Roses - billdip

Chapter 14

Dipper sat on the stool behind the shops register with his forehead pressed against the wooden counter. He played with the buttons on the register and closed his eyes. It was slow today. Every now and then gravity falls gets super quiet, but it sucked that it had to be on a rainy day such as it way today.
Dipper was bored. He wanted to get out into the woods to get his kind of things. It had been about 2 weeks now since bill left and it was still consuming dippers thoughts. However, it wasn't the only thing he was thinking about; recently ford had begun pestering dipper about the increasing nightmare realm energy. Dipper figured that bill had to be far away from gravity falls by now, so it did concern him, but his hormones were getting the better of his judgement.

Dipper sighed.

"Woah, bro," he heard Mabel near him. He slowly lifted his head to look at Mabel. He sighed again and moved his arms and hands to support his head above the table.

"What?" He asked.

" you look terrible." She laughed.

"Gee, Thanks." Dipper sat up. "What do you need?"

"To trade our shifts. Ford wants you again."
Mabel crossed her arms.

"Again?!" Dipper grunted. "First I didn't get any sleep last night working with him and now he wants me again?!" Dipper stood up aggressively, sliding his feet across the floor as he made his way into the house. He heard Mabel say something but he wasn't all that interested. Instead he was focusing on the next crazy thing that ford wanted dipper to accomplish. Two nights ago he'd made him watch that glowing orb thing without blinking for a good 20 minutes. And only an hour or so before that.. Well it's best not to dwell on negatives.
Dipper made his way down the stairs to ford's lab and saw him tapping away on a computer. Ford's eyes immediately lit up as he saw dipper walk down stairs.

"Dipper! I don't have much time to explain!" He stood up and frantically began to search the area for something. He pulled open drawers and pushed papers and gadgets off the table tops. Finally he opened up a filing cabinet and pulled out some sort of remote type object. It was the shape of a remote, but it had an antenna on the top of it and a screen above the buttons. Ford rushed over and shoved the small device in dippers hand. "Quickly now! Go outside and start wandering towards the west! I started picking up strong waves from that direction! I need to stay here and monitor from my computer!"

"What is this?" Dipper asked, getting a closer look at the gadget.

"It works a little bit like an EMF meter, now go! We don't have much time!" Ford started to push dipper back up to the stairs. "It's already on so just get walking!"

Dipper sighed but he didn't fight back. He made his way back up the stairs and grabbed an umbrella from the holder by the door.

"Where you going bro?" Mabel asked before dipper could step out the door.

Dipper turned to face her, a look of obvious dread in his eyes. "Fords sending me on another one of his crazy missions."

"Oh, well it's raining now but it's suppose to thunder storm in a bit. Come back soon, ok?" Mabel insisted.

"Yeah, sure thing." Dipper smiled at her before turning towards the door. He twisted the golden, rusted nob and headed out into the weather. After opening up his purple umbrella he stepped out into the rain, keeping the gadget ford gave him close to his chest, making sure not to get any rain on it. Dipper looked around, remembering which side of the forest was west, and began to head into the trees. He pushed back soaking bushes and kicked mud off his shoes practically every step, but he kept going as to not receive fords wrath for stopping.

Dipper took the time to read the weird symbols on the buttons of the gadget. None of them were English, or any kind of science term he was used to, so he gave up and examined the screen. It was glowing a pale blue. Other then the color there were no words, pictures, or indicators on the screen. Dipper could help but think it wouldn't have hurt ford to explain the device to him before he went out guiding it through the woods.

Time passed and The rain was pouring down, and dipper was a little afraid of the thunder starting to pop up, but he just kept on walking. He walked and walked all the way up until he reached the edge of a cliff. Unfortunately, he'd reached his limit on going west. He was really far away from the shack now, how long had he walked? 30 minutes now? It didn't really matter he just needed to turn back now, but he didn't really want to. Dipper could feel the rain getting noticeably weaker as time passed, to the point where he could lower his umbrella. His pant legs were soaked, Along with some odd spots here and there.

He looked around himself for a place to sit, then spotted a large rock that had been sheltered from most of the rainfall. He brushed it off and stood a seat, staring out beyond the cliff before his feet. The umbrella rested carefully by his side and the gadget sat in his lap. It was tranquil.

He thought of bill, once more.

Closing his eyes, he remembered their parting, he remembered decorating the shop, waking through the woods together. He remembered bill first appearing that night. How stubborn he'd been to even accept an apple from dipper.

Dipper smiled to himself. They hadn't been together a long time, and before that they were mortal enemies, but he couldn't help but smile. If bill had been human, if only he'd been human... dipper wasn't sure where he was going with this. He shook his head trying to clear his thoughts.

Bill wanted dipper to forget about him, so he would, or at least he'd try. Dipper... didn't want to forget, but he didn't really have much of a choice, did he?
He caught something out of the corner of his eye. The screen on the gadget had changed. Dipper picked up the object and examined the glow. It was now a dark royal blue. Dipper picked it up and turned it a bit, tapping it lightly to see if it was a malfunction. The color of blue only seemed to get darker, nearing the color back.

Suddenly his phone in his pocket began to ring. The buzz made him jump but he quickly regained his composure and pulled it out of his pocket. Ford was calling him.

He answered and held the phone up to his ear, "Hello?"

"Dipper! You need to get out of there! The readings I'm getting are much higher then I expected! You need to-" there was a huge crack of thunder that made Dipper cover his ears from the sound. The sound of pouring rain filled his ears and he could barely hear Ford through the phone.

"I'm sorry grunkle Ford! I can barely hear you over the-" Dipper nearly dropped the phone. He stuck out his shaking hand and realized he was dry. The rain he could hear so clearly right next to him, the thunder cackling above him, nothing was pouring down on him. He stood up slowly and looked back into the forest to see the rain coming down hard behind him. The edge of the cliff was also being nailed by rain.

"Dipper? Dipper!" Dipper could faintly hear Ford calling him.

Dipper couldn't help but he hopeful. "B-bill?" He asked the air, the phone now forgotten by his side, still on a staticky line with Ford.

Dipper looked around his eyes wide and heart pounding. His whole body felt stiff. The race n wasn't hitting him but he felt cold. He couldn't tell if it was his vision or if the world around him was growing darker, but there was a change in the already dark landscape.

"Sorry, not bill, but someone similar," Dipper heard a voice from everywhere around him. His chest tightened.

"W-who are you?" Dipper asked. He glanced down and saw his phone which was freaking out. The screen was glitching with colors and static.

"That's not a question I'm going to answer, human. Instead let me show you."

Dipper could see the world being noticeably blackened, but on top of that he felt his consciousness fading. "Bill-" he managed to whisper our before his eyes shut without his permission.