Dipper POV
"Where is he?" I asked again. Eliza had just given me a distant stare in response. "Is he hurt?"
"We don't...we don't have time for this. Come on!" She grabbed my wrist again and tried to yank me farther into the chasm. I pulled away immediately and stood silently. "What are you doing? Come on!"
The ground continued to pound as a huge shadow hovered over me. I turned to see a huge beak attached to a giant bird's head. Teeth perturbed from the sides of the beak.
I faced the beast with balled fists and determination. I raised a hand and muttered a quick latin phrase with a quick wrist flick. A flame blast exploded from my palm, and the beast squawked and backed away from us. My hand was still warm, so I formed a fire whip in my palm. I pulled my arm back and snapped it hard. The tip struck the beast's neck and it screeched in pain. "GET OUTTA HERE!" I screamed as it began galloping away. I snapped the whip a couple of times for good measures.
After the fire fizzled out, I turned back to Eliza. "Dude...whoa."
"Where is my grandfather?" I asked again.
Eliza was somewhat taken back by my comment. "Look...I know you brought me back, but...I don't... You don't need to see Stephen the way he is. You need to really brace yourself, man."
"Seriously, seeing you was...horrifying. I think...I think that's just because I know you and I really..." I shook my head. "I've never met Stephen. I should be fine," I said firmly. Eliza didn't look convinced, but that's okay: I wasn't too convinced myself. She hugged me tightly.
"We're twelve. This isn't fine and it never will be. We're gonna be scarred for life one way or another. I mean, we're gonna need heavy therapy when this is all over, ya know. I'm just trying to protect you from that. I don't think it can be helped at this point, really." She spoke softly into my ear, and her warmth was comforting. Eliza pulled away from me with a weak smile. "Gee, I wonder how many times we've said that," she chuckled halfheartedly.
I shrugged and kicked a small rock. "Let's not keep Stephen waiting." Eliza nodded and she led me to Stephen, which wouldn't have been so bad if we weren't following her bloody footprints. The idea of how much blood there would be was unnerving.
My only thought was that it wouldn't be as bad as Eliza. The poor girl was ripped open like...I don't even know what. Her eye was pulled from its socket and her intestines were just strung out like party streamers. It was just horrible. Blood coated everything: her clothes, her face, and that nest. The nest had to be the worst of it all; that bird had attacked her and it was saving her for later. I can't even begin to imagine how much pain she was in.
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There was so much blood and he looked so...I don't want to talk about it. The point is, I got him off that rock and I brought him back. He's breathing and he's responding to us, that's all that matters.
After Stephen collected himself, he turned to me with a bright smile. "You must be Dipper." He outstretched his hand to shake mine. "Stephen Esteban Pines," he said happily.
I grabbed his hand firmly and met his brown eyes with mine - a family trait. "Stephen Quincy Pines," I said proudly. "Or Dipper."
"No wonder you're so skilled at handling magic. It's all in the name," he chuckled. He then stretched out his arms for a hug. "C'mere." I took that instantly. "C'mon Eliza, get in here." And just like that, we ended up in a group hug that made me cry a little. I never thought I'd meet my grandfather.
I wish Grandma Pines had told us about him before. I understand why she didn't, I guess. Why would she want to think about her husband? The husband she loved and stood by faithfully? Having to think about what she had lost so long ago would have been dreadful. It does bother me now that I think about it; each time Mabel and I asked her about him, we were just bringing up old memories - we were just causing her pain.
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We walked for quite some time afterwards. I offered to teleport us to the top of the ridge I had come from, but Stephen passed (and it now occurs to me that he probably could have been doing that himself). He wanted to talk to me for a while.
Apparently, it was nearing night, so when it got too cold (or dark?) we would just zap off to the ridge. It didn't seem too dark but it was definitely chilly. Upon a unanimous vote, I summoned a fire ball to float with us for warmth and guidance.
I was telling Stephen - or should I call him Stanley? - about everything I could. I told him about the gnomes, the manotaurs, the multi-bear, the ghosts in Dusk-2-Dawn, the Rumble McSkirmish incident, the bottomless pit, the eighth-and-a-half president, and the Gobblewonker McGucket made.
"Fiddleford... How is he?" Stephen asked.
