Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Dipper was four, he’s pretty sure, when it first happened.

A great aunt on mom’s side had died, one no one in his immediate family really knew, but they went to the funeral anyway, because that was the polite thing to do.

He remembered being uncomfortable in a suit that was small even on his tiny body, and Mabel kept tugging at the collar of her own dress, even as their mother batted her hands away. She still insisted on wearing her favorite bright pink slap bands, and apparently it wasn’t a fight worth putting up, because she was still wearing it, kicking her feet on a chair that was too tall for her while the great-aunt’s husband mumbled into a microphone about how much she’d be missed.

And then Dipper, bored and trying to stave off the temptation to nap, looked around the room and paused.

Great Aunt Maggie sat in a small chair in the corner of the room, watching her husband with a detached expression. Her hands moved in time to something Dipper couldn’t see, and he realized what the motion was a second later; she was knitting, or at least trying too. Mabel had picked up the hobby recently, and he had watched her hands with a sort of interest. Great Aunt Maggie’s hands moved the same, but with a practiced ease that suggested far more practice than Mabel had.

“Mommy,” Dipper tugged his mother’s sleeve, unable to tear his eyes away. “Mommy, mommy.”

“What?” His mother leaned down, her voice a whisper. “Do you need to go to the bathroom? I told you to go before you left-”

“Mommy, look,” Dipper pointed, and then remembered that was impolite, dropping his hand. “It’s Great Aunt Maggie.”

“Yes, hon,” his mother said. “She’s in the box next to Great Uncle Luke, we talked about this-”

“No, mommy, she’s right over there.”

His mother looked perplexed, and she twisted to look back to where Dipper was looking.

Great Aunt Maggie was staring at him now, and it sent a shiver down Dipper’s spine.

His mother looked at him, and Dipper realized that he must have made a mistake, because instead of shock and joy on her face, she looked confused and a little worried.

“Dipper,” she said. “There’s no one there.”

Great Aunt Maggie’s gray face stared, and stared, and stared.

It was one of those concrete facts of life, the sort of thing you forget about because you’ve lived with it your whole existence and didn’t know anything different. Gravity was trying to pull you to the center of the earth, sweet things tasted good but made your teeth fall out and your body rebel against you, and Dipper could see dead people.

Once he figured out how to tell who was breathing and who wasn’t, it was obvious. The dead were the color of dust, like an overcast gray on a rarer cloudy day in California. They walked around with wide eyes, if they had them, staring at everything with a sort of paralyzed horror, even if there was nothing in front of them. They mumbled endlessly, usually whispering and groaning to themselves, but sometimes they would shout. Especially if they thought they were being ignored.

Especially if it was Dipper.

The dead didn’t take kindly to being ignored, because talking to them (or at least trying to talk, they were mostly incoherent) made people look at him strangely, and that was the last thing that Dipper wanted. Most of them didn’t realize they were dead, but they knew something was wrong. They knew that everyone in the world except for sometimes one small boy was ignoring them, they knew that they were in pain and drifting moments ago, and were now trapped in whatever strange limbo they found themselves in. They knew they needed something, but they had neither the language or sanity to describe it.

Dipper got used to it, and like a lot of things, stayed quiet about it. Especially to his parents. It was fine; there’s a lot of things he kept to himself. Mom and dad don’t know a lot of things.

Mom and dad didn’t know that sometimes his stomach tied itself into knots for no discernable reason whatsoever. They didn’t know that sometimes his mind would get stuck on a thought like a mouse in a glue trap, thrashing and tearing itself apart with what if, what if, what if until it’s unrecognizable. They didn’t know that sometimes something unknowable would sneak up on him, grabbing his lungs and squeezing until all the air left him and he wheezed like something had broken into shards, unable to be put back together.

Mabel knew (at least she knew some of the less supernatural things) but she always did, because Dipper was certain that there’s no universe where she can’t read him like a book, in a language neither of them were taught but were born knowing. But she didn’t know about the people–she couldn’t see them, and she looked so nervous when he pointed them out.

So he stopped doing it. It was usually fine, anyway. If he looked down and tried not to focus on how his breathing sped up so much he got dizzy, he could get through most encounters with the dead with the thin excuse of needing to go to the bathroom until the soul and the panic passed.

Usually.

He was seven and swinging, so high he was starting to get dizzy as the inertia carried him back down to earth, the chains on the park swing rattling each time.

“I’M GONNA WRAP AROUND!” Mabel squealed, and their father grimaced from where he sat on his park bench.

“Please don’t try,” he said. “I don’t wanna have to drag you to urgent care again.”

Mabel merely giggled, unafraid. She always seemed fearless; Dipper wished he was more like her.

He closed his eyes, only focusing on the April air on his face and the not-entirely-unpleasant feeling of his stomach dropping and rolling with each up and down.

“Dipper!” His father said. “Not so high!”

Dipper opened his eyes to apologize, and then nearly fell off the swing.

A girl, somewhere in her teens, was standing behind his father, staring at him. She was wearing a ragged pink dress, the type Mabel would fantasize about in a teen movie, and her makeup was badly smeared. Her hair stuck out in ten different directions, sticky from hairspray and something darker and congealed.

Dipper stuck his legs out to stop himself, digging them into the mulch, his momentum halting so suddenly that it reverberated through his bones.

His dad chuckled, none the wiser. “You didn’t have to stop, buddy. You just had to not go so high.”

The girl’s face was death-gray, and Dipper saw bruises around her throat in the shape of hands, stark against her skin. “Mom?” The girl asked in a wavering voice. “Mom, please, I’m sorry. I just wanna come home.”

“Dad,” Dipper said. “Dad.”

His dad’s smile shrunk. “Dipper? Buddy, you alright?”

“Please,” the girl said, her voice cracking. “Please, please. I’m sorry, I-I just wanna…” her voice broke entirely now, and blood started to run down from her nose.

“Dipper?” His dad had stood up now, and Mabel was staring at him, openly concerned. “Hey, little man, what’s-”

Dipper turned, and fled into the playground. His dad was calling after him, but he wasn’t listening. None of them could see the girl, crying uselessly for her mother in her prom dress, and they never would. No one else could see these horrible, awful people that seemed to follow him like flies followed garbage, forever tailing him uselessly, like he had any idea what to do to help them.

It was the loneliest feeling in the world.

Mabel found him first, hiding in the corner of the playground behind the tic-tac-toe board, and sat with him. She didn’t say anything, didn’t ask what his deal was, didn’t even smile at him. Just sat beside him, shoulder to shoulder, letting him tremble silently and stare at the ground. It was for the better, probably, he didn’t think he’d be able to tell her even if he wanted to.

They went home early, their trip ending early and sour as rotten fruit. Dipper refused to go back to the park for years, seeing a girl wandering in a ragged pink dress whenever the school bus drove past.

He’s ten in a flash, and Cole from language arts has invited him to sleep over at his house.

It was his first one, to his own slight embarrassment. Mabel had had countless sleepover since their parents deemed her old enough to do so–Mabel attracted people like moths to a flame, and there were weeks in July when it seemed like there was always a gaggle of girls staying in their basement, or Mabel was off at someone else’s house, sleeping bag in hand.

Usually, Dipper didn’t let it get to him. He was fine, he liked being home, and he got to pick the movies whenever Mabel wasn’t there.

But it was weighing on him all the same. Was the wrongness that seemed to pervade his very soul this obvious, that other kids seemed to sense it? Was he this bad at hiding it? He had already nearly mastered the art of looking down and ignoring the strange people lingering in the corners of his vision, never making eye contact with bloody figures or ashen faces, or else they might notice him staring and start talking to him. He swallowed the prey animal's instinct to flee, and it tasted bitter every time.

Dipper did feel sorry for them; it was just that his sympathy only extended as far as it could go without them screaming at him once he began to shrink away, unable to comprehend their pleas and cries for acknowledgement over his own pounding heartbeat, echoing in his ears like rhythmic gunshots.

In any case–he was really good at ignoring it. Good enough where he himself was merely ignored at school instead of being outright picked on. It was easier to be uninteresting than it was to be outright strange, to just blend in under the radar. Going to the bathroom between class breaks to press his face so tightly into his arms that he couldn’t breathe was just another facet in the daily life of Dipper Pines.

Cole sat next to him in language arts, and as such they ended up getting partnered quite often for various projects. Cole was nice; he liked a lot of the same movies Dipper did, they would chatter about video games they wanted or owned, and Cole even had a vague curiosity about Dungeons, Dungeons, and More Dungeons, which to Dipper felt the same as holding up a bright neon sign that said “WE SHOULD BE FRIENDS!” completed with sparklers stuck on the end.

As it was, they had to make some poster or other on one of the themes they had discussed while reading A Wrinkle in Time, and halfway through their half-hearted plans to meet at the library to work on it, Cole grinned.

“Hey, you wanna spend the night at my house?” He asked. “We can work on the project, but I also just got a new racing game and I’m sick of playing against no one. Wanna try it out?”

That was all it really took.

It had been a good night thus far; they had pizza for dinner, talked idly about the book before deciding they were sick of it and wanted to play video games instead.

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Cole said, twisting his entire body to steer his digital car around a very sharp corner. “But why don’t you, like, talk to anyone?”

“What?” Dipper asked, frowning. His car was struggling to overtake Cole’s. He wasn’t very good at taking sharp turns without crashing, and Cole was using it to his full advantage. “What do you mean?”

“I dunno,” Cole said. “I mean, you’re cool. But you never really hang out with anyone. You don’t really talk. I kinda thought you were a loner because you, I dunno, were super weird or hated everyone or something. No offense.”

“I am super weird,” Dipper said, in a light enough tone that Cole cracked a smile, though he didn’t know how true that was. “I dunno. Mabel usually does more than enough talking for the both of us.”

“Mabel?”

“My sister. You know her. We’re twins so she’s in the same grade-”

“Oh!” Cole snapped his fingers. “Was she the one who accidentally set off a glitter bomb in the gym in second grade?”

“Yeah,” Dipper nodded. “She still calls that her greatest achievement even though it got her grounded for two weeks.”

“Huh,” Cole said. “I guess you two look related. Never would’ve guessed it, though, you two are so different.”

“Yeah, we get that a lot,” Dipper said, though it was really only Mabel’s friends that said that, and while Dipper was pretty sure they said it harmlessly, he could quite be sure.

“But dude, that doesn’t answer my question,” Cole said. “Why don’t you talk to anyone?”

“I guess I just don’t,” he lied.

Cole’s digital car crossed the finish line first, and the screen lit up in congratulatory text. Dipper stood up. “Hey, where’s your bathroom?”

“Down the hall, first door on the right,” Cole said. “Can’t miss it.”

“Thanks,” Dipper said. “Be right back.”

He ducked out, following Cole’s instructions until he found the door, hanging ajar between the hallway and an almost pitch black bathroom. He pushed the door open, flicked on the lights, and screamed.

Or at least tried to. The scream got trapped somewhere between his throat and mouth like a bug tangled in spiderwebs, and all he could do was squeak softly, horrified.

A man was lying in the bathtub, covered in blood, half-naked and wearing a ratty pair of boxers. The water in the tub was stained red, swirling around his body in strange patterns, and the man was wheezing, glassy eyes pointed at the ceiling, half-gone already.

His attention flickered to Dipper, and he let out a horrible, rattling wheeze. “Hey, kid,” he managed to say, lips dry and cracked. “Can you…call someone? Anyone. I-I…I changed my mind about this.”

Dipper thought he might throw up, and another weak squeak wrenched out of his throat. The man blinked slowly, like it was a Herculean effort. “P-please?” He rasped. “I think I…I think I messed up…”

Dipper reeled back, hand over his mouth to prevent anymore terrible sounds from exiting his throat. He stumbled backwards, slamming the door shut as he nearly fell backwards in his attempts to get as far away from the door as possible.

The panic, the need to flee, and the pure and undiluted dread was back, like a drug injected directly into his nervous system. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t shout, couldn’t think anything but run, run, run, get as far away from here as you can-

“Dipper?” Cole’s voice echoed down the hall, and he peeked his head out from his room. “Did you–woah, dude, are you okay?”

“What?” Dipper asked, and his voice was shaking.

“You’re, like, ash colored,” Cole said. “You look like you saw a-”

“I need to go,” Dipper blurted out.

Cole blinked. “What?”

“I gotta…” Dipper swallowed hard. “I gotta go home. I just, um, I just got really nauseous.”

It wasn’t technically a lie; vomit felt like an imminent danger, but it was a weak excuse, and hardly the root cause of the issue. Dipper thought that if he focused, he might be able to hear the sound of raspy breathing from the bathroom. He tried not to focus.

“Oh,” Cole said, and frowned. “Yeah. Sure, whatever man.”

Dipper felt his heart sink. “Really, I really am sick-”

“It’s fine,” Cole shrugged, scowling at the ground. “My mom was the one who told me to invite you anyway, so it's fine.”

“Oh,” Dipper said, abruptly staring at the carpet as well. Beige shag, he wondered if someone ever had to clean blood stains out of it. They would need cold water. He knew that now. “Um. Okay. Cool.”

“Cool,” Cole said, already making his way downstairs. “I’ll tell my mom to call your mom.”

Dipper was silent the entire car ride home, even as his mother tried to push him for what exactly his ailment was. Mabel picked an old sci-fi movie to watch because their parents had already promised her the remote control, and the obvious attempt to try and make Dipper feel better only had the opposite effect. He pretended to be exhausted halfway through the movie so he could retreat to his room, avoiding prying and worried eyes. He didn’t think he could take anyone else looking at him tonight.

When he arrived the next day at school, the shaky friendship between him and Cole had shattered like old glass.

They got a B- on their project.

He was twelve as quickly as it took to change TV channels, sweating through his shirt while his parents drove to a hospital in San Francisco, with Mabel and Dipper in the backseat.

Grandpa Shermie had had what he called a “bump in the road”, but what Grandma Nora called “a cardiac event”.

“I’m fine, really,” he had said over the phone. “Probably coulda walked it off, but you know how Nora is about these kinds of things.”

“It was a heart attack!” Nora protested.

“A minor heart attack, the doctor said so himself. They’re just keeping me to run up my insurance-”

“Shermie, I swear to God-”

“Okay!” Shermie had laughed, and Dipper had felt some relief at the sound of it. “Okay, yeah, just for observation. We’re all good here, really. Healthy as a horse, just gotta cut back on some of those fatty foods or whatever.”

And Dipper had felt intense relief, and then Grandma Nora said: “We’re excited to see you at the hospital this weekend!”

He knew what happened in hospitals. People died. A lot.

This was one of those things he couldn’t get out of. He wanted to see Shermie, quiet the whispering in his head that insisted that Shermie was already long gone, and the next time he saw him he would be a ghoulish shadow of himself that would scream and yell and say terrible things, and no one would be able to see him but Dipper.

But his parents had been snipping and snapping at each other since before the drive even began, and it was only making Dipper’s heartbeat faster. Mabel was staring out the window, staring into the ocean in search of whales–nevermind how unlikely it was–an expert at blocking things out. Dipper had spent most of his life trying to learn that skill, and had come up naught.

Arriving at the hospital felt like arriving at his own execution.

“Are you alright?” Mabel asked him as they were led through the labyrinth of the hospital. “You look like you’re gonna barf like crazy.”

“Don’t say barf,” Dipper said in a tight voice, staring at the ground. If he was looking at the ground he didn’t have to see anything awful.

“Are you doing that thing again?” Mabel whispered. “Where you freak yourself out and start shaking and stuff?”

“No.”

“‘Cause it looks like you’re about to.”

“I’m fine.”

Mabel frowned at his voice, and Dipper felt guilty. Mabel was probably one of the few things keeping him from completely losing it–time and time again, encounter after encounter, she would be at his side, waiting patiently for his mind to stop consuming itself in a panic like a fox gnawing off its own leg to escape a trap. She never asked for anything in return, never pressed a reason, never complained about her self-imposed duty. Those moments when she sat beside him while he tried to remember how to breathe, shoulder to shoulder, were probably the most still she had ever held.

He was about to apologize, but his parents stopped abruptly in front of a door.

“Ah, 203, here we are,” his father said, and Dipper lifted his head to see the door pushed open to reveal Shermie and Nora. No unexpected guests.

Dipper let out a sigh of relief so palpable he could feel the anxiety draining from his limbs. Shermie looked a little pale, but he wasn’t full of tubes and wires. All he had was an O2 clip on his finger, and was fiddling with it when Mabel shrieked in excitement at the sight of him.

“GRANDPA!” Mabel squealed, dashing in the room.

“Mabel!” His mother said. “Remember, we said gentle!”

Mabel seemed to hear her, slowing down and gifting Shermie with a gentle hug. Shermie returned it, beaming broadly. “There’s my favorite girl! How was the drive? See any whales over the bridge?”

“No, maybe next time!” Mabel said, twisting around to hug Nora.

“Hey, Dipper!” Shermie grinned, and Dipper rushed in to give him his own hug. “How’ve you been?”

“Okay,” Dipper said. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“‘Course I am,” Shermie said. “It’ll take way more than some chest pain to take me out.”

“A heart attack, dear,” Nora rolled her eyes fondly. “Good Lord, it’s like pulling teeth with you sometimes. Stan’s no better, but maybe he can at least talk some sense into you.”

“Stan’s coming?” His father sounded surprised.

“Mhm,” Shermie said. “So either he thinks I’m dying, or I actually am dying and no one bothered to tell me.”

“Stop talking about dying,” Dipper’s mother said, and Dipper agreed.

“Yay!” Mabel said. “We get to see Grunkle Stan!”

“Do you know when he’s gonna-” Dipper started, turning to face Nora, and froze with a choked noise.

“Dipper?” His mother asked. “You okay?”

There was a man in the corner of the room, swaying unsteadily on his feet, clad in a hospital gown and nothing else. He stared, wide eyed, but that wasn’t what attracted Dipper’s attention. What was most glaringly wrong with the man was that his lower jaw was entirely gone, dripping blood and exposing his top teeth, his tongue lolling out. The blood fell to the floor with no sound, and it made no puddle, and somehow that only scared Dipper more.

The man tried to say something when Dipper made eye contact with him, but all that came out was a gurgle.

“Dipper?” Mabel asked.

“Um,” Dipper said in a small voice, unable to tear his eyes away from the dead man. He stared back, his eyes blank and glazed. “I-I…I have to go to the bathroom.”

“Dipper!”

It was too late. Dipper half-stumbled, half-sprinted out of the room, down the hallways and as far away from the room as possible. He had no idea where he was going, where he was going to hide, how he was going to explain himself–all he knew was that he had to get as far away from the jawless man as possible.

He sprinted past countless people, realizing more and more to his horror that the doctors, nurses, and patients had a healthy mix of strange folks among them. Those with an unnatural color to their face, those covered in blood, and those who simply looked confused, milling about helplessly through the hospital.

It was too much, and his mind was working double time like there was no tomorrow. There was no plan, no strategy, nothing. Just an animal desperation to get as far away from the ghosts as possible, especially the jawless man. But there was nowhere to go, not now, not ever. There was no corner on the earth untouched by the dead. There was nowhere to hide where they couldn’t follow.

But for all his gasping and panic, he couldn’t keep up the pace very long. An embarrassingly short time later, he half-collapsed into a chair next to a vending machine, curling up as small as he could make himself and yanked the brim of his hat down over his face, feeling his body tremble against his wishes.

This is a place for the dead, his mind cackled. And soon it’ll be a place for Grandpa and Grandma, mom and dad, you, even Mabel-

“Mason?”

Dipper jumped, startled, and jerked his head up.

An old man was standing over him, looking at him with an equally unsure and surprised expression. It had been a while, but Dipper would know that fez anywhere.

“G-Grunkle Stan?” Dipper asked, trying to cover up his stutter with a cough. “What are you doing here?”

“Uh, Shermie had a heart attack? Why else would I be here? I hate hospitals,” Stan said, still staring at Dipper like he had something on his face.

“Right, yeah!” Dipper nodded. “Yeah, um, I don’t like hospitals either. That’s why I’m, um. Out here.”

“...and that’s why you look like you’re gonna pass out?” Stan asked.

“I’m not gonna pass out,” Dipper argued, but then he saw someone dragging themselves through the halls by their hands, too gray-faced to be alive, and he buried his head in his arms.

“You’re about to do something,” Stan said. “What’s with you?”

Dipper swallowed hard. “...I don’t like hospitals,” he finally said, horrified by how quiet his voice was.

There was such a heavy beat of silence that for a moment, Dipper thought that Stan had left. He jumped when Stan shuffled into view, his shoes just visible below the brim of Dipper’s hat.

“...you wanna go back there together?” He asked, sounding incredibly awkward.

Dipper considered it, but then shook his head. “I…” he took a shaking breath. “Not yet.”

“Well,” Stan said, and Dipper heard a chair scraping across the floor. “Shove over a bit, kid, make some room.”

“What?” Dipper glanced up, and saw Stan was sitting in his own chair next to him, arms folded with an impressive old-man frown. “What are you doing?”

“Make sure you don’t run off again and, I don’t know, walk in on a surgery or something,” Stan said. “Seems like it might be traumatizing or whatever.”

That would probably be the least traumatizing thing I’ve seen today, Dipper thought, but instead said: “Don’t you wanna see Shermie?”

“I’ll see him in a minute,” Stan said. “Shermie’s fine, and if he decides to have another heart attack, he’s in the best place to do it. Y’know, I should have one while I’m here, get it out of the way.”

“I don’t think you can choose when to have a heart attack,” Dipper said.

“That’s quitter talk,” Stan reached into his pocket, and pulled out his wallet. “Here, get me something from the vending machine. And uh, I dunno, maybe something for yourself or whatever. And your sister, ‘cause she’s gonna be mad if she doesn’t get anything.”

“You’re giving me money?” Dipper asked suspiciously. He didn’t know Stan well–in fact, the last time he had seen him, he had still been in a booster seat–but he knew that while Stan was nice enough, he wasn’t exactly warm and fuzzy. The best words to describe him would be ‘weird’ and ‘aloof’, like he was already halfway to being one of the departed that only Dipper could see. “Are you feeling alright?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Stan rolled his eyes and shoved a handful of bills into Dipper’s hands. “Hurry up before I change my mind.”

Dipper squinted at it. “This isn’t real money. It has your face on it. What are ‘Stan-bucks’?”

“My own personal currency! Trust me, give it a couple years and it’s gonna be huge,” Stan grinned, and leaned in. “And until it catches on with the rest of the public, vending machines can’t tell the difference between this and a five dollar bill.”

