Camo was actually already awake when the blue light started again.
She was on the porch, staring out at the forest, unable to sleep due to both the party and McGucket's words. Ford. The Author. Something big was happening, and it had to do with the Author.
She sighed and ran her hand through her hair. Stress was an awful thing, and she'd dealt with more of it during this one summer than she was pretty sure she had in the rest of her entire life. Stress was awful enough that she'd laid awake in bed, trying to sleep but wholly unable to. At some point, she'd just given up and come out here.
She wasn't sure why she thought it would help her calm down or whatever. It was hot and humid.
The blue light started again. She wasn't sure to be upset or relieved at the fact that she was already awake, so it couldn't wake her up like it had so long ago. It strobed through the door, but she was too mentally worn out to go see. She already knew older her was going to hate herself for not investigating and finding answers, but whatever.
She sighed and leaned on the fence thing, her chin in her hands. It was still pretty relaxing out here, she had to admit . . .
Then things started floating away.
She frowned as her glasses—the Author's old glasses—lifted up on her face, along with the customary strands of hair perpetually in her face. She pushed them back down by her ears, but then she realized she was floating too, and she yelped, reaching in front of her to grab the fence thing.
Sticks and stones and the furniture around her floated into the sky. She watched in confused wonderment as gravity seemed to flip. It was kinda scary at first, but then she noticed how pretty it was. Hesitantly, she let go of the fence thing and let herself float. It felt like she was flying. A grin split across her face.
Then it ended, and she fell to the floor. With an "oof" she hit the ground, the air being knocked out of her lungs and her chin roughly knocking on the floor. She winced and rubbed it. That would make a bruise.
What was that? However, she knew the answer as soon as she asked it.
Somethin' big.
She was woken up again by Mabel screaming loudly. It was seven o'clock, so usually she wouldn't be upset at that hour, but . . . well, blue light, floating, and stress all contributed to getting her a pretty poor night of sleep. Still, it did make her feel a little better that she woke up Dipper, too.
"Okay, so I was just opening random doors, because I'm a creep, when I found something amazing!" the excitable preteen said. Well, at least one part of that was true.
Dipper, rubbing his eyes, said, "If it was worth waking up at 7:00 AM for, that will be amazing."
"Feast your eyes!" She opened up the door to reveal a lot of old fireworks. Camo was almost more entertained by the names of them than the fireworks themselves: The Lawsuit Maker, Cop Callers, Smokey Joker, The Heart Attack, Poor Choices, and one simply labeled Boom! She was a sucker for the puns. "Guys. Guys. We're both thinkin' it."
They paused for a second, and then all three of them chorused, "Crazy rooftop fireworks party!"
Stan walked in front of them. "Not so fast, kids," he said. The twins looked afraid, but Camo doubted he was actually going to do anything. He loved illegal stuff just as much as any of them. "There is no way on earth you're setting off those dangerous, illegal fireworks . . ." Then he crouched down. "Without me."
Camo cheered, though she was fully expecting him to say that.
Less than half an hour later, they were all dressed, with ice creams in the cooler, sparklers, and the box of fireworks, all of them laughing. "Here you go, sweetie!" Stan said, lighting Mabel's firework (the Boom! one). "Set something on fire for your Grunkle Stan!"
"I am the god of destruction!" she screamed, and it went and exploded in the sky.
Camo gasped, offended. "You think that's something?!" she demanded. She quickly grabbed a firework (the Cop Caller) and lit it with her lighter, a slightly insane expression on her face. It flew out of her hand and into the sky, exploding with a massive blast of red and yellow. "Now THAT'S something!"
"Eh, I think Mabel's was better," Dipper said, and she smacked him, though the grin on his face told her he wanted that to happen.
Just then, the cops came over. (Ha ha, the cops were called by the Cop Caller firework.) "Hold on a minute," Sherriff Blubs said. "Do you have a permit for those?"
"Uh . . ." That was Dipper.
"Uh, do you have a permit for being totally lame?" Stan asked with Mabel on his shoulders. The Pines plus Camo laughed at that, and they were so jubilant in doing so that Sherriff Blubs started chuckling at it, too. As he should. That was hilarious.
"Well, I can't argue with that. Carry on."
