Comfort and rest often come from the ability for someone to find ease. The familiar, even if measured as discomforting, can be an enormous boon to finding rest. Sometimes it is a break from the norm that allows someone to collapse into a restful bliss. For Dipper Pines, it came from a bed almost too small for him, in a stuffy attic, in a rundown road-side attraction. In his slip, dreaming of nothing in particular, he had the smallest of smiles while resting.
Then, from his deep, soundless rest, he heard his name. "…Dipper..."
Dipper groaned, and turned in his bed slightly. The comfort of the bed sheets, so warm and inviting, kept him still. It was probably just some dream fading away, or another coming closer. It mattered little to him in this semi-consciousness.
"…Dipper..." the almost familiar voice called again.
Dipper groaned, relenting enough of his mind to speak. "I'm sleeping," Dipper replied in his groggy state. Already being swept into the world of the living, Dipper blinked and started to rise. He asked, "What is –"
"BODYSLAM!" Mabel bellowed. Without further warning, Dipper gasped as her entire weight crashed down onto his chest, destroying hopes of gentle awakenings.
Gasping for air, Dipper croaked and leaned up, his heart pounding in his chest. "Mabel!" Dipper gasped as she leapt off him, cackling happily.
She beamed at him as she collected shower materials. "Get up, slowpoke!" she teased, grabbing her robe last as she hopped out of the room, "Stuff to do! Mysteries to solve! People have to be scammed and Grunkle Stan is only so young!" Mabel reminded her brother as she disappeared behind the door.
Dipper growled as he caressed his now sore center. The ache he felt was caused more from the shock of a morning ambush than her actually landing on him. He gave the closed door one disapproving look as he shifted himself off the bed, ready to challenge the coming day. From the corner of his vision the two blue cylinders taunted him, still sitting on the old desk by the wall. They had sat there all of yesterday, emitting their faint blue hum. Dipper approached them and could only wonder what exactly they were.
He reached out and collected one, holding it in his palm. "Maybe this calls for a little research," Dipper said, nodding to himself. He gave it a little toss into the air and caught it again, "we're going to figure you out, whatever you are," Dipper told the cylinder fiercely. He placed it back down, moving to his dresser, but not before stubbing his toe on a leg of the desk. "Gah- oh, c'mon!" he snapped.
Many curses and hops on one uninjured foot later, plus half an hour for usual morning routine, Dipper and Mabel descended the stairs. They easily found their Grunkle Stan in the kitchen, pouring himself the cereal they had purchased the day before.
"Morning you two," he said as they moved for their own food needs, "What's the plan today?" he asked with the tone someone might ask when inquiring about the weather, "Searching for the meaning of life? Gonna make peace between gnomes and faeries? Poke a yeti in the butt?"
Mabel giggled. "In the butt," Mabel snickered as she poured herself a glass of orange juice.
Dipper took a seat across the table from Grunkle Stan. "This is the mission," Dipper said readily, placing one of the two cylinders on the table before his great Uncle.
Chewing some cereal, Stanley spied the glowing object. "Oh yeah, that thing," Grunkle Stan leaned in closer to them, adjusting his glasses to get a better look, "What does it do again?"
Mabel took a chair between the two of them. "Look pretty," Mabel informed Grunkle Stan.
"Only so far," Dipper added, and continued, "I've tried going through a list of things it could possibly be-"
Grunkle stan snorted. "Oi, here we go, another list," Grunkle Stan rolled his eyes and brought over his cereal to the table as he sat down.
Casting his Grunkle a quick glare, Dipper explained, "The three top candidates are as follows," Dipper held the object in discussion to the light, "one; a highly sophisticated and advanced battery for something equally super-futuristic, two; a new type of information storage surpassing anything released to the public, and three; a strange module for biological information-"
Mabel flinched, her brain only able to take in so much. "Bio-who-ha-whats-it?" Mabel asked, spilling some orange juice on her arm as she too sat down. "You can't escape that easy, orange blood," she murmured as she licked the juice off her skin.
Dipper continued, "A capsule for DNA or maybe some sort of crazy disease. It seems self-contained, but also has a source of power- it keeps letting off that faint light," he gave it a quick shake, which it left a thin trail of white light, "see?"
Grunkle Stan watched with intense, haunted eyes. "Kid," he grumbled, "the last thing I want you to do with that if it has diseases is shake it around like a baby rattle," Grunkle Stan said as he leaned back, "unless you intend to wipe out the earth with whatever god-awful plague rests inside it."
Dipper paused, mid-examination. "Eh... right," Dipper agreed with the point, and quickly laid it to rest on the table before him. The color of the strange object held onto his focus. He stared at it, curious as to which, if any, theory of his held to the truth. After all, they served no directly notable purpose yet.
Having licked her arm clean, Mabel looked to her brother. "What's the plan then?" Mabel asked as she looked between the cylinder and Dipper. She added, "Should we find the closest government facility, break in, and steal all their secrets?"
Grunkle Stan shrugged. "That almost sounds dangerous," Grunkle Stan said calmly as he ate his cereal.
Dipper shook his head. "Not yet. Even if there isn't anything official stated about this thing," Dipper rolled it around on the table, "We could probably find some sort of hint towards where it came from. If there was a source of internet up here," Dipper gave his Grunkle a dissatisfied look, "this wouldn't be such a problem."
Grunkle Stan looked to him, and then to Mabel, who also cast a disapproving glare towards her great-uncle. "What?" he demanded, "That costs money," Grunkle Stan held a spoon at Dipper with warning, "And something as needlessly complicated as the internet won't help my life improve in quality."
"And you want to charge people for staying here," Dipper retorted as he stood and walked to the fridge.
Stan barked, "Hey! People don't come to Gravity Falls for a source of anti-social behavior. They come here, and specifically to this building, to get a look at freaky stuffed animals they think I caught out in those woods. Who needs internet?" Grunkle Stan defended his position, and Dipper just shrugged. "I got all the weird they could want, here – in person! Right where it belongs."
"Here, here!" Mabel cheered, and aggressively chugged her orange juice.
"You know, kiddo," Stan turned on his grand-niece, "you had me impressed yesterday. Just what was with all that high-kicking and punching crud, exactly?"
"It's called," Mabel pulled her Uncle and herself closer, and arched her hand before them, "'The Path'."
Grunkle Stan eyed his grandniece. "The... Paths," Grunkle Stan repeated.
Dipper answered quickly, "A new form of martial art that was recently developed. She apparently has a personal teacher."
"Wow, Private lessons in beating people up!?" Grunkle Stan asked to Mabel, "you're walking down the right path, kid!"
"The Mabel agrees," the teenager stated, standing up from her seat, and strutting out of the kitchen.
Dipper eyed her leaving. "Put your glass in the sink," Dipper called to her as she vanished. A second later she was reverse-strutting into the room. She claimed her breakfast stuff and deposited it into the sink, before walking out the same way, now strutting out even harder.
Grunkle Stan, having watched Mabel's performance, told Dipper, "I sometimes worry these things get to your heads." Dipper rolled his eyes, and finished his milk. Stan then scratched his chin, and smirked at Dipper. "You know, maybe you should look into that sort of thing too, kid," Stan told Dipper as he placed the dishes into the sink.