“That’s stealing,” Dipper frowned.

“What are you, a cop?” Stan asked with a huff. “I’ll tell you what’s stealing, three dollars for a candy bar! I’m being robbed here!”

Dipper managed a small smile at Stan’s tirade, hopping off the chair to explore the vending machine options. “Just get me a Pitt Cola,” Stan said, and Dipper obliged, grabbing Chipackerz for himself and Gummy Koalas for Mabel.

“Nice,” Stan said in lieu of ‘thank you’, but that was alright. He popped open the tab and took a sip. “Nothing like clogging up the ol’ arteries a little more. I’m gonna drink this in front of Shermie and gloat. Wanna join me?”

“Um,” Dipper said, looking down at the floor and then up again. Someone with blood running out of their right ear was wandering, but they didn’t seem quite so scary now. They didn’t even seem to notice Dipper was staring. “Y-yeah, sure, okay.”

“They said it was 203, yeah?” Stan said, standing up and wincing when his knees popped. “Ouch. Don’t get old, kid. It’s the pits.”

“Sure,” Dipper said, just glad not to be wandering the hospital alone anymore.

“Dipper!” Mabel rounded a corner, and looked relieved when she saw him. “There you are! You ran off and I lost you, I-GRUNKLE STAN!”

Gone was the gentleness; Mabel cannonballed herself at Stan, and it was a miracle he didn’t fall flat on his back and break every bone in his body. In another world, Mabel could have been a linebacker.

“H-hey, pumpkin,” Stan wheezed. “Can we ease up on the hug a little? I hear my ribs squeaking.”

“Sorry!” Mabel giggled, not at all sorry, but she let go anyway. “You look older.”

“Yeah, that’s how the passage of time works,” Stan said. “Anyway, where’s my dumb brother? I gotta bug him.”

“C’mon!” Mabel grabbed his hand and started leading him back to 203. “Mom, Dad, and Grandma’ll be happy to see you too.”

“Sure,” Stan said, though his agreement sounded more placating than sincere.

Dipper tried very hard not to look in the corner of the room, but he couldn’t help it. The jawless man was staring at him with bloodshot eyes and an equally bloody body, still swaying back and forth like he was about to collapse. He mumbled something once more, tongue twitching and still glistening with saliva under the fluorescent lights, and Dipper felt sick.

“Hey, kid,” Stan stepped directly in front of him, nudging him. Dipper jumped, startled out of his incoming panic. “Give your sister her snack before she explodes.”

“You got me a snack?” Mabel asked, and a grin spread across her face when Dipper handed her the Gummy Koalas. “Awesome! Thanks Dipper!”

“Oh, no, honey, not now,” his mother said. “You’ll ruin your dinner-”

“They can have them,” his father interrupted with an eye roll. “It’s not that late in the afternoon-”

“Yes it is,” his mom said tersely. “And besides, the gummies always get stuck in Mabel’s braces, it’s a disaster and you know that-”

Nora coughed, looking distinctly uncomfortable. “Stanford, it’s so nice of you to join us.”

“Right, yeah, wouldn’t miss it,” Stan said quickly. “How’s it feel getting sentenced to a rabbit food diet, Sherm?”

Shermie looked equally relieved to have the tension broken, scoffing at Stan. “Only you would drive twelve hours just to bother me.”

They fell into the type of chatter two people keep up out of niceties; some kinder ribbing, asking how the other had been, commenting on dull things like the weather, but Dipper could see an uncomfortable stiffness in Stan’s spine, like his clothes were just a few sizes too small and he was aching to change. Or maybe to flee. It was hard to tell.

Visiting hours were over before they knew it, and Dipper’s parents herded them out of the hospital to go back to a hotel for the night. They at least managed to look embarrassed about their sniping.

“Good seeing you, Stan,” his father said, and Stan bobbed his head once like a chicken.

“Good seeing you too. Andy, Christine,” he nodded at their parents. “See you soon, Mabel and Mason.”

“Dipper,” Mabel said automatically, and Dipper sort of wished she hadn’t.

Stan blinked. “Huh?”

“Um,” Dipper said, a little embarrassed, but Stan had seen him near tears in a hospital hallway. He could handle a nickname that stuck like glue. “Everyone just kinda calls me Dipper.”

“Ah,” Stan nodded. “I gotcha. Well. Mabel and Dipper, I’ll be seeing you soon.”

Dipper assumed that ‘soon’ meant maybe in the next five years. As it turned out, ‘soon’ meant the following summer.

Dipper jerked awake on the bus abruptly, his eyes focusing just in time to see a sign reading ‘WELCOME TO GRAVITY FALLS!’ that was almost immediately swallowed by thick pine trees.

“Wake up,” Dipper elbowed Mabel, and she startled awake.

“I’m not sleeping!” Mabel said quickly.

“We’re almost there,” Dipper said. “Start grabbing your suitcases. Did you really need to bring every sweater you own?”

“Just because you live out of a plastic bag doesn’t mean I will,” Mabel said.

“I do not,” Dipper protested, twisting to try and snatch his suitcase out from under the seat, pausing when he saw a pair of muddy sneakers a few rows behind them. “I thought we were the only people on the bus.”

Mabel craned her neck up and looked around. “We are.”

A cold sweat immediately broke out on the back of Dipper’s neck, and he managed to swallow a gasp when he saw the sneakers stand up with far too much ease for a rattling bus. He sat straight up, pretending to busy himself with sorting through his suitcase, fiddling with the zippers and trying to look focused as he heard the squish, squish, squish of the approaching spirit.

“Dipper?” Mabel asked, and Dipper heard a frown in her voice. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah!” Dipper said, too forcefully, and wondered how many times he had assured people he was okay when he absolutely wasn’t. The number must be in the thousands by now. “Never better!”

He saw muddy sneakers out of the corner of his eye, and pointedly turned away, still trying desperately to look busy. He could hear them breathing, a slow rattling sound that always set Dipper’s teeth on edge no matter how many times he heard it. He wasn’t sure why they breathed, but it wasn’t like he could do anything to stop it.

In the window, he could vaguely see the reflection of a person standing behind him, swaying slightly with each bump and turn of the bus, like they were trying to keep their balance. He flinched when Mabel touched his arm, and tried to cover it by shifting in his seat. It probably didn’t work.

“Dipper?” She asked, her voice hushed and worried.

Dipper swallowed hard, and forced himself to tear his eyes away from the window. “I’m fine,” he said, refusing to look at the person beside him. “I’m fine. Just got nauseous for a second.”

Mabel said nothing, but Dipper could picture her expression.

Dipper took a shaking breath, trying to keep his head on straight. Terror would get him nowhere. The summer was going to be rough enough; they both knew why they were here. And it was bad enough that they were leaving the comforts of home and all their friends (at least, friends in Mabel’s case) and Dipper was determined not to ruin what was still salvageable of Mabel’s summer by like this.

“I’m fine,” he said again, and tried to believe it.

Finally, the bus came to a halt with a squeal like a dying dog. Dipper heard the extra bus guest grunt, and then squish-squish-squish their way off the bus.

Mabel didn’t race off the bus like Dipper knew she wanted to. She waited for him to grab his suitcase and start lugging it off the bus, into a town that looked, sounded, smelled, and felt so alien it was almost like being on a different planet.

“Oh, good,” Dipper glanced up at a slightly more familiar raspy voice, suddenly face to face with Stan, grinning a salesman's smile. “I was starting to think I’d gone to the wrong stop!”

“Hi, Grunkle Stan,” Mabel said, with less enthusiasm than she had the previous time. Being forced to spend a summer away from everyone you knew tended to drain such enthusiasm, though she was still putting some valiant effort into her smile. Dipper hardly bothered, ducking his head down to hide under the brim of his hat.

If Stan noticed, he did a fantastic job pretending not to.

Dipper could picture him gesturing grandly when he said: “Welcome to Gravity Falls!”

Dipper decided, quickly, it wasn’t that he was wrong about Gravity Falls being the worst, per say, it was just that he was misinformed.

Gravity Falls, in fact, wasn’t a sleepy logging town filled with a few wandering dead and little else. It was a very awake logging town filled with almost everything but the dead.

And not only that, other people could see the things chasing him.

Even as gnomes had tried to knock over their speeding golf cart and kidnap Mabel, Dipper had to swallow a grin because she could see them, and was shrieking along with him. For what felt like the first time in his life, his fear was not only validated, but also shared. Maybe this was why people liked watching scary movies; the community that came with fear felt like a bond forged in iron.

Soos believed him when he said he thought Mabel’s boyfriend was a zombie. Mabel believed him when he said there was more to this town than gnomes. He was pretty sure Wendy believed him when he said he was going to borrow the golf cart to fight gnomes. The only person who didn’t believe him was Stan, and Dipper was so used to people thinking he was weird and crazy that Stan’s occasional scoffing rolled off of him like water from a duck’s back.

That wasn’t even to mention the mysterious journal he had found in the woods, penned with oddities and occurrences beyond Dipper’s wildest dreams. Proof that he wasn’t simply hallucinating to himself and filled with bone-deep dread for no reason, that there was something out there, and while it could help or hurt, it was undeniably real. The vindication was so strong it almost made Dipper dizzy.

And the author himself (or herself, as Mabel protested a few times, because they didn’t really know) felt like a friend that Dipper just hadn’t met yet, spending most of the journal facing the unknown head on with nothing but his wits and a book in hand. There was nothing Dipper wanted more than to be able to do that, than to be able to use his awful skill to do something good, something useful. Here was someone with their own strangeness–an extra finger–and they used it to fuel a legacy.

(Nevermind the legacy was broken now, and that the author spent the final few pages of the journal descending into paranoid ramblings that barely made sense and felt like an ominous warning both of the town itself and Dipper’s own mind)

And best of all, he hadn’t seen a single dead person.

Nothing ever lasted, though.

Cloning himself with a copy machine to spend more time with Wendy was a great idea that had absolutely no downsides, Dipper decided, a few weeks after settling in nicely to Gravity Falls, feeling more grounded than he could ever remember being.

“Okay,” Tyrone said, adjusting his hat. “Knock ‘em dead, number one.”

“Yeah, I gotcha,” Dipper said, darting onto the dance floor. “I’ll keep an eye on time so it’s even!”

The dance was shockingly full. For someone who seemed so averse to loud noises and general merrymaking, Stan knew how to throw one hell of a party, even if it didn’t seem to have a reason to do so. Though, Dipper realized, that wasn’t strictly true; Stan liked money, and charging admission was a good way to make some. At least it seemed to be a success. This would put him in a good mood for weeks.

Dipper paused halfway across the dance floor, suddenly taken aback.

Soos was focused on his rented DJ panel, face screwed up in concentration. Maybe that’s why he didn’t see the teenager behind him. But she was hard to miss.

She looked like the 1980s had gotten sick and thrown up on her. Brightly colored windbreaker and matching leggings, leg warmers, big sneakers. Her sandy hair was up in a wildly curly perm, and her pink glossy lipstick was smeared across her face. Before Dipper could even really acknowledge her, she reached out and messed with something on the panel.

The music changed instantly from a pop tune on the radio to something with trumpets and a shouting man. The teenager squealed in happiness and darted offstage, waving at someone in the crowd; another teeanger, a boy with a denim shirt and denim pants; equally placed in the 1980s.

“Mike!” The teen girl said. “I did it!”

“Okay, dudes, who’s messing with this thing?” Soos said, trying to quickly mess with the board, looking confused. “This is rented, and I really want my deposit back…”

The girl and Mike were dancing almost obnoxiously to the song, glee on their faces. No one else seemed to notice them, and a second later, Dipper realized why. Mike turned, and his face was covered in tiny cuts, glass shards still stuck in some of them. When Perm jumped, Dipper could see the edge of a nasty bruise under her bangs. He’d seen this before; it was likely a car crash.

Dipper’s heart began racing. This was how it always started; soon they would suspect he could see them, and they would become hostile, furious to be ignored. And the dead were so terrifying when they wanted to be. None of them died peacefully, either. Everyone seemed to be covered in blood that had never quite dried, no matter how long they had wandered. The age didn’t matter; if anything, younger ghosts were all the more persistent

Nausea began to build in Dipper’s stomach, and he clenched his fists so tight his nails dug into his palms. He couldn’t ruin the summer for Mabel by hoisting his own problems onto her already, not so soon-

But even as he stared, the duo paid no attention to him, too busy dancing with each other, gracelessly but laughing at the rest of the party’s confusion.

Dead party crashers. That was a first.

It was also a first, Dipper realized, that they were smiling. The dead never smiled. But for all the world it seemed like the duo was having the time of their lives. They were dancing, laughing, singing along to a song that no one but them knew, and if Dipper hadn’t seen their injuries, he probably wouldn’t have even guessed they were dead.

“SOOS!” Dipper jumped before he could stop himself. Stan had poked his head around the corner, scowling. “If I can recognize the song, it’s not hip enough! Change it!”

“Sorry Mr. Pines!” Soos stammered out, and whacked the DJ board. After an ugly scratch noise, the pop song came back on again.

The girl stopped dancing. “Aw, what?! Boo! Boo Stan Pines!” She shouted uselessly after him as he left, looking for a moment like she was going to follow him before Mike grabbed her arm.

“Hey, Angela,” Mike said. “It’s that Pacifica girl who was picking on Stan’s niece.”

Dipper’s head snapped to where Mike was looking, confusion and fear instantly forgotten at the idea of someone picking on Mabel when he was off making clones.

A blonde girl around his age was making her way through the crowd, looking down at everyone from the tip of her nose, even if she was shorter than them. Dipper knew her deal instantly: someone who had been told she was better than everyone else, and fully believed it. Such people were not only found in Gravity Falls.

Dipper was already planning to make a few more clones to carry out an elaborate revenge plot when Mike turned to Angela and said: “Watch this.”

As Pacifica walked by him, Mike stuck his foot out.

Pacifica should have walked right through it, maybe shivered slightly. Dipper had seen people walk through ghosts a hundred times and been none the wiser. But Pacifica tripped ungracefully, her arms windmilling out with a startled expression on her face. Her lackeys froze, apparently short-circuited by the concept that their queen bee was not immune to falling.

Mike and Angela burst out laughing as Dipper’s jaw dropped open.

“Little twerp,” Angela giggled, watching Pacifica try to walk it off with little success. “Yeesh, we weren’t like that at her age, were we?”

Mike shrugged. “Who knows? Not our problem now. Anyways, I have it on good authority that ol’ Archie’s gonna straighten out that whole twisted family tree near the end of the summer.”

“Wanna go see if we can blow up some light bulbs and piss Stan off?” Angela asked.

“Sure,” Mike said with a grin. “Revenge for the terrible music. It’s our birthday present for him.”

It’s Stan’s birthday? Dipper thought, but jumped when someone tapped him on the shoulder.

“Woah, dude!” Wendy grinned at him easily. “Don’t have a heart attack! You manage to get away from the ticket booth?”

“Um,” Dipper said, peering over his shoulder to try and catch a glimpse of Mike and Angela as they disappeared into the hall after Stan. “Um, yeah!”

“You good, man?” Wendy asked. “You look nervous.”

“That’s just my face,” Dipper said, which was true. “Sorry, um. I thought I saw someone.”

“Someone you knew or something?” Wendy asked.

“Something like that,” Dipper said.

“God-!” Stan jumped when the lightswitch he had flipped suddenly shorted out with a spark. He looked like he had wanted to finish his outburst with something a little more PG-13, but only just managed to restrain himself. He scowled.

“That’s the third bulb this week,” Stan said, and glared at Mabel and Dipper, who were busy watching a Ducktective rerun. “Are you two messing with the lights?”

“No,” Mabel said.

“Maybe it was a ghost,” Dipper said before he could stop himself.

“You and your ghosts,” Stan rolled his eyes. “How many times do I gotta tell you there’s nothing supernatural going on in this town? You’re letting your imagination get away from you-”

“Or maybe the fuse box’s just old or something, like you,” Dipper said, frustrated to be blown off once more and maybe a little bitter. “Another year older. Happy birthday.”

Dipper had expected Stan to scowl, snap at him for being nosy. But Stan made a terrified choking sound, and paled as though Dipper had accused him of murder.

“It was your birthday?” Mabel asked, surprised and a little perturbed by Stan’s reaction.

“Who told you that?” Stan demanded, and Dipper leaned away, unnerved by the harshness behind Stan’s voice. “Who told you it was my birthday?!”

“I-I saw it on a calendar-” Dipper started.

“No you didn’t,” Stan said, and Dipper heard the implied liar at the end of his sentence. “No you didn’t, it’s not written down anywhere. Who told you?!”

“No one!” Dipper said, wishing he could run for it, but that would make it very obvious that he had something to hide, and he actually did have enough to hide without Stan unraveling his secrets over something as stupid as a birthday. “No one! Or maybe someone mentioned it? I dunno! I mean, come on, you throw a big party for no reason? It’s not rocket science to make an educated guess.”

The light flickered, and Dipper half-expected a ghoul to appear behind Stan, leering and cackling like it was in a corny horror movie.

But nothing happened. The strange panic drained out of Stan, and he mumbled something about Dipper needing to mind his own business.

“Why didn’t you tell us it was your birthday?” Mabel asked tentatively. “We could’ve gotten you something!”

“I don’t want anything. And anyway, birthdays stop being fun when you turn twenty one,” Stan said blandly, snapping back into his old mood–bored and relaxed–so quickly it was startling.

Mabel frowned, unsatisfied with that conclusion. “Why were you being so weird about it, though?”

“I wasn’t,” Stan said. “And quit it with the ghosts and ghoul talk. You’re only freaking yourself out.”

“I’m not-” Dipper started, but Stan had already stomped out of the room. Dipper huffed, sinking lowering into his chair.

“Do you think it’s a ghost?” Mabel asked, mostly making conversation during commercials.

And Dipper almost told her. It banged against his throat, a confession almost ten years in the making. Because she had never seen a ghost, but she had seen other things. Monsters thought impossible made real right before their eyes. Why wouldn’t she believe him if he was to tell her he had seen the dead since his first funeral?

“Do you believe in ghosts?” Dipper asked.

Mabel’s face split into a metal grin. “I believe you’re a huge dork! Hey-o!”

“Hilarious,” Dipper said, letting the dryness in his voice cover up his disappointment. “You’re hilarious.”

And he let it go.

He saw ghosts around town frequently after that, like someone had opened a bottle and they all flew out now that he finally said the word out loud.

Spirits of all eras and all manners of death wandered the town, far more free-roaming than he was used to. These ghosts were different from the ones Dipper had met before. They seemed more aware of themselves and the world around them, watching people and events around them with a focus befitting a person with a beating heart. They greeted each other, sometimes as friends, and sometimes (to Dipper’s entertainment) as enemies.

(It was funny, frankly, to see the ghost of someone who clearly died during the pioneer era glaring down at someone in a bad superhero Halloween costume. Dipper wished he knew what their beef was)

Maybe it was the town’s weirdness seeping into the ghosts, making them sort-of less weird in a strange reversal. The author had written about ghosts, fairly extensively in fact, but Dipper had found himself confused by his categories. The ghosts Dipper saw were never anything more than visions only he could. He had never seen them display anything like the traits described in the journals. A lot of the ghosts the author talked about didn’t even seem human.

Category Zero, Dipper thought blandly once. Just people. Freaky looking people sometimes, but just people.

These ghosts weren’t nearly so scary. Dipper didn’t have to fight to ignore him; they were already disinterested in him. And for some reason, the relief rapidly turned into intense curiosity.

It was later in June when Dipper suddenly gathered his courage. He and Mabel had been chasing down a man who’s right side had never been seen before, and after an unnerving discovery about his lack of humanness, Mabel had declared she was going to go home and eat Gummy Koalas until she forgot about the whole experience.

“You’re gonna pull off one of your brackets,” Dipper said, walking in step alongside her. “And there’s no orthodontist in Gravity Falls, and Stan’s gonna be mad if he has to drive out of town to get it fixed.”

“Who could stay mad at this adorable face?” Mabel asked, and she probably made an adorable face, but Dipper’s attention had zeroed in on a woman walking across the street, too gray-faced to be living.

She seemed utterly at ease; no confusion, fear, or sadness that was always so present on the ghosts he had seen back home. She looked bored, but not upset. Simply someone going about her day, and she just happened to be dead.

“Hello?” Fingers snapped in front of Dipper’s face, and he blinked. “Earth to Dip-Dot?”

“What?” Dipper shook his head. “Sorry, zoned out.”

“Yeah, no doy,” Mabel said. “I was just saying that Gummy Koalas are great when you have braces because they get stuck in the metal, because it’s like a snack for later.”

“Gross,” Dipper said, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw the ghost turn a corner. “Hey, uh, you go ahead. I gotta run and do something real quick.”

“What?” Mabel looked confused. “What is it?”

“Just, um,” Dipper floundered. “A quick errand.”

Mabel stared at him, and Dipper tried to look as relaxed as possible. The second he started putting effort into it, though, Mabel frowned. “Are you okay?”

“I’m great,” Dipper said. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Mabel said nothing for a long moment, staring at him. Dipper wriggled, feeling scrutinized.

“You don’t look great,” Mabel said uneasily.

“Gee, thanks,” Dipper said, itching to run after the ghost before he lost his nerve. “Look, it’s fine, okay? I-I just need to run to the office store, get some more pens, notebooks-” he saw Mabel’s distaste growing, and he leaned into it. “-maybe a new graphing calculator-”

“Blargh! Nerd stuff!” Mabel covered her ears. “Lalala! Not listening! You go do your dork errands, I’ll be eating Gummy Koalas until I throw up!”

“Glad we’ve figured that out,” Dipper said, amused. “Meet you back at the shack?”

“Sure,” Mabel said. “If you’re not back by nightfall I’ll send out a search party in three to five business days.”

“Wouldn’t expect anything less,” Dipper said, and they waved each other off as they went in separate directions. As soon as Mabel rounded the corner, Dipper started sprinting.

He caught a glimpse of the ghost ducking in a small alley off the town square, which was a little strange, but worked in his favor. He nearly tripped turning the corner in the alley, and caught sight of the ghost, about to exit out the other side.

“HEY!” Dipper said, pointing dramatically at the ghost in the alley. “GHOST!”

For a moment, the ghost didn’t turn around, and Dipper worried he had been wrong.

But then she glanced back, and then looked around. “...me?” She asked, voice oddly hoarse.

“Um,” Dipper said, and then nodded vigorously, suddenly having list his nerve to speak.

