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    Chapter 18: She Cheated



Author’s Note: As always, I go precisely where my whimsical ideas and prematurely-conceived foreshadowing lead me. If it weren't for this chapter, this story would be significantly shorter. Don't look at me like that.



   When you’re flying in a normal human rocket, it can be rather painful. The vehicle’s engines push the ship forward with their own force, while the rest of the vehicle’s frame has to hold together under the stress of keeping up. Passengers feel as if pressed backwards into their seats, since the rocket is trying to accelerate forward, but every molecule in their bodies just wants to stay at rest. By all accounts, it’s an uncomfortable, squashing sort of feeling. Not exactly a perk of space travel.

But that’s only the case for human rockets.

Alien spaceships are a little different. Their engines directly manipulate the gravitational field, essentially making the ship fall in whatever direction it’s told to. The passengers don’t feel the acceleration or the force at all, since the entire ship: engines, frame, passengers, fuel, is all falling together with the exact same speed and acceleration. A rather floaty sort of experience; much easier on both person and machine.

But that’s only the case for new alien spaceships.

The situation is rather worse for old, beaten, battered, ancient ships, who’ve been half-buried in the hard ground for millennia while their fuel decays and their seals rot and their alloys rust. Their gravity field might be more intense here but less intense there; half the pilot’s body might be pulled too strongly in the direction of travel, while the other half feels left behind. As the direction of thrust changes, waves of stress and strain swirl and shift through the cabin.

Long, stiff bits like bones feel it the worst. It’s a stretching, pummeling sort of feeling, that makes the blood begin to boil and the head begin to hurt and the joints begin to ache and the occasional hapless teenage passengers begin to wonder: Why in Paul Bunyan’s name did we ever think this was a good idea?

Wendy finally couldn’t force herself to hold onto the joysticks any longer, and let go. Her hands came away shaking, and the grips were moist. Soon as she released them, the noise from the reactors died off, and the ship went back into true free-fall, drifting upwards on its momentum, while air resistance and the Earth’s natural gravity slowly decelerated them back down.

“Oh, ugh, Geez…” Her voice didn’t carry far above the wind, but Dipper heard her.

“Yeah… Woah… Ha ha…” He glanced at her in a bewildered way, and began to laugh as he sorely rubbed his temples. “Ha ha… Ow… HA HA HA HA!”

“Ha ha!” She tried to massage her arms, squinted her eyes shut, and began to laugh too. “HA HA OH GEEZ HA HA HA… Wooooooah this is a bit worse than I thought…”

“Ha… HA HA… What, is pain hilarious now…?” Truth be told, they weren’t laughing at the pain, but at the unexpectedness of it. They’d just departed a rather perilous situation, and hadn’t expected a clean getaway to be quite so achey.

Dipper’s eyes drifted back out the dome-shaped window above them, and he saw the horizon spinning lazily. The ground was about 10,000 feet away, and getting gradually closer. Perhaps they weren’t all that safe… “Ha ha… Uh… Oh man, just get us on the ground, how ‘bout. Ha ha… Ha ha…”

“Sure thing Cap’n… Aww man, okay… Oooooh, this is not quite the way I imagined it…”

She grabbed the joysticks again, and twisted and pulled. The ship flipped over to something vaguely like right-side-up, and began something vaguely like a controlled descent.

It was absurdly hard to keep it going in a straight line, and the smallest mistake sent it tumbling or drifting in one direction or another. Nevertheless, she thought she was getting the hang of it, as she pulled up and leveled out over the ground.

Dipper gripped the armrests for stability, and turned his gaze out the window, looking for landmarks.

There was some kind of high peak in the distance, jutting hard and stony above the surrounding trees… That must be the Multi-bear’s lair. And that means the town must be somewhere West of here… Which way was West? Wendy slipped up for a moment and the ship tipped up on its side, which coincidentally let Dipper find the sun as a reference. It was mid-afternoon in Summer, so West should be… That way! “Uh… Go tha… Turn Starboard! T-t-two-o’-clock!” He squealed, and raised a hand to point.

“Yep! Yeah, I got you, fam…!” She grunted, as she spun the ship.

“No no! Too far!”

“It’s touchy, it’s touchy… Oooookay! Yeah, here we go. There!”

“Waitwaitwait now pull up! PULL UP!”

“I’m pulling up, and… Oh man I can’t see the ground!” She gave the sticks another twist.

“Wendy! Now we’re upside-down!”

“Yeah, well, now I can see the ground! …See? Look! You can just look right up and see how far you are from crashing!”

“You’re gonna hit the trees!”

“…Why would the put they dome on the top anyway? Like, you never really need to look up…”

“You’re gonna hit the trees!”

“Are not.”

“Are too!”

“Are not.”

“ARE TOO!”

They didn’t.

“…But it was too close!” Dipper said.

“Hey, who’s the one with the driver’s license here?”

“You have a learner’s permit for CARS!”

“I think you like it!”

“I…! Huh? Nooooo…”

Wendy gave the next ridge a little more room, and now they were high enough to see across the valley. There were the hanging cliffs! They were looking a little upside-down at the moment, but still clearly recognizable. The town should be a mile or so in front of them.

Dipper saw the church steeple first, then the barrel and crate factory, and now he could see the town in its entirety. Hey everyone! Check it out! We’re in a UFO! Cool, right?

As the town square sped by below, he caught a glimpse of confused, upturned faces from the street. Wendy slowed down slightly at this point, searching for the next reference to get them headed for their final landing site: The Mystery Shack’s lawn.

She found the water tower out of the corner of her eye, swung the ship around, and punched the throttle, this time almost enjoying the rush of acceleration, even with the vibrating gravity fields. I’m actually getting the hang of this! She though. Once you get the hunk of junk off the ground, it actually handles pretty well. This isn’t actually so hard!

“I gotta say dude…!” She hollered over the wind. “You sure know how to show a girl a good—”

But then something happened that wasn’t supposed to happen.

An explosion rocked the ship.

Something on the Port-side ‘wing’, just outside their view from the dome, had just blasted to pieces for some reason. Part of the vehicle’s glass hull paneling shattered away entirely, throwing off the vehicle’s aerodynamics and sending them spinning for the ground. Smoke filled the cabin before the wind whipped it away. Blue flames roared in their periphery. Sparse debris could be seen floating in the air around them. All the lights on Wendy’s console turned either off or turned red.

And there were no ejection seats.

As for Wendy, the whiplash of the blast had swung her head, hard, into the seat’s lousy excuse of a headrest. She was wearing a football helmet, but still, it logically must have done some damage… Right? I might have a concussion… But I’m still the one with the controls! I’m still the pilot! I remember my old Wrestling Coach said you don’t often notice concussions right away… Which means I have a couple seconds of control left at least! I can still land it! So she locked her eyes on the horizon out the window, and fought to level the vehicle.

It was slow and clumsy to respond this time. The gravity field was even more uneven, and the ship rolled left as she pulled up; as if the entire Port side was just dead weight. They plowed through several trees before she got it a little higher.

Dipper yelled something about cancelling out the lost torque by using the pedals. She didn’t really get the gist.

Past the fire and the smoke and a rapidly evolving headache, she made out a familiar shape: the Mystery Shack, coming up fast. They were almost there!

She tried to aim for the green, and pulled back to decrease their speed as much as possible. But the ship malfunctioned one last time; went into one last tumble off-course.

The impact was sharp and severe. Wendy’s head whipped hard into the back of her seat, and unconsciousness was a welcome reprieve.

Stan woke up from a most peculiar nightmare.

Minutes previous, the van door opened and Mabel slid down off Robbie’s lap, landing on the Mystery Shack’s driveway. Waddles squeezed through behind the driver seat, and plopped to the ground next to her.

“Hey, thanks for letting me drive, Robbie!” Mabel smiled. “That was pretty fun!”

“Yeah, no problem… No problem…” Robbie nodded, and twiddled his fingers in his lap while he thought.

“And uh… Thanks for everything, Robbie.” She added. “Thanks for helping me with the thing, and thanks for being nice to Waddles, and… And for keeping me safe and stuff… I mean…” She snapped a sudden salute. “Future robobotanists of the world applaud your brave efforts, soldier!”

“Yeah, it’s… It’s no problem…” Robbie shrugged. “I guess… Uh… Say, your brother and Wendy wanted to be picked up, right? When was that?”

“Uh… I think they said 4:00…?” Mabel frowned, and glanced at her watch. “And it’s like 3:00 now, so…”

“Yeah… Ugh… Kay…” Robbie sighed and pulled out his phone, to scroll through his recent messages. There were several messages about a concert tonight. “I got a concert tonight too…” He sighed. One of the messages mentioned the town of Boring. “All the way in… Boring…” Another message was a threat from the drummer about ditching again. Another one was Tambry saying something similar. “I bet they’ll kill me if I’m not there for practice, and Tambry will kill me too if I’m not there beforehand to hang out with her… So… Aww man, and it’s like a 2 hour drive…”

“So when do you need to leave?” Mabel scratched her head.

He did the math. “’Bout… A half hour ago…”

“Ha ha! Wooooowww…!” Mabel giggled, feeling sorry for him but feeling like mocking him at the same time. “Why did you ever agree to pick up Dipstick and Wendoid?”

“I’m not sure… I forget.”

“Weeeell… Oh, you know what??” She smiled. “I can just ask me Grunkles to come pick them up!” She pointed towards their RV. “They’ll understand.”

“…You sure?” Robbie frowned.

“Oh yeaaaah we got this! You go! Go! You go to that concert, and you shred some mad guitar, and you blow their MIIIIINDS! I believe in you!”

“Uh… But you’re sure you can pick them up?” Robbie asked. “I’m okay and stuff?”

