Who Wants to Get Badgered?
(May-June 2012)
4-Back and Forth
(California, May 28)
"Bogus," Mabel declared. She meant that the schedule for their school gave them that day, Memorial Day, off—and then had them return for only Tuesday and Wednesday, with school ending formally at noon on Wednesday. "We could be on our way to—what was it, Dipper?"
"Gravity Falls, Oregon," Dipper said. "It's funny, but it doesn't seem to be on any map that I can find online."
"It's a very small town," Dad said. "And you just wait. On Thursday you'll board the bus, and after a really long ride, you'll be in Oregon."
"How long?" Mabel asked.
Dad, who was answering emails with his laptop open on the dining-room table, said, "Eighteen hours, roughly. That means you'll have to sleep on the bus Thursday night."
"Whoa!" Mabel said. "What if we have to, uh, you know, Number One or Number Two?"
"There's a bathroom on the bus," Alex Pines said. "However, it doesn't have a shower, so I strongly advise you and especially Dipper to get off the bus, get to your great-uncle Stanford's house—"
"Grunkle!" Mabel exclaimed. "Grunkle Stanford! I just thought that up! Great uncle, Grunkle! Pow! New word! Great, huh, Dipper?"
"Grunkle Stanford," Dipper repeated. "Grunkle. Pretty nice, Sis."
"Yay me!"
"May I finish?" Dad asked.
"Go ahead," Mabel said. "It won't be as great as 'Grunkle,' but don't let that stop you."
"I was saying, I'd strongly advise you both, but Dipper especially, to go straight to the shower in your, ah, Grunkle Stanford's house as soon as you get there. Bus rides will make you sweaty, regardless of whether the air-conditioning is turned up."
"Aw," Dipper said.
"He's got you, Brobro," Mabel said. "I'll get him to clean up," she added to their dad. "Even if I have to turn the garden hose on him."
"I'll shower," Dipper said. "I promise, OK?"
"Believe that when I see it," Mabel said. Dipper had always had a hesitant approach to bathing. He had been known to run the shower while only washing his hands and face in the bathroom sink. Mom had come to be happy if Dipper could be persuaded to take a three-minute shower once a week.
"Come on, I'll take a real shower," Dipper grumbled. He still hadn't lived down the time the previous spring when his mom had opened the bathroom door to check and saw that he stood pantsed but shirtless at the sink, not in the shower, which had been running full blast for about three minutes.
Their mother came in and said, "I've got one for each of you. Here's Mabel's." She handed Mabel a sheet of paper. "And Dipper, this is yours." He took it from her.
On the ruled pad that she normally used for writing down grocery lists she had an itemized check-list of things they had to do and pack before leaving. Mabel rolled her eyes. "Aw, Mom!"
"I don't want you forgetting anything," she said. "Here's a pen for you and one for you. Now, we're going to go through the list and if you think of anything that I've left off, speak up and make a note. Mabel, number one: On Thursday morning, you'll strip your bed, re-make it with clean sheets . . .."
Muttering a little, Mabel followed along as her mom read each item. "Can I take the cat?" she asked.
"No," Mom said. "And don't empty your backpack and try to stuff her in at the last minute, because I'll check before we take you to the bus station."
"Well-played, Mom" Mabel said. "Well-played."
Both she and her brother had a few tweaks to the list. Mabel wanted to wear her favorite sweater, which was fine, and Dipper asked Mom to remind him to wear his star cap. "Ugh," Mabel said. "Leave that! It's blah. And people might think it's a Russian Army cap and you'll get arrested as a spy."
"It's not Russian!" Dipper said. "And I like brown. It's the cap the Piedmont Stars used to wear." The Stars had been a short-lived minor-league team, noted more for their drab uniforms—brown and khaki—than for their playing record.
"I'll remind you," Mom said, ignoring Mabel's suggestion.
And so their preparations went on . . ..
(Gravity Falls, May 28)
"OK," Stan Pines said that same morning as he ushered Wendy Corduroy into the gift shop. "This here's your station, at the cash register, see?"
"Yeah," Wendy said, sounding less than enthusiastic.
"Soos! Where are you?"
"Right here, Mr. Pines," said the handyman, emerging from the museum. "I was replacing some burned-out light bulbs because they're burned out and that makes them, like, not work anymore. Hi, Wendy."
"'Sup, Soos?" she asked.
"Nah, nah, I'm gonna introduce you," Stan said.
"Dude," Wendy said, "This is a small town, and I've visited the Mystery Shack lots of times. I know who Soos is."
"The handyman!" Soos said proudly. He drew himself in, looked serious, and saluted. "Who can fix things up? The handyman! If anyone can do it, the handyman can!" Then he chuckled. "That just came to me, zap! Like that, dawgs!"