"What? Stuff getting to my head?" Dipper asked and turned to face him.
"Lessons on beating people up!" Stan said excitedly, "you know, your Grunkle Stan knows a thing or two about it," he added, wiggling eyes eyebrows. "Maybe I could show you a thing or two!"
Dipper scoffed. "Uh, no offense, Grunkle Stan," Dipper held a hand up," I'm not all that into the idea."
"What?!" Stan barked, "You're actually going to let your sister beat you out on the 'being more a man than you' contest?" Stan asked with disbelief.
Dipper scowled. "Beating people up isn't a sign of manliness," Dipper told his Grunkle, "it just means you failed at coming to a compromise or agreement."
"Ugh," Stan shivered in disapproval, "You reek of wimpy. Here," he reached into the maintenance closet, and pulled out a paint bucket and a pair of brushes, "before you go solving the mysteries that no one cares about, freshen up the paint on the front walls."
"Oh, what-"
"No whats or buts! Get on it!" Grunkle pointed to the door.
Dipper turned heatedly and marched ahead, holding the paint and brushes tightly. "Show you a thing about manliness," Dipper mumbled under his breath as walked out of the kitchen. He entered the gift shop, where Mabel was busy trying to re-arrange letters on post cards. She stepped back to marvel at her work - 'I survived the tour with my friends, family, and guests at the Mystery Shack'. She giggled.
"Perfect," she said in awe of her work.
Dipper rolled his eyes, and dropped a paintbrush into her arms. "Grab it, we got painting to do."
"Wax on, wax off," Mabel muttered as she grasped the paint brush and followed her brother out the door.
The two started their painting of the front walls. The wood was rough and worn, making clean strokes difficult. The rough wood made it even more difficult to not splatter themselves with paint. While this supposedly meaningless task angered Dipper, Mabel found immense fun in painting. Her strategy was much different than Dipper, who would try to paint along the length of the boards of wood. She instead made intricate stories involving people and crazed fairy tales, and would merely paint over them when that part of the story concluded.
Nearing the end of a story, Mabel explained, "And then when the great pink dragon, Gloomby, appeared," Mabel painted a large dragon with a large round belly and goofy, bulging eyes, "He promised to take princess Aura and prince Crystalline to the highest mountain tops," she painted a large and curved mountain, "where they could finally break the dreaded werewolf's curse by kissing under the light of the moon, under an aurora!"
Having at first half-listened, now enveloped with her story, Dipper sighed. "I hope, so badly, this is you just making this up, and not an actual show's plot," Dipper said to himself as she continued.
"But-" Mabel said as she painted over the rest of what she had just completed, "They arrive too late, and princess Aura turns into the dreaded Werewolf of Scary-Forest-Land-ia!" she painted a forest with a frowny face, and a truly detailed and scary werewolf woman, "And it's up to prince crystalline to defeat his one true love in a bid of survival! Oh, the humanity!" Mabel made to faint, and tossed her brush aside. Dipper saw her falling from the corner of his eye, and grabbed her quickly. Once in his arms, Mabel laughed, "Safe! Ten out of ten, bro."
"Okay," Dipper let himself laugh for a moment, "c'mon, let's wrap this up before Grunkle Stan decides he has other things for us to slave over."
Mabel blew a quick raspberry. "I will find the fun in it, even if it destroys me," Mabel declared with her entire being. Dipper pushed his sister back up just as sounds of an approaching truck had the two turn around. Soos in his pickup truck came up the driveway. "Hi Soos!" Mabel waved.
"Heya you two," Soos pointed to the two of them as he stepped out, "Painting today? You know what they say about painting," Soos joked.
"What?" Mabel begged for the answer, excitement shooting from her eyes.
"That, uh, once the can, is... canned," Soos struggled to come up with a clever catchphrase, "you, gotta... once- gosh, uh, once the can is open, you gotta make a... jokin'."
Mabel gasped in aw. "Poetry," she declared.
Soos nodded humbly. "The struggle for art is ever present in our lives. Wow, speaking of art," Soos spotted the still intact painting Mabel had done, "That's a wonderful interpretation of 'The Magical Sparkling Adventures of Aura Dearest'."
Dipper groaned, "Oh god, it really is a show."
"Web-comic," Soos corrected him.
Putting down his wet brush, Dipper stepped back from the wall. "Well, I've heard of crazier shows than that, I guess," Dipper sighed as the three of them admired Mabel's handiwork. Dipper then looked to his sister and smirked. "Dude, sis, we should totally leave it up and see how long it takes for Stan to notice it."
"Totes happening!" Mabel cheered as she fist-pumped into the air. "Wanna place a bet on how long it takes?"
Dipper declared, "Three days."
Mabel darkly guessed, "He never will!"
Soos hummed, and the said, "I will estimate... thirteen days."
Mabel looked and smiled at Soos. "Oddly specific!" Mabel told him happily.
"Thirteen carries significance, after all," Soos reminded them, "it is both a numerical blessing, and a cursed number."
"Well, I'm done with giving the wall a new look," Dipper said, brushing off spare paint along his arms, "we've got a mystery to crack."
"Best of luck you two," Soos saluted the two of them, "I'll be inside with Mister Pines," he explained, and then started for the gift shop.
As Dipper waved, Mabel bounded into the air and cheered, "Bye Soos!" she then turned to her brother. "Gonna crack down on this mystery!" Mabel blurted out excitedly.
"We take the car this time," Dipper turned to his sister. She quickly pouted, her hopes of scaring the daylights out of her brother dashed.
The twins, after grabbing one of the mysterious cylinders, left for the town. Mabel was insistent on something playing on the radio, yet found little to their interest. After the two of them surrendered to the silence of an off-radio, Dipper grumbled, "I could have sworn there was a good station on two days ago. Playing electro-pop is way better than the usual country music," Dipper said gloomily as they drove into town.
Arriving by a recently bent road sign in town, Dipper declared, "Here we go." The two exited the parked car and found themselves across the street from the library. Crossing the road, Dipper added, "It's kind of weird knowing that there's a secret passageway leading to the mines underneath town."
"Just think Dipper," Mabel said as they j-walked, "if there was a serious earthquake, this entire town could vanish into a series of holes in the ground! Like if mole-men were invading!" she said with dread.
Dipper had a thousand-yard stare. "Not exactly comforting," Dipper told his sister as they entered the building.
From the nearby booth, the familiar voice of the library called out. "Oh, good," she said, her eyes as wide as ever with those massive glasses, "I was worried I had locked you two in here overnight a few days ago. I'm very pleased you two didn't die."
"Thanks, Miss Isoar," Dipper nodded to her stiffly as they walked past. As they strode past the woman, he turned to his sister, "Most unfortunate last name ever."
Mabel shrugged. "At least it isn't stupid, like... booger," Mabel guessed, "so, where do we start?"
"I've got a few ideas," Dipper sighed as he peered around. "Why don't you bring over books about advanced bio-engineering and robotics, and I'll go through some basic practical uses of quantum-"
"English! Dipper, I speak English!" Mabel reminded her brother.
