Heya, peeps! This is the final rendition of "Moon's Light Madness"! Hope you've all enjoyed!

Drabble 14: Moon's Light Madness (Pt. 4, End)

Sum:
The tune reminded him of something he couldn't quite put his finger on . . . .

Universe:
Mystery Trio
Werewolf Au

(The nameswap is in affect; in other words,
Stanford is Author and Stanley is the Grunkle
we've known for more than half the summer.)

A`N:
Okay, so, here we are again. I know that you've probably been
wondering where this was going to end at, given the last note
the previous drabble on this left on. Well, let me reassure you
That this is still going to be finished! Don't worry at all!

Stanley stared down at Fidds, unconscious on the floor, groaning internally and silently cursing whatever bit him in the first place. He could hardly move without pain, though. He wasn't entirely sure what was going on; all he knew was that as soon as the Professor had said his name, something clicked. It was like a floodgate opened and allowed him to view all(or most) of his memories.

He remembered being human, Fiddlefords name, his brother, the happenings of the last month or so. He couldn't recall ever feeling so . . . human, I guess is the word for it, while still in a wolfish form. Not even when he was two days from the new moon and could remember the most, even recognizing his brother as human standing in front of him.

Lee shook himself of these thoughts, instead looking around and waiting for either his brother to show or for Fiddle-forks to wake up. He could also lay a reason as to why he took on a rabies-infested lion last night. The instinct that had suddenly shown itself; his packbrother was in trouble, and his packfriend. If he hadn't intervened . . . they would both be hurt bad or dead.

'Packbrother? Packfriend?' he contemplated, mentally shaking his head. 'This feels very . . . weird . . . ' he rolled his eyes at the repeatedly added 'pack' to the front of most words, the human in him finding it slightly annoying that he couldn't apply the terms without it, while the wolf half was content with it, seeing it as a mark of close friendship and familiar bonds.

Before too much longer, Fidds woke up again. He was quick to confirm that the werewolf was indeed his friend Stanley, leaving the room in a hurry. He returned shortly afterwards, spreading a thin, soft blanket over him and muttering something under his breath about potions and mountains before leaving again.

The wolfish side to Lee whined at the leaving of his packfriend, while his human side realized how empty his stomach felt and silently cursed while he waited for Fidds to return.

It wasn't that long, actually, before the short man returned, though he was carrying a small collection of papers and a map or two. Dragging a side table closer, he started to spread them out, rambling aloud for his friends benefit. While Lee rolled his eyes at this, he did prick his ears forward to listen, having nothing better to do.

" . . .anford discovered a reoccurring plant described in all the stories, and luckily the ones found around here in Gravity Falls match up to a 'T'. Now the only real tricky part is getting up there and actually locating it. Several things hint to one mountain in the nearby area, but it'll still be a bit of a hike. At first, we weren't sure how, er, feral you would be, so the plan was to have one go and the other stay. I do believe, however, after you've healed up a bit, that we can all go on this trip."

Lee nodded slightly, yipping quietly and slowly straining his nose towards the table, trying to ask to see. It took Fiddleford only a moment to figure out what the other wanted.

"Oh! Here, um," he pulled down a few papers, one a map and the other three ink-drawn pictures with descriptions of the plants, which, from reading some of the descriptions of the nearest one, seemed to indicate a cure. He whined and strained for one, and Fidds, taking it to mean something else, pulled back.

"Well, let's see here," he adjusted his glasses a moment. "'The Cydonia Moschata is an uncommon, medium-sized plant and can be found only high in the mountains. It blooms in late spring. It has narrow, barb shaped leaves, which are usually dark green. It also grows decent sized flowers, which can be dark purple and light purple. These plants grow separated by a fair distance from each other, and can be used as medicine.'" he recited.

Lee groaned internally, rolling his eyes, but paying a little more attention when "poison" was mentioned.

" . . .oisonous, and the odds for it to be helpful rather than harmful are fifty-fifty, but the most recent story, from around a seventy-five years ago, mention finding a garden filled with various plants, including the Cydonia Moschata, that had an unidentifiable language engraved in a boulder near the gate. With luck, we might be able to figure it out and learn exactly what that's all about."

Lee stopped paying attention afterwards, and not to long afterwards, Ford finally arrived. His gaze swept over the professor, the wolf, and the half-scattered research, but he seemed to not really see it. Hair a mess, clothes disheveled, thick layer of stubble coating his jaw and bags under his eyes.

In other words, he was a mess.

Lee barked, tailing thumping against the couch happily.

Ford walked over and stood peering down at the wolf. "I didn't see any sign of Lee." was all he said, but he sounded defeated. Solve one problem, lose another entirely.

