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Summer is easily the best time of the year that children wait for. No school, no homework and no teachers telling them they can't sleep in. Parents hope their kids will go out and play with their friends so they can also have time to relax. Though shipping kids off to their extended family was actually a lot more common than one might think.
So when Mabel and Dipper landed in Gravity falls they weren't sure what to expect. Meeting their grand uncle went as well as Dipper expected but Mable was vibrant and bubbly the whole time. Though Dipper couldn't help but notice the branches from the trees above, there was someone watching them as they arrived at the porch of their great uncle's house. But it disappeared once Dipper looked back, perhaps he was just being paranoid.
The whole trip to gravity falls was annoying, Mabel was far more excited for grass and boys while Dipper flinched at every moving shadow. No shock when Dipper and his sister slept above the creepiest tourist trap. It wasn't the fact that the antiques were obviously fake but getting up in the middle of the night to get water and half delirious was not pleasant when someone just lives a jar of eyeballs in the kitchen. Dipper did not have a fun time with that choking hazard.
On top of all of that the twins had to work in the shop instead of checking out the town. Dipper grumbled as he got assigned to sign duty, he really didn't want to go out. Any time he entered the woods it felt like someone was watching him or something. He went in anyway because his uncle didn't care and blew Dipper off. While leaving Wendy, one of the stack employees, looked like she wanted to say something but went back to her phone.
Out while hunting signs Dipper came across a mysterious hide vent that had a book inside. At least now his summer has gotten interesting. Mabel, who had been seemingly following him, wanted to know more about the book too. So he puts the book in the bookbag he brought with him and decides it would be better to not read the book in the middle of the creepy woods. While walking back to the mystery shack there was a giant white van that looked like it came out of a sci-fi movie parked in the lot. A very loud boom of a laugh came from inside the van before it turned on and backed up.
In the dust of a very reckless driver that almost hit Mabel had Dipper not pulled her back were two kids who only had two bags each other. Almost a parallel of Dipper and Mabel when they arrived though they were definitely older than the twins. A long red haired girl and a boy with messy black hair, Dipper was going to get closer when a high pitch squeal from the stack stopped him in his tracks. Wendy had started running at full speed at the girl while the boy inched away covering his ears.
"Jazzy! Girl Oh my god! You have to tell me everything, Amity Park is Gravity Falls sister city after all." The taller girl spun Wendy around her arms and the boy inched away just far enough to not get hit with Wendy's limbs. The girl stopped spinning Wendy when she spotted Dipper and Mabel.
"Awe you didn't tell me we have new summer buddies! Hi, My name's Jasmine but you can call me Jazz. That's my brother Danny, say hello." Jazz set Wendy down before tugging her brother who was clearly trying to escape. She yanked him but the hoodie and from personal experience Dipper already knows that hurts.
Danny looked uncanny up close, almost like he was too perfect to be born normal. It wasn't that bad but Dipper took one look at him before looking at his sister and he could already see the heart eyes. Of course Danny's poor timing fell in line with Mabel's boy crazy phase. Slightly prayers that Mabel doesn't pressure him into doing something he doesn't want to do.
Introductions aside Danny wasn't much of a talker, his sister did most of the talking while they stood in the parking lot. Turns out the Fenton siblings and Wendy were cousins, they were dropped off in Gravity falls while the Fenton parents went to a science convention in California. Thankfully for their quick unexpected arrival, their grunkle (Mabel's new word) told all of them to buzz off from in front of his shack. Which pretty much meant a free day, Wendy had her dad's pick-up truck so Jazz and Danny just stacked their things and the 5 kids went for a ride back to town.
Jazz and Danny were not new to town at all, they spent every summer in Gravity Falls for one reason or another. Dipper tried focusing on the fact he was sitting in the back of Wendy's pickup without a seatbelt and she drove fast. Danny on the other hand looked so unfazed by his cousin's driving, Mabel was laughing and cheering every time Wendy hit a bump. Clearly Dipper was the only one concerned about their well being.
"Didn't my dad almost hit you two with his van? Trust me the trip here was so much worse." Danny didn't even bother looking up from his phone when he said that. At least Dipper now knows who almost sent his sister to the hospital and that dangerous driving is possible genetically.
"So Danny, what do you do for fun?" Mabel asked in the same pitch she made when flirting with a guy. Dipper couldn't already see where this was going and he wasn't going to be able to stop Mabel once she got going. But Danny on the other hand finally looked up from his phone as Wendy started to slow down.
"Go with my friends and girlfriend to an abandoned mansion and toss paint balloons at the walls we hadn't destroyed yet." Effectively with one sentence Dipper could see his sister melt at the mention of a girlfriend.
