Chapter Text
Mabel was writing in her scrapbook, sitting in the middle of her messy bed of blankets and stuffed animals. Stickers covered the pages, as well as her face, colourful smiley faces littered about. A purple witch hat hung from the backboard post of her bed, her model, as she drew on the paper.
Her day with Grunkle Ford was great, it was sad a bit, but they had smiles on walking home.
While he takes it with grace, Ford was embarrassed by Bill’s strange book thing. From screaming and swearing when finding the book, graphic enough that Stan swore to start a Swear Jar just for him, to a spiral.
Ford, and soon Stan, refused to let them see some of the pages. Once everyone added their last goodbyes to Cipher, and the twins were sent to bed, Stan sat Ford down to talk.
(She remembers sneaking down the stairs, past the tv room, for some water. She couldn’t help it, she had to peek.
Ford’s tired, raw and puffy face. His eyes are dry, but there are tear stains down his cheeks, just staring blankly at where Stan presumably is.
She raced up the stairs, she wasn’t supposed to see that. )
Stan had taken Dipper to some trip across town, Stan said some about gold being buried and just took off. Leaving Ford and Mabel their own devices.
Ford proposed his own agenda to Mabel, setting spells, curses and unicorn hair around Cipher’s statue. She gasped, ran off up stairs and swiftly returned with two purple witch hats.
“Here! Put this on!” She yelled happily, holding out a hat to Ford as she put hers on. Ford dramatically grabbed the hat from her and placed it on his head. “How do I look, my dear?” he asks with a smile, Mabel cheers, “ Just beautiful!”
She jumped out the door, doing ninja poses as she landed, “The ‘Cipher Defence Squad Assistant’ is ready!” He laughs at her antics, grabbing her hand as they walk into the woods.
-
As Mabel was putting the finishing touches of glitter to her scrapbook, a ‘zappy’ sound caught her ear. She stopped and waited.
ZAP
Sounded like it was outside, she crawled on the nightstand between her and her brother’s beds and looked out the triangle window. A flash of pale blue was paired with the zap sound, by the very edge of the woods.
Excited and curious, she jumped out of bed, raced down the stairs and was out the door just as Ford passed the stairs.
She ran across the yard, following the light and sound, to see a surprisingly familiar device.
Time Tape.
It looked broken, a large crack in the side exposed its mechanics. It twitched and glitched, making her nervous. It was spitting blue static, singing the ground.
Just as she had the thought to tell Grunkle Ford about this, a bolt of blue static burst from the gadget, hitting her before she could scream.
-
Ford watched as Mabel sped off towards the shack, declaring to make contributions to her scrapbook. He smiles warmly as he shakes his head, watching Mabel disappear through the door frame.
He takes off the purple witch hat, staring up at the evening sky as he makes his way inside. His outing with Mabel to Cipher’s statue had been… nice. Her funeral speech has left something bittersweet in him, but he truly enjoyed his time with his niece.
The shack is empty aside from Mabel and himself, Stan and Dipper were away and won't be back until noon tomorrow.
Ford walked into the kitchen, Stan had left food in the fridge that Ford just had to heat up. Something about Stan not trusting Ford with cooking because he “conveniently” remembers the numerous kitchen fires Ford caused when they were teens.
Ford claims and insists he’s better now that he’s a grown man and everything, but Stan said no. Ford, while he’ll never say it out loud, was secretly thankful he didn’t have to cook.
With dinner in the microwave, Ford jogged up the stairs to the Twin’s room. With their own respective twin gone, they had the TV room all to themselves. On the walk home, she had talked about all the activities they could do, from nail painting to (maybe) a short game of DD and more D.
He stopped in front of the door, knocking politely.
“Mabel.”
Ford calls for Mabel, no answer.
He knocks on the door again, no response.
“Mabel?”
He opens it, empty aside from Waddles on her bed.
He knocks and checks the bathroom, nothing.
He speeds down the stairs, calling her name in every room. Again, absolutely nothing.
“Mabel!”
Ford feels his heart and nerves start to spike, anxiety worming its way quickly into him.
Ford runs out the Mystery Shack to the backyard, bursting out the door.
“Mabel!” He screeched with panic, voice cracking, frantic worry in every feature.
Where- where could she have gone?! He saw her go into the house!
On his second round of the yard, he spotted a gray square on the ground, blue sparks spitting out of it. His brows furrowed as he got closer, he’s seen one of these before. He pulls out Journal 3, and checks where the Kids wrote. Time Tape.
The tape gave a violent sputter, blue bolts jolting out. A larger bolt shot out and hit a sizable rock near Ford, it vanished instantly.
Ford was not liking the evidence towards his missing niece.
The scientist speedily equips rubber gloves on and pulls a pen from his coat, he spies as well as he can through the cracks. Spotting a mini button, he sticks the pen inside the crack to push it. The sparks died as the machine powers down.
He checks the screen to see when it was set to. 1983.
He pockets the device, races into the house to gather whatever he thinks he’ll need and races out of the shack and down the road to town. He needs to see an old friend.
-
Mable landed in fluffy, cold snow, the warm summer breeze turned into a biting cold. She got up to look around. She’s in the same locations, the Shack is in front of her, but it's like someone had flipped a switch from summer to winter.
She looked at the Shack.
She learned a lot about the Shack recently.
When she is could be a problem.
But it’s cold.
She climbed the stairs to knock. Quiet. She knocked again. The door flew open and then a crossbow was pointed at her. It was out of her face soon though, as a much younger Grunkle Ford looked down at her confused. He looked awful. Frost bitten, his hair was everywhere, his eyes looked tired, and scared.
“...Listen, kid.” He stumbles a little, “You have to go. It’s not safe here.” He starts to close the door, Mable shouted, “Please! I need-”
“I’m truly sorry, but you must leave” the door is almost closed.
“Please, it’s cold.”
He stops just before the door meets the wall.
A long pause.
He opens the door, “I’m afraid it's not much better inside.”