Chapter Text
Luz had been planning a surprise for King and Eda for months, She was going back to the Boiling Isles early. School was scheduled to start in a few weeks, but she wanted to do something special. Luz hadn’t seen anyone besides Amity on the Isles since last semester, and she thought that needed to change.
The portal to the Boiling Isles opened right next to the Owl House, and she didn’t notice anything wrong at first. She was so wrapped up in seeing Eda and King that she missed the disarray of her surroundings. After a few seconds into walking up to the door though, it was very hard to miss.
The sky was turning a dark red and the plants at her feet were withering. The more she looked the more disturbed she was.
Eda had to know what was going on, right? She walked up to the house and whispered to the owl on the door, who was sleeping.
“Hey, hooty…?”
“Who go- LU-”
Luz covered the bird's beak. “Shut up. It’s a surprise.” She smiled.
Hooty pulled back to free his break looking slightly disgruntled but kept quiet nonetheless.
“Who’s there, Hooty?” Eda called from inside.
“Come find out!” Hooty flirtatiously responded.
“Dear god. Don’t say it like that,” Luz muttered.
The door opened and she had to look down to see that King was there, his back turned. “It’s prob-” he looked up and stopped his train of thought. “LUZ!” the titan jumped up into the girls arms, forgetting he was bigger than when he had last seen her. She stumbled back but managed to grab and support him.
“Woah, you’re- getting a lot bigger.” Luz observed, getting him into a more comfortable position in her arms.
“So are you! Did you get shorter?” King asked.
“No bud, I think
you
got taller.”
“King? Who’s there?” Eda yelled from the kitchen.
“It’s Luz!” He screamed back to her happily.
She was glad to see that King hadn’t changed much in her absence.
“Hi, Eda!” Luz called as she headed toward the kitchen.
“Kid? I thought you weren’t going to be back for 3 more weeks?” She stopped cooking to go over to Luz.
“I wasn’t… but I thought I could surprise you! Surprise!” Luz said awkwardly.
“Well, it’s nice to have you either way.”
Luz set King down and went to hug the Witch, to her surprise. After a few seconds, Eda returned the hug, wrapping her arms around Luz.
Luz let go after around 5 seconds and frowned slightly. “By the way, why’s the outside all… bleh?”
Eda hesitated. “We’re not sure. Everything kinda just… happened.”
“I have a bad feeling about the whole thing.” King chimed in.
“Weird.” Luz thought for a moment, before deciding to change the subject. “OH! I’ve been practicing some glyphs and how to combine them, anddd…”
She handed King an ice sculpture of himself. “I made a statue for the King of Demons himself.”
“WOAH!” King tried to pick it up, but it was too big. “Oof-” he exclaimed as he dropped it.
“Careful, buddy.”
King set the sculpture down and ran to give Luz another hug.
“I’m going to put it outside so that all of the Isles know to fear the KING OF DEMONS!” He threw his arms up before struggling to lift the statue and waddling outside to set it up.
Luz giggled at him and watched as he set it down outside.
“He seems in good spirits.” Eda smiled, before turning back to Luz, a serious expression. “Look, Luz, I have a bad feeling about something.” Luz nodded, indicating Eda to keep going. “Do the Isles feel… off to you? Besides the surroundings.”
“Yeah. Like I said before to King, It all just feels... Blah.”
“It just randomly happened a few days ago and no one really knows why.” Eda fretted. “Former covenheads are saying it’s nothing, but I have my doubts. I haven’t reached Raine about it, but they always seem to know something .”
“Something does feel off, but right now there’s nothing that we can do. So let’s save the worrying till you can talk to Raine and figure it out. Okay?”
“Eh, you’re probably right.” Eda quickly changed the subject. “Do you like my new prosthetic arm?”
“You got a new one?”
“Yeah, the old one never worked.”
“How does a- wait is that the time?” She looked at the clock in slight shock. “I have to go see Amity. Bye, Eda!”
The Witch smiled at Luz. “Cya. Don’t do anything I would.”
“Trust me, I will!” Luz yelled as she left the house.
“Bye, King!” She said in his general direction as she rushed out of the door.
“He- where are you going?!” He looked up at her as she stopped running to answer his question.
“To see Amity!”
“Oooh, Can I come?!” King ran to jump on her back. Luz stopped running at this point.
“Why?” She laughed as she propped him up in her arms.
“Cause I missed my best friend. Duh.”
Luz cooed. “Alright, fine.” She accepted in mock annoyance.
She rushed off toward Amity’s house trying not to worry about the weirdness of the area surrounding her. It got harder to ignore the further she got from the Owl House. The further she trecked the more she realized that the entire Boiling Isles were like this. Which was… disconcerting. Still, she tried to put the worries aside and focus on seeing her girlfriend.
“King, how long has it been like this? Eda told me a few days but…”
“Around a week now that I think about it. It looks like it’s getting worse.”
“Oh…” She reacted. That wasn’t… great.
Luz approached Amity's house, but it was barely recognizable. A shell of what it was before.
King got down and held Luz’s hand. He was tall enough for that now. It slightly startled her, but otherwise paid it no mind. She walked up to the door and knocked on it gently but loud enough to be heard.
Amity answered and instantly turned red. “Luz? You shouldn’t be here- I'm so happy to see you but it’s not safe.”
“What do you mean?”
