"But," Dipper interjected at just the right moment. "After that, then I can ask you the same question you ask me."

The half-gem paused, finger folding down. Steven's thumb rubbed his non-existent stubble in thought, mouth quirking as an imaginary Sherlock pipe was stuck in it. "Ah, so you wanna play serious, eh?" Dipper nodded curtly. "I can do that. Well then. Um... Oh! What's your real name?"

Leaf green eyes bugged out. "What? No! You can't ask that!"

"Why not? I thought there were no rules?"

"Yeah, but not..." The blue gem's cheeks flushed, almost glowing in the nighttime air. "That."

"Oh c'mon!" Steven laughed, pushing at Dipper's shoulder and making him sway dangerously over the side. "What could be so bad?"

In response, he only grumbled under his breath and crossed his arms unconsciously.

"Dipper," the chubbier boy probed.

"Argh! Fine," the now-heavily blushing gem groaned.

Steven took a moment to celebrate with a fist pump and a hissed 'yesss!'.

"Ihavefive," mumbled Dipper.

"What?"

"Urgh... I have five names, alright?" Dipper threw his hands up in the air. He fell back to lie on his back, wide eyes staring at the stars. "And technically, only 'Dipper' is a nickname, and one of the other ones are..." he cleared his throat, grumbling inaudibly, "so three real names, whoo-hoo."

Steven blinked. His body had been twisted to follow his apparently multi-named friend's movements, but now he twisted it back to spare a glance at the midnight sky. "Okay, so... What are they?"

"Ah geez. Well, Magnus," Dipper conceded. He lay spread eagle on his back, refusing to look at anything else than the stars. "Magnus Adula Pines."

Steven made a noise of encouragement. "That's nice! You have a middle name! Usually most middle names I've heard is, like 'Always' or 'Danger', though it seems to be pretty common from what I'm seen…or," he made a face, both fond and embarrassed, "'Cutiepie'. Yours is… an actual name."

He tilted his head to look at his friend, and ducked it when he realised that Dipper's left eyebrow was raised, patiently waiting for him to conclude his point.

"It's pretty," he finished lamely.

Dipper smiled and nodded, "Moonstone."

"Of course."

"Crescent."

At this one, the younger gem paused. A small serene smile graced his chubby features. "That's a nice name."

"And... " Dipper hollowed his cheeks, put his hands behind his head and ruffled his for once hatless ash-brown hair a bit. He took a breath and winced as he sighed the name out loud, "Artemis."

The trees underneath them shushed any more words from being uttered. Their dark leaves rustled noisily like chatter in a crowd, and a few was even spotted turning over the undergrowth. Steven rubbed his arms together as goosebumps rose along his skin, the high Oregon winds getting to him.

"And Dipper," the pink-clad quartz gem said suddenly, out of the blue.

"What?"

"Your name," he said, wobbling to kneel beside his friend. He took Dipper by the shoulders and shook him lightly, smiling widely with a light in his eyes as if he'd just figured out the biggest problem in the universe. "It's Dipper too. And 'Dipper' is yours. No one else's."

A star shot through the midnight sky. Steven yawned widely and settled on his side with Dipper's jacket acting as a pillow. "Wake me when you're going down' he said, eyes already closed. Five minutes later, he was asleep.

Dipper set down his can of Pitt Cola and took his journal back up again, ignoring the frigid sting of the gold metal corners and spine on his skin. He opened the page he had been working on, where a hasty sketch of Steven's face and smaller doodles of his apparent guardians greeted him in ink. Then he flipped back, to one of the very first in the third journal.

The entry there was just that - an entry. There was no picture of monsters, no rushed accounts of magic or hastily thought-of equations clogging the corners. To anyone else, on this page, it looked just like an ordinary journal of a mysterious man.

And it lasted for one huge wall of text, spanning one and a half pages. Dipper had read the words there again and again, but tonight only the last line he could not bear to look away from.

His upturned halfmoon gem gleamed in the midnight light.

"No one else's."