He wiped his face, the bags under his eyes pronounced. "Just bring every recently published book that looks sciency, okay?" Dipper told her sister.
"Yessir!" she saluted, and trotted off.
The two claimed an entire table to pour over books. Dipper had made quite a collection, worthy of any scholar in the advances in science. The topics ranged and spanned through every possible topic. Anything and everything could relate to the strange cylinders. Many of the texts, to his anger, were far too unspecific for his desires. Most dealt with hypothetical developments and nothing pointed to what they may have. The few times he felt his stomach tighten at the mention of a development in technology that could lead to a possible discovery, he ended up finding a dead end. An hour later, he rubbed his eyes after thoroughly delving through his third scientific journal, and looked at Mabel.
She seemed to be pleasantly enjoying herself, staring into a book that was propped up to prevent Dipper's eyes from seeing the contents. The cover of the book said 'Advances In Artificial Intelligence and Their Merits', but Dipper stared at his sister as her eyes remained nearly in the same spot for several seconds. Her mouth curled in a tiny smile and her eyes twinkled. Dipper even spotted a single, brightly colored page poking out from the book, different in its light-sheen from the other pages.
He rolled his eyes. "Which magazine are you looking at?" he asked in a tired voice.
"Nothing!" she slammed the book closed after a moment, smiling a little too toothily to be innocent.
"It's poking out of the book, you know," Dipper pointed out at the large book. Mabel followed the accusation, and indeed the top section of a magazine was emerging.
Mabel shoved the book off the table and dusted her hands off. "Whoosh! I guess that one wasn't working out."
He stared at her. "How many pages did you actually get into that?" Dipper asked, not attempting to hide his disappointment.
She sighed. "Seven," Mabel admitted with a crestfallen look to her brother. Dipper rolled his eyes. Mabel whined, "Oh dude, come on! I can't handle nerdy books like this! They're all about math and studies and stuff. There isn't anything fun in these!"
"It's research, Mabel," Dipper told his sister. "It usually is kinda dry and slow."
"Research isn't always boring and slow! It's just about the topic, and this topic is putting my eyes into a trance of sleepy time," Mabel rested her head moodily on the table, "And there are too many words with eight or more letters in them. My eyes! Dey cannot take eet!" Mabel dropped her face directly against the table with a 'plumph'.
"So, you're just going to let me go through all of this?" Dipper asked grumpily. Mabel's response was to take the first book her hands could find as they scraped across the table, open it, and place it on top her head. "Learning by osmosis?" Dipper asked, a corner of his mouth turned up in humor.
From under her hair and the book atop her head, she gloomily mumbled, "I will endure."
Dipper snorted. "Now that I think of it, osmosis isn't the best way to describe that. Not that you'd-" Dipper thought aloud, but was startled when Mabel's head shot up like a rocket, her book flying off to the side. Dipper yelped, "Woah! Mabel, what is it? It... it didn't actually work, did it?" Dipper asked in astonishment.
"Shh," she smushed her palm against his mouth, and they both listened. It took a moment for Dipper to realize what she was focusing on, but he followed her line of vision to the entrance of the building. Outside, a conversation was passing by. Mabel's focus hardened and sharpened as the distant sounds of a talk between two girls grew slightly closer. Her eyes narrowed as she peered at the door, almost positive she knew the source behind the talk. As she waited, two girls passed by the Library door; one a skinny girl with thick glasses, the other a tall and heavy set girl with a broad body.
Dipper blinked, and started to mumble, "Hey, wasn't that-"
Dipper learned the hard way that Mabel's ability to propel herself at inhuman speeds had not been haltered in their time living separately. He was nearly tossed out of his chair as she used him like a springboard. The table almost catapulted out of the way as Mabel blazed through the library, desperate to exit and reach the two girls talking to one another as they passed by. Mabel blasted out of the door with near-sonic speeds, screeching to a halt as she breathed heavily.
The two ahead of her had turned at the smell of scorched sidewalk. Mabel panted loudly, doubled over as she recovered from her mad sprint. She turned her vision upwards. To her grand excitement, it hadn't been a moment of wishful. She had heard correctly, seen correctly; she knew the two passing teens.
The two teenagers before her asked, "Mabel?" as they stared at her.
"GUYS!" Mabel screeched and charged her long lost friends, Grenda and Candy Chiu. The incredible hug that followed between the three of them could have sent shockwaves into the surrounding forests of lasting plutonic love.
The shortest of the three spoke first. "Mabel, it is so good to see you again!" Candy stated happily as they broke from their hug, Mabel nearly jogging in place as they looked at her. Candy was an inch shorter than Mabel and wore very thick glasses. Her pale skin contrasted with her jet black hair, giving her an almost ghostly look.
"Yeah! You should have come up to visit sooner!" Grenda told Mabel excitedly. She was a towering teenager with auburn hair. Grenda was built both in body size and in muscle, she was easily the biggest girl Mabel had ever hugged.
Mabel did a double-take after Grenda spoke. "Woah! Grenda, what happened to your voice?!" Mabel asked as she heard her friend speak again, for the first time in three years.
"I got a speech coach at school!" Grenda explained. Indeed, her voice had changed considerably. While she had not lost the deep nature of her voice, strong and resonant, it was certainly no longer gruff. She sounded strangely womanly; smoother and more level than it had been before. "It brought me to tears for ever! And I punched her at least twice!"
Candy eyed the twin. "Mabel, we weren't told you were coming back to town," Candy explained, "what's with the visit?"
"Oh, well," Mabel started casually, "my brother and I thought Grunkle Stan died, but he was just capture and held ransom for his Mystery Shack, and instead of going home we had to face a horrible shape shifting monster who got taken away by an army of Goblins, who probably ate him. You know, the usual stuff."
Candy nodded. "That does seem like a sensible reason to visit," Candy said with a pleased smile, and Grenda added a quick, "Yeah, totally."
From behind them Dipper's voice called out. "Wait, Mabel," Dipper's voice called back from inside the library, catching the three's attention, as he emerged onto the street. He spotted the three together, and took a long breath before saying, "Oh, hi guys! Long time no see."
"Hey Dipper!" the two waved to him cheerily.
He chuckled, and then stepped up to his sister, and quietly said to her, "Mabel, you know I don't want to be that jerk, but we were looking up stuff that object could be, you know, related to? Maybe this reunion could… wait..?" At his request, Mabel glared at him with her hands at her hips. Dipper gulped, and stepped back. "I... fine," he said, backing away and nearly hitting someone entering the shop. "Ah, sorry," he mumbled as he walked inside.
"Wow, Mabel," Grenda said loudly, "I thought you grew up to be pretty. Dipper has hair growing- On his face!"
"That is an accomplishment for your brother, no doubt," Candy added with a polite nod.
"Psh, he's starting to," Mabel shrugged off the compliments, "but you two! You both look fantabulous!"
"We should organize a party! Grenda leaned in.
