First off, HAPPY HALLOWEEN! I just had to get that out of the way. Now this is a VERY special chapter, not just for me, but Fallers worldwide. It is special for Fallers because it is the episode that started the main mystery, so it seems appropriate that I release this episode Halloween weekend.
This episode is the most important one for me. Long story short, I was visiting family and my little cousins turned the show on, and it happened to be this episode, and… here we are. I can't believe it guys. 8 months ago when I started this story and the show ended, I have been waiting to give you all this chapter and get into the main part of the show. Things are going to start getting interesting. But before we dive head-first straight into chaos, I have shout-outs to do!
Gamelover41592- Thanks for the review! Hopefully you will send in some questions next time!
Maximal7x13- Thanks for the review! It took me a little time to figure out how to answer the questions and not break the forth wall too much, but I got it, so I'm glad it worked out. I did google catalyst, so I'm pretty sure you used it correctly. Don't worry about the trying to sound smart thing; that just makes you more like Dipper!
Skitty- Thanks for your review! I have an original chapter planned for their anniversary, so that should give you a bit more. It's kind of why I was a bit vague with the details of their actual anniversary; giving you something to look forward to. My plan is to re-write the fight scene in D&M vs. Future to make it more like an actual fight than Mabel getting upset and running off. All that disconnectedness is leading up to that time, and I think you will like what I have planned. And I've said this before: Now that we are in the main part of the show, things are going to get interesting.
Charr17- Bud, that wasn't your fault. Someone else sent in that same question, but it was specified to Dipper. I was going to have that happen anyways. Totally not your fault! And each relationship will have problems sooner or later; it was only a matter of time. Thanks for your review!
Lula Bear the awesome- Thanks for your review! I'll go into a bit more detail later when I write their anniversary chapter, but until then, hopefully that is enough to keep you happy!
Onsie- Thanks for your review! The reason she was freaked out during inconveniencing wasn't just because of the ghosts. It was also a bit of claustrophobia and not knowing who/what was making the events happen and why. As for what they see in each other; Alex likes Willow's creepiness and impulsiveness, and Willow likes Alex's calmness and serenity. They balance each other out. Hope that makes sense and that you can see it!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything except my OC's. Gravity Falls and its characters, including Bill Cipher, came from the mind of Alex Hirsch.
Dipper's POV (Friday, July 13th)
I'm not superstitious, but this Friday the 13th wasn't starting out so well. There were no tours to keep us busy, and we couldn't go outside and do anything. The reason? It was POURING out. This was the first substantial rain we had had since we came up here, but there was almost nothing for us to do. It was only nine in the morning and we had only been up for like an hour, but we were already bored out of our minds.
The three of us were playing Chinese Checkers. Well, two of us were playing; Mabel had stolen all her pieces and was playing a weird version of marbles with them. Willow and I were almost done when Stan called us downstairs.
"Kids! I need you to laugh at this with me!" He said, pointing at the TV. Gideon was floating through the sky and singing.
"Who's cute as a button and always your friend? Lil' G-I-D to the E-O-N! Wink!" And then he winked and I mentally face-palmed.
"That kid will never leave us alone, will he?" I asked rhetorically. Ever since the Shrink Ray incident, we could barely go a day without having to kick him out of the building.
"Not unless I use him as a target and make him look like a porcupine," Willow replied. If she did want to do that, I don't think any of us would stop her.
"Remember when I wouldn't date him and he tried to destroy us?" Mabel asked.
"Technically he only tried to destroy me and Dip, but yeah," Willow replied.
"He's always trying to trick me into losing the Mystery Shack," Stan added. The stupid people in Gravity Falls made a law called Finders Keepers. Long story short, whoever had the deed to a property owned it, no matter what the deed itself said. It made it easy to buy/sell property, but when someone was willing to kill to get a property, it became a pain in the neck.
"One time I caught him stealing my moisturizer," Wendy added, she and Soos walking into the room. The driveway had gotten majorly flooded, so they were both stuck here, but that wasn't anything majorly weird. They hung out here so much that they had started leaving a change of clothes here for if they ended up spending the night.
"And yet, our mutual hatred for him bonds us together," Soos finished as Bud Gleeful did the VO.
"Come on down to Li'l Gideon's Tent of Telepathy, opening soon at this location." The shack came on the screen, then Gideon's tent fell from the sky and crushed it.
"Should we be worried about that?" I asked, not that concerned.
"The only way Gideon's taking over this place is by breaking in and stealing my deed," Stan assured me. I shrugged. Gideon had been trying to take over for weeks now. If he hadn't been able to yet, there was no way that-
CRASH! Something very loud came from down the hall. "Not again," Stan sighed, standing up. Soos went into the kitchen as the rest of us followed Stan to his office. He threw the door open and, sure enough, Gideon had broken the window and was trying different combos to Stan's safe. "Gideon!" Stan yelled as Soos caught up to us.