Fidds cleared his throat. "Um, actually Ford, ah, how do I put this . . . .Lee's right here." the smaller man gestured to the wolf laying on the couch, who only nodded his head to try and help confirm that.

Ford narrowed his eyes crouching next to the wolf's head, staring into it's eyes. "Hm . . . how can we be sure?" he asked.

Lee groaned internally and rolled his eyes at his brothers paranoia. Ford got up a moment later and left the room. He was soon back, but with a framed picture of him and Lee when they were twelve with the Stano'War.

"Which one is me in this picture?" Ford demanded, holding it close enough so the wolf wouldn't have to strain.

Lee's eyes flicked from one to the other. The two were twins; and in this particular image, they'd ditched their shirts and glasses, having recently took a dip in the ocean, so their hair was dripping and not in their usual styles, either.

After a long moment, he tapped the one on the left, that didn't have a band-aid on the jaw; that had been there for awhile, after a bout of roughhousing a few days prior.

Eyes widening, Ford withdrew, mumbling under his breath and heading for the door.

"Wait, where are you going? Is the werewolf Stanley or what?" Fiddleford demanded, suddenly looking very nervous.

Ford paused by the door, glancing back. "It's him all right . . . I'm gonna go get cleaned up. . . ." that said, he left the room.

Two days later -and after a long night of discussion- the Mystery Trio were hiking up into the mountains. It would be at least a two day trip to get to the place, and after that, it could take anywhere from a day to five days to search the surrounding area for the garden. Luckily, werewolves heal very quickly. The bullet to the shoulder, once removed, healed almost overnight, and was no just a scab, and the worst of the clawmarks thin, tiny cat scratches and on the mend.

In the meantime, as they hiked up there, Ford was asking questions a mile a minute about werewolves. Lee wasn't necessarily a patient guy, and could only put up with it for so long before threatening to give him a left hook if he wouldn't shut up.

When they stopped for the night, Lee didn't pull out any of his own gear. Sure, he helped the other two nerds set up, but he didn't do anything with his own stuff. Just watched the darkening sky or watched the woods surrounding them. When night did come, he only pulled put a blanket and wrapped it around himself, laying with his back to the small fire.

And with the moon, came the changes. Fidds looked away, but Ford couldn't help but watch. In under a minute, there was a wolf, not a human shape, under the blanket. Lee poked his snout out, before slowly standing and shaking the blanket off. He was still tangled up in his clothes, though, and couldn't get them off. With a bark and a yip, he managed to get his brothers attention to the problem.

With a small laugh, Ford shook his head and helped ease the clothes off. With an appreciative now and another quiet yip, Lee then started to walk off.

"Hey! Where are you going?" Fidds demanded.

Lee barely paused, looking over his shoulder to bark, wagged his tail, locked eyes a brief moment with his twin, and then he was gone.

Even in a different form, the two could have a whole conversation with just one look. Though there were less full sentences now, and 'pack' was added to the front of 'friend' and 'brother'.

"It's fine Fidds, he'll be back before long." Ford reassured.

At the end of a long day, they set up camp at the designated spot. There were several places where the garden or it's remains could be, and searching for them first thing tomorrow was next on the list.

But when Ford was suddenly awoken by his frantic wolf-brothers yips and nudges later that night -or, more like, early that morning- and holding something in his mouth.

"Lee, calm down! What is it?" he asked.

Lee whined and dropped what he was holding. A large rock, with strange runes carved into it. Ford was quick to grab his notepad and start copying them down. It was only afterwards that he realized his brother was scratching letters into the dirt next to his sleeping bag, but they were messy and illegible.

He gave his brother a gently rub between the ears. "Sorry, bro, I can't make it out. Tomorrow, though, okay?

Lee rolled his eyes and whined, pointing his snout to where the sky was already starting to brighten with the dawn.

Ford rubbed the back of his neck. "Oh, right." he replied sheepishly.

Lee did a sortof-shrug and moved over to his own pack, taking his piles of clothes, bundled in the blanket, in his jaws. Pausing by the rock, he managed to get both in his mouth before dashing off into the trees.

Roughly an hour later, the other two members of the Mystery Trio were ready to go . . . except that Stanley hadn't returned yet. Then, they heard shouting.

"Ford! Fiddle-sticks! Get your butts over here already!" he shouted.

The two scrambled their stuff together and bolted that way, huffing and out of breath when they got there. And there stood Lee, leaning nonchalantly against a tree near an old stone wall and rusty gate.

