Uncle Phil, and Susie' next to two columns with unmarked checkboxes labeled 'left' and 'right'.
"Manley Dan is right handed." Dipper adds, marking in the right column box by Manley Dan, "That means all we gotta do is find our left handed suspect and we got our killer!"
"Oh man, we are on fire today!" Mabel cheers, poking up at the air with several 'pazow's.
"Let's find that murderer." Ben affirms, putting his hand out as far as he can.
Both Twins place their hands on top of Ben's, nodding with confidence. They look toward Gwen who doesn't seem to want to join in. "Well?" Mabel asks.
Gwen looks away awkwardly but ultimately gives in and joins, "Alright fine."
"This case is in the bag!" Dipper claims, brimming with confidence.
The children spend the rest of the day testing each person on the list for which hand is dominant, waving, tricking them into signing something, making them catch something thrown at them, etc.
Dipper marks off the last person they checked and then flips to the next page, and gasps! "Guys! There's only one person left on this list!" Ben, now back in his human form, Mabel and Gwen crowd around him while he turns it to show them.
"Of course!" Mabel exclaims, resting her head on her chin.
"It all adds up!" Ben agrees, pumping his arm in the air!
Gwen folds her arms in skepticism, "Shouldn't we actually check which hand he uses before we assume it was him?"
"No need, he's the only one left!" Dipper insists, pointing with the eraser of his pencil to where he's the only unmarked suspect, "There's no way anyone else could've done it! Let's get the sheriff and get him tonight!"
"Yeah!" Mabel and Ben shout in agreement, raising their arms high into the air!
The Twins and Ben hurry away without hearing Gwen out. "But…How do we know our vandal is even on the list in the first place?"
Later, the sheriff and the children arrive at the Gravity Falls Gossiper to arrest the culprit! They all run over and surround the door, the Twins on the side with Sheriff Blubs and the Cousins on the other with the deputy! Both officers wield batons and flashlights, but none of the children are armed. Gwen still remains visibly hesitant despite the others' collective enthusiasm.
"You kids better be right about this," Blubs threatens, facing the Twins, "or you'll never hear the end of it!"
"The evidence is irrefutable." Dipper calmly asserts.
"It's so irrefutable!" Mabel adds.
"Not completely." Gwen mutters, rubbing her shoulder, though no one hears her over the deputy.
"I'm gonna get to use my math stick!"
"Ready? Ready little fella?" Blubs asks the deputy. The two of them start quietly shouting 'woo', laughing, and playfully hitting eachother.
"On three!" Dipper commands. On the three, the deputy violently kicks open the door, and he and Blubs both head in.
"Nobody move! This is a raid!" Blubs shouts as they zero in on Toby Determined, who falls out of his chair while blinded by their flashlights.
"What is this?" he asks, "Some kind of raid?"
The deputy answers by knocking one of Toby's lamps off his desk, shattering it on the floor.
"Toby Determined!" Dipper announces, pointing at Toby, "You're under arrest for the murder of the wax body of Grunkle Stan!"
"You have the right to remain impressed with out awesome detective work!" Mabel smirks at her own quip. She and Dipper high five eachother, and then they both high five Ben.
"Gobbling goose feathers! I don't understand!" Toby exclaims, standing up and holding his arms out in confusion.
"Then allow us to explain: " Dipper offers, "You were hoping that Grunkle Stan's new attraction would be the story that saved your failing newspaper."
"But when the show was a flop, you decided to go out and make your own headline." Mabel continues.
"But you were sloppy!" Ben raises his arm dramatically as he takes over, "All the clues pointed to a shabby shoed reporter who was caught left handed!"
"Toby Determined, you're yesterday's news!" Mabel quips, crushing one of Toby's papers and throwing it away behind her.
"Boy your little knees must be sore." Toby retorts, "From jumping to conclusions!" He does a little dance while making a 'ha-cha-cha' noise. "I had nothing to do with that murder."
"I knew it—Wait, what?" Dipper, Mabel, and Ben all starts asking confused questions, while Gwen rolls her eyes and folds her arms.
"Then where were you the night of the break-in?" Blubs demands, trying to get everything back on track.
Toby pulls on his collar and winches, but ultimately shows them security camera footage of him making out with his cardboard cutout of the female news reporter Sandra Hemanaz, resulting in collective 'ew' from the entire group. "Time stamp confirms it." Blubs relents, "Toby, you're off the hook, you freak of nature."