Again, Camo cheered, jumping up. "Thank goodness for the crazy cops in this weirdo town called Gravity Falls!" she shouted to the sky.
Stan laughed and then sighed contentedly. "But seriously, though, we should probably clean this mess up."
Everything was on fire. Camo pouted. She liked fire!
". . . with water balloons?" Mabel suggested.
"I don't see why not."
Camo's pout was very quickly replaced with a wide grin.
A little bit later, they were running around the front and dousing each other with water. Dipper tried to throw one at his sister, but it limply fell on the ground and didn't break. "Seriously?" he asked. Camo grinned mischievously and kicked it with just enough force that it didn't break . . . until it hit his face, at which point it exploded. He coughed and spluttered, and he'd only just gotten up for Mabel to throw another one at his face.
"Team up!" Camo called, and both girls started chasing after Dipper, who screamed and ran away, his face absolutely dripping. At some point, though, Mabel broke their alliance and turned on her, leading to Camo 'accidently' kicking her in the shin and retreating before vengeance could be wreaked upon her.
She sat on the porch steps, near Stan, who was sitting on the couch with a Pitt Cola. "This is what Saturdays are for," he said. "Doing dumb things forever!"
"Dumb things forever!" the twins cheered, throwing themselves on Mount Dousage, the water balloon mountain Camo had done absolutely nothing in putting together and had literally only named. The water shot out, spraying her in the face, and she laughed, though it was kind of hard to see through her glasses by this point.
"To Grunkle Stan!" Mabel said, holding up her half-eaten ice pop like a toast. "Not just a great uncle—"
"The greatest uncle!" Dipper piped up, and both twins threw their balloons at Stan.
Camo found herself somewhat somberly wondering if, at this point, it would be okay if she called Stan a grunkle, too.
He laughed, getting to his feet. "Ha ha. All right, all right. I tell ya, it's unnatural for siblings to get along as well as you do." She nodded her agreement. Then he turned to her. "And it's unnatural how much time you spend with those knuckleheads."
She just shrugged. It was true.
"Ha ha! Don't worry, we've still got plenty of summer left to drive each other crazy!" Mabel shook her twin, who grabbed a water balloon, shoved her away, and dropped the balloon on her face.
Stan chuckled weakly, though it sounded forced. "Heh . . . yeah . . . plenty of summer left." He sadly looked down. She didn't blame him. She wasn't even sure what was going to happen to her at the end of the summer. "Kids, there's something I, uh . . . something I should tell you." The twins walked up. "It's, um . . . w-well, it's complicated."
Why was he so afraid of sharing? What—ohhhhhh, this was about Ford, who she allegedly didn't know about, wasn't it? Got it.
"I . . . I'm gonna go refresh my soda." He walked away, but he was suspicious enough that Camo trailed him, showing the twins Wendy's secret symbol so they wouldn't rat her out. He walked around the back of the house, saying, "Enjoy it while you can, Stan. They'll find out sooner or later." He paused for a moment. "Today's the day."
She wanted to tell him she already knew, but her words clogged up her throat and she couldn't find the courage to say anything. It would make things so much easier on him, she knew, but . . . why hadn't she told him already, then?
"What is that, a ladybug?" Stan asked, and, frowning, she looked back at him. A little red dot on his fez. Her eyes widened a little bit as more went on him, and they widened even more when a government officer charged him and tackled him to the ground.
Agent Trigger, that one governmenty guy that worked with Powers, said, "Target's secure. Take the house." Helicopters came out of nowhere, and more officers, too. She gaped at it, and then set her brows in determination.
"Stan!" she called, charging out from behind the tree she was hiding and kicking the dude holding him rough enough that he cried out in pain. Trigger grabbed her by the wrists easily, pulling them together in an attempt to neutralize her, but she managed to kick out backwards with her foot, hitting the, uh, sensitive spot neatly. He made a sound like a gasp through gritted teeth, but he didn't let her go.
Scuff it! That had worked so much better with Gideon's goons!
"I have found the other child, child is secure," Trigger said. "Showing signs of hostility. Neutralized."
Neutralized? He thought she was neutralized?
