countless hours making waves
Pacifica has been to Lake Gravity Falls before. This, however, is the first time she isn't on the deck of a luxury boat.
It's bright out and the weather has taken a turn for the warmer end of the spectrum. The sun is climbing towards high noon and the water sparkles with dazzling intensity in the eddies where it ripples and rolls. Pacifica is seated at the back of a trawler that smells powerfully of diesel and has a collection of dents and scrapes that tell a history of hard use. The engine is pushing the craft slowly but surely towards the center of the lake, not far from Scuttlebutt Island.
It's the first day of the fishing season. In what seems to be a tradition, Soos and Stan have closed the Shack for 'family fun day' so everyone can go out on the lake in the Stan O' War II. Pacifica only caught part of the story, but the boat is the one Stan and Ford took out into the Arctic Ocean in search of anomalies, which explains its rough appearance. She isn't sure what happened to the boat that her parents kept at the lake. Probably sold, at some point. It was much nicer than the boat she's currently on, but she's still happy to be included. It is a 'family' bonding day, after all (though Soos is also here, so maybe it's not such a literal use of the word).
The occasion still doesn't explain the ridiculous hat Dipper is wearing.
It's a floppy fisherman's hat with 'DIPPY' emblazoned on it in brightly colored, poorly stitched felt lettering. She's trying to listen to his story, but it's hard to get past how stupid he looks.
"—and it turned out that it was just a robot McGucket built for attention," Dipper concludes. "Which was actually pretty amazing, but not an example of cryptozoology, so I didn't think the magazine would go for it."
Pacifica nods absently, wondering how she can get him back into his regular hat. Maybe if she pushed him overboard he would want to wear something dry?
The engine cuts out and the boat begins to glide to a stop. "Alright, this looks like a good spot!" Stan says as he steps out from the helm. "Plenty of fish and not a cop in sight. And guess who brought the joke book!"
Dipper winces. "Uh— oh, hey, Grunkle Stan, can you teach me how to weight my hook?"
Pacifica isn't much interested in fishing. She's looking forward to swimming at the beach later. She leans over the side of the boat and swishes her hand through the cool water, savoring the feel. It's getting too hot out for her comfort, and if she's going to be baking on this boat for the next couple hours then she's going to sit inside, out of the sun. There's no way she's risking her complexion.
Mabel's smiling reflection appears in the water next to Pacifica's own. "See any cool fish?" she asks.
"We should go swimming," Pacifica says, well aware that's on the itinerary for later but wanting to speed things up.
Mabel makes a sympathetic face. "We promised Grunkle Stan we'd go fishing with him. Come on, you might like it!"
Pacifica imagines handling a slimy fish and curls her lip. "Fish are gross, Mabel."
"Not as gross as that," Mabel giggles, pointing to where Stan is trying to get Soos to put his shirt back on. "Ha ha! You're a free spirit, Soos!"
Pacifica leaves the four of them happily ribbing each other and tossing their lines into the lake. She's about to go inside the boat and read on her phone when she sees Ford at the bow, lowering a cord into the water. She hesitates; Ford is a bit intimidating and she doesn't know either of the great-uncles that well, but whatever he's doing looks like it might be at least a little interesting. More interesting than staring at her phone for hours, anyway.
She goes inside to touch up her sunscreen and then makes her way to the front of the boat, curious. Ford hears her approach and glances over his shoulder.
"Ms. Northwest. Or, do you prefer Pacifica?" he says genially.
"Pacifica is fine," she says. The formality attached to her last name just reminds her of her parents, and that's a reminder she can do without.
"Well, Pacifica, are you enjoying our day out on the lake?" he asks, turning back to whatever it is he's doing.
"I don't really get fishing," she admits.
"Never cared for it myself; too much sitting around. Why wait for the fish to come to you, when you can do this?" Ford holds up a small device attached to the cord and flicks a switch.
Pacifica reaches out and grabs the nearby railing, startled by a deep thump that comes from somewhere beneath her. A few seconds later an entire array of fish float to the surface of the water and bob in the gentle waves. Ford scoops several up and tosses them into a nearby bucket.
"Done and done," he says cheerfully, wiping his hands on a rag. "I just caught more fish in five minutes than they will all afternoon."
Pacifica thinks he's kind of missing the point, since the others seem to be enjoying the company more than the catching fish part. She's on Ford's side, though, so she doesn't argue. Fishing is boring and they could be spending time together swimming instead of waiting on the fish.
Ford's gaze is fixated on the mistier side of the lake, where the fog of the falls obscures the opposite shore. "Scuttlebutt Island," he says, pointing it out. "Have you ever been?"
Pacifica can recall going past it on the Northwest boat during parties, but she's never set foot there. "No. People say weird things about it."
"And the lake in general. I suspect that there's an ancient creature living in these waters, often referred to by the locals as the Gobblewonker. The circumstantial evidence is significant enough to justify further study." He tilts his head ruefully. "I just never found the time. There were other avenues to pursue, and an aquatic hunt in any body of water is time consuming, to say the least."
