Bonus Fic - Love Isn't For Suckers

Blood red lips seemed to fill Dipper's whole world, with flashes of teeth like small ivory knives appearing between them as the woman's mouth moved in speech. Something about those teeth didn't seem to feel right, but the stray thought quickly faded from his mind. His dazed ears couldn't quite understand the words that were being spoken, but the tone of the voice was soothing and he felt his panic-driven heartbeat slow to a sluggish crawl in his chest as the gentle voice caressed his mind.

There's nothing to worry about.

What was I so worried about anyway?, he thought to himself.

Don't panic.

There's no reason for me to be worrying like this, right?

The world grew dim, fading into clouded grey shadows except for those lips.

You're safe.

I mean, I'm totally safe here.

Just relax.

Dipper felt his arms drop to his sides and he heard a clatter as something fell from his suddenly nerveless fingers.

What had he been holding again? It sounded wooden…

It doesn't matter.

Yeah… it really doesn't…

Something wasn't right.

What was it though?

Forget about it.

Something wooden?

I swear this seems like it was important…

Some nagging voice in the back of Dippers mind forced its way through the fog of calm.

Wooden… Steak… wooden steak? That doesn't make any sense, who would carve a steak out of wood?

Calm down.

Wooden steak?

Steak?

No… stake.

Shut up!

Wooden stake.

Vampire.

Crap! We were hunting a vampire…

Relax damn it!

Dipper felt the veil of calmness that had settled over his mind start to fray and dissolve as an all-too-familiar panic began to set in once again.

I can't just stand here like this! I have to move!

You aren't going anywhere.

Dipper's body felt like a clumsily manipulated puppet, his arms hanging limp at his sides and his head lolling uselessly around on his neck but his eyes were locked on the hypnotically moving lips. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't force his body to move an inch… even twitching an eyelid seemed to be beyond his control now as he felt the spell of her voice, its' voice pinning him down.

No… this is not going to happen!

This will go a lot easier if you just sit still and accept it.

Screw you!

Dippers' muscles burned as he forced his eyes closed and took a step back. His whole body felt like it was moving through molasses, tendons straining painfully against bone as Dippers' legs fought against his own commands. With a grunt he managed to give his aching head a vicious shake and he felt the gentle tug of the voice in his mind vanish. All at once the pressure holding his limbs in place was suddenly gone and he almost stumbled from the bizarre sensation of life returning to his numbed nerves. Dipper forced his eyes open again and saw a tall figure standing with her arms crossed in front of her chest, her face illuminated by the yellow glow from the old gas-lamps burning on the walls.

It was a face full of harsh lines and angles, but still somehow beautiful despite its predatory appearance – his eyes traveled from the knife-sharp cheekbones to the large, almost catlike, eyes beneath arched brows & finally came once more to the pair of blood red lips that stood out from the chalk white pallor of its skin like an open wound. Those lips were currently quirked just slightly upward in an expression of amused contempt.

"You've got a pretty strong brain there darling," she said, "most guys can't break free when I've already started on the whole 'everything's fine, now just sit still and let me eat you' routine."

Dipper was slightly surprised to find that the undead monster trying to dominate his mind had an extremely thick southern accent.

Huh… I guess I kind of expected her to sound more… I dunno… 'old country?'

Is that racist of me? Do vampires even count as a race?

Wait, why am I even thinking of that right now? Get the stake idiot!

Dippers eyes darted toward the wooden dagger that he had dropped on the floor during his earlier daze, but before he could make a dive for it the vampire was moving, her entire body seeming to blur as she darted toward him. Dipper tensed and tried to step aside but wasn't fast enough to avoid a stinging slap across his face that was delivered with enough force to bring stars of pain to his eyes and drive him to his knees.

Dazed, Dipper could only watch as the vampire bent down and picked up the dropped stake, tossing it idly in her hand a few times before she threw it hard behind her through the glass pane of a nearby window and far out of his reach.

"You could have done this the easy way and just let me hypnotize you so that I could have my dinner in peace," she said in a disappointed voice, "but now we've got to do it the hard way where I have to start breaking your bones and beating you till you can't move and then have my dinner. I hate the hard way... I always end up ruining my nice clothes."