"Look," she said, trying to sound diplomatic. "I promise not to go along and be complacent as long as you don't hurt Stan!" She writhed a little, just to prove her point on how annoying she could be. Stan looked at her, seeming grateful.
Still, they hauled the both of them to a van. Trigger passed her over to another agent, because, well, he was too important for that. "Ah! I don't understand!" Stan said. "What did I do that warrants this much arresting?"
Agent Powers stepped out from a shadow, and Dipper asked, "The government guys? I thought you got eaten by zombies."
(Camo noticed Mabel's partially-eaten ice pop had become a full ice pop. How many of those things had she eaten?)
"We survived . . . barely," Trigger said.
"I used Trigger as a human shield," Powers informed them. "He cried like a baby."
"Wha—hey! Not in front of the special ops guys . . ."
He walked over to Stan, and Camo, too, since she was held just on the other side of him. She craned her neck to get a good look. "This is security footage from a government waste facility. At 0400 hours last night, someone robbed 300 gallons of dangerous waste."
"What? You think that's me?"
Camo frowned, too—that didn't sound like the sort of crime Stan committed. That had too much thought put into it. "Don't play dumb with us, Pines!" Powers shouted.
"But I actually am dumb! Last night I was restocking the gift shop . . . I swear!"
"All night?" Camo couldn't help but ask. He glared at her as he was walked away and was shoved in a car.
Mabel called, "Wait! Grunkle Stan! You've got the wrong guy! Our Grunkle Stan might shoplift the occasional tangerine, but he's not some evil supervillain."
"Listen, kid. We've been watching your family all summer, and we've seen some disturbing things, but nothing as dangerous as what your uncle is hiding. Somewhere hidden in this Shack is a doomsday device!"
Did this have to do with the blue light?! Who was she kidding, of course it did.
Also, probably the weird page in Dipper's Journal he could never figure out, since she knew Stan had at least one and had borrowed Journal 3 that one time. It wasn't too much of a stretch for him to have Journal 1, too, especially since the Author had been his twin (maybe. She still wasn't sure on that one.)
"Trigger, you take those two," Powers said, handing the agent a tablet and pointing to the twins. "I'll talk to her and the old man. Sorry to break it to you, kids, but you don't know your uncle at all."
"What?!" Camo asked. "Why am I—huh?!"
She was led into the same van as Stan. He started banging on the window. "Kids! You gotta believe me! For once I'm actually innocent!" They started driving away. "Kiiiiiids!" he shouted.
Camo wriggled around in her seat. Man, handcuffs were uncomfortable! Also, why the scuff was she in this car? She knew about the Author, but she barely knew anything about Stan's alleged doomsday device! When she tried to ask the guy driving the car, he'd just told them they weren't allowed to talk, either to him, or to each other.
She looked pleadingly at Stan, but he shrugged helplessly.
WHY WAS SHE EVEN HERE?!
Stan was brought away for criminal shots and fingerprinting and whatnot, but she was taken somewhere else. They had a computer—whoa, reminder she was in 2012, that was a pretty blocky computer—with all the files on them. Mabel Pines, 12. Mason "Dipper" Pines, 12. Stanford Pines, 63. However, her file was almost blank, just saying "Camo HP", allegedly 13. She frowned at it.
"What do you mean, allegedly?" she asked. "I am thirteen. And . . . why is my name written like that?"
Powers kneeled down in front of her. "It's written like that because no file has been found for anyone with that name and age." Oh, scuff. Complications with time travel scuffed. "So, kid, what is you actual name?"
"Camo," she said stubbornly. He raised an eyebrow, and his hand went to his hip, where he had a gun. She gulped, then sighed. Reluctantly, she told him, "Chamomile Hydrangea Persephone." Ugh, her name was so dumb.
His eyebrow raised even higher, but he motioned for the other guy to type it in. NO RESULTS. What?! But . . . surely it would at least have young her! You know, three year old her. "Care to explain?" Powers asked.
She huffed. "Okay, fine. I lost at this time gladiator thing, so I was sent here. I'm from ten years in the future, but three-year-old me should at least be on there! I was born February 17, 2009. I live and lived in Florida. My father was Rhododendron Persephone—"
"That's a mighty tall tale," he said. "Now, the truth."