"Hooray!" Toby exclaims, lifting his arms up in celebration.
"But—But it has to be him!" Dipper exclaims in disbelief, "Check the axe for finger prints!"
After some set up time, they do just that. But after dusting Blubs discovers, "No prints at all."
"No prints?" Dipper and Ben synchronize their confused protest, Dipper holding his head and Ben just holding his arms up at the elbows.
"Hey I got a headline for ya." The deputy offers Toby, "'City Kids Waste Everyone's Time!'" He, Blubs, and Toby all have a good laugh the kids' expense.
Embarrassed, Dipper rubs his arm, Mabel rubs the back of her head, and Ben folds his arms and looks down. Gwen deadpan stares at the other children.
"Boy, I'd be pretty embarrassed if I was any of you!" Toby finishes laughing, conveniently ignoring the still playing footage of his make out with a cardboard cutout.
That night, Stan holds the funeral for his wax doppelganger in one of the less used rooms in the Shack. Fold-up chairs were used to seat the children, Soos, and the other wax figures. "Kids, Soos, lifeless wax figures," Stan gestures to each group as he begins his speech up one the podium.
The Twins sit in the front with Soos, and the Cousins sit behind them with the Twins and Ben still glum about not solving the case, Mabel now holding the axe without the gloves from earlier, Soos sobbing and constantly drying his tears with a tissue, and Gwen hiding in the seat behind Soos so Stan doesn't see how annoyed she is at having to go through with this.
"Thank you all for coming." Stan continues, holding his own tears back, "Some people might say it's wrong for a man to love a wax replica of himself—"
"They're wrong!" Soos jumps out of his seat to passionately object.
"Easy Soos!" Stan holds his arms up to placate the handy man before continuing by addressing Wax Stan directly, "Wax Stan? I hope you're picking pockets in wax heaven!" His tears finally begin to shed, and he has to cover his face to hide it, "I'm sorry I got glitter in my eye!" he shouts as he runs out before finishing. Soos, still sobbing, goes after Stan so they can grieve together.
Dipper sighs once they're gone, "Those cops were right about us."
"Dipper." Mabel objects, "We've come so far, we can't give up now. Right?" She turns to the Tennysons for backup.
"I don't want to but what else can we do?" Ben asks, draping his arms over the backs of the front chairs.
"But we considered everything!" Dipper continues, getting up and walking toward the wax casket, "The weapon, the motive, the clues…"
"And even with Greymatter's brains we still got the wrong guy." Ben adds.
"I tried to warn you guys to check him first, but you never listened long enough for me to get to it." Gwen sulks, a scowl on her face. "You two are just as bad as Ben is."
Dipper, nodding at Gwen's beratement, happens to look down at Wax Stan's shoe and notices something off topic. "Wax Stan's shoe has a hole in it."
"All the wax guys have that." Mabel explains, going up to her brother for emotional support, "It's where the pole thingy attaches to their stand dealeys."
"Wait a minute!" Dipper realizes, "What has holes in its shoes and no fingerprints?" The color drains from his face as he voices the conclusion, "Guys! The murderers are—"
"Standing right behind you?" an English voice finishes Dipper's thought for him as a wax detective steps out of the isle where he was stood for the funeral.
"What the- Hey!" Gwen shrieked upon seeing supernatural phenomena firsthand for the first time, but was grabbed by the wax woman a seat behind her before she could get up!
Ben was almost grabbed by the wax archer behind him but managed to duck out of the way and back out of the isle before they got him, backing away warily as every wax figure comes to life!
Dipper looks around in horror at each figure, "Wax Sherlock Holmes! Wax Shakespeare! Wax Coolio?"
"What's up Holmes?" Wax Coolio confirms by speaking.
The figure holding Gwen, Wax Lizzie Borden, grabs her axe back from Mabel as they back Ben and the Twins into a corner.
"Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh!" Mabel hyperventilates in a panic, hiding behind Dipper, who in turn hides behind Ben, who has his hand hovering over the Watch's interface.
Wax Lizzie holds her axe up to Gwen's throat as Wax Sherlock steps up, "Congratulations my armature sleuths! You've unburied the truth! And now we're going to bury you!" the figure holds his magnifying glass threateningly at the children.
