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Dipper Pines woke up with the uncomfortable certainty that something was wrong.
He stared at the ceiling.
Saturday.
Sunlight was streaming through the window of the attic bedroom, birds were chirping outside, and somewhere downstairs, Mabel was loudly singing a song that appeared to consist entirely of the words waffle and Saturday.
Everything seemed normal.
Which was exactly the problem.
Dipper sat up.
He remembered Friday.
He remembered staying up late at the Shack, reading through Journal 3 while Mabel attempted to convince him that cryptozoology was “just regular zoology with better branding.”
He remembered going to bed.
And then—
Saturday morning.
Dipper frowned.
“Wait.”
He grabbed his phone from the bedside table.
Saturday.
He checked the date.
Saturday.
He stared at the screen.
“No.”
He scrambled out of bed and opened the door.
“MABEL!”
“WHAT?”
She appeared at the bottom of the stairs wearing mismatched socks and a sweater covered in glittery pine trees.
“Did anything happen yesterday?”
Mabel blinked.
“Yesterday?”
“Friday. After I went to bed.”
“You mean after you fell asleep?”
“I don’t know! Did I—”
Mabel squinted at him.
“Dipper, did you sleepwalk again?”
“No!”
“Nightmare?”
“No!”
“Did you accidentally get abducted by aliens?”
“I don’t know!”
Mabel gasped.
“THAT’S WAY MORE EXCITING.”
Dipper hurried past her and into the attic.
“Wait, wait, wait.”
He grabbed Journal 3.
The book was open.
Dipper froze.
There was writing on the page.
His handwriting.
His stomach dropped.
He flipped backward.
More notes.
Pages and pages of them.
He hadn’t written any of this.
At least, he didn’t remember writing any of it.
Mabel leaned over his shoulder.
“Whoa.”
Dipper’s eyes moved across the first page.
11:47 PM — Strange footprints behind the Shack.
He turned the page.
12:13 AM — Not animal tracks.
Another.
1:02 AM — Creature may be nesting somewhere north of the property.
Another.
2:46 AM — It knows I’m looking for it.
Dipper’s blood ran cold.
And then he reached the final page.
There was only one sentence.
If I forget this, follow the footprints.
Dipper slowly closed the journal.
Mabel’s expression had changed.
“Okay,” she said quietly. “That’s creepy.”
“I didn’t write these.”
“You definitely did.”
“I don’t remember writing them!”
“Maybe you were sleep-writing.”
“That’s not a thing.”
“You’re the paranormal expert.”
Dipper opened his mouth.
Closed it.
“That’s… annoyingly fair.”
A loud voice came from downstairs.
“HEY! KIDS! BREAKFAST!”
Stan.
Dipper grabbed the journal.
“We’re telling Grunkle Stan.”
⸻
Ten minutes later, the kitchen table had become an impromptu investigation headquarters.
Stan stared at the journal.
Ford adjusted his glasses.
Mabel ate cereal directly from the box.
“So,” Stan said, “let me get this straight. You don’t remember writing all this?”
“No.”
“But it’s your handwriting?”
“Yes.”
“And the notes say there’s some kind of mystery creature living in the woods?”
“Yes.”
Stan nodded.
“Cool.”
Ford looked at him.
“That’s your response?”
“Yeah.”
“You aren’t concerned?”
“Kid’s been in this town for months. If something’s living in the woods, it probably owes us rent.”
Ford ignored him.
He examined the journal carefully.
“Dipper, these entries are genuine.”
“I know.”
“But there’s something strange.”
“What?”
Ford pointed to the ink.
“It’s fresh.”
Dipper frowned.
“How fresh?”
“Within the last twenty-four hours.”
The room went silent.
Mabel slowly lowered her cereal box.
“So… you wrote them yesterday.”
Dipper swallowed.
“But I don’t remember yesterday.”
Stan leaned back.
“Well, that’s bad.”
“Thank you for your insight, Stan.”
“You’re welcome.”
Ford stood.
“Show me where you found the first clue.”
⸻
The footprints began behind the Mystery Shack.
They were difficult to see at first.
Small.
Uneven.
Barely visible in the dirt.
Dipper crouched down.
“These don’t match any animal in Journal 3.”
Ford examined them.
“Nor any creature I’ve encountered.”
Mabel leaned down beside them.
“They kind of look like triangle feet.”
Dipper stared at her.
“Mabel.”
“What?”
“That’s not a thing.”
“You’re right.”
She nodded seriously.
“Triangle feet would be ridiculous.”
They followed the tracks into the forest.
The deeper they went, the more familiar everything became.
A broken branch.
A rock with a strange marking.
A tree with three lines carved into its bark.
Dipper recognized every one.
“I saw this yesterday.”
Ford looked at him.
“You remember?”
“No.”
Dipper touched the marking.
“I don’t remember seeing it. But I know I did.”
They continued.
Then Dipper stopped.
There was a piece of red string tied around a branch.
He recognized it.
“That’s mine.”
Mabel’s eyes widened.