Mabel mirrored her, leaning in. "Maybe, for old time sakes, we could rent some crazy rom-coms and a whole metric ton of Pitt?" Mabel suggested eagerly. The three giggled and began exchanging ideas for the evening, excited to set up plans for the future.
Inside the library, Dipper grumbled as he returned to his seat. Being dumped for Mabel's long-since friends was harsh, but he supposed that Mabel, despite her good intentions, wouldn't be much as help as he hoped she would. So, sitting back down, he opened another book, and began pouring into it.
What felt like hours passed to little avail. Again and again, he scanned through text and passages for mention of anything relatable to what they had. Altogether he found nothing of any help. The 'already looked through' pile grew and stacked up, and he was running out of things the library had at all to offer. Not to top it off, by the time he was at his second to last book, Mabel finally returned, happy as the day she discovered sugar.
Dipper grumbled, "About time," and he pushed the last book across the table to her seat. "Here's the last one we need to go through," he explained, "Just do me a favor and scan it for anything we might need to know, okay?" he said through a clenched jaw. In his haste to assign her work, he missed the look on her face. She had gone from happy to an all too evident strain of guilt. Her brother, after a moment of peering into his own book, realized that she had made no movements. He poked his own nose out of the book, and then his eyes widened at her expression. Their eyes met, and one of those crazy twin communication moments happened. He knew she had done it. "Oh... oh no, you didn't."
She, through a smile, grimaced, "I may have."
"No, tell me you didn't," Dipper begged.
"I more than probably did."
"Mabel... why? Why!?" he demanded with horror dripping in his voice.
"Because," Mabel adopted a lecturing tone, "When a group of teenagers catch up, the most sensible thing for them to do, is to all get together and have one epic sleepover!" Mabel burst up, dancing on her chair excitedly. From across the library, there was a loud 'Shh', and Mabel winced. "My bad!" she called out, and dropped herself down.
Dipper's face fell to the table with a loud bang. Taking her seat, Mabel snorted. "Oh, come on," Mabel scolded him, "I'm sure you can get your kicks from the kind of parties we hold! We're a bit more mature than when we were twelve."
Face still deeply imbedded into a wooden table, Dipper informed her, "I recall letting my heel be a chew toy for a night to avoid those parties."
"Oh, brighten up!" Mabel smiled fully at him, "at least it's-" her sentence fell away, looking past her brother.
He looked up from his slouch, giving her a curious look. "What?" he asked, starting to follow her stare.
Behind them, by a darker corner in the library where cobwebs and dust seemed rampant, a person in a hooded jacket was gathering books hastily. Dipper blinked, and watched as the person turned towards the librarian counter, before adding several more into a backpack. Dipper turned and gave Mabel a stern look.
She squinted at the man, and then looked to Dipper. "It doesn't matter where you are," Mabel stated aloud, "acting like that, wearing that getup – looks really suspicious."
Dipper frowned. He wanted to check these last two books, as they could be the missing key to discovering the cylinders. He then turned around to the man scavenging for books. Relenting to his curious nature, Dipper quietly said, "Agreed. Pause from the research," Dipper and Mabel stood from their seats and began approaching the mysterious and suspicious figure.
They approached the man, sticking close to the ends of the aisles. The person wore dark leather gloves and dirty dress shoes, as well as a pair of fitted trousers. They couldn't see his face or hair, as he was still turned and the hood was lifted around his head. Dipper spied harder, squinting to get a look at the kinds of books he was stealing. The hands moved quickly, and Dipper couldn't get a bead.
He looked to his sister, "Okay, we can follow him, if we-" but Mabel had other plans.
She stepped aside, and took a wide, heroic stance. "Hey!" Mabel called to the man, "what's with all the book-shoving and stuff?"
The figure froze. Slowly, it turned it's head towards them. They saw a fair, pale-skinned face with equally pale blue eyes. He stared at Mabel, and then quickly spotted Dipper. A strand of blond hair fell past his face. He made to speak, and then winced. As if the words wouldn't form easily, he finally gave up and shook his head. Accidentally dropping one of the books in his shake, the figure whipped around suddenly. Before the twins could react, the man had run down one of the aisles.
Mabel bellowed, "Get that blondie!" as she and her brother split. Dipper turned to the left, hoping to cut off the fleeing figure while Mabel ran right after them. The person was quick, running not only out of the aisle, but into another, forcing Dipper to re-think his plan.
From the exit, Miss Isoar cried out, "No running in the Library!" as they darted around the interior.
Again and again, this person flew from one aisle to another, randomly choosing new places to vanish behind. Dipper was growing tired and frustrated. Each time he thought he had the person cornered, the person easily changed directions. He couldn't cut him off, no matter how hard he tried. He was slippery and fast. Mabel, however, was hot on the figure's trail.
"Almost got him!" Mabel cried as she chased him.
In a daring act, the figure leapt onto one of the larger bookshelves. It teetered for a moment, and then the person leapt again, higher onto another shelf. Mabel attempted following suit, but the shelves grew more and more unstable. As she made to lunge at him one last time, the shelf beneath her gave away, and she fell to the floor as an entire row of books collapsed onto her.
The librarian screamed, falling to her knees, "My literature!"
Dipper shouted "Mabel!" as he stalled, about to run to his sister's side.
Mabel was already pulling herself out of the wreckage. "After him, man!" she pointed, and Dipper spotted the suspicious man bolting for the door. Dipper nodded and charged, putting as much forward momentum he could into his bull-rushing. With a roar that would make any masculine being proud, he finally collided into the hooded figure just outside the shop. Dipper crashed to the side, causing the suspicious person to spiral, the contents of the backpack started to spill around.
The hood fell off, and Dipper finally saw the person- a young man, probably eighteen or so, acne here or there with dark bags under his eyes and bright blond hair. He looked tired, but under his coat was a vest and dress-shirt, implying some amount of wealth. Dipper started to get up from his charge when the man scrambled to grab as many books as he could, and then ran off.
Finally back on his feet, Dipper shouted, "You forgot some, you creep!" Unable to follow, Dipper winced. he realized he had landed roughly on one of his knees, busting it up mildly. A chase was out of the question now, but he watched where the man ran to until he made a turn by the alley that was between the biker bar and a small office building. "Agh... ow," Dipper looked down to his scraped-up knee, and winced as he stretched it to assess damages.
"Dipper?" Mabel asked as she stepped out, and then spotted her wounded brother, "Ohmigosh! Dipper!"
Dipper turned to lean onto the exterior wall of the library. "It's just- ow," Dipper hissed as he tried shaking to imply the lack of injury, as his eyes slightly watered, "okay, its- uh... doesn't hurt."
"How bad is it?" she asked, leaning down to inspect it, "Ouch. You're probably going to need disinfectant, you goober."
"Goober, am I?" Dipper grinned triumphantly, and waved a hand to the other half of the dropped books their target had left behind, "look what he left behind for us."
She looked, and then cheered with a hop. "Ah yes! We've got evid- wait," she then paused, and gagged, "Ew. No more reading," Mabel requested strongly.
"Let's see what- ow!" Dipper clutched at his knee, "ah... okay... Mabel, can you just pick them up for me? Toss them into the car, would ya?" Dipper asked his sister.