The ghost blinked, and squinted. “...you’re not dead.”

Dipper shook his head.

“You…” her eyes widened with increasing wonder. “You can see me?”

Dipper nodded.

“I…oh my god!” The ghost laughed, and it sounded like a wheeze. “Oh my god! I’ve never talked to a living person before! Oh my god, I heard about this, but I didn’t think…oh my god!”

Dipper still said nothing. It occurred to him, suddenly, that this was the longest interaction he had ever had with a ghost. And this one wasn’t even shouting at him.

“Sorry, I’m being super rude,” the ghost came towards him, and Dipper forced himself not to flee. She didn't look scary; just ashen. “I’m Josie. Nice to meet you.”

“Um,” Dipper managed to swallow the lump in his throat. “Dipper. Hi.”

“You good?” Josie asked. “You look like you're about to join me on the other side here.”

“Sorry, this is…” Dipper shook his head. “I’ve never talked to a ghost before.”

“Aha,” Josie nodded sagely. “First time seeing a ghost?”

“No,” Dipper said. “I’ve been…I’ve been seeing ghosts forever. This is just…this is just the first time I’ve talked to one. This is…oh my god. I also realized this is the first time I’ve said out loud that…that I can see you guys. I think up until the summer started I was still kinda convinced I was hallucinating everything, all the time.”

Josie looked perplexed. “I…jeez, little fella, that’s heavy.”

“I dunno,” Dipper said, but his chest certainly felt heavy. He felt shaky, like he was unexpectedly giving a speech. “Maybe a little.”

“Not that I’m not, like, super honored and all to be your first ghost you chose to talk to,” Josie said. “But why me? I’m sure you’ve seen the others around town. I’m not super interesting. I mean, I choked on a Chipacker.”

“I…I had some questions,” Dipper said, trying to stop himself from shaking. “I’ve had some questions for a while. About…about ghosts. About how this whole thing works. Look, I’m new in town. I’ve only been here about a month. But the ghosts here are…they’re so different from back home. Back home, they don’t know who they are. They don’t know where they are. I don’t even think a bunch of them know they’re dead. All they know is that everyone’s ignoring them, they don’t know what’s happening, and for a lot of them, their last memory was something terrible happening to them. They don’t…” Dipper trailed off for a moment, and forced himself to take a breath. “They aren’t super friendly if they think I’m ignoring them.”

Josie winced. “Aw, I’m sorry, little fella. That sounds rough.”

“It’s fine,” Dipper said, though it wasn’t. “But…the ghosts here aren’t like that. You guys seem…” he trailed off again, and gestured vaguely.

“Sane?” Josie offered.

“...I guess,” Dipper said weakly.

“I mean,” Josie said. “I can tell you what I know, but I’m no expert.”

“What?” Dipper blinked. “But…but you’re a ghost.”

“So?” Josie said. “You’re alive. Tell me absolutely everything about being alive.”

Dipper frowned, and Josie laughed. Dipper thought he saw the telltale orange of a Chipacker in the back of her throat. “Living, dead, undead–it’s all just a mode of existence, man. I can tell you my experience, and what I’ve been told, but I can’t tell you the secret to life or whatever. I’m just a lady who didn’t know how to give herself the Heimlich. Lame death.”

“Okay, just…” Dipper sighed. “Do you know why…you’re aware?”

“Kinda, yeah,” Josie said. “See, being a ghost can be really lonely. When you die, when you first pop back into awareness…you’re right. The first thing, and really the only thing on your mind is that final moment before what we call here the Big Push. The Big Push isn’t so bad, just kinda like drifting off. But everything leading up to that can suck if you’re not dying in your sleep or whatever. Especially if it was violent. I mean, I choked, and I came back still thinking I was choking even though I wasn’t in pain anymore. That feedback loop can drive someone crazy real fast. Especially if everything else about you–your name, your life, your loved ones–is still hazy.”

“You didn’t remember your name?” Dipper asked.

“For a minute, no,” Josie said. “See, that’s where everyone else comes in. Ghosts can see each other. We can talk to each other. That’s the key, really. Everyone around you keeps you grounded, lets you know that the worst of it is over, helps you remember that you’re more than just that moment of fear and pain looping over and over. It’s nice. It’s a little community.”

“So…” Dipper pinched the bridge of his nose. “Hang on. The key to not going insane is just…talking to people? Making friends?”

“Just like real life!” Josie grinned. “Yeah, it’s a bit more involved, and it takes work to stay like…” she motioned vaguely. “This, and not a hacking, coughing, crying person begging for help from people who can’t see her, but yeah. Friendship and connection saves the day.”

“Huh,” Dipper said, and then paused. An idea, a little desperate and completely out of the blue, began to form in his mind. “Um,” he said, withdrawing the journal from his vest pocket and flipping through it carefully. “This is a little random, sorry. Does…does this look familiar?”

Josie squinted at it, frowning. “Hm. I don’t think so. Well. I dunno. Maybe? Looks old, and like I said, I haven’t been around that long.”

“Are you sure?” Dipper asked. “It was written by someone investigating the weirdness of the town. He wrote a whole section on ghosts! Look!”

Dipper flipped open to the page giving an introduction on ghosts, and Josie leaned in close to get a better look. After a moment, she frowned and shook her head. “Sorry, little fella. Can’t say I’ve seen it. Wish I could help more.”

Dipper sighed, already disappointed. “S’fine. Thanks anyway.”

“It looks right, though, just from what I saw,” Josie said. “About ghosts having a reason to stay behind, that is.”

“Really?” Dipper perked up. “What’s your reason?”

Josie shrugged, and then laughed when Dipper frowned. “Come on! We don’t all have unsolved murders weighing on us. Most of us lived mundane enough lives where our goal was like, self-fulfillment or something stupid and vague like that. The sort of thing that’s hard to figure out. I don’t even really know my reason.”

“So, if you don’t know your reason for sticking around,” Dipper said, frowning even more deeply. “Can you even, um. You know. Move on?”

“Nope,” Josie said.

“Oh,” Dipper said. “Oh. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Josie said. “Being dead isn’t that bad usually. It’s dying that sucks. But that doesn’t last forever. Just a moment. It passes.”

“You really have no idea who wrote this?” Dipper asked, staring at his reflection in the gold-plated hand.

“None whatsoever,” Josie said. “But, hey, that thing looks pretty old. I bet if you talked to some of the older ghosts, they might be able to help you out.”

Dipper perked up. “Really? They’d talk to me?”

“One thing us ghosts love to do, it’s talk,” Josie said. “They’ll be thrilled there’s a new person to tell stories too. Especially since you’re living. Don’t be shocked if they ask you to do a few favors, though. Not like we can do much for ourselves. Oh! Start with Willy, he hangs around by the dump. He died of a heart attack back in the 1940s, I think. Untied tie, carrying around a briefcase…can’t miss him. He’s big on chatting with the rest of us. He might have an idea of who your writer friend is.”

“Really?” Dipper asked, a smile spreading across his face.

“It’s worth a shot,” Josie said. “And if he doesn’t know, Willy probably knows who does.”

“That’s amazing!” Dipper said. “A-and he won’t freak out on me, yell or anything?”

“Willy’s a little annoying and pedantic,” Josie said. “But perfectly sane. I wouldn’t send you into the woods after the lumberjacks or anything. As long as you stay in town, everyone’s nice.”

That was an ominous thing to say, but Dipper was too busy grinning ear to ear, his mind racing. “That’s awesome! Josie, seriously, this is just the lead I’ve been looking for!”

Josie saluted him with her own grin. “Glad to help in the quest for whatever this is.”

“Oh, uh, I almost forgot to ask,” Dipper said. “Who was the first ghost?”

“The first ghost?”

“The first ghost who helped the other ghost not go crazy,” Dipper said. “Who kept them from going crazy?”

“No one,” Josie said. “There was another living person who could see us. They talked to us, brought a bunch of us back from insanity.”

Dipper’s breath caught in his throat.

Josie grinned. “What, you’re surprised that another person in this town can see ghosts? Come on, man. There’s gnomes in the forest. Of course there’s a medium running around.”

“Who is it?” Dipper asked, almost in a whisper.

Josie shrugged. “I dunno. No one’s spoken to ‘em for a long time now. I only died a few years ago.”

“Would Willy know?” Dipper asked.

Josie shrugged again. “Maybe.”

“Okay,” Dipper said, an even bigger smile spreading across his face. “I…I’m not the only one, then? I’m not…I’m not a freak? Someone else can see you all too?”

“I-” Josie frowned. “Well, yeah, but Dipper, maybe you shouldn’t-”

“Thanks, Josie!” Dipper said, shoving the journal back into his jacket, already starting to run off. “Sorry that you died!”

“Don’t be!” Josie said. “It happens to everyone!”

It took a little longer than Dipper would have wanted to find an excuse to slip out alone and make his way to the dump. Stan always had more chores for him, there was always another monster to chase, and it was harder than he thought it would have been to shake Mabel.

But he did make his way there, and when he didn’t see any businessmen lingering on the outskirts of the dump, he took a deep breath, and ventured inside.

It occurred to him that this was never something he would have done at the beginning of the summer.

“Hello?” Dipper called out hesitantly. “Willy? I-Is there someone named Willy here? Josie sent me!”

Dipper rounded the corner, and paused.

A gray-faced man was staring at him, clutching a briefcase, a navy blue tie hanging loose around his neck. Dipper swallowed, and waved. “Um. Hi. You’re…you’re Willy, right?”

“You can see me?” Willy asked, looking flabbergasted.

“Uh,” Dipper said, and wondered if he would have to go through this with every ghost he spoke to. “Yeah, man. Hi. I’m Dipper.”

Willy grinned. “Capital to meet you, my good man! I’m William James Loman, but call me Willy! Everyone does!”

“Sure,” Dipper said. “Listen, I-”

“What can I do for you, sport?” Willy asked. “By God, it’s been so long since I’ve spoken to a living person! In fact, I thought he was the only one!”

“You spoke to a living person before me?” Dipper asked, forgoing questions about the journal for just a moment.

“Why, yes!” Willy nodded. “Suppose it makes sense, a gift such as your’s is extremely uncommon, but uncommon things seem to just thrive in this town, don’t they?”

“Right, yeah, gnomes in the forest and all,” Dipper said. “Do you, um, know who it is?”

“Ah,” Willy’s smile wilted a bit. “Hm. Uh. Well. Seems I’ve forgotten the fellow’s name.”

“What?!”

“Well, in my defense,” Willy said. “I was lost in my own mind for quite some time. Then this inquisitive man pulls me out of it! Very kind of him. Didn’t even really ask for anything in return. Just had a few questions, though don’t ask what they were, I can’t recall. See, after we spirits become lost, it can…it can stick with us. That much pain and fear swirling around tends to hang about, clouding memories even if we don’t mean it to. My mind’s mostly where it was, but…some things slip away. Especially seeing as I haven’t spoken to him in such a long, long time.”

“Don’t suppose you know what this is either, then,” Dipper said glumly, pulling the journal out and showing it to Willy.

Willy squinted at it. “...I think that’s supposed to have a one. Not a three.”

Dipper’s heart skipped a few beats. “W-what?”

“Yes, you know,” Willy nodded slowly. “That does look quite familiar. I think…I remember a man, standing before me. He…he had a journal much like that tucked under his arm. He was asking me so many questions, but I…why, I was still half-mad. I couldn’t answer them.”

“You don’t…” Dipper swallowed. “You really don’t remember anything?”

Willy shook his head. “Just a shadow of a face, I’m afraid.”

“But…” Dipper said, feeling vaguely light-headed from excitement. “If…if he had the journal, that means…oh my god. Oh my god. The author! He was the other one who could see ghosts!”

Dipper started pacing before he could stop himself, ignoring the confused looks from Willy. “It makes perfect sense! Of course he could see ghosts! That’s why he was able to gather so much data on them! He must have outlined his daily ghost interactions in the first journal! That must be what he was asking you!”

“Now that you mention it,” Willy said slowly. “I do believe his questions had a clinical edge to them. Scientific, you could say. Couldn’t make heads or tails of ‘em, he got frustrated with me real quick.”

“This is incredible!” Dipper laughed, high-pitched and relieved. “Oh my god! I-I’m not the only one! A genius, an actual genius, can see you guys too! This is incredible!”

“Talkin’ to the air?”

Dipper shrieked, stumbling away from Old Man McGucket, who had just about materialized next to Dipper, grinning and blank-eyed. “I do the same all the time! Howdy, air!” McGucket waved at Willy mindlessly, who waved back.

Gravity Falls, Dipper had learned, was filled with unique characters, but very few could hold a candle to the hillbilly that had somehow wandered out of Cumberland and into the far reaches of the Pacific Northwest. For a moment, when he first met him, Dipper had thought he was dead–only the dead wailed and pleaded for attention like that with so little awareness–but everyone else reacted to him like they knew exactly who he was, and was little more than a nuisance.

“Why, hello, Mr. McGucket,” Willy said pleasantly. “How are you today?”

McGucket didn’t respond, turning back to Dipper with a grin. “Glad to see another fan of air-talkin’!”

“Oh my god,” Dipper wheezed, clutching his chest.

Willy chuckled. “He won’t hurt you. He’s harmless.”

“Sure, he seemed harmless when he was chasing us with a robot lake monster,” Dipper grumbled, standing back up.

Willy frowned. “That…does sound like him, yes. I apologize on behalf of him.”

“Don’t bother,” Dipper said, and McGucket just stared at him, smiling with annoying docility. A fly buzzed around his head, and he made no move to shoo it away. “He’s bananas.”

“Be kind to him,” Willy said, his voice suddenly sharp.

“Well!” McGucket screeched, giving no indication that he was aware of any conversation happening around him. “Oughta get home to the missus! She gets re-ea-ea-eal cranky when I’m late, and I don’t want more rabies shots!”

“What-” Dipper started, but McGucket had already scampered off, almost animal-like.

Dipper glanced at Willy sideways. “Why are you talking to him? He can’t see you.”

“I should think he would like the company regardless, though,” Willy said. “It’s hard not to feel sympathetic. He’s not unlike how I was prior to regaining myself. I know what it is to be ignored. I know what it is to feel left behind. He doesn’t even have the benefit of knowing people simply can’t perceive him. He’s been ignored on purpose.”

“What?” Dipper blinked. “Why…why is he like that?”

“I’ve not the foggiest idea,” Willy said. “But he has…moments, sometimes. Of semi-clarity. He looks for his son. He calls for someone.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know,” Willy said sadly. “He doesn’t remember their name.”

Dipper frowned, trying to match Willy’s picture of McGucket with the picture he had–a crazed old man hellbent on causing destruction and chaos everywhere he went, even by accident.

“You don’t have to be dead to be a ghost,” Willy said softly, half to himself. “And someone doesn’t have to be buried to haunt you, either.”

“Hey, less yappin’, more sweepin’,” Stan grumbled, shooing Dipper away from the cash register where he had been having a spirited discussion with Wendy about a TV show she liked and Dipper was pretending to like.

Dipper scowled, clutching an ancient broom tightly. “I was sweeping!”

“Yeah?” Stan raised an eyebrow. “‘Cause it looked to me like you were too busy making goo-goo eyes-”

“I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT,” Dipper said, probably too loudly, because a baby in a stroller nearby burst into tears. The mother glared, and stalked out of the gift shop without buying anything.

Stan scowled at Dipper. “That’s coming out of your paycheck.”

“I don’t get a paycheck!” Dipper protested.

“I’m taking it out of your imaginary paycheck,” Stan amended. “You know, I was just thinking about starting to pay you.”

“No you weren’t,” Dipper grumbled.

“I wasn’t,” Stan agreed. “But I definitely won’t now.”

Dipper mumbled to himself, mostly just nonsense, but Stan’s head snapped back to him. “If you got something to say, you might as well say it.”

Dipper dipped his head down towards the ground, letting the brim of his hat conceal Stan’s face. He heard Stan sigh. “You’re gonna give yourself an ulcer with how much you choke down, kid.”

Dipper scowled, turning away. “What do you know?”

“More than you think,” Stan said.

Dipper went quiet again, biting his tongue to keep a venomous remark at bay. He swept vaguely at the floor, mostly just pushing dust around. When he turned, he was surprised to find Stan’s shoes still in view.

“You’re still here?” Dipper asked before he could stop himself.

“Don’t have anywhere better to be,” Stan said. “What, you want Chipackerz from the vending machine again or something?”

Dipper thought of Josie and the wad of orange permanently stuck in the back of her throat and shook his head. “That was forever ago. I’m not a little kid.”

“That was only a handful of months ago,” Stan said, and then, in a strangely careful voice: “You ever gonna tell me why you were so upset-”

“I was upset because Grandpa Shermie was in the hospital,” Dipper snapped, jerking his head up to glare at Stan. “And right now, I’m upset that since he had a heart attack we can’t be with him and Grandma Nora in San Francisco while mom and dad get a divorce or whatever.”

Stan blinked, looking surprised. “That’s not-”

“I’m not stupid,” Dipper snapped. “We’re not here to get fresh air. We’re just here so they can figure out custody stuff and scream at each other without worrying that we’re gonna hear. Look, you don’t want us here, and we didn’t really wanna be here, but we’re here now, so why don’t we just call a truce and make the best of it?”

“That’s not-” Stan sputtered. “Kid-”

“Save it,” Dipper said, his voice edging on a snap. “You only want us here because child labor laws don’t count if it’s family.”

Stan laughed, humorless and harsh. “You got it all figured out, huh?”

“I see a lot,” Dipper said, turning away to uselessly poke at a dust bunny. “I know more about this town than you do-”

He stumbled around someone as they stepped out behind the t-shirt stand, and was about to mumble an insincere apology when he froze.

The man he had nearly run into was ashen, far too colorless to be alive. But beyond that, his right eye was bright red, leaking fluid and blood down his cheek slowly. He was walking unsteadily, the right side of his face drooping horrifically. He regarded Dipper with some interest, and Dipper felt his throat close up.

Dipper forgot that ghosts could still be scary.

“Um,” Dipper said, realizing he was never going to get used to unexpectedly running into a corpse. “Um.”

Someone snatched the broom out of his hand, and Stan moved in front of him, blocking his view of the corpse to better glare at him. “If you’re just gonna putter around and mope,” he growled. “At least go do it somewhere else.”

Dipper blinked, startled out of an incoming spiral by Stan. “What? Are you…are you letting me off early?”

“You’re chasing off my customers!” Stan shook the broom, and Dipper caught a glimpse of the ghost behind him, watching them with a vague interest. “Go find your sister and run around in the woods until dinner or something, I dunno what you do out there all day.”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” Dipper muttered.

“Sure, whatever,” Stan rolled his eyes, and Dipper’s jaw clenched. “Now scram. I gotta enough on my plate without you giving me the evil eye.”

“It’s just not fair!” Dipper told Josie, pacing up and down the alleyway. “Why does he keep dismissing me?! He can’t possibly be that dumb to ignore all the weird stuff that happens in this town! No one can be!”

Josie shrugged, sitting on the ground. “I dunno. I don’t remember too much weird stuff from when I was alive, to be honest. Maybe it’s just one of those things you notice more in hindsight.”

“So I have to wait for him to die to believe me?” Dipper asked bitterly.

“That’s a little dark, don’t you think?” Josie asked.

“Maybe,” Dipper sighed, sitting down across from Josie. “It’s just frustrating.”

“At least you have your sister,” Josie said. “From what you’ve told me, seems like you two are kicking butt in this town.”

Dipper had accidentally made a habit of visiting Josie whenever he had a moment alone. Besides Mabel, she probably knew as much about the author as Dipper did. Which was to say, she was also at a complete loss at his identity, though she agreed it seemed likely that he was the one talking to ghosts.

And besides investigation, it was nice to have a person to complain to that wasn’t Mabel, especially since she had a habit of defending Stan’s gruffer side. Dipper was highly suspicious that he liked Mabel a lot more than him. Soos was apt to defend Stan too, and he couldn’t go to Wendy without feeling like a whiny little kid. So Josie it was.

“I guess,” Dipper shrugged. “I dunno. It just feels like we’re hitting dead end after dead end. None of the ghosts you’ve sent me after to talk to know who the author is, and most of them are positive they never talked to a living person.”

“Besides you,” Josie corrected. “You’re a medium too.”

“Ugh,” Dipper frowned. “I don’t like being called a medium. It sounds so…unprofessional.”

Josie snorted. “Oh, sorry, what do your business cards say?”

“They say ghost wrangler,” Dipper said, and then coughed. “I-if I had any. Which I don’t, because that’s silly-”

“Ah ah ah,” Josie grinned, leaning forward with a mischievous glint in her eye that reminded him of Mabel. “Seems like you’ve put some thought into this. Maybe even enough thought to actually make them.”

Dipper crossed his arms, and Josie laughed again. “Come on! You can’t just leave me hanging like that! Show me, show me, show me!”

“Fine! But only because I know you’ll literally haunt me otherwise,” Dipper huffed, reaching into his bag for a separate notebook, the one he was using to record his ghost interactions. He had been recording most of the supernatural shenanigans he had gotten into in the blank pages of the journal, but the ghost felt more personal, somehow. Something he wanted to keep for himself, at least for now. All the ghosts he had spoken with were recorded with their name, a description alongside a sketch, how they died, and if they were any potential help in his search for the author.

He flipped open to a page that was mostly blank, except for an outline for a business card that he had drawn a few days ago, during a more self-indulgent mood.

Josie’s eyes flickered over his writing, and her smile grew. “Mason ‘Post-Mortem’ Pines?” She asked with a grin.

“People remember alliteration,” Dipper mumbled. “It makes me more memorable.”

“Oh, this is golden,” Josie cackled. “Wait ‘til the others get a load of this.”

Dipper’s head jerked up. “Others?”

“Yeah!” Josie nodded. “You’re kinda becoming a celebrity, little fella. Word travels fast among us spirits. Everyone knows about the little medium.”

Dipper frowned. “I said I didn’t like medium-”

“Hey,” Josie snapped her fingers. “If the cops put out an APB on you, would they say you’re a small medium at large?”

“Wow,” Dipper said dryly. “It’s such a shame you didn’t go into comedy.”

“Aw, you’re gonna kill me again over here,” Josie said. “But seriously, this is a good thing. News about you looking for another guy who can see us is spreading. The more that we talk about it, the more likely we are to come up with something to help you out. Plus, you don’t have to explain who you are each time and field a buncha questions.”