"Or," Dipper said as he held his hands out in a placating gesture, "and hear me out here, I'm just thinking out loud, you don't eat me and we forget about this whole thing? I mean, look at me – I'm really stringy and I ...um… I do so many drugs that my blood probably tastes pretty terrible. Like expired ketchup dumped in a barroom ashtray."

To Dipper's surprise the vampire gave a sort of snorting giggle at his plea and tilted her head, a strange glow seeming to burn from behind her eyes as she looked him up and down speculatively.

"Has anyone ever told you that you're kind of cute when you get all terrified like that?" she purred.

"I may have heard it mentioned once or twice," Dipper muttered, recalling Mabel having said almost the exact same thing the last time she'd startled him awake.

"You know, I don't really have to kill you… this doesn't even have to be unpleasant for you if you don't put up a struggle," the vampire said in a soothing voice, inching closer toward him.

"Having my blood drained seems like it could get pretty unpleasant though," Dipper answered in as calm a voice as he could manage, awkwardly shuffling crabwise across the floor as he backed himself over toward the doorway.

"I'm sure I could find some way to distract you enough that you wouldn't even notice me doing it," the vampire said in a playful sing-song voice, "it would be just like getting a little ol' love bite, or a really big hickey,"

Dipper winced slightly recalling some of the more enthusiastic bites that Mabel had left on his shoulder and neck in the past. She always called him a wimp whenever he complained about them afterward, playfully pointing out that they couldn't have hurt that bad if he hadn't objected when she was putting them on him in the first place.

Mabel.

I think she came in here after me… She did! That was the plan we'd made...

I hope she's nearby… I'm not sure how much longer I can hold this thing off.

"I'm not sure I know you well enough for hickeys yet," Dipper said, shooting quick sidelong glances at the door.

Anytime now sis!

"Why wait? Life is short," the vampire replied.

Dipper cocked an eyebrow at her questioningly at the remark.

"For some of us anyway," she corrected herself with a shrug, "besides, you're no Bela Lugosi but you're kind of cute in a way…"

"Listen lady, I am extremely flattered," Dipper stammered out, "but I'm seeing someone right now and it's pretty serious and being killed and/or sleeping with you would probably put a major damper on my relationship."

"I don't see any rings on your finger," the vampire said, her outline blurring as she closed the gap between them and was suddenly beside Dipper.

A small delicately manicured hand pressed firmly against his chest, pinning him to the floor as surely as if someone had just parked a truck on him. Long nails scratched teasingly at his chest through his shirt, and he suppressed a shiver from the ice cold feel of the creatures flesh against his even through his clothes.

"Well, what's it going to be – the easy way or the hard way?" the vampire whispered into his ear, her lifeless breath like a chill puff of winter air that made the seductive tone of her voice into something strange and terrifying.

"They both seem pretty hard to me," Dipper blurted out, not sure of how to answer her in a way that wouldn't involve bleeding.

The vampire gave another giggle as she shot him a saucy smirk and after a beat Dipper realized what he'd just said.

"Wait! That was not innuendo!" Dipper stammered, feeling his ears start to redden and burn.

The vampire's delicate fingers tangled into Dippers hair and gently tugged his head to the side, exposing his throat and though he struggled he couldn't budge the cold dead limbs pinning him down even an inch. He shuddered as he felt the cold touch of its long pointed tongue dragging up from his collarbone to his ear. Teeth like dagger points nibbled gently on the lobe of his ear, not quite piercing the skin. He shivered, but whether it was from fear or something else equally primal he wasn't sure. The icy wind of the creature's voice whispered into his ear once more,

"You are just precious… I think I might even keep you for a while,"

Despite the fear that was knotting up Dipper's gut he felt his heart start to speed up from the pressure of her flesh against his as she leaned down over him, one long ivory-pale leg moving up to straddle him and gently rest her weight on his body.

"Are you sure you wouldn't want to go on a date or something first at least? I'm an old fashioned kind of guy," Dipper joked nervously.

"Honey I'm 180 years old – I know old fashioned like you couldn't begin to imagine," the vampire said as she stroked a claw-like fingernail gently along his lightly stubbled jawline.

"I kind of have a bad track record with older women," Dipper said, squirming under her touch.