"Wait!" Mabel said aloud, catching her brother by surprise, "The whole reason he thought he was suspicious was because he was going to steal them," she reminded him. "We should probably check these all out."
Miss Isoar was much less pleasant towards the Pines twins when they re-entered the library. Aside from nearly destroying her entire collection, they had blatantly disregarded almost every rule a standard library had, let alone terrified her in her building of solace. Mabel would attempt to apologize many times, insisting that someone had tried to steal them, and their destruction was merely a side-effect of them saving some of her books. To this, and each time she scanned a book for them, Miss Isoar would coldly ask, "Would that be all!?"
The two left the library as fast as Dipper could limp. From a brief scan of the books, the two had discovered one text that had not originated from the library. Scanning it briefly, Dipper realized it had been a journal, likely of one belonging to the thief. Mabel was very curious to spy into the life of someone like that, but her brother fended her off. With a collection of various books and one new journal, the two arrived back at the Mystery Shack, soon to be Mystery Manor.
Stanley Pines stood outside the shack, drinking a Pitt. "Ah, the trouble twins return," Grunkle Stan called to them, oblivious to newly painted werewolf behind him. "Yeesh, what happened to you two?" Grunkle Stan noted the battered nature of the twins, as Mabel was covered in bruises from falling books and Dipper limped with his scraped knee while carrying a bag of books.
Mabel squeezed her eyes closed, and turned away dramatically. "The library is a war-zone only the brave should venture," Mabel explained darkly.
Stan took a long sip of the drink. "Huh. My limited interest does call for me to ask questions, but that could lead to responsible actions, so forget that. Get inside and get yourselves cleaned up. And no blood on the carpets!" Grunkle Stan warned Dipper, and awaited them past the door.
Dipper grumbled, "Real humanitarian," as he limped into the house.
Once inside, they spotted Wendy by the register counter, organizing her usual reading materials. She spotted them as they entered and did a double-take. "Whoa, dude, don't tell me I missed some crazy adventure," she said as they walked inside, Stan closing the door behind them.
Dipper groaned, "Library isn't what it used to be," as he walked further inside.
"Books did that to you?" Wendy snickered, "guys, you just read with them."
Mabel chuckled. "That's boring!" Mabel argued," it's more fun to make giant fortresses out of them, and wage bloody war against the fortresses! BWAAH!" Mabel ran ahead, yelling bloody murder as she knocked her brother aside.
"I heard a triumphant charge," Soos poked his head in through the doorway leading into the heart of the Shack.
Mabel beamed at him. "Just our glorious return, Soos," Mabel patted his arm, "next time we'll include you in on the mystery chase."
"For-sooth, I am yet to be forgotten," Soos said dramatically as he held the back of his against his face, and left the room.
Pulling himself back up, Dipper heard a call behind him.
"Hey, Dipper," Wendy said as the twins made for the kitchens. "Catch," she said as she tossed him a small medicinal tube from under the counter. Once in his hands, she explained, "Works better on open cuts and stuff than the standard store-bought stuff. Be a man, it's going to suck putting on."
He eyed it briefly, and then waved to her. "Thanks," he said and smiled. They entered the kitchen with Grunkle Stan, who pulled out a small roll of gauze, and place it on the counter.
Taking a seat by the table, Grunkle Stan eyed the twins. "So, any luck with the glowing tube found at my fake-wake?" he asked as he watched them apply their needed medicines.
Dipper groaned. "Not a thing," Dipper said with defeat as he applied the thick grey paste to his leg. "Ow! She wasn't kidding!" he gasped as pain rocketed through his body, a terrible stinging pulsing at his knee where the scrape met with the paste.
Mabel cheerfully added, "But we attacked a creepy man in the library," as she withdrew an ice cube from the freezer and began to glide it along the bruises on her arm.
"A creepy looking guy?" Stan repeated, "was McGucket trying to eat magazines again?"
Dipper shook his head. "No, we never saw this guy before. Had pale skin and bright hair... kind of looked dressed up?" Dipper tried explaining the person's appearance, "wore a hooded jacket.
Stan shrugged. "Sounds like any other grungy teen that walks around at night."
Dipper winced again as he spread the burningly painful ointment across his wound. He reached behind him and lifted his own bag, placing it down onto the table. "We caught him trying to steal away some of these," Dipper explained.
Stan leaned forward, adjusting his glasses to better read the books. "Huh, okay, let's see here... Arcane Archaics, Jaded Eyes Towards the Skies, whoa, wait a second," Grunkle Stan stood, going through books faster and faster, a frantic energy building behind his eyes.
Mabel leaned over, "Whab is ib?" Mabel asked with a full mouth, having given up on dabbing her book-caused injuries and instead started chewing on her ice-cube.
Dipper studied his great-uncle's reaction carefully. "Grunkle Stan, do you know these books?" Dipper asked as Grunkle Stan scanned the covers of the nine checked out books that they had rented from the library.
The elderly man looked to the twins seriously. "Kids, this is bad news if someone is trying to steal away these kinds of books," Grunkle Stan placed the one he had just been looking at down, and gave them a warning stare, "these here books are tied to the kinds of rituals that brought monsters like Bill Cipher to town."
"What?!" Dipper and Mabel both exclaimed.
"Not joking with you," Grunkle Stan flipped open one of the books, and displayed its contents; a detailed blue-print for a type of ritual involving plants, animals, and many bowls of scribbled down liquids. "To the average reader, dumb stuff. Hooliganisms! But," he pulled the book back to himself, "To so someone who know's what they're looking for… these are some old copies of seriously dangerous magical stuff. Spells and enchantments, summoning rituals, binding chants; the whole nine yards of bad magic-mojo-news."
Dipper stared at the table, deep in thought. "And this is only half of what he was trying to get away with," Dipper mentioned aloud.
Grunkle Stan seemed even more worried at this, and put down the book. "I'm going to put this to you straight," Grunkle Stan sat down, looking intently into the eyes of his kin, "don't try using these books for anything but research. The kinds of stuff in these books are as dangerous as they come- curses that can change the course of a family's history level of bad! If someone is going around swiping these kinds of texts away, who knows what they're trying to accomplish. So... be careful. You probably just stumbled into a big, nasty can of worms someone else is holding above all our heads."
"And they could pour at any second," Mabel grimly added.
"Who knows?" Grunkle Stan admitted.
Mabel sniffed loudly, and then pushed out her chest and torso. "Well, as long as I can throw in the first punch, they wont have a chance to cast any spell my way!" Mabel grinned cockily, "Cus when the Mabel gets the fire going, the fire spreads!"
Dipper eyed her. "That just makes it sound like you're flammable," Dipper said.
"Pwah! Don't hate on the Mabes," Mabel pointed an accusatory finger at her brother. "Besides, its not like you're going to be the one who can out-fight whoever is looking up these things."
"What? I can hold my ground if I need to," Dipper debated. He dabbed some more cream onto his knee, and hissed, "Ouch!" he squealed.