"Stanford, my arch-nemesis. We seem to have entered a dangerous game of cat and mouse. But the question remains; Who is the cat, and who is the-"
"Soos, broom," Stan ordered, taking the broom from Soos' hand and walking into his office. He started hitting Gideon with the broom, Gideon hissing like a cat each time. Eventually, Stan got behind him and started pushing him out the door into the rain.
"You mark my words Stanford! One day I'm gonna get that combination! And once I steal the deed, you'll never see the Mystery Shack again!"
"Good luck bucko!" Stan replied, slamming the door and giving Soos the broom back before walking into his office, the girls and I behind him. We turned around as he put the combo in; we had asked for it before, but he had refused saying 'the less people who know, the better,' so we didn't push him on it.
"Clear kids," he told us. We turned around and saw the deed sitting in the safe, along with a few other papers. Probably just his birth certificate and businessman papers. He closed the door and hit lock, then stood up and turned back to us. "Don't worry about that kid. The combo is in the one place he'll never find it: my brain." If I had learned anything this summer, it was that Stan is stubborn as a mule, and it would take something gigantic for him to reveal his secrets.
Half an hour later, we were all back to being bored. It had gotten so bad that we had willinglysat down to watch some of Stan's old movies. Even though none of us besides him were really watching it. Wendy and I were lazily firing Nerf guns at each other, Willow was messing with a Rubik's Cube (her record was 30 seconds) and Mabel was curled up with Waddles.
The movie that was in right now was Grandpa the Kid, some old cowboy movie from the 60's. "I'm tired during the day," Grandpa the Kid announced, Mabel waking up a bit.
"I can relate to this," Stan said as Mabel pulled out one of her favorite movies.
"Grunkle Stan, can't we watch a movie we'll all enjoy? Like Dream Boy High! 'Where love is on your permanent record!'' The four of us booed; At least Stan's movies were good for their time period. Mabel kept smiling. "You'll learn to like it," she assured us as something crashed in the kitchen.
"Dudes!" Soos yelled, running into the room. "There's a bat in the kitchen! It tried to touch me with it's weird little bat fingers!"
"Don't worry, I got this under control," Stan said, then put the back of his chair down. "Dipper, take care of it."
"Why can't the girls to it?" I asked. It wasn't that I didn't want to do it… okay I didn't, but anything was better than nothing. But Stan always made me do dumb things around the house and was easy on the girls. And yes, sometimes it wasn't so bad; it did lead me to the journal almost a month ago, but still; it was ALWAYS me!
"Because life isn't fair. Now go fight a bat so we can watch TV." That was it; I was done.
"No way Grunkle Stan! You always make me do dumb chores. I'm putting my foot down this time!" I yelled, stomping for emphasis.
"I said do it kid. NOW!" We both stared staring at each other, and eventually Stan won.
"Fine, I'll do it," I relented, walking towards the kitchen, Mabel behind me and Willow walking towards her workshop. I pick up a frying pan and a spoon, mumbling to myself. Mabel came up and stood back-against-the-wall by the doorway.
"Remember, bats are more afraid of you than you are of them," she told me. I shrugged and walked into the kitchen, eyes open for the bat. It came at me from behind and I started running around, bumping into everything and making a mess, getting scratched and bruised the whole time. This Friday the 13th REALLY wasn't going all that well.
Willow's POV
The rain had stopped, so the bat had left when Wendy opened the door to head home; Stan had cancelled everything for the day, so she took off. I had grabbed the first aid kit that I kept in my workshop for Dipper, who had gotten scratched up pretty bad. Soos was using the disinfectant and Mabel and I were bandaging him up, which was hard because he kept flinching every time Soos touched him.
"It stings!" He complained as we finished up.
"You'll be glad for it when whatever diseases that bat had don't infect you," I replied, closing the kit.
"Why does Grunkle Stan always pick on me?" He asked, continuing before we could answer; he always did that when he was mad about something. "Think about it! The more painful or difficult the chore is, the more likely I'll have to do it. Why doesn't he pick on you guys?"
"Dipper, Stan's personality of one of life's great mysteries," Soos said, sounding pretty philosophical. Then the normal him came back. "Like whether or not it's possible to lick your own elbow."
"Bet you can't!" Mabel jumped excitedly.
"Bet I can!" Soos replied, trying to do so. They both started walking outside. I put the kit back in my workshop before following them out. Dipper would want to be alone, and chances were high that they would get lost because they weren't paying attention.
We walked a pretty far ways out. I had never seen this area of the forest before. It was pretty cool, but I felt like we were being watched. It probably didn't help that Mabel had been chanting the entire time and I had left my crossbow at home. Thank god Soos eventually gave up. "Like the infinite horizon, it eludes my grasp," he stated.
"Let's head back; this place gives me the creeps," Mabel said, looking around for the first time.
"You guys are lucky I was paying-" An all too familiar laughter came from off to our right behind some bushes. "Not Gideon again!"
