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darkspine10 · 7 months

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GF Fanfic - Fallout

Dipper and Mabel Vs. The Past (42,392 words) by darkspine10

Chapters: 9/9

Fandom: Gravity Falls

Rating: Teen and Up

“Now… pull.”

Bang!

The crackers burst open all around the dinner table as the Pines family pulled them apart in unison. At the head of the table, Dipper cheered. “Wahey! Nice one, Merrise.”

She was clutching the larger half of the paper cracker, eagerly pulling out the gift inside. She found a green paper crown and put it on. It fit snugly on her bald head. She continued rummaging around. “Ooh, there’s a little spinning top.” She flicked her wrist, sending the wooden toy careening past her plate of turkey slices. Dipper grabbed it as it fell off the edge of the table.

“It’s a dreidel actually, but close enough.” He sent it going again so it spun in place between himself and Merrise. Wendy, sitting in her high-chair beside her sister, was transfixed by the spinning motion.

Dipper’s own dinner plate was loaded down with dumplings and a noodle dish, the same as his sister’s. Pacifica and Merrise’s grandparents had the same as her, turkey alongside mashed potatoes and cooked vegetables, while Zera was sustained on a plate that consisted entirely of sushi. When asked by Mrs Pines if that was akin to cannibalism, Zera had simply flashed her pearly whites and bitten down on a shrimp puff.

Zera was now holding the floppy remains of the cracker she’d pulled with Mabel, looking at it like something was missing. She’d got the short end. “What are these things anyway?”

“It’s a human seasonal tradition, in some parts of the planet at least,” Pacifica explained. She was sitting opposite, wearing a contented tipsy grin. The Christmas sherry she’d partaken in was already having an effect. “Forget about it. You’ll learn the ropes soon enough. I mean, I needed Mason to explain what taxes were when I was 17 for crying out loud, there’s always something new to discover.”

“It’s not a human tradition. It’s an old family tradition!” Mr Pines thumped his chest, and Mrs Pines and the twins gave a chorus of ‘Pines!’. “Some of Mary’s older generations lived in London before emigrating and they brought it over with them.”

“Humans are weird,” Merrise giggled, drawing a smile from her aunt Zera and lighthearted complaints from everyone else sitting around the table.

Dipper hushed them all by clinking a fork against his glass. “Quiet down everyone. If I could have a moment of your time-”

“Boo, no speech!” Mabel jeered. “We did that last time we met up. No talk, only eat!”

“I won’t be long Mabes, jeez.” She pouted, but quieted down nonetheless. “Thank you. On this day two years ago, Mabel, Pacifica, and myself were in India. We’d meet Zera for the first time only a few days later, and hadn’t even begun our journey into the multiverse where we met Merrise.” His thumb played with the neck of his glass. “Now to have you all here, with no disguises, fully revealed at my parents’ table, it’s… like a dream come true. Cheers!” He downed his sherry. Everyone raised their glasses in toast, though Merrise only had fruit juice to toast with. “So Merry Christmas to all of you goobers! Happy Hanukkah! Xochtil Assura Tengosa Mulakht to my daughter! Am I saying all that right, Sixer?”

“Eh, close enough, Dad,” she replied, already back to wolfing down her food. It wasn’t often she ate so readily, still coming to terms with the lingering effects of having had to scrounge for scraps and make her food last. Today must be a happy day for her indeed.

Down the table, Mr Pines had Journal 9 open and was reading snippets between each bite. Dipper had penned a new entry after they’d all got back from the power plant safely. The page was dominated by a detailed sketch of Errata “So,” he said, swallowing, “run it past me again, son. Where exactly did this fella disappear to anyway?”

Mabel flashed an annoyed look. “Dad, we agreed, no journal biz at the table until dessert.”

“Heck, I’m a curious man, pumpkin. All these stories in here are exciting. I want to soak it all up as quickly as possible.”

“There’ll be plenty of time for late-night reading later,” Mrs Pines said, as she furtively glanced at Journal 3 open on the table next to her. Mr Pines chuckled, but threw a questioning look at Dipper.