Grunkle Stan gave him a disbelieving look. "Uh huh. Like that one time you never fought anyone successfully in your life."
Dipper gasped. "Hey! I fought-" Dipper started to mention Rumble McSkirmish, only to recall he sorely lost the fight, which was the only reason the video game character was sent back the video game reality. He then proclaimed, "I messed up Gideon, didn't I?"
Grunkle Stan smirked. "Oh, look out," Grunkle Stan nudged Mabel in the shoulder, "Dipper over here beat up a shrimpy, loud mouthed, porter belly boy! Looks like he's moving up the ranks!"
"I bow," Mabel began to snicker with Stan, "to your awesome might, oh terrifying one!"
"Hey, I could totally learn anything as well as you can if I put my mind to it!" Dipper defended himself heatedly as the two laughed at him. "I bet that whole martial arts thing isn't that hard."
"Maybe not for me," Mabel bit her lip in stifling her laughter as she stepped towards him, "but you'd probably just end up over-thinking things, like usual. Boop!" Out of seemingly no where, she placed a sticker on his forehead. It read 'Authentic Strong-ham' with a picture of a pink pig with large muscular arms lifting old-time dumbbells.
Glaring at his sister, Dipper bemoaned, "Whatever." Dipper turned back to the table, and scooped up the books into the bag they came in, "I'll be looking through these, in case someone actually needs something important."
Mabel and Stan shared an amused glance and began laughing again as Dipper departed from the kitchen, slightly scowling. Mabel hopped out of the room with her brother, skipping past him up the stairs. As she entered the room and made for her clothing selection, Dipper looked in, uncertain of her purpose in their room.
He watched her looking through various tops and bottoms. "So, what are you going to be doing while I look these through? Nothing too loud, right?" Dipper asked deliberately.
She craned a look over her shoulder. "Define loud," she asked, pulling out a series of workout clothing.
"Like 'you're going to stomp around the room', loud?" Dipper asked as she took her clothing and departed. As he situated himself on his bed, he slid the books out and around him. Many of them were indeed older, some appearing to even have dates from prior to the twentieth century. Mabel came back into the room, wearing a martial arts robe of white with grey lining, a single brown belt tied around her waist. Dipper spotted her, and paused, drinking in the sight. Despite his dismissal earlier, Dipper said, "Wow. Okay, I gotta admit, kinda cool."
"I know, right!?" Mabel twirled, allowing the ends of her robe to swing out as he spun, "this is mid-rank, brown belt, in the Paths," she explained, pointing to the color.
"So, the last is black? With different degrees in mastery?" Dipper tried guessing as she removed her shoes.
Mabel happily shook he head. "Nope! In the paths, there is no such thing as master level," Mabel explained as she sat herself down in a butterfly stretch.
"Really? I... I don't know how to feel about that," Dipper answered honestly, watching her go through several quick stretches. "What do you do to distinguish student from teachers?"
From the floor Mabel explained, "Oh, well, they're called the Focus-Level. When you get past mid-rank, brown," Mabel said, jumping up and jogging in place, "you and your teacher decide an appropriate element that works with you. That element tells you your further training."
"Wait... so not everyone knows the same moves?" Dipper asked, worried for the noise she was already making. Her bounding up and down, jogging in place – it didn't pair well with the old, wooden floor. Still, Dipper asked, "How does that work, teaching the same martial art but with everyone learning differently?"
Mabel, still in mid-jog, said, "Well, there are basic move sets, but The Paths isn't about knowing moves entirely, it's about energy! And cool stuff! Like," she tried explaining, stopping for a moment from her warm up, "some people are more likely letting others tire themselves out in a fight while using little of their own energy, while someone else is more likely to be aggressive and forward to take them down quicker. Those two people shouldn't have to know how to fight the same, because they can use their different thoughts to different skills."
Dipper nodded, unable to help himself from agreeing. "Okay... that's not too bad, I guess," Dipper said, understanding, "so, do you have any idea what your... uh, 'element' is? I'm going to guess... fire. Or air, for that empty head of yours," he added with a grin.
After sticking out her tongue at him, Mabel declared proudly, "Yeah, but air and fire are both cool," Mabel said, and adopted a dramatic stance as she stared into the distance, "for the great flame of passion flows through my body, yet I am not tied to the earth: I will soar through the air, like a... goose!"
Dipper shuddered. "Geese are evil. Be a hawk or something cooler," Dipper told her as he lifted a book to himself.
"I can be a goose if I wanna!" she blew a raspberry at him, and began her practice.
The two remained in their room for quite some time. To Mabel, it was great work. She easily glided through each motion, each practice. The memory of how she practiced was still fresh inside her mind. She would mouth the words of her teacher as she practiced, occasionally throwing in a Mabel trademark sound effect as she completed a more impressive technique.
Dipper was less enthused about her practice. Not that he thought it wasn't cool, in fact it was the opposite. While she was mostly quiet, the few times she let herself become airborne it distracted Dipper greatly. He would peek up from the book he was looking into to watch her, wondering if he couldn't do that himself. Other times he was just down-right impressed with her skill. It wasn't like him to quickly be pulled away from his studies so easily. He could only wonder that should their parents have remained together; would he have had the same kind of training. Would he also have found that teacher of hers, and learnt this new way of self-defense?
Eventually Dipper was spared the continual distractions. With a sigh and bow to someone invisible before her, Mabel bounded to her shoes, placed them on, and let her brother know she was going to be jogging outside. Dipper wished her well, and finally began to really dig into the text.
Dipper found that Grunkle Stan hadn't been wrong. Many of the passages were totally reference and historical context, but the sheer amount of dark work in the books astounded Dipper. He began to mentally tally the number of times a book called for a sacrifice in recorded magical spells.
Grim book after dark text were dug through, and Dipper had began to take notes; not on the spells suggested inside, but the connections between them all. As of the fifth book, he had discovered a link between demon-rituals, summoning the dead, levitation, a particularly detailed collection on how to bind souls to people. There was even a collection of medieval recipes for alchemy and potion brewing. Yet, none stood out as the strongest, or most evil. They all just had a flavor of dark magic.
Dipper scratched his head. "Why the heck is all of this in the public library?" he demanded. He considered the town he was staying in. "Oh, right," he mumbled.
He took the second to last book, and pulled it open. Dipper's eyes widened; it was the oldest book, bar far. Of the nine rented, each with their own ways of explaining bits and pieces of spell and sorcery, this last one was literally a spell manual. It boggled Dipper's mind as he looked through them, the spells ranging from detecting a person's presence to shooting fire from your hands. Many had incantations and mystical regents to use for these spells, while others were 'focused rituals'; mental projections of thoughts to create magic. Dipper realized that this was more than likely the most important of the nine abandoned books the jittery man had forgotten.
One of the spells within the text caught his eye- mimicry. Dipper's curiosity had himself scan the notes and realized it wasn't vocal mimicry and more of a copy and paste for talent and skill. His mind reeled at the possibility for someone to use this spell over and over, and the egotistic fantasy scenarios started popping in his head. They ranged from being the greatest martial artists in the world to being the greatest mathematician that ever lived, all glorious moments of superiority. Yet his Grunkle's warning flashed in his mind, so Dipper cooled those thoughts. He then winced as he saw the requirements for the spell. He would not be willingly drinking fresh, sacrificed blood any time in his life.
