Dipper POV
So I did and it didn't take us long before we came across it. What I remembered to be a small compartment in the base of the tree was replaced with the door to the lab, without the vending machine it was just a metal slab with large bolts and a green keypad. The bark above the door was scared with the simple phrase 'The Lab'. There was so much it didn't say, so much it should.
Bill, for his part, had followed without commenting on the passing doors and he now stood behind me still withholding any comments he might have.
"Ok." I sighed. "Ok." Again I tried to reach for the handle, unsure if I would have to put in the code or not, but my arm didn't budge. "Bill." His name tumbled from my lips and I turned quickly away from the door, stepping away from it and towards him.
"Yes?"
"I need to tell you something first." fisting my hand into my hip to steel myself. This was ridiculous, he likes pain even finds it hilarious but I can't have him laughing at this. "This is not a pleasant memory for me ok? I've been actively avoiding it since it happened." That openness met me again, his whole body leaning into what I had to say. "Shit... happens to me in there and I think we might be walking right into the middle of it. Just- please don't laugh at it, or say anything, or anything you might want to do. I need you to, to just watch ok."
His eyes skimmed the door over my shoulder, "What happens down there?"
"I don't like to talk about it, and I'd rather not once we're done ok. Just in and out for the spell."
"Pinetree, if it's that strong of a memory, the door won't reopen to us till it plays to it's completion. If you haven't dealt with it, you will relive it, especially if it was traumatizing. You human brains are funny that way." He spoke slowly, as if cornering a wild animal with no sense of humor in his tone.
My heart skipped and panic hissed in my lungs. "Fine. It's fine." It had to be, for the sake of my own health, "I just don't want to talk about it when we're done here."
He looked spectacle for a moment but ultimately shrugged, "Once we get that spell you will never have to feel that way again. I will personally make sure of that."
Bill took my hand again, this time softer, lacing his fingers in mine. If alarms weren't already blaring this would have sent off several I'm sure. I stared down at them, joined together. Even as he tugged me towards the door and opened it himself, I kept my eyes lowered and my attention focused on his hand in mine as we made our way down the narrow stairs.
The dimly lit space was empty, everything covered in a thin layer of dust despite being cleaned regularly. Ford's computer and writings littered the large desk space, trinkets and small projects pushed to the edge or gathered around on the floor all in different stages of completion, the walls covered in machines making the whole thing run. The space gave me the creeps which had come as a shock after being so excited to come down here the first time. Bill gilded us closer to the desk, looking around till he found the three journals neatly tucked on a shelf below the table top. He pulled them out one by one with his free hand.
"Help me." He pushed the third journal my way, I watched as he flipped open the first. Numbly following his lead I flipped through some of the pages. I quickly closed it though, putting it to the side to reach instead for the second journal, out of all of them the third journal is the one I spent a full summer studying and I already know it doesn't say anything about the weirdness field around the town. It'd also become too nausea-inducing to look at my own entries in the second half of the journal, the ramblings of a younger more extroverted version of myself.
We worked carefully through our respective journals, scanning down page after page. Ford had a knack for little sketches and I was hoping he would have drawn some sort of rendition of the field alongside his notes of it. That was, till the door creaked open slowly at the top of the stairs. I tensed, tightening my grip on Bill's hand. He looked over at me, then turned to look up the stairs. We both watched as a 15 year old version of myself came creeping down. A wild animalistic look in his-my eyes. He-I looked worse than I remembered, gaunt and clearly exhausted with dark circles under his eyes, brown hair grown out to an uncomfortable length sticking to his forehead from attempts to push it away from his face. I tugged Bill to the side as the younger me joined us, jittery, at the desk.
"After I came back Ford set new ground rules." I felt compelled to explain, watching Bill watch this pathetic version of myself, "I wasn't allowed in his lab and he took all the journals. I wasn't allowed to read them anymore. I couldn't do much of anything." Bill reached for the second journal just as my younger self started flipping desperately though the third journal. "I was having such bad bouts of night terrors and insomnia, and I remembered he kept remedy spells for things like that, but when I asked him for them he gave me something else. I don't know what it was but it made everything this so much worse. Night terrors shifted into sleep paralysis and I started to hallucinate, the episodes of insomnia would last for days to even weeks. I came down here just looking for some relief." My attention glued itself to Bill, it was easier than watching this wrecked part of myself. Bill was careful to not stand too close to him, watching out of the corner of his eye as he searched the journal and listened to me.
He stopped, on a page I'd not been able to read before. "I can't read this but it's definitely about the weirdness field." Bill turned the book towards me, pushing it a little so I wouldn't have to come closer, his face turned down in frustration.
"I can, I just would have to decode all of Ford's inscriptions." My heart was racing, making my voice shake a bit. Ford, he'd be here soon.
Bill checked me, his hand gave mine a squeeze, "Alright, we take this with us." He ripped out the page, along with the three ahead of it and past it just in case. At the same time the door broke open again this time with a bang that made both me and my younger self jump, shaking my nerves with overwhelming fear.
Bill POV
Dipper's hand ripped from mine, nails scraping across my skin with a sharp sting. He practically took flight, slamming himself into the far wall. I turned to more movement on my other side, the memory version of Dipper hurriedly closed the journal in front of him. He reached out and snapped shut the journal I had, sweeping all three off the table to shove them back into the shelf. Both of them shared the same look of horror but Dipper's eyes held an extra dose of fear fed by anticipation.
