Chapter Text
There was something almost blistering about the arctic sun. On days with no clouds, despite the temperatures hovering right around freezing, you could feel sweat at your back if you didn't find the shade.
Which is why, despite how many times Stanley called him "Ridiculous" for it, Stanford always had one of those small retractable umbrellas with him.
Another reason, of course, was using its re-tractability as a weapon.
"Fire, Grunkle Ford!!!"
And the sturdy combination of metal, plastic and nylon slammed the huldrakarl directly in the throat as Mabel pulled back his hair to expose it.
"That's for leading me on, you creep!!"
Ford couldn't stop a proud grin at her proclamation, and he pulled the umbrella back to wack the moronic folkloric being in the face.
"And that is for thinking you could kill my Grunkle!! Does he look like a 'feeble human' now?? Huh??" The surprisingly strong teen forcefully pulled the huldrakarl back and then used that momentum to toss him off onto the forest floor. "Now scram!!"
The folkloric being - furry digitrade legs showing under his long coat - stood up with a shiver and growled out at them "You were too high maintenance anyway!"
"My niece is the perfect amount of maintenance!" Ford valiantly defended "You, however, are clingy and desperate! Now run off before I show you my gun!"
Despite the roll of his eyes, the young huldrakarl did just that, running off into the forests Mabel and him had just been hiking through before Ford had burst in and ruined the being's carefully-laid trap to take Mabel away forever.
Hah! Fat Chance!
As the two of them watched the being rush off into the wood, Mabel let out an exhausted breath, and Ford startled when she swayed dangerously. "Ah! Mabel!"
Mabel caught herself before her great uncle needed to, and she took a deep, deep, overly-dramatic breath before flashing him a quick grin to reassure him that it had just been a moment of relief. "Hey uh, didja know that Huldrakarls are part of like, whole community-things? its kinda cool. Hullfolk an' stuff"
Ford lets out his own breath, though it's more similar to a slightly defeated sigh. "Yes, yes dear. Lets get back to the boat, hm?"
Mabel takes another second to get hear head on straight with a shake, she looks up at her uncle with a grin. "Yeah, We gotta tell Grunkle Stan and Dipper about what happened! They won't believe it!"
"Hah! I'm sure. Considering the two of them were too busy fishing, i'm sure we'll be the ones with the winning story this evening." Ford encouraged, gently patting his niece's back.
"You bet! Let's go!"
"Let!! My!! Grunkle!!! Go!! You!! Wet!!! Horse!!!"
Dipper repeatedly beat back the skeletal looking bakhaasten with his fishing rod as it thrashed about in the shallow part of this river that - just a few moments ago - his great uncle and him had been enjoying the peace of for the last hour and change.
And then the horse-beast just, popped up out of the water!! And Stanley decided to get on it's back so that Dipper could get a picture on his new phone, despite Dippers repeated warnings that this was a creature called a "Brook Horse"-
And here they are.
"Dipper - Dipper stop hitting it! I can get off!!" Stan tried to placate the kid by getting himself off of the damned thing, and only succeeded in pissing off the horse even more than it already was.
"Let him go and I'll stop hitting you!!" Dipper warned the beast, the collapsible fishing rod in his hands looking more like a damned baton than a fishing rod, and serving a similar purpose. The creature neighed in annoyance at the action, looking genuinely hurt by the attack, which Dipper tried not to think about in the moment - he could afford to be distracted. "Let him go!!"
Then, suddenly, a punch was thrown and landed directly on the ghostly horses elongated face, and that seemed to be the final straw for it. Stan - the puncher- was bucked off the horse so hard he went flying a good 6 or 7 feet in the air before landing with a harsh roll.
"Grunkle Stan!!" Dipper quickly turned away from the ghost, and ran towards his uncle, who was letting out a pained groan.
"Ooh… I'm gonna be feelin' that for a few days" The older man grumbled out, eyes flitting from his nephew to the river, where the horse-creature had disappeared.
"Are you okay? Do you need me to call Grunkle Ford?? Can you walk??" Dipper's anxious word vomit seemed to come out all as one jumbled question.
"Take a breather, worry-wart. I'm achin' but I'm fine." Stan reassured.
Dipper didn't actually look all that relieved. "Thank goodness - You could have drowned, Grunkle Stan! That was so-"
"I know, kid!" Stan quickly cut off that train of thought "Gosh, Didn't think that stupid horse myth was one of the true ones…."