We all walked over and peered through the bushes. Gideon was on his knees in front of a bunch of candles and a picture of Stan, the eyes crossed out. He was saying the same gibberish over and over, almost like a chant. "What's he doing?" Mabel whispered.
"Shush," I whispered back, not wanting to miss a second of this. All of a sudden, the entire forest turned gray, us and Gideon the only things in color. Things started slowing down; literally. A frog and some butterflies that were by us froze in midair.
Something exploded in the air about ten feet up. Small beams of light were circling a white triangle that was getting bigger. Once it reached its full size, maybe three feet per side, small flames lit around the edges of it, the inside showing space. Laughter seemed to be coming from everywhere, but none of us were laughing.
Oh God, I thought as an eye appeared towards the top of the triangle, the pupil like that of a cats. Soos and Mabel hunched down and Gideon stepped back, but I kept staring, praying it wasn't what, or who, I thought it was.
"Crap." All at once, the way back home disappeared and my entire mind went blank as the flames disappeared and the triangle went from showing space too solid black. There were white outlines of three rows of bricks coming from the base. A bow tie appeared just under his eye, a top hat floated just above his head, and skinny arms and legs had appeared.
The word nachos flashed in my head as the triangle went from black and white too yellow and black and floated down towards Gideon. "Oh, Gravity Falls! It is good to be back! Name's Bill Cipher, and I take it you're some kind of living ventriloquist dummy?" He asked Gideon, the slight hope I had had that I was wrong gone after he confirmed what I had thought; Bill Cipher had returned. Bill Cipher laughed and answered his own question. "I'm just kidding. I know who you are Gideon."
"W-What are you? H-How do you know my name?" Gideon asked. The idiot summoned something without knowing what it was? I thought he was smarter than that!
"Oh, I know lots of things!" Bill Cipher replied, a blue light coming from behind him. His body started flashing different images as his voice dropped a few octaves and he repeated "LOTS OF THINGS!" Then the light disappeared and his body and voice returned too normal.
"Look what I can do!" He said excitedly. He gestured to a deer that was nearby and pulled all of the teeth out of its mouth, teleporting them to Gideon's hands. "Deer teeth! For you kid!"
"You're insane!" Gideon yelled, dropping the teeth on the ground.
"Sure I am. What's your point?" Bill Cipher asked, putting the teeth back in the deer's mouth. Gideon seemed to have gotten over his shock because he started barking orders like he normally does.
"Listen to me demon! I have a job for you! I need you to enter the mind of Stanford Pines and steal the code to his safe!"
Shit! Bill Cipher's laughter stopped as he realized what Gideon had said. "Wait… Stan Pines?" He turned away from all of us, his body going staticy. I couldn't see what he was showing, but it couldn't be good. After a few seconds he turned back to face us. "You know what kid? You've convinced me. I'm sold! I'll help you with this and in return you can help me with something I've been working on. We'll work out the details later."
"Deal!" Gideon replied, holding his hand out. Bill Cipher made blue flame come from his hand before he and Gideon shook, finalizing the deal.
"Well, time to invade Stan's mind! This should be fun!" Bill Cipher stated, floating back above us, a blue light coming from behind him. "Remember: reality is an illusion, the universe is a hologram, buy gold, BBBBBBYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEE!" He turned solid black and disappeared.
I opened my eyes and saw that the color had returned and the animals that were near us had become unfrozen. I looked through the bushes and my blood ran cold again as Gideon said, "It worked," and started laughing evilly, proving that it hadn't just been some crazy dream.
I took a few steps backwards then turned around and took off towards where I knew town would be. Mabel and Soos ran after me, yelling for me to stop and explain, but I ignored them, focused on getting back to the shack as quick as possible.
It had just started raining again when we got to the edge of town and I finally started to slow down. "Snacks!" I heard Soos call from behind me, so I ran towards the vending machines that were close by. As impatient as I was to get back, arriving out of breath is not a good idea.
"Okay, what the hell is going on?" Mabel asked as Soos walked up to the vending machine. "That reaction was a lot more than what was called for."
"Gid-Gideon summoned B-Bill Ci-Cipher," I explained, still trying to wrap my head around it. "The author has history with that… that creature. According to him, Bill Cipher is pure evil and should be avoided at all costs. I don't know how Gideon knew how to summon him, but he did and he's going after Grunkle Stan. We have to get back. Now."
We took off again, running through the rain before re-entering the forest. Now that we knew which direction we were heading, we were willing to take a shortcut through the woods. Eventually the shack came into sight. Throwing cation to the wind, we ran through the door and into the living room, Mabel and Soos in the lead; If my reaction had been bad, Dipper's would be ten times worse, and I didn't think I could handle telling him. Stan was sleeping peacefully in his chair. Dipper was there sweeping, but looked up as we barged in, sensing our anxiety.
"Dip, we gotta help Stan!" Mabel yelled before bending over to catch her breath.
"Back up. What's the hell is going on?"
