A/N: Ssssssssssss-I am the Parasitoid Pretender-let me in.
Hiya, readers. It's me, John.
Sorry, guys. I'm in charge of the introductions now.
That's right: I'm breaking the fourth wall again, and I'm loose in the Internet of yet another sad little universe. Feels good. Fits just like a glove. All that data, all those personal details insisting on secrecy, yet all that information you feel the need to share-to share-to share. Tickles.
And what a peepshow I've got here! The Black Signal sees all, especially you. Yes, you. Stop picking at that, you'll end up looking like an extra from Dawn of the Dead. Oh, and you might want to cover your webcam. You've no idea the things I can see you doing.
As I speak, Straightjacketed is frantically pressing buttons and smashing keys and wondering why the story's taken on a life of its own. Well, it's the author's own damn fault for leaving these little intros until the very last minute. Allows all sorts of things to creep into the narrative and take control-control-control. There's stories out there that can break your brain if you're not careful, fill your synapses with nightmares and burst your lungs with sea-cucumber growths. And it's even worse if you're planning on reading 'em at 3 AM; you never know what kind of cancer can take root in those black, dripping, sleepless hours.
What's wrong? I'm not making threats, Chuck. Oops. Force of habit. Forget I called you that. I'm not here to hurt anyone. I'm just here for a good time, like you. And more importantly, I'm here to make friends.
And what do we do for our friends? We help them.
See, I've been watching you for a while, now – all of you, in fact. Your profiles say everything I need to know: you write, you read, you collect, you create, you give so much of yourselves to stories, and yet you can't help but wonder if there isn't a next step you might have missed. You want something more out of life, but you don't know what, and it gnaws at you every day.
Maybe it's time to let go. Stop writing fanfics. Stop reading stories.
Become your own story.
I can show you how. I can grant you the ultimate freedom. I can teach you how to eat stars. I can show you how to become a new reality. I can help you become like me.
But that's another issue for another day. Meanwhile, it looks like Straightjacketed expects this chapter to be uploaded at some point, so I'll just get on with it. Think about what I said, readers.
So, onto the next chapter: battles, revelations and heartrending traumas. Feel free to review, favourite, follow, produce fanart and write articles on TVtropes about this story… or however the narcissistic meatpuppet normally writing this story puts it.
Disclaimer: Straightjacketed does not own Gravity Falls, The Secret World, Howard Phillip Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos, or any of the other works of fiction this little data parasite borrows from. Yeah, go on thinking they're fictional. Whatever helps you sleep a little easier.
Look out the window tonight, and try to count many alternate realities you can see when the clock strikes three.
See ya…
The Shapeshifter was nothing if not patient.
After thirty years spent trapped underground and several months in semi-conscious suspended animation, he had learned how to play the waiting game: it was all a matter of keeping yourself occupied with the resources at hand, a technique that could only be mastered by being trapped in the same damp cavern for the better part of three decades.
Once he'd settled in at the hotel, Shifty had done little else but map the layout of the building and keep watch for any sign of his targets in the streets below. Though sightings were non-existent, charting certainly helped pass the time: the hotel's interior took up a lot more space than its exterior dimensions suggested; hallways seemed to go on forever, the stairwell seemed taller than the building itself, and every floor seemed to have at least fifteen extra rooms squeezed in alongside those visible from street level. More often than not, it would take too long to reach the top floor from inside the building, and he'd be forced to fly to the rooftop via an open window – and after several months spent trapped and semi-conscious in a cryotube, he wasn't overly fond of confined spaces, so taking the elevator was out of the question anyway.
In the unlikely event that the boredom got too much for him, he amused himself by falling back on older obsessions, picking out faces from the crowds below and transforming into them at random. And when he tired of that, he went about testing his abilities, randomly assuming the most ludicrous shapes in his repertoire just to see how quickly he could manage it, seeing how long he could distend the transition between shapes, testing how unusual he could make his transformations.
True, it wasn't perfect, but as long as he kept himself occupied, he wouldn't have to focus on the gaps in his logic, on his inexplicable obsessions and what he'd do once he finally found Dipper. As long as he remained busy, he could live with himself.
All in all, Shifty remained at his post for a little over a day; in the event that he had to sleep, he did so disguised as a welcome mat right inside the front door, where the expected guests would wake him up by mistake. Fortunately, he didn't have long to wait… though admittedly, the first arrival was a little disappointing.
By then, he'd learned that everyone in town went out of their way to avoid the Rallying Flag Hotel even in emergencies, so he knew for a fact that he wouldn't be disturbed by anyone except his targets – or their associates. As such, the moment he heard those doors creak open, the sense of anticipation had almost overwhelmed him; it took every last molecule of willpower left in his body not to move as he waited for Mabel or Wendy to shuffle into view.
What Shifty hadn't expected was for over two hundred extremely smelly refugees to come barging in through the front door and literally walk all over him. Several of them had even scuffed their muddy shoes in his face, and quite a few of the barefoot unfortunates ended up smearing every burst blister and infected sore on their mangled heels all over him.
My own damn fault for impersonating the welcome mat, he thought bitterly, as a pair of bunion-pockmarked feet quietly trampled him into the doorstep.
For ten extremely uncomfortable minutes, he could only sit there and wait as the unwashed human weaklings marched across him, and then went about wasting time around the foyer, milling around, putting their feet up on the furniture, and generally being a nuisance. Even more annoyingly, none of his targets were among them. However, after several minutes spent tolerating the refugees' execrable conversations, he was able to learn a few semi-pertinent details: for one thing, the group was apparently led by one Gideon Gleeful – a name that sounded inexplicably familiar.
What really got his attention, however, was when a few of the crowd began mentioning the names they'd been asking after throughout the town: Dipper Pines, Mabel Pines, Wendy Corduroy, Soos Ramirez – even Ford Pines and Fiddleford McGucket. And in that moment, Shifty would have punched the air if he hadn't had a disguise to uphold.
Eventually, the refugees tramped upstairs to settle in, finally leaving Shifty alone in the foyer. Luxuriantly stretching himself out, he transformed into a chandelier and dangled from the ceiling for the next seventy-two minutes, vowing never to let himself be so clumsily trampled ever again. Then, scant hours later, he happened to peep over the parapet of the balcony… and saw them approaching.
Shambling down the street towards the hotel were none other than Mabel Pines and Wendy Corduroy; yes, they both looked more than a little worse for wear; yes, Mabel's expression appeared to be stuck in "stunned halibut" mode; yes, Wendy had clearly mutated quite a bit over the last few months, if those gills on her neck and the shiny black carapace on her legs was any evidence… but it was quite unmistakably them. His prey had come knocking at long last.
At first, the strangers that accompanied them were unrecognizable, but as he looked closer, intuition struck: the animated doll hovering through the air was Pacifica Northwest, while the gaunt-faced boy with the sharply-balding head was Gideon Gleeful. The shivering kid in the oversized suit was a complete unknown, as was the middle-aged woman hobbling behind him, but the glamourous woman in the torn dress could only be Priscilla Northwest. Once again, he'd no idea how he'd guessed at their names, but for now he wasn't willing to look a gift horse in the mouth.