"Bravo, Dipper Pines!" Wax Sherlock congratulates, tilting his head back and forth as he takes Wax Stan's head out of his overcoat, "You've discovered our little secret." The wax detective turns back to the other figures, "Applaud everyone! Applaud sarcastically!" to which the figures clap. "Ah, no, that sounds too sincere. Slow clap." Most of the figures get a tired, irritated expression while slow clapping, "There we go. Nice and condescending."
"How are you guys alive?!" Gwen screeches, trying to kick her way free of Wax Lizzie, "You're all made of wax!"
"Are you…magic?" Mabel asks, her fear being replaced with childlike wonder.
Wax Sherlock starts to break down into laughter, "Are we magic? She wants to know if we're magic!" He slams his pipe into Wax Stan's coffin, right by the children's heads, "We're cursed!"
"Cursed!" the rest of the figures repeat, chanting it angrily.
"Cursed to come to life whenever the moon is waxing." Wax Sherlock explains, "You're uncle bought us many years ago at a garage sale."
"A haunted garage sale, son!" Wax Coolio adds.
"Our previous owner warned your uncle we came at a terrible price, but he stole us anyway. And so the Mystery Shack Wax Collection was born." Sherlock reminisces, waving his arms around, "By day we would be the playthings of man."
"But when your uncle was asleep, we would rule the night!" Wax Coolio interjects himself in.
"It was a charmed life for us cursed beings." Wax Sherlock tries to finish without getting annoyed at the rapper, "That is, until your uncle closed up shop. We've been waiting ten years for getting revenge on Stan for locking us away! But we got the wrong guy."
"So you were trying to murder Grunkle Stan for real?!" Dipper simplifies, horrified and frozen in place.
"You were right all along Dipper! Wax people are creepy." Mabel exclaims, backing further away from the figures."
"Enough!" Wax Sherlock interrupts, "Now that you know our secret, you must die." His wax eyes roll back into his head, and the rest of the figures follow suit, and start to growl as they approach.
"Ben, now would be good time to turn into something!" Gwen calls out, trying to shake her legs enough to make Lizzie drop her.
"Quiet, girl!" Lizzie threatens, holding the blade of the axe up to Gwen's neck, then swing it back to decapitate!
Ben doesn't allow enough time for that to happen, slamming his palm down on the watch without even looking to see what he might turn into as green light fills the room! Dark red rocks creep out over his skin from around the watch, engulfing it as they travel up his arm and coat his entire body, and expanding it to more adult proportions. After the rock finishes, bright yellow light bursts forth from the cracks, and the entire body is coated in flame!
The Twins and wax figures alike stand back from Ben's new fiery form! "What in blazes?!" Sherlock screeches, being the first to turn back.
Before them stands Ben, now transformed into a rocky form engulfed in fire. "I'm in blazes!" Ben quips, smirking a little as he stands to his full height. Gangus Kahn charges at Ben, unafraid, but Ben charges back shoulder bashes the wax figure, melting right through him like butter. "You guys are so toast." Ben chuckles, walking closer to the rest of the Wax group.
"That's it!" Mabel exclaims, grabbing an electric candle from behind her, "We can melt them with hotty melty things!" Dipper grabs the other one on the table behind them, brandishing it as if it were a sword!
The wax figures recoil back in fear until Sherlock yells, "Execute the others while we have the chance!" drawing his sword. Lizzie swings back her axe for a second attempt to chop off Gwen's head as the girl screams, but Ben propels himself forward by firing flames from his feet, rocketing through her upper body with a splat, only to faceplant on the wall behind her.
Gwen rubs her head a bit as Robin Hood approaches her, but she takes Lizzie's axe swings it, lobbing off one of the figure's arms! "Thanks!" she calls out to her cousin.
"No problem!" Ben replies, standing back up to face the hoard of figures cautiously approaching.
"Interview this Larry King!" Dipper quips, melting through Larry's neck, making his head fall off! His body scrambles to try to fix the problem.
Wax Groucho tries to attack Dipper from behind but is sliced in half by Mabel melting through his waist. "I've heard about a cutting remark but this is ridiculous." The comedian jokes. "Hey, why is there nothing in my hand?"
The Twins continue to slice and melt their way through figures, leaving Ben preoccupied with the majority, but Wax Queen Elizabeth charges at Gwen! Gwen tries to chop the queen with the axe, but it isn't enough to cut through her so Gwen instead kicks her into the fireplace, turning to go join the Twins.
Ben finishes off Coolio, the last of the figures attacking him, but then notices Sherlock heading for the others. "Look out!" he reaches his arm out, blasting a fireball by accident, hitting Wax Edgar and only narrowly missing Gwen.