“You’re leaving yourself breadcrumbs?”
“I guess.”
“That’s adorable.”
“This is not adorable.”
“Little paranormal Hansel and Gretel.”
“Mabel.”
“Sorry.”
They pushed through a wall of bushes.
And found the clearing.
A small makeshift camp sat beneath the trees.
There was a battered tent.
A fire pit.
Several books stacked on a crate.
A collection of strange objects arranged around the campsite.
And sitting beside the fire was a man.
He looked exhausted.
His blond hair was messy.
His clothes were dirty.
His face was pale.
And his expression went from surprise—
to annoyance—
the second he saw them.
“Oh.”
Dipper stopped breathing.
Ford went rigid.
Mabel’s jaw dropped.
Stan immediately grabbed his shotgun.
The man sighed.
“Really?”
Ford’s voice was barely above a whisper.
“Bill.”
The stranger smiled.
It wasn’t a friendly smile.
It was the old smile.
The smile that made Dipper’s stomach twist.
“Hey, Sixer.”
Ford raised the gun.
“Get away from my family.”
Bill lifted both hands.
“Okay, okay! No need for the dramatic entrance.”
“You’re Bill Cipher.”
“Technically.”
“What does that mean?” Dipper demanded.
Bill looked down at himself.
“Well, obviously, I’m currently working with a reduced feature set.”
Mabel blinked.
“You’re human.”
“Don’t say it like it’s a disease.”
“It is kind of funny.”
“It’s horrifying.”
Dipper stared at him.
Bill looked different.
Not just because he had a human body.
He looked tired.
Genuinely tired.
There was no glowing eye.
No floating.
No impossible grin.
Just a very exhausted-looking man sitting beside a dying campfire.
Ford stepped closer.
“What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“Honestly? No.”
Stan cocked the shotgun.
“Start talking, Triangle.”
Bill grimaced.
“Everyone keeps calling me that.”
Mabel smiled.
“Triangle.”
“Stop.”
“Triangle.”
“I said stop.”
“Triangle.”
“Fine.”
Bill looked toward Dipper.
“Ask him.”
Dipper frowned.
“Ask me what?”
Bill gestured toward the journal.
“You’ve been investigating me.”
“I’ve been investigating the creature you were investigating.”
“Same difference.”
“You left those clues for me.”
Bill’s expression changed.
For just a moment, he looked embarrassed.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
Bill looked away.
“Because you’re annoying.”
Dipper narrowed his eyes.
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“I figured you’d investigate instead of immediately trying to kill me.”
Ford’s eyes narrowed.
“You were watching him?”
“I was watching all of you.”
Ford’s hand tightened around the gun.
Bill sighed.
“Look, I haven’t exactly had a great week.”
“Good,” Ford said.
Bill rolled his eyes.
“Thank you for your emotional support.”
Dipper stepped forward.
“What happened to you?”
Bill stared at the fire.
“I lost my powers.”
Nobody spoke.
“What?”
“I lost them.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
Ford looked suspicious.
“You don’t know?”
“I was trying to get them back.”
Bill pointed toward the scattered books.
“Apparently, that didn’t go well.”
Dipper crouched beside the books.
He recognized some of the symbols.
“You were trying to reconstruct the interdimensional equation.”
“Yes.”
“Using human materials.”
“Yes.”
“Without your powers.”
“Yes.”
Dipper looked up.
“That’s incredibly stupid.”
Bill smiled.
“There he is.”
Ford glared.
Bill shrugged.
“I was desperate.”
That silenced them.
Mabel looked at him carefully.
“You’re scared.”
Bill’s smile vanished.
“No.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
“Bill.”
“I said I’m not.”
Mabel sat beside him.
Bill stared at her like she’d just committed an act of unspeakable violence.
She smiled.
“You don’t have to lie.”
For once, Bill didn’t have a joke.
He looked down at his hands.
“When you’re me,” he said quietly, “there’s always something you can do.”
Dipper listened.
“You can change things. Make things happen. Make people do what you want.”
His fingers curled into fists.
“And now…”
He looked around the clearing.
“Nothing.”
Mabel’s expression softened.
Bill swallowed.
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to be without that.”
Dipper understood that feeling more than he wanted to.
Not the part about conquering dimensions.
The other part.
The fear that maybe if you stopped being good at the thing everyone expected you to be good at, there wouldn’t be anything left.
“You don’t have to figure it out all at once,” Dipper said.
Bill looked at him.
“Are you giving me life advice now?”
Dipper sighed.
“Apparently.”
Bill stared at him.
Then, unexpectedly, he laughed.
It was quiet.
Almost genuine.
Ford watched the exchange with deep suspicion.
“Don’t mistake this for trust,” he said.
Bill looked at him.
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
⸻
They searched the campsite.
Dipper compared the notes in Bill’s books with his own journal.
Something wasn’t adding up.
The footprints.
The clues.
The missing day.
Bill’s experiments.
They were all connected.
“Dipper,” Ford said.
Dipper looked over.
Ford was holding one of Bill’s notebooks.