The vampire seemed like she was going to make a reply when the door to the room suddenly slammed open loudly and the creature leaped off him with the grace and speed of a startled cat, clinging high onto the far wall of the room with hands that now seemed almost spidery and gnarled compared to the delicate fingers that had been caressing Dipper's face just moments before.

Breathing a sigh of relief Dipper scuttled to his feet and joined Mabel at the doorway. His sister stood with her hands on her hips and a hard glare on her normally smiling face, brown eyes staring daggers at the creature perched in defiance of gravity near the ceiling.

"Hands off my boyfriend worm-bait." Mabel snapped, trying to scrunch her face up into her idea of a fierce scowl which unfortunately looked more constipated than intimidating.

After the initial surprise the vampire made to recover her poise, clambering down from the wall to the floor with frightening speed. Her full lips twisted up into a wide predatory grin, canines gleaming wet in the dim light as she ran her tongue across them theatrically.

"This must be my lucky night – two meals come walking in all on their own. I might even have enough for leftovers."

Mabel's hand inched slowly toward her waist where a colorful belt full of knitted pouches hung low off her hips. Her fingers slid carefully inside one of the small woolen bags as she kept her eyes fixed on the vampire.

"Well I couldn't let you start your dinner yet without the right SPICES!" Mabel said, shouting the last word triumphantly as she hurled a handful of powdery dust from the pouch directly into the creatures face.

The vampire recoiled, hands clawing at the air and gagging as it stumbled against the wall. After a confused moment the creature straightened up and glanced down at its hands.

"What the hell is this? Glitter?" the vampire asked incredulously, wiping sparkling flakes of color from out of its eyes.

Mabel glanced down at the pouch at her waist and slapped her glitter-dusted palm to her forehead.

"Awww man - I even said a cool line and everything! Stupid utility belt! Whose dumb idea was it to wear these anyway?" she groaned.

Dipper shot a questioning glance at her.

"That was just my emergency glitter," Mabel said sheepishly as she dug around through the remaining pouches until she found what she had been seeking with a triumphant 'Aha!'

"Who the fuck carries emergency-" the vampire began to say before a fistful of hastily thrown garlic salt caught it full in the mouth, causing it to burst into an unholy shriek as thick yellow smoke poured out from between its rapidly bruising lips.

Razor-thin lines of electric blue flame limned across its face in an irregular spiderweb pattern, ivory skin fragmenting off like chips of porcelain to reveal a core of thick tarry ooze that ignited with cold fire when it touched the air. Dipper grabbed Mabel and pulled her behind him protectively as the burning creature took a single lurching step toward them before it dropped to the floor, scrabbling and shuddering as if it were in the middle of a seizure. Wood and plaster splintered under the convulsive blows of its flailing limbs and the air hummed with the almost inaudible whine of its dying wail.

"Finish it?" Mabel asked, a touch of sympathy creeping into her voice. Undead monster or not, she couldn't stand the sight of a creature in pain.

Neither could Dipper most of the time & he grimaced and nodded in agreement.

"The chopper," he said.

Dipper held out his hand toward Mabel, and with practiced efficiency she handed him an old machete from out of the bright purple backpack she wore slung over her left shoulder. It's slightly nicked blade was traced along with a number of strange squirming symbols and fragments of old spells that Dipper had picked up during their years on the road to make the once humble gardening tool into something far more dangerous than it already was. He noted with some slight exasperation that Mabel had apparently added a few cartoonish designs of her own etched into the metal, and that she had also found the time to decorate the handle with a preposterous number of sequins and costume gems since the last time he'd been forced to use it.

Garish or not, the blade should still do its job. He swung once, hard, and felt the edge shear through the burning brittle neck and bite deep into the wood of the floorboards. Icy sparks of burning cold flared out to hiss against his skin but he brushed them off with only a slight wince. With the head severed the cold fire died completely and what was left of the body began to melt like a pool of thick oil into the floor, rapidly shrinking away to nothing as if the creature had never existed in the first place. Dipper carefully wiped the blade clean on the frayed old curtains by the broken window before handing it back to Mabel.

"Well, looks like that's finally taken care of," Dipper said. He felt the days aches begin to catch up with him now that the adrenalin was starting to wear off.

"Do you think we should have recorded that?" Mabel asked as she re-sheathed the machete and slipped it back into the backpack.

"I don't think a video of us setting what looked like a woman on fire and then decapitating it would have made us too popular with our fans," Dipper said.