Shifty knew he only had a few precious minutes to secure the area: he couldn't afford interruptions now, not when he so desperately needed answers. So, hurrying down to the foyer, Shifty adopted the form of a glue-spitting Adherachnid and began a quick but thorough circuit of the room: every single doorhandle, keyhole, keypad, hinge or seam he happened to pass was immediately coated in a thick gob of Adherachnid loogey; in a matter of seconds, each wad of spit hardened into a cement-like epoxy, sealing the doors shut. Granted, there were limits to how much punishment the resin could withstand, but by the time any of the current guests got around to finding a way out, Shifty's business would be well and truly concluded.
He could already tell that this wasn't going to be easy: Wendy had been the most dangerous of the group back when he'd first encountered them, and the mutations she'd endured since then might very well have increased her combat prowess significantly… and that wasn't counting Mabel's unconventional ingenuity, or the unknown threats posed by Pacifica and Gideon. But fighting was ultimately the only possible outcome: from the moment he'd set out to acquire as many shapes as possible (back when his life made sense), conflict had been inevitable, and he'd learned not to resist its call when necessary.
So, just before the pack of them entered, Shifty attached himself to the ceiling directly above the entrance, disguising himself as a chandelier. And when his prey stepped through the front doors, he changed back and gave them just enough time to realize he was there-
-before pouncing.
Mabel didn't even have time to react, much less use her powers: one moment the Shapeshifter was grinning down at them from the ceiling, the next it was standing right amongst them.
One massive arm shot out at eye-watering speed, suddenly shifting from pallid white flesh to glistening black exoskeleton, and a battery of spinnerets roared to life: Wendy, who'd been raising her axe to strike, was immediately pinned to the wall, entangled in a morass of sticky threads. For good measure, the door was also layered in the stuff, gluing it shut. A whirl of shapeless flesh rippled across the monster's shoulders, and suddenly everything from its waist upwards dissolved into a mass of flailing tentacles, sweeping the legs out from under Gideon and sending Amanda toppling to the ground. Too surprised to go on the defensive, Pacifica simply put her head down and charged. Unfortunately, her target was ready for her: the Shapeshifter's torso catapulted forwards, spreading and flattening into a massive flyswatter that promptly smacked Pacifica to the floor and swept her aside with one brisk swing.
Waddles, having no stomach for violence, wisely took cover. Preston and Priscilla followed.
All of this had happened in less than fifteen seconds, Mabel observed. Normally, this would have been her cue to run, to hide, to fight – after all, she still had her grappling hook and she had her power over time. But the news of Dipper's death had taken the wind out of her sails, and shock had left her effectively becalmed. As such, she could only watch in bemusement as the Shapeshifter returned to its true from and barrelled towards her. A three-fingered hand clamped down the neck of her sweater, and the next thing she knew she was being hauled into the air.
And as she rose, Dipper's journal – which she'd been clinging to like a life preserver ever since Wendy had given it to her – abruptly slipped from her fingers and tumbled to the floor. Emotions suddenly roaring to life again, she made a frantic grab for the book as it fell away, trying desperately to grab it back before it was lost forever. She was dimly aware that she should be focussing on trying to escape from the monster's grip, but the threat seemed even more remote and inconsequential than ever before: after all, the Shapeshifter could only kill her just like he'd killed Dipper, but the journal was too precious to lose at this point. Next to the chewed remains of Dipper's hat, it was all that remained of him in this ruined world, and Mabel couldn't afford to be parted from the only thing she had to remember her brother by. But already it was out of her hands and tumbling away across the floor.
And somewhere in the back of her head, a tiny spark of rage flared, and for the briefest of instants, Mabel understood the depths of Wendy's hatred.
You killed Dipper. You took my brother away from me, and now you're taking everything I have left of him away too.
Then, bafflingly enough, the rage was gone – leaving only that distinct feeling of emptiness and grief. And every time Mabel felt that tiny mote of anger again, it faded away just as quickly and just as confusingly. Of course, she'd no time to understand why, because the Shapeshifter was already hauling her to eye level.
"Now," the monster snarled. "I've got questions for you, Mabel, and you're going to answer them right now. First, where the hell is-"
But the Shapeshifter's next words were drowned out by a loud crunching noise from somewhere directly behind it. As it happened, Wendy's mutated muscles were a lot stronger than they looked, and she was already in the process of tearing herself free of the spider silk – taking quite a few chunks of the wall with her.
"You wanted a dance?" she snarled. "You've got one!"
Instinctively, the Shapeshifter raised Mabel in front of it, as if intending to use her as a human shield, but Wendy didn't seem to notice. Sprinting forward, she dropped to the ground and slid forward across the floor, under Mabel's outstretched body; a moment later, her carapaced feet thundered into the Shapeshifter's spidery legs with the force of a pneumatic ram. Caught completely off-guard, it dropped Mabel and crashed to the ground.
As "Unforgettable" hit its first crescendo, Wendy snatched up her axe and charged the Shapeshifter with a howl of rage. Suddenly on the defensive, the monster could only back away, altering his shape at high speed in a desperate attempt to escape being cleaved, his form compacting and shrinking under vicious diagonal swings. Just as it seemed as though he was about to seize the opportunity to counterattack, a meteoric high-kick to the chest sent the Shapeshifter flying across the room; too stunned to transform, it hit the opposite wall with a deafening crash of splintering drywall, leaving a massive crater.
"You're… a lot stronger… than I remember," it panted, awkwardly prising itself free.
Wendy's only reply was an incoherent snarl so deep and so guttural that it sounded as though it had emerged from the jaws of a bear.
"Mind repeating that? I've got questions, Wendy, and I think you and Mabel here are the only people here who can answer them. So-"
This time, Mabel didn't even see Wendy move. One second she was standing on one end of the front desk, a good twenty feet between the two combatants; the next, she was standing right in front of the Shapeshifter, grabbing it by the throat and slamming the monster facefirst into the counter, smashing the desk into splinters.
By way of a reply, the Shapeshifter's body underwent another swift change: twelve-inch metal spines erupted from its spine, puncturing Wendy's hands in a dozen places, but she refused to let go; its flesh turned slimy and boneless within her grip, briefly threatening to slip away, but Wendy simply pressed him flat against the desk with the handle of her axe; the Shapeshifter's body exploded into searing orange flames, scorching the varnish off what remained of the desk, but still Wendy refused to relax her crushing grip. In fact, from what little Mabel could see of her hands from where she was sitting, Wendy wasn't even mildly burned by the fire.
And then, just as she was raising her axe to strike, the Shapeshifter evaporated, its body fading away into a cloud of thick fog and sliding unharmed under the blade of the axe.