“Honestly Dad, it’s one of those things even I don’t know.”

“A vanishingly small pool, I’m sure you’d say.” Pacifica rested her chin on her steepled fingers, smugly satisfied with herself.

“I guess we were lucky,” Mabel said, spinning a pair of chopsticks around a particularly slippery noodle. “It all got wrapped up pretty nicely. Errata was made out of all of Dipper’s paranoia and conspiracy junk written in the journals, so all he had to do was get over his hang-ups and embrace a little loss of control. Errata’s chaos was the problem and the solution.”

“You could write an undergrad psychology paper about it,” Pacifica teased.

Mrs Pines gripped Dipper’s hand across the table. “I know it’s taboo to be talking about New Year’s when Christmas isn’t even halfway over, but I was wondering what your plans were? Jetting off back home?”

Zera answered first. “May and I were thinking of taking advantage of the winter weather, going on a ski trip somewhere.”

“Aunt Mabel, skiing? With her hand-eye coordination?” Merrise sniggered. “I would pay money to watch that.”

“You scamp,” Mabel said fondly. “What about you, Dip, Paz?”

“I think a few quiet days at home before the holidays end would be very pleasant,” Dipper said. “Besides, I know our job prospects are a tad fluid at the moment but Merrise has school starting up again in a few weeks. We’ve got some extracurricular homeschool lessons planned to help her catch up.”

“I have to do math, at home!” Merrise visibly slumped in her seat. “Can you believe it? I wish I could stay here in Piedmont longer.”

“And we’d love to have you,” Mrs Pines said warmly.

“Whatever happens,” Dipper said, “my new year’s resolution is to meet up with Mom and Dad way more often. Either we drive down to Piedmont or you travel up north, both work. I’ve missed having you two in my life.”

“It would be nice. Maybe you could show us some of those magical creatures you write so eloquently about in these journals.”

“Well, we’ll… take it slow.” Dipper grimaced. Telling his parents the truth seemed like an appealing idea on paper; introducing them directly was another kettle of fish. Though if his father could nonchalantly accept a Cycloptopus and his mother could be intrigued to encounter the denizens of Gravity Falls then maybe he was worried over nothing.

Mr Pines sat back in his chair. “I’d certainly love to see what I missed, catch up with all the sights from the last time I was there. Reading all about your experiences reminds me why I sent you twins there in the first place. Even back then I always felt there was something special about Gravity Falls.”

“It certainly is a special place,” Dipper said, smiling over the memories.

“Though don’t think we aren’t a little aggrieved that you didn’t come up with the idea of talking to us sooner,” Mrs Pines said, slightly harshly. “We’ve missed you the same way you’ve missed us.”

“You shouldn’t blame him too much,” Pacifica said, surprising both Mabel and Dipper with her earnestness. “He was an opinionated teenager who thought he knew best, but his heart was in the right place.”

Mrs Pines nodded. “And anyway,” she flashed a wicked grin, “I want to try out some of these magic spells Mabel keeps telling us about. They sound like a lot of fun.”

After they’d all finished eating, full of food and good spirits, the Pines retired to the living room to hand out presents. Undisturbed in the corner, Waddles and Apep wore new matching green sweaters knitted specially by Mabel for the season. They started by lavishing their attention on Merrise, since it was her first proper Christmas celebration. Her grandparents hadn’t known her interests beforehand, but she appreciated the glitter paint kit and light-up planetarium globe (with the Pines having hedged their bets and got what Dipper or Mabel probably would have enjoyed as kids, since they had nothing better to go on). Merrise had her toy T-Rex as a more personal gift in any case.

For Wendy, too young to appreciate gifts for herself, Mr and Mrs Pines supplied old baby clothes from the twins’ youth. Pacifica didn’t want to seem rude, so accepted the gifts despite her smile hiding her pain at the fact another of her kids would be doomed to poor fashion choices.

As an olive branch for the decade-long deceptions, Mabel had put together a thick scrapbook for her parents, her own equivalent to the journals. The photos within didn’t cover any of the supernatural incidents they’d encountered, but rather focused on personal moments of the last few years, giving Mr and Mrs Pines a window into the casual normality of their lives alongside magic and aliens.