"Watch it dweeb, you almost burned us alive!" she berates him, in the process almost getting slashed by Sherlock.
"Hey!" Mabel calls, taking the now bodiless head of Wax Shakespeare and throwing it at the detective!
Sherlock parries the projectile, but then notices he's the only able bodied left, the rest of the figures melted or in so many pieces they can't fight. "My, my, it seems you've got me cornered." He points at, spreading his arms for dramatic effect, "You've got me trapped between 3 capable children with weapons that could cut me to pieces, and a charcoal man with some kind of power over fire."
"We could let you live." Mabel invites, lowering her candle, "If you agree not to attack us or anyone else again. We could even become friends."
Sherlock lowers his own guard. "Maybe...Maybe we could just be friends instead of trying to kill eachother." Dipper and Gwen look at eachother in confusion, while Mabel tries to smile to look friendly. Ben for his part lowers his guard but keeps a watchful eye.
"Come on, let's go work this out somewhere without the bodies of your old friends." Mabel offers, walking toward the door, dropping the candle in the process. Dipper and Gwen follow her example, dropping their weapons, the group turn to leave as Sherlock wordlessly approaches them.
However, Sherlock raises his sword one final time, and was about to swing it down at Dipper just as the children notices, but was struck by one of Ben's fireballs just before he could bring it down, melting him just enough for him to cry out in pain, dropping the sword next to him. "Fiddlesticks! Humbug! It's a total kerfuffle! What a hullabaloo!"
"Ah, I really wanted to just be friends." Mabel whines, looking down.
"It's ok, not everyone can be your friend." Dipper tries to comfort her, placing his hand on her shoulder.
"I guess magic is real…" Gwen finally voices, watching Sherlock melt.
"I guess that means we've finished the case." Ben points out, breathing pretty hard from the fight.
"Yeah, I guess it does." Dipper agrees, clapping his hands together, kicking up enough dust to prompt him to sneeze.
"Hahaha!" Sherlock breathes out his last words as the heat from Ben finishes him off, "You sneeze like a kitten! Those policemen were right, you're adorable! Adorable!"
The spend the rest of the night finishing off remaining wax figure parts by throwing them in the lit fireplace or having Ben melt them with his new fire form, at least before the Watch timed out and he was rendered human again.
In the waking hours of dawn, the head of Wax Shakespear declares, "Though our group be cleft and twain, man of wax shall rise again!"
"Put a sock in it!" Ben demands, licking the head into the fireplace to melt away.
"Hey!" Mabel pouts, "I was gonna ask him if he knew any limericks!"
Ben shrugs, tossing a leg of another figure in.
Looking around, Gwen collapses onto one of the chairs, "I can't believe that was real. Looks like we did solve the mystery though."
"Yeah." Dipper replies, grabbing Wax Stan's head from where it had tumbled onto the floor during the fight, "All because we had eachother!"
"You should come with us on our next adventure!" Mabel squeals, "It'd be nice having another girl on the team!"
"Maybe…" Gwen nods. She was about to continue when Stan walked in.
"Hot belching waffles! What happened to my parlor?" he shrieks, recoiling at the sight of the damage.
"Your wax figures turned out to be evil so we fought them to the death!" Mabel answers, smiling more brightly than she probably should've.
"I decapitated Larry King." Dipper adds.
Ben cringes at them being so honest for something so unbelievable, and Gwen remains too tired to care.
Stan stares for a moment but laughs it off, "Ha ha! You kids and your imaginations." He resumes scowling after he finishes his laugh.
"On the bright side though, look what we found." Dipper holds Wax Stan's head forward, and tosses it to their Grunckle.
"My head!" Stan exclaims, catching it and laughing with joy, "I missed this guy! Ya done good, kids." He walks forward, "Alright, line up for some affectionate nuggying!"
"I'm not so sure about that- " Dipper tries to deny, alongside the other 3 also trying to deny it without being rude, but all devolving into laughter anyway.
The celebration is broken up when Sheriff Blubs and the deputy pull up by the broken window. "Solve the case yet, kids?" Blubs asks, "I'm so confident you're gonna say 'no', that I'm gonna take a long slow sip from my cup of coffee." He starts to drink.
"Actually, the answer is yes." Dipper holds up the Wax Stan head, proud.