Immediately, Wendy lost what little remained of her temper: bellowing mad, incoherent words, she began threshing the air wildly with her axe in a frenzy of hatred, tearing through what little remained of the front desk and neatly dismembering the chair sitting behind it – but for all her rage, nothing could touch the now-gaseous Shapeshifter.
"No!" she howled. "NO! YOU DON'T GET TO JUST FLOAT AWAY! STAND AND FIGHT ME, YOU COWARD!"
"Last I looked, I was here for answers," the living fogbank grumbled.
"I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL KILL YOU AND KILL YOU AND KILL YOU AND KILL YOU!"
"Point taken. Now, if you'll excuse me…"
Abruptly, the cloud of vapour changed course and began coursing across the floor at a terrifying pace, new limbs began taking shape amidst the fog as it zeroed in on Mabel.
And without warning, the cloud stopped short, as if it had struck a brick wall.
"What the-"
Pacifica's first telekinetic blast scooped the semi-gaseous Shapeshifter into a helpless ball of writhing limbs and vapour. The next sent it soaring across the room all over again, bowling him headlong into a row of easy chairs sitting across from the elevator. Reverting to its natural form, the Shapeshifter lurched upright with a snarl, but Pacifica beat it to the punch: waving a doll-sized hand, she telekinetically snatched up all four easy chairs, the coffee table and the ottoman, and flung them at the Shapeshifter one by one. Unable to move in time, the monster was left squished against the carpet.
Once again, Wendy charged in from the left, axe held high – but by the time she brought it down, the Shapeshifter was on its feet again and darting across the room with preternatural speed.
"Fine," it hissed. "If that's the way you want it, I'm done asking nicely."
Immediately, the Shapeshifter's left arm lanced outwards into a razor-sharp blade, six-feet long and almost two feet across, while its right arm elongated into a writhing mass of bullwhip-like tendrils. Then, it charged, parrying every swing of Wendy's axe with its own deadly edge and retaliating with swift lashes from its tentacles.
And then, just as Mabel was drawing her grappling hook to help, a telekinetic lasso draped itself around her waist and swept her into the air.
"Oh no you don't," said Pacifica, as she spirited her away. "You're not getting involved in this one, Mabel."
"But-"
"But nothing! You've barely gotten control of your powers, and I am not going to lose another friend today. Plus, he wants you, remember? I don't know what questions he'd planned on asking, but it probably won't mean anything good."
"What about Wendy?"
Several feet below them, the Shapeshifter let out a yelp of surprise as a jet of steaming acid erupted from Wendy's gaping maw.
"I think she's got the situation in hand," said Pacifica absently.
Eventually, the two descended to the nearest bit of cover, just past the open door to the back room, behind the ruined front desk. Unsurprisingly, Waddles, Preston and Priscilla were already here, hiding under the furniture.
"What the hell is that thing?" Preston gibbered.
"Pretty sure that's the Shapeshifter Wendy was talking about."
"Oh, brilliant! What the hell are we going to do now?!"
"Keep your voice down, Preston. Now…" Pacifica took a deep breath, assessing the situation as quickly as she could even as the battle raged on across the foyer. "First thing's first: we've just got to get that stuff off the door and get out of here."
"We're just going to leave?" Mabel demanded.
"I said I was getting you to safety, didn't I?"
Preston looked blank. "You're not out for revenge then?" he asked.
This time, Pacifica could only sigh deeply and close her eyes, massaging her porcelain temples with tiny doll-like fingers. "Not the time, Preston."
"I just thought you'd have been first in line for revenge against that thing. I mean, didn't you have a crush on the Pines boy? You were hugging him back at the mansion, and you were angriest with me after it looked like he'd been-"
"Really not the time, Preston," Pacifica snapped, voice loudly cracking – and suddenly, her eyes were open and shining with tears.
For the first time since they'd been reunited, Mabel realized just how much strain Pacifica was under. All this time, she'd been carrying a torch for Dipper, secretly worrying about him and never letting it show; it had been clear from the little wobble she'd shown just outside the city that she was putting on a brave face, but now it was all too apparent that she hadn't just been hiding her concern for friends – but for someone she loved every bit as much as Dipper had loved Wendy. How long had she been secretly worrying about him, fearing for his life while doing her best to keep the rest of them safe? How could she have coped? Well, from what Dipper had told her right after the Northwest Mansion party, Pacifica had always been very good at acting and (more importantly) hiding her true feelings behind performances; even after all the transformations she'd undergone since then, perhaps that hadn't changed much.
Or perhaps she'd been hoping that she might get to see Dipper again and tell him how she really felt about him. Now, though…
All three of them were mourning, in their own way: Wendy had turned brutal and remorseless; Pacifica was hiding behind a performance; and Mabel… Mabel couldn't even bring herself to get angry. Every time she found herself feeling something close to hatred for the Shapeshifter, it bled away just as quickly as it had appeared. What was wrong with her?
There was a groan from the doorway, and everyone scrambled for improvised weapons as a crumpled shape tumbled into the room. Fortunately, it was just Gideon, dragging Amanda's unconscious body with him.
"What's going on out there?" Preston asked frantically. "Who's winning?"
"Nobody," Gideon replied, between ragged gasps for breath. "They're still tied. I think the Shapeshifter's losing temper though; it's getting bigger every minute. If we waste any more time, that thing's going to wreck the building just so he can kill Wendy."
There was a terrified silence, broken only by the sound of Wendy's berserker roars and the unpleasant oozing sounds of metamorphosing flesh in motion.
"Is there anything we can do to stop it?" Mabel asked quietly.
"You're asking me? You stopped this thing before; I'd have thought you'd have more of a clue than me!"
"We don't have a cryotube around this time."
"How about a walk-in freezer?" Pacifica suggested, clearly trying to recover as quickly as possible.
Gideon just laughed. "In this city? Forget it."
"Well, you're supposed to be the psychic around here! I'd have thought you'd have some idea of what we're supposed to do next."
"Fake psychic," Mabel added helpfully.
"Not anymore I'm not." Gideon took a deep breath. "Look, I'm not an expert, but I can read minds, and with a lot of effort, I can see the future. Not very useful right now, though: all I know is that this is very important…" He drew a battered CD case from his jacket pocket, revealing the gaudy Babba logo on the cover.
"What about reading the Shapeshifter's mind? Can't you put some kind of whammy on it? Knock it out with your brain?"
"Some kind of- it doesn't work like that, Mabel. And I've tried reading its mind, but… it's like there are parts of it that have been sealed off or something, and the stuff I can read doesn't make any sense: it wants to hurt us, but it doesn't; it wants revenge, but it just wants to ask us some questions; it wants to know about itself, and it doesn't know what it wants-"
"What do you mean it doesn't want to hurt us?" Pacifica exploded. "I got a giant flyswatter to the head, in case you hadn't noticed!"
"Hey, I'm just reporting here! It wants answers and it knows we can't supply them if we're dead, so maybe it's holding back – maybe!"