“Oh yeah! It’s all good!”

“Okay…”

“Well, we also got some cold pizza in the fridge! Do you wanna come in and chow down for a couple minutes before you go? It’s got glitter on it…!”

He gave her a weird look (the same look everybody seemed to give when offered food and glitter in the same sentence.) “NO.” He explained.

“Welp! See you around then, champ!” She punched him in the arm. “May the magical happiness spirits guide you on your path to bedazzlement!”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah…” He growled, and pushed her hand away. His eyes landed on the steering wheel for no obvious reason, and he stared long and hard, thinking. Mabel watched him, wondering what he was going through his head. “Look…” He finally turned back to her, and sighed. “Could we talk serious for a minute, Girl Dipper?”

“Ha ha! It’s ‘Mabel’! Ah-duuuurrrrr!”

“Yeah, yeah, ‘Mabel’. Whatever. But… Really, could we talk serious for a minute? Without… Glitter, and cute animals and nonsense, okay?”

“Uh…” Mabel didn’t like the way the conversation was heading one bit, but Robbie made it sound important. “Okay…”

“Look.” He repeated. “I’m not your boyfriend. You pretended like that was the way it was, to… To trick your brother or whatever? Yeah, good going with that… But… But it’s not true. I don’t…” He sighed. “You’re a nice girl. Really. You’re, like, a really sweet, innocent person, and you try to be super nice and everything, even to killer robots, even to killer aliens, even when it’s dumb to be nice… And you’re my friend… But… I don’t like you. At all. I don’t like hanging around with you, I don’t like speaking with you, I don’t really like helping, and… I wish you didn’t bring me along today.”

His words stung. “…Oh…” Mabel’s smile deflated slowly, and something small, deep inside her, turned from sweet to sour.

“And…” Robbie scratched his head. “I know you hate growing older. And I know you hate what your brother and Wendy are doing: destroying the robo-aliens. I know you’ve got a vision of some happy little… Some dainty little animal paradise once this is through, that you’ll become some ultra hippy scientist god who forces adorable goodness down everybody’s throats every day of every year… You want to believe that it can all be sweetness and sparkles and crap forever… Look, I can’t pretend to know what’s going through your head, so I won’t. But Mabel… It. Won’t. Work.”

Mabel’s frown deepened.

“This world is hard and cruel.” He explained. “The harsh, contested domain of wicked men. And the sweetest person in the world can’t fix it. And the sweetest person in the world can’t stay sweet for long. The robots are going to die, or be contained, quarantined, and weaponized, and there’s nothing you or anybody can do to make it happy. If you keep opening your heart up to people and things, and seeing the good in everyone… If you keep living that lie, your heart’s GONNA be broken… Your spirit will break… And you’ll turn hateful inside.”

Her eyes fell to the ground.

“And frankly.” He pressed on. “Pigs don’t live very long. Your ‘Waddles’ is gonna end up in somebody’s stomach in a couple years at best. Same with everything and anyone else you’ve ever loved. Things die. Things end. Your parents will die. Your uncles will die. Your brother will die. All your friends will die, and finally, you will die. And those who outlive you will remember you for your selfishness and your many tragic mistakes and NOT for your sweetness… You need to grow up, Mabel. You need to learn to think… You need…”

Robbie scowled deeply, a grim and evil look that fit him well. The sincerest, most honest look he could have given. “Learn to think dark thoughts, my girl.” He concluded.

And then he closed the door, put his van in gear, and rolled off down the road, leaving her brain and heart a confused and injured mess.

The ground in front of her feet wasn’t very interesting, but it held her attention anyway.

Waddles came up next to her and nuzzled her knee with his cute little pig nose.

She glanced over at him, and their eyes met.

“That’s not the real Robbie.” Waddles said.

“Oink grunt snort.” Was the actual noise that came out.

“I still love you.” Were the words Mabel heard.

She bent down and hugged him, and a single grim, dark tear rolled down her cheek. “I wanna do the right thing…” She whispered. “Can’t I do the right thing…? Can’t I… Can’t… There’s a happy ending here, isn’t there?”

“I feel deeply and profoundly afraid.” Waddles said. “Give me some food.”

“Grunt snoik grunt.” Was the actual noise. “Oink grunt.”

Mabel sniffled. “Yeah… Ha ha… Yeah… I guess you’re right… It’s just one of life’s great mysteries, isn’t it…?” She hugged him just a little tighter. “Thanks for believing in me though… Say, are you hungry?”

He’d already said that he was.

So Mabel stood up, brushed a strand of hair from her eyes, and continued toward the Shack.

Soos met her at the door, dressed in his suit and fez. “Hey, S’up dude!” He smiled, offering her his fist. “How’s it hangin’ today, my dopest dawg?”

Mabel chuckled lowly, not much in the mood for humor. “Now who in the world could this be…?” She faked puzzlement as she punched his fist anyway. “It looks just like Mr. Mystery, but it sounds just like Soos…?”

“OOH! Oh yeah! Right! Sorry dude! Right!” Soos hurried to lower his eyepatch, and give his 8-ball cane a clever little twirl. “Greetings…” He recited, in a mysterious voice. “Welcome back, dear child, to the deep and miry domain of Bewilderment and Befuddlement that is the world-renowned Mystery Shack…!” He twirled his free hand, to reveal an ice cream sandwich which must have been hidden up his sleeve for some mysterious reason. “Would you dare be entreated to one of our mysteeeeeriously magic mystery snacks?”

She chuckled lightly, and gave him a half-hearted punch in the gut. “No… That would break my diet.” She explained sadly. “My doctor said I shouldn’t have anything but shame, pouting, and dread for the rest of the day…”

“Oh…” Soos frowned in understanding, then sat down on the floor. He didn’t take a knee or squat or bend over, he just sat, with his legs straight ahead of him; low enough to look her straight in the eye. “That’s a sucky diet, dude.” He nodded wisely.

“Yeah…”

“Hmm…” Soos stroked his chin. “I’ve got an idea, dawg. Why don’t we make an exception? Just for right now? You break your diet and I’ll break mine, just for one crazy, bonkers, kooky snack.”

“Heh…” Mabel tried to chuckle. “Wait… You’re on a diet…?”

“Of course!” Soos nodded. “A diet of food! So how about it? You break your diet of sadness and eat an ice cream sandwich, and I’ll break my diet of food and eat some grass. Even-steven, dawg. Whaddaya say?”

Mabel laughed for real this time, though not as powerfully as normal. “Okay… We can do that.”

“Great! Anything to shorten up that face of yours!”

“Shorten my face…?”

“Yeah! You know how everybody always says, like, ‘why the long face’, or whatever? Well I just thought, like, why isn’t ‘why the short face’ a thing for when you cheer up? Ha ha… Right?”

“Woah, that’s so wise…” Mabel admitted, reaching for the ice cream. “Okay, you win. Let’s-”

A faint explosion echoed across the valley and in through the front door. They both froze.

“Duuuuuude the 4th of July isn’t for 3 more weeks. That means somebody’s gone totally insane… I don’t like it, duuuude…”

“That didn’t sound like a firework…”

They both rushed out onto the porch, their eyes searching for the source of the noise. Mabel found it: a disturbance in the distant air; a trailing plume of smoke somewhere above the town. It was thick and dark, almost greenish, surely no firework.

But that wasn’t all. There was something else just beneath the cloud; something hard and solid, spinning and falling out of sight, trailing more smoke behind it.

“Duuuuuude…” Soos commentated.

“What was…?” Mabel frowned.

The shape reappeared, this time bigger and nearer, speeding toward them through the trees. ‘Through’ the trees in the most literal sense; the trunks and branches were cut and smashed aside before it. Now it seemed to realize its fault, and increased in altitude, silhouetting briefly but clearly against the crisp blue sky.

Was that an alien spaceship?

It was a bit bigger than your average fighter jet, all dirty and encrusted in roots, vines, and plants, as if a giant had used a house-sized shovel to scoop up a mound of dirt, and there just happened to be a flying saucer buried in there.

“Duuuuuuuuuude!” Soos elaborated.

Mabel wasn’t really sure what to do. It was coming right for them, and, (judging by what it did to the trees,) it would probably level the house when it hit in just a few seconds… But Stan and Ford and Melody were in the house! She had to warn them!

Soos turned and rushed back into the house to do just that. “DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUDE!” He blared.

But Mabel’s brain had, unbidden, produced a single dark thought. If they’re inside, they will die. I only have time to save myself… So instead of crying out or ducking indoors, she dived for Waddles, snatched him up in both arms during her summersault, and came up running.

You monster. She told herself. Saving yourself when you should have saved them… How dare you?

Fortunately for the family and her conscience, the incoming ship didn’t hit the house. By now it had swerved rightwards and upwards; no longer aiming for them. Now it was headed for the yard. Now it wobbled and changed course again; not even aiming for the yard. Now it was going to pass by the property entirely, and land in the forest…

Mabel’s eyes followed it as it passed directly overhead. She saw the smoke billowing from its side. She saw the cracks spreading through its weakened hull. She felt the field of force rippling from its intact engines, she felt the heat radiating from its wrecked engines. She would have felt the intense and deadly ionizing radiation spilling from its burst reactor, but humans can’t feel such things.

Half a second later, the tip of its wing clipped the question mark off the weathervane.

Two seconds later, it passed out of sight into the trees.

A second after that, the ear-splitting sound of impact.

Mabel heard it bounce and tumble and smash, end-over-end and destructively, in much the same manner as a square wheel. Above the point where it had disappeared, she saw the tops of tall trees sway, topple, and shake.