"This evil triangle guy," Soos explained, still eating his Burrito Bites, "Said he's gonna break into Stan's mind and steal the code to his safe! Also we stopped for snacks on the way here."
Dipper froze and the broom fell to the ground, his skin getting at least three shades paler. "T-T-Triangle guy? Wills…" He trailed off and looked at me.
"Nachos," I whispered, barely loud enough to hear. He freaked out and almost ripped his vest as he tried to pull the journal out, whispering a few curses the whole time. He eventually found the right page and started reading out loud.
"'Beware Bill! The most powerful and dangerous creature I've ever encountered.' Blah, blah, blah. 'Whatever you do, never let him into your mind.'" Stan grunted and started twitching in his sleep.
"Grunkle Stan!" Mabel yelled. His twitches started getting worse and his eyes flew open, glowing blue. I grabbed the journal out of Dipper's hands and started reading.
"'It is possible to follow the demon into a person's mind and prevent his chaos. One must simply recite this incantation.'"
"This is just great. I spend all day cleaning sinks and fighting bats for Stan and now I have to save him from some crazy brain demon?" Dipper asked, taking the journal from me. Mabel got right up in his face.
"If we don't do anything Gideon will take the shack, or worse, and I KNOW you want to stay here as long as possible!" We all turned back to Stan as he screamed a bit, Dipper relenting.
"Fine, but only for the sake of the rest of summer. Get ready guys. We're about to journey into the most horrifying, disturbing place any of us have ever been; our uncle's mind."
Five minutes later, we were ready to go in. We had a bunch of candles on the ground in a half circle around Stan, the flames the only light. I was bringing my crossbow with me; going in empty-handed would be suicide. The other's each had a Nerf gun with them, just in case.
"Everyone ready?" Dipper asked. We all nodded, wanting to get this over with as soon as possible. "Then let's do this." We all reached out and put our hands on Stan's head, Dipper reading the incantation. "Videntis Omnium. Magister Mentium. Magnesium Ad Hominem. Magnum Opus. Habeas Corpus. Inceptus Nolanus Overratus! Magister Mentium! Magister Mentium! MAGISTER MENTIUM!" Then everything went white.
Dipper's POV
Just an FYI, that incantation roughly translates to: Confidence of all. Master of the Mind. Magnesium to man. Great work. May you have the body. Inception by Nolan is overrated! Master of the mind! Master of the mind! MASTER OF THE MIND!
It was the weirdest thing I've ever felt, and I've been telekinetically manipulated, traveled through time, got shrunk and swapped bodies with my sister, so my saying it was weird is saying A LOT. You know how when you are almost asleep, but then feel like you're falling? It felt like that, but ten times worse because we couldn't wake up and stop it. And when we did wake up, it was that confused feeling like when after you have a dream that could happen and you believe the events actually did happen, and you have to convince yourself that it was a dream. It felt like that, and the weirdest part was having to remind myself that we were technically asleep. Pretty sure I was gonna have a headache when this was over.
Stan's mind was interesting to say the least. We were standing outside the shack, everything different shades of gray. The signs on top of the shack weren't in their right place, and the boards that it was built out of were coming apart. Everything inside the shack had been thrown around outside, including Stan's favorite chair, which was leaning against the pole of an old, two-person swing-set with one of the seats broken.
"Whoa," Soos said, which pretty much summed up what we were all feeling.
"Okay guys," Willow said, turning around to face us. "We don't know what it's going to be like in there, so we stay together, and look out for Bill Cipher."
"Yeah, look out for Bill Cipher!" Willow whirled around and froze as Bill floated onto the porch, twirling a cane around his wrist. I can safely say that the drawing of him in the journal didn't do him justice. Seeing him in his normal form with full color… It was creepy, especially considering he didn't have a mouth and yet was still talking. I didn't like not being able to see someone's emotions.
"You leave our Grunkle alone you monster!" Mabel yelled, running towards him. She dove, but he just grew another foot or two and let her go through his stomach. Willow fired, but the bolt went right through him before Mabel came tumbling back out, her arms crossed. "GOTCHA! Wait, what?" We all turned to face him, watching as he floated back to the porch.
"Ah, Stan's family, we meet at last! Question Mark, Shooting Star, Oak Leaf, Pine Tree. I had a hunch I might run into you!" He made a finger gun and shot two red lazer beams out of his finger. The first one vaporized Willow's crossbow, making her freak out. The second one flew right at me and burned a hole through my chest. Not having internal organs is a weird feeling.
"What do you want with Stan's mind anyway?" I asked him, calming down a bit.
"Nothing much; just the code to the old man's safe! Inside that shack is a maze of thousands of doors representing his memories. Behind one of them is the memory of him setting the code! I just need to find it and Gideon will pay me handsomely!"
"Not if we stop you!" The girls yelled at the same time, making him laugh.