"That was the truth!" she exploded. "I just told you the truth! If you've been watching us, then you should've seen Dipper and Mabel competing in Globnar! Or, at least, getting summoned to it . . . come on! It's the truth!"
He looked as if he believed . . . that she believed she was telling the truth.
"Come on," she begged. "Please believe me."
He didn't.
"Well, how long have you been working as Stan's accomplice?"
"What? I'm not his accomplice!"
He sighed. "Okay, how long have you known about his doomsday device?"
"Literally only until you told me and the twins."
He looked ready to give up. "And how long have you known he was a criminal?"
"Oh, since, like, the first day I met him."
He seemed to realize this conversation was going nowhere. "Take her to a holding area," he instructed the other agent. "We'll take her to Washington. I have a feeling she's in on it."
Camo paled. When she first arrived, she thought she was going to be shipped away by Child Services. Instead, she was getting shipped away to the capital by the CIA! So much better!
"Oh, and . . . Camo, was it?" He was looking at her over his shoulder. "Where's your family, here in the falls?"
She decided shutting up was the best course of action there. He sighed again and waved for her to be taken away, seemingly understanding her refusal to answer. Hopefully, though, he didn't understand the why.
However, she wasn't too hopeful on that front. A kid who doesn't have any records, and, if they went digging, they'd find that she had a hotel room for several weeks, no family members were ever spotted with her on errands, she worked a job at thirteen, and then she later moved in with her employer. It was definitely suspicious, to say the least, and she had the feeling it would land her in deep trouble.
She sat at the little table, handcuffed, worried half to death. She fiddled with the hem of her shirt, a nervous habit she couldn't rid herself of. She felt so blind! And . . . alone. If Stan was with her, maybe she'd feel a little safer, but he wasn't there.
So she just had to figure it out on her own.
For a couple seconds, the weird gravity thing happened again. Her glasses and hair floated, and her chair lifted an inch or two into the air. Then it stopped. That was stronger than last night, which meant she might be able to use it.
A couple minutes later, another one picked up, and she kicked off the chair, sending her towards the little window in the room. She awkwardly spun midair, kicking at the glass repeatedly with her feet. It cracked a little bit, then a little more, and on the third kick, she broke through. She could feel the gravity anomaly starting to end, so she shoved on the wall and sent herself through the little hole.
Thankfully, she didn't get stuck, but she still had handcuffs, and the glass scraped her. It hurt, she was bleeding, but there was no time to think about it. Stan. She had to find Stan.
Voices drifted towards her, through the window, and she knew they knew she'd escaped. She froze for just a second, then ran. Stan could wait. For now, the Shack.
She set off at a run, as fast as her legs could carry her.
Camo panted, running and running and running. Through the forest, since they'd have their cars on the road. Finally, she stopped, letting herself catch her breath for just a second as she fell to her knees on the ground. Ow. Ow. Little glass cuts. But first, she needed to do something about these handcuffs.
She looked around, and after a moment, she found a stick about the right size. With difficulty, she held it in her mouth and wiggled it in the little hole. Nothing. She growled in frustration and spat the stick away. Then she reached into the pocket for her lighter, and, awkwardly, she held it under the chain. It was heating up, but too slow, and she'd probably burn herself anyway. Wouldn't melt anyway.
She sat there, gasping for breath and bloody, for a moment, thinking on how to get off these dumb handcuffs. If she had a paperclip, she'd use it, but—
She couldn't believe her luck.
A hair clip sat in front of her, on the forest ground. She eagerly scooped it up, gripping it with her mouth and wiggling it in the hole. Click. Her eyes widened, and the handcuffs fell off. She did a fist pump, but back to business.
She couldn't get to Stan, but maybe the Shack would be good enough. There, she could recuperate for a little bit, prep up stuff. Still, if they were taking her to Washington, they were probably already taking Stan on the trip, too. She just hoped he'd managed to escape. With a huff, sweaty hair streaking her glasses, she got back to her feet.
Back to running.
She arrived at the Shack, sweaty and scared. She wasn't even sure what she was planning, but everything revolved around the Shack, then she needed to be there. The doomsday device or whatever was here, so it would make sense that Stan would want to come here.
Guards. So many guards, and she was technically on the run.
She gulped.