Stan pushed his glasses up and rubbed his eyes. "OK. But for this summer, Wendy, this here is Soos Ramirez, and he's the handyman and general maintenance guy. Soos, this is Wendy Corduroy, and until school starts this fall, she's gonna be the cashier. Now. Do you know how to work a cash register?"
"Not a clue," Wendy admitted.
"Yeah, that's what I thought. It ain't hard. Here, Soos you come over and be a customer. Pick up a piece of merch."
"Yes, sir, Mr. Mystery!" Soos said to Wendy, "When customers are coming through, Mr. Pines becomes Mr. Mystery. You can tell 'cause he wears an eyepatch then. Let's see . . . what would I want to buy? Shopping for a souvenir, doo ti doo ti doo."
"Oh, for cryin'—" Stan said. "Look, uh, get one of those question-mark tee shirts. In your size. You can have it as a bonus."
"Outstanding!" Soos cheerfully rifled through their stock of olive-drab tee shirts with a deep green question mark on the front and found an XXL size.
"Good," Stan said. "OK, come up and make like you're buying it, only you don't have to really buy it, just pretend you're buying it. You're gonna pay with a fifty-dollar bill, and Wendy—"
"I don't have a fifty-dollar bill," Soos said. "I got like three dollars, I think."
"You don't actually have to—wait a sec." Stan reached under the cash register and got a notepad. He tore off a sheet and scribbled on it, then folded and ripped it into roughly two bill-sized halves. He handed over the half that he'd drawn on. "Here ya go. This is a Stanbucks bill, see? Fifty dollars. Put this in your wallet and then pay for the shirt with it. I just want to show Wendy how to do a sale."
"OK," Soos said. "Hey, could I buy a candy bar with the change?"
"No," Stan said. "Let's just do the one thing first. OK, bring the merch to the counter. Wendy, what do you say to a customer?"
"Um, 'That's one ugly-butt shirt, dude?'"
Stan face-palmed. "I'd fire you both if I could. Make nice, Wendy. Upbeat. Remember, a happy customer is easy to fleece. So you smile and be cheerful."
Wendy put a fake smile on her face. "Yes, sir, that's a great shirt you're buying, last you for years."
"Ooh, maybe I should get two!" Soos said.
"Makes no diff to me," Wendy said.
"No, no, wrong! Wrong, Wendy, wrong! But Soos, you got the right idea."
"I won't let it go to my head," Soos promised.
"Yeah, OK. Always try to upsell the customer, Wendy. If a guy comes up with a shirt like that, be sure to point out there's a matching trucker's cap right over there. Tell them that the cap completes the ensemble. Practice that."
Wendy did, and Soos got the cap. "I'm gonna be, like a major-league fashion plate!'' He said.
"OK, Wendy, take the merch. Make sure you double-check the price tag. See this one? 'Shirt ?-XXL, $17.50.' You check 'cause some smartass will tear a tag off some cheap item and put it on something more expensive. Then you ring it up. Hit the dollar sign first. Now one and seven. Now the period. Now five zero. And hit enter, right there. Good! Now hit C for 'Continue.' OK, check the tag on the cap to make sure the price is right."
"Says 'Cap, AD, MBr, $15.99.'"
"So ring it up. Yeah, good. Now hit 'FIN,' that means 'Finish.' And hit enter."
The cash register dinged and the cash drawer shot out."
Stan said. "Every morning you're gonna begin by stocking the cash," Wendy nodded, and he went on: "You'll begin with two hundred in twenties, two hundred in tens, two hundred in fives, and a hundred in singles. Coins are there, fifty cents—you won't see any of them normally, they're rare—quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies. You'll start off with a roll of each, but stow a few extra rolls here, see?"
"Where do I get this cash?" Wendy asked.
"From me. I keep it in the office safe, but I'll give you your daily stock at the beginning of the day. End of the day, we'll count up and make sure your total matches the amount you begin with plus the total amount of your sales for the day."
"OK."
"Now, tell Soos what he has to pay you—total's there in the window of the register, see?"
"Uh, that's $33.49," she said.
"This is, like, a fifty-dollar bill," Soos said handing over the mock bill.
"Now here's where you enter the payment amount, right there—dollar sign, five, zero, period, double zero, and hit 'Sale.' OK, so now there's the amount of change the customer is due. First get a bag for the merch—bag it, yeah—and then count out the change. Oh, first tell the customer how much the change is."
"Uh, OK. Mr. Ramirez, your change is, um-$16.51."
"Count out the cash and hand it over, bills first, then coins. Only don't really give it to Soos, just put the dough on the counter."
"Ten," Wendy said, laying down a bill, "Fifteen," adding a five, "Sixteen," adding a one-dollar bill, "Fifty, and one. Sixteen fifty-one."