"Fat chance! I'm the master of the mind!" He yelled, blue flame coming from somewhere. "I even know what you girls are thinking right now!"
"That's impossible!" Mabel yelled. Bill snapped and the two boys from her Dream Boy High movie appeared, giving Mabel compliments. "I'm never letting go of your leg!" Mabel yelled, grabbing the leg of the blue-haired boy. Bill turned to Willow, who was standing defiantly.
"As for you, you're gonna be trouble. Right now you're wanting that little toy of yours back. How's about this instead?" Bill snapped again and a familiar face appeared right next to Willow.
"Hey Oak Leaf," the fake Alex greeted, leaning in towards Willow. She leaned back and glared at Bill.
"I know what game you're trying to play here. Showing us what we want to throw us off. There's no way you're gonna get away with this."
"You say that now. I know what I'm doing. You kids are out of your league. I was you, I'd turn around now before you see something you might regret. Later suckers!" He tipped his hat and flew backwards, crashing through the wall of the dream-shack.
"We're going in," I announced, leading the way in. The inside of the building looked weird, but this time it was a cool weird. Like everything else, the entire space was gray. There were a bunch of floating staircases leading up to different doors. The doors were labeled by category, so hopes and fears (which was a wooden crate with chains locked over it) were separate from the memories.
"This place is cool looking," Willow stated as we walked through the memory door.
"I'm sure there are plenty of memories of Stan bossing me around," I muttered. Mabel got in my face again.
"What did I tell you? Just drop it! Priorities bro! We have to find the code before Bill does!"
"She's right," Willow stated before facing the group. "If we all stay together we have no chance. Split up, but stay close, and no one goes anywhere alone. Let's go!" Soos and I teamed up, Mabel and her boys taking the right while we took the left, Willow and 'Alex' heading down to the end of the hall and working their way back to us.
I opened the first door I came too. A younger Stan was sitting on a bench in a jail cell, two other inmates on either side of him. "Jorge, Rico, you're the two best Colombian prison friends a fella could make," Young Stan said, putting his hand on the other's shoulders. They said some Spanish to each other, and even though I didn't know what it was, it didn't sound nice. I shrugged and moved onto the next door.
We explored for a good 20 minutes, not finding anything about the safe, but there were some memories that were pretty interesting. Great-Grandpa Filbrick yelling at Stan for wearing Groucho Marx glasses to his Bar Mitzvah. Stan watching Cash Wheel on his birthday. Lots of things with the broken swing-set we had seen outside. One that was kind of sweet was Stan teaching Soos, maybe 13 years old, how to box. Soos had gotten kind of emotional, but the next one was probably the most shocking.
"Guys, you might want to see this," Willow called us over, holding open a relatively small door. We all peered inside and saw a place somewhere in Vegas. "He was married to her?!" Stan was probably 30, and the woman he was with was… whoa! She was… you know what, I can't describe her without it sounding weird. But men would kill to have a life with her!
"Stan Pines, do you take Marilyn Rosenstein to be your wife?" The Justice of the Peace asked.
"I do," Stan replied, the two of the kissing before the Justice could tell them to. The memory went staticy for a few seconds before clearing, showing Stan in and office sitting across from someone, files between them.
"I'm sorry Mr. Pines. Marilyn is a scam artist. She only married you so she could take your car," the official told Stan. The memory went staticy again, so Willow closed the door and we walked on. At some point we had gotten back into one big group, so when I saw the door labeled "Dipper Memories" all of them told me to move on.
"I just wanna know what the old guy really thinks of me," I told them, figuring this was the best way to do it.
"We already know how Grunkle Stan feels about us! He loves us! We're great," Mabel said, all of them continuing down the hall. I followed for a few feet, but then doubled back and slipped through the door.
"Just a quick peek," I told myself, walking down the hallway. Stan's voice calling my name echoed all around me. I shrugged and opened a door. Stan and I were standing on the porch, Stan yelling at me.
"No buts! Now go chop that firewood already!" He wacked my head with a rolled-up newspaper. I walked over to the chopping block (why he wanted firewood in the middle of summer was beyond me) and started cutting as he sat down on the couch he kept outside.
"Stan, I've been meaning to ask you. Why are you so hard on Dipper all the time?" Soos asked Stan.
"Soos, I'm gonna let you in on something. Wanna know what I really think?" Stan started whispering, and I leaned in a bit more to hear what he was saying. "…The kid's a loser. He's weak! He's an utter embarrassment! I just wanna get rid of him."
I closed the door and started walking back to find the group. If they wanted to find the code they could go ahead, but I couldn't care less anymore. If Stan didn't even want me here, then I wouldn't make it harder on him to get rid of me.
Willow's POV
"Okay guys, I've got a good feeling about this door," Mabel stated, putting her hand on a door marked "Top Secret." She opened the door, giving all of us nightmares.
Stan was in his boxers in the bathroom. "Hey Mr. Tummy!" He said, changing his voice and making his belly button talk. "Hey Mr. Stan!" He went back to his normal voice. "Are you hungry?" "Yes!" He said that as his tummy before feeding it crackers.