With the presents all handed out, the family spent an hour regaling each other with some of their favourite dramatic events or strange creatures written in the journals, with Mabel in particular doing a complex recreation of Weirdmageddon where she provided the voices of every single person involved. Her Bill Cipher was scarily accurate to Dipper and Pacifica’s ears. Mr and Mrs Pines listened, at times enraptured and incredulous depending on the events being described. It would take them both a long time to fully process quite how weird their children’s lives had been.

As the light outside fell, Mabel had wanted to revive an old tradition of watching classic Christmas cartoon specials, but was disappointed to find that no channel was showing any she remembered. Both she and Zera ended up chilling with her dad, watching the train videos he liked to zone out too. Mabel’s eyelids closed as a steam train chugged along somewhere in snow-blanketed Europe.

Dipper kept Merrise entertained and awake by trying to explain that the seasons were reversed in the southern hemisphere, a fact that she couldn’t get her head around at first. Dipper had to resort to shining a flashlight on one of the baubles hanging from the Christmas tree to properly get the point across. By the end of the night she drifted to sleep curled up on the couch, clutching both her llama and T-rex toys tightly.

Well into the night Mabel and Zera dazzled Mr and Mrs Pines with displays of minor magic. Making small light orbs or other non-taxing spells. Dipper even added a few of his own, though his skills weren’t nearly as honed as the others. Pacifica, pleasantly hypnotised into sleep by the colourful magical lights, drifted off into a sherry coma. Zera volunteered to put Wendy to bed upstairs, herself ready to sleep after all showing off her magic all evening.

In the end the twins were left awake with their parents. For the first time in ages they were together as they’d been all those years ago. Dipper kept himself from falling asleep by sketching the scene in the living room, capturing the Christmas tree, his sleeping wife and daughter, Mabel crouching on the floor, and his parents sitting side-by-side. He knew this moment wouldn’t last forever. But tonight was long enough to appreciate it.

Dipper Pines had no more problems

Dipper Pines had told the truth.

#gravity falls #gravity falls fanfic #dipper pines #mabel pines #pacifica northwest #dipper and mabel's parents

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darkspine10 · 7 months

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GF Fanfic - King of the Tulpas

Dipper and Mabel Vs. The Past (28,842 words) by darkspine10

Chapters: 6/9

Fandom: Gravity Falls

Rating: Teen and Up

Dipper stared out across Piedmont and over to the Golden Gate. Beyond, the ocean, stretching out until it was lost in a mire of fog. Their position on the hill commanded an impressive view of the urban sprawl. He felt a chill run up his arms. The creature, Errata, was probably looking at the city from on high in much the same way, delighting in how best to sow chaos. Anywhere his gaze lingered could be a possible target.

His daughter was down there, right now. Getting a babysitter had been hard at such short notice in the festive period, but the Pines had a friendly neighbour who’d pitched in. Now Wendy was alone at home, while her family kept the city safe.

First they had to deal with the immediate threat. He turned his attention to the oddly geometric concrete building, and the rest of his party standing in front of it. Pacifica had parked the Mini beside the Sunstones, a tetrahedral sculpture designed to line up perfectly with various solstice lines and astronomical events. Merrise was hopping on one leg, trying to relieve the tension before they went inside. His mother’s expression didn’t seem to approve of anything.

On a normal day, a trip to the Lawrence Hall of Science would be a perfect day out with his family. A museum with a strong focus on interactivity and delivering scientific topics to the masses, it was Dipper’s idea of a great time. Though Pacifica might disagree, patience while browsing museums not being one of her strong suits. He and Mabel had spent countless long afternoons wandering around inside, killing time and messing around with the exhibits.

“Are we going inside now?” Merrise asked impatiently. “The news said this was one of the places.”

“Why here?” Pacifica asked. She was eyeing up the museum from a distance, staying on edge. The place was empty of people, who’d all fled once the creature reports started and panic spread like wildfire. The police were still in the midst of establishing a cordon, allowing the Pines to slip in unnoticed. “Of all the places in the Bay Area, one of those journal spirits chooses this museum?