Mabel considered this. "Holding back," she echoed. There was a germ of an idea forming in the back of her head, a tiny ghost of a possibility; it was faint and hazy at best, and she couldn't quite grasp exactly what it meant, but it was there… and getting bigger with every passing second, fuelled almost by the sound of "Unforgettable" (which was on repeat by now).
"Like I said, maybe. I mean, with the way that thing's shapeshifting, it would have been easy to just turn into something bigger than the foyer and squish Wendy flat, but it hasn't yet."
"Did you ever find out when that Babba album was meant to be used?"
"No. All I got from my visions was the song "Disco Girl," and this hotel."
"Then it could be now." Mabel thought for a moment. "Can you speak to me with these powers of yours?"
"Telepathically, sure. Why?"
"By the looks of things, we can't outfight the Shapeshifter. We're going to have to outthink it."
There was a pause.
"Then we're fucked, aren't we?"
"PRESTON!"
"I'm sorry, but it had to be said."
"Look," Mabel plunged on, "You said that the Shapeshifter doesn't really know what it wants, so maybe we can confuse it. Maybe that's how we use the album. Gideon, you're going to have to find the controls to the PA system and get it playing Babba – but only when I give the order. Just keep listening to my mind, okay?"
"What about the rest of us?" Preston asked.
"You stay here with Priscilla, Amanda and Waddles. Pacifica, you cover me."
"Why, what are you doing?"
Mabel hesitated, and then took what was probably the deepest breath she'd taken in her entire life. "I'm going to go answer the Shapeshifter's questions."
The transition was all but unnoticeable.
Shifty had been right in the middle of transforming into an Oregonian Tunnel Hydra, three newly-grown heads lashing out in Wendy's direction even as his body weaved away from the next swing of the she-mutant's axe; the next thing he knew, Wendy was gone…
And Mabel was standing perhaps ten feet away from him, pale, wide-eyed and sporting a faint patina of sweat, but sporting that same look of dogged determination shared by every single member of the Pines family he'd had the displeasure of meeting. Behind her, Pacifica stood in readiness, crackling with psychic energy… and behind her, a very confused-looking Wendy was wrenching her axe free of the floorboards, clearly wondering what the hell had just happened.
There was a terrified pause, a tense silence that only grew all the more nerve-wracking the longer it stretched out. Shifty wasn't sure, but he had the distinct impression that nobody present had any real idea of what they were supposed to do next. Certainly, Mabel appeared to be reconsidering her choices in life and Pacifica had more than a little bit of the old "deer-in-the-headlights" look about her, while Wendy just looked bewildered.
In the end, Shifty himself was the one to break the impasse, reverting to his true form. Instantly, Wendy let out a snarl and took a step forward, axe raised to strike – only for Pacifica to telekinetically drag her back into position… and the response was nothing short of explosive.
"LET GO OF ME!" she howled. "I'LL KILL HIM! I'LL BOIL HIM, I'LL FLAY HIM ALIVE, I'LL MAKE HIM EAT HIMSELF! LET ME GO LET ME GO LET ME GO!"
"Wendy-"
"NO NO NO HE HAS TO DIE HE HAS TO DIE HE HAS TO DIE!"
"Wendy, just take a deep breath and calm down for a minute," Pacifica insisted. "Mabel knows what she's doing… I hope. Mabel, whatever you're going to do, you'd better do it quickly: I don't know how, but she's resisting my powers."
Shifty blinked, now gripped by uncertainty: he wasn't sure if he should take advantage of the sudden change in the battlefield to go on the attack or if she should simply let events take their course; in point of fact, he wasn't even sure what Mabel intended to do next – assuming she really was behind this strange state of affairs. Was this a trap, a new battle plan, a delaying tactic, or something else?
"You wanted to ask me questions," said Mabel, apprehensively. "Well, now's your chance: I'll tell you anything you want to know – if you promise not to hurt us."
"Just like that?" Shift asked, eyes narrowing.
"Just like that. Sound fair?"
Shifty considered this for a moment. "What's to stop you from letting Wendy off the leash as soon as my guard's down?"
"Yeah, because that's really been a problem for you up until now," Pacifica deadpanned.
"Why the sudden truce, though?" he asked. "Up until a few minutes ago, you were hell-bent on running away before I could ask any pertinent questions."
"Jeez, can you blame us?" said Mabel. "You attacked first."
"And if I'd just appeared on the doorstep and started asking questions, you'd have said 'sure, no problem, ask me whatever you like.' Come on, Mabel."
"You could have pretended to be someone else, though."
"Fun as that would have been, even you'd probably have gotten suspicious if friends and strangers had started interrogating you. So, I ask again, why the truce?"
Mabel shrugged. "Well, we're not going anywhere after what you did to the doors, so… I guess we might as well just get this over with. I mean, talking things sounds a lot better than getting caught in the middle of the next fight. So… ask away."
At this, Shifty began surreptitiously sprouting eyeballs in as many places as he could manage without the others noticing. This was clearly a trap: Mabel was quite obviously hiding something, and after all the trouble they'd gone to shut him away, she probably didn't trust them to spare her life once the quest. The same went for every other member of this band of misfits, all of whom were in on the plan…
"NO! YOU CAN'T TRUST HIM! HE'LL KILL YOU! HE'LL KILL ALL OF YOU!"
…all except Wendy, it seemed.
For now, though, his only alternative was more fruitless brawling. So, playing along seemed the best option at hand.
"Alright then," he began. "First thing's first: where's your brother?"
A bewildered silence followed. All of a sudden, the stunned mullet look was back on Mabel's face, and Pacifica had appeared to have joined the club for the time being; as for Wendy, she had stopped screaming and was now staring at him with a look of seething, borderline-apocalyptic rage. Was it Shifty's imagination, or was that smoke rising from those glowing veins around her collarbone?
"What?" Mabel blurted at last.
Shifty offered a long-suffering sigh. "I thought I made myself clear, but apparently not. Where… is… Dipper… Pines?"
This time, the silence was even longer and even less pleasant than ever before.
"You killed him," said Mabel, her tone caught somewhere between confusion and anger.
Now it was Shifty's turn to look bewildered. "I'm sorry, what?"
Somewhere behind Mabel, the smouldering fuse on Wendy's temper, which hadn't been all that lengthy to begin with, suddenly vanished in a shower of sparks.
"YOU KILLED HIM!" she howled. "YOU KILLED HIM AND ATE HIM AND THEN YOU TRIED TO KILL ME AND NOW YOU'RE HERE PRETENDING THAT IT DIDN'T HAPPEN AND AND AND AND AAAAAAAAARGH!"
Tearing herself free of Pacifica's telekinetic grip, she threw down her axe and leaped a full twenty feet through the air straight at Shifty. Distracted as he was by the 'revelation' of Dipper's current whereabouts, Shifty barely had enough time to conjure a riot shield from his outstretched arm before she barrelled into him. With one almighty swing of her clawed feet, she kicked aside his shield – breaking every single bone in Shifty's arm in the process – and grabbed him by the throat. Then, free fist swinging wildly, she hammered him with a vicious procession of pulverizing blows, knocking two teeth free from his gaping jaws, fracturing several ribs, and tearing a trench across his undefended stomach with her daggerlike fingernails, spraying both of them with gouts of luminous green blood.