"Sweet Sally!" Mabel announced, slamming the door shut.
"We've been searching forever! What if the triangle guy finds the memory before we do?" Soos asked, looking around as if mentioning his name might bring him to us.
"If we wanna find Stan's memory we gotta think like him," I realized. "He's always hiding stuff."
"Yeah, like how he hides his arrest warrants under the rug in the gift shop!" Soos supplied. I nodded then glanced around and saw the same rug.
"Soos, that's it!" 'Alex' and I bent down and pulled the rug back, revealing a door that looked more like a tree house entrance. Everyone crowed in and I pulled the door open.
Stan kissed the deed before putting it into the safe. "There ya go," he said, closing the door. "And now to set the code. 13… 44… and finally-" I closed the door before we could learn the entire thing. Half of us were made by Bill, and like Stan said; the less people who knew, the better. But that didn't stop me from wondering. My guess was 48.
"What do we do now? Jinx!" Mabel's boys said. God, they were getting annoying!
"Let's just destroy the door before Bill finds it!" Mabel said, glancing around.
"On it!" 'Alex' yelled, running to a suit of armor that was nearby and taking the battle ax from its hands. He ran back over and was about to bring the ax down when Soos stopped him.
"Maybe I should do it! My big fat arms are great at destroying stuff!"
"Okay," he said, taking a step back. Biggest mistake EVER! Soos held his hand out over the door, a blue light coming from it. After a few seconds, the door came up out of the floor and started floating above Soos' head.
"Hey guys!" Another Soos came running up, completely oblivious to his clone. "I just saw a memory of Stan rolled skating and wearing short-shorts! Didn't look half bad." Then he realized he LITERALLY was talking to himself. "Something weird is going on here."
The first Soos started laughing, his two eyes morphing into one before his form changed back into Bill Cipher. "Boy you kids are gullible! I knew you would lead me straight to the code! That was even easier than I thought!"
"You're a stink face!" Mabel yelled, one of her boys backing her up. "Don't treat me like a child Xyler!"
"Later suckers!" Bill yelled, flying backwards, door in hand.
"Guys, we gotta save Stan! Let's get-"
"What's the point?" We all turned around and saw Dipper walking down a flight of stairs, looking as depressed as ever. "Why should I save him? I work for Stan all day and all he does in return is say he wants to get rid of me."
"Dip, I'm sure that's not true," Mabel told him.
"I saw it with my own eyes in one of his memories! He always picks on me and now I know why! Stan HATES me!" I sighed, having enough of this.
"Forget what you saw! If we don't stop Bill, then Gideon will get the shack and summer is over!" I knew he was looking forward to the next seven weeks, but he must have seen something major.
"No! Stan doesn't even want me here, and I'm not gonna make it harder on him to get rid of me! Stay if you want, but as far as I'm concerned, as soon as we wake up, I'm calling Mom and Dad!"
"But what about-"
"Not gonna happen! I'm not fixing Stan's problems anymore!"
"Well FINE! We'll save Stan on our own! Let's go guys!" I lead the way, not caring who followed or not. I didn't care if I had an army behind me or if it was just me: I loved this place now and I was staying here as long as possible, and NOTHING would make me leave before the end of summer.
Bill's POV
Humans are idiots; I LOVE IT! Although Oak Leaf could be some trouble. But I wasn't worried about her right now. I just had to get the code to Gideon and then they wouldn't cause problems for anyone. Speaking of, Gideon called just then. I did owe the kid, but he was getting kind of annoying.
"Bill! Did ya find the memory with the combo yet?" He asked me. I was glad there was only a few minutes' left before our deal was completed.
"Relax short-stack; I got it right here," I told him, holding out the door so he could see it. Evil laughter is my favorite sound!
"Perfect! Now give it to me and I'll fulfill my end of the bargain!" Man, if that worked, things were gonna get fun!
"Finally! You got a pen there?" I opened the door as he grabbed a pen and notebook out of his jacket. "It's 13… 44… WHAT!?" Something came from somewhere and the door flew out of my hand. It fell through a door with a memory about the Bottomless Pit, disappearing down the abyss.
At first I thought Oak Leaf had figured out how to get her little toy back. But when I turned around I saw that Shooting Star had used one of those little kiddie foam gun thingies instead. "The deal's off!" Dammit! I had forgotten Gideon could see everything!
"Kid, wait! I can-"
"NOPE! I'm switchin' to plan B!" Gideon hung up and I broke into a bunch of pieces. I looked over at the others who were still celebrating. I could still have some fun with them.
"YOU!" I yelled, making myself red this time. Red means fear; fear means fun! They all glanced at me, the humans drawing their foam guns like that would help anything. "You can't imagine what you just cost me! Do you have any idea what I'm like..."? I lowered my voice and lit my hands on fire, "WHEN I'M MAD?!"