In moments the landscape was silent again, and Mabel was left staring in awe at the damaged tree line, wondering what exactly she’d just witnessed.

What? Where? Why? Who?

ALIENS?

Waddles struggled in her arms, so she let him down, and began to feel through her pockets for tools. She didn’t really have any proper rescue equipment… Just some ribbons and a curiously pencil-shaped twig. If the aliens were trapped inside or in need of medical attention, she wouldn’t really be able to help them…

But were they beyond helping? She wondered (another unwelcome dark thought). That ship hit pretty hard, and it was more likely than not that everything and everyone inside was killed. Smashed or burned alive.

Maybe…

NO! NO! They can’t be dead! ROBBIE’S WRONG! THEY CAN’T!

She turned and began to sprint back for the house. Whatever was in there, it would have to wait 5 minutes, just 5 more minutes… Long enough for her to get proper help…

She opened the Shack’s door to enter, just as Soos and the Stans opened it to exit.

“What’s going on?” Stan stammered, almost tripping over Mabel. “What was that noise, some of us need our sleep!”

“It’s 3:00 in the afternoon, Stan!” Ford frowned.

“DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUE!” Soos explained.

“Guys!” Mabel pointed toward the trees. “It’saspaceshiporsomething andtheremightbepeopleinside andwe’vegottahelpthem andwelcomethemtoourworld andtakethemtoourleader andgivethemchocolatemilk!”

“Oh… OH!” Ford followed her pointing finger. He saw nothing in the trees, but was nonetheless fascinated. “Fascinating.” He assessed. “Are you sure it’s aliens…?”

“Well it was a big flying-saucer-shaped flying saucer!” Mabel explained. “So I think it was a flying saucer!”

“Well… Yes of course… But… But what did it look like?” Ford interrogated her. “Was it circular? Triangular? Teardrop-shaped? Manned or unmanned? Damaged…? How big was it?”

“Uh… Like, a house-sized circle? And it was all dirty…? I don’t know! But it was all on fire and stuff! We’ve gotta go!” She grabbed Ford by his second pinkie and began to drag him toward the trees. “It crashed and stuff and you’ve gotta come help!”

“Wait, fire…? Hold on! Hold on!” Ford pulled Mabel to a stop, and put out a hand to halt Stan as well. Then he reached way down deep into his trench coat, and pulled out a Geiger counter. “If my experience is any indication, then the vehicle could be nuclear, so we’ve got to be incredibly careful while approaching…” Ford pointed the counter toward the trees, whereupon it began clicking loudly and wildly. He glanced at the readout. “It could be… HOLY MOSES, WHAT THE HECK?!? Okay, stay back! EVERYBODY STAY BACK! Okay… Oh my I don’t even… I don’t… Okay. Think. Think Ford! Think…” He rubbed his temples. “Uh… Uh… Okay. Okay I’ve got it. Soos!” He turned to the larger man, and pressed a few coins of Aztec gold into his fat fist. “I need you to take Melody, Mabel, the pig, heck the goat, and everyone else on the property, load them up in our RV, and take them back down to town. Get them all set up, get a room at the motel or something, take them out for pancakes, I don’t care, but don’t. Bring. Them. Back. Here. Okay?”

Soos nodded solemnly. “I. Am. That. Hero.”

“WHAT? Great Uncle Ford!” Mabel gasped incredulously. “Why can’t I—”

“This entire area is soaking up Gamma rays!” Ford shushed her. “If you get much closer than this, I don’t want to be liable for your cells getting ionized from the inside out! Nobody’s getting closer than this, and everybody non-essential is getting much farther!”

“But—”

“No buts! Stan!” He turned to his brother. “I need you to call the Mayor’s office, and get him to cordon off the road to town. Nobody up here, especially not tourists, until we do something about the radiation. Then call Daniel Corduroy, and have him get his logging crew up here with excavators. We need to find this thing, get it buried, and QUICKLY. Call McGucket too, and tell him it’s the ‘N-word’; he’ll know what to do. Then call the Northwests, and mooch a favor out of them somehow. Get them to bribe somebody in the FBI to…”

“Yeah, uh…” Stan shook his head. “That’s a lot of points to remember, and a lot of phone numbers I don’t know.”

Ford bit his tongue. “Right.” He thought for a moment more. “Okay then, I’ll make the calls. You go down into my old lab, grab the hazmat suits, shovels, a crowbar, my magnet gun, and a plasma cutter, in case there’s anything alive inside we have to get out. Also two semi-automatic ray guns in case they’re better left inside. Also see if you can find the hitch and tow cables for Soos’ truck… And… And some worklights for tonight… And… Oh dear, what else…? We’ll need decontamination showers…”

“Sheesh, slow down Poindexter. That’s enough for the old noggin’ to remember at one time…” Stan nodded, already on his way.

“Okay… Okay…” Ford turned back to the wreck, and began to mutter out loud. “Okay. It’s gonna be alright. Depending on how fast we get it buried, the house can probably be sterilized and safe for human habitation within a few weeks… That area of forest will be a different matter. Once I get the phone calls out, nobody will dare get nearby except gnomes, and there’s nothing I can do about them… Can only pray it doesn’t get into the groundwater… Everybody’s getting mobilized, I just have to make a few calls… Just a few calls… What am I forgetting? What am I forgetting?!?”

Aliens, aliens… Why would there be aliens? The whole world to land in, why our YARD? No activity for thousands of years, why NOW? He savagely interrogated his memory. Mabel described a ship a lot like one of the shuttles from Crash Site Omega. And did she say ‘dirty’? So it must have come from on-planet, instead of from outer space… But everything at CSO is dead, so who on Earth could have-

Something clicked.

“MASON!” He suddenly cried, and began to sprint across the yard in the direction of the trees. “DEAR GOD IN HEAVEN AND ALL THE SAINTS! WENDY! MASON! KIDS, CAN YOU HEAR ME?!?”

Mabel had another dark thought.

As many people have been so kind as to point out over the years, Dipper wasn’t a particularly strong individual. To his memory, he’d never won a physical contest in his life, nor lifted more than about 40 pounds, nor grown more than 5 chest hairs.

At this particular moment, he was feeling that weakness more than ever. His head pounded and his inner ears sloshed and the smoke stung his eyes and lungs and he felt as if baked alive in his armor as the eerie blue flames poured from the ship’s wreckage. His arms and legs still ached from the flight, and the multitude of cuts, scrapes, bruises and injures from throughout the week were beginning to cry out, rubbing and cracking in the heat and demanding his attention. He could barely breathe, he could scarcely see, and his ears were no help either. In this state, walking forward in full armor was chore enough.

But he also had another person, half again his size and also fully armored, draped across his shoulders. One arm was hooked around her arm, the other around her leg.

Say what you may about his body, but his will was still his own.

His will forgot all else, and it ordered his leg ‘step’, and it stepped. And it told his other leg ‘step’ and it stepped. So did he move forward, boot-print by crooked boot-print, and he closed his eyes and he focused and somehow it worked. Slowly and dogmatically he came out from underneath the curved hull, up out of the trench and down the other side of the berm. About then he bumped into a tree with his eyes closed, which event he took as a sign that he’d escaped the worst of it.

But he could still feel the heat, smell the smoke, and hear the flames, so he forced his legs to keep on moving. Subconsciously he turned them about to point downhill, and he increased his snail’s pace just slightly.

Minutes later, perhaps longer, perhaps shorter, he stumbled, and managed to catch himself. If he hadn’t, he didn’t believe he would have been able to stand up again.

Minutes later, perhaps longer, perhaps shorter, his feet began to feel strangely cold and slippery. He finally dared to open his eyes, and a welcome sight partially emerged from the blur: that of a slow stream winding through the forest. Water… His brain equated it with safety.

He set Wendy down as gently as he could on the bank. It wasn’t very gently, and the motion tipped him over entirely. He crawled out from underneath her, and sat up… Good. Now he could actually help. He pushed his glove up between her helmet and her shoulder pads, and put a finger on her throat. Faintly through the material, he could feel a steady heartbeat.

Yes!

Now he pressed his gauntlet up to her face in front of her mouth. Very faintly, he could see mist forming on the smooth surface.

She was breathing!

Yes!

YES!

They were both alive… They were both safe!

Relived, he began to rack his brain for how to treat unconscious people. You were supposed to get their legs up higher than their heart… Right? Yeah, that’s it; their heads need more blood… He grabbed her ankle in one hand, her wrist in the other, and turned her around on the bank to get her head pointed downhill. Now… He thought he remembered you were supposed to remove any clothing or stuff that could restrict breathing… Right?

He began to unbuckle her armor, piece by piece. The helmet squeezed past her ears. The chainsaw chaps unbuckled and fell aside. The shoulder pads came undone and were removed. The gauntlets slipped off like gloves. The arm guards followed the gauntlets and the leggings followed the boots. Everything went into the stream; too shallow and slow to carry them away. The flannel jacket he left in place; seemed only decent.

What now?

Since she was breathing, that means she’d be fine in a little bit, and you didn’t need CPR… Right?

Well, it couldn’t hurt.

He knelt down by her head, and began to pump on her chest. It might be doing something, or it might not, or maybe the stimulus would wake her from whatever matter of horrid slumber this was.

The seconds ticked by as he pumped, and he wondered how fast you were supposed to do it. Does it even matter how fast you do it? Why would it matter? How does CPR even work? When am I supposed to kiss her? Wait, no, I mean breath in her mouth. Wait, no, I mean… Whatever it’s called. No, I ain’t gonna kiss her.

The seconds kept ticking by, and Wendy’s condition wasn’t changing.

But Dipper didn’t keep pumping forever, because a noise distracted him from behind.

Splash.