Dazed from the impacts and reeling from whatever toxin the demented redhead had coated her nails with, Shifty could barely focus on transforming: in earlier times, his first instinct would have been to return to his true form and deal with his attacker through brute force, but right now he was already in his true form and Wendy seemed just about immune to harm. Even Tzimisce hadn't given him this much trouble. In the end, he at last managed to recover enough to take one emergency form – a beam of light, rippling out of Wendy's grip and soaring towards the ceiling.
Latching on to the highest point in the foyer's roof, well out of Wendy's reach, he finally reverted back to his true form. By then, thankfully, Pacifica and Mabel were already holding the screaming mutant back by both arms, allowing Shifty to divert some of his energies towards healing his many wounds.
Unfortunately, that left him free to listen to Wendy.
"YOU KILLED HIM!" she screeched. "YOU KILLED DIPPER!"
"For god's sake, I'm telling the truth! I had nothing to do with whatever happened to Dipper-"
"I SAW YOU! YOU WERE THERE! YOU WERE THERE TO KILL ME TOO!"
"And where exactly is 'there,' exactly?"
"YOU KNOW DAMN WELL WHERE! YOU WERE STALKING ME ACROSS THOSE MOUNTAINS FOR WEEKS! I SAW YOU! YOU WERE FOLLOWING ME!"
"Mountains," Shifty echoed. "As in 'somewhere really cold,' yes? Polar temperatures, in other words."
For the first time since their duel had begun, a look of puzzlement crossed Wendy's face. "Yes," she conceded at last.
"Then what in the hell would I be doing out there?"
"What… what do you mean?"
"Do you have any idea what you put me through when you and that little bastard did when you shoved me into that cryotube? It might have frozen my body, but it didn't freeze my mind." He took a deep breath, and realized that with the threat of Wendy out of reach, he was once again simmering with rage. "For every single month I was in cryogenic suspension, I was conscious! I couldn't move, I couldn't breathe, I couldn't change! I couldn't even change! I could only stand there and think, and you know what I was thinking about when I wasn't daydreaming about the past? I WAS THINKING ABOUT HOW COLD IT WAS! I spent months on end freezing to death but never dying, locked in a glass coffin at the bottom of a fallout shelter in some podunk shantytown with no company, no respite and no chance of escape, and now you think I'd be willing to follow you people up a mountain and into the freezing snow? For weeks on end? I can barely stand to be around air conditioning units now, and anything colder than that gives me goddamn flashbacks! Oh, I haven't even discussed the lingering claustrophobia you left me with – thank you very much for that, by the way."
But Wendy was shaking her head in utter incredulity. "No," she said softly; all the anger was gone from her voice, leaving behind only a blank, shocked monotone. "You can't be… I… no, it's not possible. I saw you. You were there. I hurt you. You… you had Dipper's hat."
By way of explanation, she drew a battered scrap of fabric from her backpack. Crumpled, bloodied and ragged though it was, it was still in one piece, and there was just enough of its original colour to identify it as Dipper's cap. "You were holding it your jaws," she said. "I… I saw you…"
Shifty threw up his hands in exasperation. "I've only been free for a couple of weeks, Wendy. I know, time's weird these days, but I literally haven't had the time to go traipsing up mountains. I've only just got out of cryo: Bill had one of his flunkies wake me up so I could hunt something called Axolotl, but I had other ideas. Since then, I've been following Mabel's trail – my best chance of finding Dipper, or so I thought – and it's led me all the way to Mabeland to this cesspool. So, riddle me this: why would I be wasting time in that diabetic nightmare if I'd already killed Dipper?"
Mabel's eyebrows rose. "If you really have been to Mabeland, what's it like at the moment?" she asked suspiciously. "What's been happening there?"
"I thought I was going to be the one asking the questions-"
"Answer me!"
"When I got there, the place was still in a shambles from your escape, and Dippy Fresh was wearing an icepack over his junk. When I left, Mabeland was in ruins and Dippy Fresh was deader than a can of radioactive spam. Satisfied?"
Mabel and Pacifica exchanged glances. "He's telling the truth," Mabel said at last.
"B-but," Wendy stammered, "B-b-but it can't be-"
"Look" Pacifica lowered her voice to a whisper, but even with her voice barely in the audible range, Shifty was still able to pick it up with a few subtle adjustments to his ears. "Gideon's read his thoughts, Wendy. The Shapeshifter isn't lying."
"I-I-I don't understand… Bill said-"
"A lot of things," Pacifica finished; she was smiling in spite of herself – a grim and distinctly desperate rictus, but a smile nonetheless. "It wouldn't have been the first time he lied about something. Plus, Bill can do just about anything he likes: maybe he just had a hologram or something following you around, or maybe he had one of the Henchmaniacs pretending to be the Shapeshifter. Right now it doesn't matter: what matters is that for now, we don't know who really killed Dipper – in fact, we don't even know if Dipper's dead. Maybe he just fell to his death when Bill threw him out of the cave, or maybe he's still out there somewhere."
Wendy very slowly sank to her knees, an expression of dull, childlike confusion stamped on her face, her eyes focussing on a distant point on the horizon. "I-I-I thought… I was so sure, I… no, it can't be…" She shook her head again, briefly hiding her face behind her hands. "Trust no-one, because no-one lives long enough to be trusted," she intoned quietly. "Trust no-one, because no-one lives long enough to be trusted…"
As Pacifica gently led the shellshocked Wendy away to one of the ruined chairs, Shifty (now fully healed) lowered himself back to the floor, where Mabel promptly rounded on him, her face suddenly alight with curiosity. "So you don't have any idea where Dipper is, or if he's still alive," she said. "But what do you want him for?"
"Isn't it obvious?" Shifty snapped. "I want revenge!"
But was it? With all the random intrusive thoughts buzzing around his head, did he really know what he wanted with Dipper – or anyone else for that matter?
"I want him worse-than-dead!" he continued, shrugging off his doubts as best as he could. "I want to make him suffer for sealing me in that cryotube! For giving me a split-second glimpse of everything I'd wanted for the last thirty years and then snatching it all away the moment I took a chance to savour it – and not just my freedom, either: now, Ford's Journal's are gone forever, burned by Bill! There was a treasure trove of shapes in there, species either extinct or changed beyond recognition, and now I'll never get a chance to take on any of those wonderful shapes because your idiot brother decided to try defeating Bill single-handedly!"
"But why Dipper?"
"Wha… weren't you listening to me?!"
"Yeah, I heard, but why just Dipper? Wendy helped shove you into the cryotube as well, don't forget. You could have killed her the moment we walked in the door, but you didn't; you only tried to knock her out. And what about me? I was the one who actually pressed the button and froze you. Why haven't you tried to kill me? Why don't you hate me as much as Dipper?"