“Maybe some kind of sympathetic resonance?” Dipper offered. “Mabel and I used to come here a lot as kids, perhaps the tulpas respond positively to those emotional traces.”

“I remember, I came here once with you guys. Let’s hope we don’t have to fight the Egyptian god of death this time.”

“The what?” Mrs Pines asked, her face pale.

“Woah, when did that happen?” Merrise asked. “I haven’t read about that one. Which journal is it in?”

“Later,” Dipper said. “We can air all the dirty laundry together as a family once the crisis is over.” He coughed into his fist and aimed his next words at Merrise. “Journal 4.” His daughter grinned and made a mental note to find and read about the incident at some point.

“And how exactly do you intend on stopping these monstrosities?” his mother asked, not unreasonably. “We can hardly ask them to kindly not touch any of the exhibits.”

Dipper smiled, his confidence returning. “That’s where my new plan comes into effect. Everyone got your journals?”

His mother sighed and showed him the red covered book with the golden hand and number 2. By coincidence, Merrise had Journal 4, with a pine tree cover, and Pacifica held up her Llama journal. He had his current Journal 9 of course, which gave them a decent breadth of knowledge. No matter what form the tulpa assumed, they would be able to counter it. Then they could enact the second part of Dipper’s plan.

As far as he could tell, from his observations downtown and scattered news reports, the recreations from the journals were one-to-one. Apart from a distinct gold or copper sheen, the tulpas accurately behaved like whatever they turned into. When they appeared like a Manotaur, they acted as such, full of rage and testosterone. This meant that if they got lucky and the random instabilities landed the tulpa in the form of a friendly or otherwise non-hostile entity, they would act accordingly and be pacified. Once in that state, Dipper planned to stabilise the tulpa, trapping it in that form permanently, until they could return the psychic detritus to Errata and hopefully end this madness.

He didn’t have many options for fixing the creatures and stopping them changing again. As they were in Piedmont he couldn’t rely on any artefacts or technological wonders to save the day. Back at the house before they’d split up he’d gone to his bedroom. In one of his drawers, beneath a hidden panel, was where he’d stashed anything he didn’t want his parents finding out about. There wasn’t much left beneath the false bottom. Dipper had taken most of his monster tracking equipment and collected relics with him when he’d moved out.

But he hadn’t taken everything. Coated in a layer of dust was a small metal box with antennae and a black screen. This was his prototype anomalous energy detector, a toy he’d cooked up with Grunkle Ford to allow him to find hotspots of unusual energy while he was away from the bigger pockets of weirdness in the Falls. Dipper plugged the device in the nearest socket and was delighted to see the screen light up with a simple map display. Nothing was registering at the moment - evidently the tulpas or Errata weren’t sending out the right type of energy waves - but it might be handy to narrow the search at close range. All they had to do now was find the tulpa, keep it contained until it switched, then lock it down as something that wasn’t liable to wreak any further havoc.

“Piece of cake,” Dipper said after explaining this to Pacifica, Merrise, and his mother. Their doubting faces didn’t fill him with enthusiasm. “Come on, Mabel’s already on her way to the other tulpa site. Do you really want to live with her gloating that she caught the first one before us?” His sense of cheer convinced Merrise and Pacifica at least, who headed into the museum.

Mrs Pines held Dipper’s shoulder before he followed them inside. “You’re really letting that girl rush into danger? For heaven’s sake, she’s 10 years old, Mason!”

“And I was 12.” He shrugged her off. “Merrise can take care of herself. I trust in her abilities. Although I know I never extended that trust to you or dad.” Sighing, he turned back to face his mother. “This is me making it up to you, if you think about it. Not the way I planned it, but it is what is, you know. Now, do you want to go catch a monster together, Mom?”

She didn’t quite smile, but relented and tapped him on the arm. “Only if you promise that Pacifica isn’t secretly an alien or a demon as well. Two in the family is quite enough to find out about in one day.”