He glanced over his shoulder, and jumped. He tried to stand up as fast as he could, but was still a little tired and dizzy from the crash, and so ended up just staggering a little as he levered himself upright. “Ugh…!” He mumbled, weary, grim despair. “You again…”

Of course they weren’t safe.

Why would they be safe? How could that have ever been an expectation? So much had happened today: the argument with Robbie, the deer-bots, the swarming bugs, the drilling worms, the alien ghosts, the rocket birds, the heart-racing chase, the ship’s takeoff, the ship’s crash… So much, so long… Of course it wasn’t over now… How could it be over?

Dipper wished he had the magnet gun, but he’d left it back in the ship, so he couldn’t leave Wendy to go back for it now… But Wendy’s axe was lying in the stream where he’d tossed it. He knelt to pick it up, and whispered in her direction. “Sorry. Just gotta borrow this for a minute…”

With this utterly insufficient weapon in hand, he stood between Wendy and the enemy, and took the best fighting stance he could muster.

But the giant robotic cat just stood there, about 5 meters upstream, and looked at him.

She didn’t attack, she didn’t charge. She didn’t even seem interested in fighting.

In fact, she was looking even worse than Dipper felt. Her right front leg was bent unnaturally and held against her chest, while the tank tread on her left rear foot was dented and refused to spin. Her mouth was scared and blackened terribly, with several saws crooked and one missing entirely. A piece of splintered wood (of all things) was wedged into a joint her steel shoulder, evidently having been pounded into place during the crash. And her entire underbelly was blackened, bent, and flickering with blue flames.

“Uhh…” Dipper said. “Listen… I know you can’t hear me, seeing as how you don’t have ears… But I’ll give you a minute if you’ll give me a minute… Just a little respite…”

Keeping a careful eye on the creature, he took a knee in the water.

The robot lion seemed to agree, as she more or less collapsed into the liquid. Steam rose and hissed all around her burning plates. A sheen of leaked oil flowed around the rocks and past Dipper’s knees.

He blinked and nodded. “Yeah… Feel ya.”

Now he knelt further down, and let the water clean him too. It soaked past his armor and his clothes, it cleaned his injuries and quenched his burns. It hurt, but this was the good kind of hurt. The kind that felt like it could heal… He cupped some in his hands and splashed his face. It ran off grey with ash.

So they both sat there for a minute or so, letting the water ebb and flow around them, trying to find a peace in the calm before the coming storm.

Finally, Dipper fancied his head was completely clear of the headache from the crash, and a few deep breaths prepared his system for what was next to come. From his kneeling pose, he looked back up at the robot lion, and she looked back at him.

He took note of the serious damage all around her mouth and saws, then glanced back up the hill and saw the ship in the distance, still smoldering and smoking. And he remembered the explosion in the port-side wing. “It was you.” He broke the silence. “You clung to the ship, through all that flight… And all the while you were drilling into the engines… The crash was all you… Wasn’t it?”

She didn’t reply, of course.

“Well.” Dipper sighed. “I… I guess I respect that. That’s… Grit. I guess. You did good. You brought us down. Heck… You even took out Wendy… Right now she must look pretty dead to you… Meaning you must think you’ve half-won. But she’ll be fine… She’ll be fine.”

The robot still just stared, in that soulless, empty way that animals always do.

“You… You know what?” Dipper asserted, after a brief silence. “I… I GET it. I GET it. I mean that, I get it. I get why you do what you do. I get why it means so much to you, and I know why you’ll never stop until we’re dead.

“And I’m SORRY. There, I said it: I’m sorry. I’m sorry we accidentally stole your son. I’m sorry we stuck you with that tracking device when you tried to come back for him. And I’m SORRY we attacked you, and I’m SORRY we shot you. I’m SORRY we invaded your territory, and tricked you time and time again. And I’m SORRY we killed your entire pack when we took off in that ship… I…”

She still stared.

“And I wish I could say we never meant you any harm, but that would be a lie because we ALL knew it would end like this: end in xenocide. Before we even started out, we agreed to destroy you if you turned out dangerous. And now that day is here, and we’ve got the Power Control Coupling for the big ship. We’re gonna use it to fire up its reactor, and smash your entire little world, with all you beasts inside it.

“It… It was inevitable; it was even responsible! Because if not us, then who? Most likely somebody who’d kill you anyway. Or maybe somebody who’d weaponize you? Captivate you, domesticate you, plug you into machines that turn you into living factories? With… With your kind among our kind, both of us would suffer…

“It… It was! IT WAS US OR YOU! And you’re not people, you’re just animals, which means it’s not murder, it’s not cruel, it isn’t even wrong! It was the right thing to do, and for that I’m SORRY! I’m SORRY your extinction was the order we gave… The order we followed… I’m sorry.”

The aperture over her eye blinked at him.

“…I never once hated you.” He said. “I’ve hated enemies before… But I never hated you. Because I get it.”

It seemed to understand.

“Now, I don’t know if you hate me, or if we just… If we just know we have to kill each other. But if you get my body language here, could you PLEASE just leave it be today? We’re both tired and hurt. Just turn around and walk away. I don’t want to kill you, but… But a girl’s laying behind me, and it just wouldn’t be fair for you to get the drop on us when she’s helpless…

“And… And she’s my very best friend in all the world, and… She means more to me than you could ever understand, and… And we’ve had a really long day and we were so happy that we’d finally won… That we’d escaped… And… Everything was going so good… And next time she’s awake, I think I’m gonna ask her on a date… And… And it’ll be my very first good date…

“So… So because of all that, I won’t let you get even one step closer to her. Save yourself by coming back another day… Please. I’ll have to kill you, and I don’t want to.”

It seemed almost like she considered the offer for a minute. And then her back shuddered, and with a groan of stressed metal and worn gears, she struggled back to her feet. Her antennae retracted and her head lowered as she took a battle stance.

Dipper sighed. “You know what? I still get it.” His voice lowered. “I totally get it. I… I guess I woulda done the same thing…” Using Wendy’s axe like an old man would a walking Stick, Dipper hoisted himself back upright. With his other hand, he unbuckled the chainsaw chaps from his arms, and held them like some kind of whip.

So prepared with the very best of the very little he had on hand, he turned to face the beast.

Her one red eye stared back into his, and her saws slowly extended.

“We don’t have to do this.” Dipper offered one last time. “Go home. Lick your wounds, take a nap, do whatever it is robots do when you’re looking like crap. Just escape… Just like we were trying to do with that ship. Forget us…”

She limped a step towards him.

Not to be outdone, Dipper took a step forward as well, keeping himself directly between the machine and Wendy’s prone form. “That… That was the last one!” He commanded her, and he felt his voice rising to the challenge. “That was the very last! If you take one more step, you dumb and heartless animal, just one more…! I swear that I will murder you dead where you stand!”

She understood.

And her will told her foot ‘step’, and it stepped.

Minutes later, perhaps more, perhaps less, a bright flash of blue light woke Wendy up.

As her eyes fluttered open, the first thing that drew her attention was the pain in her head. It screamed at her as she moved, throbbing and pounding with her heartbeat. She sat up and rolled over sorely, allowing her eyes to land on a narrow, shallow creek. Oh good, water… She felt thirsty… And sick… Really sick. The motion of rolling over caused her head to spin, and her stomach couldn’t take anymore. Before she could take a drink, she keeled over and puked in the stream.

Ugh…

Gross…

Wait, why does my puke have blood in it? That’s not a good sign.

Wait…

It wasn’t the puke. The creek itself had blood in it. And a spreading slick of thick, black oil mixed with the red.

Her eyes followed the flow upstream, and there they landed on an enormous, dark shape. The body of a robot lion. She was lying just about a few meters from where Wendy had been sleeping.

And she was utterly dead.

Wendy shakily stood to her feet, and took a step toward the machine. And that was when she noticed another, much smaller shape, reclining in the water against the beast’s metal belly.

“She cheated…” Dipper’s tiny voice whispered.

Now Wendy could see her friend’s entire body, and she froze, shocked. In an instant, she took in everything: The blood at the bottom of a crater in his helmet. The slashes in his belly beneath the shreds of his armor. The punctures in his chest. His broken leg. His missing arm.

“DUDE!” She rushed up to him and he fell into her arms. Trying to keep him still, she stripped off her jacket and undershirt, and began to tear both into strips. Which bleeding to plug first? There was too much… Maybe his stomach? That seemed reasonable, right? “Dude, hang in there man, I… You’re not gonna…!” She realized she was lying. “You CAN’T die! You can’t!”

“…Wendy…” He wheezed.

“Come on, man! Come on! Stay with me!” She slapped him on the cheek.

“I… I love you…”

“YEAH, NO KIDDING, REALLY?!? Come on! You’ve gotta…! Dipper! Dipper, are you listening?!? You gotta pull through! Listen to me! I love you too! You gotta fight!”

Fight he did, this one last time. Down to the furthest reaches of his mind, he struggled and raged at the encroaching darkness. Trying to force back at its overbearing advance, trying to strike at it, screaming at it, pleading with it, telling it a tale of everything he’d ever wanted to do but hadn’t done. The things he’d wanted to apologize for, the promises he’d wanted to keep, the mysteries he would have solved, the good he would have done, the lives he would have saved, the family he would have made, the adventures he would have lived…

He had had such dreams!

The darkness carelessly shrugged aside his protests. All the hope he once had cherished, he saw crushed and strangled before it, torn asunder and scattered like dust in the wind.

In the final dying light, he thought he heard Wendy’s voice calling out.

“Hang in there man!” She was telling him. “You’re gonna pull through one way or another! I know it! I PROMISE YOU LIFE!”

But her words were just words.

And death does not wait for words.