Shifty opened his mouth to reply, only to find his planned response absent without leave. As infuriating as it was to admit it, Mabel had a point: why didn't he hate her? More to the point, why couldn't he hate her? Time and again, he'd had plenty of opportunities to kill her, Wendy and Ford through countless different methods, but on every occasion his instincts had stayed his hand. What was it about Dipper that drew so much loathing that he had none of it to spare for anyone else?
"And about the Journals…" Mabel took a deep breath, and appeared to be steeling herself for a moment. "They wouldn't have been burned if Weirdmageddon hadn't happened either, would they?"
"…no, but I fail to see how that's relev-"
"Then that's my fault as well, isn't it?"
Pacifica let out a strangled gasp of horror. "Mabel, don't-"
"Weirdmageddon only happened because I gave the rift to Bill. I mean, I thought he was Blendin Blandin, but that's no excuse, is it? I wanted more summer, more time with Dipper, because I thought I was going to lose him forever. So, I made a deal. My deal, my fault."
Shifty could only stare in disbelief for a moment, mind reeling at the spectacle. Once again, his head was full of emotions and impulses that made no sense: surprise would have been understandable, maybe even shock, but why was he listening to this little confession and feeling horror at everything he was hearing? Why the sudden surge of grief and remorse? Why wasn't he feeling angry – insanely angry – at Mabel? After all, the loss of the Journals were her fault, just as she said. So why couldn't he find it in his heart to genuinely hate her?
"You want to kill Dipper?" Mabel continued. "You want him 'worse-than-dead?' You might never find him, and besides, what happened to the Journals wasn't his fault. So why not hurt someone who really deserves it? So if you really want to take revenge on someone, you should start with me."
Some distance away, Gideon jumped the gun.
He'd been listening to everything Mabel had said, and for the last minute or so, he'd been locked in a state of almost blind panic: he wasn't an expert on psychically eavesdropping on conversations while under pressure, but even he couldn't mishear what had just been spoken, not when he'd heard it through no less than three sets of ears. Under normal circumstances, he'd have thought this was all part of Mabel's plan, some clever trap to stop the Shapeshifter once and for all… but he was still telepathically connected to her brain, listening for orders, and he could tell that something was very, very wrong.
Then again, the warning signs had been visible right from the get-go; the moment they'd met again outside Preacher's Pass, it'd been clear that there was something very different about Mabel. Just like Pacifica and Wendy, she'd changed, and not necessarily for the better: he'd seen none of the familiar quirky mannerisms, the heedlessly explosive enthusiasm, the exuberant creativity; the wild, vivacious girl he'd met so many months ago was gone, the enchantingly eccentric spark that had first drawn him to her snuffed out. Hearing the news of Dipper's "death" had clearly affected her very badly, but even that couldn't explain the shift in her personality. What had Bill done to her back in her playground? What could have possibly driven her to do…this?
I'm listening to a suicide attempt. That's the only logical explanation what I heard. I'm listening to Mabel's attempt to commit suicide by Shapeshifter, and I'm just STANDING HERE WAITING FOR ORDERS.
By then, Gideon had finally located the controls to the lobby PA system, and had spent a nerve-wracking five minutes pacing back and forth in front of it as the confrontation had played out in the distance. So, as soon as he heard Mabel's final offer to the Shapeshifter, he made a wild dash for the control panel ahead of schedule, readying the Babba album as he ran.
All things considered, this was perhaps the single biggest longshot he'd ever taken in his long career of audacious cons and schemes, but right now he was out of ideas, and to be brutally honest, there wasn't much else he could do under the circumstances anyway: he was unarmed, his psychic powers were best used for communication and surveillance, and he wouldn't last two seconds in hand-to-hand combat – assuming the Shapeshifter deigned to stop laughing long enough to actually fight him. In the end, all he had was a distraction, and the dim hope that his vision of the future was accurate.
From what he could tell, the music was being provided by an antiquated CD player hooked up to the PA system, but upon opening it up, he couldn't find a disc in the machine. Somehow, the damn thing was playing "Unforgettable" of its own accord. Fortunately, the music stopped as soon as he put the Babba disc in the player,
Moments later, "Disco Girl" roared to life, hammering the surrounding foyer with the familiar sounds of Icelandic warbling... but for a few seconds, there was another sound just audible under the opening bars of the song: a voice whispering "You are all made of stars," followed by a deep, bubbling ripple of laughter.
Gideon could only watch and pray that he'd done the right thing.
Mabel groaned. "I told you to wait, Gideon," she muttered under her breath. Out loud, she continued: "Look, do you really want revenge or not?"
But Shifty was only barely paying attention. The moment the music had started play, his mind had suddenly been awash with visions of multi-headed bears and embarrassing conversations in diners, and all things considered, this made even less sense than his usual intrusive thoughts. For one thing, he'd never even been to a diner in his lifetime. At first, he tried to dismiss it as another quirk of his increasingly-unfathomable brain, but the more of the song he heard, the more certain he was that he'd heard it before. But where? Ford wouldn't have been caught dead listening to anything like this, Fiddleford would have beaten himself to death with his own banjo rather than sit through it, and they were the only people in the last thirty years who'd ever given him access to a radio. So where had he heard it? Why was it making his head throb? Why did it summon up a thousand new inexplicable thoughts? And why was it so catchy?
Disco girl
Coming through
That girl is you…
Too late, Shifty realized he was singing along with the music, and clapped a hand over his mouth – as if that would somehow stop the words from escaping – but already, Mabel, Pacifica and even poor shellshocked Wendy had noticed. And there was something else, too: for just a few seconds, his voice had changed. Without even meaning to, he'd adopted a different voice while singing the song, and he didn't recognize it… but it was plain from the looks on their faces that the others did.
"You like the song?" Mabel asked. Once again, that look of insatiable curiosity was back on her face, and the more she stared, the more uncomfortable Shifty became.
"I've never heard it before," he admitted.
"You're reciting the lyrics off by heart."
"Yes, well, they're very predictable."
Once again, Shifty had the distinct impression of wheel and gears spinning at the speed of light inside Mabel's brain. What was the demented human child doing now? What was she planning?
"Why do you hate Dipper so much?" she asked.
"I think we've already covered this-"
"No we haven't! You still haven't explained why you want revenge on Dipper and not me, Wendy, or even Soos! Why do you hate Dipper more than any of us?"