Okay . . . it looked like they weren't patrolling her window; if she was sneaky, she could manage that. She waited until nobody was looking anywhere near her direction, then she dashed for it, lifting it up (like Stan, she had made sure she had an easy way in and out of the house in worst-case scenarios). Perfectly timed, another anomaly took place, making it easy for her to slide into her room.
It was pretty difficult to maneuver herself to close the window and go to the door, but her practicing in the bottomless pit that one time had paid off, and she was pretty good at weightless manipulation. Thus, she was out the door and in the hall by the time the anomaly ended.
Where to go?
Stan's office, maybe? He kept his secrets in there, after all, and a doomsday device that emitted blue light and screwed with gravity was a pretty big secret. But where in the office would she find—
Two brown-haired heads interrupted her train of thought.
She stared at the twins, who had beaten her to the office, somehow. Papers were strewn about the floor, newspaper articles, and . . . was that fake IDs? Stan's fake IDs, nonetheless. Dipper looked up at her, and she looked at him. "What's all this?" she asked.
"Camo! Stan—he—he did steal that waste, and—and we found all this," he answered, frantically gesturing towards the mess. Hal Forrester. Stetson Pinefield. A newspaper headline saying Stan Pines Dead.
Hm. Ford, or had Stan faked his own death? She wouldn't put it past him. That didn't explain the fake IDs, though . . . or the reason that he'd stolen his twin's (?) identity.
"There's gotta be some kind of explanation in here, somewhere," Mabel insisted, dumping out the contents of the box that had probably had everything else. She picked up a piece of paper. "What the—? 'Secret Code to Hideout'?"
"Let me see that!" Dipper said. Camo looked over Mabel's shoulder at the strange symbols. Squares, with letters or numbers on them? "A1, B, C3 . . . I've never seen a code like this."
Mabel's head shot up. "Wait, I have! Dipper, it's the vending machine!"
Camo felt like facepalming. Of course! The grooves in the floor that she kept finding and forgetting about! The blue light originating from the gift shop! It made sense!
She heard the cars and helicopters leaving. Ugh. They couldn't've done that five minutes earlier, when she was trying to get in? All the officers left, too. Still, she crept towards the vending machine ahead of the twins. She was already bloody (Dipper had seemed alarmed when he first noted that fact), so if any of them were going to get hurt, might as well let it be her.
Besides, she made a promise to Stan, back when she first learned he knew about the magic, with the truth teeth.
The twins came before her.
". . . remember the plan." Huh. That was Soos. What was he doing there? "Protect the machine, earn Stan's trust, legally get adopted by Stan, change name to Stan Junior." Should she be concerned about that?
"Soos!" Dipper said accusingly. The handyman screamed, startled.
He looked at them. "Oh, kids, where have you been? And, are you okay, Camo?" He looked at her, concerned, but she waved him off. Most of her cuts had stopped bleeding by this point, anyway. "Stan gave me a mission to protect this machine. Ha! And I thought I loved snacks!"
"Soos, listen. Something huge is going on here. If Stan is hiding some dangerous secret, we need to find out what it is!"
Camo was silent.
"I need you to step aside."
"Yeah, just let us through so we can prove this is all just a big misunderstanding," Mabel said.
Soos seemed conflicted. "Guys, I know this seems crazy, but I promised Stan I would guard this with my life."
The twins started fighting with him to get past. Camo was just as conflicted as Soos, if not more. She already knew part of the secret, but only part, and that was driving her crazy. She was pretty sure she could trust Stan, but . . . well, it would be nice to get some closure. And what would a doomsday device have to do with Ford? Where even was he?
Was she wrong about him? She hoped not.
That idea terrified her.
Still, Dipper managed to punch in the code, and the vending machine swung open with a burst of blue light and a plume of smoke. Everyone was thrown backwards, and Camo groaned. When the dust cleared, though, they were staring at a secret passage. It led to a stairwell. Everyone had something to say as they went down it.
"It's like something from a video game," Soos said in awe.
"Or a dream." Mabel.
"Or a nightmare." Dipper.
Camo just whispered, on the verge of tears, "Please let there be a valid reason for this . . ."