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    Chapter 18: She Cheated



Author’s Note: As always, I go precisely where my whimsical ideas and prematurely-conceived foreshadowing lead me. If it weren't for this chapter, this story would be significantly shorter. Don't look at me like that.



   When you’re flying in a normal human rocket, it can be rather painful. The vehicle’s engines push the ship forward with their own force, while the rest of the vehicle’s frame has to hold together under the stress of keeping up. Passengers feel as if pressed backwards into their seats, since the rocket is trying to accelerate forward, but every molecule in their bodies just wants to stay at rest. By all accounts, it’s an uncomfortable, squashing sort of feeling. Not exactly a perk of space travel.

But that’s only the case for human rockets.

Alien spaceships are a little different. Their engines directly manipulate the gravitational field, essentially making the ship fall in whatever direction it’s told to. The passengers don’t feel the acceleration or the force at all, since the entire ship: engines, frame, passengers, fuel, is all falling together with the exact same speed and acceleration. A rather floaty sort of experience; much easier on both person and machine.

But that’s only the case for new alien spaceships.

The situation is rather worse for old, beaten, battered, ancient ships, who’ve been half-buried in the hard ground for millennia while their fuel decays and their seals rot and their alloys rust. Their gravity field might be more intense here but less intense there; half the pilot’s body might be pulled too strongly in the direction of travel, while the other half feels left behind. As the direction of thrust changes, waves of stress and strain swirl and shift through the cabin.

Long, stiff bits like bones feel it the worst. It’s a stretching, pummeling sort of feeling, that makes the blood begin to boil and the head begin to hurt and the joints begin to ache and the occasional hapless teenage passengers begin to wonder: Why in Paul Bunyan’s name did we ever think this was a good idea?

Wendy finally couldn’t force herself to hold onto the joysticks any longer, and let go. Her hands came away shaking, and the grips were moist. Soon as she released them, the noise from the reactors died off, and the ship went back into true free-fall, drifting upwards on its momentum, while air resistance and the Earth’s natural gravity slowly decelerated them back down.

“Oh, ugh, Geez…” Her voice didn’t carry far above the wind, but Dipper heard her.

“Yeah… Woah… Ha ha…” He glanced at her in a bewildered way, and began to laugh as he sorely rubbed his temples. “Ha ha… Ow… HA HA HA HA!”

“Ha ha!” She tried to massage her arms, squinted her eyes shut, and began to laugh too. “HA HA OH GEEZ HA HA HA… Wooooooah this is a bit worse than I thought…”

“Ha… HA HA… What, is pain hilarious now…?” Truth be told, they weren’t laughing at the pain, but at the unexpectedness of it. They’d just departed a rather perilous situation, and hadn’t expected a clean getaway to be quite so achey.

Dipper’s eyes drifted back out the dome-shaped window above them, and he saw the horizon spinning lazily. The ground was about 10,000 feet away, and getting gradually closer. Perhaps they weren’t all that safe… “Ha ha… Uh… Oh man, just get us on the ground, how ‘bout. Ha ha… Ha ha…”

“Sure thing Cap’n… Aww man, okay… Oooooh, this is not quite the way I imagined it…”

She grabbed the joysticks again, and twisted and pulled. The ship flipped over to something vaguely like right-side-up, and began something vaguely like a controlled descent.

It was absurdly hard to keep it going in a straight line, and the smallest mistake sent it tumbling or drifting in one direction or another. Nevertheless, she thought she was getting the hang of it, as she pulled up and leveled out over the ground.

Dipper gripped the armrests for stability, and turned his gaze out the window, looking for landmarks.

There was some kind of high peak in the distance, jutting hard and stony above the surrounding trees… That must be the Multi-bear’s lair. And that means the town must be somewhere West of here… Which way was West? Wendy slipped up for a moment and the ship tipped up on its side, which coincidentally let Dipper find the sun as a reference. It was mid-afternoon in Summer, so West should be… That way! “Uh… Go tha… Turn Starboard! T-t-two-o’-clock!” He squealed, and raised a hand to point.

“Yep! Yeah, I got you, fam…!” She grunted, as she spun the ship.

“No no! Too far!”

“It’s touchy, it’s touchy… Oooookay! Yeah, here we go. There!”

“Waitwaitwait now pull up! PULL UP!”

“I’m pulling up, and… Oh man I can’t see the ground!” She gave the sticks another twist.

“Wendy! Now we’re upside-down!”

“Yeah, well, now I can see the ground! …See? Look! You can just look right up and see how far you are from crashing!”

“You’re gonna hit the trees!”

“…Why would the put they dome on the top anyway? Like, you never really need to look up…”

“You’re gonna hit the trees!”

“Are not.”

“Are too!”

“Are not.”

“ARE TOO!”

They didn’t.

“…But it was too close!” Dipper said.

“Hey, who’s the one with the driver’s license here?”

“You have a learner’s permit for CARS!”

“I think you like it!”

“I…! Huh? Nooooo…”

Wendy gave the next ridge a little more room, and now they were high enough to see across the valley. There were the hanging cliffs! They were looking a little upside-down at the moment, but still clearly recognizable. The town should be a mile or so in front of them.

Dipper saw the church steeple first, then the barrel and crate factory, and now he could see the town in its entirety. Hey everyone! Check it out! We’re in a UFO! Cool, right?

As the town square sped by below, he caught a glimpse of confused, upturned faces from the street. Wendy slowed down slightly at this point, searching for the next reference to get them headed for their final landing site: The Mystery Shack’s lawn.

She found the water tower out of the corner of her eye, swung the ship around, and punched the throttle, this time almost enjoying the rush of acceleration, even with the vibrating gravity fields. I’m actually getting the hang of this! She though. Once you get the hunk of junk off the ground, it actually handles pretty well. This isn’t actually so hard!

“I gotta say dude…!” She hollered over the wind. “You sure know how to show a girl a good—”

But then something happened that wasn’t supposed to happen.

An explosion rocked the ship.

Something on the Port-side ‘wing’, just outside their view from the dome, had just blasted to pieces for some reason. Part of the vehicle’s glass hull paneling shattered away entirely, throwing off the vehicle’s aerodynamics and sending them spinning for the ground. Smoke filled the cabin before the wind whipped it away. Blue flames roared in their periphery. Sparse debris could be seen floating in the air around them. All the lights on Wendy’s console turned either off or turned red.

And there were no ejection seats.

As for Wendy, the whiplash of the blast had swung her head, hard, into the seat’s lousy excuse of a headrest. She was wearing a football helmet, but still, it logically must have done some damage… Right? I might have a concussion… But I’m still the one with the controls! I’m still the pilot! I remember my old Wrestling Coach said you don’t often notice concussions right away… Which means I have a couple seconds of control left at least! I can still land it! So she locked her eyes on the horizon out the window, and fought to level the vehicle.

It was slow and clumsy to respond this time. The gravity field was even more uneven, and the ship rolled left as she pulled up; as if the entire Port side was just dead weight. They plowed through several trees before she got it a little higher.

Dipper yelled something about cancelling out the lost torque by using the pedals. She didn’t really get the gist.

Past the fire and the smoke and a rapidly evolving headache, she made out a familiar shape: the Mystery Shack, coming up fast. They were almost there!

She tried to aim for the green, and pulled back to decrease their speed as much as possible. But the ship malfunctioned one last time; went into one last tumble off-course.

The impact was sharp and severe. Wendy’s head whipped hard into the back of her seat, and unconsciousness was a welcome reprieve.

Stan woke up from a most peculiar nightmare.

Minutes previous, the van door opened and Mabel slid down off Robbie’s lap, landing on the Mystery Shack’s driveway. Waddles squeezed through behind the driver seat, and plopped to the ground next to her.

“Hey, thanks for letting me drive, Robbie!” Mabel smiled. “That was pretty fun!”

“Yeah, no problem… No problem…” Robbie nodded, and twiddled his fingers in his lap while he thought.

“And uh… Thanks for everything, Robbie.” She added. “Thanks for helping me with the thing, and thanks for being nice to Waddles, and… And for keeping me safe and stuff… I mean…” She snapped a sudden salute. “Future robobotanists of the world applaud your brave efforts, soldier!”

“Yeah, it’s… It’s no problem…” Robbie shrugged. “I guess… Uh… Say, your brother and Wendy wanted to be picked up, right? When was that?”

“Uh… I think they said 4:00…?” Mabel frowned, and glanced at her watch. “And it’s like 3:00 now, so…”

“Yeah… Ugh… Kay…” Robbie sighed and pulled out his phone, to scroll through his recent messages. There were several messages about a concert tonight. “I got a concert tonight too…” He sighed. One of the messages mentioned the town of Boring. “All the way in… Boring…” Another message was a threat from the drummer about ditching again. Another one was Tambry saying something similar. “I bet they’ll kill me if I’m not there for practice, and Tambry will kill me too if I’m not there beforehand to hang out with her… So… Aww man, and it’s like a 2 hour drive…”

“So when do you need to leave?” Mabel scratched her head.

He did the math. “’Bout… A half hour ago…”

“Ha ha! Wooooowww…!” Mabel giggled, feeling sorry for him but feeling like mocking him at the same time. “Why did you ever agree to pick up Dipstick and Wendoid?”

“I’m not sure… I forget.”

“Weeeell… Oh, you know what??” She smiled. “I can just ask me Grunkles to come pick them up!” She pointed towards their RV. “They’ll understand.”

“…You sure?” Robbie frowned.

“Oh yeaaaah we got this! You go! Go! You go to that concert, and you shred some mad guitar, and you blow their MIIIIINDS! I believe in you!”

“Uh… But you’re sure you can pick them up?” Robbie asked. “I’m okay and stuff?”