Dipper grumbled for a moment before letting it go, running over to where the two of them had parked those fancy rental bikes (They'd only paid for one of them. No way they were paying that much for both) and grabbed the picnic blanket they hadn't bothered to use. He rushed back over, and draped it over his partially-dampened uncle "We gotta get back to the ship, Grunkle Stan"
"I know I know - gimmie a minute!" Stan grumbled out, sitting himself up on the ground and appreciating the blanket keeping the wind off his soaked pants. Dipper looked more manic than he usually did, probably acting more appropriately for the situation than Stan was, but it wasn't exactly a helpful state of mind to be in.
"Okay, okay, how about we take like, 5 minutes, then make our way back." Stan suggested "Just take a breather"
Dipper grumbled at the idea, but sat himself down right next to his uncle "That was… weird and scary - felt like we were back in Gravity Falls'r something"
Stan chuckled "Yeah, it did have that sort of absurd dumbness to it" he admitted "But! This means that tonight we'll have a hell of a winning story"
Dipper perked up at that "Oh yeah - oh, I can't imagine Mabel and Grunkle Ford having a better story than almost getting kidnapped by the Bakhaasten"
"Thought it was called a Brookie Horse or somethin'?" Stan questioned.
"Brook Horse, Grunkle Stan. But we're in Scandinavia - We need to call it by its actual name" Dipper reasoned.
"Back-Hassen-whatever is too complicated" Stan complained.
"Bakhaasten" Dipper corrected again.
"got something in your throat?" Stan teased.
Dipper groaned, and Stan grinned.
"What? No way you guys win! We literally kicked a huldra's butt! You just hit a horse!"
"That horse is a legendary creature of death! Huldras are just hollow-backed faeries!"
….Dipper and Mabel were going to argue about that for a while, it seemed.
"You're alright, Stanley?" Ford asked as the two men stood by the small kitchen in their beloved boat, watching over the food that was heating up.
"Yeah, yeah I'm fine. Horse-thing just dragged me into the water up to my waist. Dipper got to it before it tried anything insidious" Stan once again waved off the life-or-death situation.
"Well, thank goodness for our proactive niblings" Stanford mused "Pass me the salt, please"
Stan rolled his eyes, grabbing the little salt shaker for his brother "Doesn't that fish already have a ton of salt?"
"The salt is not for the fish, Stanley - its for the potatoes!"
"That you're putting with the fish!"
This sort of lively double-debate had become common-place in the two or so weeks since the younger twins had joined the older twins on board the Stan'o'War II for the summer.
It had admittedly been a bit of a hard sell to get the kids all the way to Scandinavia, but once Stan and Ford had A: Explained where the missing twin came from, and B: Reminded them that they had upended their children's lives with the divorce (Which, while mutual, was proving complicated finance-wise), the answer had become clear. It also helped that the twins regaled both parents separately with a quite informative power-point that ended with what Stanley called "strong persuasion" and Ford called "an actionable threat"
And so, the two kids booked a flight to Denmark, where they were picked up right in Copenhagen before the ship made its way west and up the Norwegian coast.
They were currently docked in a small village called "Eidshaug", headed up north to "Andenes", which was as north as the brothers dared to go with Dipper and Mabel - hoping to show the kids the northern lights.
So far, all they'd done was get into trouble. The best kind of trouble - the fun kind! But still - it was certainly keeping the seniors on their toes.
But, that was how it had started. This was how it was going: They'd found a routine on the ship - something that came easy to all of them after a little trial-and-error those first few days.
The younger twins would typically pick which older twin they'd spend the day with, and the day would shake out in a myriad of different ways depending on the errands, chores, and activities that the elder twins has scheduled. Despite a couple of… supernatural hiccups …. everything had been going smoothly.
"I am following this recipe to the letter, Stanley!"
"Maybe if you'd used fresh fish, sure! But you insisted on taking that nasty salted stuff instead"
"Stanley, It is a substitute the cook book approves of! I took all the necessary steps-"
And now there were two separate arguments going on in the same space.
"The Huldrakarl was totally-"
"Its too salty still! Add another potato!"
"No way, the Bakhaasten-"
"Read the Recipe, Stanley!"
The cacophony lasted well into the dinner session, with the topics changing over several times and only stopping once everyone was eating.
"… Huh. Not too salty" Stan admitted as he took a good bite of the stew's contents.
"Humph" Was how Stanford responded, and the argument broke out all over again. This time with Dipper and Mabel chiming in.
By the end of the meal, they'd all stopped to watch the little TV on the ship - which was tuned to some Scandinavian film none of them had seen, and were decidedly making fun of and riffing on instead of being fully engaged.
…And then an alarm went off.
"Ooooh looks like its time for Grunkle Ford to call his Giiiiirl Frieeeeeend" Mabel teased out.
Stanford huffed, having gotten used to the teasing, at least a little "They are my partner, not my girlfriend - as I keep telling you!"