"If you get a big bill, a fifty or hundred, they go up here at the top of the drawer, horizontal, see? Yeah, now close the drawer and tear off the receipt and put it in the bag and last of all, you say—"
"Thank you and come again."
"And if he comes back and says he decided he don't want the shirt, what do you say?"
"Um . . . ." Wendy said, shrugging.
"No . . . ." Stan prompted, dragging the word out.
"No thanks?"
Stan pointed at a sign.
"Oh. No Refunds," Wendy said.
"Dude, she's great!" Soos said.
"Yeah. I hope the business lives through the day. OK, Soos, you can keep the stuff."
"What do I get?" Wendy asked.
"You get on my nerves," Stan said. "Tell you what—I'll let you take one item of merch, up to twenty bucks. Pick out something."
"I'll take this," Wendy said, ringing up No Sale to send the cash drawer out and taking a twenty-dollar bill.
Surprisingly, Stan didn't object. He actually smiled. "Well-played, Wendy. Well-played."
(Creepy Hollow, in Roadkill County, May 28)
A party of two dozen Gnomes, plus Queen Klemmatha, ascended the steep hill—actually more of a ridge—past the crater where once a human house had stood before it burned down. At the top they stood on the edge of a swath of waste land.
A good distance away—a hundred yards or more—rose steep gray bluffs. At one point an oddly-shaped cave mouth gaped, looking like a human, or even a Gnomish mouth opened in an expression of disgust or nausea. The Gnomes had encountered something horrifying inside it just once, and they called it the Gack of Doom, because two Gnomes had not come out alive, and, well, it looked like a mouth saying "Gack!" before going on to "Bleeaghh!"
The Gnomes quietly slipped past that part of Creepy Hollow and eventually came to a spot where Jeff said, "Stop. All right, guys, just like we practiced, assemble!"
It was an ancient Gnome skill. Gnomes stood on Gnomes, gripping each other's arms tightly, forming legs, torso, arms, and head. Within seconds, a kind of composite Gnome—one twelve feet tall, at least—stood there staring across the stretch of dead ground. Jeff was on the "head." "OK, Carson, Jason, Garmharz, Bob, K'harken, you guys are the right hand. My Queen, they are going to pick you up and raise you to shoulder height."
They did so, with Jeff cautioning, "Gentle, gentle, don't squeeze, good, just like that. Are you comfortable, my Queen?"
"Yes, thank you, boys," said Klemmatha. "The view from here is much better."
"We could have climbed a tree," Jeff admitted, "but if the badger shows up, we'd want to form up to fight it off. All right, look across. See the pointy rock? Over to the right of it-that low mound of sand? Look between the rock and the mound. That damp sand—right behind it, see the opening to a burrow? That's the badger's den. It may be there now. The badger holes up and sleeps during the daytime. It comes out at night."
"Then what is the plan?" the Queen asked.
"We will keep watch. When we are sure there is only one badger in the den, we will try to lure it here. We will dig a pit trap and line it with stone so the badger cannot dig its way out. One of us will flee from the badger. When necessary, the Gnome will Blink to escape just far enough for the badger to miss catching him. Then here, where stones will mark the edge of the concealed pit, the Gnome will Blink across to the far side of the pit and stop. The badger will charge toward him, the thin covering of slender tree branches and sand will give way, and the badger will fall into the trap."
"What will you do with it?" the Queen asked.
"We could kill it with spears, or stone it to death," Jeff said reluctantly.
"Except-?"
"Well, I'd prefer that we didn't. Not right away, anyhow. We might be able to tame it."
"Tame a badger?" the Queen asked.
"The Gnome way is not to kill without great reason," Jeff said.
"I approve. Even should the Gnome being chased perish, if we capture the badger, we should attempt to tame it. Kill only if there is no help for it." The Queen pointed. "Those bluffs can be scaled. You know what lies on the top of that great ridge."
"Our homelands," Jeff said.
"And once a badger tastes Gnome flesh—"
"The badger will kill more and more," Jeff said.
"Promise me that you will first try to tame the beast before you attack it," the Queen said.
"We promise," Jeff said.
"And if the badger somehow avoids or escapes from the trap?"
"The Gnomes of the forest will assemble into a giant form that the badger cannot destroy. We will use boulders and logs to batter the creature if we must. I will see that the badger kills no single Gnome."
"Very well," said the Queen. "But understand—we face great danger."
"We will not forget, my Queen," Jeff said.
"Then let us make the pit," the Queen said. "Prepare it well. And remember, all—the badger is not evil. It acts according to its kind, from hunger, not malice. It is a danger, but not an enemy."
"We will bear that in mind." Jeff, feeling disturbingly uncertain, ordered, "Set the Queen down. Now Gnomes of the forest, disassemble."