Dipper chuckled. “Don’t worry, she’s full-blooded human. Blue blooded perhaps, but definitely of this Earth.”

The two of them entered the museum to find it dishearteningly silent. Pacifica and Merrise stood amongst the exhibits, lost in the empty lobby. Dipper’s eyes furtively darted around, scouting behind every display case where a creature might be lurking. Without the ebb and flow of a crowd the sound was deadened by the exhibits. He checked his old energy scanner and saw a pulse in the east wing, just past the planetarium. “Alright, fan out,” Dipper said, “but don’t wander off,” he directed at Merrise. “We want to be able to work together when we find this thing.”

“Gotcha,” she replied. “I’ll only spend 5 minutes in the gift shop instead of 10.” She ran her hands along a large plastic model of the moon, enjoying watching it spin. “Hello Luna.”

“You know, I was never very ‘good’ at museums.” Pacifica followed her daughter, holding her Pine Tree pendant up as if it was a ward against evil. The enchantment it possessed could give them an early warning of danger as keen as any of her husband’s fancy detectors. “Always reminded me too much of the tutors my parents forced on me. I had to study up on every topic so museums had nothing extra to offer. Plus the history museum in town sucked.”

“It’s not all bad,” Dipper said, “there are some fascinating halls down in the basement you should check out one day.”

Pacifica craned her neck around and put a protective arm around Merrise. “This place isn’t too big. There can’t be many places to hide. We should be ready for anything.”

Merrise nodded and started flipping through her journal, hoping that they’d run into something found in its pages. They weren’t armed as such, since they had no idea what they might be facing. Any pre-prepared weapons might turn out to be useless, not that they had any to fall back on in any case. Instead Dipper was hoping that with the journals’ insight and the rapid changes of form, they could find whatever they needed to combat the tulpa within the museum itself. As plans went it wasn’t his finest, but he wasn’t about to say that with his mother in earshot.

Beside him, he heard his mother tsking as she studied Journal 2. “Some of this stuff sounds ridiculous. Blood rain, super termites, dimensions filled with witches and owls and demon kings. I never knew Marc’s uncle was like this. This is supposed to be scientific?”

“It’s all real, believe me,” Pacifica said. “Normal rules don’t apply in Gravity Falls. You can trust me, I’m a native. You can’t walk five yards in that town without discovering a new species previously unknown to mankind.”

“Perhaps it’s a shame then that we… that I never visited.” She sounded genuinely sad to have missed out. Who wouldn’t, Dipper thought. The world was so much bigger than anyone outside the Falls really knew.

Entering the east wing, Dipper was glad that he had thought to bring flashlights. The area was shrouded in darkness. A velvet rope blocked off access and he climbed over it. A set of double doors refused his attempt to open it.

“What are you doing, Dipper?” Mrs Pines asked. “It’s sealed off.”

“Dad, it does say forbidden.” Merrise shone her flashlight at the sign. “No entry except to staff.”

“Lighten up, there’s no-one here to tell me off. It’s probably closed for the winter season or something. The scanner says our tulpa is most likely through here.” He finally succeeded in jimmying the door open, falling inwards. When he looked up it was straight into the eyes of an attacking predator. A velociraptor in mid-jump coming straight towards him. Dipper panicked and stumbled backwards, but felt embarrassed when Pacifica started laughing.

Her torch beam revealed his attacker to be a stationary model. “Ha ha,” he said dryly, getting to his feet. “That’s my karmic punishment for ignoring the warning signs I suppose.” He panned his light around and was disheartened. The east wing dinosaur exhibit would have been genuinely impressive in the light. In its absence, the carefully arranged displays of dinosaurs amid faux-jungle was nothing more than a maze, with flashing teeth and claws around every corner. “Now I know how Ghost Eyes felt when we tricked him in Salem.”

Pacifica’s beam alighted on a velociraptor’s eye, shimmering and reflecting back at her in the glass. “Freaky. It’s like being in the Mystery Shack after dark.”

“What were you and Dad doing in that place at night?” Merrise asked, before making a kissy face.