"Partner doesn't have the same ring to it" Mabel argued "Plus, Mx Nell would appreciate the bit"
"They do like a good bit" Dipper agreed.
Stan laughed "Go on, call your girlfriend or whatever you two wanna call it when you talk every other day and 'wish' each other 'well'."
Stanford scoffed "We wish each other well because we do wish each other well, Stanley!"
"Sure, Grunkle Ford" Dipper felt the need to add, and Stanford decidedly waved them off, leaving them to the Scandinavian movie on the tiny box television.
"Do you guys think maybe I am layin' the teasing on thick? I don't want to make Grunkle Ford like, actually uncomfortable" Mabel asks as Ford left in the little crowded 'living' space on the boat.
"Nah, he'd tell yah, sweetheart" Stanley reassured with a rather careless hand wave.
"I dunno Grunkle Stan…" Mabel looked at Dipper, who continued her train of thought for her like any good twin should
"Yeah, maybe he's just acting like it doesn't make him uncomfortable or something" the boy reasoned with a shrug
Stan scoffed "Oh come on, he'll at least tell me if his feelings are hurt, and he hasn't told me yet! Keep up the teasing!"
Dipper and Mabel looked at each other, before looking back at their uncle "Bold words from the guy who turns all red when we ask how Mister McGuckett's doing" Mabel grinned.
"Whoa, hey, hey, I didn't say you could tease me-"
The night ended when the movie was over and Stan insisted they get themselves into their bunk bed - stating they had an early day if they wanted to make good headway up the coast to see those northern lights.
"We're admittedly a bit behind after that whole uh, debacle with those freaky looking seagulls" Stan grimaced. "But we've already made up for it with today's sailing, so we should be back on that schedule Ford wants us on by tomorrow if we get an early start."
"Did Grunkle Ford ever figure out what the deal was with those things?" Mabel contemplated "They were like. Vampire Birds - kinda crazy"
"He's still figurin' it out - wants to pick up a few more books 'bout the shore folklore around here to double check sources - but you can ask him about that tomorrow" Stan replied, standing by the entrance to the bed-area (Calling it a room was generous) "Alright kiddos, good night!"
"G'night Grunkle Stan!" The twins say in unison, and Stan closes the thick curtain to let them sleep in darkness. The man decided to head to the front of the ship, where - on the upper deck - Stanford was still on the video call.
"Are you certain who you met was in fact a Huldrakarl? I was unaware they could even travel!" He heard Stanford was exclaiming rather excitedly.
"Definitely. Friend's friend's son's father - not her husband" Stan heard the grainy response, and rolled his eyes
"Ey, Poindexter - time for bed!" he called as he leaned on the man and came into frame of the camera "And Heya, Doc"
"Hello, Stanley" Nell replied, looking about ready for bed themselves "How's the Scandinavian summer treating you?"
"Like autumn" He grins "Hope my brother isn't boring you"
"If he's boring me, I'm boring him" Nell responds in kind with their own small smirk "And I can see it is getting late for you"
"Ah, yes, I suppose it is." Stanford acknowledged "We will have to pick up this conversation tomorrow. Have you noted it?" He asked.
Nell lifted up a little notepad, showing her scribbles with some notes for "Next Time - All good"
"Excellent - Do have a pleasant evening, Nell. Wishing you well"
"Wish you well right back, Stanford - Have a good night, both of you. Sleep well"
"Right back at yah, Nurse" Stan gave her a wink, before deliberately shutting the laptop on his brother's behalf, and immediately beginning the benign teasing "Man, you two really were at it"
"We are intellectuals capable of maintaining a conversation" Stanford argued, getting up and following his twin out onto the deck into the chilled night "You really should try it sometime"
Stan scoffs "You wound me" he flatly retorts before going over to the cooler they kept tied down with bungee chords (and locked while the kids were awake) "Drink?"
"I thought it was time for bed, hm?" His brother gave him a playful brow raise.
"Sue me for wanting to spend a little quality time with my brother without two ankle-biters running around" Stan took out a beer, opening it right there on the railing.
Stanford chuckled "A beer, then"
Stanley tossed the bottle, and Ford opened it with his bear hands, getting a grimace from Stan. "Don't do that. You'll rip your hand open"
"My hands are calloused enough" Ford chuckled "Now, how about we discuss tomorrows plans-"
The conversation didn't last very long after that - maybe 30 minutes - but it was enough time for the brothers to laugh and finish their drinks before turning in for the night. Considering how last summer had gone at this point - With Stan struggling, Ford dimension-hopping and the younger twins getting into trouble without any adult assistance, it seemed this summer was already shaping up to be a marked improvement over the last one.
The last thought Stan had before drifting off, lulled to sleep by the soft snores and breathing of his family, was that nothing could get better than this.