“That…that’s good, really good,” Dipper nodded slowly. “Um, do you think maybe you could spread the word not to come to the shack? And not to come up to me randomly when I’m with other people. I’m only not-weird here because everyone else is weirder by proxy. I’d kinda like to keep it that way. It’s hard to ignore you guys sometimes.”

“Duly noted,” Josie saluted lazily.

“Aw, rats,” Dipper said, spotting his own long shadow stretching across the concrete. “It’s getting dark. I should probably head home before Mabel gets worried and Stan gets mad at me.”

“I remember a little bit about Stan from when I was alive,” Josie said thoughtfully. “Sometimes he had discounts for locals, to draw us back in when tourist season was slow. He was…he always seemed weird, but he was nice enough, I guess.”

Dipper snorted. “Clearly,” he said. “You didn’t know Stan at all if you thought he was nice.”

And it really shouldn’t have been a shock, not with everything he had seen, that there were more than ghosts lurking in the periphery of his vision, just out of sight and waiting to make itself known.

Though in fairness to himself, no one in a million years could have predicted a demon in the shape of a triangle with a top hat, tap dancing merrily like Shiva dancing on the ruins of the world.

And Stan might not have been nice, but he probably didn’t deserve to have his mind rooted through by such a bizarre creature. And if he did deserve it, then Soos still deserved to stay employed at the shack, which would be very difficult if the demon found the code to the safe that held the deed to the house and handed it over to Gideon.

(It all felt a bit absurd, but absurd was the bread and butter of Gravity Falls)

“We gotta find that memory before Bill does!” Mabel said, and started throwing open memory doors at random. “Hurry!”

“Great,” Dipper said. “Another thing we do that he won’t believe.”

“No time for sarcastic commentary, Dipper!” Mabel said, which in fairness, was probably true. “Go go go!”

Dipper grumbled something unknown even to himself, stalking off through Stan’s Mindscape, still annoyed about the hole Bill Cipher had literally blown through him. It reminded him too much of a rather gorey ghost he had seen at a gas station a few years ago.

He opened and closed doors without much interest, each memory only cementing a foul image of Stanford Pines. Stan hiding money, fake and real, between his bed frame and mattress. Stan stuffing his pockets with junk he probably didn’t even need and making a beeline for the exit of the store. Stan glaring at Dipper, yanking a broom out of his hand, and even in the memory Dipper saw the shadow of a specter looming over him while Stan chewed him out.

This is stupid, Dipper thought, reaching for a particularly worn looking door, oddly scorched. We have a one in a million chance of finding this, and a far higher chance of seeing something we don’t want to see-

Dipper wrenched the door open, and paused.

A little boy, maybe a few years younger than Dipper, was studying a deck of cards with such concentration Dipper wouldn’t have been surprised if they burst into flames. He was sitting in a blanket fort of some kind, and in front of him sat a privacy screen like the ones Dipper had seen used in Dungeons, Dungeons, & More Dungeons. A head of dark hair just barely peeked over the screen, likely studying their own cards.

“Got any kings?” The boy asked.

“Nope,” the hidden child said. “Go fish.”

“Stan,” Dipper said, his voice barely a whisper.

Stan as a child was so surreal that Dipper almost closed the door. Dipper knew, logically, that Stan had been a kid once, but he couldn’t imagine anything other than the scowling old man.

But the little boy had Stan’s nose, and the frown on his face as he reached for a new card from the deck couldn’t have come from anyone except his great-uncle.

“This is stupid,” little Stan muttered. “I didn’t even break the window. Crampelter did and no one believes me, and now I’m grounded and Pa’s angry with me again.”

“I know,” said the hidden boy, probably a friend. “Sorry.”

“No one believes me about anything,” Stan muttered. “It’s not fair.”

“I know,” said the boy. “I’m sorry.”

Stan was quiet for a moment.

“Any threes?” The other boy asked.

“Does it get easier, you think?” Stan asked suddenly. “Being a kid?”

“...I don’t know,” the boy said.

“It’s just awful,” Stan said quietly, shuffling his cards. “Feeling like this all the time. Scared. Helpless. Out of control. Sometimes…” he trailed off for a moment, and then seemed to gather his courage to speak. “Sometimes it feels like my stupid brain will think of something, something so awful, like…like what if we all burn up in our beds tonight? Or what if a riptide gets us and we drown? Or…or I see or do something so awful it ruins everything forever and ever.”

The other boy said nothing, and Stan hunched down, closely studying his cards. A three, a jack, and a faded king. Stan flipped the card in his hand over; an ace of clubs. “...I’m so tired of being scared all the time,” Stan whispered. “I’m so tired of being crazy.”

“You’re not crazy.”

“Sure,” Stan sounded unconvinced. “It’s not fair.”

“You’re right, none of this is fair. Not to you, me, or anyone,” the boy said. “And I know you’re scared. But you’re a lot braver than you give yourself credit for. Especially when it comes to the people you care about. I’ve seen it. Remember the Jersey Devil?”

Dipper blinked, wondering what in the world that meant (perhaps a code name of some kind), but Stan laughed.

“Maybe,” Stan said. “Doesn’t feel like it, though.”

“You never acknowledge your good traits,” the boy said. “It’s very annoying.”

“Oh, you don’t wanna talk about things that are annoying,” Stan said with a grin. “Or we’ll be here all day talking about you.”

“Still,” the boy said. “I think you’re brave. And even if you are scared–that’s not gonna stop you. Never did before.”

“...guess not,” Stan said. “No threes, by the way.”

“You’re lying.”

“Nuh uh,” Stan lied, ducking lower under the screen.

Dipper hadn’t realized that he had stepped forward until he stumbled, falling into the memory gracelessly. Stan looked back at him, blinking a few times in surprise.

“Um,” Dipper said, suddenly terrified that he was breaking some kind of space time continuum. “Um.”

“You have a hole in your belly,” Stan observed, and glanced at it with mild distaste. There was a small pop!, and it disappeared.

Dipper’s mouth fell open. “What…?”

“It’s in my mind, Dipper. None of this is really real, you can do whatever you want,” Stan said, and then turned back to the game.

“You know who I am?!” Dipper asked.

“Well, duh,” Stan rolled his eyes. “This is a memory. I got all the same knowledge the big guy does. You’re pretty hard to forget. At least your smell is.”

That made Dipper laugh for real, sharp and echoing in the memory. Something rumbled in the distance, down the halls of Stan’s memory, and Dipper’s grin instantly died.

“Oh no,” he said. “Mabel, Soos! I-I have to help them!”

“Don’t keep ‘em waiting, kid,” Stan said, a small smile on his face as he turned back to the hidden boy. “I definitely don’t have any threes.”

“Who…” Dipper paused, just for a moment. “Who is that?”

Stan paused, glanced at the hidden boy, and then back at Dipper. He was frowning.

“...that’s no one important,” he said finally, in a voice that definitely wasn’t being honest. At least not entirely.

“...hey, no one important,” Dipper said weakly.

“He can’t hear you,” Stan said, turning back to his cards. “No one can. He’s just a memory.”

Just a ghost, Dipper almost said, but there was another rumble, and he sprinted after it, towards Soos and Mabel, a little more determined and a little braver than he was this morning.

There was a startling lack of spirits in the next few days that followed.

Soos’ abuelita’s house was free of ghosts completely, a bit to Dipper’s shock, and he wondered vaguely if the tiny old woman had chased them off. There was an edge to her that lurked behind her cloudy eyes, like a shark below the surface of the ocean. Dipper decided it would be wise not to test her.

How deeply insulting to nearly have the shack commandeered by a ten year old who had access to a bulldozer. How embarrassing to have to rely on the goodwill of poor abuelita, who barely had space for herself and her grandson. And how deeply, deeply upsetting to be sprung with bus tickets home and Stan’s regretful face. The only consolation was that Stan looked just as reluctant to send them back to Piedmont as they were to go. He couldn’t even look them in the eye.

Dipper couldn’t find it in himself to be angry at him, not after what he had seen in his mind.

But something must have changed from the start of the summer to now, something intrinsic to who Dipper used to think he was. Because the Dipper from the beginning of the summer probably wouldn’t have thrown himself off a ledge after a giant robot, even if it was to rescue Mabel. Though he would admit that they would have both been splattered across the forest floor without Mabel’s grappling hook either.

And Stan had found the true reason Gideon was able to win over the hearts and minds of Gravity Falls. No magic, no psychic powers, and certainly no helpful ghosts–just good ol’ fashioned spyware. It was almost quaint how un-supernatural it was.

But it had led back to the attic, unpacking suitcases for the second time that summer, Mabel jumping on a thoroughly beaten-down mattress once more, unable to contain her excitement once more. Dipper might have joined her if Stan hadn’t rapped his knuckles against the doorframe, life back in his eyes.

“You two settling back in alright?” He asked. “No hidden cameras in the corners or nothing?”

“Nope!” Mabel said cheerfully. “I burned the outfit Gideon made Waddles wear! It smelled like hairspray and now I’m seeing double!”

“That’s my girl!” Stan grinned, and glanced at Dipper. “Anything you wanna burn? We can dig an illegal fire pit out back. I found a bag of marshmallows that’s probably still good. Those expiration dates are probably just a suggestion.”

“Uh, I’ll let you know if I find anything,” Dipper said, tossing his backpack on the bed. The flap burst open–he desperately needed a new one–and he spotted two books inside. The journal and his own composition notebook of ghosts. He paused, mulling their contents over in his mind. Secrets knocked at the edge of his mouth once more, and for a moment, he considered laying all his cards on the table.

But maybe that was too many secrets for one day. Maybe just one would do.

“Actually, um,” Dipper said, fishing the journal out of his backpack. “I’ve been thinking. Mabel and I talked about this a few times, and she always said I should tell you about this. I always ignored her, but…I think she’s right.”

He glanced at Mabel, half-hoping she would interrupt and order him to shut up. But she just looked surprised by his candor, and when they made eye contact, she grinned, nodding quickly. She always despised keeping secrets. Dipper did too, he only did so by necessity.

“This is a journal I found in the woods,” Dipper said, handing over the book for Stan. He took his mostly because Dipper had shoved it into his hands, looking surprised. “It talks about all the crazy stuff that goes on in Gravity Falls. And I know it’s important. Gideon almost destroyed the whole town trying to get it. I don’t know what that means, and I have no idea who wrote it, but after everything…” Dipper took a breath. “I think you deserve to know about it too.”

Stan’s mouth was fixed in a thoughtful frown, the same look he had when numbers in the books didn’t quite add up, but Dipper couldn’t quite see his eyes behind his glasses. His hearing aide was gone–Dipper wondered when he took it out. Probably when the feedback from the cameras first started.

“Grunkle Stan?” Dipper asked, suddenly worried he might be in trouble.

And then Stan started laughing.

“Grunkle Stan?!” Dipper asked again, suddenly worried Stan had gone insane in a split second.

“Now I know where you’re getting it all from!” Stan cackled, flipping through the journal with far less care than Dipper had. “Spookums, monsters, ghosts! This kooky book’s been filling your head with conspiracies!”

Stan yanked the brim of Dipper’s hat over his eyes playfully, and Dipper ducked away, adjusting it. “It’s not fake!” Dipper protested, angry all over again. “It’s real! I’ve seen it!”

“You’ve seen the squash with a human face and emotions?” Stan asked, showing him the page. “That’s a great attraction idea, actually.”

“I-I haven’t seen that one specifically,” Dipper said. “But-”

“You gotta quit reading this nonsense for your own good,” Stan shook his head, still grinning. “Talk about an overactive imagination! Mind if I borrow this?”

“No!” Dipper said, but then realized he had misspoke when Stan stood up, already making his way to the door. “I-I mean, no, give it back! Don’t-!”

“Magic book!” Stan laughed, his gruff voice bouncing around the hall. “What’ll they come up with next?”

“No, I need it!” Dipper protested.

“Dipper, you don’t need that book!” Mabel said. She looked thrown by Stan’s reaction as well, but was still grinning. “The journal didn’t kick Gideon’s stupid butt. You did! All on your own! You’re a hero whether you got that journal or not!”

“I…” Dipper paused, and realized his heart wasn’t pounding. He hadn’t spiraled in weeks, and any panic that did sneak up on him was quashed, especially with the ghosts of Gravity Falls being little more than residents only he could see. His mind still tried to find something to fixate on, something to use to drive him to the edge, but it seemed quieter these days. There was so much around him to drown out the worst of it, after all. “...thanks, Mabel.”

He frowned before he could stop himself. “I still want the journal back, though.”

“Ah,” Mabel shrugged. “I’m sure you’ll get it back soon. What’s an old man gonna want with a smelly old journal anyway?”

“Yeah,” Dipper said, letting out a breath. “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

“At least there’s no more secrets!” Mabel said, looking pleased with the new development.

Dipper had no idea what would happen if he showed her his notebook. If he confessed how long he had actually been lying to her. Stan would brush him off, no matter how much evidence stacked up, but Mabel had no reason to doubt him other than her own eyes.

He wondered if she would hate him for it, for keeping a secret from her for so long when she had always been there for him when he was crashing like an out of control car. Maybe she would look at him with badly disguised pity, afraid to approach him when spirits clung to the edges of his attention like insistent children.

Or worst of all, she wouldn’t believe him, and all the suspicions that she had to have secretly held about his sanity would only be confirmed. Some days, Dipper still questioned it himself.

“Yeah,” he agreed, stuffing the notebook deeper into the backpack. “Yeah, it’s nice to get it off my chest.”

Something old and tired awoke from beneath the shack, like a corpse that would have much rather been allowed to rest, thank you very much. But the man in the basement had never been good at burying things.

Two spirits, nuisances and little else, watched the flashes thoughtfully with the kind of interest that people who had nothing to lose had.

“Think he’s gonna end the world?” Mike asked Angela.

“I dunno,” Angela said. “Be a crazy afterparty if he did, though. But I guess it’d be a pretty sad afterparty.”

“Yeah,” Mike said, watching the flashes from the windows, as if the thing in the shack could not be contained. And it couldn’t–they knew that, at least. “I guess you’re right. He’s ignored the warnings for this long. Sunk cost fallacy and all that.”

They watched their mediocre lightshow. Being dead was boring. They had to take whatever entertainment they could find.

“At least if this is the end,” Angela said. “It’ll be a helluva performance.”

Chapter Text

“Oh,” Josie said, her eyes wide as Dipper explained why he had been M.I.A. for the past few days. “Yeah. That’s a lot.”

“I’ll say,” Dipper said, taking a seat in front of her. Josie almost exclusively hung around this particular alley these days; it was easy for Dipper to get to, and secluded enough where it was unlikely that anyone would come along and see Dipper talking to the air. “Sorry I couldn’t talk to you for the last few days.”

“Oh man, no worries,” Josie said. “After all that I’d feel bad for taking up your time. So Stan still has your journal?”

“Yeah!” Dipper sighed. “I keep trying to build up the courage to ask for it back, but every time I do, something pulls him away or I get distracted. I guess, to be fair, there’s been a lot going on lately. Getting rid of all of the Gideon left over, drumming up business for a reopening party, repairs, stuff like that. I don’t even know where he’s keeping it.”

“What if he’s using it?” Josie asked.

“Using it?” Dipper asked. “Using it for what? He doesn’t even believe in the supernatural. I’ve seen ghosts making fun of him right to his face and he didn’t do anything. If I told him what I could see he’d cart me off to the nearest nuthouse.”

“Maybe he’s using it to stop a table from wobbling,” Josie suggested.

Dipper laughed before he could stop himself, and then coughed. “It’s time to get serious. Summer is halfway over, and I’m no closer to finding the author. If I leave without knowing who he was, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.”

“I know, I know,” Josie said. “Just…I dunno. Maybe you could enjoy your summer too?”

“I am enjoying it!” Dipper said. “Not having questions hanging over my head is super enjoyable for me!”

Josie quirked her eyebrow. “Ever consider anti-anxiety meds, pal?”

“Ha ha,” Dipper said joylessly. “I’m running out of time, Josie, this is serious. The author gave everything to figure out the mysteries of Gravity Falls. I owe him at least a summer to find out if he’s even alive.”

“Kind of a weird way of looking at it,” Josie said. “Just saying. Plus, what if whatever got him gets you?”

“It won’t,” Dipper said, though he couldn’t really be certain. “I won’t let it.”

Josie frowned, but thankfully didn’t argue. “Well…if it helps, I’ve been going out more. Haunting on the town, if you will. There’s a really pretty guy who died of a climbing accident who hangs out behind Skull Fracture, and you know, even with the obvious head trauma he’s really a looker-”

“Josie.”

“Right, sorry,” Josie coughed. “Point is, I gotta list of spirits you can talk to. All older than me. Hopefully one of them can give you a lead, even if I don’t love encouraging this.”

“Then why are you helping?” Dipper folded his arms.

“‘Cause I know you’ll go running after the lumberjacks in the woods or something if I don’t steer you away from them,” Josie said. “Plus, I’m kinda curious myself.”

“...I guess that’s fair,” Dipper said. “Thanks, Josie, the names would be great. By the way, are you sure you don’t want to come to the shack’s reopening party?”

“You wouldn’t be able to talk to me while you’re there,” Josie shrugged. “I’d just be following you around the whole time. Did enough of that in college bars, you know? Besides, nothing kills a party vibe like the dead showing up.”

Evidently, Dipper’s talents weren’t limited to seeing the dead. In very specific, very unfortunate circumstances he could raise them, but only if the U.S. government was present to witness it.

Unfortunately, the dead he raised were far less gifted conversationalists than Josie and her friends.

Dipper had thought he had been terrified and disgusted enough by the dead that he was almost numb to it. But the zombies were a different deal altogether. They did not stare blankly, muttering to themselves. They stared with predator focus, crazed with hunger and nothing else. They moaned and wailed a cacophony of horrible noises that made Dipper want to duck down, cover his ears, and wait for it to be over. Rotten teeth gnashed and lunged, smelling like pork left to marinate in the sun and fetid water. The only thing human about them was that most of them still walked on two legs, and they were so horribly solid and deadly–they had already bitten Soos, and Dipper wondered how long it would be before he stopped being mostly harmless and twisted into something unrecognizable.

Dipper wondered if he would recognize any of the zombies as his ghostly acquaintances if they had more skin.

“Where’s Stan?!” Mabel asked, slamming the door as a zombie rammed itself against the rattling wood, undeterred by pain. “He was just with us!”

“Maybe they already got him,” Dipper said, trying to stave off spiraling with little success. “Oh my god, oh my god, Mabel, it could already be too late, they could have found him already and snatched him, torn him into little pieces and spread him across the lawn–”

“Don’t say that!” Mabel said, on the verge of tears. “Stop it!”

It felt wrong that it should end like this; a pile of corpses chasing him when he had spent the summer trying to befriend their lost souls. All that work, all that growth, all that intelligence rendered useless in the face of something brute forcing its way through the doors.

Was this what happened to the author? Dipper thought dizzily. Did he find something he couldn’t outsmart? Or out-fight? Or both?

“LOOK OUT!” Mabel shrieked, grabbing Dipper and pulling him away from a window as a zombie burst through it. Glass dug into its detritus-like face, and green ooze dripped from jagged wounds. It pulled itself through the window as Mabel and Dipper stumbled away, clawing at the sides of the walls so deeply it left gouges.

Dipper swung his shovel wildly, an improvised weapon if ever there was one, but the zombie reached forward and wrenched it out of his hand with ease. It pulled itself through the window, collapsing into a pile of viscera and bones on the ground before it rose to its feet, completely focused on the twins, starvation in its glowing eyes.

It moaned, long and unending, and Dipper wondered if being a zombie hurt.

“Oh my god,” Dipper said, stumbling back. “Oh my god, this is all my fault, Mabel, I’m so-”

Something cold and leathery grabbed his arm, and Dipper twisted painfully with a terrified scream to see a zombie gripping his arm tight enough to bruise it, pulling him towards his mossy teeth, head shoved through a crack in the walls-

A baseball bat whizzed over Dipper’s head, close enough he could feel the wind of it. It collided with the zombie’s face, so hard it literally pulverized it, bits of brain and skull flying across the room as if it had exploded. Dipper felt something gelatinous splatter across his face, and he gagged. Someone yanked him away from the crack.

Stan stood over him, heaving for air, his suit torn and covered in zombie blood.

“Grunkle Stan!” Mabel cried, relief so heavy in her voice it almost outweighed the fear.

“Attic!” Stan ordered, forgoing any sentimentalities. In fairness, there wasn’t time.

“Stan-” Dipper said, though he was unsure where he was going.

“NOW!” Stan roared, turning to face them. His face was covered in zombie bits and bobs, like trophies from past kills.

Dipper didn’t need to be told twice, making a beeline for the attic as the dead screamed at him once more.

The last zombie howled in agony, answering Dipper’s questions about whether they felt pain, overcome with the power of mediocre karaoke. Its head exploded, and Dipper cheered, then promptly threw up over the side of the roof, because it was gross and frankly a little scary.

“Ooh-” Stan winced, awkwardly patting Dipper’s back. “Yeah, kid, that’ll do it.”

“I-I’m okay,” Dipper heaved, spitting a few times off the roof for good measure. “Sorry, I’m good now.”

“WOO!” Mabel cheered, unperturbed, bowing gracefully to the piles of twice-dead bodies. “We are Love Patrol Alpha! Glad you enjoyed!”

Dipper heard more whooping, and winced when he saw Mike and Angela, from Stan’s not-birthday party, sitting in abandoned lawn chairs and whooping. “God!” Mike cackled. “I wish I had a camera!”

“When’s the world tour?!” Angela shouted.

Dipper hoped this wouldn’t spread amongst the ghost community, but realized he probably wasn’t lucky enough for that. All the more reason to try and keep his abilities hidden from these particular ghosts.

“We should do that again!” Mabel said, punching the air for emphasis.

“The…” Dipper blinked. “The zombies or the karaoke?”

“If it takes zombies to get you two to do karaoke,” Mabel said seriously. “Then that’s a price we’re willing to pay.”

“Um,” Dipper said. “I’m not? Willing to pay?”

“Okay, real talk,” Stan said, his face growing serious, and Dipper wondered if he was Turbo-Grounded now. He knelt down to Dipper and Mabel’s height, and his knees creaked. “Listen, you’re right; this town is crazy, always has been. So you gotta be careful. Ignorance’ll only get you so far. I don’t think I could ever forgive myself if you got hurt under my watch.”

“Aw, Grunkle Stan,” Mabel grinned, unafraid. “You don’t have to worry about us! Look!” She gestured to the carnage in the yard. “If we can take on this, there’s nothing we can’t do!”