“Oh yeah! It’s all good!”

“Okay…”

“Well, we also got some cold pizza in the fridge! Do you wanna come in and chow down for a couple minutes before you go? It’s got glitter on it…!”

He gave her a weird look (the same look everybody seemed to give when offered food and glitter in the same sentence.) “NO.” He explained.

“Welp! See you around then, champ!” She punched him in the arm. “May the magical happiness spirits guide you on your path to bedazzlement!”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah…” He growled, and pushed her hand away. His eyes landed on the steering wheel for no obvious reason, and he stared long and hard, thinking. Mabel watched him, wondering what he was going through his head. “Look…” He finally turned back to her, and sighed. “Could we talk serious for a minute, Girl Dipper?”

“Ha ha! It’s ‘Mabel’! Ah-duuuurrrrr!”

“Yeah, yeah, ‘Mabel’. Whatever. But… Really, could we talk serious for a minute? Without… Glitter, and cute animals and nonsense, okay?”

“Uh…” Mabel didn’t like the way the conversation was heading one bit, but Robbie made it sound important. “Okay…”

“Look.” He repeated. “I’m not your boyfriend. You pretended like that was the way it was, to… To trick your brother or whatever? Yeah, good going with that… But… But it’s not true. I don’t…” He sighed. “You’re a nice girl. Really. You’re, like, a really sweet, innocent person, and you try to be super nice and everything, even to killer robots, even to killer aliens, even when it’s dumb to be nice… And you’re my friend… But… I don’t like you. At all. I don’t like hanging around with you, I don’t like speaking with you, I don’t really like helping, and… I wish you didn’t bring me along today.”

His words stung. “…Oh…” Mabel’s smile deflated slowly, and something small, deep inside her, turned from sweet to sour.

“And…” Robbie scratched his head. “I know you hate growing older. And I know you hate what your brother and Wendy are doing: destroying the robo-aliens. I know you’ve got a vision of some happy little… Some dainty little animal paradise once this is through, that you’ll become some ultra hippy scientist god who forces adorable goodness down everybody’s throats every day of every year… You want to believe that it can all be sweetness and sparkles and crap forever… Look, I can’t pretend to know what’s going through your head, so I won’t. But Mabel… It. Won’t. Work.”

Mabel’s frown deepened.

“This world is hard and cruel.” He explained. “The harsh, contested domain of wicked men. And the sweetest person in the world can’t fix it. And the sweetest person in the world can’t stay sweet for long. The robots are going to die, or be contained, quarantined, and weaponized, and there’s nothing you or anybody can do to make it happy. If you keep opening your heart up to people and things, and seeing the good in everyone… If you keep living that lie, your heart’s GONNA be broken… Your spirit will break… And you’ll turn hateful inside.”

Her eyes fell to the ground.

“And frankly.” He pressed on. “Pigs don’t live very long. Your ‘Waddles’ is gonna end up in somebody’s stomach in a couple years at best. Same with everything and anyone else you’ve ever loved. Things die. Things end. Your parents will die. Your uncles will die. Your brother will die. All your friends will die, and finally, you will die. And those who outlive you will remember you for your selfishness and your many tragic mistakes and NOT for your sweetness… You need to grow up, Mabel. You need to learn to think… You need…”

Robbie scowled deeply, a grim and evil look that fit him well. The sincerest, most honest look he could have given. “Learn to think dark thoughts, my girl.” He concluded.

And then he closed the door, put his van in gear, and rolled off down the road, leaving her brain and heart a confused and injured mess.

The ground in front of her feet wasn’t very interesting, but it held her attention anyway.

Waddles came up next to her and nuzzled her knee with his cute little pig nose.

She glanced over at him, and their eyes met.

“That’s not the real Robbie.” Waddles said.

“Oink grunt snort.” Was the actual noise that came out.

“I still love you.” Were the words Mabel heard.

She bent down and hugged him, and a single grim, dark tear rolled down her cheek. “I wanna do the right thing…” She whispered. “Can’t I do the right thing…? Can’t I… Can’t… There’s a happy ending here, isn’t there?”

“I feel deeply and profoundly afraid.” Waddles said. “Give me some food.”

“Grunt snoik grunt.” Was the actual noise. “Oink grunt.”

Mabel sniffled. “Yeah… Ha ha… Yeah… I guess you’re right… It’s just one of life’s great mysteries, isn’t it…?” She hugged him just a little tighter. “Thanks for believing in me though… Say, are you hungry?”

He’d already said that he was.

So Mabel stood up, brushed a strand of hair from her eyes, and continued toward the Shack.

Soos met her at the door, dressed in his suit and fez. “Hey, S’up dude!” He smiled, offering her his fist. “How’s it hangin’ today, my dopest dawg?”

Mabel chuckled lowly, not much in the mood for humor. “Now who in the world could this be…?” She faked puzzlement as she punched his fist anyway. “It looks just like Mr. Mystery, but it sounds just like Soos…?”

“OOH! Oh yeah! Right! Sorry dude! Right!” Soos hurried to lower his eyepatch, and give his 8-ball cane a clever little twirl. “Greetings…” He recited, in a mysterious voice. “Welcome back, dear child, to the deep and miry domain of Bewilderment and Befuddlement that is the world-renowned Mystery Shack…!” He twirled his free hand, to reveal an ice cream sandwich which must have been hidden up his sleeve for some mysterious reason. “Would you dare be entreated to one of our mysteeeeeriously magic mystery snacks?”

She chuckled lightly, and gave him a half-hearted punch in the gut. “No… That would break my diet.” She explained sadly. “My doctor said I shouldn’t have anything but shame, pouting, and dread for the rest of the day…”

“Oh…” Soos frowned in understanding, then sat down on the floor. He didn’t take a knee or squat or bend over, he just sat, with his legs straight ahead of him; low enough to look her straight in the eye. “That’s a sucky diet, dude.” He nodded wisely.

“Yeah…”

“Hmm…” Soos stroked his chin. “I’ve got an idea, dawg. Why don’t we make an exception? Just for right now? You break your diet and I’ll break mine, just for one crazy, bonkers, kooky snack.”

“Heh…” Mabel tried to chuckle. “Wait… You’re on a diet…?”

“Of course!” Soos nodded. “A diet of food! So how about it? You break your diet of sadness and eat an ice cream sandwich, and I’ll break my diet of food and eat some grass. Even-steven, dawg. Whaddaya say?”

Mabel laughed for real this time, though not as powerfully as normal. “Okay… We can do that.”

“Great! Anything to shorten up that face of yours!”

“Shorten my face…?”

“Yeah! You know how everybody always says, like, ‘why the long face’, or whatever? Well I just thought, like, why isn’t ‘why the short face’ a thing for when you cheer up? Ha ha… Right?”

“Woah, that’s so wise…” Mabel admitted, reaching for the ice cream. “Okay, you win. Let’s-”

A faint explosion echoed across the valley and in through the front door. They both froze.

“Duuuuuude the 4th of July isn’t for 3 more weeks. That means somebody’s gone totally insane… I don’t like it, duuuude…”

“That didn’t sound like a firework…”

They both rushed out onto the porch, their eyes searching for the source of the noise. Mabel found it: a disturbance in the distant air; a trailing plume of smoke somewhere above the town. It was thick and dark, almost greenish, surely no firework.

But that wasn’t all. There was something else just beneath the cloud; something hard and solid, spinning and falling out of sight, trailing more smoke behind it.

“Duuuuuude…” Soos commentated.

“What was…?” Mabel frowned.

The shape reappeared, this time bigger and nearer, speeding toward them through the trees. ‘Through’ the trees in the most literal sense; the trunks and branches were cut and smashed aside before it. Now it seemed to realize its fault, and increased in altitude, silhouetting briefly but clearly against the crisp blue sky.

Was that an alien spaceship?

It was a bit bigger than your average fighter jet, all dirty and encrusted in roots, vines, and plants, as if a giant had used a house-sized shovel to scoop up a mound of dirt, and there just happened to be a flying saucer buried in there.

“Duuuuuuuuuude!” Soos elaborated.

Mabel wasn’t really sure what to do. It was coming right for them, and, (judging by what it did to the trees,) it would probably level the house when it hit in just a few seconds… But Stan and Ford and Melody were in the house! She had to warn them!

Soos turned and rushed back into the house to do just that. “DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUDE!” He blared.

But Mabel’s brain had, unbidden, produced a single dark thought. If they’re inside, they will die. I only have time to save myself… So instead of crying out or ducking indoors, she dived for Waddles, snatched him up in both arms during her summersault, and came up running.

You monster. She told herself. Saving yourself when you should have saved them… How dare you?

Fortunately for the family and her conscience, the incoming ship didn’t hit the house. By now it had swerved rightwards and upwards; no longer aiming for them. Now it was headed for the yard. Now it wobbled and changed course again; not even aiming for the yard. Now it was going to pass by the property entirely, and land in the forest…

Mabel’s eyes followed it as it passed directly overhead. She saw the smoke billowing from its side. She saw the cracks spreading through its weakened hull. She felt the field of force rippling from its intact engines, she felt the heat radiating from its wrecked engines. She would have felt the intense and deadly ionizing radiation spilling from its burst reactor, but humans can’t feel such things.

Half a second later, the tip of its wing clipped the question mark off the weathervane.

Two seconds later, it passed out of sight into the trees.

A second after that, the ear-splitting sound of impact.

Mabel heard it bounce and tumble and smash, end-over-end and destructively, in much the same manner as a square wheel. Above the point where it had disappeared, she saw the tops of tall trees sway, topple, and shake.