Pacifica scowled, though Merrise couldn’t see the expression in the dark. “Yeah yeah, we were all young once. Don’t lose focus, little miss.”

Merrise giggled and ran ahead, only to stop up short as she entered the main room of the wing. “Woah. This planet has some scary wildlife.” Caught in her beam was the exposed skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus Rex, reaching up to the ceiling and posed in a frozen roar. It completely dwarfed Merrise, who’s entire body was smaller than a single leg bone.

“Don’t worry,” Dipper said, putting an arm around her. “They’re extinct. Mostly.” He grimaced. “We’ll be fine so long as the tulpa doesn’t manifest as one of them. We don’t have Stan around to punch one in the nose,” Dipper said, fondly remembering.

“Oh come on!” Mrs Pines threw up her arms in frustration. “Mason, you can’t seriously tell me you’ve encountered dinosaurs before.”

“Sure,” he said, shrugging. “They were frozen in amber and a heatwave-”

She cut him off, tutting and shaking her head. But while she was struggling to take it all in, Pacifica noticed something odd. Behind her husband and daughter, the vast fossilised T-Rex seemed to have a thicker shadow than it should. A near imperceptible motion made her swallow.

Mrs Pines was completely oblivious. “I like to think I have an open mind. There’s a lot I will accept. But I cannot believe you’ve seen a real, live dinosaur!”

“Well then you’d better start believing very fast, Mary.” Pacifica shone her flashlight at the T-Rex’s skull. Inexorably, the shadow twitched and then moved into the light. Standing right behind the skeleton, with flesh on the bones, was the genuine article.

The roar it gave echoed around the abandoned hall. Flecks of spittle rained down on the family. Dipper and Merrise sprung into action, diving away and sprinting across the room. Mrs Pines stood still, paralysed as the titanic biped stared her down with hungry intent. Pacifica barrelled into her mother-in-law and the two of them rolled away right as the powerful jaws clamped down on the empty air where they’d been standing. They fled under the vast skeleton, but were forced to halt when the tulpa swung its tail at the display. Bones came crashing down around them.

“What are the weaknesses!?” Pacifica yelled at Dipper. She and Mrs Pines cowered underneath the still-standing lattice of bones that formed the skeleton T-Rex’s ribcage, while the living one repeatedly slammed its head into the display.

Dipper held his flashlight in his teeth, illuminating the giant reptile as he flipped through his journal to the index at the back. “D, Dinosaurs. Oh no. Dinosaurs are in Journal 3!” he called.

“Great, fat lot of good that does us!” Pacifica shot back. Clattering bones rained around Mrs Pines as she feebly covered her head with her hands. Her flashlight shimmered off the T-Rex’s thick skin. It had a slight bronze sheen, the only hint that it wasn’t a genuine dinosaur.

“It’s got little arms though, and it’s slow!” Merrise said, breaking into a run towards the T-Rex’s claws. “That’s a weakness enough.” Dipper reached out to stop her, but knew she was too slippery. She ran right between the T-Rex’s legs, making it abandon its attack on the others. Merrise’s slender frame belied the impressive burst of speed she was capable of. She hadn’t survived on her own for years without being able to escape from sticky situations in the blink of an eye.

Strained from the effort of swinging its heavy jaws around, the dinosaur seemed to tire. But then golden sparkles lit up the museum hall like a miniature sun. The tulpa shed its excessive mass for a more compact form that required less energy. Unfortunately the form it chose was a much more efficient hunter to chase down Merrise. Dipper looked on the form with wry amusement. Four spindly legs held up a fleshy, insectoid torso. The tulpa had taken the neutral form of the shapeshifter. A piercing howl brought Dipper back to the danger of the present situation.

Running to intercept the tulpa from catching Merrise, Dipper waved his arms around and cried out. “Hey, over here, I’m a juicier target, more meat on my bones than that stick insect kid!”

“Hey!” Merrise said, briefly halting and throwing an annoyed look at her father.