By the time he had turned to the tenth book, the thief's lost journal, Mabel had returned; sweating and panting excitedly. She made happy talk with her brother, yet he did little to reply, having tasked himself with reading into the journal. By the time Mabel had run into the shower and cleaned off, he was feverishly writing down important notes.
She clicked her tongue at her brother. "I thought Grunkle Stan said we shouldn't try those spells and stuff," Mabel asked as she stepped back in, drying her hair with a towel.
Dipper shook his head. "This isn't spells," he told her, "This is that creep's journal. He got it several months ago, and it's about his search for a specific spell. That spell is going to help him complete a task set by his 'master', which is so important he doesn't mention the actual objective anywhere in here, nor his masters name!" Dipper concluded disappointedly, and added in sarcasm, "Because that would be too easy for me to just find the bad-guys real name, right here in his own journal. Ugh!"
"Well, in The Paths, you aren't supposed to talk about your master using their name. That way their secret identity can remain unheard," Mabel said excitedly, "and people don't go around looking to prove themselves in a fight."
"You can't even describe what they look like?" Dipper asked, flipping several more pages, "Ridiculous. This guy doesn't even want to talk about the guys favorite color or whatever."
Mabel beamed. "Of course we can talk about what they look like," Mabel answered happily, "my master is a beautiful woman with long bright brown hair and large blue eyes who's gaze is akin to a moonlit walk along a gentle pond," she ended very artistically, a grace in her voice.
"Right... so she looks sort of like you?" Dipper asked, and Mabel shrugged.
Mabel shrugged. "I guess so, bro-deh-bro."
"Well, I'm sure that's cool and all-" Dipper yawned, stretching out his arms, "feels like I've been here for hours."
"You have," Mabel told him as she plopped down on her bed, "it's almost seven."
"What!?" Dipper gasped, peering out the window he had neglected the entire afternoon, "how long did you jog for?!"
"I dunno. I just ran around the shack a few times. I lost count after fifty or so," Mabel wondered mentally if she had truthfully done the amount of running she had been supposed to complete or more.
"Then that means-" Dipper started, but cut himself off. The sound of a car coming to a halt outside the house caught his attention. Dipper quickly stepped to the window and looked below to his horror; two teenage girls had stepped out of a parked van, large duffle bags at their sides.
Mabel squealed. "It begins!" she yelled excitedly, hopping up and down. She twisted around and charged down the stairs to greet her friends.
Dipper, left alone in the room, stared at the open doorway. "It... begins," Dipper whispered, mental sirens screeching 'battle-stations' going off in his head.
An hour later, Dipper had realized he had made a grave error. Perhaps it had been stubbornness, or perhaps a twisted take on optimism; Dipper had decided it would be best to stay in his bedroom. Surely, he had the metal facilities to block out the torrential waves of noise and neon lights. Perhaps it would be made all the easier with the topic in his head; this mystery was one that had wedged itself deep into his brain, and would certainly, absolutely take away all his focus.
He was entirely wrong. Sitting in his bed, having scribble the same word 'noise' in his notes a dozen times, he inadvertently listened into Mabel's conversation with Grenda and Candy.
"I mean, who goes around stealing books, anyway?" Mabel asked to her two friends as they sat on the floor, magazines and food items strew around them.
Grenda, sitting next to Candy, suggested, "Maybe he wanted to do a crazy collage of magical books, and was going to rip out the pages. You can't return destroyed books, can you?"
"Not without fines," Candy answered, her voice as diminutive as ever, "at least you two got that journal of his."
Grenda gasped. "Speaking of journals," Grenda bounced off the mentioned subject, "would you believe whose journal got left around at school?"
Candy bounced a little in her seat. "Oh, I heard about that!" Candy excitedly replied.
"Lemme in on this dirt," Mabel begged, "Whose was it?" Mabel asked, leaning closer.
"Pacifica Northwest!" Candy announced and Grenda bawled with laughter.
Mabel gasped and grinned devilishly. "Shut up! Really?" Mabel gasped.
Grenda cackled. "Her face looked like a tomato for two straight weeks after that!" Grenda told Mabel, "It didn't stop glowing red until she found who had taken her journal. They had already texted all their friends about what Northwest secrets had been written down in the journal."
Candy snickered, and then paused. "I think whoever found the journal vanished after that," Candy puzzled in thought.
Mabel sighed. "Wow, I can't believe I missed something like that," Mabel admitted, shaking her head, "so what has Miss all-the-money-in-the-world been up to?" Mabel asked.
"Being a jerk-wad, like usual," Grenda told her bluntly.
Candy nodded solemnly. "She's the head in almost all the clubs at school, so it's hard for anyone who she doesn't really like to become part of a club," Candy stated sadly, "the only club I've been able to get into is the 'Practical Engineering Club', and that's because I'm a founding member."
Fascinating with the idea, Dipper jumped in. "Woah, that sounds kind of cool," Dipper said, turning briefly from his notes, nodding in approval to the mention of the club.
"Thank you, Dipper," Candy smiled back.
"How many are in it?" Dipper asked.
"Three," Candy admitted, slightly deterred.
"Oh," Dipper nodded, and turned back to his notes.
Mabel whined, "But she's not that smart! How is she getting to be the head of these clubs?"
Candy poked at her own can of Pitt. "She gives generous donations to the clubs funds," Candy explained sadly, "and she gets the title of sponsor and adviser. She's in fifteen clubs total, I think."
"I almost got kicked off the weight-lifting club because of her!" Grenda growled, "that little troll."
Mabel looked to the floor, crestfallen. "And here I thought I had made some headway with her," Mabel sighed, thinking back to her previous summer in Gravity Falls.
Pacifica Northwest had been her one true nemesis turned friend nemesis; a frenesis. She certainly wasn't the most evil human Mabel had the pleasure of knowing – Gideon Gleeful had taken that role for the majority of the prior summer. Pacifica Northwest was a girl extreme wealth, knew it, and used it to the best of her ability. Her family had owned dozens of businesses and she loved to act like her first name was on each of those organizations. Her sense of ego and Mabel's love of good sportsmanship clashed instantly upon meeting one another. Yet, at the end of that Summer, Mabel could have sworn she had made an improvement to Pacifica. Mabel had, at least, hoped that. Maybe she had been wrong.
Grenda put a heavy hand on Mabel's shoulder. "I don't know about her, but I do know about "Brunch Meeting"!" Grenda announced, pulling out a DVD copy of a movie made in the eighties about teen angst and social stereotypes. Mabel and Candy both shouted in approval.
Dipper flinched, and closed the journal firmly. He decided that was enough. "Well, I'll just leave you three to, uh, whatever it is you plan on doing for the rest of the night," Dipper said as he began to stuff his study-materials into a backpack and grabbed his jacket.
"Where're you going off to?" Mabel asked his brother with a studious eye, as he walked over to the desk and grabbed one of the cylinders.