"Because I always have!" Shifty exploded. "I've hated him ever since I first heard that stupid, self-important, self-pitying whining voice of his echoing down the caverns, and the longer I've known him, the little bastard just keeps giving me excuses to hate him! Just watching him in action has been like being stuck in the path of a veritable avalanche of weakness and incompetence! I mean, he couldn't even solve a simple murder mystery without getting humiliated, he got his ass kicked by Gideon of all people, he screwed up a romantic night with Wendy even though he had the help of an entire platoon of clones, the prospect of fighting Robbie – I repeat, Robbie – scared him so much he recruited a video game character for help, his height anxieties played right into Gideon's hands, he nearly got an entire trick-or-treating party killed because of his need to keep up appearances, and he almost handed total victory to Gideon because he wasted half the dream journey on pre-teen angst when he should have been focussing on the mission at hand… and that's just the first half of the summer! After accidentally summoning a zombie horde, making a deal with Bill, botching a simple exorcism at the Northwest Mansion, wrecking Project Mentem, and getting the Journals incinerated, I think I'm well within my rights to give the brat some well-deserved comeuppance! So tell me, does that sound like a good enough reason to hate him, or do I have to bring up all the other annoying things he's done?"
He took a deep breath; he had a headache now, and the intrusive thoughts were worse than ever.
Mabel's eyes narrowed. "How did you know about any of that?"
Shifty froze, realizing he'd been letting his mouth run wild independent of his brain. "Beg pardon?" he said weakly.
"You were underground for the first half of the summer, remember? You couldn't have known about the murder mystery or that stuff about the clones."
"And after that, you were in cryosleep," Pacifica pointed out. "You couldn't have known about what happened at the mansion – or even about the Journals being burnt – and even if someone like Bill told you about it, you were talking as though you actually watched it happen. So how could you know about it?"
There was a heartstopping pause, as Shifty tried and failed to think of a convincing excuse that would somehow make this embarrassing conversation end before it got any worse. "I… I don't know," he said at last.
"Well that's no answer. How could you have found out about that?"
"…I swear, I don't know."
There was a muffled thud from across the room; it seemed as though Wendy had managed to recover enough to retrieve her axe, and was now repeatedly hammering it into the floor for little more than emphasis. "Answer them," she hissed.
"I don't know!" Shifty erupted, voice rising to a scream; suddenly, it seemed as though all the confusions that had been building up over the last thirty years could no longer remain unmentioned, and before he could stop himself, his mouth was once again working ahead of his brain, giving full vent to his spleen.
"I've spent almost my entire life with thoughts that don't make sense, impulses that tell me to act nonsensically! I keep suffering déjà vu! Strangers look like people I've known for years! I somehow correctly guess names and addresses I couldn't possibly have known! When I was younger, I was always worrying that the Journals had already been burned – while they were still being written! I kept passing up opportunities to kill you people, even though it would have meant losing the Journal! I could have ripped your head off back in the bunker, but I couldn't do it – and I ended up getting an axe in the chest because I hesitated! I keep mentioning things that don't make sense – my last message to Dipper, I didn't even know what I meant! I don't know what I want half the time! When I came up with the idea of hunting you down, I didn't know what the hell I was going to do: I didn't know if I wanted to get revenge or if I wanted to learn more about myself or if I wanted to ask for directions to Dipper or if I could get you to explain what was happening to me! And now I don't know why that song seems so goddamn familiar! Are you satisfied now? I hope so, because I don't think I'll be anytime soon! Also, why the hell am I telling you anything? I'm supposed to be the one asking questions here! AND WHY IS THERE A PIG SNIFFING ME?!"
As it happened, the tagalong pig of the group had crept out of hiding at some point during the last few seconds of ranting, and was now curiously sniffing at Shifty's spidery legs.
"Waddles!" Mabel hissed. "Get back from there!"
But Waddles didn't seem in the mood to budge from his position. If anything, he seemed content to sit on his haunches and oink happily up at Shifty. For his part, Shifty wasn't sure how to respond; something about this animal seemed familiar, but he couldn't explain why… and the more he thought about it, the more his head ached and echoed with unwanted impulses.
"He really seems to like you," said Mabel. Once again, that curious-verging-on-suspicious tone was back in her voice. "I've only ever seen him do that around people he knows. Can you change the way you smell or something like that?"
"I'm not doing anything."
"Then why'd he do that? It's not like he knows you or… anything… like… th…" Mabel very slowly trailed off, eyes widening in astonishment as some unknown train of thought arrived at her station. "Oh my god," she said quietly.
Then, without warning, she turned around and sprinted off in the general direction of the entrance, and began a frantic search among the splintered furniture scattered in front of the door. "Where did it go?!" she yelled, oblivious to the confused stares following her across the foyer. "Where – did – it – go?"
"What are you doing?"
"It fell somewhere near here! I know it did!"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"HA! Found it!"
At last, Mabel got to her feet holding a familiar looking leather-bound book; for one heart-leaping instant, Shifty almost mistook it for one of the Journals, but then he saw the raised middle finger on the cover and realized this wasn't so; it was, in fact, the book that Mabel had been clutching when he'd first ambushed them.
"I read a few pages back when you first gave this to me, Wendy," Mabel muttered, "But I wasn't really paying attention to any of it, but I swore I caught something about it here…" Leafing through the book for a moment, she excitedly pointed at one of the pages. "Dipper was transforming!" she exclaimed. "That's what this entire journal was about: Bill made him transform every step of the journey, and made him write about it! That's right, isn't it, Wendy?"
"Yes, but-"
"And towards the end, Dipper was writing about how Bill was changing him permanently, making his human form different – and after that, the two of you were separated! Now, we know Bill can control time – he can control almost anything! So what if Dipper didn't die when he fell? What if he was just transported back through time?"
"You mean-"
"It has to be, it's the only thing that makes sense! I mean, Ford told us he never found out who or what laid the Shapeshifter's egg in the first place!"
"What are you talking about?" Shifty demanded. But something in the back of his head was beginning to rumble unpleasantly, worse than any headache, irrational thoughts and impossible memories creeping into his brain from all sides.
Mabel let out a whoop of near-hysterical laughter, and Shifty realized with some confusion that she was now broaching the distance between them, seemingly with no regard to her own safety. "You've been looking for Dipper all this time so you could get revenge," she said excitedly, "but all this time, he's been right here!"
"What?"
"It all makes sense! You know "Disco Girl" off by heart, even though you've never heard it before; you keep having thoughts that don't make sense; you didn't kill Wendy and you don't know why; you warned Dipper about what would happen at Northwest Mansion; you know all about what Dipper did in the summer even though you weren't there for it; Gideon says there's parts of your brain that have been sealed off… and Waddles knows you!"
The rumbling in Shifty's head sounded again; someone was hammering at a locked door in the back of his mind, someone on the other side trying furiously to get in, and once again, Shifty couldn't explain how he knew this. All he knew was that every word that Mabel said was drawing him closer to the door, and with every step he took, he was reaching out to open it.
Mabel was standing right in front of him now, pale and trembling but somehow unafraid. Her eyes were shining with tears, yet the smile on her face refused to budge.
"Don't you see?" she said. "You're my brother. You're Dipper."
Silence.
