Chapter 3

Ford stalked off with Stanley, looking incredulously stunned. "Okay, HOW?" he demanded, whacking a low-hanging branch out of his way. Stan's surprisingly-good poker face only agitated him further.

"Just did," Stan replied. He ducked when Ford aimed a swing at his head. "Hey, watch it! Just tell me what's next on your stupid list, we're working on a time frame here, REMEMBER?"

Ford actually growled at him, knowing full well that Stan knew that would make him shut up, pulling out his notebook. "It would be MUCH easier if we could get to that damn crystal cavern," he grumbled. "The water there is almost the purest thing we can manage at this time of year."

"Then MAYBE we should just go LOOK for another way in instead of bitching about it," Stan said. "A lot can happen in seventeen years, you know."

"Stanley, if YOU want to go and see, be my guest!" Ford snapped, shoving the notebook back into his pocket. "If ANYTHING, splitting up would keep this aneurism you're giving me from exploding!"

Stan scowled at him. "Fine!" he shot back, then dug around in his bag and shoved a small smoke bomb at him. "Don't waste it." He slung his bag over his shoulder and headed off in the direction of the cavern. Ford stared at the bomb in his hand, feeling a small twinge of guilt before shoving it down, stuffing the bomb into his pocket and heading off into the direction of the next item on his list.

The Moths of Eternal Moonlight (OKAY, YES, HE NAMED SOME OF HIS FINDS OFF OF D'N'D'N' MORE D CREATURES) were one of the nicer finds he discovered in the forest. After a couple months of examination, he found that the moths worked with the lunar cycle. Their lives were very short, being hatched during the full moon, cocooned at the new moon, and then emerged for the full moon after that. Provided predators didn't find them, they only lived until the next new moon, where they settled down and promptly died.

Ford only discovered their attributes after death when he was studying the new batch that was hatching up. He found a new batch of them hatching right next to a collective settlement of dead ones, and saw that in death, their wings still glowed brightly in the moonlight. When he touched them, he found that they were like hardened, brittle glass.

Naturally, he took a few for experimentation, and found that they has amazing preservation qualities. The trees and plants they settled on remained green and healthy, even in the winter. It would only stand to reason that they would be useful for helping Dipper and Mabel.

The ONLY problem with this was that the area the moths bred and settled was right smack dab in gremloblin territory.

Ford absently rested his hand on the gun on his thigh holster, heading off in the direction of the moths. If only this were winter, when those creatures went into hibernation…

He made sure to make as little sound as possible, since gremloblins worked by sound and smell. Their eyesight was atrocious, until they had a hold of you, and by then it was too late. The last thing he needed was to have his worst nightmare paralyzing him with fear.

Ford finally made it to the area where the moths were, having to look carefully to find them. In the daytime, the dead moths were clear as glass without the shininess to make them easy to spot. After some careful scrutiny, he found a good bit of them, smiling at his fortune.

He took an empty box out of his pocket, carefully plucking the moths off of the branches and putting them inside, filling up the box before securing it shut and putting it into his bag. That was two things down now, he just had to track down that brother of his and—

The sound of growling dragged him out of his thoughts. He froze up, then slowly turned his head to the side, seeing a gremloblin sniffing at the air, edging its way up to him. Ford swallowed hard, his hand inching towards his gun as he backed up ever so—

Snap

—and he stepped on a twig. Brilliant. The gremloblin's head snapped up, looking in his direction. Ford quickly looked away, eyes darting around as he looked for an escape route, found one, and took off for it.

He heard the gremloblin roar and bolt after him, smashing through trees and foliage. Ford bit back all the loud swearing he was wanting to shout, only to keep the noise down to a minimum. If he could just get out of the gremloblin's sight, the creature would lose interest and head on!

He leapt over a fallen tree, feeling something drop out of his pocket. Hoping it wasn't anything important, he glanced back for a split second and saw the smoke bomb Stanley had given him. THAT could be useful, actually.

Ford skidded to a halt and doubled back, having to dive to the ground to snatch it up, scrambling under the gremloblin's reach. He jumped up and swung his arm back to throw the bomb, only to be knocked back into a tree by its tail.

'Oh shit,' he thought, shoving his glasses back up his face before he dropped and broke them. Only female gremloblins had tails, and they were worse than the males around breeding season. He looked around frantically for the bomb, swearing sharply when he saw it knocked about ten feet away. The gremloblin snarled at him, crouched down low in preparation to spring at him.

Ford fumbled for his gun, keeping his eyes just off to the side to keep from looking her directly, jerking back when he saw her bound up.

He was sure she would have gotten her claws right in him, if Stanley hadn't come out of NOWHERE and tackled her right out of the air and to the ground.

The gremloblin jerked up, snarling and swiping at Stan, who leaned out of the way and took a diving leap onto her back, manhandling her back to the ground. The gremloblin screeched, reaching back and swiping at him with her claws, managing to catch his arm and buck him off.

Stan rubbed at his arm, flexing his hand several times as he felt numbness spread, swearing under his breath as he glowered at the gremloblin. The beast roared, glaring right back, her eyes flashing.

"STANLEY, DON'T LOOK RIGHT AT IT!" Ford shouted, scrambling to his feet, only to pause when Stan just glared back harder and took a threatening step forward…and to Ford's amazement, the gremloblin stepped back.

Stan made a feral-sounding growl in the back of his throat, taking another stomping step forward, and the gremloblin broke eye contact, shifting back, growling softly. Ford snapped out of his stupor and whipped his gun out, taking aim before having his arm shoved down by Stan.

"It's fine, Ford," Stan said. "Leave it." He shook out his arm, the numbness creeping over his shoulder. "Shit, let's get out of here before this spreads anymore." He hurried off down another path with Ford in tow, looking up when thunder rumbled across the sky, which had begun to accumulate clouds. "Oh, you've got to be kidding me…"

Ford looked around before remembering something. "This way," he said, grabbing Stan's arm and hurrying off, noticing about two minutes into walking the path that Stan was stumbling and cursing under his breath. Ford bit his lip, finally coming to a cave that he remembered being there thirty-odd years ago. He quickly checked inside to see if it was empty before tugging Stan in just as it began to rain.

Stan collapsed against the wall of the cave, his hand twitching as the gremloblin's paralyzing toxin took hold. His legs had gone numb about a minute ago, but now they refused to move. Only his left arm was still functional, but even that had some numbness to it.

"The toxin shouldn't last more than an hour," Ford said, peeking out to make sure nothing else would use the cave as a shelter. "You might have some muscle spasms for a few days after, though."

"Nothing I'm not used to already," Stan retorted, sighing. "At least I'm not aching after that scuffle, small mercies there." Ford went quiet, sitting on the wall opposite to Stan, chewing his lip, glancing down absently and noticing that his hands were shaking.

"….What the hell were you thinking?" Ford finally said with no real bite to his voice. "You could have gotten yourself killed! Gremloblins—"

"If you're already thinking about it, it wont work." Ford looked up, frowning. Stan shrugged his left shoulder. "They make you see your worst nightmare, right? If you're already thinking about it, they lose that edge. Those things are cowards by nature. If they cant scare you, they cant hurt you." He closed his eyes, sighing.

Ford sat in silence for a good while. "…how do you know all this?" he asked. No reply. "Stanley?" He looked up, seeing Stan still against the wall. He had a moment of panic until he heard light snoring. "…Figures." He checked his watch and set it for an hour, thinking he'd let Stan sleep that long before waking him up, looking out at the rain.

It wasn't a minute later until he was snoring too.