"He's sort of gone, if you know what I mean. He lives in the junkyard and just sort of wanders around the town. He's been deemed the local kook."
"Poor guy. All he wanted to do was explore the unexplained. He never asked for that. Ford definitely doesn't deserve it either," he remarked quietly. He rubbed his chin and gripped a familiar medallion that hung around his neck. "How's Stanford?" That was Grunkle Stan's necklace. How'd he get that?
"Uhh, well." I scratched the back of my neck. "He's sort of dealing with Bill right now with my sister and Soos, the Mystery Shack's handyman."
Stephen shook his head with a defeated grumble and tucked the necklace into his shirt."Great. Wait, the 'Mystery' what?"
"The Mystery Shack. Grunkle Stan set up a museum with fake displays as a tourist attraction. People aren't that bright, so it gets a lot of business," I explained.
Stephen sighed. "That was my house. Oh, Stanford. Great, okay, great." He paused for a moment and stopping walking. "Wait a second, is my old lab still under the house." I nodded. "So you got here through the portal, then? Where-where did you enter at?" Stephen seemed hopeful, but I couldn't keep him that way.
"It doesn't matter. Grunkle Stan never got it to work right. I'm only here because I had to save Mabel and everyone else; I made a deal with Bill. He threw me in here and now he can't touch Stan, Mabel, or Soos." Stephen slapped his hand to his forehead. I sighed and instinctively reached for the bill of my hat. That was still gone. I minded a glance to Eliza, but she wasn't wearing it anymore. All she had was her cat-ear headband. "I did give Mabel something to get here, though."
Stephen raised an eyebrow and Eliza gave me a look of disbelief with a scrunched brow. I couldn't blame them, though. I don't quite believe myself.
"While I was negotiating with Bill, I put the President's key on the ground next to a '13' I wrote in the dirt. Then I gave her this poetic rundown of what to do with it -"
"You're poetic?" Eliza interrupted with a grin.
"Yeah, I'm the president of the poetry club at school." She giggled but I don't think it was supposed to be in a mocking way. It was cute...like she thought it was cute.
"Dipper, could you please continue?" Stephen asked a little impatiently.
"Right, right. Uh, so, I kind of told her to find Door 13 on 13 Main Street. According to the Journal, it's got powerful dark energy, so I figured that Stan or Soos would be able to use that energy to power the portal up and get us out of here. Mabel definitely picked up what I said, I guarantee it. I always run my poems by her, so that couldn't have been any different," I explained. There was a sense of victory building up inside me.
"That's great Dipper, but you do realize those are cursed doors, right? They're not exactly cooperative." And that was when the victory died.
"So...if Mabel opens one of those doors...?" I thought aloud.
"Who knows what'll happen. Fiddleford and I experienced some crazy things whenever we approached those doors. We only ever opened one and that didn't end too well: a nearby raccoon mutated into a horrid shadow beast and we had to...contain it. It's a shame we couldn't stop it before it took out the mall. Did they rebuild that?" Eliza nodded in response.
"Oh, great," I muttered under my breath. "I've led my sister and the rest of my family to their doom. No wonder Bill agreed to that deal." He wouldn't lay a finger on them, he wouldn't need to.
Stephen laid a hand on my shoulder and gave me a sympathetic smile. "Let's just hope Mabel doesn't figure any of that poem of yours out. Now, it's pretty nasty out here, huh. Would you mind using a teleportation spell?" I nodded proudly and whipped out the spell book from my vest.
"Alright, everyone brace themselves." I rose up my hand, unintentionally dissipating the fire ball, and carefully pronounced the spell. "Zippous zappous duneres jedestin!" I wasn't about to mess that up in front of Stephen and Eliza.
A tornado of dirt encased us, lifting us into the air. Eliza immediately went into a panic and I could sense Stephen was uneasy. All I can say is that that didn't do that the first time I used the spell. The dirt flew us across the sky until our feet touched solid ground. When the dirt dispersed, I actually found myself only on semisolid ground. The spell stuck me a little too close to the edge of the cliff.
I went to put pressure on my heels and the ground broke beneath me. I fell back, my arms windmilling for balance. I screamed and reached for something to hold onto but, of course, you can't hold onto air.