A/N: WELCOME TO THE ANGST FEST HAHA!
When Dipper heard the knock on his door, he jumped a mile.
Who's there?
Has Bill found some new pawn to come and find me, and hurt me?
Trust no-one, trust no-one, trust no-one.
As he went to answer it, he grabbed the nearest weapon, a crossbow, a revolver would have been better, quicker, easier, but I have to answer the door soon, what if they try to break in, and flung the door open. He barely registered the tired-looking woman on his doorstep before he pulled her close, and peered roughly in her eyes, checking, checking please no, please no more slitted pupils, yellow sclera, and that knowing grinning triumphant glint, I'm prepared now, Bill, I don't care who you're possessing I will not let you cross this threshold.
"What the hell are you doing, Dipper!" The harsh words, so unlike what he'd expected from the owner of those wide brown eyes, shook him, and he truly stepped back and looked at the sister he hadn't seen in over ten years. She had always been slender, but now she was terrifyingly gaunt. The only weight she seemed to be carrying seemed to be at her midsection, where, unbeknownst to him, her body held the memory of the pregnancy which had tragically, inexplicably, heartbreakingly ended months too early. Her face and arms were marked with yellow-green bruises, stark against her too-pale skin, and her hair, once so long and so beautiful, was cut into a choppy, messy bob. This was not the Mabel he knew.
Trust no-one, trust no-one, how can someone I know so well be so different from how I remembered? What if she's being possessed, possessed by someone who curses, and gets into fights, and doesn't eat properly? Or what if something terrible has happened, and she's changed, and I can't trust her. Trust no-one, trust no-one.
"Dipper, what's going on?" she asked, sounding impatient and a little annoyed, "I haven't seen you in years, and the first thing you do is grab me and give me an eye exam. Why did you want to see me so badly?"
"There's no time to explain. Come in and I'll show you."
There's no time to explain. Something was very wrong with her brother. Mabel had known that something was not quite right with him when he'd not even expressed slight concern over the fact that she looked like Death, after spending eighteen years of his life fussing over her, but this was the clincher. Dipper Pines ALWAYS had time to explain things. In fact, usually it was other people who didn't have time for Dipper to explain, because he loved explaining things so much, and was so good and through about it. He led her briskly through his house, past piles of mess, and scribblings, and over and over again, the same triangle motifs. She followed him down, into a secret passageway (which, despite her worry, she had to admit, was very cool) and she soon found herself standing before a huge, triangular thing.
"Dipper, what is it?"
"It's a portal, but that's mostly irrelevant, as far as you are concerned. I have to ask you something?"
"What?"
"Do you remember our plan as children to fly around the world to uncharted places?"
When Mabel's face lit up, Dipper knew he had made a good call. This was still Mabel, and she would help him.
It was perfect.
He could trust her.
Probably.
"Of course I do," she said, excitement lighting up her hollow features.
"Well, I need you to take this book, and go as far away from here as you possibly can." Almost as soon as he'd suggested this, her smile dropped, and was replaced with a tight, angry jaw.
"Why?"
"The contents of the book are very, very dangerous, Mabel. I can't risk this falling into the wrong hands." or even my hands, who knows, I might become too curious and Bill will use me and it will be just typical, typical Dipper gets overwhelmed by his stupid curiosity and everything is terrible…
"I'm sure there's a better way than me going far, far away forever," Mabel said, and ever-reckless, ever-corner-cutting, she pulled out a cigarette lighter, and made to set fire to the journal, the journal where all Dipper's life's works, everything he'd achieved, everything he'd worked towards, everything that he had was about to go up in flames AGAIN, because of Mabel, this was the second time, first his John Hopkins application, and now his journal, did she have any idea.
"Mabel!" he shouted, his voice rising aggressively, but he didn't care did she have any idea what she was about to do, "Don't you dare destroy that book!"
"Dipper, you called me here to get rid of the book, and I get here, wanting to see the brother I haven't seen in years, and the only reason you want me here is to leave again just to get rid of the damn book! So I'm doing it, I'm burning the stupid bloody book, because isn't that what you want!" The harshness, the callosity, the cursing, it wasn't Mabel, wasn't the Mabel that Dipper knew.
He couldn't trust her.
As Dipper roughly knocked the journal and the lighter out of her hands, sending her stumbling back into a control panel, Mabel saw red. She was absolutely through with men pushing her around, just wanting her for what they needed her for, and she was not going to take this from her brother.
"No! Mabel, you wouldn't understand!" Dipper said, "This book–it's dangerous. I've seen–and been through some terrible things, you'd never–"
"And I haven't!" Mabel yelled back, absolutely furious. He had no idea, "Dipper, I'm a criminal in almost every state from California to Louisiana! Even now, I'm on the run from my husband, and speaking of which, where did you think these bruises came from! Do you have any idea what it's like to feel so lonely…that you don't know why you still get up and do things! And all alone here, you probably have no idea what it's like to marry someone and then discover they're someone completely different from who you imagined! And you will never, never understand what it's like to…to…" Her tears swallowed the rest of her sentence, unable to hold her miscarriage against him. And yet he stood there, still holding the stupid book.
"Mabel, I understand you've had a hard time, a really hard time. But this is so, so important. The world depends upon it. You can write to me, now that you know where I am, and I can send you money, or–" he thrust the journal at her, knocking her back a few steps. But Mabel was done being shoved around. It was time for her to do some of her own.
And she did. Angrily, wanting to make her brother sorry for the silence, for abandoning her, for calling her back only when it was convenient, his rough coolness, his condescending condolences, everything came together as she shoved him hard in the shoulders.
Hard enough to make him stumble, back, back into the portal.
As he disappeared, and she reached out, trying to do anything she could to reverse her stupid mistakes, one last truth hit them both.
Trust no-one.