“It’s true, you need to build some more body mass.” Dipper’s call did the trick though, and the shapeshifter began pursuing him. “Uh oh.” He sprinted back into the jungle display, hoping to lose the creature among the replica dinosaurs. This was something he regretted almost instantly, as it simply made it easier for the tulpa to blend in and surprise him. Crouching behind a plastic stegosaurus, Dipper tried to slow his racing heart.

A spindly fist exploded through the side of the dinosaur and peppered him with shrapnel. The shapeshifter was climbing through and baring its teeth, until, screaming a war cry, Pacifica charged towards it and brought her journal swinging down on the creature’s head. It whimpered and scuttled away, morphing into a hefty spider-demon to gain speed. Pacifica shook detritus off of the golden llama on the front cover of her journal. “‘Books are the greatest weapon’, my ass.” She held out her hand and pulled her husband to his feet. “How are we meant to stop it switching around as a billion different killer monsters?”

“I was thinking of using a spell-”

“Pshaww, yeah right.”

“Hey, Mabel and Zera aren’t the only ones who can use magic.”

“If you call repeating the same spell 50 times before it works ‘magic’.”

“Drain it of energy, that’s what you said.” Mrs Pines was out of breath as she ran over to them. “You’re the experts, you tell me how to fight these creatures.” She was putting her trust in them for now, and Dipper nodded. Pointing to the rafters he spotted the tulpa high above, swinging from a web.

“Unless we have any giant boots lying around-” His words died in his throat as the golden monster dropped from the ceiling and changed form yet again. The floor shook as it squatted low to the ground, with a rocky carapace and shining gemstones for eyes. “That’s a Rosetta, they’re-”

“Weak to gold!” Merrise called. By luck she had already found the relevant page in Journal 4.

“Now where do we find-”

“Wedding rings!” Pacifica shouted, slipping hers off and flinging it at the rock beast. It instinctively recoiled, folding its outer plates up to form a defensive shield. Before Dipper and his mother had a chance to add their own rings to the assault, the tulpa shifted, losing even more mass in the process. It was no bigger than a child now, and would’ve outrun them had Merrise not reappeared and tackled it to the ground.

Pacifica halted to pick up her ring, slipping it on guiltily under Dipper’s glare. “What? Our lives are more important than a token of our marriage.”

“Fair enough. Merrise, what have you got there?”

She had the tulpa’s arms pinned behind its back and let Dipper shine the flashlight in its face. “It’s you!” Mrs Pines said, shocked. Dipper saw that the tulpa was indeed a clone of himself at age 12, except with a number two on his cap instead of a pine tree.

“A paper clone,” he stated. As the clone was a more or less accurate recreation of Tyrone, the tulpa’s only thoughts became of survival. It struggled to break free, desperate to bolt.

“Ooh, I know these guys, they’re weak to water!” Merrise said, excitedly releasing her captive clone and running to a nearby fire hose fixed to the wall. She shot a spray of liquid at the tulpa, which shrank and hissed.

Blocked by the spray, Merrise missed the tulpa shift again. Sharp claws, a bulky fur-clad body, and vicious teeth burst out from the tiny copy of Dipper. “Wait, stop!” the real Dipper cried. “That’s the Gremloblin, water isn’t a weakness, it’s-”

The monster hollered and sprouted a pair of leathery wings. Merrise turned off the hose. It made a pathetic squeak and drew the tulpa’s attention. She had nowhere to escape to as it surged toward her. She dropped the hose and ran but far too late. As the Gremloblin flapped its wings it knocked both Dipper and Pacifica out of the way on opposite sides of the room. Caught in the blade-like talons, Merrise wriggled ineffectively and screamed for help. The monster was between Merrise and her parents. Only Mrs Pines was close, and she trembled like a leaf.

“Mirror, need a mirror,” Dipper said in panic, patting himself down.

“Compact!” Pacifica shouted triumphantly. “Never leave home without it. Mary!” She tossed the compact through the air and Mrs Pines gave a leap to catch it. Unsure what would happen but desperate to save Merrise, she put herself between the tulpa and its prey and held the mirror high. The Gremloblin’s nightmare inducing eyes were turned back on itself and the tulpa promptly dropped Merrise. She fell to the floor, but gave a shaky thumbs up to show she was ok.