Ford reached the bottom of the stairs in a stumble, "Dipper." He growled, eyes shadowed behind gray hair and those black rimmed glasses, stubbled jaw clenched in rage and concentration. "The fuck are you doing down here."
The memory of Dipper flinched hard, digging his hip into the desk, curling in on himself. He was frail and a thin shadow of the man standing behind me watching it all play out once again. "Bill." He hissed, low and pained, horribly knowledgeably, he'd wrapped his arms around his stomach holding tight like he might split in two.
The memory of Ford came further into the room, causing a whimper to escape both Dipper's. Ford planted his feet right in front of me, staring past me at the shifted papers on the desk. Side stepping out of the path of the memory I kept my eyes on it. Sixer had always been an oddball about his things but I've never seen him quiet like this, nor had I seen Dipper like this before. This version of him was a weak and feral creature desperate for an end, for relief. The real Dipper was nothing like this, he'd grown to be composed and cautious with a fire in his eyes I knew from years before, I didn't realize it had ever been put out. My attention returned to the man who doused it.
"I thought we already discussed this." He snarled.
"I know, I know, but Grunkle Ford I need help. Please help me." The memory of Dipper whined, ringing his hands between them.
"Pinetree," I started but wasn't really sure what else to say. This isn't what I was expecting to find down here.
"I'm sorry but I told you- I should have-" Dipper behind me started to speak over his memory counterpart, who was stuttering over an explanation of his inability to sleep. They both feel silence as Sixer cuts them off.
"Shut up! I told you don't belong down here! Did I not make myself clear!"
Stepping back further, I turned away from the scene in favor of talking to the real Dipper, "You don't have to explain this to me." his hands were grasped together in a feeble attempt to stop from shaking and his eyes were trained on his shoes moments away from squeezing shut all together. Yet, he stood strong. With his shoulders pinned back against the wall, his back was straight and his feet firmly planted with the only hints of panic or fear visible in his face and hands. I nodded to myself, no matter what happens in this memory Dipper was exactly who I thought he was. Satisfied, I looked back at the other two figures in the room, resolved to just watch as the memory played out and let Dipper handle it as he already was.
A few steps away Ford had gotten much closer to the younger Dipper, towering over him with a sneer that caused Dipper's legs to shake and forced him to lean all of his body weight on the desk. His eyes shooting around the old man for an escape as he tried and failed to leave. Ford's arm reeled back, high above his head, his hand came down in the same motion with a loud snap across Dipper's cheek. The sound of skin hitting skin was met with nails digging hard into my arms. Dipper pulled me off balance, and if I was capable of tripping I would have, I caught myself before falling on top of him. "Dipper." His name came in a whisper even though the tone of my voice wouldn't affect our surroundings. He pressed himself into my back, ducking his head into my shoulder, hands still firmly holding my arms.
"Please don't move." He breathed. The memory of him stumbled hard, unable to catch himself before falling to the ground with a cry of pain. "This was the first time he- and it was the worst."
"I'm not going anywhere." Was all I could respond with. Dipper was the one pressed between a wall and a dream demon and yet I was the one that felt stuck. So I didn't move, instead I watched the memory and listened to Dipper's breathing, paying more attention to the flex of his grip.
Ford has always been quick to anger, something I'd taken great advantage of and enjoyment out of in the year I knew him, but now this anger was different and it was not funny. He used his weight and height against the younger version of Dipper, every curse, growl, hiss of pain, or cry caused the real Dipper to flinch. He'd buried his face in the center of my back, his breath hitched or gasped with every time Ford would hit his younger self. His hands had crept and jumped till they landed on my shoulders digging into my jacket and the skin, releasing small stings of pain to burn under my skin.
The memory stretched on, Dipper was a shaken mess against me having given in to sobs that ranked him and leaning his whole body weight against me. Ahead of me Ford was running out of steam and under his foot the memory of Dipper lay in a heap barely protecting his head under his arm. His skin already turning bruised in shades of red and blue, splits of over abused skin starting to bleed, his cries became soft whimpers once his strength left him. Ford stooped, clawing Dipper up, forcibly placing him on his feet with one hard shake. Dipper behind me choked back tears, forcing his breath to even out.
"Don't ever cross me again." Ford's voice was strained and forced against what I could only assume was old age and too many beers, but the threat still landed. "Get out."
The memory came to an end as the younger Dipper dragged his limping form with pained gasps up the steep staircase. Dipper's memoryscape shifted, truly drawing the memory to its end, and we found ourselves standing back in the open forest space. We stood still, wordlessly as Dipper regained himself, still clinging to my back. I waited with him for as long as he needed.
He'd worried before that I'd laugh. I didn't find anything about that funny, this pain was void of humor. This moment of violent enactment of pain carved a hole in my chest, every moment of it, every sensation from it, and every moment after, ignited seething vengeful hateful fire.
Nothing about this was funny.
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I know cannonly Ford gets character growth and builds a healthy happy relationship with Dipper as they bond, but I find it so interesting to go down the other path. I think it's not to far of a stretch from what we know of his childhood and growing up with Stan to assume that he would be bad with kids and abusive at his most extremes. I also reread the published 3rd journal before/while writing these chapters and I think it only adds to my characterization of him being way to over protective of his work and shutting Dipper out completely if he questioned Ford perspective.