Comfort

Summary: When Mabel finds out what happened to her brother in the woods the night before she goes to comfort him and makes him promise something; Ford and Stan become extremely concerned over something that Bill had said during his time possessing Dipper at the final battle.

Mabel blinks her eyes against the early dawn, her alarm going off to wake her up for the school day.

She sits up in her bed and gives a loud yawn. The young woman glances over to her slumbering brother, who was snoring very loudly. She gets up, the bed creaking beneath her, and goes to Dipper and pokes his side.

"Dip Dop… wake up, it's time to get ready for school," Mabel tells him, her poking him in various parts of his back.

Dipper grumbles, "No… Mabel… I'm tired…" He then curls into his blanket, wrapping himself and putting a pillow over his head.

Mabel shrugs. "Have it your way, if Grunkle Stan yells at you that's your problem," she tells him. The young woman then proceeds to walk out of the room and runs down the stairs. She then enters the kitchen and sees Grunkle Stan sitting at the table, Ford sitting across from him.

Confusion sits in Mabel. Ford should already be at the school… Sitting on the table was her pocket knife, the blade out with dried blood on it.

"Guys… what's going on?" Mabel asks softly.

Stan then replies softly, "Dipper… was in the woods last night."

Mabel gasps, her hands starting to shake. "Was… was he at the…?" she then asked, her voice trailing off. No wonder why Dipper was so tired. But… why was her knife on the table and whose blood was it?

Ford then finally says, "And Mabel, you need to hide this better, this was found next to him." He had gestured to the knife on the table.

Mabel's eyes widened as her brown gaze goes to the knife. "I didn't know he knew where I hid it…" she admits honestly.

"He's observant, he just probably subconsciously saw you," Ford assures her, trying to make sure she didn't get upset.

"But… what happened?" Mabel then demands, her anger rising. What happened to her brother?

Stan then sighs, adjusting himself in his seat. "Well, Ford woke up because he thought he heard something. So, of course Mr. Paranoia here went and checked the rooms," he then began to explain.

"And I didn't see Dipper, and I looked around and couldn't find him," Ford continues on. "I woke up Stan so we could look for him."

Stan then adds, "I grabbed a blanket and ran out to the woods. I heard a call for help… and it was Dipper… he had the knife by him, so I checked for any wounds, but he didn't seem to have any. He…" Stan then stops speaking, not wanting to say anything else. "Let's just say he really needed someone with him for a bit." He finally says slowly.

"But… where did the blood come from?" Mabel questions, her pointing at the knife.

Ford picks up the knife by its handle. "Well, I'll have to do some DNA testing on it," he stated.

Stan then glares at his twin. "How the hell do you have the equipment to do that…?" he then slowly asks, his eyes narrowing.

"Don't judge me," Ford grumbles. "Also, I have samples of all our blood anyway. We all actually have the same blood type by the way."

"WHY DO YOU HAVE OUR BLOOD?!" Stan shouts, quite concerned.

"Um… non-specific excuse!" Ford shouts dramatically as he then jumps up from his seat, grabs the knife, and runs to the main showroom of the Shack and goes through the vending machine door to get to his lab downstairs. Stan then furiously follows him, still demanding why there were samples of all their blood down in the lab.

Mabel watched her grunkles leave the room, and after only a moment's hesitation she leaves the kitchen and runs back to her and Dipper's room. She enters the room, Dipper still snoring away, and she goes to his bed and crawls in with him, hugging him close to her. There was a tired groan from him, but he doesn't try to squirm away.

She then remembers something from when the two were very little, when kids were making fun of Dipper about his birthmark. The two would come home, Dipper as a young preschooler crying his eyes out and desperately trying to cover his forehead with his short brown hair. Dipper would lay in bed for the rest of the day, him crying, and Mabel would lie with him, running her fingers through his hair to comfort him and tell him how much she loved him and say how his birthmark was unique. That was when she started to call him "Dipper", to show that it was a good thing, and since he wasn't a fan of his actual name, he introduced himself as Dipper Pines ever since.

So she starts running her fingers through his hair again, now ten years later, and tries to comfort him once again. Mabel then feels him hug her, him shaking as he started to sob softly.