Despite his sister trying to advance, Dipper was actually kind of relieved that he was taken. Something about Danny was a tad bit unsettling and he wasn't exactly sure what it was but it was definitely there. They still haven't arrived at their location so Dipper decided to take out the book that he found in the woods and Mabel leaned in so she could see what he was reading. Danny went back to his phone and completely stopped paying attention to them.
The journal was a clear notebook about everything that happens in gravity falls. Apparently Dipper wasn't just being paranoid; there was actually something wrong with Gravity Falls. From murderous gnomes to vampires and everything in between. Then there was the one page that said to trust no one, well his grunkle didn't believe Dipper when told him about being watched. He wonders if that applies to everyone, even those who weren't from Gravity Falls.
There was an abrupt stop when Wendy tossed Dipper and Mabel into each other hard. The book flew out of Dipper's hands and hit Danny right in the face falling into his lap. Dipper didn't expect Danny to look as annoyed as he did but Danny just pinched the book that was in his lap and tossed it back to Dipper. Almost as if the book looked like a plague or a disease with how careless Danny treated it. Danny seemed completely uninterested by it at least, Dipper didn't have to worry about him stealing it.
They stopped in front of Greasy's Diner because Jazz was hungry and apparently Wendy had questions that she still hadn't answered. Amity Park kept coming up since that's where the Fentons were from though Danny kept shifting in his booth seat whenever Jazz was going to mention something. Whatever it was about Amity Park, Danny somehow silently steered the conversation from his hometown to Wendy's school year. Wendy was apparently only older than Danny by a few months and his birthday was in August.
Being surrounded by high schoolers wasn't exactly what Dipper was expecting when they came but it wasn't that bad. Though it clearly wasn't what Mabel was expecting since she took the window seat and was mopping at her lost chance still. He tugged on Mabel to get her attention when the waitress came to get their order and beamed back to her usual self when Jazz said she would buy them lunch. Who could complain when someone offers to give them free pancakes.
"You know we spend a lot of time here but I don't think I really know much about you two. Also not to be mean but how old are both of you?" Jazz smiled brightly while looking at Mabel and Dipper.
"12!" Mabel said with excitement.
"12." Dipper mumbled.
Jazz nodded and went on about glitter bombs she used to make when she was 12. Of course that got Mabel into talking to her about how effective glitter is with pranks. Dipper moved away from his twin because she reached across the table to grab syrup while covering his ears because she was talking very loudly. Jazz turned to Danny before poking him in the side to get him to start talking as well since he was silent the entire time.
Her brother grumbled cuz he clearly didn't want to talk but one pointed fork at him and Danny caved immediately. He was spacing out because he asked what they were talking about and when Jazz said they were talking about when they were 12 Danny seemed confused. Danny squinted at the ceiling before deciding to just say that he remembers vaguely what he did when he was 12. Dipper was kind of confused because technically that would have been 2 years ago for Danny and the fact that he didn't remember was quite concerning.
"Dude what do you mean you vaguely remember?" Wendy reached over Jazz's shoulder to punch Danny in the arm which he swiftly dodged.
"I mean I vaguely remember because honestly the past year has been so busy it feels like 2 years have passed within one year. You know with the whole thing going on over there." Danny looked between his cousin and the twins while mildly gesturing in a random direction.
Whatever happened in Amity Park the Fentons did not want anyone outside of their family knowing what happened. Amity Park on one hand wasn't a city that Dipper remembers or heard about on the news so he wasn't exactly sure what to make of it. Since Wendy says that they're technically sister cities perhaps the journal has notes about Amity Park. The rest of the lunch went as quickly as possible after they dropped the topic of Amity Park.
Wendy was going to drive her cousin back to her place so she offered to drop the twins back off at the shack but Dipper wanted to take his sister to go see something. So they split ways with Wendy driving off with her family. Mabel was mildly confused on where Dipper was going to take her but she was excited nonetheless. That excitement was short-lived when they arrived at the Gravity Falls library. There was barely anybody inside which was a good thing.
Mabel complained because she was wondering why they were even there in the first place when they could have just gone back to the shack. However Dipper simply put the journal on the table and said that it would be easier for them to go over the journal and a private place where there weren't a lot of people then in the shack. On top of that he wanted to look up Amity Park on the library computer. The only reason his sister even agreed to this was so that she could search up other stuff after he finished using the computer to look up Amity Park.
Looking up Amity Park on the computer wasn't what he was expecting. First of all apparently it was considered the most haunted place in the US, secondly they had video proof and evidence all over the Internet of ghosts. Ghosts were real and nobody was talking about it, well mine is all the people who live in Amity Park clearly. Speaking of the city it had its own heroes and villains almost like cartoon characters from a show or a comic.