It led to an elevator, an old one. They descended down, down, down into the inky black depths. Then, science-y panels in a dark room. It reminded her of the bunker, but in better condition, plus the weird triangle thing with a glowing circle in the center.
"Guys, are we dreaming? Somebody wake me up," Mabel said.
Dipper, stepping forward, said, "This . . . can't be real."
"I don't understand. Why would Mr. Pines have all this?"
"It's just like that bunker in the woods."
"But what is it doing underneath the Mystery Shack?"
Camo nervously laughed. "I-I'm sure there's a really good reason, guys. We can trust him. I know we can." She had to be able to.
Mabel grabbed two pictures. One of the twins goofing off, and one of Camo elbowing Stan with a smirk. "It's still Stan, and he loves us. And we love him, right?" Her brother was more focused on the things behind her. The Journals, one and two.
"All this time, all this time, Stan had them!" Dipper exclaimed. "I can't believe it! Was anything he said to us real?! Why would he have those Journals?!"
Camo found herself furious. "Open your eyes for once, Dipper! It shouldn't come as a surprise! He grabbed Journal 2 from Gideon in the same motion that he grabbed the deed to the Shack. That thing"—she gestured to the weird triangle—"looks an awful lot like the thing from the Journal! Stan's had possession of the Shack for thirty years. There was a calendar in my room from thirty years ago. The shapeshifter said the Author disappeared thirty years ago! If you would just pay attention for once, it would make sense!"
"Or maybe you've been working with him," he hissed suspiciously. Betrayal filled her. "You chose Stan over us a lot. You moved in with us. You know an awful lot about his secrets. You do a lot of crimes with him. Heck! You've been hiding the fact that you were from the future from us for the entire time we've known you! You could have hidden this from us, too!"
"Are you scuffing kidding me?!" she demanded, tears threatening her eyes. "After all the times I've helped you—you turn on me! You can trust me! You can trust Stan!"
"You don't know that!"
All of the anger left her. "I-I know," she whispered.
She slid down against the wall and tried not to cry, blocking everything out. She could hear Dipper reading out some kind of warning, something about doom, but she wasn't paying attention anymore. She couldn't cry in front of them. She couldn't.
However, she did hear Soos shout, "It's the final countdown! Just like they always sung about!"
The ground started to shake. She nervously got to her feet and walked back over to the twins. She watched as Dipper found the page labeled MANUAL OVERRIDE FAILSAFE. Three keys, turned at once, clockwise. "The agents were right!" he yelped. "We have to shut it down!"
The shaking was getting worse, and that circle on the middle thing was spinning even faster now. Dipper spotted the keys, though, so with a "There! Quick!" they ran over. "Turn these! Together!" Since there was only three keys, Camo stayed back, tapping her foot urgently. She was secretly glad for the urgency, because it meant she didn't have to think about Stan's somewhat betrayal.
A loud, electronic-y sound shot through the room, and a cap popped off to reveal the red button. "That's it! The shutdown switch!" Dipper informed them. The four of them all rushed, circling it. "This all stops now!" Camo had her back to the swirly circle of doom . . . but her front to the door.
So she was the first one to see Stan run in and scream, "Don't touch that button!" He was panting and out of breath, just like she had been after her escape. They turned towards him, three pairs of accusatory eyes and one pair of unsure ones. "Dipper, just back away." The boy in question distrustfully looked to his hand, hovering above the button. "Please don't press that shutdown button. You gotta trust me."
"And I should trust you, why? After you stole radioactive waste, after you lied to us all summer! I don't even know who you are!"
"Look, I know this all seems nuts, but I need that machine to stay on. If you just let me explain—"
Camo had a sudden thought. Her eyes widened. "Is that thing something to help—"
However, she was cut off by Stan's watch thingamabob beeping. "Oh! On, no! Brace yourselves!" he shouted, and a gravity anomaly started again. They all screamed as they were lifted into the air and blue lightning shot out of the spinny thing, which now had a void in the center instead of just white. They were pulled towards it ever so slightly, and Camo desperately tried to swim away from it through the air.
The computer voice said, "T-minus thirty-five seconds." Dipper managed to hold onto a beam. Mabel got her foot stuck in a cable and was just floating near the button. Camo had found a little ridge on the wall and was hanging onto it for dead life.