"You're okay, Dip'n Dot…" Mabel whispers to him. "I'm right here… you're safe now."

"Thank you… thank you, Mabel…" he gently sobs. "I'm so sorry…"

"For what…?" she gently asks, feeling his body shake.

"I… I hurt myself…" he sobbed. "I took the knife and stabbed myself… but… I can't tell if it was real or not… I'm not hurt… but I feel it… I'm losing my mind…" His arms then wrapped tighter around his sister, him burying his face into Mabel's shoulder, tears and snot getting onto her long-sleeved nightgown.

Mabel's heart skipped a beat. Her mind went to the bloodied knife that Stan had brought back. Dipper just admitted to hurting himself… but now he can't tell if it was real or not… but the knife still had blood on it… She shakes her head gently and continues to run her fingers through her brother's messy brown hair.

"Dipper…" she said hoarsely, her eyes starting to brim with tears.

A sniffle. "Yes, Mabel…?" he replied.

"Promise me you'll never hurt yourself again in anyway…" she begged. "Please… I know you're suffering, but I'm here for you… please, please, please don't hurt yourself!" Tears begin to fall, her lips quivered, and now her body started to shake as she began to sob. "I love you so much Dipper, you're my twin brother, and I don't know what I would do if you weren't around again…"

Dipper gasps to take a breath. "I… I promise… I'm so sorry…. I love you too… you know I'd do anything for you… so… I will promise…" The boy then releases his hug and lifts his head, Mabel seeing that his eyes were red and puffy, thick bags under his eyes from lack of sleep, and his skin was pale with a light sheen of sweat on his face. He then lift up his right hand, pinky out.

Mabel mirrors this action, something they had done as children. Both of them intertwined their pinkies together.

"Pinky Promise," they both said in unison.

Soon Dipper fell asleep once again, him snoring as his head went onto Mabel's shoulder. Mabel felt her eyes become droopy as well, and she knew she wasn't going to school today. She then rests her cheek on her brother's head and her breathing slowed as she fell asleep. The two haven't slept in the same bed since their travels in the RV during Weirdmageddon and before that when they were small children, and it was just a comfortable feeling to sleep alongside her twin.

As they slept, their pinkies were still intertwined for their promise.

Ford lifted up the paper that had the test results on it, him frowning at the result.

"Stanley…" Ford called out to his twin, who was sitting in a chair almost falling asleep.

"Yeah, Poindexter?" Stan replied groggily.

Ford then shows Stan the results, the old conman taking it and adjusting his glasses. Over the years he did read books on physics and such to try to work on the portal to bring his brother back, but biology wasn't his thing.

"I… I don't know what I'm looking at, Stanford," Stan honestly tells him.

Ford then explains, "It is Dipper's blood…"

Stan's hands shake. "But… he had no wounds on him… how is that possible?" he voice was wavering with worry, he couldn't bear to see the kid suffering anymore. The day that Dipper pointed a gun to his family, asking if they were Bill and him being tricked… it was the same look of madness and despair in the boy's eyes that once was reflected in Ford's when Stan saw him again.

"Well… he did have a hole in his shirt," Ford pointed out. "But that doesn't explain why there isn't a wound."

Stan then says something that made Ford's heart drop to the pit of his stomach, "Do you think… it has something to do with Bill?"

Ford whips around. "What do you mean?" he demands.

"Remember… remember when we did the wheel but we all couldn't say the incantation?" Stan asks slowly, as if he didn't want to say it.

"Out with it, Stanley!" Ford's voice growled, his voice so low and his eyes hard.

"Bill did say he was bound to Dipper's soul…" Stan then pointed out, his voice hitching. "What does that mean…?"

Ford's body then slumps, his heart racing. His stomach felt tight with knots as he felt like he was going to be sick. "I… I don't know, Lee…." He honestly said. "I don't know and it scares me to death every time I do think about that."

"We need to keep a better eye on him…" Stan then states.

"Agreed."

A/N: Hmmmmmm I wonder what will happen... possibly another story? Hmmm... we shall see...

Thanks for reading as always!

~Skye Hendersen~