“I’m not kidding,” Stan said, stone-faced enough that Mabel’s smile shrunk a bit. “Be careful. I’ll let you hold onto that spooky journal, so long as you promise only to use it to defend yourselves, and not go looking for trouble.”

“...sure,” Dipper said slowly. “If you promise me no more secrets.”

Something almost like amusement flashed behind Stan’s eyes. “Sure,” he said. “No more secrets. Do we have an agreement?”

“Yeah,” Dipper said, shifting so Stan couldn’t see him crossing his fingers behind his back. “No problem.”

“Guess you know a bunch of the monsters in that journal already,” Mabel said. “Did you ever see a leprecorn?”

“No,” Stan said, standing up with a grunt. “And if I ever do I’m packing everything up and starting fresh in Maine or something. Some things are just too stupid to allow.”

“So maybe there was a ghost messing with the lights,” Dipper said, testing the waters. Mike and Angela burst out laughing, and Dipper frowned, pretty sure he had found the culprits of the sparking fuse box.

Stan snorted. “Sure, who knows?. But don’t start using ‘em as an excuse to mess with the electricity.”

“I won’t,” Dipper said, ignoring Mike and Angela’s hoots and hollers. “I won’t.”

“So,” Victor said, scratching idly at an ear that was mostly hanging by a flap of skin. “Whaddya wanna know?”

Victor lived primarily behind Skull Fracture, a biker bar that Dipper was also pretty sure doubled as gay bar every so often, on account of Gravity Falls being too small to host both. They had drag bingo nights on Tuesday.

Victor was one of the grosser ghosts of Gravity Falls; as Josie had promised, he had died in a climbing accident. His skull was just barely holding out on the top right side, soaking most of that half of his body in blood. Dipper could see bits of skull–appropriate for his choice of hangout–clinging to his hair, skin, and clothes. Bits of gray matter splattered across his face and scalp.

Dipper supposed, a few months ago, this might have sent him into a spiral. But Josie had warned him about Victor’s condition, and it helped that Victor was perfectly friendly, and had even started the conversation with his hand covering his gaping wound until Dipper said he had seen worse. He had, after all.

“I need to know if you’ve ever spoken to a living person, besides me,” Dipper said. “Maybe someone with this journal.”

Dipper held out the journal, and Victor squinted at it. His right eye was bright red, filled with blood from his injury. “Hm. How old is it?”

Dipper shrugged, and Victor hummed again, tilting his head. A bit of skin hanging off his scalp flipped up, exposing his skull, and Dipper looked away, feeling a bit nauseous now.

“It looks familiar,” Victor said. “But I really couldn’t place it. It’s all a bit fuzzy, you see-”

“Yeah, I know,” Dipper sighed, tucking the journal back into his vest pocket. “Willy from the dump explained it to me. You sure there’s not anything you can tell me about the author?”

Victor paused, thinking hard. “I think…I did see someone with a journal once…oh! He had six fingers,” he said grandly.

Dipper sighed, long and annoyed.

“And!” Victor held up a finger. “He wore glasses.”

“...cool,” Dipper said, withdrawing his own ghost notebook and writing ‘NOT HELPFUL’ under Victor’s name. “Well, thanks. I’m gonna-”

“Oh, uh,” Victor coughed. “You mentioned Josie said I could help you, right?”

“...yes,” Dipper said slowly, unsure how Josie was relevant.

“...I don’t suppose she’s mentioned me at all?” Victor chuckled, pulling at his t-shirt collar. “Like, in maybe a nice way?”

“...why?” Dipper asked, perplexed.

“Never mind, don’t worry about it,” Victor coughed, which Dipper was pretty sure ghosts didn’t need to do. “Um, just, you know, if she asks about me, tell her I said hi. Or don’t, actually, maybe…maybe I should be more distant, mysterious even!”

“Why are you doing all this?” Dipper asked.

“Never mind, don’t worry about it,” Victor said again, shaking his head rapidly. “It’s fine.”

“...sure,” Dipper said slowly.

They stood in awkward silence for a moment, and then Victor coughed again.

“Um, so, has she? Asked about me, I mean?” He asked.

“And I’m leaving,” Dipper decided, turning on his heels to march back into the street.

“Tell her I said hi!” Victor called after him.

“You sure Soos didn’t wanna come hang out?” Dipper asked, hoping Wendy would say no once again while she fumbled with the keys outside her house.

“Yeah,” Wendy said, unlocking the door. It swung open, and Dipper smelled pine trees. “He doesn’t like scary movies, which is weird because this whole summer has been one long scary movie. Mabel didn’t wanna come either?”

“She doesn’t like black and white movies,” Dipper said, which was true, but she mostly wasn’t coming because he hadn’t told her Wendy had invited them to watch Nearly Almost Dead But Not Quite! at her house. He and Wendy hadn’t had a chance to properly hang out in weeks, and maybe he wanted to relax with her without worrying that Soos was going to kill the moment or Mabel was going to mention something about his crush with a half-malicious smile.

“Eh, her loss,” Wendy said, and kicked off her boots before stepping inside. “It’s a classic.”

Her house was exactly how Dipper imagined it. Not that he had spent a lot of time doing so, because that would be weird. A tiny living room with mostly wooden furniture connected to an even smaller kitchen, where a woman with black hair and Wendy’s face was puttering around. She perked up for a moment when Wendy stepped through the door, but then immediately looked away.

“Shoes off,” the woman said, without looking up.

“Oh! Sorry,” Dipper said, peeling his shoes off before he stepped on the carpet.

“What’s wrong?” Wendy asked, glancing back at him.

“Oh, uh, nothing,” Dipper motioned vaguely. “Your mom told me to take my shoes off.”

Wendy stiffened. “What?”

“Um…” Dipper glanced at the woman in the kitchen, and realized she was staring too. “Shoes off?”

Wendy’s expression changed, so sudden it almost made Dipper jump. She was scowling now, tinged with something sharper. “That’s not funny, dude.”

“What?” Dipper said. “I-I just-”

“You can see me?” The woman asked, and Dipper’s heart sank.

Wendy had mentioned her dad and brothers a few times in passing, but never her mother. Dipper had assumed it was just never relevant to the conversation, or maybe he had just never really even noticed the gap, but looking back now, the avoidance of mentioning her seemed purposeful.

“Um,” Dipper said, feeling sweat break out across his forehead. “Um, I’m sorry, I just…”

Wendy was scowling at him, fists clenched. “Did Robbie tell you about my mom or something?”

“Y-yeah, I think so,” Dipper said quickly, thinking a silent apology to Robbie, because even he probably didn’t deserve the angry phone call that was coming. “Yeah, um, I’m sorry, I think it was just super off-hand or whatever, probably not even worth mentioning-”

“Can we just drop it?” Wendy asked gruffly, turning away. Her mother was staring, her eyes flickering between her daughter and her guest.

“Yeah, sure,” Dipper said, relieved for an out, even if they both knew Dipper’s comment made no sense for his excuse. “Sorry.”

Wendy didn’t say anything, simply venturing deeper into the house. Dipper glanced back at the kitchen, and risked a tiny wave when Wendy wasn’t looking.

The woman’s eyes widened even more, and she waved back.

Dipper was nearly silent for the rest of the afternoon.

“Hey, so,” Mabel said a few days later, both of them pretending to reorganize t-shirts in the gift shop. “That freeze tank is gonna hold, right? The one with the shapeshifter in it?”

“The cryo storage?” Dipper asked, and Mabel sighed.

“Quit talking like a nerd, bro-bro,” she scolded.

“I’m not-” Dipper sighed. “Whatever. And, uh. Probably. It’s probably fine. Plus, even if it did get out, it has to get through all the security stuff.”

“I feel kinda sorry for it,” Mabel said.

Dipper blinked. “It tried to kill us.”

“Yeah, but,” Mabel shrugged. “Seems like it just wanted to go outside. I’d be a little crazy too if no one let me outside.”

“Hm,” Dipper said, never really having considered this. “I dunno. He still tried to kill us.”

Mabel rolled her eyes. “Lots of things try to kill us, Dipper.”

That was true, but still didn’t seem quite fair. Dipper opened his mouth to argue, and paused when he went to go to the back.

There was a draft coming from the vending machine.

“Huh,” Dipper said, glancing around. Every so often, a draft meant a ghost, but the gift shop was extraordinarily quiet today. And ghosts didn’t go through walls. (Josie told him that most ghosts were still disappointed by that.)

“Hey, Mabel,” Dipper said, wandering to the right side of the vending machine. It was barely an inch away from the wall, but instead of wood paneling, Dipper thought he saw a black void, like an extra room hidden behind the machine. “Do you think there’s more secret rooms in the house? Like the one with the freaky carpet?”

“Ooh!” Mabel bounced over, grinning. “Do you think you found another one?”

“Maybe,” Dipper said. “There’s a draft coming out from behind the machine. Help me pull it back?”

“Sure,” Mabel said. “Kinda weird if there’s another secret room, though, huh?”

“It’s cool, though,” Dipper said, grabbing the side of the vending machine. Mabel copied him. “Ready? Yank on three. One, two-”

“HEY!”

Dipper shrieked, as manly as he could manage, and Mabel put up her fists, ready to start swinging. Stan was glaring at them from the gift shop entrance, glaring thunderously.

“What the fu-” he cut himself off, just barely, sounding furious. “What the heck do you think you’re doing?!”

“There’s a draft back here,” Dipper said, trying to peer behind the vending machine again. “We think there might be another secret room-hey!”

Stan shooed them both away from the vending machine, still scowling. “Quit playing with that! It could fall on you and crush you to a pulp. Or worse, we might lose profit if you break it!”

“There’s something back there!” Mabel protested.

“There’s not,” Stan said, leaning back against the vending machine. It slid back into place, flat against the wall with a strange ca-chunk. “Trust me, I put the machine there myself. Well, not me specifically. The vending machine guys did.”

“We’ve found hidden rooms before,” Dipper argued.

“Yeah, well, that was just once,” Stan said.

“Twice,” Mabel corrected. “The one with the living wax figures that we murdered in self defense and the ones with the carpet that made us switch bodies.”

Stan stared at them for a moment, and then frowned. “Actually, don’t tell me, I don’t wanna know.”

“I felt a draft from back there,” Dipper said.

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” Stan said. “It’s an old house. Drafty.”

“How’d you not know about the second room, by the way?” Mabel asked. “It looked old.”

Stan shrugged, leaning against the vending machine again. “I dunno, I didn’t build the house. Came into it in the early 80s.”

“You’re not from here?” Dipper asked, genuinely surprised. He wasn’t sure why he assumed Stan had always been a fixture of the town, but hearing that he hadn’t suddenly appeared in the shack one day, already old and already crabby was odd, even if he had seen a memory of Stan’s childhood. “Why’d you even come to Gravity Falls, then?”

Stan looked amused, but something strange was lurking behind his glasses. It looked like a cornered rabbit, almost. If a cornered rabbit had a nasty bite waiting for its pursuers. “Since when do you wanna know my life story, kid?”

Dipper shrugged haplessly. “I dunno. We just…got sent up here. We don’t really know you. And then we fought zombies together, so…”

“Trauma bond!” Mabel said joyfully.

“I’ll start boring you with my tragic backstory or whatever when I need a reason to chase you two away,” Stan said blandly. “For now, those t-shirts aren’t gonna organize themselves.”

Stan was gone before they could argue, and Dipper frowned, staring at the vending machine. “...I’m pretty sure there’s something back there.”

“Grunkle Stan was acting super cagey,” Mabel said, somehow looking worried. “Don’t you think?”

“He’s hiding something,” Dipper said, and then groaned. “I can’t believe he’s still hiding stuff from us!”

“We’re hiding stuff from him too,” Mabel said.

“That’s different,” Dipper said, and before Mabel could ask ‘how?’ and render him answer-less, he pushed at the vending machine.

Mabel didn’t help him. “Maybe he does have a secret tragic backstory.”

“What, he had to sell something at market price instead of hiking it up two hundred percent?” Dipper said, and kicked the vending machine in frustration, only to end up hopping on one foot, clutching his throbbing toe.

“He’s probably right about the vending machine though,” Mabel said sadly. “About it crushing us, I mean.”

“Hm,” Dipper said, unsatisfied with the explanation.

“The faster we finish organizing the shirts,” Mabel offered. “The faster you can go back to obsessing over your clue board.”

That was incentive enough for Dipper. The vending machine would have to wait.

“Young man,” a woman in a very uncomfortable looking mauve dress said, looking down at him from under a parasol. “That journal of your’s hardly seems like a suitable read.”

“Yeah, well,” Dipper said, not bothering to look up as he wrote in his notebook. “I’m not taking advice from someone who died from drinking heroin or whatever. Josie told me about that.”

The woman’s scowl deepened. “It was cough medicine at the time! I had a nasty cold!”

“Sure, whatever,” Dipper sighed, scribbling ‘kind of annoying’ as a note for this particular ghost in his notebook. “Listen, Constance, is it? I’m not trying to bother you, I just need to know if you’ve seen this journal before.”

He held up the journal for Constance to look at, and she turned her head away with a ‘hmph!’ “I can’t say. I don’t associate with the kind of rabble-rousers who must have written something so ghastly as that.”

“Rabble…?” Dipper shook his head. “Whatever, fine. Did anyone living ever talk to you? Before me? Come on, you must have met someone. How long have you been dead?”

Constance gasped. “Do you have any idea how rude it is to ask a lady her death-age?!”

“...no,” Dipper said. “So. Talk to anyone else?”

“Oh,” Constance sighed. “I can’t recall. It was all so long ago. Maybe, but…goodness, it’s blurry.”

“When did it stop being blurry?” Dipper asked.

“Hm,” Constance said, looking thoughtful. “Time’s hard to keep track of, but…decades ago, at least. Less than fifty years. More than ten, though. I’m afraid I can’t narrow it down anymore than that.”

“Okay,” Dipper sighed, stuffing his notebooks back into his backpack. “Thanks, I guess. Do you know who else I could talk to-”

“There was a lot of chaos,” Constance said suddenly. “I remember that. Even in my state, I remember.”

Dipper perked up. “Chaos?”

“Old creatures stirring,” Constance said, her voice suddenly quiet and solemn. “Strange beings beginning to wake up. Static in the air, like the moment in between the lightning and the thunder. Something was coming. We felt it, all of us. Restless. Wandering. Scared and searching for long-gone loved ones to hold close in the night. I remember that.”

“...what…” Dipper swallowed, suddenly perturbed. “What was happening?”

“I haven’t the foggiest,” Constance said. “But it’s happening again.”

“Is it?” Dipper blinked.

“Surely you must be able to sense it,” Constance said. “With sight such as your’s. Can’t you feel it? Iron on the wind. A chill in the woods. A curtain blowing with no breeze, trying to show what lies beyond. What’s not meant for you to see, not meant for you to know. Something is coming, boy. Mark my words.”

“But…” Dipper coughed. “You don’t have any idea what this big thing is?”

Constance scowled. “Mark my words, boy,” she said again. “Mark my words.”

“Right,” Dipper backed away, already deciding how he would tell Josie that her suggested lead was a freak. “Consider them marked.”

Dipper woke slowly, oddly sweaty and his throat stinging painfully. He groaned, long and annoyed, just quiet enough so that Waddles only snorted sleepily from his pig bed before going back to sleep.

He was thirsty.

The tap in the upstairs bathroom might work, but Dipper craved ice water, and he hoped someone remembered to refill the ice trays. He stumbled down the stairs, mostly fearless of the shadows, refusing the turn on the lights and trusting muscle memory and a hand on the walls to keep him from falling.

He made it without incident, wincing at the foul taste on his tongue. Maybe he could grab something to eat while he was here, he hadn’t eaten enough at dinner-

Something moved in the shadows. Dipper was suddenly very wide awake.

“...hello?” He called out softly, and suddenly realized he sounded like every character in a slasher who was about to get knifed.

He pressed his back against the wall, his eyes darting around frantically. If it was a ghost, he could handle it–they had never come at night before, but they had mostly stopped being scary except for when they surprised him. But Josie had sworn she had spread the word that the shack was off-limits, though once Dipper told her about Mike and Angela, she said there was nothing she could do about them. So either this ghost hadn’t gotten the message, or didn’t care.

Or, Dipper realized with a chill, it had been here the whole time, and was only showing face now.

“Hello?” Dipper called out, and this time, he felt something. A hum, droning and all-too present, so low it made his teeth rattle. Dipper’s stomach dropped, and he forced himself to take a breath. It was fine, this was fine. It couldn’t possibly be a ghost (at least not entirely) because ghosts weren’t able to do stuff like that. But then again, he had seen Mike trip Pacifica. Maybe he never knew what ghosts were capable of.

“Hello?” Dipper called one final time, creeping through the house. A soup pot, drying from being washed that evening, sat on the stove, and Dipper snatched it up in case he met with something more solid than a spirit. No one answered him.

He crept through the shack, wincing at each creak and groan of the wooden floors, as though the shack had come to life and was displeased with his activity. He gulped, anxious at the image of a living house. He would be wandering through its throat now, surely, if that was the case, and it was just waiting to snatch him up.

Another shadow passed, in the gift shop, and Dipper’s heart seized. He forced himself to take a breath, and charged in.

Only to be met by someone grabbing his wrist. The pot fell from his hands with a clatter. Dipper shrieked, trying to thrash away, but the stranger’s grip was shockingly strong, a ghost made manifest by nothing but its own anger and determination-

“Moses, kid!” The grip on his wrist released, and Dipper fell to the floor. “You trying to give me a heart attack?!”

“Grunkle Stan?!” Dipper asked breathlessly.

Stan looked positively eerie, illuminated only by the halfmoon outside, but Dipper knew that fez anywhere. “Who else could it be?!”

“Um,” Dipper said, pulling himself to his feet. “I-I thought I saw something-”

“So what, you were gonna fight off a werewolf or whatever with a saucepan?” Stan asked, snatching the pot off the floor.

“It wouldn’t be a werewolf,” Dipper said. “It’s not the full moon.”

Stan sighed, and though Dipper couldn’t see it, he would bet his life that Stan had just rolled his eyes. “What’re you even doing down here? It’s the middle of the night.”

“I was thirsty.”

“Bathroom’s upstairs.”

“I wanted ice.”

“Ice tray’s empty.”

Dipper frowned. “Well…I’m also hungry. What are you doing up?”

“Um,” Stan said, and for a split second, he hesitated. “Night stocking.”

Dipper blinked. “Night…stocking?”

“Yeah!” Stan nodded enthusiastically. “Old folks don’t sleep so well sometimes. Some of us watch late-nite TV, some of us play solitaire, and some of us stock the gift shop.”

“...what?” Dipper said, feeling like a joke was being played on him.

“Come on,” Stan said, shooing Dipper out of the gift shop. “Little kids need their sleep or something.”

“I’m not a little kid,” Dipper protested.

“Sure,” Stan said, though it mostly sounded like he was humoring him.

Dipper hazarded one last look at the gift shop before it disappeared behind the doorway.

It was completely empty.

“You know, now that you mentioned it, I’m hungry too,” Stan said idly. He flicked on the lights, and Dipper and Stan winced as their eyes adjusted. “Oh, whaddya say to stove s’mores?”

“Stove s’mores?” Dipper asked, and Stan looked at him as though he confessed he didn’t know how a toilet worked.

“Jeez, kid, how do you not know about stove s’mores?” Stan shook his head. “You roast the marshmallows on the stove.”

“We have an electric stove at home,” Dipper said, and Stan shook his head sadly.

“That’s tragic. I made ‘em all the time when I was your age,” Stan said, rummaging through the cabinets for the ingredients.

“Is that part of your tragic backstory?” Dipper asked.

Stan chuckled, though for a second, Dipper thought he almost flinched. “Yeah, something like that. It should be…here!”

He dumped the marshmallows, chocolate, and graham crackers on the table. “The crackers are gonna be stale. And the marshmallows are like rocks, but if you cook ‘em enough they should soften up. Something’s probably wrong with the chocolate but I don’t know what.”

“Hm,” Dipper said, because a stove s’more was starting to sound more appealing. “Should I get Mabel?”

“If you want,” Stan said, leaning maybe a little too close to the gas stove, click-click-clicking the dial. “Or it can just be us for now and we can do this again tomorrow at a reasonable time.”

“Just us?” Dipper said, more surprised than anything.

Stan shrugged. “If you want.”

Dipper considered this. Something about the ritual felt special, though there wasn’t anything noteworthy about it. The s’mores probably wouldn’t even be good. But Dipper was getting them first, and somehow that made them feel almost sacred, like Stan was letting him in on a benign secret, just between the two of them.

He thought of a younger Stan, existing only in memories now, and wondered if they might have been friends if they had met, in some impossible world that ignored the laws of linear time.

“...we can make some with her tomorrow,” Dipper decided. “I don’t wanna wake her up.”

“Sure,” Stan said, still click-click-clicking.

“You’re gonna blow up the kitchen,” Dipper said, suddenly having a very clear picture of the both of them burnt to a crisp, the marshmallows comically intact.

“No, I’m not, Mr. Electric Stove,” Stan said distastefully. “I completely know what I’m-”

The burner suddenly came to life with an angry FWOOSH! as flames shot out, shooting high and orange as Stan jerked away just before his eyebrows were swallowed by fire, before it settled into an azure glow, calm and hot.

“There, see?” Stan grinned. “Completely safe.”

“Completely,” Dipper deadpanned.

“Now I should have…aha!” Stan dug a pair of chopsticks, abandoned from a takeout order weeks ago, and managed to skewer a marshmallow on one of them. He offered it to Dipper. “Don’t burn it to ash this time.”

“It’s better when they’re all burnt up,” Dipper said, sticking the marshmallow into the fire. It burst into flames, and he grinned.

“Marshmallows are an art, kid,” Stan shook his head with no real disappointment. “Maybe we shoulda gotten your sister after all, at least she understands that.”

“You know I wasn’t messing with the lights, right?” Dipper asked suddenly, and then wondered where that came from.

“Heh, right,” Stan chuckled, watching the marshmallow blacken and flake in the fire. “It was your ghost.”

“I’m serious,” Dipper said, glancing back at Stan, unsure why this was so important. “It wasn’t me. Honest.”

Stan’s expression was unreadable for a moment. “...yeah, I believe you. I always did.”

Something strange, maybe relief, uncurled in Dipper’s chest. He nodded stiffly, turning back to lift his marshmallow out of hell to watch the flames attached to it flicker.