I started flashing different symbols in my eye and on their faces. The look of fear on their face was PRICELESS! I made fire surround us in a circle then grew it to be at least ten feet high. Then I made a rock in the shape of Stan's face come out of the ground and fly into the sky above the building. I grew myself to 20 feet, making them panic even more. I could wait to see their faces when I made them, "EAT NIGHTMARES!"
Dipper's POV
Bill wasn't kidding when he said this place was a maze. I had been walking around forever and hadn't found the way out. At this point, I was just opening random doors, hoping to find something that looked familiar. I opened another door and saw that it was the same one from earlier of me chopping wood. "This again?" I said to myself. At least I knew where to go from here.
"Kid's a loser, he's weak…" Stan was saying to Soos. I started to close the door, not wanting to hear Stan saying those things about me again. "Those are all things people said about me when I was a boy."
Wait, what? I opened the door the whole way and leaned in, listening to the entire conversation this time.
"It was terrible. I was the biggest wimp on the playground!" A door opened behind me. A young Stan, maybe 8, got hit in the face with a soccer ball, causing him to run away crying. "So one summer my pop signs me up for boxing lessons. It was even worse than the school yard!" Another door opened, showing a ten-year-old Stan pinned under another kid, boxing gloves on each of their fists.
"Left hook!" Young Stan yelled, punching the other kid's jaw. That door closed and another opened, showing Stan, maybe 16, in line for the premier of Grandpa the Kid. "At the time I thought my pop was trying to torture me. But turns out, the old man was doing me a favor all along!" In the memory, a thug came up behind a woman and tried to take her purse. Stan left-hooked him, knocking him to the ground, the other people hailing him a hero and the woman kissing him.
"So ya see? That's why I'm hard on Dipper: to toughen him up. So when the world fights, he fights back." Okay, yeah, I screwed up big time.
"Do you think it's actually working?" Soos asked. In the memory, I cut the piece of wood in half, then started celebrating because I had been able to do it.
"He's really coming along! When push comes to shove, I'm actually proud of him. Just don't ever tell him I said that. His head's big enough as it is." I don't know when but I had been leaning against the doorway when the barrier gave out. I stumbled into the memory, Soos and Stan turning towards me.
"Kid, what are you doing here? Nice hole in your chest, by the way. Let's fix that up." Stan snapped and the hole closed up as if it had never happened.
"W-What? How did you do that?" I asked, patting my chest and back. Man, it felt good to have my organs back.
"Word to the wise kid. We're in the mind! You can do whatever you want in here!" He held out his hand and made a Pitt Cola can appear, popping the top without touching it.
"Well how about that?" I said to myself. I turned around when I heard screaming and saw flashing lights. I forgot about the others! "What am I doing?! I gotta stop Bill!" I took off towards the fight, Stan's advice playing over and over in my mind. We might actually have a chance now!
Willow's POV
"EAT NIGHTMARES!" Bill yelled, lighting his hand on fire and firing a laser towards Soos. This was NOT gonna end well.
"Nightmares? I hope he doesn't mean that British dog man I'm always dreaming about." The laser hit the ground three feet in front of him. A bull dog in a green suit and bowler hat was standing facing us.
"'Ello, 'Ello, 'Ello! Who's crike for a stick in the pudding?" The dog asked, hitting Soos with his cane a few times. Soos panicked and started running around, the dog following him around.
"YOU!" Bill yelled, aiming at Mabel. His laser hit her, causing her head to grow to twice its regular size and turn a weird shade of green.
"My cuteness!" She yelled. "What did you do to my cutenettttttttthhhhhh…?" Her voice got really deep and slow, making her slur a bit. Okay… a lot.
"YOU'RE NEXT!" Bill yelled, pointing at Alex and Mabel's boys, the latter's starting to danc. Bill blasted them, making them fly off their feet and off the rock.
"My dream boys!" Mabel yelled as Bill blasted Alex. He had actually been expecting it, so when he got blasted, instead of going airborne, he slid across the rock before going over. I saw his hands on the ledge, so I ran over and grabbed him.
"I'm not real. You can let me go," he told me. But… I couldn't. Real or not, I couldn't handle losing him again. "LOOK OUT!"
He pulled me over the ledge. Something flew past us. Bill had fired another laser at me, but Alex pulling me down had caused it to miss. But now both of us were hanging over the edge, Alex holding us both up by one hand.
"HEY BILL!" Dipper flew up above us, surrounded by blue light. "Nice bow tie!" He blasted lasers from his eyes through Bill's chest. He then turned to me and Alex and Force-Lifted us back onto the rock. "Guys! I just learned you can conjure whatever you can conceive in Grunkle Stan's mindscape!"
"Huh?" The others questioned.
"Just think of cool fighting stuff and it'll happen!" I told them, imagining Chewbacca's bowcaster in my hands. It appeared, and I was able to blast the dog man and vaporize him. Man this thing was fun!