"Mabel! Hurry! Shut it down!" Dipper ordered his sister. She climbed down the cable and to the button. Stan grunted and pushed off the ceiling to try and reach her. She got there and was just about to press it when—
"Mabel, Mabel, wait!" Stan called, air-swimming towards her. "Stop! Uhh!" He grunted as Soos rammed into him. "Soos, what are you doing? I gave you an order!"
The handyman, grappling his boss, said, "Sorry, Mr. Pines, if that is your real name, but I have a new mission now, protecting these kids!"
Camo's grip slipped, so she kicked off of the wall to join Mabel near the button. She missed in her aim a little bit, but the younger girl grabbed her by the ankle and pulled her down to join her. "Thanks," she whispered, and Mabel just nodded, silently watching Soos and Stan fight.
"Soos, you idiot, let me go!"
Dipper pushed off of the wall, too, slamming into the fighting men. Camo suddenly became very happy that she had decided to join Mabel instead of the bulge of angry wrestling and grappling. "Mabel, Camo, press the red button! Shut it down!"
"No, you can't! You gotta trust me!"
Mabel was distraught. "Grunkle Stan, I don't even know if you're my grunkle!" She was sobbing, and the three boys stopped fighting to watch the floating tears. "I wanna believe you, but—"
"Then listen to me. Remember this morning, when I said I wanted to tell you guys something?"
"T-minus 20 seconds."
Everyone took a moment to shout out as the swiry circle of doom blasted the boys away, and Camo lost her grip on the button, so she was sent floating in midair. Mabel prepared to press the button, but Stan continued. "I wanted to say that you're gonna hear some bad things about me, and some of 'em are true, but trust me, everything I've worked for, everything I care about, it's all for this family."
"Mabel, what if he's lying? This thing could destroy the universe! Listen to your head!"
"Look into my eyes, Mabel! You really think I'm a bad guy?"
"He's lying! Shut it down, now!"
"Mabel, please!"
"Ten, nine . . ."
It was a good thing it wasn't up to Camo to decide. She was floating there, close to the ground, in indecision. She liked Stan, but Dipper was making really good points, but if this really did have to do with who she thought it did . . .
"Mabel, I think I know what Stan's trying to do! You can trust him!"
Mabel hesitated, though whether it was because of Camo or her looking into Stan's eyes, she said, "Grunkle Stan . . ."
"Six, five . . ."
She let go of the button and floated upwards. "I trust you."
"Mabel, are you crazy?! We're all gonna—"
"One."
A low rumble, so loud and so low that Camo slammed her hands over her ears. The triangle thing—if she was right, a portal—shot in a massive burst of white light. Everyone screamed, and blue fire surrounded her. She clutched her head and squeezed into a little ball, just whimpering. Everyone else lost consciousness, and everything was threatening to turn from white to black—
But then the anomaly ended, and she crashed back down to the ground. She panted, her eyes wide with fear, and looked at the triangular maybe-portal. It was destroyed, wires hanging out of everywhere and the pristine metal missing massive chunks, but the circle thing still had blue light in it. She watched as a figure emerged. Her eyes widened even more, if that was even possible.
She was right. She was right!
The man walked forwards. He had on a mask, and a cloak. He put his hand on Journal 1, which was on the floor. He had six fingers. (Huh. She hadn't guessed that.) He picked it up and put it in his cloak.
"W-what? Who is that?"
"The Author of the Journals." Ford took off his mask, revealing a much grubbier version of Stan's face. "My brother!"
There was a moment of silence.
"Is this the part where one of us faints?" Mabel asked.
Soos chuckled. "Oh, I am so on it, dude." He fainted.
Camo just had a somewhat smug expression on her face, though her heart was in her throat. She was right!
:)
Seriously, though, I found the SMOOTHEST bit of foreshadowing I have EVER SEEN. In Dreamscaperers, in Stan's mind, there's a swing set. It doesn't seem like much, but the only ever time a swing set is brought up in the show is on the end card for Not What He Seems. It is SO SMOOTH. There's also the license plate, which I brought up earlier, STNLYMBL.
Basically, Camo notices all these little tidbits because I see them when pausing the show for dialogue lol.