Mabel was so excited the moment that they realized Amity had heroes, they went through the list cuz apparently they have a fan site. By the end of doom scrolling that website, Mabel had very thoroughly declared that Red Huntress was her favorite hero now. Dipper on the other hand was more curious about Phantom and apparently his clone was called Wisp. Cloning was possible, ghosts from the afterlife were real in either saving or attacking people.
Dipper checked the journal and it seems that even ghosts were mentioned briefly for a section. This was the third journal of the series or perhaps if you found the other ones they would most likely have more information about ghosts. So it wasn't just a Gravity Falls thing; there were other towns similar that were dealing with the same issue but just different monsters or legends. That just made Dipper wonder about how many legends or myths were actually real.
The section in the journal didn't go into immense detail about ghosts but it did say to be wary of them since they are able to possess the human body. The last thing Dipper wanted was him or his sister to get possessed so probably it would be best for them to steer away from Amity Park if they got sent there one day. Well Mabel went through the website, she gasped drawing Dipper's attention back to the screens. They're in full view of a picture of a family that looked very recognizable by their two children.
The head scientists in research of ghosts and the paranormal just so happened to be the Fenton siblings' parents. How ironic that the old photo that was used on the Amity Park website had Danny looking less unsettling than he does now. Perhaps the big boom of ghosts that apparently happened about a year ago caused him to stress out. With his parents being the forefront for that research you can completely understand what he meant by it feeling like 2 years instead of one since he last visited Gravity Falls.
"Ew, I forgot that photo was even taken. They could have taken such a better photo." Dipper and Mabel were startled by one Danny Fenton presumably appearing out of nowhere. He didn't even seem mildly shocked that the twins were looking at a website with his picture on it. Maple tried playing it off when she got caught doing something embarrassing but Danny just shrugged it off.
"You don't seem concerned that that picture is just on a website at all." Dipper squinted at Danny because he's trying to figure out how he got in without either of the twins hearing him. It was definitely a bell on the library door. They should have heard it chimed when it was opened.
"1, trust me that is not the only photo of me that is in this Amity Park circle at all. 2, I can tell that you're trying to guess how I got in but trust me. I have broken into more places a lot harder than this one. This was child's play." Danny smirked, Danny was not concerned by how smug he was but more on the fact that he confessed that he has broken into other places before. High schoolers really were a world-class difference from middle schoolers. "Bus with how many times Amity Park was just referenced during lunch I'm not surprised that either of you wanted to look into it. Especially you."
Dipper wasn't sure if he should have been offended by the gesture. Since Danny seems to not care Mabel completely did a 180 and changed the subject back to Red Huntress because that was her new idol. That caused Danny to snort. He pulled out his phone and sent a text message to who knows before telling Mabel about stories of witnessing Red Huntress in action. Watching his twin light up like a Christmas tree was better than her moping around after getting rejected but the way Danny told his stories was mildly concerning.
The way Danny spoke about the Red Huntress it was almost like it was a personal level of connection between them. But according to the website the only person that actually talked to the Red Huntress was Phantom. Unless Phantom was possessing Danny sometimes which would honestly make sense since he was the son of Ghost Hunters. Though that sounded a little too uncanny and very unrealistic but it was a possibility since the journal said ghosts were unpredictable. But there was no way to actually confirm that because there were no physical or digitally good images of Phantom.
Which was very odd since all the other ghosts, the destructive ones, had good pictures. Dipper asked Danny why there were no good pictures of phantom and Danny just said that people can never get a good picture of something that moved constantly. But there were definitely several videos of Phantom standing still and they were still blurry regardless. When Dipper pointed that out today honey he got a little bit agitated but just shrugged it off as maybe it being a weird ghost effect that he only has.
Disney seems to know more about Phantom and the Red Huntress that he was letting on. Perhaps Dipper was right in the whole possession theory that he had before and if he was right did that mean that Phantom was with them right now. So he asked Danny another question: do the ghosts leave Amity? Danny just shrugged and said he has never seen a ghost outside of Amity before but he wouldn't be surprised if there were some. Well that wasn't comforting at all.
He was going to try and interrogate Danny a little bit more but some weird blues smoke came out of his mouth and like that Danny was gone. He sped off towards the door which chimed when Danny opened it this time. Whatever got him in a tizzy, Dipper was very much interested in looking into that so he grabbed his journal and he was about ready to follow him. He asked Mabel if she was going to come with and she said no because she wanted to look more into her new favorite hero.
Dipper left his twin in the library and left to see that Danny was nowhere inside. Whatever Danny ran to he was going to find out what Danny was hiding because he was clearly hiding something. Well there was information or the fact that Phantom is possibly possessing his body. Dipper did not trust him mildly and that was from the very beginning because Danny has been unsettling and just a little bit unnerving the entire time since he has arrived.