“This entry is dated yesterday.”
Dipper read it.
His eyes widened.
“That’s the same time I started writing my notes.”
Ford nodded.
Bill looked confused.
“What?”
Dipper flipped through the pages.
“You weren’t investigating the creature yesterday.”
“I was.”
“No.”
Dipper pointed to the notebook.
“You were investigating how to restore your powers.”
Bill frowned.
“Yes.”
“And then?”
“I don’t remember.”
Dipper stared at him.
Then at his own journal.
Then back at Bill.
“The missing day.”
Bill’s expression changed.
“What about it?”
“It wasn’t mine.”
Silence.
Mabel’s eyes widened.
“Wait.”
Stan lowered his shotgun.
“You mean—”
Dipper nodded.
“Bill lost the day.”
Bill stared at him.
“No.”
“You did.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“You don’t remember yesterday.”
“Neither did you!”
“Exactly.”
Bill looked horrified.
Dipper quickly explained.
“The experiment must have gone wrong. You erased your own memory.”
Ford’s expression darkened.
“And while he was suffering from the memory loss, he apparently spent the day investigating the creature.”
Dipper shook his head.
“No.”
Everyone looked at him.
“The creature wasn’t real.”
Bill blinked.
“What?”
Dipper held up the journal.
“The clues were all about you.”
Bill stared.
Dipper continued.
“You weren’t leaving clues for me because you were investigating something.”
He pointed toward the forest.
“You were leaving clues so someone would find you.”
Bill went silent.
Mabel’s eyes widened.
“You wanted us to find you.”
Bill looked away.
“…Maybe.”
Stan snorted.
“So all this time, you were basically sending out a supernatural distress signal?”
“I prefer ‘strategic information dissemination.’”
“Distress signal,” Mabel said.
“Shut up.”
Dipper smiled slightly.
“And the day you forgot?”
Bill looked at him.
“You spent it helping people.”
Bill’s face went blank.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
Dipper began reading from the notes.
“You fixed the water pump at the ranger station.”
Bill’s eye twitched.
“You helped a kid find his dog.”
“Impossible.”
“You scared off a creature that was attacking some campers.”
“That one sounds more like me.”
“You repaired the vending machine at the gas station.”
Bill looked personally offended.
“I would never.”
Mabel grinned.
“You did.”
Bill buried his face in his hands.
“Oh, this is humiliating.”
“And,” Dipper continued, “you helped Grunkle Stan carry a box of supplies.”
Stan blinked.
“I knew that guy looked familiar.”
Bill groaned.
Mabel suddenly gasped.
“I have the perfect name.”
Bill looked up.
“No.”
“Helpful Triangle!”
“Absolutely not.”
“Helpful Triangle!”
“I have destroyed entire civilizations.”
“Helpful Triangle!”
“I am a terrifying interdimensional being!”
“Helpful Triangle!”
Bill pointed at her.
“I hate you.”
Mabel beamed.
“I knew we’d get along.”
Ford sighed.
“This is ridiculous.”
Dipper looked at him.
“Grunkle Ford?”
Ford looked toward Bill.
He remained suspicious.
Very suspicious.
But after a moment, he lowered his weapon.
“Helping people isn’t exactly the worst thing you could be doing.”
Bill stared at him.
“Was that a compliment?”
“No.”
“Because it sounded dangerously close to one.”
“It wasn’t.”
Bill smiled.
“Sure, Sixer.”
Ford’s eye twitched.
⸻
That evening, they returned to the Mystery Shack.
Bill stayed in the woods.
Nobody trusted him enough to let him sleep inside.
Mabel had offered him a glitter-covered sleeping bag.
Bill had declined.
Dipper was sitting on the porch when he remembered something.
He went back upstairs.
Journal 3 was still open.
He turned to the last page.
There was another note.
One he hadn’t noticed before.
The handwriting was unmistakably Bill’s.
Dipper read it.
Maybe being human isn’t as terrible as I thought.
He stared at the sentence.
For once, there was no joke underneath it.
No threat.
No cryptic message.
Just the words.
Dipper carefully tore the page from the journal.
He folded it and slipped it into his pocket.
Then he closed the journal.
He wasn’t going to show Bill.
Not yet.
Maybe some mysteries weren’t meant to be solved all at once.
Outside, Mabel shouted from the porch.
“DIPPER! COME SEE WHAT I MADE!”
Dipper stood.
“What?”
Mabel held up a large cardboard sign.
It had a badly drawn yellow triangle wearing a cape.
Across the top, in enormous glitter letters, were the words:
HELPFUL TRIANGLE
Dipper burst out laughing.
From somewhere deep in the forest came an angry voice.
“I CAN STILL HEAR YOU!”
Mabel shouted back.
“GOODNIGHT, HELPFUL TRIANGLE!”
“I’M GOING TO BECOME POWERFUL AGAIN JUST SO I CAN ERASE THAT SIGN!”
Dipper smiled.
For the first time all day, everything felt normal.
Well.
Normal for Gravity Falls.