“You just gonna let it turn to ash or are you actually gonna eat it?” Stan groused.

“It’s marinating,” Dipper said.

“What, in the fire?”

“Yes,” Dipper said, and found himself grinning when Stan laughed at that. A real, full-bellied laugh.

The marshmallow smoked, and Dipper watched the air flicker strangely around the flame, distorting the world around it. He wondered if there was a name for it. A fire ghost, maybe.

He glanced up, looking at a trail of smoke making its way towards the ceiling, and frowned. A sprinkler was affixed to the ceiling, cobwebs hanging off of it. “Hey,” Dipper said. “Is this gonna set off the-”

A shrill scream of an alarm echoed through the shack, and the sprinklers switched on.

Dipper and Stan reacted as though burned, shrieking wildly. Stan said several words that Dipper was certain he wasn’t supposed to hear, and he heard Mabel thumping down the stairs, yelling “WHAT DID YOU DO?!” with Waddles behind her, squealing in the water.

In the end, they had to dry out everything via a rickety hair dryer that probably hadn’t been used since the 90s. Dipper couldn’t stop smiling.

He forgot about the droning noise.

In Dipper’s defense, he probably wouldn’t have done something as stupid as shaking Bill’s hand if he was running off of more than three hours of sleep in the last two and a half days. Nevertheless, here he was.

He was pretty sure he wasn’t dead.

“MABEL!” Dipper screamed, his noncorporeal form rocketing through walls. He knew she couldn’t hear him, but going silent felt like giving up. “Oh god, oh god, oh god…MABEL, WHERE ARE YOU?!”

Dipper forced himself to float up towards the ceiling, on the catwalk above the stage as puppets lay strewn around on the floor, abandoned for now during intermission. Grenda was no longer on the catwalk, and neither was his body, piloted by something with little respect for pain receptors and polite conversation.

But there was someone standing at the edge of the catwalk. A woman with her back to Dipper, her long sandy hair tumbling out of a bun. She could have been easily ignored if it hadn't been for her neck. It was bent at an almost perfect ninety degree angle.

“HEY!” Dipper shrieked, waving his arms frantically. “HEY, HELP!”

The woman turned around, and screamed.

“WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU?!” She demanded, nearly falling off the catwalk in an attempt to get away from him. “GET AWAY FROM ME, GET AWAY!”

“What?!” Dipper asked, startled by her reaction. “I’m not a ghost!”

“Obviously!” The woman said. “You’re floating and see-through! What happened to you?!”

“A dream demon stole my body,” Dipper said. “Listen, we don’t have time-”

“A fucking what now?!” The woman gestured wildly. “What…what is happening?!”

“Listen!” Dipper snapped. “My body was stolen by a demon! I was tricked! I can see ghosts, and now I kind of am one, sort of? But I need your help-”

“Oh!” The woman snapped her fingers. “Are you the little medium? I heard about you!”

Dipper blinked, annoyed enough for a moment to stop panicking. “I told Josie not to call me that.”

“Oh, I didn’t hear about you from Josie,” the woman said. “I heard about you from Nathan, who heard about you from Cassandra, who heard about you from Faisal, who heard from Ethel, who…oh, I think Ethel did hear from Josie.”

“How many dead people are in this town?!” Dipper asked incredulously.

The woman giggled. “I think Gravity Falls people have sticky souls. We tend to hang back, watch the action. Oh, I’m Zoe, by the way. Um, I got a little tangled up in the ropes back here a while back. We were doing Waiting For Godot, and I was Godot, which is weird because that’s not a real part. I think the director really misunderstood the message of the play, but-”

“Can we please talk later, Zoe?” Dipper pleaded.

Zoe giggled again. “Oh, whoops, yeah. Hey, how come you get to fly if you’re not technically dead? That’s not fair.”

“Zoe!”

“Sorry, sorry,” she motioned for Dipper to go ahead. “How can I help you?”

“I’m looking for my sister,” Dipper said. “She’s probably the only one who can help me. Did you see where she went-”

“Who’re you talking to, Pine Tree?”

Dipper and Zoe shrieked in unison, and Dipper whirled around to see himself, smiling far too widely. “You…” Dipper glanced between Zoe and Bill, confusion mounting. “You can’t-?”

“Don’t tell it I’m here!” Zoe said. “I hate scary stuff!”

“Finally cracked under the pressure?” Bill asked, and threw his head back to laugh, so hard and suddenly that Dipper winced. “Don’t worry! You’d hardly be the first! But you’re too late, kid. All’s I gotta do is wait for act two. I hear it’s gonna go out with a bang!”

He laughed again, stalking off and leaving Dipper sputtering. Zoe practically threw herself out of Bill’s way, and the demon was none the wiser.

“Oh, wow,” Zoe said, watching Bill climb down the ladder with very little carefulness. “I hated that.”

“Imagine how I feel!” Dipper said, though his mind was racing with the revelation that Bill didn’t seem to see Zoe. “How could he not notice you? He’s supposed to be, like, a god or something, and he could see me…”

“You’re not a ghost,” Zoe pointed out. “And who cares? I’m just glad he’s not looking at me with his creepy eyes.”

“Listen,” Dipper said. “I need to find Mabel. She’s the one putting this whole thing on. Do you know where she is.”

“Um…” Zoe snapped her fingers. “Yeah! Dressing room! She took a bunch of puppets with her! It’s directly down the hall beneath us, last door on the left.”

“Oh, thank God,” Dipper breathed out, forcing his unsettling body to zoom downstairs. “Thanks, Zoe!”

“Good luck on fighting the devil or whatever!” Zoe called after him. “Come back after you get your body back! We can hang out!”

“So,” Josie said, looking confused. “You were a ghost for a minute?”

“I wasn’t a ghost,” Dipper said irritably. “But it’s…it’s weird. Bill’s this supposedly all-powerful demon and he can’t see a ghost?”

Josie shrugged. “How’s author hunting going?”

“Oh, um,” Dipper said, mostly grateful for her to change the subject. His arms still stung from where Bill had stuck forks with them, cackling with a mixture of sadistic and masochistic glee. “Well, the laptop’s completely destroyed. I don’t even think Soos and his duct tape miracles could fix it. So that’s a bust. I thought about trying to bring it to an electronics store or something, but I think that would raise too many questions. It’s just a dead end.”

“You said the password had eight letters, right?” Josie asked, and Dipper nodded. “Did you try ‘password’? As the key?”

“I-” Dipper gestured wildly. “Of course I tried ‘password’! That’s like the most common computer password ever! It didn’t work!”

“Okay, yeesh,” Josie said. “Touchy subject. Just thought I’d ask. Oh, hey, how’s the rest of summer going?”

“Fine,” Dipper said, feeling grumpy. “Stan’s being weird.”

“Weird how?”

“Just weird,” Dipper shrugged. “I dunno, I think all old people get a little weird after a while.”

“Maybe he’s like you,” Josie said. “Maybe he’s also worried about the summer ending, doesn’t wanna see you and Mabel go.”

Dipper chuckled. “That’s what you think?”

Josie shrugged, and Dipper found he couldn’t think of a proper rebuttal for a moment. He thought about failed stove s’mores before he could stop himself. They hadn’t attempted it again since their foolhardy first mission. Dipper had tried to work up the courage to ask a few times to try again, but found himself lacking. He suspected it was because it would ruin the spontaneity of the event.

Somehow, planning stove s’mores felt far less special than running into each other in the middle of the night, no doubt each harboring their own secrets but willing to put them aside, at least for a minute.

“Earth to Dipper?” Josie asked, snapping in front of his face. “You still on planet earth?”

“Sorry,” Dipper said. “I…Stan likes us. A lot. But when the end of the summer comes, he’s gonna be relieved for the peace and quiet again, trust me.”

If Stan had really wanted to make the s’mores, after all, he would have asked Dipper to do so already. He was just trying to be nice, probably assuming Dipper was breaking down again, like he had at the hospital.

“Sure,” Josie said, though she looked uncertain. “Sure.”

“And you’re absolutely sure you don’t remember who wrote this?” Dipper showed the journal to a young man behind the library.

Kavir shook his head, skin sunken. Dipper was pretty sure it was rude to ask, but he was fairly certain Kavir had gotten sick. “Sorry,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen it.”

“You’re completely positive?” Dipper pressed. “Maybe you spoke to someone once? Has a living person ever talked to you?”

“You,” Kavir said, and Dipper sighed.

“Besides me.”

“Oh,” Kavir frowned. “Um. I don’t think so? Sorry. Honestly, I’m still shocked that you can see me.”

Dipper sighed, grabbing his notebook out of his backpack and writing down ‘NO LEADS’ under Kavir’s page in big, blocky letters.

“Maybe Elijah could help you. He lives in the museum,” Kavir said.

“In the museum?” Dipper asked, and Kavir nodded. “How am I supposed to go in and talk to him without people thinking I’m crazy?”

“You could break in,” Kavir suggested. “After hours.”

“I’m not gonna break into a museum!” Dipper said, offended by the very idea.

He broke into a museum, because Dipper’s life was apparently now a series of loosely connected incidents ranging from ‘childhood mischief’ to ‘jailable offense’. He liked to think that Stan would be proud.

But he was here, in the guts of the museum, watching someone else’s life fall apart in bits and pieces, like a movie spliced and re-edited so many times you almost lost the plot of it altogether. McGucket, in a sort of feverish desperation, trying to justify to a camera that this idea would work, that this would fix his inability to properly function under the constant stress that was being in Gravity Falls, and that there was no way to fix it other than a self-inflicted traumatic brain injury.

Predictably, it went poorly.

He was being unfair; Dipper thought he might even sympathize. There was a freedom in insanity, one he had seen in ghosts too many times. If you couldn’t see the fear maybe it couldn’t see you; it made sense, in a desperate, ‘I’ve tried everything else so I might as well engineer my way out of it’, mad scientist sort of way. Dipper wasn’t sure how comfortable he was with his line of thinking, but here he was. In a moldering basement almost everyone else had forgotten about.

“Mr. McGucket?” Mabel whispered when the TV turned to static, buzzing eerily in the dark basement.

McGucket didn’t move, staring at the TV, his back to them. If he had turned around, Dipper wouldn’t have been shocked at all to find him gray-faced, the raised scar on his temple that Dipper only noticed now reopened and pouring blood.

Willy had told him exactly who and what McGucket was all that time ago, and Dipper had ignored him.

Damage on damage, scar tissue on scar tissue, where if you tried to peel off the cast the skin might come with it. Better to leave it be, even as it festered and stung. The band-aid was so large there was nowhere to grab it to rip it off, and who knew what else might rip off alongside it? Something precious? Something needed? The whole of him entirely?

“Mr. McGucket?” Mabel asked again, and Dipper wondered when they’d tagged ‘Mr.’ on to the beginning of his name. ‘Old Man’ felt cruel now, though. “Are you okay?”

McGucket finally turned, so slowly it was almost unbearable, staring down at the glass tube in his hands like it was a bomb. He was not gray-faced, nor had his scar burst open. He was completely alive, and a ghost all the same.

“...I’m sorry,” Dipper said softly.

McGucket blinked, finally seeming to remember that four others witnessed this. He smelled vaguely like sulfur and charcoal, maybe the aftereffects of taking several sustained blasts from the memory gun directly to the face moments ago. If he was experiencing any negative side effects from that, he certainly wasn’t showing it.

After a long moment, his face split into an uncertain, gap-toothed smile. “Don’t be,” he said, his voice shockingly quiet. “It…it ain’t a pretty picture, but I know what happened now. I know why. Feels important to know why. To have a reason why it’s all like this, why my head’s got more holes than a target practice bottle. I ain’t too sure ‘bout fixin’ it, or undoin’ it, but…it’s a start.”

“Hey, uh,” Wendy said, rubbing the back of her neck. “Do we wanna maybe get outta here? It stinks down here.”

“Sorry,” Soos said. “I sweat when I get nervous.”

“That’s not-okay,” Wendy said. “...we should get out of here. Before the cops arrive or something. Do you want a ride back?”

No one pointed out that ‘back’ for McGucket was the dump. One problem at a time.

McGucket nodded wordlessly, trodding after the others, still holding a canister. He still held it carefully, but not quite so fearfully. Moreso like it was something precious now, to be protected at all costs.

“Do you, um,” Dipper said, and then shook his head. “Nevermind, it’s pushy.”

“Nah, go ‘head,” McGucket said, clambering into the car. “Might help, who knows?”

“...do you remember anything?” Dipper said, pulling out the journal for emphasis. “About the author?”

McGucket paused, though he didn’t look surprised. He must have expected this question. “Why d’ya wanna know?”

“We’ve been looking for him all summer!” Mabel said, hauling into the car. “Dipper’s been going a little crazy over it.”

Usually, Dipper would have protested, and they would have started squabbling aimlessly. But McGucket was staring at Dipper, his eyes so focused it almost looked painful, and Dipper found he couldn’t look away.

“I think…” Dipper swallowed. “...I think we might be ghost hunting.”

Mabel frowned, but McGucket looked like he had expected this answer. He leaned back against the seat, his eyes suddenly faraway. “...I don’t remember much,” McGucket said, speaking as if he were the only person in the world. His voice dropped to a whisper, a confession held in for decades on decades: “But I think I loved him.”

No one said anything, afraid to break the stillness.

Dipper said nothing, clambering into the truck. He shut the door and paused, suddenly remembering Kavir’s tip.

“Oh,” Dipper said. “Wait, I should-”

He glanced up and screamed.

A headless corpse was standing outside the car door.

The car reacted as though a bomb had gone off. Mabel jumped, tangled in her seatbelt, Wendy whirled around, fists clenched, and Soos nearly ripped the steering wheel out. McGucket spewed barely legible curses and Southernisms that Dipper was pretty sure he made up on the spot, clutching his chest.

“What?!” Wendy asked, startled. “Is the cult back?!”

The headless corpse stumbled off, arms comically out and shuffling along the ground so he didn’t trip. He was wearing what Dipper was pretty sure was pioneer getup. He seemed harmless, if likely frustrated and confused.

“Oh my god,” Dipper wheezed, clutching his chest. “Sorry, sorry, um…” he wracked his mind to come up with a suitable excuse. “One of those hawktopus thingies swooped right up in my face, startled me. It’s cool, I’m cool. Sorry.”

The cat relaxed. McGucket’s leg was bouncing.

“Jesus, Dipper,” Wendy said, pinching her brow. “Thought we were gonna have to go for round two or something.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Dipper said, red-faced in spite of his best efforts. One of these days, he was really going to have to get over his crush on Wendy, especially when she had rejected him in what was probably the kindest way possible. “I just wasn’t expecting it, and after the day we’ve had…”

“Are you okay?” Mabel asked, leaning around McGucket to give him a look.

“I’m cool, I’m cool,” Dipper said, and to his shock, he meant it. Panic did not start eating at his mind, drowning him in short gasps for air and tremors. He knew what the ghosts were; just another type of person. “I’m cool, really. That…” he laughed, a little dizzy. “Jeez, I thought I was gonna have a heart attack.”

“Dude,” Soos said seriously. “That was right in my ear.”

For some reason, that only made Dipper laugh harder. He made a mental note to chew out Kavir for sending him after what had to be Elijah, likely the only ghost in Gravity Falls who was still insane.

“What happened to your hand?” Mabel asked, a few days later over breakfast.

Stan glanced back, halfway reaching for something on the top shelf. “Huh?”

“Oh, yeah,” Dipper said, only just noticing a bandage on Stan’s hand. “What’d you do?”

“Nothing,” Stan said too quickly. “Mind your business.”

“Grunkle Stan!” Mabel scolded, affronted. “We’re worried about you! Are we not allowed to be worried about you? Is that it?”

Stan sighed, looking exhausted. “No, jeez, just-”

“Is it gross looking?” Dipper asked.

“Oh, yeah,” Stan nodded, his face grave. “Skin’s all torn off, there’s pus coming out of it, it smells horrible-”

“Well, now you have to show us,” Dipper said.

“Show us, show us, show us!” Mabel chanted, pounding her fists on the table.

Stan frowned. “You kids are weird.”

“We’re not the ones being weird about a bandage,” Dipper said.

“Fine,” Stan rolled his eyes. “It’s, uh. Papercut.”

Mabel blinked. “...a paper cut needed, like, a whole thing of gauze.”

“...it was a big piece of paper,” Stan said slowly.

“...you can come up with a better lie, if you want,” Dipper said, amused.

“Don’t you two have chores to do or something?” Stan grumbled. “Or a monster to harass? Something to break? Get off my back.”

He was gone before they could protest too much.

“...think we should be concerned about that?” Dipper asked.

“I dunno, maybe,” Mabel said. “Grunkle Stan doesn’t seem like the kind to keep up on disinfecting a cut-”

“No, I mean about the fact that he’s obviously hiding what happened to his hand,” Dipper said.

Mabel considered it, and then shrugged. “I bet it’s fine,” she said. “He’s probably just embarrassed about what happened. He probably fell down the stairs again or something. Just be glad he didn’t make us help him up this time.”

“...yeah,” Dipper decided, mostly because he had other things on his mind. “Yeah, I guess…I guess you’re right.”

As long as they didn’t create some sort of ontological paradox, Dipper decided that he and Mabel would be fine while they were stranded in 2002, provided they didn’t get caught by the time cops. At least, that was what he decided to believe.

“Okay, this is fine,” Dipper said, fiddling with the broken time tape, afraid to let it snap again. He could imagine them getting lost in the Cretaceous era and snapped up by a dinosaur all too easily. “This is fine, I’m totally not freaking out.”

“Yeah, you sound like you’re not freaking out,” Mabel said, and Dipper wasn’t quite sure if she was being sarcastic or not. “It’s fine! We just gotta get to the shack, find some tools to fix that thing with! No biggie!”

It felt like a big biggie, but Dipper didn’t argue.

The Gravity Falls of 2002 was eerily similar to the one of today. He even knew most of the faces he saw, though many of them were far younger. Most of the gray-faces looked familiar too.

“Maybe we should take the bus,” Mabel said, glancing across the street at the bus stop. “It might take less time than walking there.”

“We don’t have any money,” Dipper said. “Besides, we should try to interact with as few people as possible. Otherwise we might-”

Dipper looked up and choked.

Waiting at the bus stop was Josie. She wasn’t dead.

Dipper felt dizzy, watching Josie tap her foot on the ground impatiently. He didn’t know how much time Josie had left. Maybe years. Maybe hours. But she was his friend, he was pretty sure. They hadn’t extensively discussed how she felt about being dead, but Dipper’s general impression of ghosts was that they would rather be living. What if he warned her? What if he ran up to her and begged her to be careful, maybe chew her food a few extra times?

For the first time, a ghost felt inherently tragic, and this one wasn’t even here yet.

“HEY!” Mabel pushed him, and Dipper jumped. “Where’d you go?”

“Um,” Dipper said. “Um.”

Instantly, Mabel’s expression turned serious. “Are you okay?” She asked, her voice hushed, and Dipper was abruptly reminded of every spiral he had had at home. He shied away, oddly embarrassed by her care. He hadn’t freaked out since the zombie incident, and that was justified. And prior to that his last mini breakdown had been on the bus to Gravity Falls.

Mabel frowned even more when Dipper pulled away from her. “Do you…do you need a second, or-”

“I’m fine,” Dipper said, probably more harshly than was necessary.

When he looked back, the bus had already materialized, hiding Josie. When it pulled away, she was gone.

“Dipper?” Mabel asked again, tugging his arm.

“I…” Dipper said, his chest twisting with an emotion he didn’t want to identify, not now, not in front of Mabel. “I’m fine. I’m okay. Let’s…let’s go. We gotta get back to laser tag with Soos.”

The last ghost on his list was far too easy to find.

At the edge of the dock on the lake, a man stood completely still. He was soaking wet, his fine suit clinging to his gray skin. Dipper thought he might have been able to ignore that had it not been for the cement shoes clinging to his feet.

“Um, excuse me?” Dipper said, and the man didn’t turn around, probably assuming that Dipper was speaking to someone else. “Gino Caruso?”

This time, the man whirled around, at least as well as he was able with cement blocks around his feet. Apparently those things still carried weight after death. “You…” he blinked. “Kid, you can see me?”

Dipper nodded slowly, suddenly uncomfortable. Falling off of rocks, drinking too much illicit cough syrup, accidentally hanging oneself, and getting sick were innocent enough ways to die. Dipper had seen movies; he knew why Gino had cement around his feet. It was purposeful.

“Shit,” Gino said with a lopsided grin, his voice strong with an inexplicable New York accent. “Shit, didn’t think I’d meet another psychic.”

“I’m not psychic,” Dipper said, annoyed before he could stop himself. “I just–wait, another?”

“Sure!” Gino nodded. “Be hard to forget the only fella who can see you after you started sleeping with the fishes.”

“So…okay, hold on,” Dipper said, pulling out the journal and holding it up for Gino to see and flipping through a few pages. “Does this look familiar?”

Gino squinted at the journal, looking interested. “Huh. You know, I think so. Was a long time ago, though. Jesus fucking Christ–pardon my French, kid–maybe decades ago even.”

“Do you know who-” Dipper started, but jumped when he heard someone’s footsteps on the dock.

“Hey!” Dipper jumped, spinning on his heels to see Tate McGucket staring at him, arms crossed, looking irritated. “What are you doing on that thing?! It’s not safe. There’s a sign and everything.”

“I didn’t see a sign,” Dipper said, and he heard Gino snicker.

“Who’re you even talking to?” Tate asked, starting down the dock. Dipper didn’t really have much interaction with McGucket’s son, but the way he pulled his hat down over his face always made Dipper a little nervous. He didn’t like being unable to read his expressions. “Listen, you can’t be out here, you’re only gonna-”

“Watch this,” Gino said, and Dipper looked back in time to see Gino grinning, a little bit of cruelty in his features.

There was the sound of wood breaking, a yelp, and Dipper looked back just in time to see Tate tumbled headfirst into the water, a plank floating in the water as though it had been yanked out from under him. Gino burst out laughing.

“How did you…!” Dipper rushed forward. “Mr. McGucket! Are you okay?! S-should I call someone, or-”

“You can get off the dock,” Tate growled, more embarrassed than angry. “Before you crack your head open on it or something and I have to deal with a lawsuit.”

“Right, um,” Dipper said, casting a glance back at Gino, who pointed at a nearby lonely jetty with a grin. “Sure. Um. Sorry you fell in.”