In moments the landscape was silent again, and Mabel was left staring in awe at the damaged tree line, wondering what exactly she’d just witnessed.

What? Where? Why? Who?

ALIENS?

Waddles struggled in her arms, so she let him down, and began to feel through her pockets for tools. She didn’t really have any proper rescue equipment… Just some ribbons and a curiously pencil-shaped twig. If the aliens were trapped inside or in need of medical attention, she wouldn’t really be able to help them…

But were they beyond helping? She wondered (another unwelcome dark thought). That ship hit pretty hard, and it was more likely than not that everything and everyone inside was killed. Smashed or burned alive.

Maybe…

NO! NO! They can’t be dead! ROBBIE’S WRONG! THEY CAN’T!

She turned and began to sprint back for the house. Whatever was in there, it would have to wait 5 minutes, just 5 more minutes… Long enough for her to get proper help…

She opened the Shack’s door to enter, just as Soos and the Stans opened it to exit.

“What’s going on?” Stan stammered, almost tripping over Mabel. “What was that noise, some of us need our sleep!”

“It’s 3:00 in the afternoon, Stan!” Ford frowned.

“DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUE!” Soos explained.

“Guys!” Mabel pointed toward the trees. “It’saspaceshiporsomething andtheremightbepeopleinside andwe’vegottahelpthem andwelcomethemtoourworld andtakethemtoourleader andgivethemchocolatemilk!”

“Oh… OH!” Ford followed her pointing finger. He saw nothing in the trees, but was nonetheless fascinated. “Fascinating.” He assessed. “Are you sure it’s aliens…?”

“Well it was a big flying-saucer-shaped flying saucer!” Mabel explained. “So I think it was a flying saucer!”

“Well… Yes of course… But… But what did it look like?” Ford interrogated her. “Was it circular? Triangular? Teardrop-shaped? Manned or unmanned? Damaged…? How big was it?”

“Uh… Like, a house-sized circle? And it was all dirty…? I don’t know! But it was all on fire and stuff! We’ve gotta go!” She grabbed Ford by his second pinkie and began to drag him toward the trees. “It crashed and stuff and you’ve gotta come help!”

“Wait, fire…? Hold on! Hold on!” Ford pulled Mabel to a stop, and put out a hand to halt Stan as well. Then he reached way down deep into his trench coat, and pulled out a Geiger counter. “If my experience is any indication, then the vehicle could be nuclear, so we’ve got to be incredibly careful while approaching…” Ford pointed the counter toward the trees, whereupon it began clicking loudly and wildly. He glanced at the readout. “It could be… HOLY MOSES, WHAT THE HECK?!? Okay, stay back! EVERYBODY STAY BACK! Okay… Oh my I don’t even… I don’t… Okay. Think. Think Ford! Think…” He rubbed his temples. “Uh… Uh… Okay. Okay I’ve got it. Soos!” He turned to the larger man, and pressed a few coins of Aztec gold into his fat fist. “I need you to take Melody, Mabel, the pig, heck the goat, and everyone else on the property, load them up in our RV, and take them back down to town. Get them all set up, get a room at the motel or something, take them out for pancakes, I don’t care, but don’t. Bring. Them. Back. Here. Okay?”

Soos nodded solemnly. “I. Am. That. Hero.”

“WHAT? Great Uncle Ford!” Mabel gasped incredulously. “Why can’t I—”

“This entire area is soaking up Gamma rays!” Ford shushed her. “If you get much closer than this, I don’t want to be liable for your cells getting ionized from the inside out! Nobody’s getting closer than this, and everybody non-essential is getting much farther!”

“But—”

“No buts! Stan!” He turned to his brother. “I need you to call the Mayor’s office, and get him to cordon off the road to town. Nobody up here, especially not tourists, until we do something about the radiation. Then call Daniel Corduroy, and have him get his logging crew up here with excavators. We need to find this thing, get it buried, and QUICKLY. Call McGucket too, and tell him it’s the ‘N-word’; he’ll know what to do. Then call the Northwests, and mooch a favor out of them somehow. Get them to bribe somebody in the FBI to…”

“Yeah, uh…” Stan shook his head. “That’s a lot of points to remember, and a lot of phone numbers I don’t know.”

Ford bit his tongue. “Right.” He thought for a moment more. “Okay then, I’ll make the calls. You go down into my old lab, grab the hazmat suits, shovels, a crowbar, my magnet gun, and a plasma cutter, in case there’s anything alive inside we have to get out. Also two semi-automatic ray guns in case they’re better left inside. Also see if you can find the hitch and tow cables for Soos’ truck… And… And some worklights for tonight… And… Oh dear, what else…? We’ll need decontamination showers…”

“Sheesh, slow down Poindexter. That’s enough for the old noggin’ to remember at one time…” Stan nodded, already on his way.

“Okay… Okay…” Ford turned back to the wreck, and began to mutter out loud. “Okay. It’s gonna be alright. Depending on how fast we get it buried, the house can probably be sterilized and safe for human habitation within a few weeks… That area of forest will be a different matter. Once I get the phone calls out, nobody will dare get nearby except gnomes, and there’s nothing I can do about them… Can only pray it doesn’t get into the groundwater… Everybody’s getting mobilized, I just have to make a few calls… Just a few calls… What am I forgetting? What am I forgetting?!?”

Aliens, aliens… Why would there be aliens? The whole world to land in, why our YARD? No activity for thousands of years, why NOW? He savagely interrogated his memory. Mabel described a ship a lot like one of the shuttles from Crash Site Omega. And did she say ‘dirty’? So it must have come from on-planet, instead of from outer space… But everything at CSO is dead, so who on Earth could have-

Something clicked.

“MASON!” He suddenly cried, and began to sprint across the yard in the direction of the trees. “DEAR GOD IN HEAVEN AND ALL THE SAINTS! WENDY! MASON! KIDS, CAN YOU HEAR ME?!?”

Mabel had another dark thought.

As many people have been so kind as to point out over the years, Dipper wasn’t a particularly strong individual. To his memory, he’d never won a physical contest in his life, nor lifted more than about 40 pounds, nor grown more than 5 chest hairs.

At this particular moment, he was feeling that weakness more than ever. His head pounded and his inner ears sloshed and the smoke stung his eyes and lungs and he felt as if baked alive in his armor as the eerie blue flames poured from the ship’s wreckage. His arms and legs still ached from the flight, and the multitude of cuts, scrapes, bruises and injures from throughout the week were beginning to cry out, rubbing and cracking in the heat and demanding his attention. He could barely breathe, he could scarcely see, and his ears were no help either. In this state, walking forward in full armor was chore enough.

But he also had another person, half again his size and also fully armored, draped across his shoulders. One arm was hooked around her arm, the other around her leg.

Say what you may about his body, but his will was still his own.

His will forgot all else, and it ordered his leg ‘step’, and it stepped. And it told his other leg ‘step’ and it stepped. So did he move forward, boot-print by crooked boot-print, and he closed his eyes and he focused and somehow it worked. Slowly and dogmatically he came out from underneath the curved hull, up out of the trench and down the other side of the berm. About then he bumped into a tree with his eyes closed, which event he took as a sign that he’d escaped the worst of it.

But he could still feel the heat, smell the smoke, and hear the flames, so he forced his legs to keep on moving. Subconsciously he turned them about to point downhill, and he increased his snail’s pace just slightly.

Minutes later, perhaps longer, perhaps shorter, he stumbled, and managed to catch himself. If he hadn’t, he didn’t believe he would have been able to stand up again.

Minutes later, perhaps longer, perhaps shorter, his feet began to feel strangely cold and slippery. He finally dared to open his eyes, and a welcome sight partially emerged from the blur: that of a slow stream winding through the forest. Water… His brain equated it with safety.

He set Wendy down as gently as he could on the bank. It wasn’t very gently, and the motion tipped him over entirely. He crawled out from underneath her, and sat up… Good. Now he could actually help. He pushed his glove up between her helmet and her shoulder pads, and put a finger on her throat. Faintly through the material, he could feel a steady heartbeat.

Yes!

Now he pressed his gauntlet up to her face in front of her mouth. Very faintly, he could see mist forming on the smooth surface.

She was breathing!

Yes!

YES!

They were both alive… They were both safe!

Relived, he began to rack his brain for how to treat unconscious people. You were supposed to get their legs up higher than their heart… Right? Yeah, that’s it; their heads need more blood… He grabbed her ankle in one hand, her wrist in the other, and turned her around on the bank to get her head pointed downhill. Now… He thought he remembered you were supposed to remove any clothing or stuff that could restrict breathing… Right?

He began to unbuckle her armor, piece by piece. The helmet squeezed past her ears. The chainsaw chaps unbuckled and fell aside. The shoulder pads came undone and were removed. The gauntlets slipped off like gloves. The arm guards followed the gauntlets and the leggings followed the boots. Everything went into the stream; too shallow and slow to carry them away. The flannel jacket he left in place; seemed only decent.

What now?

Since she was breathing, that means she’d be fine in a little bit, and you didn’t need CPR… Right?

Well, it couldn’t hurt.

He knelt down by her head, and began to pump on her chest. It might be doing something, or it might not, or maybe the stimulus would wake her from whatever matter of horrid slumber this was.

The seconds ticked by as he pumped, and he wondered how fast you were supposed to do it. Does it even matter how fast you do it? Why would it matter? How does CPR even work? When am I supposed to kiss her? Wait, no, I mean breath in her mouth. Wait, no, I mean… Whatever it’s called. No, I ain’t gonna kiss her.

The seconds kept ticking by, and Wendy’s condition wasn’t changing.

But Dipper didn’t keep pumping forever, because a noise distracted him from behind.

Splash.