"Downstairs. Or the car. Somewhere quieter, I guess," Dipper shrugged as he slipped his shoes on and left the room.
"He gotten much taller," Candy noted after he left, "so did you," she added.
Mabel stuck out her tongue, and teased, "Oh stop it, you!"
"So what's been happening with you?" Grenda asked Mabel as Candy pulled out a laptop from her duffle bag, preparing for their movie. "Anything cool? I saw that robe on the bed- are you doing karate?"
"Oh, no, guys, it's so cool!" Mabel gladly took the opportunity to explain her martial studies again. Twenty minutes later, the movie playing away unwatched, Mabel had wrapped up talking many topics: about her time at school, her many attempts at romance, and her great passion for martial arts. Her long-lost friends were certainly impressed with the amount of time she had put into it, and hung onto her words like a vice.
Candy told her with excitement, "You need to show us sometime!"
Mabel waved a hand away. "Naah, the Mabel shouldn't be bragging any more than that," Mabel told them.
Grenda leaned closer to Mabel. "So, how good is your brother at it?" Grenda asked. Mabel blinked, uncertain to her question. Grenda added, "at kicking and punching? And killing!" she burst out.
Mabel chuckled, and sheepishly said, "Uh... he doesn't study the paths."
"What? You only study martial arts?" Grenda repeated. "He doesn't? Isn't that, like, a required man-thing to do?"
Mabel shrugged. "Yeah, I mean, he didn't even know about it until we came up here?" Mabel told them, expecting that to answer their questions. Grenda and Candy turned to one another, confusion clearly etched into their looks. "Oh, right. You two aren't in the loop," Mabel nodded and remembered the fact that she and her brother weren't technically living with one another any more, "my, er, parents split up three years ago."
Candy stood up, taken aback. "Oh," she meekly said.
"No way," Grenda said sadly.
"Yeah. When they sent us up here, it may or may not have been because they weren't getting along with one another, and needed some time to figure things out," Mabel nodded solemnly, "they were still kinda angry with one another when me and Dipper came back."
"Wait, does that mean-" Grenda started.
"-That you and Dipper were-" Candy continued.
"Living apart?" Mabel smiled her best, pathetic, little smile, "Yeah."
Grenda frowned deeply. "That's horrible," Grenda said with a heavy voice.
Candy nodded. "That would explain why it became very hard to reach you after that summer," Candy thought aloud.
Mabel sighed. She hadn't had many voices to really level with, when it came to the topic of the split. "Yeah," she admitted, "Kinda sucked when the best plan the parentals could come up with involved having us for alternating months. But then mom had to move out of the county, so we couldn't even do that. Now we just sort of... call one another, sometimes."
"It must have been hard," Candy told her.
Mabel nodded, looking between her two friends. She could see the pity in their eyes, and she regretted letting this sadness take it's hold on them. The vibes, immaculate as they were once, were plummeting and crashing to the earth! She stiffed her lips, and recounted why she was having this at all: a friend's reunion – Not some pines pity festival! Mabel buried those painful memories. She kneeled forward, and pointed to the screen, where the movie continued to play.
"Blah! The only stupid feelings I want to see is from those fools! Just kiss her already, Diego!" Mabel called to the TV, getting a laugh from both her friends. The three of them sat together, drinking soda and making fun of the movie's characters intermittently while chatting and catching up. Mabel's mind, however, could not shake that cold spot she had gotten in her chest when thinking about her split family, and then how much had changed since she had last been up in this town.
Dipper had moved to his car. Sitting in the front seat, he looked from newly written note to another. The notes the newly acquired journal made were obviously not in mind for the outsider to read, as the entries were vague and nonchalant. Dipper could at least thank the thief for having very legible handwriting. Dipper grew frustrated with the idea that someone out there was this boring to read about and yet could pose such a threat to the town, or at least themselves.
He lifted the journal, and read aloud, "The town of Gravity Falls is my next target. They better have decent food. The last town had terrible food. I miss food from home," Dipper read aloud from the journal, groaned, "this guy is dull as a cinder block."
Dipper wondered why he was putting this much effort into figuring out this case. The man clearly wasn't a fighting type. Even being a little taller than Dipper, the thief had preferred to run away. Maybe this was just one of those freaky dudes who decided to look up demonology for the sake of boredom. Not only that, he was supposed to be looking up the mysterious blue thing for clues as to what mystery was really going on. Yet, once again, Grunkle Stan's warnings rattled in his head, a siren of bad things to come. If someone had wanted all these particular books, it couldn't be a coincidence. The person's ability to fight didn't mean he wasn't a threat or not.
Dipper simmered at that thought. He peered through the windshield of the car, craning his head forward to see if the three upstairs had quieted down. He couldn't see them, but a faint reflection of a television or computer of sorts bounced down to him, and he sighed.
Asking the distant window to his bedroom, Dipper asked, "You just couldn't hold off a night, could you?" He let out a long, pained breath. He considered his sister's inability to displease her friends. He smirked suddenly, the idea of Mabel ever turning someone down when they had done nothing to earn her displeasure made him actually laugh. "Just not in your character," he added. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the cylinder, playing with it in thought; its gentle blue glow shimmered in his eyes.
A crazy idea came to him. It was one of those infectious thoughts that plagued him when his logic wasn't getting the job done. Still, he was weak to these sorts of thoughts. Dipper sniffed as he decided what he was going to be doing. He dropped the glowing battery-like object into his backpacks pocket. Tossing his notes to the passenger seat, he put a key into the ignition and woke the car up. Heading down to town at night seemed like a crazy idea now, but his mind was set. He was going to get a lead on this one case. He spun the car around, and started driving away. As he drove down the road in the night, something caught his eye. It had been just above him, high in the treetops.
"Wait," he stopped the car as he scanned high above him. He was certain something wispy and red had just darted above him, disappearing deeper into the forest canopy. He reached over to his glove compartment, where a high-powered flashlight awaited him. Then, as he moved to open the compartment, he spotted the newly stolen journal. He sighed, and told himself, "Focus." He guided his hand back to the steering wheel. He was resolved to solve at least one mystery. The car started forward again, and Dipper mentally prepared himself. He would be spending the entire night looking for traces and clues of this person's whereabouts.
C'mon guys! So easily distracted! I mean, how easy is it for someone to just PAY ATTENTION to your freaking assignment of blue-cylinder thingy? . But then again, Creepy McSkulk-a-lots (not his real name) was certainly worthy to investigate I think. Who knows what he's up to? :o Then again, GRENDA AND CANDY! WOOPWOOP!
We needed to check in on those two social outcasts :D
Sorry for getting the update so late today, everybody. Midterms have ways of creeping up on you, and they mean business. I hope I didn't have an egregious amount of errors this week- usually pretty good about them.
So, I hope to hear from you ladies and gentlemen! Your words, encouraging or otherwise, always have a way of uplifting my desire to write.
Seeya next week! (EZB pulls a level on his desk, with the label nearby saying 'Dramatic Exit'.)
(From miles away, a massive, fiery explosion rocks the land as the building EZB was in is blasted apart.)