Tate grumbled something, but Dipper wasn’t listening, rushing to the jetty, met with Gino’s grin from a rock in the middle of the line the second he emerged from the thick forest surrounding the lake. “How did you do that?!” Dipper demanded.

Gino cackled. “Come out onto the jetty and I’ll tell you.”

Dipper took a step forward, and paused.

Each rock was lined with slick algae, glimmering green in the July sun. Plant life clung to the stones, and Dipper watched it writhe as the water passed over it. He could already see himself in his mind’s eyes slipping on the rocks–and falling off a dock was one thing. It was another danger entirely to fall onto rocks, headfirst with windmilling arms.

Victor’s grisly injury flashed into his mind.

“...I’ll pass,” Dipper said, folding his arms. “I can hear you just fine from right here.”

Gino’s smile widened. “Smart kid. Smarter than I thought you’d be.”

“You moved the sign about the dock being off-limits, didn’t you?” Dipper said.

“Guilty,” Gino shrugged.

“You…” Dipper hadn’t expected him to admit it. “Why? Someone could have gotten hurt.”

“And what?” Gino asked. “We’d have one more wayward soul in this godforsaken town? Who cares?”

Dipper stepped back, suddenly uncomfortable. “No wonder you’re all the way out here,” he said. “None of the other ghosts would want you around.”

“Oh, please,” Gino rolled his eyes. “You think I’m that evil for wanting a little fun? Newsflash, kid. I know exactly who you are. Even out here in the boonies of the boonies, word gets around. I heard there was a new medium in town. At least I’m honest about my intentions.”

“No one’s lying to me,” Dipper said, but felt uncomfortable even as he said it. “Least of all the ghosts. They wanna help me find the author, same as everyone else.”

“Everyone’s a liar,” Gino said, and with a smile: “Your author was right about one thing. Don’t trust nobody. Especially in this town. Look where trust got me.”

He pointed to his cement shoes, and Dipper forced himself to shake his head. “You’re wrong. You don’t know what you’re talking about. If you’re not going to tell me anything about the author, you’re just another dead end.”

“Ain’t I just,” Gino chuckled. “‘Sides, I’m sure a corpse’ll turn up soon enough.”

“You don’t know anything,” Dipper snapped, trying to ignore a sick feeling in his stomach. “You can’t do anything. I’m not scared of you. You’re just a ghost.”

“Oh?” Gino’s grin grew shark-like. “You don’t think that if I can send a plank flying, I can’t send a rock at your head?”

“...how?” Dipper asked before he could stop himself, taking another step back.

“Oh,” Gino sat down on the jetty ungracefully. “How can I move things? Easy. Here’s a little something for free, kid. Any of us ghouls can do it. Just takes a little push. A little spark of life; happiness, sadness, fear. But most of all? Anger.”

“...anger?” Dipper asked.

“Ain’t nothing in this world or the next stronger than the hate we got for each other,” Gino said, making a motion like he had a cigarette before he seemed to remember he had none. “That hate can move mountains. It’s just usually that we’re moving mountains to drop ‘em on each other. If I saw the fellas that did this to me…”

Gino’s too-white smile suddenly dropped so fast that Dipper took a step back. “...well. They oughta be glad they’re dead by now and I can’t find ‘em.”

“You’re the only one who can do that,” Dipper said, deciding he didn’t want to think about Mike and Angela tripping Pacifica or turning out the lights. “Because you’re the only bad ghost.”

“Oh, I’m bad now, am I?” Gino asked. “What gave it away? The Chicago overcoat? Listen, kid, here’s another piece of advice for free. No one’s good. We’re all just in various stages of fucked up, and some of us are unlucky enough that it catches up to us sooner than later. But later always comes. The later where you get fucked over by the people you’re supposed to trust. Happened to me, and look where I am now. Happened to your author too.”

“What?!” Dipper perked up. “W-what are you talking about?!”

Something snapped in the twigs behind Dipper, and he whirled around with a gasp, face to face with a doe, staring at him fearlessly. The Gravity Falls deer were always far too brave for his comfort. It felt like they were watching him.

Maybe they were.

The doe bounded off into the woods a few moments later, but it brought Dipper no comfort. When he turned back to face Gino, the man was already gone.

Once, a few years ago, Mabel had picked a murder mystery for family movie night. It had been mostly a comedic show, based on an old board game that Dipper hadn’t ever found particularly exciting, but the movie had been entertaining enough.

The mansion the film was set in was sprawling, huge and old, with spiraling stairs, a library packed to the brim, and a dead body in some room or another. The Northwest Manor felt identical to the mansion in the movie, save for the dead body. At least for now. Dipper wouldn’t be shocked if they had a corpse hiding out in some forgotten room.

“So is everyone here always a massive jerk, or is that just today?” Dipper asked, following Pacifica through winding halls, craning his neck to take in everything. The house felt eerily sterile; as far as Dipper knew, only Pacifica, her parents, and a sprawling staff dwelled here. The extra space made him dizzy.

Pacifica ignored him entirely. “That’s the room where all the weird stuff happened,” she said, pushing open a massive oak door into a room that felt excessively large. “Well? See anything freaky?”

Dipper did, immediately.

Hunched in the corner of the room, there was a woman, covered head to toe in thick mud. It clung to her long hair in clumps, and he could see pine needles stubbornly stuck to her dress. She was curled in a ball, as small as she could possibly make herself, hands over her head as if to protect it, shuddering. Deep, ugly sobs wrenched their way from her chest, and she seemed unaware of Pacifica and Dipper.

It wasn’t the most terrifying ghost Dipper had ever seen. But something about her open wailing, completely unheard by everyone else, made him nervous. The room itself wasn’t helping. Animal heads lined the walls, mostly bears and big cats (Dipper was pretty sure that wasn’t legal), their mouths forced open into frozen snarls. A fire was already lit in the room, casting eerie shadows on the wall that weren’t quite human, but close enough to make him look twice.

Dipper shook it off. There was no way in hell he was going to show nerves in front of Pacifica Northwest.

“Right,” Dipper said, trying not to stare at the corner. “Um, any mud getting in the house?”

“Ugh,” Pacifica rolled her eyes. “No. Weren’t you listening? Just plates and cutlery flying around.”

“Right, well,” Dipper said, flipping through the journal. “Seems like you just have a category one ghost. No biggie. They’re kind of annoying. Which, really, makes them fit right in here.”

Pacifica rolled her eyes. “Just get rid of it.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Dipper said, pulling a water bottle out of his backpack. “Just gotta douse the corners of the room with holy water, and boom! Bye-bye, ghostie.”

“Of course you carry around holy water in your backpack,” Pacifica said.

“Hey, at least I’m prepared,” Dipper said. “Now, a little space please.”

Pacifica narrowed her eyes. “Why?”

Dipper shrugged, trying to look nonchalant. “Oh, you know. Ghost-wranglers need room to work and all.”

Pacifica snickered. “Ghost-wranglers?”

Dipper felt his face grow hot, and huffed, hoping the eerie glow of the fire disguised it. “Look, just give me a few minutes. You can even wait right outside the door, I don’t care.”

“You’ll try to steal something,” Pacifica said.

“You got me,” Dipper said blandly. “There’s nothing I want more in the world than the head of a snow leopard. Man, are you psychic or something?”

Pacifica rolled her eyes so hard it almost looked like it hurt. “Fine, dork, but we’re checking your bag and pockets when you leave.”

“Yeah, there’s no way you weren’t already gonna do that,” Dipper said, but Pacifica left, the oak doors closing behind her with an eerie thunk.

Dipper let out a sigh of relief, and took a swig of his water bottle. It was just tap water, but it made for a decent prop.

“Hey, lady,” Dipper said, creeping towards the sobbing woman. “Hey, hi.”

The woman glanced up, staring at him through bloodshot eyes peeking between fingers, blown wide with fear. “You can see me?” She rasped, something too dark to be mud dribbling from her mouth.

“Yeah, I’m good at seeing stuff,” Dipper said, trying to look friendly. “I’m Dipper. Do you, uh, know your name?”

The ghost hesitated. “...Hannah,” she said, sounding slightly uncertain. “...it’s raining.”

“Hi, Hannah, wish we could meet under better circumstances,” Dipper said. “Okay, listen, I don’t wanna sound rude here-”

“It’s raining,” Hannah said again.

“Uh,” Dipper said, glancing at the window to see the downpour outside, as though some great god were weeping. “Yeah. It is. Is, um…is that a problem?”

“...it was raining just like it was then,” Hannah whispered. “Big, fat drops, falling from the sky. Like Noah. Like the end times.”

“Okay, okay,” Dipper said. “I think I’m getting it. You…you died because of the rain?”

“...yes,” Hannah said, looking relieved that Dipper understood. “Yes.”

“I’m sorry about that, really, I am,” Dipper said. “But see, the thing is-”

“I knew there was trouble, when it started,” Hannah whispered, her eyes going blank. “I’d never seen rain like that before. We lived in a valley, all of us. They didn’t call it a company town but we all knew it was. But it was the only work we had. They told the men to skin the mountain. That’s what they called it. I remember, it made me so sick. ‘Skin the mountains, boys’ they ordered. ‘Not one tree left standing’.”

“They did, weeks and months of pulling down pines so tall it hurt to look up at ‘em,” Hannah intoned. “Old trees, ancient trees. I thought we might be making them mad, but that seemed such a silly thing to say. But maybe I was right. And when we finished, when the men were done flaying those mountains alive…there was nothing left but loose soils and a few stubborn stumps. But they were spat upon. We told them that men, good men, died taking those trees down to build them a castle. They didn’t care. No one was enough for them to honor. Their graves were left abandoned. All of it was. And then the rains came.”

“So much rain,” Hannah shook her head, and Dipper found himself unable to interrupt. “It turned the soil into sea. I knew there was trouble coming, and the men did too, all their wives and children knew. My husband was already gone, just me and my babies left in the world. I was going to leave. But he…Lord, I’ve never seen anyone so angry. He told us we were cowards for letting them get away with disrespecting us like that. Maybe he was right. But I didn’t care. I just needed to leave, to get out and find work anywhere else, out of that valley sitting slick and muddy at the base of a naked mountain, but it…”

She shook her head, her voice suddenly a horrified whisper. “It was too late. It was always too late. It was like a roar of thunder; the entire mountain seemed to come loose, racing down in a flurry of dirt, water, and whatever was left of those vengeful trees. Hand to God, I saw it sweep away an entire house before it swept me away too. The mud got in my hair, my eyes, my nose, my mouth. I tasted it, and I swear it tasted like blood. I fought, you’ve got to believe me, I fought so hard to get my head above it all, but I wasn’t strong enough. No one was. I heard ‘em screaming, crying, terrified and drowning on mud and pine needles. I heard my babies begging for me. I couldn’t save them, I couldn’t save any of them, they were all swept away and there ain’t no one left to bury us but we were already buried-”

Hannah cut herself off when thunder rumbled outside, and she curled in on herself, new sobs wracking her frame.

“I…” Dipper swallowed. “I-I’m sorry, Hannah. But…but listen, you can’t…you can’t stay here. Look, if you follow me out, I can take you to a friend of mine who can help you. Josie, she’s really nice and we can find you somewhere better to be, it’s no wonder you’re a little confused, these animal heads are freaky-”

“You look like my little boy, a bit,” Hannah said, peeking at Dipper again. Tears streamed down her face. “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

“O-oh, I…” Dipper took a breath. “Hannah, a landslide isn’t your fault-”

“No,” Hannah whispered. “I’m sorry that I couldn’t stop him. I tried to make him stop. He won’t listen. He’s back, and you’re all going to die.”

Lightning flashed, thunder screamed like the mountain’s revenge, and Dipper felt sick.

“W-what?” Dipper asked. “Hannah, Hannah, what are you-”

Something shifted in the room. Dipper thought he heard a creak, and in spite of the roaring fire, he was suddenly freezing cold. He thought he heard a groan, and every hair on the back of his neck stood up.

Hannah wasn’t looking at him anymore. She was staring at something behind Dipper, her eyes impossibly big, taking quick, desperate gasps of air.

“...Hannah?” Dipper whispered.

Hannah leaned forward. “Don’t look behind you.”

Dipper’s mouth went dry, and he heard a low laugh behind him. Against every molecule in his body screaming for him to run through the walls like a damn cartoon character, he slowly turned around.

Something that could barely be described as a ghost sneered at him, a huge hulking man with ripped overalls and flannel, covered in mud. He had a huge beard made of blue flames, his eye was missing, and worst of all, an axe was lodged firmly in his skull. And he looked pissed.

Oh, yeah, Dipper thought, a little dizzy. Ghosts only get deadly when they get mad. This guy sure seems mad.

“You shouldn’t have come here!” The ghost roared, ripping the axe out of his forehead and swinging it at Dipper.

Dipper shrieked and threw himself out of the way just as the axe crashed into the floor, splintering wood. Pacifica burst in. “Did you break something?!”

“YOU!” The ghost roared, whirling around on Pacifica.

“Pacifica!” Dipper gasped. “There’s a-”

But his warning wasn’t needed. Pacifica’s eyes widened when she saw the axe-wielding ghost. She could see him–Dipper’s assistance on that front wasn’t needed. “OH MY GOD!”

Hannah screamed.

Dipper was, at least, used to being pursued by ghosts, but it was the first time a ghost dragged an axe behind him, the axe he used to make deep gouges in the floors and walls of the manor. This ghost could, and would kill him. In fact, it seemed like his primary goal was murder.

And somehow, between catching the ghost in the silver mirror, it still got worse.

“‘My kind’, that pompous, stupid…” Dipper grumbled, Preston Northwest’s words echoing in his mind as he lit candles around a felled tree, a silver mirror in the middle. “This is dumb, if it wasn’t for Mabel being there…”

“Dipper…” the silver mirror hissed, and Dipper saw the image of the lumberjack ghost resurface. “It’s not too late to change your mind. It’s not too late to let me out.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Dipper said. “I’m really not in the mood for this. I’m sure hell or whatever has plenty of rich people in there for you to torment.”

“I saw you, before I manifested,” the ghost said. “You were speaking to Hannah Pryer.”

Dipper paused, a match hovering above a candle. “...you didn’t see anything.”

The ghost chuckled. “You’ve no reason to lie to me, boy, least of all about your gift.”

“It’s not…” Dipper huffed. “It’s not a gift. I don’t know what I did to deserve this, but it’s definitely not a gift. A curse, maybe. Actually, definitely a curse.”

“You spoke to Hannah, you understand what the Northwests and their ilk have cost us,” the ghost growled. “Lives snuffed out, families torn apart, everything destroyed. The valley is still filled with the bodies of my companions. Unmarked and unremembered. Women and children who had nothing to do with this. Do you think it’s fair that Hannah goes without justice?”

“Last I checked,” Dipper crossed his arms. “You were the one terrifying Hannah, not me.”

“There is always fear about what needs to be done,” the ghost said. “I am a cleanser, here to rid the world of the rich cancer. You would deny me that?”

“Look man,” Dipper said. “I’m not saying they don’t deserve some serious comeuppance, but I dunno if I’m the guy to make that call.”

“No one’s asking you to do anything,” the ghost hissed, hands pressed against the glass. “My rage has granted me the powers of the hells, wherever they may be. Set me free, witness the glory of my vengeance. See the fire I start burning hotter than the sun itself.”

“Yeah, see,” Dipper said, lighting the final candle. “That’s not really convincing me that I should let you out. I literally had one of my friends warn me about lumberjack ghosts. Guess this is why.”

“You claim you have no right to decide the price they must pay,” the ghost said. “But you deny me the chance to make my judgement. It seems that you’ve chosen a side already.”

“Look, I agree the Northwests suck,” Dipper said. “But most of the people up there have nothing to do with what happened to you! I dunno what you’re planning, but it’s definitely not good! And unless there’s some fair and unbiased ghost judicial system you haven’t told me about yet, I really don’t think you’re the guy to make that judgement either. My sister and her friends are in there, and I don’t really want them caught up in the crossfire of this.”

“You understand,” the ghost said. “You understand us spirits, you hear our cries, you see our pain, and you refuse to help us.”

“I don’t owe you anything!” Dipper snapped. “I don’t want this, I just-!”

Dipper sighed. “Forget it, I’m not getting into this with you. You’re gonna be gone in a minute anyway.”

“...very well,” the ghost said, sounding more disappointed than anything. “Then…will you do an old lumberjack one final request? Please, allow me to look upon the trees, one final time.”

Dipper sighed, and had half a mind to refuse the ghost's death just because he was annoyed.

“...sure, whatever,” Dipper said, picking up the mirror and holding it out to the forest. “Go nuts.”

For a moment, there was silence, and then the ghost started laughing.

“What are you-OW!” Dipper dropped the mirror when it suddenly sparked red, growing fire-hot in his hand. It fell to the ground, shattering on a tree root. Less than a second later, the ghost manifested again, cackling wildly.

“VENGEANCE IS MINE!” He howled, soaring back to the mansion.

Dipper blinked, his hand stinging.

“Uh oh.”

Dipper grinned, stomping a muddy foot into the Northwest's carpet as the newly opened party raged around him, townsfolk flabbergasted by the Northwest’s display of pure decadence. Hearing Preston freaking out over it made him smile even wider.

“But seriously,” Pacifica said with a grin she was trying and failing to swallow. “I should go find someone to clean up this mud. My parents’ll just have a heart attack after all we did to save them.”

“Yeah, fair enough,” Dipper said, unwilling to even pretend like he wasn’t enjoying the chaos that was once the Northwest party, townsfolk making themselves at home all around him.

“I’ll be right back, and, uh,” Pacifica coughed. “Maybe we can hang out or something for the rest of the party? If you want. If you want to leave after the whole ‘being turned into a tree’ thing, I get that.”

“Uh, honestly,” Dipper shrugged. “That’s probably only in the top five of most traumatizing things that have happened to me, so…”

Pacifica stared at him, and Dipper felt his face grow hot. “Jeez, did the ghost turn on the heat or something?” He laughed nervously. “But, um, yeah. Yeah, I could hang. Didn’t get to try any of those fancy mini-sandwiches, so that looks fun.”

For some reason, Pacifica’s face flushed as well. “Yeah, I can rustle a few up. Give me a minute?”

“Sure,” Dipper said, backing away to get out of the center of movement in the party. “Sure, I should go make sure Mabel and her friends are cool. It looked like they were arguing.”

“Don’t go too far,” Pacifica said, and it sounded like she meant it. The crowd swallowed her up after a couple steps, and Dipper felt a smile spread across his face.

“Not bad, Post-Mortem Pines,” Dipper mumbled to himself, leaning against the wall, ignored by everyone in favor of the party. “Not bad.”

“Are we bringing back ‘Post-Mortem’?”

Dipper yelped before he could stop himself, jumping. “Josie?!”

Josie grinned at him. “Who else would it be?”

“When did you get here?” Dipper asked, a bit disoriented to see her outside their usual meeting place.

“Heard there was some kind of hubbub going on at the Northwest party,” Josie said. “I had to check it out. Seems like I wasn’t the only one with that idea.”

She nodded out at the crowd, and Dipper’s mouth dropped open. Almost all the ghosts he had been speaking with over the summer had flooded in with the rest of the townsfolk. Constance was following the chimp butler with a look of fascination on her face. Kavir was talking animatedly to Zoe. Mike and Angela were sprinting around the room, making nuisances of themselves.

“I thought you said dead people kill a party,” Dipper said.

“Well, there’s an exception to every rule,” Josie said. “Besides, apparently some other ghosts beat me to it.”

“Guess so,” Dipper said.

“I heard you turned into a tree,” Josie said.

“Um,” Dipper shrugged. “Temporarily, yeah.”

Josie paused. “So, did you…did you, like, die for a minute?”

“I’m actually trying really hard not to think about it,” Dipper said.

“Oh, yeah, fair enough,” Josie nodded, and then abruptly gasped, hiding her face. “Oh god, did he see me?”

“Who?” Dipper asked. “What are-”

He spotted Victor on the other side of the room, also trying to look like he wasn’t peeking at Josie. “Oh. Victor. You know, most of the ghosts you sent me after were dead ends, him included-”

“Sh sh sh,” Josie said. “Is he looking at me?”

Dipper frowned, almost annoyed, and then blinked, feeling a bit foolish for not realizing a few things until now. He sighed, exasperated and a little unable to help it. “...you know, when I talked to him, he asked about you.”

Josie blinked, looking shocked. “...really?”

“Yep,” Dipper nodded, smiling at her expression. “I kinda forgot to tell you. Sorry.”

“Why, you little…!” Josie looked more amused than angry. “T-that could mean anything. It doesn’t mean he…you know.”

“And also, really? Victor?” Dipper asked. “His brains are coming out of his ears.”

“Hey, looks aren’t everything,” Josie said. “Besides, we ghosts have slim pickings.”

“...I think you should go talk to him,” Dipper said.

Josie blinked. “...really?”

“Yeah,” Dipper nodded. “You won’t know unless you talk to him. Though I’m pretty sure you already know.”

“Hm,” Josie said, casting a glance across the room.

“If I could, I would push you,” Dipper said. “You should go. Have fun. Not every day you get to go to a party somewhat orchestrated by a ghost.”

“Sure,” Josie said, and then grinned. “As long as you go hang out with Pacifica.”

Dipper felt his face heat up, and he quickly stared at the ground. “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Josie laughed. “See you later, little fella. I expected a full report on whatever nonsense you got yourself involved in this time.”

Dipper nodded. “Gotcha.”

He watched Josie take a deep breath that did nothing, and stride across the room. Victor lit up when he saw her coming, and while Dipper couldn’t hear them speaking, they fell easily into a conversation.

Mabel would have loved that, he thought unexpectedly, and for some reason, he wished he could share it with her.

“Dipper!” Another voice hissed, and this time, Dipper was face to face with McGucket. “I’ve been lookin’ for you!”

“Oh, hey Mr. McGucket!” Dipper smiled. “Enjoying the party? I hear the mini-sandwiches are–hey, you good?”

“I fixed up the laptop,” McGucket said, his face grave and frightened. His left leg was twitching uncontrollably, and he was wringing his hands. “I’ve been doin’ calculations, and I think somethin’ terrible is a-comin’! The apocalypse! The end times!”

“Okay, okay,” Dipper said, holding up his hands, half-feeling like he was talking to Hannah again. “Look, is the world gonna end in the next few hours?”

“I-I,” McGucket said, looking thrown by this question. “W-well, I don’t think so, but-”

“Do you think this can wait until after, then?” Dipper asked, not bothering to keep the plea out of his voice. “Every party I’ve been to this summer has ended in disaster. This one started with disaster, so maybe the end of it will be fun. Do you think I can get that? Just this once?”