He glanced over his shoulder, and jumped. He tried to stand up as fast as he could, but was still a little tired and dizzy from the crash, and so ended up just staggering a little as he levered himself upright. “Ugh…!” He mumbled, weary, grim despair. “You again…”

Of course they weren’t safe.

Why would they be safe? How could that have ever been an expectation? So much had happened today: the argument with Robbie, the deer-bots, the swarming bugs, the drilling worms, the alien ghosts, the rocket birds, the heart-racing chase, the ship’s takeoff, the ship’s crash… So much, so long… Of course it wasn’t over now… How could it be over?

Dipper wished he had the magnet gun, but he’d left it back in the ship, so he couldn’t leave Wendy to go back for it now… But Wendy’s axe was lying in the stream where he’d tossed it. He knelt to pick it up, and whispered in her direction. “Sorry. Just gotta borrow this for a minute…”

With this utterly insufficient weapon in hand, he stood between Wendy and the enemy, and took the best fighting stance he could muster.

But the giant robotic cat just stood there, about 5 meters upstream, and looked at him.

She didn’t attack, she didn’t charge. She didn’t even seem interested in fighting.

In fact, she was looking even worse than Dipper felt. Her right front leg was bent unnaturally and held against her chest, while the tank tread on her left rear foot was dented and refused to spin. Her mouth was scared and blackened terribly, with several saws crooked and one missing entirely. A piece of splintered wood (of all things) was wedged into a joint her steel shoulder, evidently having been pounded into place during the crash. And her entire underbelly was blackened, bent, and flickering with blue flames.

“Uhh…” Dipper said. “Listen… I know you can’t hear me, seeing as how you don’t have ears… But I’ll give you a minute if you’ll give me a minute… Just a little respite…”

Keeping a careful eye on the creature, he took a knee in the water.

The robot lion seemed to agree, as she more or less collapsed into the liquid. Steam rose and hissed all around her burning plates. A sheen of leaked oil flowed around the rocks and past Dipper’s knees.

He blinked and nodded. “Yeah… Feel ya.”

Now he knelt further down, and let the water clean him too. It soaked past his armor and his clothes, it cleaned his injuries and quenched his burns. It hurt, but this was the good kind of hurt. The kind that felt like it could heal… He cupped some in his hands and splashed his face. It ran off grey with ash.

So they both sat there for a minute or so, letting the water ebb and flow around them, trying to find a peace in the calm before the coming storm.

Finally, Dipper fancied his head was completely clear of the headache from the crash, and a few deep breaths prepared his system for what was next to come. From his kneeling pose, he looked back up at the robot lion, and she looked back at him.

He took note of the serious damage all around her mouth and saws, then glanced back up the hill and saw the ship in the distance, still smoldering and smoking. And he remembered the explosion in the port-side wing. “It was you.” He broke the silence. “You clung to the ship, through all that flight… And all the while you were drilling into the engines… The crash was all you… Wasn’t it?”

She didn’t reply, of course.

“Well.” Dipper sighed. “I… I guess I respect that. That’s… Grit. I guess. You did good. You brought us down. Heck… You even took out Wendy… Right now she must look pretty dead to you… Meaning you must think you’ve half-won. But she’ll be fine… She’ll be fine.”

The robot still just stared, in that soulless, empty way that animals always do.

“You… You know what?” Dipper asserted, after a brief silence. “I… I GET it. I GET it. I mean that, I get it. I get why you do what you do. I get why it means so much to you, and I know why you’ll never stop until we’re dead.

“And I’m SORRY. There, I said it: I’m sorry. I’m sorry we accidentally stole your son. I’m sorry we stuck you with that tracking device when you tried to come back for him. And I’m SORRY we attacked you, and I’m SORRY we shot you. I’m SORRY we invaded your territory, and tricked you time and time again. And I’m SORRY we killed your entire pack when we took off in that ship… I…”

She still stared.

“And I wish I could say we never meant you any harm, but that would be a lie because we ALL knew it would end like this: end in xenocide. Before we even started out, we agreed to destroy you if you turned out dangerous. And now that day is here, and we’ve got the Power Control Coupling for the big ship. We’re gonna use it to fire up its reactor, and smash your entire little world, with all you beasts inside it.

“It… It was inevitable; it was even responsible! Because if not us, then who? Most likely somebody who’d kill you anyway. Or maybe somebody who’d weaponize you? Captivate you, domesticate you, plug you into machines that turn you into living factories? With… With your kind among our kind, both of us would suffer…

“It… It was! IT WAS US OR YOU! And you’re not people, you’re just animals, which means it’s not murder, it’s not cruel, it isn’t even wrong! It was the right thing to do, and for that I’m SORRY! I’m SORRY your extinction was the order we gave… The order we followed… I’m sorry.”

The aperture over her eye blinked at him.

“…I never once hated you.” He said. “I’ve hated enemies before… But I never hated you. Because I get it.”

It seemed to understand.

“Now, I don’t know if you hate me, or if we just… If we just know we have to kill each other. But if you get my body language here, could you PLEASE just leave it be today? We’re both tired and hurt. Just turn around and walk away. I don’t want to kill you, but… But a girl’s laying behind me, and it just wouldn’t be fair for you to get the drop on us when she’s helpless…

“And… And she’s my very best friend in all the world, and… She means more to me than you could ever understand, and… And we’ve had a really long day and we were so happy that we’d finally won… That we’d escaped… And… Everything was going so good… And next time she’s awake, I think I’m gonna ask her on a date… And… And it’ll be my very first good date…

“So… So because of all that, I won’t let you get even one step closer to her. Save yourself by coming back another day… Please. I’ll have to kill you, and I don’t want to.”

It seemed almost like she considered the offer for a minute. And then her back shuddered, and with a groan of stressed metal and worn gears, she struggled back to her feet. Her antennae retracted and her head lowered as she took a battle stance.

Dipper sighed. “You know what? I still get it.” His voice lowered. “I totally get it. I… I guess I woulda done the same thing…” Using Wendy’s axe like an old man would a walking Stick, Dipper hoisted himself back upright. With his other hand, he unbuckled the chainsaw chaps from his arms, and held them like some kind of whip.

So prepared with the very best of the very little he had on hand, he turned to face the beast.

Her one red eye stared back into his, and her saws slowly extended.

“We don’t have to do this.” Dipper offered one last time. “Go home. Lick your wounds, take a nap, do whatever it is robots do when you’re looking like crap. Just escape… Just like we were trying to do with that ship. Forget us…”

She limped a step towards him.

Not to be outdone, Dipper took a step forward as well, keeping himself directly between the machine and Wendy’s prone form. “That… That was the last one!” He commanded her, and he felt his voice rising to the challenge. “That was the very last! If you take one more step, you dumb and heartless animal, just one more…! I swear that I will murder you dead where you stand!”

She understood.

And her will told her foot ‘step’, and it stepped.

Minutes later, perhaps more, perhaps less, a bright flash of blue light woke Wendy up.

As her eyes fluttered open, the first thing that drew her attention was the pain in her head. It screamed at her as she moved, throbbing and pounding with her heartbeat. She sat up and rolled over sorely, allowing her eyes to land on a narrow, shallow creek. Oh good, water… She felt thirsty… And sick… Really sick. The motion of rolling over caused her head to spin, and her stomach couldn’t take anymore. Before she could take a drink, she keeled over and puked in the stream.

Ugh…

Gross…

Wait, why does my puke have blood in it? That’s not a good sign.

Wait…

It wasn’t the puke. The creek itself had blood in it. And a spreading slick of thick, black oil mixed with the red.

Her eyes followed the flow upstream, and there they landed on an enormous, dark shape. The body of a robot lion. She was lying just about a few meters from where Wendy had been sleeping.

And she was utterly dead.

Wendy shakily stood to her feet, and took a step toward the machine. And that was when she noticed another, much smaller shape, reclining in the water against the beast’s metal belly.

“She cheated…” Dipper’s tiny voice whispered.

Now Wendy could see her friend’s entire body, and she froze, shocked. In an instant, she took in everything: The blood at the bottom of a crater in his helmet. The slashes in his belly beneath the shreds of his armor. The punctures in his chest. His broken leg. His missing arm.

“DUDE!” She rushed up to him and he fell into her arms. Trying to keep him still, she stripped off her jacket and undershirt, and began to tear both into strips. Which bleeding to plug first? There was too much… Maybe his stomach? That seemed reasonable, right? “Dude, hang in there man, I… You’re not gonna…!” She realized she was lying. “You CAN’T die! You can’t!”

“…Wendy…” He wheezed.

“Come on, man! Come on! Stay with me!” She slapped him on the cheek.

“I… I love you…”

“YEAH, NO KIDDING, REALLY?!? Come on! You’ve gotta…! Dipper! Dipper, are you listening?!? You gotta pull through! Listen to me! I love you too! You gotta fight!”

Fight he did, this one last time. Down to the furthest reaches of his mind, he struggled and raged at the encroaching darkness. Trying to force back at its overbearing advance, trying to strike at it, screaming at it, pleading with it, telling it a tale of everything he’d ever wanted to do but hadn’t done. The things he’d wanted to apologize for, the promises he’d wanted to keep, the mysteries he would have solved, the good he would have done, the lives he would have saved, the family he would have made, the adventures he would have lived…

He had had such dreams!

The darkness carelessly shrugged aside his protests. All the hope he once had cherished, he saw crushed and strangled before it, torn asunder and scattered like dust in the wind.

In the final dying light, he thought he heard Wendy’s voice calling out.

“Hang in there man!” She was telling him. “You’re gonna pull through one way or another! I know it! I PROMISE YOU LIFE!”

But her words were just words.

And death does not wait for words.