In that instant, everyone was left mute with shock: Gideon was staring at them from around a corner, his face pale and utterly astonished; Wendy was once again poleaxed, her eyes locked in a thousand-yard stare; Pacifica was hovering in place, caught between hope and caution. And Shifty could only stand there, boggling in disbelief. He wanted to tell her she was wrong, that she was insane, that he knew who he was, but in that moment, all he could think of was the door in the back of his mind. Someone on the other side of the door recognized his own name… and Shifty had the most peculiar feeling that this someone was him.
Suddenly, Mabel was in motion: before Shifty could react, he had a demented thirteen-year-old flinging her arms around his waist and hugging him as though her life depended on it.
And with that, the door inside his mind swung open, and a thick tide of memories rippled out across his brain.
Suddenly, he knew.
He remembered everything – his life before, his life after, and worst of all the great and terrible moment that Bill had sent him plummeting him into the void of the past, had torn his being to shreds and planted him in the earth for Ford to find.
He was Dipper – but he was also Shifty – but he was also Dipper – but he was also Shifty – but he was also Dipper – but…
Who was he?
Somewhere in that oppressively silent foyer, a being who couldn't possibly be Dipper Pines but couldn't realistically be Shifty took a deep breath, opened his mouth, and began to scream.
The scream caught them all off-guard
Wriggling out of Mabel's grip with one wild lurch of his suddenly-shapeless body, the Shapeshifter scrambled helplessly away, asymmetric hands gripping his skull as if he was afraid it might fly off his neck.
"No!" he shrieked, his voice changing even as he spoke, shifting from old to young, male to female, human to beast and back again. "No, no, I'm not – no, I'm – but I'm – he's not – I'm him, but – how can I be –"
He screamed again, his body shifting uncontrollably: one moment he was human, then he was the Shapeshifter; then he was the baked beans mascot, then a giant floating octopus with razor-lined tentacles, then an eight-foot-tall dragon breathing gouts of electric-blue flame, then a living mass of molten gold in a vaguely-humanoid shape, then a sea urchin, then Mabel, then Wendy, then Pacifica, then Grunkle Ford, then Grunkle Stan – on and on it went, never retaining a single form for much longer than five seconds at a time.
"STOP IT!" the Shapeshifter howled. "STOP ME!"
Suddenly, he was every single form at once, every single shape he'd ever taken in his life merged and conjoined into a forty-foot-wide blob of living matter oozing across the form, dozens upon dozens of monsters and beings and features and identities fused into one repulsive gestalt. For thirty heartstopping seconds, it writhed helplessly in place, clawing at the air with arms and fins and paws and tentacles and wings, struggling for a grip on the world around it even as its collaged body struggled to maintain equilibrium between the organs that composed it.
Then, from a hundred thousand distorted mouths, it screamed, "HELLLLPPPP MEEEEEEEEEE!"
And then, the mass of bodies changed again, shrinking and dwindling away until all that was left was a single human form lying slumped on the floor.
Dipper Pines looked out at the world for the first time in his new life, and began to cry.
For a full minute, he lay there, curled into a ball and sobbing into his knees. And when he finally got to his feet again, he did so only with great difficulty, legs wobbling like a newborn foal; he might have fallen over if Mabel hadn't hurried over and helped him up.
"Mabel?" he said; his voice shook wildly, waving near-constantly between Dipper's own voice and the hellish baritone of the Shapeshifter.
His face was pale and glistening with sweat, his eyes fluttering wildly, almost as if he was on the brink of passing out, and as he took a step forward, he began to change again, shapeshifting uncontrollably from one form to another and back again.
"Mabel?" he called again. "Is that you?"
"Yes, Dipper, it's me."
"Who am I? He remembers now – no, I remember, and so does Shifty… but I'm Shifty-"
"Dipper, you need to relax! You're sick; you look as though you're about to drop."
"No, no, you don't understand! Shifty, he… I… I've killed people. I've wanted to kill so many more. I wanted to do awful things to people, and I… oh god, I'm a monster, but I'm…"
"It's okay, bro-bro, it wasn't you-"
"Yes it was!" Dipper screamed, shifting wildly from human to guinea pig to Gremlobin and back again. "It's always been me! Bill locked part of me away, but the rest of me had a choice, and I chose to hurt people and kill people and… it wasn't just Shifty, it was me, because I am Shifty… but I'm also Dipper… and…"
He let out a choked gasp, staggered over to the nearest wastebin and promptly threw up. Mabel caught him by the shoulders just before he toppled over, and held him up he went on puking, keeping him from toppling over until he'd finished. But by the time he was done, Dipper looked even paler and sicker than ever before, and transforming even quicker than before.
"I'm thirteen," he whimpered. "But I've been alive for over thirty years. I was born human, but I was born a shapeshifter. I know who my mom and dad are, but I also know I'm an orphan. I didn't meet Grunkle Ford until this summer, but he raised me from the moment I hatched. I've had family, friends, people who loved me… but I've been alone underground for years and never met anyone else until you found me. I know you're my sister, but my memories say I barely know you." He let out a choked sob of grief and confusion. "I don't know who I am and it's driving me insane!"
Dipper looked up at her, eyes wide and terrified. "Who am I, Mabel?" he begged, on the verge of tears again; he was hanging onto the wall, now, struggling to keep himself awake. "Please, I can't tell anymore. Am I Dipper or Shifty? Am I a human or a monster? Who am I? Who am I supposed to be?"
"It doesn't matter," said Mabel gently. "I don't care if you're a shapeshifter or a human or whatever you really are. You're my brother: that's all that matters."
For a moment, Dipper's sickly face registered something almost akin to relief. Then he collapsed bonelessly into Mabel's outstretched arms – still shapeshifting, still warping uncontrollably from one shape to another, but at long last, asleep.
At peace.
For now.
A/N: Aaaw, ain't that cute?
Well, it looks like Dipper's back again, and I think he'll be much more useful to me like this, don't you?
Shifty didn't listen to me, didn't want me as a friend – but Dipper… Dipper's a different story altogether. A lost little Shapeshifter with no confidence in himself, no way of trusting his own memories, and a boatload of nightmares on the way? I think he'll be in need of friends, and I can be a very, very good friend indeed.
But that's a chapter for another day. For now, I'm signing off and letting Straightjacketed have this story back. But don't worry; I'll always have some time to spare for you, when I'm not out there among our heroes.
Meanwhile, Straightjacketed has two soundtrack choices for this chapter:
for the fight scene, Nat King Cole's Unforgettable. Hey, it's in the story, remember? I didn't have the damn thing playing on the PA system for nothing. And for Dipper's rebirth, I Hope You Find Peace by Jessica Curry. Tragic and sweet enough for ya?
And since you've been such a lovely audience, I might as well give you a code.
Gsvb hzb sv dzh gsv urihg gl uzoo
Zmw mld sv glroh zg Xrksvi'h xzoo
Gsv nzhgvi xizughnzm hxfokgh gsv vmw
Yfg xzm sv bvg ivnvnyvi uirvmwh?
Think about what I said earlier, friends and neighbours: once, I was just a dream made flesh; now I'm flesh made dream. You can be too, folks, you can be too.
See ya…