“Just-”
Amity pulled Luz inside by her hand, and King ran in to follow them. Amity quickly closed the door behind the two. She led them into a room with triangles on paper, they were spread across the room.
“Does
this
seem familiar?” Amity held up a paper that showed a yellow triangle with one eye, limbs, and a tophat and bowtie. Luz had to laugh.
“Is this a prank?”
“It’s not a prank!” Amity cried, shutting Luz up.
“Sorry, it’s just… how is that a threat?”
“He’s one of the most powerful entities I’ve ever read about, and I’ve heard rumors around the grapevine that he just discovered our dimension… I read about triangle figures in history, and somehow everything always comes out to a yellow triangle… It confused me for a bit, but now it’s starting to make sense.”
“More powerful than Hooty? Belos?”
“Take Hooty, times it by ten.”
“Oh.”
“Maybe more. And for Belos, well… I’m not sure how capable he
truly
is yet.”
“But wait-” King shot in. “This is still all speculation, right?”
“Yes… but It’s making more and more sense each day. The sky going a darker red? The entire ground looking black? It’s weird .”
“Yeah?”
“That’s his
WHOLE THING
! Making things ‘weird’.”
“Amity, how do you know this…?” Luz asked, concerned. She wanted to trust her girlfriend but at the same time, it all felt like a crazy conspiracy.
“I read a lot when we were in your human realm. It seemed like a funny joke story, something somebody would make up about the boiling isles but- I don’t know. I sound crazy.” Amity sighed and sat down, putting her head in her hands.
“Hey, hey…” Luz shot up and comforted her girlfriend. “I’m sure we’re gonna figure it out, and I’m not leaving until we do.”
“Yeah! You have a
titan
on your side, Amity! What’s better than that?!” King tried.
Amity gave him a watery smile. “Nothing I can think of.”
Luz squeezed her hand attempting to comfort her. “Well figure it out.” She reassured.
Amity pulled her into a hug clinging to her life her life depended on it.
For a moment they just hugged each other and everything else faded away. Evil triangles could wait. For now, they had each other and that was all that mattered.
King coughed to break them apart and Luz sent him a half-hearted glare.
“Other than the possibility of another deadly threat to the isles how has everything been?”
“Good, I’ve missed you though,” the witch answered with a soft blush.
“Oh, you have?” came the teasing response.
Amity ducked her head to hide the deepening blush.
“Anyway, how’s the human world?” she changed the subject. “Are your mom and Vee doing ok?”
“Yeah, they’re good. Vee is finishing her college a semester early so she only has one left. Then it’s off to Vet school for her.”
“A vet is somebody who cares for animals, correct?”
“Yeah.”
“Got it.” Amity nodded.
The two continued to banter, but King explored the house. It was nothing much, and frankly, he was getting kind of bored. He wanted to hang out with Luz.
That boredom turned into fear when he heard a high-pitched laugh echo in the distance.
______________________________________________________________________________
Mabel hated growing up. When did she turn twenty-five? Dipper was always busy now. He was writing a book about his experience in Gravity Falls along with helping Ford with his research, so it was rare that the two got time to hang out. Or call. Or text. Or really talk, ever.
The last time she had seen him was a year ago at Stan’s funeral. His real funeral. It was a mixture of things, heart failure, old age… She kind of blocked it out. Dipper was a mess, then again so was she. She had never seen Dipper cry before. At least, not when she remembered. It hurt almost as much as the loss itself. Then again, that was when it was first announced. At the funeral itself, Dipper remained somewhat calm. A nice facade. She offered to drive him home since he came with Ford, and he accepted. The two drove in silence. That was the last time she had spoken to her brother in a year.
Mabel wasn’t at the hospital when it happened, which she will always be guilty of. She tried, she really did, looking for quick flights since a bus could never get there in time, but none of them were available. All she could do was stare at the phone as Dipper sent updates until the last text.
Dip-shit: He’s gone.
That night she cried into her boyfriend's arms until she fell asleep.
After everything went down, Dipper became more reserved and tried to focus more on the book and his research with Ford. She wanted to connect with him, make it work, make it like they were twelve again (besides the man-eating triangle) but, that was easier said than done.
Oh, and that boyfriend I brought up? Turned out he was gay. So they broke up. Mabel and him are still friends, but after that, she realized maybe she needed to do some reevaluation of herself as well.
Mabel had started a sewing company and was going to go into the office until she got a text.
Dip-shit: Can we talk?
Dip-shit: It’s important.
Mabel: Is Ford okay?
Dip-shit: Yeah, he’s fine.
Dip-shit: It’s just him and me have been noticing some… weirdness.
Ice ran through her veins.
He didn’t mean…
He couldn’t…
It wasn’t possible. It can’t be possible.
Mabel: What type of weird?
Dip-shit: I think we should talk about this in person.
Dip-shit: What does your schedule look like?
Mabel: dude please text like a normal person. I’m ur sister, not your boss lmao
Mabel: anyways I can get on a bus tmmr
Hopefully, the store won't catch fire without her.
Dip-shit: Great. See you soon.
Mabel: YOU DON’T NEED TO USE PROPER GRAMMER FOR EVERY TEXT IT TAKES WAY MORE TIME
She exited her messaging app and went to Google, searching for bus tickets. She bought the first one to Gravity Falls, Oregon, leaving at eight in the morning.