"We can do anything?" Mabel asked, bringing her face back too normal. "Like have kittens for fists?" She pulled her arms into her sleeves and when they came out, she had kitten faces instead of hands. She held them out and fired a bunch of them at Bill, covering him completely.
"Anything huh? Soos love stomach beam stare!" Soos lifted his shirt and a question mark ray flew at Bill. It was so powerful that Bill flew backwards off of the rock.
"Enough games!" He yelled, closing the hole in his chest and turning his eye into a laser cannon. He shot as laser at the ground and started moving it towards us.
"Hamster Ball shields activate!" Mabel yelled, all of us making pinkish-purple hamster balls form around us. The laser hit the shields and bounced back, right into Bill's eye. "Rise Xyler! Rise Craz!" Our shields broke apart and Mabel made her boys appear again, playing their instruments. Bill moved his hands from his eye to cover where his ears would be if he had any.
"Now to imagine your worst nightmare! A portal out of Stan's mind! Everyone, together!" We all started picturing the portal opening up right underneath him. I opened an eye and saw a black hole in the rock, red lightning coming out of it. Just a few more seconds and-
"ENOUGH!" Everything went white and disappeared, leaving us floating in the air. We all looked like we did when we first got here, including my crossbow, which was back on my side. Bill turned back too yellow and dusted his hat off.
"You know what; I'm impressed with you kids. You're more clever than you look," he told us, putting his hat back on his head. "So I'm gonna let you kids off the hook. You might come in handy later. BUT KNOW THIS!" His voice went really deep and he made a six-fingered hand appear above his head. "A darkness approaches. A day will come in the future when everything you care about will change." He vaporized the hand and started making everything go dark.
"Until then I'll be watching you!" An image came up behind him. He was in the center of a wheel, a bunch of symbols surrounding him. "I'LL BE WATCHING YOU…" Each symbol started lighting up, going clockwise. The light ended on a question mark before the entire thing disappeared, him going with it. The light came back and it was just us.
"He's gone. We did it," Dipper breathed. I could not wait to get back and get some restful sleep. Speaking of, we all started flickering and our legs started to disappear. "Stan must be waking up."
"Thanks for saving me," I told Alex. I had no idea what would have happened had that one blast hit me.
"Saved you? You almost died because of me," he whispered. "Hey, listen. Whatever happens between you and the real me, just know that we will always love you."
"Always love you too," I told him, us kissing… on the cheek before me, Mabel and the boys disappeared.
We woke up. It was… weird. I knew it was technically a dream, but it felt real. Not like it was something that could actually happen (I still had my doubts about some of this stuff) but I actually felt all of the bruises. I looked at my legs and saw a bunch of scratches that hadn't been there before. But a few cuts and bruises were better than Gideon owning the Shack.
"We did it!" Mabel yelled excitedly, all of us doing a big group hug.
"What? Did what?" We broke apart and looked over at Grunkle Stan, who was rubbing his face. "What're you all doing here? And why was I dreaming of two brightly colored and radical young men?"
"Grunkle Stan, you're okay!" Dipper yelled, jumping up in his chair and hugging him.
"What is this: a hug?"
"Nope! It's a choke hold!" Dipper replied, changing position and putting Grunkle Stan in a choke hold. They did that for a few seconds before Dipper let go, the two of them smiling at each other.
"Not bad kid. Not bad," Grunkle Stan told him, rubbing his neck.
"I'm just glad Gideon didn't get into the safe. I really like this old Shack," I stated looking around. I had hated this place when we first came, but now it was like a second home to me. I couldn't handle-
"Do you feel that?" It felt like an earthquake. I didn't think Oregon got those. But I guess anything was possible. The building shook again. "GET DOWN!" I yelled, but it was too late. The wall behind us exploded, throwing us against the far wall.
"You kids okay?" Grunkle Stan asked, coughing from the dust. We were banged up, but other than that, we were okay physically. But our mental state was questionable when we looked up and saw Gideon standing over us, deed in hand.
"But we defeated Bill!" Dipper told him. Gideon had mentioned something about a plan B.
"Bill failed me! So I switched to plan B: Dynamite!" Gideon explained. Why hadn't that been plan A?!
"What? Bill? Who- What're you guys talking about?" Grunkle Stan question, looking back and forth between all of us.
"Spoiler alert Stanford: I got the deed! The Mystery Shack belongs to me! So get off my property!" Gideon turned around and spoke into a walkie talkie. "Daddy, bring it around the front."
"Don't worry guys; It's all part of the dream! We're gonna wake up any second right! Right?" The ground started rumbling. We all ran outside and saw Gideon standing on a crane, his dad driving, a wrecking ball hanging down. Gideon's dad pressed a few buttons and the ball flew through the signs on top of the Shack.
"Someone pinch me dude," Soos said. The M of the sign crashed down in front of us. All it did was drive home what we all knew: We had lost. Gideon owned the Mystery Shack.