Beyond the gate and wall stood rows upon rows of plant beds, some empty and other full to bursting. "Well, by my Nana's clear Silver Mirror! When'd you find this place?" Fidds exclaimed, going to peer over the wall.

Lee flinched, then shrugged with a grin. The blanket was thrown over his shoulder, and the stone was placed next to a bunch of other stones, though now the runes looked like little more than random squiggles, all alike. "Found it last night, but couldn't exactly open the gates. I could practically smell the, er, what'd you call it? Sight-own-ya Move-shc-kautta? Whatever, I just couldn't get in to nab some." he seemed a tad annoyed, but otherwise said nothing more.

"'Cydonia Moschata', Stanley." Ford corrected, moving to try the gate. "And it's a major part of the cure we're going to nee-"

"Don't touch the gate!" Lee suddenly snapped, grabbing his brother and yanking him back. Fidds jumped back from the wall.

"What? What is it?" the shorter man demanded.

Lee only shook his head, looking away and holding out his right hand. The palm and fingers were burnt in a pattern, as if had gripped a red-hot pole. "Got burnt." he mumbled.

Fidds cursed under his breath and pulled out the first-aid kit, making the other sit down so he could tend to it. Meanwhile, Ford took a closer look at the bars. Using a stick to rub a little of the rust off, he noticed that the handle actually looked rather reflective. Tentatively, he reached out and touched it, but nothing happened. It looked familiar . . . and then he realized from where.

"Silver . . ." he said aloud, making the others turn to him. "It's silver; silver hurts werewolves."

Lee groaned and rubbed at his face with his other hand. "Kinda wish someone had told me that earlier . . . " he grumbled, flexing his bandaged, burnt hand with a wince.

Fidds rolled his eyes and packed up the kit. "Don't whine so much about it. Let's just go in and find what we're looking for."

"I don't think that-till be necessary, young'ins." an old, gravelly voice creaked.

A man, hunched over and wearing a ratty cloak, the hood pulled up to hide his head and face. He was bent over, hints of a long, grey beard evident. He stood just on the other side of the gate, watching but making no move to touch it or leave.

"I had a feeling, I had a feeling, I did, that someone woul' be coming tip-toein' up to my moun'ain."

"Who are you?" Ford asked.

The man shrugged. "I'm younger than this gar'en yet as old as the town be'ow. Welcome. I guess you've come for a cure for yah frien'?" he asked, pointing a thing, bony hand towards Lee.

"Yes," Lee replied hesitantly. "What do you know about that?"

The old man shrugged. "I know how i' is for the moo' to overta'e yah and ma'e yah lose control. Abou' a moon or so ago, I go' ou' and raced through the fores'. A young man I come 'cross, I bite, despite the fight he put up; made me lose another tooth. Sincere apologies. When you have no family keeping you bound to your mind in the moonlight, you find yourself bound to other things." he swept his hands wide, indicating the whole garden.

"What? You're a werewolf, too? You flipping bit me?!" Lee snapped, temper rising. Ford held out his hand, stopping him.

"Yes yes, and again, I apologize. My hands and face are still burnt from the bars," he indicated the rusty gate, "made of silver, they are. Humans in, humans out. Me in, never out. I guard and tend this place, but never can I leave."

Fidds walked tentatively up to the bars. "Couldn't you just make a little of the cure yourself?" he asked.

The old man shook his head. "Too many a years I've been cursed, outliving all of my family, for many, many years since today. To take it now would leave me a shorter life than I have long outlived; I'd die, turn to dust, cease to exist; however you wish to put it."

The other three remained silent, unsure what to say. The man sighed and shook his head, reaching over and plucking a plant from somewhere behind him, tossing it over the fence.
"Here. If you've foun' this place, then you prob'ly know the cure, as well. This is all you nee'; and again, I sincerely apologize for bein' the star' of this problem; let's hope I can be the en' of i', too."

With that, he turned and walked away.

The plant was small, with narrow, barb shaped leaves, which were dark green. The flowers were decent sized, both dark purple and light purple. Fidds picked it up and carefully tucked it away into his pack.

Years from this, the other two would tease Lee about this, and if anyone else asked, it was about a Halloween prank he'd pulled one year, that ultimately got him a baseball bat to the gut.

Though every night, wolves would howl deep in the woods.

And every full moon, some farm or another, sometimes near and sometimes far from Gravity Falls, would lose an animal or two.

And some would swear they saw some wolves; some dark and some light brown.

And while the three were sometimes called up to try and help with this, they could never catch the culprits.

And every night, they'd have a good, fun time together, laughing beneath the moon.

Did Ford convince Lee to bite him before using the cure, and Fidds, too? Or is there simply wolves running amok out there? We shall never know. Please review!