"Dipper said that thing was just a robot, made by McGucket," she tells him.
Ford's eyebrows raise. "Fiddleford? He always was a genius with biomechanics. But sightings of the Gobblewonker predate whatever contraption Dipper encountered. I don't doubt Fiddleford is capable of creating such an automaton, but my suspicion would be that he based it on the real thing."
Pacifica is suddenly less enthused about swimming. "Great, another monster. Just what this town needs."
"I don't think there's any reason to be concerned. I never found any reports of anyone being eaten. Or even nibbled on."
She still keeps her hands out of the water for the duration of the fishing trip.
Fishing drags on longer than had been promised, of course. She eventually gives in and tries fishing with a borrowed pole (it's exactly as boring as it looks). As the sun begins to dip towards the water, the other boats out on the lake start to thin out. Bonfires spring up on the shore as the light fades; they are flickering points that dance in the distance, reflected in long, shimmering lines on the lake's surface.
They bring the boat back to the docks and swim in the shallows. Dipper, Mabel, and Ford seem briefly concerned about the 'Tooth Island,' whatever that is. There must be no sign of it because they soon relax.
She forgets about the Gobblewonker and splashes around with the others. Mabel's swimsuit is bright yellow and covered in blue stars, and it looks like she customized it herself. Dipper's boardshorts don't quite cover up the wide pink scar on his hip, a vivid reminder for Pacifica of what he risked to help her (Mabel immediately begins teasing him about the few sparse hairs just beginning to sprout from his chest). Pacifica looks great in her fashionable swimwear, and she knows it. Judging from the way Dipper doesn't seem to be able to look directly at her, he knows it too. She takes his hand and wades into the lake, enjoying the chilly water lapping at her knees, leaching away the heat of the day. But there are some gross-looking weeds, so she refuses to go any further in.
Her reluctance is quickly overcome as Dipper and Mabel pick her up and throw her into the deeper water; she surfaces squealing indignantly. She has her revenge when she puts a handful of sand down the back of Mabel's swimsuit and gets Dipper good when she pretends to lean in for a kiss, only to dunk him thoroughly (Stan, especially, enjoys that maneuver, roaring with laughter from his folding chair near the fire). Mabel challenges everyone to a chicken fight, which is straight up unfair because she has Soos as her base and no one can knock him over. Dipper finds their weakness; he pokes the older man in the stomach. Soos snorts with laughter and bends forward to protect himself, sending Mabel face-first into the drink.
Dipper does a victory lap through the shallows with a triumphant Pacifica on his shoulders. She is drenched and a little cold and she's got sand in places she doesn't want to think about, but she's smiling and laughing and when she slides off his shoulders, she wraps her arms around him and puts her head against his chest. They stand together with the water bobbing at their ankles. She listens to his heartbeat as she looks out over a lake dyed purple and orange beneath the sunset, and she's happy.
She's happy.
They wrap themselves in towels and gather around the fire. Ford cheerfully hums an odd tune to himself as he mans the portable grill; the smell of sizzling fish makes Pacifica's stomach rumble. Stan is trying to read from a dog-eared book of ghost stories, but Dipper and Mabel are heckling him mercilessly, denying his attempt to set the mood. It's almost fully dark. The sun has sunk behind the cliffs of the valley and the moon fades in and out behind scrolling clouds. If she stares out across the water long enough it's like she's sitting at the edge of night, the only island of light in a vast, dark sea.
"And that's when she realized… the cat was coming from inside the house! Wait, 'cat?' …Oh, it's call. Wait, that still doesn't make any sense. Maybe I skipped a part. How am I supposed to tell with this stupid tiny print?" Stan complains, squinting at the book.
Dipper is leaning back on his elbows, looking deeply unimpressed. "Grunkle Stan, literally anything would be scarier than this."
"You could tell us about your colonoscopy again, Stanley. That gave me nightmares," Ford jeers from over by the grill.
"Everyone's a critic," Stan retorts, tossing the book into the pile of fishing gear. "I don't hear you offering to do better!"
"I've got a tale of terror," Mabel says, leaning forward with her fingers wiggling ominously. "It's called: That Time Grunkle Stan Told Me All About Puberty and Wouldn't Stop Even When I Screamed!'"
Stan gives her a look of confusion. "Is this something I don't remember 'cause Ford blasted me? I'd call that a bonus."
"You probably remember. I was just in Dipper's body at the time," Mabel states, like that's no big deal and not worth explaining further.
"I dodged a bullet that day," Dipper says reflectively.
"Waddles' body was really great at rolling in the mud," Soos adds. "I tried it again after, but it just wasn't the same."
"You should have known better than to let the kids play with one of my experiments," Ford chides him.
"I shoulda known better?" Stan says incredulously. "Who leaves a mind-switching machine laying on their bedroom floor?!"
Pacifica leans in closer to Dipper as his two great-uncles continue the argument. "Do I even want to know?" she asks.