Blubs almost chokes on his coffee and spits it out onto the deputy's face, who as a reaction to the pain spits out his own coffee onto Blubs's face, prompting a short cycle until they run out of coffee to spit. They drive away, writhing in pain, their screams mixing. "It burns! It burns!" "My eyes! Ah! Ah!"
The entire group laughs hysterically at the two, Stan even pointing out, "They got scalded!"
After calming down, Gwen finally perks up a bit. "We did get rid of all the wax figures, right?"
"I am 99% sure that we did!" Mabel exclaims.
"Good enough for me." Dipper smiles.
In a vent, watching, is Wax Larry King's head. It laughs in triumph until it's distracted by another creature in the vent. "So, you're a rat." He tries to engage it in conversation, "Tell me about that." The rat bites him and tears his ear off, running away with it. "Hey! Get back here!" Larry tries his best to hop after it while narrating himself, "I'm hopping! I'm hopping after a rat that stole my ear!"
Ok, hope any of ya'll still around enjoyed that, because you're unlikely to get any more. I won't say conclusively that I'm never coming back, but I've lost the hyperfixation that allowed me to get this far in it.
For those unaware, a hyperfixation is a sort of mini obsession a neurodivergent person can have that only lasts for a limited time before they hyperfixate on something else. I was diagnosed with a form of autism called asperger syndrome or "high functioning austim" a short time after I turned 18, and that retroactively explained little quirks I've developed like those hyperfixations.
Anyway, back to the topic of this fic's future, don't expect it to have one. I'd have to hyperfixate back on writing fanfiction again to get the motivation to write without it being a massive energy drain on me. I'm only posting chapter 3 now because it was already finished and I didn't want to leave you guys hanging like so many fanfic authors do.
Also I heard a rumor somewhere that is dying. Dunno if that's true but if the site does go down and I decide to come back at some point after, I'll probably to go AO3 or something. Probably not under the name Bad Pun King since I don't even go by that anymore, but The Book and the Watch should still be under the same name if I do.
All that out of the way, since I'm unlikely to return I've decided to let ya'll know the general outline of what I was going to do with the story, so you at least have an idea of where I was going if I don't come back. If I do return, the following paragraphs after the line will contain spoilers. Spoilers will end after the 2nd line.
So. General idea was what if ten year old Ben & Gwen joined the Pines twins in that fateful summer of Gravity Falls. As you've seen so far, it mostly goes the same way as regular Gravity Falls. Season 1 was only going to be changed by Ben learning his original playlist of aliens (Diamondhead, Four Arms, Ghostfreak, Greymatter, Heatblast, Ripjaws, Stinkfly, Upgrade, Wildmutt, XLR8) over the course of the season, maybe Blendin having a panic attack over meeting Ben, Vilgax's drones would appear in some chapters to antagonize characters, Ben and Gwen would sometimes change the way the outcome is reached but rarely if ever the outcome itself, then Ben would unlock Cannonbolt at random during Gideon Rises.
Then between seasons 1 & 2 of Gravity Falls would be 2 Ben 10 centric episodes, based on the episodes Secrets and Ghostfreaked Out. They would have heavier divergence from canon due to taking place in Gravity Falls instead of near Mount Rushmore or at Bancroft Academy. Secrets would actually see a lot of cameos from season 1 Gravity Falls characters appearing in the panic of the fight between Ben and Vilgax.
Then season 2. Ben lost Ghostfreak over the course of Ghostfreaked Out so with Cannonbolt he's back to 10 aliens, and with Vilgax gone there wouldn't be drones everywhere anymore. Over the course of season 2 Ben would unlock Wildvine, Upchuck, Ditto, Eye Guy, and Way Big. I had specific episodes planned for each unlock but its been so long the only one I remember is that Way Big was going to show up during Weirdmageddon for the fight between the Shacktron and the henchmaniacs. I can guess that Eye Guy was probably going to show up during Society of the Blind Eye just because of eye themes. Other aliens I'd have to see if I wrote them down somewhere.
The question of who would tell the kids Ben's aliens are aliens? I didn't actually plan that, I just figured it'd come up in dialog with the first person that has reason to know and let them know. Ford at the latest, maybe Bill would say something, could even be from Blendin.
I remember seeing at least one person worry I was gonna shoehorn Alien X in at some point. Not to worry, I was only ever going to use classic series aliens. Only Way Big would ever be an overkill alien, and even then only during Weirdmageddon.
That pretty does it for what I had planned. Sorry I couldn't be a more consistent author for you guys.