#rev!robbie

Dipper was still worried about the missing journal, but had yet to drum up enough courage to tell Mabel about it. He wished he could still read Great Uncle Ford’s mind. But Great Uncle Ford did not yet ask for the journal back. And Dipper kept looking for it. He just hadn’t found it yet, and he wasn’t sure how much time he had left until he was found out. Or how much trouble he would be in if he didn’t find it in time. He knew he’d be in trouble.... But what kind of trouble, he wasn’t sure.

Grunkle Stan’s thoughts and flashes of memories when Great Uncle Ford would get angry made Dipper very afraid to find out.

He hadn’t told Grunkle Stan, though, either, and he definitely hadn’t told Great Uncle Ford.

That didn’t mean that the fact that he was a bundle of nerves was lost on anyone in the family, however.

Mabel had an idea on how to get him to loosen up a bit.

Which was how Dipper and Mabel were in the back of Thompson’s car, on their way to do teenager stuff with Robbie, Tambry, Wendy, Nate, Lee, and Thompson. They were in the very back while everyone but Wendy and Thompson were in the rows between them and the front seats. Wendy sat up front with Thompson.

Dipper couldn’t control the fact that Wendy’s thoughts were slipping into his mind. He was too nervous to use the skills that Bill had been teaching him.

What are they even doing here, what are they up to, how could Robbie even invite them, you can’t trust those twins, not at all, this is gonna suck, it’s bad enough I have to watch Robbie and Tambry kiss, ew.

“Are you sure it’s a good idea to bring the Telepathy Twins along?” Nate asked, sweating a little nervously. What if something goes wrong, what if they get hurt, what if their scary uncles use voodoo or something to punish us?

Nate and Lee were honestly having so similar thoughts that Dipper couldn’t really tell the two apart. It just sounded like it was two people thinking the same thing over and over.

“Grunkle Stan and Great Uncle Ford don’t know voodoo,” Dipper said. He meant to comfort the teenager.

It just made both Nate and Lee jump and look over at him. Dipper frowned.

From hearing their thoughts, he knew they thought he was being grumpy, but that was just his uncomfortable face. He was just uncomfortable. Why couldn’t anyone read his expression properly aside from Mabel? And sometimes Grunkle Stan?

Wendy gave him a very dark look from over the car seat shoulder, and Dipper ducked his head to avoid looking at it or making eye contact with her.

He could hear her thoughts too loudly if he made eye contact. He didn’t want to hear how badly she thought of him and his sister that loudly.

“Hey, chill out, guys. You are always thinking someone’s got some weird voodoo magic thing goin’ on and getting freaked out, he probably heard you guys talking about it when we were all in the shop once. Don’t freak out, we’re all supposed to be having fun,” Robbie said.

Robbie looked over at Dipper and Mabel. Mabel nudged Dipper, and Dipper looked up and made eye contact with Robbie.

I know my friends are sometimes jerks, but they’ll come around and see how precious these kids are and not be afraid of them anymore, and we’re gonna have a lot of fun at the abandoned convenience store tonight and it’s gonna be awesome.

Dipper smiled at Robbie, thankful for the comfort.

They arrived at the Dusk Til Dawn store. It had been abandoned for years. Dipper and Mabel weren’t sure when. But it was fenced off, and the store was probably locked from the inside. The lights were all off, and it looked rather foreboding.

“How’re we gonna get in?” Lee asked.

Thompson climbed the fence, then landed on the other side. “Climb - the - fence! Climb - the - fence!”

Dipper could hear his secret insecurities, the reasons why Thompson forcefully threw himself into danger and was the almost-out-of-control leader of the teenager group. Thompson was afraid to be seen as weak, afraid of losing his friend group if they thought he was frail, wimpy, a loser.

Wendy was the next one over, her mind blank and focused as she climbed the fence. Robbie, Tambry, Nate, and Lee went one right after the other, Tambry talking all the way about all sorts of things.

Dipper and Mabel honestly didn’t have to read her mind; she honestly spoke literally every word that popped into her head, no matter how vapid, vain, or rude it was. It was actually rather refreshing and amusing. It didn’t annoy Dipper at all, since he couldn’t control his mind reading really as it was. It was a little overwhelming right now, but it meant that when Tambry wasn’t talking, there was nothing to overhear from her thoughts. Quiet with Tambry was pure silence.

“Hey dorks, what’s the hold-up?” Wendy sneered, crossing her arms. Dipper and Mabel had yet to climb over the fence.

“We can’t rip our clothes,” Dipper said. “Great Uncle Ford would be angry.”

“We’ll just have to levitate, Big Dipper,” Mabel said.

