Mabel pranced around the room, giggling as she threw around solid rainbow-colored things from a big jar labeled 'Industrial Sprinkles - Use in case of first-time sleepovers!'. They dusted Steven's hair, his sleeping bag, the twins' beds and the rest of the attic. "Sleepover!" She shrieked unnecessarily.
Dipper laughed along until Mabel tackled him off of the bed without warning. Caught off-guard, Steven let out a loud bark of laughter at his usually calm friend's expression of unabashed stupor but flopping his back beside them anyways.
"Whoo! We are never going to go to sleep!" He screamed, all three children falling into happy chuckles.
Fast forward to night time. Three thirty in the morning. Steven sat up with a gasp, sweat trickling down his back and seeping into his star-speckled nightshirt.
His took deep breaths to slow his heartbeat. His arms came back down to his sides. Steven sighed and slumped over his sheets.
To his left at eye-level was a leg, covered in cartoon band-aids all colorful and cheery. Mabel's leg, to be exact, which was dangling over the edge of her bed where she passed out at a quarter to two, and stayed ever since. Steven looked from around the room to the triangle-shaped window, then back to Mabel. Her gem twinkled cheekily in the darkness.
Steven stood as quietly as he could and pushed her form so that it rolled gently to rest on the middle of the bed instead. He brought her blanket to Mabel's chin and smiled crookedly at the glitter-sprinkled drool that spilled down her cheek. Briefly he wondered if he should be ready to call a doctor in the morning to do something about that pink plastic glitter. Didn't seem... Healthy.
He turned around, carefully stepping over his sheets and the remnants of the one unfortunately destructive game of Attic Stuff Mini Gold they played, and was about to check on Dipper when he realised that the bed across the room was empty.
"You don't sleep?" Steven grunted as he pulled himself over the last rung of the ladder. He took a moment to regain his breath and compose himself first before rolling over and crawling to where Dipper sat.
The roof was bathed in faintly blue twilight, the half-moon shining sure and bright over the entirety of Gravity Falls. For some reason, Steven was not surprised at the least to find a beach umbrella and a cooler up here. Everything was silent save for the sounds of the forest at night. Crickets and other insects. The wind mingling with each other along with the crisp flora around them.
"Sleep?" the slightly older boy brought the tip of a pen to his lips, legs dangling freely over the edge of the roof. On his lap was a thick, leather-bound book, the most fantasy-ish Steven had ever seen. It was exactly what he thought the ancient magic tomes in Connie's stories always looked like, down to the yellowed pages and gold-plated corners. "Nah, that's more of Mabel's deal."
Steven hassled himself with sitting next to Dipper, face upturned and inquisitive. The blue gem took a while to notice but when he did, his legs and mouth stilled and eyes drifted sideways to stare at the pink-clad boy. Dipper rose one eyebrow in question.
Seconds ticked by. Steven hadn't seemed to have gotten the message.
"What?" Dipper clarified.
"Oh, well. I just thought, ehem. This is usually the time when one of us - that would be you - would tell a thing about themselves that the other person didn't know before."
"Who told you that?"
"Ly-fe," Steven poked a bewildered Dipper on the nose. "Believe it."
"I don't," the latter frown-pouted, rubbing his already red nose. He snapped his book shut and put the pen behind his ear. "But okay. What do you want to know?"
Steven held his chin for a moment and looked around. What didn't he know about Dipper Pines?
Heck, what did he know about Dipper Pines? That he fights monsters and gets hurt looking for them? That he's a gem? That he reads a lot?
Aha! The half-gem opened his mouth, ready to deliver a meaningless opener question with the intention of lightening the mood. He had his finger up in the air, nose to the sky, the whole seven circles. He knew just what to ask.