“I…” McGucket frowned. “I suppose, but-”

“Great,” Dipper said, already backing away. “I’ll find you after this. Enjoy yourself!”

McGucket only frowned, but Dipper forced himself to turn away, running smack into Pacifica.

“Guess what I found!” She said, looking pleased, shoving a mini-sandwich into Dipper’s hands, sitting elegantly on a fancy napkin.

“Oh, nice!” Dipper said. “Thanks, I-”

He caught sight of Josie and Victor in the corner of the room. They were smiling at each other, nearly giddy. Victor leaned in and whispered something in Josie’s ear, and she giggled, blushing. Dipper didn’t even know it was possible for ghosts to blush.

“What?” Pacifica said, turning around. “What is it?”

“Oh, you know,” Dipper shrugged. “More vengeful spirits.”

Pacifica rolled her eyes. “Don’t even joke about that, freak.” But her voice had no bite to it, and she was smiling.

There were worse ways to end a ghost hunt.

(Dipper wasn’t able to find McGucket at the end of the night, but he figured it must have been fine. Probably.)

“You,” Josie said the next day. “Have a talent for getting into trouble like no other.”

“Guess so,” Dipper chuckled.

“I didn’t even know ghosts could move stuff, let alone manifest like that,” Josie said thoughtfully.

“Yeah, well, maybe don’t try it,” Dipper said. “I’m pretty sure you gotta get super scary for it to work.”

“What about Hannah?” Josie asked. “Did you ever see what happened to her?”

“Uh,” Dipper shrugged. “I dunno. She’s probably at peace or whatever too. Why?”

“Maybe you should go back,” Josie said. “See if she needs any help. I can go with you this time if you want.”

“What?” Dipper shook his head. “No, that’s…she’s fine. I’m sure she’s fine. I need to focus up, look for new leads on the author, I’m entirely out of ghosts that you gave me to talk to, and now I’m a little hesitant to go looking for them on my own-”

“You really don’t want to help her?” Josie asked, looking perplexed.

“I…” Dipper frowned. “Sorry, I’m confused about what the issue is?”

“...look,” Josie said. “I’ve never met anyone who can see us. It’s rare. Maybe so rare that there’s only you. Don’t you want to use that gift for good? To help people?”

“Not you too,” Dipper scowled. “It’s not a gift, Josie. It’s a curse.”

“It certainly is with that attitude,” Josie laughed.

“I’m not joking,” Dipper said, and Josie’s smile melted away. “It’s…do you have any idea what it’s like to see you guys all the time? It’s terrifying! Most ghosts don’t know what’s going on! Most ghosts just…just wander! They cry and scream! And the second, the very second they think I might be able to see them, they won’t leave me alone! And I try to ignore them, I really do, but it’s hard when a man who killed himself in your new friend’s bathtub is telling you to call the police!”

“Look, look,” Josie said, holding up her hands placatingly. “I’m not trying to start a fight. I’m just wondering if you’ve ever tried talking to the ghosts outside of town. Maybe if you tried, they wouldn’t be frightening. You might even be able to help them-”

“No,” Dipper shook his head wildly. “No, no no no. N-no, I can’t.”

Josie looked perplexed. “You’re the only one who can see us. We can help each other, but a living person being able to see us mean that you might even be able to help us move on-”

“I don’t want to do that!” Dipper burst out. “I don’t…you don’t get it! You’ve never gotten it! I don’t want to see ghosts! I never asked for this! I don’t want to see any of it! I don’t want to be like this, and I never did! I’d do anything to make it all just go away!”

Josie’s mouth went tight. “...so you’d do anything to never see or hear me again?”

“That’s not fair,” Dipper shook his head. “You know that’s not fair. You don’t know what it’s like-”

“Yeah, you’re right, I don’t,” Josie snapped. “But you don’t know what it’s like for me either. I’m dead, Dipper. The game’s over for me. No second chances. Do you think I’m okay with being dead?! With being like this?! If I was, I would have already moved on! I’m stuck here, probably forever because damned if I know what my reason is! That’s all a ghost is, man! Someone stuck! Someone who can’t move anymore! I’m like that because I’m dead, but you’re not! You’re alive, and you’re missing it, for what?”

“I’m not stuck!” Dipper shouted, for once not caring if anyone saw. “I don’t owe you or any of the other ghosts anyway! I’m just trying to enjoy my summer!”

“Yeah, you’re doing a great job of that,” Josie scoffed. “With your nose in a dusty old journal, forget about Stan and Mabel-”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Dipper said. “I never asked to be some…some ghost therapist or whatever. I just wanted help finding the author.”

Josie shook her head. “Is that all I’m worth to you? Some dead lady who might be able to help you in your dumb quest?”

Dipper folded his arms, glaring.

Josie rolled her eyes. “I know that’s not true.”

Dipper didn’t say anything, and Josie’s frown deepened. “...come on. I know you’re pissed at me, but that’s not true.”

“If you don’t have any more names of ghosts I can talk to,” Dipper said stiffly. “Maybe I should just go home.”

Josie blinked, not bothering to hide her surprise before a ferocious scowl settled across her face. “...maybe you should. But don’t come back here with that stupid book again. I don’t wanna see it anymore. I don’t need it to…to pathologize me. I’m a person. If your stupid author, medium, whatever he is couldn’t understand that, I thought you would be able to.”

“Fine,” Dipper said, his heart pounding in his ears as he stormed off. “Then you don’t need to see me at all.”

Dipper was pretty sure that, at this point, he had figured out Gravity Falls. If something started out awful and crappy, by the end of it, he was having a good time. But if something started good, fun, or even peaceful, he could bet that his day would be ruined.

That was best demonstrated to him when he started the day setting off fireworks and throwing water balloons, only to watch Stan carted off by S.W.A.T. (Dipper was slightly relieved to see Agent Trigger and Agent Powers; it meant he hadn’t killed them accidentally by summoning the zombies)

“Stan night-stocks,” Dipper told Mabel, digging through Stan’s security tapes after escaping government custody via car crash (it was a miracle they were all in one piece). He was far more willing to take Stan’s word now that there was much more at stake. “I even ran into him one night. If we just find the footage, we can clear his name. We have to.”

The fear, the dread, the heart-pounding anxiety that Dipper had been so good at staving off all summer was starting to creep back in, though he wasn’t entirely sure why. They had faced worse odds, but this felt like they were careening towards the edge of a cliff, and this cliff promised absolutely no soft landings.

Stan was hiding things, no doubt, but surely he wasn’t hiding this.

“Found this week’s!” Mabel said, pushing the cassette into the VCR. The screen fuzzed, and a second later, it lit up, showing Stan restocking the gift shop at the edge of twilight, a bored expression on his face.

“There!” Dipper said, partially to Mabel and partially to quell his own mind. “See? Just like he said! He-”

Stan abruptly looked around on tape, a deep scowl lining his expression. Once he was certain no one was watching, he slipped out the door. Dipper’s smile died.

“...that doesn’t mean anything,” Mabel said, but started fast-forwarding through the tape, a worried expression on her face.

At five in the morning, the door reopened, and a person in a hazmat suit reentered. Mabel frowned. “Maybe…that could be anyone, maybe it’s not-”

The figure in the hazmat suit dropped a barrel on his foot, and said something very loudly that Dipper and Mabel’s parents would not approve of.

“Right,” Dipper said, his stomach twisting. Puzzle pieces were floating in his head, disconnected by anything but his own mounting panic, at least for now. “Definitely Stan.”

“Okay, so he stole some toxic waste!” Mabel said, looking like she was having an increasingly hard time with being Stan’s defense lawyer. “That doesn’t mean anything! Who knows what he needs that for?”

Dipper spotted a battered cardboard box underneath the TV, and pulled it out. His heart skipped a beat. “Mabel, oh god.”

Dipper dumped the box upside down. Passports, IDs, and cash that was far more convincing than the Stan bucks that Stan was so fond of spilled out. Mabel’s eyes widened, picking up a driver’s license. “‘Stetson Pinefield’? ‘Hal Forrester’? ‘Andrew 8-Ball Alcatraz’? Why…why would Grunkle Stan need all this?”

Dipper said nothing, reaching for a thin black rod on the floor, previously hidden by the papers. He turned it over in his hands, unsure of its purpose, before pressing down on some kind of silver button.

A blade, shining even in the dim light, popped out with a sharp click. Mabel and Dipper both flinched in unison.

“Why…” Mabel swallowed. “Why would he have that?”

Dipper stared at his own reflection in the blade, and was almost positive he saw a shadow standing behind them. He whirled around, heart pounding-but there was no one there.

Dipper felt sick. “Mabel, I…”

“Dipper,” Mabel said, her voice suddenly hollow. “Look.”

It was a newspaper article. Admittedly, Dipper stopped reading it after the headline: STAN PINES DEAD

The rest of the words only floated into his ears tangentially. Fiery car crash…no remains…foul play suspected…

“I don’t…” Dipper shook his head, plucking out one final article. UNNAMED GRIFTER AT LARGE, it read, which would have been fine, if the man in the picture scowling like he wanted to hurt someone wasn’t absolutely identifiable as Stan.

Puzzle pieces clicked together, and Dipper had to shoot out a hand to grab the desk so he wouldn’t sway. The panic, a friend he had nearly forgotten about, was back, and the room might have even been spirit free.

“Mabel,” Dipper said, and his voice felt faraway. “I don’t…I don’t know if that’s Stan. I don’t even know if that’s our great uncle. But I don’t…I don't think this is his house. I don’t think this is his life. And I don’t…”

Dipper stared at the switchblade for a moment longer, before tucking the blade back in and stuffing it in his pocket. “I don’t think he’s safe.”

Mabel looked away.

The end of the world had never been filled with more light and triangles.

The machine, the device, the thing in the fabled basement was flashing wildly, like it had swallowed lightning and was aching to spit it back out. And spit it did; Dipper could smell ozone in the air. If he squinted, he thought he saw something moving in the light.

But very little of that mattered when Dipper saw the other two journals on Stan’s desk.

“Oh, my god,” Dipper said, reaching out to touch them, and then hesitating as thought they might bite him. “Oh my god.”

“Dude,” Soos said. “Your face is getting all red.”

“Oh my GOD!” Dipper ended with a shout, kicking the nearby desk chair, which jerked away a few inches and only made his toe hurt. “All this time, all this time, he had them?! Oh my god!”

“This doesn’t mean-” Mabel tried, but Dipper was tunnel-visioned, focused only on his own anger and disbelief.

“I knew he was hiding something!” Dipper kicked the desk chair again, ignoring how it hurt his foot. “All this time, I knew! And I thought that if it was something important, he would tell us! But he’s been lying about everything, he’s even been lying about who he is!”

“That doesn’t mean he wants to end the world!” Mabel protested.

“Why not?!” Dipper motioned to the whirring contraption. “Look at that thing, Mabel, it doesn’t exactly look friendly! Why would he have those journals?!”

“Maybe he’s the author?” Soos asked.

“No, he-” Dipper suddenly felt nauseous, so sudden and so quick he almost gagged. The switchblade in his pocket weighed a million pounds, and a few more pieces fitted together. A picture was there, and it was an ugly picture.

“Oh my god,” Dipper said. “Oh my god, he killed the author.”

Mabel gasped. “Don’t say that! That’s not true!”

“Think about it!” Dipper said. “An isolated house in the middle of the woods with secret rooms, weird experiments, and traces of something else! Do you think Stan could have built all that?! We saw a six-fingered handprint on the wall on our way down here! I know you both saw it, and didn’t say anything!”

“Dude, I know Mr. Pines is in some serious doo-doo right now,” Soos said, looking ill. “But he…he’s not a killer, he wouldn’t-”

“What other explanation makes sense to you?!” Dipper demanded.

“I don’t know!” Mabel said, on the edge of tears. “But he’s not…he didn’t…” she couldn’t even say it. “It’s Stan. He loves us!”

“How can we know that?!” Dipper demanded, throwing open the other two journals, his heart hammering even faster when he saw a schematic, identical to the ones in the third journal, ones he had never been able to decipher. “Look at that!”

Dipper flicked on the black light he carried with him, and now his anger was combined with fear. Dire warnings in invisible ink covered the page, the writings of a desperate man who had decided that whatever lay beyond the machine was asking a price too high.

THERE IS NOTHING BEYOND THE LIGHTS WORTH THE DANGER, one page read. ALL THAT REMAINS BEYOND IS DEATH.

“Convinced?” Dipper asked, but Mabel was staring at the page.

“‘If the countdown reaches zero’,” she read out loud. “‘Our universe is doomed’.”

“AH!” Soos said, pointing to a digital clock counting down above the observation window, with only a few minutes until zero. “It’s the final countdown! Just like the one from the songs!”

“Oh my god,” Dipper stumbled back, partially out of fear, and partially because the ground began to rumble. “We have to turn the machine off!”

He flipped through one of the new journals, freezing when he came upon a page for a manual override. He sprinted into the room where the machine had begun whirring even faster, emitting a high pitch ring that was starting to hurt Dipper’s ears. “There!” He pointed at a set of three keys, prime to be turned.

The keys turned easily, rust and time having left them alone; and behind Dipper, something hissed and popped into view. A bright red button, pulsing in time with the machine.

Dipper lunged for the button-

“NO!”

And against his own will, Dipper stopped.

Stan was standing in the doorway, heaving, his eyes wild. His gaze flickered between Dipper and the portal, his bandaged hand outstretched as though he could snatch Dipper away.

“Dipper, j-just-” Stan took a gasping breath. “Just…just back away from the button.”

“Grunkle Stan,” Mabel said, though Dipper hardly thought he deserved that title. “What’s going on?”

“L-listen, I know this is scary and weird and you might even be mad at me, but I swear I can explain everything,” Stan took a couple steps into the room, hands up. “Just step away, let me-”

“Might be mad at you?!” Dipper demanded. “You think we might be mad at you?! You’ve been lying to us all summer!”

Stan winced. “I-I know, I’m sorry, I just-”

“That’s not-” Dipper shook his head. “You’ve been lying longer than that! You’ve been lying ever since we met you! The house, the counterfeit money, the fake IDs! Where does it end?!”

“You-” Stan shook his head. “You shouldn’t have gone through my stuff!”

“Oh, I’m sorry!” Dipper snapped, and suddenly him and his fury were the only two things in the world. “I have to do a full-on investigation to get any answers around here!”

“I know I lied,” Stan said. “I-I can explain it all, honest-”

“Did you kill the author?!” Dipper demanded.

Stan’s jaw dropped. “What?! I-I don’t…why do you think-”

“I’m not stupid,” Dipper said. “I’ve seen everything! You’ve lied about everything else?! Why wouldn’t you be a murderer?!”

“Dipper, stop, please!” Mabel begged.

“You’re upsetting your sister,” Stan said, and for some reason that pissed Dipper off all the more. Suddenly, he thought he could understand the Northwest ghost’s anger, his desperation to tear everything apart.

Stan took a few steps closer. “Look, I-”

“DON’T COME ANY CLOSER!” Dipper shouted, and pulled the switchblade from his pocket. It opened with a satisfying click, and Stan’s face instantly went white.

“Kid,” he said, his voice hushed and choked. “Put that down. Now.”

He was so serious that Dipper almost listened. But he merely held tighter, pointing the blade at Stan. He thought he saw faces, shadows in the blade, reflected by the machine, but Dipper had learned his lesson about looking back by now.

“Was any of it real?! The boat, the parties, the water balloons! The s’mores! Was it all just a ploy so you could bide your time until we went home?!” Dipper demanded. “Or would you have gotten rid of us if we figured it out, the same way you got rid of the author?! What’s under the cement here?!”

“I-I would never hurt you two!” Stan said desperately, his chest heaving. “Kid, of course it was all real, you two were the best thing that’s happened to me in years-”

“Why, because I found the journal?!” Dipper shouted. “Because we kept suspicion off you?! Who are you?! What did you do to my great uncle?!”

Stan’s eyes were huge, the lights reflecting off his glasses in a way that made Dipper dizzy. “Dipper-” he said, his voice pleading.

“Answer the question!” Dipper screamed, holding the shaking switchblade out. “DID YOU KILL THE AUTHOR?!”

Stan was shaking almost as badly as Dipper was. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought he saw tears in Stan’s eyes.

“...I don’t know,” Stan said, in a whisper that Dipper couldn’t believe he heard. “I don’t know.”

Stan’s watch beeped, and the machine screamed. “Oh god,” Stan said, his face growing even more pale. “Brace yourselves-”

Things got a little strange after that.

Gravity gave up on them. Dipper yelped as his feet suddenly lifted from the ground, and when he tried to scramble for the button, he was out of reach. His grip on the switchblade only tightened, terrified that Stan might try something ill-advised now that weightlessness was on the table. He managed to grab a piece of abandoned scaffolding, holding on tight. He glanced back at the machine, and his mouth went dry.

The reflections in the switchblade had been no trick. In the center of the triangle, where the light was, there were people.

At least, most of them were shaped like people, humanoid and upright. But everything else was gone; just a white shadow, with holes for eyes, and a gaping emptiness for a mouth. The machine wasn’t screaming, those things were; muffled, but slowly getting louder. This machine, whatever it was, led to somewhere else, something beyond. Maybe even the Beyond.

So this was the author’s intention; find out where his ghosts went when their purpose was fulfilled. But whatever he opened up was no cloud sanctuary with pearly gates. Whatever this was, it was horrible. Dipper knew it in his soul, the same way he knew when to stop eating when he was full, the same way he knew that the sun would come up tomorrow, the same way he knew there was nothing he could do to escape the shadow of death.

Whatever was in the machine was pressing at the veil, fingers just barely beginning to break through. It could not be allowed to emerge.

“Dipper!” Mabel cried, and he saw she was holding on by a wire, pulling herself down towards the shut-off button.

“Hurry!” Dipper shouted. “Shut it down!”

“NO!” Stan said, pushing himself off the wall to lunge for Mabel, only to be intercepted by Soos, who–like Mabel–was probably a linebacker in another life.

“SOOS WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” Stan screamed, struggling to escape. “I GAVE YOU AN ORDER TO PROTECT THAT VENDING MACHINE!”

“Sorry Mr. Pines, if that’s your real name!” Soos said, looking genuinely heartbroken. “”But I have a new mission; protecting these kids!”

“SOOS YOU DON’T-” Stan started, but was cut off when Dipper tackled him too, trying desperately to hold him back. Stan tried to push him off, but yelped when Dipper swung the switchblade before his body even registered what it was doing. He missed skin by a mile, knocking off Stan’s fez instead, the blade slicing into the maroon fabric.

“MABEL, PRESS THE BUTTON!” Dipper shouted.

“NO!” Stan said, looking nearly feral with desperation. “NO, YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND!”

“Grunkle Stan,” Mabel said, and now the tears were finally starting to fall, albeit upwards. “I-I don’t even know if you’re my grunkle! I wanna believe you but-”

“Then listen to me!” Stan begged. “Remember this morning when I said I wanted to tell you guys something?”

“T-minus twenty seconds,” a robotic voice said, and the machine flashed with a vengeance. Dipper saw shadows creeping along the walls, the beings just beyond the light reaching back, their translucent fingers reaching through the edge.

The force blew Dipper into the stone wall, the switchblade wrenched free from his grip and flying somewhere above his head. Stan grunted when he hit the wall, trying to wriggle out from a pipe that had him pinned, with no luck.

Mabel raised her hand to hit the button, and-

“I was gonna say you’re gonna hear some bad things about me,” Stan rushed “And some of them are true. But trust me, everything I’ve done, everything I’ve worked for; it’s all for this family!”

“MABEL, HE KILLED SOMEONE!” Dipper howled, animal fear gnawing at his mind as he stared at the things in the machine. “WE DON’T KNOW WHAT ELSE HE’S DONE, SHUT IT DOWN!”

“Look into my eyes, Mabel!” Stan said, and to Dipper’s horror, Mabel looked back at him. “Do you really think I’m a bad guy?! PLEASE!”

There was a moment of total stillness, where Dipper thought he saw stars beyond the spirits, strange and uncanny. Mabel was frozen, and there was no way, surely no way she would ignore Dipper. It was supposed to be them, just the two of them fighting the world, because Dipper knew that if nothing else was true, if he couldn’t stop eating when he was full, if the sun never rose, if the dead pursued him like a hunted fox until he joined their ranks, Mabel would be by his side the entire time.

But Mabel wasn’t looking at him now. She was looking at Stan.

“Grunkle Stan,” she said, and let go of the button, floating up. “I trust you.”

“MABEL-” Dipper started, entirely unsure what he was going to say, but it didn’t matter now.

“One,” the computer said, and the portal flashed.

The veil was lifted, Stan now the necromancer.

Spirits, or ghouls, because Gino was right about one thing, poured out of the portal like the mudslide that murdered a community all that time ago, sweeping along the floor before scuttling up the walls, their screams so loud they rattled Dipper’s teeth. That’s all they were; screams, mouths open and hungry for something Dipper couldn’t give them, long fingers scrabbling and clawing for purchase, pulling at his clothes, his hair, his skin, eyes empty and unseeing anything but a life, and they ached for that life so bad they would do anything for it.

Dipper screamed, but it was lost.

They were pulling at him, desperate for something they had lost, their mouths open and still wailing with no reason to draw air. Dipper wasn’t sure where everyone else was, if the ghouls had already gotten them, or if this was all the world was now, ended by Stan’s careless hands, just gaping misery, pulling him to something he couldn’t see.

And if Dipper knew one thing about misery, it was that it craved company. Especially of the unwilling.

“GET OFF OF ME!” Dipper screamed, so loud and desperate he felt it sting and reverberate in his throat. “DON’T TOUCH ME!”

But his shouts of desperation were only drunk up eagerly by the ghouls, laughing now in manic glee, so pleased, so happy to be released from the prison the author had put them behind, and Dipper wasn’t going to die, because whatever these things would do to him was nothing compared to death. They were beyond human, they were beyond ghosts, they were husks of hunger, want, and grief. Nothing more, just an empty pitcher that could never be filled.

Dipper felt claws around his throat, and gasped.

There was a droning noise, low and harsh enough to make his brain rattle. He thought he felt something warm and coppery drip out his nose, and he might have been concerned if breathing wasn’t the biggest issue on his mind, and then just as he thought he was about to pass onto whatever hell awaited him the portal-

Everything went

white.