She activated her amulet, and he felt Mabel’s powers lifting him up into the air. He smiled a little at her as she did so. She was always looking out for him.

The teenagers stared in awe as they landed on the other side of the fence without having to climb the fence at all.

Wendy scoffed and turned and walked towards the store by herself.

The doors proved to be a non-issue. Mabel simply used the amulet to rip it open, almost pulling the doors off their hinges. Wendy was begrudgingly impressed, while the others were openly and very impressed.

Dipper could hear all but Robbie and Tambry started to think suspicions and fears about the amulet’s powers, and that made him start to sweat under his shirt collar.

They stuck around in the store for a few hours. The teenagers were running around and getting into various kinds of trouble. Dipper and Mabel used the amulet’s powers to keep from getting their clothes dirty. Eventually Mabel found the Smile Dip.

Dipper smiled as her face burst into a giant grin as she grabbed it.

“I thought these were banned in America!”

“Was there a reason for banning them?”

Mabel didn’t answer his question. She immediately dumped an open packet of it into her mouth.

After a while of trying to be part of things with Robbie, Dipper went back to Mabel. His brow furrowed when he saw that her eyes were unfocused and that she was drooling.

“Mabel?” he said softly, walking over to her and kneeling beside her.

She was unresponsive, but maybe it was because he wasn’t speaking loud enough.

“Mabel, are you okay?”

Dipper reached out to her and shook her gently, but she still didn’t respond.

For a moment, he was frozen, mind unable to do anything but absorb what was happening around him: Mabel unresponsive and the teenagers’ thoughts and voices echoing through the convenient store and the smells of Smile Dip and soda and open chip bags and candy and the suspicious feeling that they were being watched.

“R-Robbie!” Dipper shouted, getting up and hurrying to grab Robbie.

Robbie and the others were daring Nate and Lee to do something - Dipper didn’t bother to focus on what it was.

“Robbie!”

Robbie turned around and looked at Dipper.

“What’s up, little man?”

“Something wrong with Ma - Shooting Star!”

Robbie’s expression changed to one of worry, but before they could move to go look at her together, Nate shouted something about not being a chicken and lay down on the ground. Dipper only saw the chalk outlines for a moment before a weird glowing happened.

Dipper’s brain couldn’t keep up with what happened next. On top of the whirlwind of thoughts and the screaming and the worry about Mabel, he couldn’t keep up with what was happening.

But he could see the ghosts, and he saw them possessing Mabel, he saw Mabel in danger, and his eyes glowed green with the power of the amulet.

Dipper vaguely remembered screaming at them to leave his sister alone. He could only remember screaming.

His own body was shaking from exertion and mental exhaustion - why did he feel so cold now? - when the power of his amulet died down, and the store was a wreck.

The roof was gone, the windows were shattered, and everything was lost in the wind if it wasn’t somehow too heavy to be lifted up into the air.

Mabel groaned in pain, and Dipper stumbled towards her.

“Mabel?”

Mabel opened her eyes, and she looked at him.

“What happened, Dipper?”

Dipper hugged her close to him, and he refused to let go.

It was a few moments after he embraced her that he stiffened. He could hear Robbie’s, Wendy’s, everyone’s thoughts now. Tambry, of course, said hers aloud.

“What kind of freakshow are you two?”

Mabel had enough strength to glare at them from her spot in Dipper’s arms. She was facing them, she could do that. Dipper just held onto Mabel tighter.

He could hear Robbie’s thoughts. He . . . he was afraid of him.

He had scared Robbie.

“I wanna go home,” Dipper said, his voice wavering.

Mabel let go of him so she could get to her feet, and she lifted Dipper up off the ground.

“I’ll call Grunkle Stan. We’ll wait for him outside.”

Mabel held him in a one-arm embrace the entire time they waited for Grunkle Stan, who came barreling down the road, stopped long enough to park, then bolted out of the car to run to them and take them into his own arms.

Dipper started to cry at this point, talking about ghosts and Mabel going catatonic on Smile Dip and Robbie hating him.

Dipper was crying too hard to hear Robbie at all. But Stan saw Robbie walk closer, trying to reach out to them before he and the others left.

“Mr. Pines -”

But Stan’s glare stopped Robbie. He didn’t say anything else, he didn’t move closer. Didn’t try to explain.

Ford Pines was the creepiest one in the family, but Robbie had never been more frightened by a single look before.

“Don’t come into work tomorrow, Robbie,” Stan said.

Robbie could only watch as Stan picked Dipper up and took him to the car, as Dipper cried his overwhelmed, twelve-year-old heart out, as Mabel glared at him before getting into the car.

He watched them drive away, then returned to Thompson, Wendy, Tambry, Nate, and Lee.