"Soos found Great-Uncle Ford's old room and there was this electron carpet experiment still in there, except we didn't know it was an experiment," Dipper tells her. "Me and Mabel were fighting over who got the new room, then we switched bodies and then other people did and it was a huge mess. You're lucky you missed it."
Probably. But there's a part of her that thinks of all the moments she wasn't there for last summer, all the things she didn't take part in because she was too busy living the life her parents wanted her to, and she isn't glad she missed them. How can she be, when she knows how much good would have gone along with the weirdness?
"Maybe," she says with a shrug, not sure if she can or even should articulate what she's thinking.
"Usually, Gravity Falls is weird in an interesting way, but being in Mabel's body was more weird than I can handle." Dipper shudders, his mouth turned downward below a thousand-yard stare. "I wonder if McGucket has any more memory guns…"
Okay, so Pacifica probably shouldn't feel bad about missing out on that particular day.
They eat under the low moon and first bright stars. Pacifica carefully consumes her fish with a plastic fork and knife, which is horribly uncouth but still better than using her hands like the twins. After a day on the lake she's so hungry she doesn't care that the food is a bit plain.
By the time they finish eating and are basking near the fire, tired and content, the stars are fully out. Pacifica lies on her back, a soft towel beneath her as she stares up into an ocean of tiny lights. The moon catches the edge of the sparse clouds, lining them with silver. Her eyelids are heavy. She starts to drift off.
She's just about to tip over into sleep when she hears something. Her eyes fly open. She listens closely, trying to hear over the sound of Dipper and Ford's conversation. She must have imagined it, right?
But there it is again: a strange, sharp chittering sound that is disturbingly familiar.
"Hey, did you hear that?" Dipper says, and Pacifica knows it's not just her.
"That was Soos," Mabel laughs.
Soos chuckles sheepishly. "Heh, sorry, dudes. This fish is hitting me like dynamite."
Dipper shakes his head. "No, I heard something else."
Pacifica hears it again. She jumps up to her feet, heart pounding. It can't be. What are the odds—
Oh, why even ask herself that. This is Gravity Falls.
As is amply demonstrated by the gross, slimy, stupid Boss-Lobster that has emerged about halfway from the surf, a half-eaten fish dangling from its dumb face.
"Boss-Lobster!" Mabel shouts in alarm. "Kill it with fire!"
Pacifica thinks that's a pretty good idea. She's just about to find something to throw when she stops, spotting a detail that makes her jaw drop.
The Boss-Lobster is missing an eyeball.
Pacifica swells with pure unfettered rage. "Oh my god did you follow me you CREEP?" she shrieks at the creature.
The monster's eyestalks turn in her direction. Its shell segments retract, clicking together defensively. With a wild, buzzing screech, it rears on its hindlegs, spins around, and scuttles back beneath the waves.
Breathing hard through her nose, Pacifica turns back towards the fire to see everyone else staring at her.
Mabel is the first to break the sudden silence. "More like Baby-Lobster, am I right?!"
"What a marvelous creature!" Ford exclaims. "Unfortunate that you scared it off like that, Pacifica; though, given the circumstance, understandable."
"It had better be scared," Mabel gloats. "Pacifica owned that Boss-Lobster! She's the Boss-Lobster Boss. The Boss-Boss-Lobster!"
Stan just looks confused. "What? Bog-Lister? What are you even saying?"
"Boss-Lobster."
"Boss… Lobster?"
"The Boss-Lobster. He's the Lobster Boss, the Boss of all Lobsters and maybe other Boss-Lobsters, I don't know. I'm not a Boss-Lobster."
Stan puts his hands to his head like he's trying to contain the crazy. "You've said boss and lobster so many times that they have lost all meaning."
"Was that really the same one?" Dipper says incredulously. "I thought it was a saltwater anomaly… Man, I was way off."
"It must be a euryhaline organism," Ford says.
"It's a stupid organism," Pacifica seethes. "What a wad. I can't believe it followed me."
"Judging by its hasty retreat, I doubt it planned on encountering you here," Ford says dryly. "My guess is it just came home."
Just like the rest of them, Pacifica supposes. The realization dims her anger. Stupid, gross, and hostile though it may be, the Boss-Lobster is a part of Gravity Falls, same as they all are.
They put out the fire and head for the cars. Soos and Mabel are the only ones in the group who still have any energy, and the two of them run ahead to pile their stuff in the back of Soos' truck.
"How do they decide which Lobster is the Boss one?" Soos asks Mabel. "You think they, like, take it to a vote, or is it more of a hierarchical meritocracy?"
Pacifica climbs into the back of Stan's beat up sedan. The interior is a far cry from the vehicles she was once accustomed to, but it's comfortable enough. It suits her just fine so long as Dipper is sitting next to her. She leans into his shoulder, closing her eyes and rocking with the motion of the car. It's not far to home, and then bed, and then who knows?
There's a whole new day of summer, just past the night.
Countless Hours Making Waves by Days in December (Mighty Atom, 2004)