"Yeah, you're probably right," Mabel said.

"What took you so long to get here anyway? Did you get turned around searching the other rooms?" Dipper groused as his fingers delicately probed the bruise along his jaw where the vampire had slapped him earlier.

"No - I was just waiting for the right moment. If I came in too early she might have heard me coming," Mabel explained.

"Cutting it kind of close there near the end weren't you?" Dipper said, rubbing his neck with a slight grimace as he remembered the feel of the creatures cold dead breath against his skin.

"I knew you would be able to find a way to keep her distracted till I got there," Mabel said.

"I appreciate the confidence," Dipper said with a slight hint of pride,"but maybe next time lets play it a little safer,"

"Speaking of distractions- was it just my imagination or were you flirting with that vampire lady right before I got here?" Mabel asked teasingly.

"What? No!" Dipper said, his voice sharp and defensive.

"Are you sure about that? Because some of that sounded like genuine playful banter before I kicked in the door there," Mabel said, poking him gently in the chest.

"I was trying to keep her mind off of killing me till you showed up," Dipper said.

"So that's what the kids are calling it these days huh?" Mabel replied, giving him a too-obvious wink.

"You aren't mad or anything are you?" Dipper asked, not quite sure what to make of Mabel's odd tone of voice.

"Well, not mad but maybe slightly jealous," Mabel said with a sniff.

"I told you, I was just trying to distract her!" Dipper objected.

"Not jealous about that you goofball - I know you wouldn't ever cheat on me," she said as she leaned in to give him a reassuring peck on the cheek.

Dipper quirked an eyebrow at her in confusion.

"Alright, so then what were you jealous about?" he asked.

Mabel crossed her arms and her face screwed up slightly into a pout.

"Well, how come all the guy vampires we've found are nasty bat-monsters that try to eat my face, but the one time we run into a girl vampire she looks like a goth fashion model?" she asked rhetorically.

"I dunno, maybe they're a different species or something? She seemed to react a lot more violently to the garlic than that guy vampire we fought a few years back," Dipper said with a shrug.

"Maybe so, but that's still just plain unfair though! The only monsters that ever hit on me were some gross little gnomes, but you suddenly have Countess kissy-fangs crawling all over you?" Mabel grumbled.

"Mabel being hit on by dead people is your fantasy, not mine – I could have done without all the attention from the unholy blood drinking lady-corpse." Dipper said.

"Alright, lets just agree to disagree on the whole vampire thing... Still, it looks like my 'idiotic' plan to use you as bait ended up working out alright after all," Mabel said with a self-satisfied nod.

"I still don't see why you ever thought that was going to work," Dipper said.

"C'mon Dip, what vampire in her right mind could resist a piece of man-candy like you?" Mabel said as she reached out to playfully squeeze Dipper's bicep.

"I can never tell when you're being serious or just messing with me," Dipper said.

"Take a guess," Mabel replied before she leaned in toward him, her arms sliding possessively around his neck to tug him into a kiss.

Dipper decided to just relax and enjoy the moment, forgetting his aches once again as he felt the soft pressure of Mabel's jaw working against his, her own small white teeth nibbling gently against his lips as she sighed into the kiss. There was just something about the relief of tension after a close brush with danger that made Dipper want to crush Mabel to his chest and not let go, and he gave in to that impulse now as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her to him. She hummed approvingly into his mouth and slid her own hands up Dipper's back, the blunted points of her finger nails tracing a spine-tingling trail up toward his neck to tangle roughly into his hair. On an impulse Dipper's lips broke contact with Mabel's and he brought them down to the side of her neck, giving the sensitive skin a quick lick before he clamped his teeth down and sucked gently, driving a low moan out from her throat.

Mabel's fingers gripped hard on Dipper's hair and jerked him off her neck to lock her eyes with his. The raw energy in her gaze mirrored his and when she spoke there was a husky note in her voice that seemed to flip all the right switches in the most primal parts of Dipper's brain,

"Okay, either we go back to the hotel right now or you're going to have to do me in this creepy room, your choice," she said.

Dipper glanced down at the tarry puddle staining the floor where the vampire had lain just moments before and felt a bolt of disgust that managed to cut through the lust that had almost overwhelmed him.

"Hotel room," he said.