The tulpa writhed in agony, shedding yet more of its golden aura and shrinking again. Dipper briefly saw seven eyes beneath a hood. “Jheselbraum?” Her enigmatic face turned to him, before sagely nodding. The shrinking continued until the tulpa manifested as a small black stone tied to a necklace. Dipper hurtled forwards and threw his body on top of Gideon Gleeful’s telepathy amulet. “Gotcha. No more changing forms please.” Tentatively he rolled clear and clutched the amulet in his hand. A final shower of particles came from the tulpa, before it lost all sign of life. It really was just an inanimate necklace now. “We did it!” Dipper held their defeated foe aloft.

“Yippee,” Merrise said, before lying back on the floor, feeling as tired as the tulpa. Pacifica wandered over and tickled her in the side, causing a burst of laughter. Merrise bounded to her feet and examined the amulet. “Is it dormant?”

“Looks like it. For now at least, until we can reunite with Errata.” Dipper pocketed the artefact. “Everyone still got their journals?”

“I think I need a moment,” Mrs Pines said. She was holding Journal 2 tightly to her chest, her fingers digging into the cover. “That was exhilarating. Are any of you hurt?” she asked, and the others all shook their heads. “Thank goodness. I suppose you’re not half bad at this adventuring lark.”

“It has its ups and downs,” Dipper admitted. “But you can’t deny it’s a lot of fun.” His mother smiled for the first time since the crisis had begun.

“Come on, we’d better leave. We caused a rather large mess.” She gestured at the overturned dinosaur statues and torn up imitation jungle.

“Add it to the list with Amazing Al’s,” Dipper said, smirking.

As the four of them made a quick retreat back to the lobby, Pacifica took a quiet moment to talk to Dipper. “I’m starting to see where you get it from.”

“Get what from?” he asked.

“Everything. You’re not so different really. You have your mother’s neurotic paranoia.”

“Thanks,” he said, “You’re still great at compliments as always, Paz.”

“Not like that,” she said, smiling. “I meant it in a sweet way. You care about us, a lot. Maybe too much sometimes, and that makes you overcorrect.”

Dipper blushed. “I love it when you’re genuine.” She smiled back and they held hands.

Before leaving the museum, Merrise held up a palm. “Sorry, gimme a sec.” She ran into the gift shop by the exit and came out carrying a plush T-Rex. “I wanted a souvenir.”

“You have to pay for that!” Pacifica stammered. “It’s not free.”

“No-one will miss it,” Merrise said, beaming and hugging the new toy. Dipper shook his head and grinned. Once a thief, always a thief. “Besides, Mabel says capitalism is always theft,” Merrise added.

“Well Mabel isn’t here right now,” Pacifica said through gritted teeth. “I need to have a word with that hippy, she’s filling your head with too much 60’s counterculture nonsense.”

“I think she deserves it.” Mrs Pines surprised the others with her statement. She patted Merrise on the back and sent her happily skipping away. “Not every kid can say they’ve beaten a T-Rex… demon… thing. Maybe we could all do with loosening up a bit.”

Curious, Dipper sidled up beside his mother. “Where’s this sudden charity coming from?”

Mrs Pines crept close and whispered. “I realised something, Dipper, when I witnessed Merrise back there, in the midst of the action. She was enjoying herself. From what you’ve mentioned of her past… I’ll simply say that as long as that girl doesn’t have to suffer from hunger pangs and has a roof over her head, then maybe some good has come from all this supernatural stuff.” Dipper’s grin nearly leapt off his face, and Pacifica softened her stance. His mother was finally coming around and who was she to argue? “Don’t take it the wrong way, I’m still disappointed in you and your sister. But now’s not the time for recriminations.”

Dipper drew a serious expression. “Speaking of Mabel, I hope her retrieval mission is going as well as ours,” he said, emerging out into the wintry afternoon.

#gravity falls #gravity falls fanfic #dipper pines #pacifica northwest #dipper and mabel's parents

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